I think I’ve done what I can to prep for the presentation tomorrow - gonna do a few more reviews and editing (scientific names for animals should be in italics), and run through it with my partner.
I have a suspicion I may have put more info then they need, but I’ve adhered to the marking rubric so 🤷🏼♀️
Anyone want to know some cool facts about Tachyglossus aculeatus (The Short-Beaked Echidna)? 😂
Is that the Niu Gini one that’s recently been re-discovered? I know they’ve got long beaked echidnas, but I think there’s been some developments on the short-beaked side quite recently.
He he, the actual word echidna is NOT an indigenous word - it comes from greek mythology and is the name of a goddess of chaos. quote below from theoi.com
"EKHIDNA (Echidna) was a monstrous she-dragon (drakaina) with the head and breast of a woman and the tail of a coiling serpent. She probably represented the corruptions of the earth–rot, slime, fetid waters, illness and disease.
Ekhidna was sometimes equated with Python “the Rotting One”, a dragon born of the fetid slime left behind by the great Deluge. Others name her the Tartarean lamprey, and place in her to the dark, swampy pit of Tartaros beneath the earth. Hesiod, makes her a daughter of monstrous sea-gods, and presumably associates her with rotting sea-scum and fetid salt-marshes.
Ekhidna was the consort of Typhoeus–a monstrous, multi-headed storm-giant who challenged Zeus to the throne of heaven. Together they spawned a host of terrible monsters to plague the earth including the Khimaira (Chimera), Kerberos (Cerberus), the Hydra, Sphinx and the Drakon Hesperios (Hesperian Dragon).
Four other closely related she-dragons were the Argive Ekhidna and Poine (Poena), the Tartarean Kampe (Campe), and the Phokian Sybaris."
The Short-Beaked Echidna is the only native Echidna to Australia - the other 3 extant echidnas are native to Niu Gini! Thank you for the etymology! I had no idea they painted Ekhidna as such a gross sea-beast 😂
I studied the skeletal structure of T. aculeatus! They have a pectoral girdle that is really similar to the therapsids (mammal-like reptiles from the Permian/Triassic)! Shows how old of a species monotremes are! Their humerus is lateral to the body, giving them that waddle, and their tibia and fibula are “backwards” compared to mammals causing their hind feet to point caudally!
The maxilla and mandible of T. aculeatus is fused into a beak-like mouth. It isn’t actually a beak, however, as it is made of specialised jaw bones and muscle, rather keratin coated bone (like a bird beak). They use their long tongue and long mouth to snuffle in soil for ants and termites (they are insectivores), and then use their tongue to grind up their food against a bony hard plate on the maxilla, along with a slight back and forth motion of their jaws, as opposed to the up and down motion humans do when we chew.
Their backwards facing hind feet (pointed towards the posterior of the animal/ pointed caudally) means that when they dig out their food or dig out burrows, the dirt is kicked back and away. Combined with the females backward- opening pouches (the opening of the pouch is also pointed towards the posterior) this means that dirt and soil and bugs won’t be kicked into their pouch and onto their puggle.
They also produce milk (one of the reasons they are in the Mammalia Class) via mammary glands, but they don’t have nipples in their pouches; the milk seeps through the skin a bit akin to sweat
It is!! I also studied the skeletal systems of the Eastern Tiger Snake (Notechis scutatus) and the Budgerigar (Melopsittacus undulatus), it is all extremely riveting! And it took me down a few different rabbit holes haha
I think I’ve done what I can to prep for the presentation tomorrow - gonna do a few more reviews and editing (scientific names for animals should be in italics), and run through it with my partner.
I have a suspicion I may have put more info then they need, but I’ve adhered to the marking rubric so 🤷🏼♀️
Anyone want to know some cool facts about Tachyglossus aculeatus (The Short-Beaked Echidna)? 😂
Is that the Niu Gini one that’s recently been re-discovered? I know they’ve got long beaked echidnas, but I think there’s been some developments on the short-beaked side quite recently.
He he, the actual word echidna is NOT an indigenous word - it comes from greek mythology and is the name of a goddess of chaos. quote below from theoi.com
"EKHIDNA (Echidna) was a monstrous she-dragon (drakaina) with the head and breast of a woman and the tail of a coiling serpent. She probably represented the corruptions of the earth–rot, slime, fetid waters, illness and disease.
Ekhidna was sometimes equated with Python “the Rotting One”, a dragon born of the fetid slime left behind by the great Deluge. Others name her the Tartarean lamprey, and place in her to the dark, swampy pit of Tartaros beneath the earth. Hesiod, makes her a daughter of monstrous sea-gods, and presumably associates her with rotting sea-scum and fetid salt-marshes.
Ekhidna was the consort of Typhoeus–a monstrous, multi-headed storm-giant who challenged Zeus to the throne of heaven. Together they spawned a host of terrible monsters to plague the earth including the Khimaira (Chimera), Kerberos (Cerberus), the Hydra, Sphinx and the Drakon Hesperios (Hesperian Dragon).
Four other closely related she-dragons were the Argive Ekhidna and Poine (Poena), the Tartarean Kampe (Campe), and the Phokian Sybaris."
The Short-Beaked Echidna is the only native Echidna to Australia - the other 3 extant echidnas are native to Niu Gini! Thank you for the etymology! I had no idea they painted Ekhidna as such a gross sea-beast 😂
I studied the skeletal structure of T. aculeatus! They have a pectoral girdle that is really similar to the therapsids (mammal-like reptiles from the Permian/Triassic)! Shows how old of a species monotremes are! Their humerus is lateral to the body, giving them that waddle, and their tibia and fibula are “backwards” compared to mammals causing their hind feet to point caudally!
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The maxilla and mandible of T. aculeatus is fused into a beak-like mouth. It isn’t actually a beak, however, as it is made of specialised jaw bones and muscle, rather keratin coated bone (like a bird beak). They use their long tongue and long mouth to snuffle in soil for ants and termites (they are insectivores), and then use their tongue to grind up their food against a bony hard plate on the maxilla, along with a slight back and forth motion of their jaws, as opposed to the up and down motion humans do when we chew.
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Their backwards facing hind feet (pointed towards the posterior of the animal/ pointed caudally) means that when they dig out their food or dig out burrows, the dirt is kicked back and away. Combined with the females backward- opening pouches (the opening of the pouch is also pointed towards the posterior) this means that dirt and soil and bugs won’t be kicked into their pouch and onto their puggle.
They also produce milk (one of the reasons they are in the Mammalia Class) via mammary glands, but they don’t have nipples in their pouches; the milk seeps through the skin a bit akin to sweat
❤️
This sounds like a fun assignment!
It is!! I also studied the skeletal systems of the Eastern Tiger Snake (Notechis scutatus) and the Budgerigar (Melopsittacus undulatus), it is all extremely riveting! And it took me down a few different rabbit holes haha
That sounds like a fun rabbit hole. Or should I say snake / budgie hole
I like the word puggle