The Clanger

Review: The Clanger

Category: Animals

Author: Oliver Postgate and Peter Firmin

Rating: 93%

The Clanger is a relatively small, pink hued space rodent closely related to the moon mouse; unlike that species, however, it possesses no true tail. The clanger is found predominantly on a small green planet that is located far from earth; they subsist on a diet of blue-string pudding and a nourishing green soup, which is procured via a symbiotic relationship with a reptilian cohabitant of that planet referred to as a ‘soup dragon’. The ‘small green planet’ population of clangers is the only known colony in existence, and is limited to five individuals. The species takes its name from the dustbin lid it uses to seal its burrow, resulting in a ‘clanging’ noise every time it emerges. They communicate with one another via nuclear magnetic resonance, which is audible to the human ear as a sound closely resembling that of the swanee whistle.

The clangers are a very peaceable race, and seem to be relatively intelligent; I like that about them. Then again, to be honest, I admire any animal which can evolve and survive in the cold vacuum of space. Clangers lead a bloody harsh life, when you think about it: they’re small and cute, and yet instead of being eaten by large reptiles like terrestrial mice, they force said lizards to serve them delicious soup. Whatever it is that’s so appealing about the clanger, clearly the dragon has picked up on it too.

They live far, far away from planet Earth, which is an excellent place to park your planet if you even resemble something edible. Human beings seem to have a curious weakness for enslaving and devouring other species, so the farther away from this danger the minute population of clangers can get the better. After all, they look like little pigs. Not a good sign.

The dustbin lids are an extra precaution, as are the burrows; as far as we know, the little green planet is no colder at night than it is during the day, since it has no atmosphere. Therefore, the clangers just build burrows- since they have no natural predators- in case of emergency. This is incredibly sensible, and probably a good example of why the clanger is still around.

Sadly, the clanger seems to have no natural defence system, unless you count their nuclear magnetic resonance, which could probably cause cancer in cases of repetitive or prolonged exposure. Even if it could, this still wouldn’t be a reliable form of defence; however, I can’t see how you could ever kill one, so there’s not really any way to oppose them.

The Clanger is a true extremophile: able to exist in the vacuum of space, in freezing perpetual night, without air, water, or any food except some blue string. These things are probably more difficult to kill than Terminator, so we should certainly surrender to them our respect, as well as our extreme caution. One day the clangers will find Earth- and on that day, humanity will be forced to whistle a very different tune.

The Angry Bird

Review: The Angry Bird

Category: Animals

Author: Rovio

Rating: 22%

The ‘angry bird’ is a species of flightless bird found in a wide variety of habitats. The group is well-known partly for the huge physiological variation of its subspecies, of which five are well-known: the red, blue, yellow, black and white angry bird. The angry bird is identified as distinctive from other species by virtue of the stark ‘eyebrow’ markings that all subspecies share, giving the birds an ‘angry’ appearance. They are also notable in their lack of limbs; unlike most other bird species, they have no wings or legs, although they are feathered. Their nesting habits are unknown, except for the white variety, which lays an explosive egg which is almost as large as itself. In their natural habitat they have only one predator: the green pig. The red angry bird is the national bird of Taiwan.

The angry bird is a very poorly designed animal. The lack of wings is a mistake, rendering the birds effectively flightless, and then there’s the absence of legs to contend with. As I understand it, the birds travel via a kind of hopping motion. There is nothing efficient about that. This is another example of evolution getting complacent, and removing appendages which don’t seem useful at the time. It’s short-sighted.

One of the biggest problems for the wild angry bird is nesting: their eggs are consumed on a regular basis by the ground-dwelling green pig, which feeds on a diet of eggs and watermelons. But honestly, if it wasn’t green pigs, it would be rats, or magpies; ground-dwelling birds are notorious for losing their eggs to terrestrial predators, and this is just a perfect example of why.

That’s not to say that the angry bird has no defence mechanism; most do. In fact, this is another easy way to distinguish between the subspecies. When under stress, a blue angry bird will replicate itself twice, effectively tripling the number of birds present. The yellow bird can perform feats of astonishing speed, the black bird swells and detonates like a bomb, the white bird produces a kind of explosive egg, and the red bird does nothing. They are, in some cases literally, all over the place: exploding is never a useful method of self-defence. Some of the others might work a bit better, but still, my complaint would be that they aren’t built to last. The only reason we don’t know much about these creatures is that they very rarely survive in the wild, let alone in captivity.

For these reasons, the angry bird is also impossible to farm as meat. Because of their obvious attachment to their eggs, keeping them for produce is also unfeasible. Kudos to the angry birds for surviving this long, but I must say I’ve seldom seen a less well-adapted, less useful organism. I can’t think of anything productive to do with these birds; as far as I’m concerned, they might as well all be flung away using some kind of giant catapult.

The Tree Kangaroo

Review: The Tree Kangaroo

Category: Animals

Author: Anonymous, variously attributed to Evolution/God

Rating: 13%

The Tree Kangaroos are a family of tree-dwelling mammalian macropods native to Australasia. The group is a small one, consisting of approximately 12 species. As the name suggests, they are descended from the orthodox macropods- kangaroos and wallabies- although they have a number of adaptations which help them exist in an arboreal habitat, such as strong forearms and long tails. They range in length between 81 and 164cm, and weigh in at up to 14.5Kg. They are primarily herbivorous, although they will take eggs to supplement their diet of leaves. They can take a 60 foot drop without injury.

It’s hard to imagine an animal more crappy than the tree kangaroo, a creature that is actually as stupid as it sounds. A flawed concept from the beginning, the tree kangaroo has failed to improve its situation- it’s not well adapted to living in trees. In fact, it’s just like a regular kangaroo, but stuck in a tree: I resent the lack of thought here. Clearly whoever came up with this animal just wanted to ride on the back of the regular kangaroo's success.

I don’t know whether it’s God or evolution who should take the blame for this monstrosity- and since they can’t agree whose idea it was, I’m going to assume they both are. Evolution has thrown up some impressive specimens in the past, but clearly it just hasn’t made the effort here- the tree kangaroo has no natural competitors, so evolution has abandoned it. If God is responsible, then this is one of his worst ideas to date- and the fact that he had access to infinite knowledge and infinite power in order to create this creature boggles the mind. Someone is at fault here: nothing has gone right for the tree kangaroo.

The tree kangaroo explores its habitat by holding onto one branch with its forearms, and hopping along the branch it’s standing on sideways. This is a stupid idea. You might also expect that, once on the ground, the tree kangaroo would make up for its clumsiness in the trees by working even better on terra firma. Wrong. On the ground, the tree kangaroo is even worse: their tails are too heavy, so they have to lean forward and hop awkwardly along. At least the sloth, which also sucks at geolateral perambulation, is a good swimmer and economical in the branches. The tree kangaroo can’t do anything.

The tree kangaroo is currently being hunted to extinction because hunting them is, as one might imagine, ridiculously easy. They don’t taste particularly good, but trust me when I say that the hunters are doing us all, and the kangaroos, a favour. The tree kangaroo is the Jar-jar of the animal world; please join me in hoping they all get replaced by lemurs.

The Ant

Review: The Ant

Category: Animals

Author: Anonymous, attributed to God/Evolution

Rating: 67%

The Ants are a group of primarily colonial insects. They are known to communicate using pheromones, and many species produce ant-specific acid: formic acid. They usually live in nests comprised of hundreds of thousands of individuals, with one queen. They are, as a group, omnivorous, and individual species range from fully carnivorous to fully herbivorous.

Ants are really the underdogs of the insect world. If they didn’t band together, they’d never get anywhere- so it’s a good thing they do just that. I had a number of reservations about ants initially, and the group is far from perfect: firstly, they’re fragile. People will tell you that if they were human size, they would be tougher than nails- but the thing about ants is, they aren’t as big as humans. In fact, they’re really tiny, a flaw shared by many insects.

My second problem is the whole pheromone system. Ants lay pheremone trails when they move, which are altered based on their findings as they travel. The next ant to leave the nest simply follows a promising trail.This works a treat 90% of the time, but the other ten percent... well, see for yourself:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mA37cb10WMU
So there are some glitches in the ants’ OS that really need fixing. Bugs, you might say.

It’s not all bad news though. By using their teamwork, ants are known to accomplish a number of amazing things, beyond the reach of larger insects. They have mastered agriculture, for example- they keep livestock and they grow vegetables. Even though their pheromone system can let them down, it allows for much greater efficiency most of the time.

It is in the weaponry department that ants really come into their own. Various species use formic acid, a type of acid specific to ants, and can spray it at long range. Species such as the bullet ant have developed immensely powerful- and painful- bites, and these as well as the acid are likely to be used En Masse, since the ants again use their most effective trait- teamwork.

Overall, then, it’s a mixed basket. I wouldn’t count on the ant franchise to bring anything special to your ecosystem, yet almost every species in the range is a decent all-rounder. You’d be hard pressed to find an ant that wasn’t suited to any given environment. The ants are solid and dependable, and I have no hesitation in giving them a double thumbs-up: they're antastic.