Creature Feature: Diplocaulus.

"Dinosaur" has been somewhat of a "generic extinct animal" category since I was in preschool. Packages containing dinosaurs have also contained cavemen, mammoths, and saber-toothed tigers. We can forgive Dimetrodon; at least it looks kind of like Spinosaurus. Then we have this: \



This strange, boomerang-headed creature is called Diplocaulus. This thing was around in the Permian, which means that, like Dimetrodon, it was properly around before the dinosaurs. It was a giant, meter-long amphibian similar to a salamander- not a lizard at all! Most Diplocaulus fossils have been found inthe good ol' U.S. of A., particularly Texas. It probably ate insects, but we don't have a time machine to prove it.


Diplocaulus has remained a mainstay of "here, have some random prehistoric stuff" packages for one simple reason: That head. Diplocaulus had a distinctive, arrow-shaped skull. Possible reasons for this skull include burrowing, making it hard to swallow, and a hydrodynamic feature. Some museums draw Diplocaulus with a flap of skin running from its arrowhead to its tail, allowing it to undulate through its watery domain. Nobody really knows what Diplocaulus's head was for, but it's marketable as hell.

Now in origami for your enjoyment.

Alas, if you want a Diplocaulus or something similar as a pet, I cannot help you. The Diplocaulus has no living relatives.  Nothing has evolved a head quite like Diplocaulus, which adds more mystery to the beast. It's still sad that no lizard has evolved headgear this cool.

Next time you find a random box of "dinosaurs," take a good look. Dimetrodon should not be there. Wooly mammoths should not be there. Technically, pterodactyls shouldn't be there (they're pterosaurs, not dinosaurs). Diplocaudus definitely shouldn't be there, even if it does look neat. Now you know what it's called and can brag about it to fellow nerds. :)

Creature Feature: Chinese Giant Salamander.

All too often, endangered animals are glamorized. I've ranted about how the less-impressive endangered species get so little press before. Sometimes, however, this favoritism is wholly unjustified.

Hello, Chinese giant salamander (Andrias davidianus)! Hello, amphibian that's on the critical list! Hello, highly endangered animal that never seems to get any press outside of Year of the Frog!

There's a lot that you probably gathered from this thing's name already. It's a salamander, it's giant, and it's from the rocky streams and lakes in China. Its only living relatives are the Japanese giant salamander and the hellbender. It's so big that frogs and fish are on the menu as well as insects.

How big is big? A little over a meter. A yard and eight inches. You get the idea: this salamander is about the same length and weight as a medium-sized dog, if not a little longer. There are even reports of them once achieving lengths of 6 feet - roughly 2 meters. That's a lot of salamander. Hell, that's a record for amphibians.

Size is not the only thing unique about this river monster. Chinese giant salamanders are also among the few salamanders that make noise. They can whine, hiss, and bark; they may even sound like human babies to some Chinese people. They also have special sensory nodes that run from head to tail in compensation for awful eyesight. Neat.

The Chinese giant salamander is among the most underrated endangered species in the world. This particular point relates to something called the EDGE (Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered)  list. To get on this list, a species has to be more or less unique in every way - particularly from an evolutionary viewpoint, meaning that there are very few extant relatives to the species in question. It also has to be critically endangered to make it into the top ten.  This salamander is literally right beneath the Yangtze river dolphin (which recently went extinct as we know it) in that regard, holding the #2 position on the entire "world's most evolutionarily distinct and endangered animals" list. Read: Not the panda or any other cute mammal, but a giant salamander is among the most threatened, unique animals in the entire world. The panda is way farther down the list.

Aside from being an amphibian and therefore more susceptible to environmental changes by default, the Chinese giant salamander has a few other things making it go from just plain "endangered" to "critically endangered." China isn't just polluted - it's the most polluted nation in the world and, as evidenced by the extinction of the Yangtze river dolphin, has the most toxic waters as well. Oh, and this salamander's from China, meaning that it's also on the menu.  (When cobras and tigers aren't prominent threats, nothing is spared.) The Chinese giant salamander is one of those awesomely unique animals that has so many strikes against it that we're amazed it isn't extinct already.

Honestly? I'm sure someone, somewhere, could find a way to market the giant salamander. Salamanders tend to have natural, dopey "derp" looks on their faces that could be shilled for cute points. Last time we tried using a mammal to  encourage conservation of these waterways - a dolphin, no less - it failed. Time to milk the amphibian - so long as doing so doesn't cause more damage, of course.

Creature Feature: Azureus.

Happy Greenfest day! OK, it's not a national holiday, but I did just get back from Greenfest. Green Fest is a huge festival sporting eco-friendly organic everything. Yes, I mean everything; I have seen organic food, environmentally-sound flooring, and even paper made from elephant dung there. If you want to keep places with awesome wildlife alive, go there next year!

That is why today's creature is a frog. Contrary to popular belief, pandas are not the best mascots for the environment; that honor should go to our amphibian friends, such as Dendrobates azureus. Since amphibians (especially frogs) have highly permeable skin and are vital to many ecosystems, they have been viewed worldwide as a gauge of environmental health. Not only are species like azureus up there visually appealing and vocal, they help keep insect populations down and provide food for many other animals. No frogs in an area (OK, besides Antarctica) means that something is very, very wrong.

This little blue frog, like most poison dart frogs, resides in the forests of South America (namely, Brazil and Suriname). This is not the big Amazon basin that everyone and their mother is worried about, but the species is nonetheless listed as 'vulnerable.' It would be a shame to lose such a cool-looking frog!

On that note, not all poison dart frogs are created equal. Though azureus is still poisonous, dart frogs of the genus Phyllobates are the ones commonly used to make poisonous arrows. Azureus is one of the easier species of frog to keep as a pet despite its toxicity. Moreover, the sexes differ physically; female blue dart frogs are bigger than males, but the men of the species have larger, heart-shaped toes.

Now, if this little froggie gave you a sense of deja vu...you have probably seen it before:

Perhaps deja vuze would have been a better term.

Tomorrow's animal will be far less spur-of-the-moment. I have a rant waiting to happen thanks to the festival.