Newsflash: TWO New Species Found In Vietnam.

One of the biggest reasons to save the rainforest involves finding new species. National Geographic does not slack in that regard, showing us a few new species that have only been documented in January of 2013. Here are two new herps recently identified in Vietnam:

Source.

This colorful fellow is called Calotes bachae. It is an agamid lizard, meaning that it is related to agamas and Uromastyx lizards. Since there are indeed several hundred agamids in Asia, this one is in good company. There are even other light blue ones to keep the male of this new species company.


As per the National Geographic article here, "During mating season, the colors of the male lizards—which can measure up to 11 inches (28 centimeters)—become especially vivid, ranging from cobalt blue to bright turquoise. This serves to attract females and to intimidate other males, said Hartmann.
While by day the lizard's blue and green coloration is striking, at night it appears dark brown, "showing no bright coloration at all," said Hartmann, a Ph.D. candidate at the Herpetology Department at the Museum Koenig in Bonn, Germany." Surprisingly enough, this striking lizard can be found in downtown Ho Chi Minh City, as well as some reserves. 

Source.

The other big discovery is Helen's flying frog, named after the researcher Jodi Rowley's mother. Ironically, it was found on a log instead of in the trees.

Flying frogs are pretty cool on their own, but this one has extra adaptations for parachuting from tree to tree. The hands are huge, even by flying frog standards; the hind legs are webbed on almost the entire limb. If this gliding style has kept it from being discovered, it's gotta be pretty effective!

Unfortunately, both of these unusual creatures are threatened by habitat loss and too much contact with humans. Both of them were also found fairly close to civilization. Go outside sometime; you might be surprised what can be found close to your house.

"They Actually Eat That:" Porcupine.

Is there any vertebrate that sounds less appetizing than porcupine? It's big, and there's a lot of meat there, but it has spines, teeth, and claws to deal with. Granted, boars and bulls can be pretty nasty, but their skin won't turn your face into a bloody mess (plus, bacon). Who looks at a porcupine and goes "yeah, that looks delicious?" Well...a fair amount of people, actually.

Wherever there are porcupines, people will eat them. They usually do not want to, though. Native Americans can and will use porcupines as meat during the winter. Kenya had a porcupine crisis in 2005 - the most logical solution, after the porcupines had dug up graves and destroyed crops, was to eat the buggers. This may have been dirty porcupine meat, but there is no greater revenge than eating the ones who ate your food.

Porcupine meat is not just for the non-industrialized, either. Porcupines are assholes, for lack of a better word, on a regular basis. They carry diseases, nibble on everything, stick you or others with their hair-turned-needles, and generally are just unpleasant to have around. Last year, people in Pennsylvania started eating porcupines, too- or at least made hunting them legal in the wake of a porcupine outbreak. Again, revenge.

The practice of eating porcupine is still largely reserved for Native Americans and people with porcupine issues in the West, but China and Vietnam at porcupine regularly. It is so popular over there that porcupines are actually threatened. We knew that Vietnam and China ate almost anything. It seemed unlikely that they would hunt a rodent enough to cause a population decrease of 20 percent. Revenge? Noooo, this is just how Southeast Asia rolls. They even farm porcupines.

So how does it taste? Supposedly...weirdly good. It has been described as being "like duck meat, but with more flavour and very crunchy." That particular person actually liked it better than duck; given what I've seen from people's reactions to duck, that is quite the compliment. Maybe the Vietnamese are onto something.

I Actually Ate That: Basa.

If you are ever in Houston and like fish, check out the Kemah Boardwalk. They have a restaurant there called "The Aquarium." It delivers what it promises: a giant aquarium makes up the centerpiece of each level, with smaller aquaria along the sides and a pillar aquarium along the stairwell. O.K., plug over.

They also had an exotic Asian fish on the menu that, as it turns out, is debatably-legal:

Source.

The "whitefish" hidden beneath a mountain  of fruit and breadcrumbs was a Vietnamese fish called basa (Pangasius bocourti). It's native to the Mekong River delta. This fish is wholly herbivorous, making it actually a bit healthier and easier to farm than most fish on the market. Several other fish may be erroneously labeled as basa, so have your wits about you at the fish market. Basa are also called "panga," "bocourti," or "river cobbler," so...just ask the right questions.

Here's where the sketchiness comes in: basa cannot be legally labeled as catfish. (The menu called it "Asian whitefish;" I pressed for more details.)  Even though they are technically catfish, there have been a few SNAFU's when it comes to labeling this oriental fish.  People in the U.S. and Britain seem to have a really hard time deciding what to name this fish.

The U.S. has a particular concern with this one. There was a "catfish war" in the early 2000's. In short, the Vietnamese were accused of flooding the market with basa and marketing it as "catfish" - also the name for the whiskered fish native to North America. Catfish farmers and the USDA were worried that basa might interrupt the profits of the native American catfish, so basa sellers were forever banned from using that word. They have to use other words instead.

Luckily, a rose by any other name indeed tastes as good. The taste if largely neutral to most people (another selling point), but 75% of taste-testers preferred basa to catfish.Whether it is ethical or not is another matter; I am unsure on the veracity of this thread, but given what we know about factory farming fish in Asia, no surprises there. The U.S. is not any better in this regard; nearly all fish farms have skeletons in their closets. Sorry, catfish farmers; best be graceful in defeat this round. 

Creature Feature: Tentacled Snake.

Look at that title. Really, look at that title and use your imagination. There are a million ways to get creative from the title alone. Did a snake do it with an octopus, and is this entry devoted to their unholy lovechild? No. Is it the ultimate in tentacle pronz? No. It's just a water snake that just so happens to have tentacles on its face.

The tentacled snake (Erpeton tentaculatum) is a rear-fanged water snake native to Southeast Asia. It is wholly piscivorous. Its entire life is spent in muddy lakes and rice paddies. Some even venture into seawater.  Unlike some snakes, which come in a rainbow, tentacled snakes are only striped or blotched. Like many water snakes, they have live babies. 

The tentacled snake was not science's most creative naming venture. The most prominent thing about this water snake is that, yes, it has tentacles. These tentacles detect fish better than the snake's tongue ever would. They use a blend of sight and touch - yes, these tentacles loop back to the vision center of the snake's brain. Imagine sticking your tongue out periodically underwater; that is why they evolved tentacles.

The evolution of tentacles is far from this snake's most impressive feat; how it uses them is just as cool as their existence: 



The way the tentacled snake manages to catch the fish is a whole different matter. In the video above, you can see the snake bending its body right after it detects the fish. This motion is enough to trigger the C-start (escape) reflex of the fish, sending it straight into the jaws of death. This snake is predicting what its prey will do next. That's pretty impressive.


Most of us think of the reptile brain as primitive. The revelation that snakes can meter out their venom and the behavior of the tentacled snake above should be enough to make one wonder how intelligent snakes really are. This one just so happens to have tentacles, making it either cooler or creepier. Your mileage may vary, of course.

Creature Feature: Vietnamese Mossy Frog.

If there is one thing that I can definitely thank the exotic pet trade for, it is the amazing potential it has to open people up to other species. Even if you personally do not have, say, a Baron's Racer, with exotic pets around we at least know they exist. One could even make the case that breeding for nifty colors in things like ball pythons is more sane than the crazy gene splicing scientists do. Most importantly, however, I would NOT have known that today's creature existed if I had not seen it in Reptiles magazine.



 The Vietnamese Mossy Frog (Theloderma corticale) is native to the wetter climates of Vietnam and China. Its habitat ranges from tropical-subtropical to the Hanoi mountain range. Much of its time is spent in shallow water with only its bug-eyes poking above the surface. It has been described as looking "alien" or like Godzilla. Neither of these descriptions do this frog's amazing mossy camouflage justice.

The camouflage of the mossy tree frog is said to be the best in the whole animal kingdom. (I personally think it has competition in the matamata, the three-toed sloth, and the tawny frogmouth.) It makes seadragon camouflage look like neon lighting. The tubercules on its skin and its coloration both contribute to the image of a lump of moss - nothing to see here! If the frog is sitting perfectly still, it is near-impossible to pick out.

Herpers (people who keep reptiles and amphibians) have several reasons to love this little frog. It can endure a wide range of temperatures and humidity. It eats crickets voraciously. If you make your terrarium right, you can observe this frog's whole life cycle in one cage. Of course, it's also fun to get one of these frogs, name him Waldo, and invite guests over to try and pick him out from his fancy foliage. These frogs like hiding, so they should be a challenge to find.

Like almost all cool frogs, the Vietnamese Mossy Frog is threatened by habitat loss. This makes captive breeding programs not only awesome, but critical to the survival of the species. They are currently protected by the Vietnamese government, so, should you invest in these frogs, be sure that they were captive-bred. In the worst case scenario, we will have another scimitar-horned oryx on our hands.

"They Actually Eat That:" Frogs.

"Frogs and snails and puppy dog tails..." That's what little boys are made of. We've done dog. We've done snails. Real-life Hypnotoad up there is not happy that frogs are, unfortunately, also fairly common food items around the world. No, we are not talking about a stupid dare in college to eat the frog on the bio dissection table. Frogs are haut cuisine in many, many places.

Frogs are often described as "tasting like chicken" (just like everything else) simply because they are closer to chickens than mammals on the evolutionary playing field. The meat of cold-blooded animals is also such that frog legs sometimes death-twitch while in the pan (or just with a little salt).



Eating frogs, particularly frog legs, has a link with French culture. If the French have touched a place, it has frog legs on the menu. Vietnam? Yep. Louisiana? Sure. France? Mais oui!



Several other places have frogs as food without French influence. China (surprised?) and Indonesia are also large consumers of frog meat. In China, frog legs are stir-fried; in Indonesia, frog legs are used in a soup called Swikee. Hell, most of the frogs eaten in France today were farmed in Indonesia.

Eating frogs has also been recorded in India, Spain, Greece, and a few places in California. In short, frogs are eaten just about everywhere in some way, shape or form. Maybe Kermit was right: It's not easy being a green frog.


Only Gaga wears them as clothing. We're pretty sure about that.


Next week: Just to prove that NOTHING is off the menu...dragons. And fortune-telling.

Creature Feature: Saola.

In the looks department, the saola (Pseudoryx nghetinhensis) is nothing special. It's a fairly bland antelope. Sure, it has some interesting features - short horns, huge scent glands, and an odd skull that make scientists think it a primitive bovid - but not weird enough to make the average Joe go "WOW!" The people in Laos and Vietnam, however, go so far as to consider it a unicorn because of one simple feature: It is that rare.

The last time we heard about something like this was the okapi, an animal so bizarre that it may as well be mythical. There are good records of the okapi in local lore; the Egyptians thought it was strange, and they were the ones obsessed with the afterlife. The okapi was also rare enough to elude scientists until the 1900's. That's rare, but the saola has beaten its record.

 The saola is just plain rare. In 15 years of searching, science has discovered zero saolas in the wild. Its mythical status is well-warranted, seeing as it has been spotted by villagers while avoiding the eye of science for so long. It was not even officially acknowledged as an animal until 1992. Either we fail as humans, or the saola really knows how to hide.

There have been very few instances of a saola ever being in captivity. In August 2010, people in Laos found a wild saola and tried to raise it in captivity, but, like any unicorn, it promptly died. No unicorn would ever tolerate being gawked at and prodded with weird poles. They would commit suicide before that.

Not a happy unicorn. Twonicorn? 

Tomorrow: OK, enough mammals. Time for a bird.

"They Actually Eat That:" Mice.

After insects getting the spotlight several times, are you really surprised mice ended up here? After all, they are at least as common as insects, a good source of protein, and follow too-omnivorous humans wherever they may go. They were bound to wind up on the menu eventually.

Eating mice goes way back. People have been eating mice since prehistoric times because, hey, they were around. The ancient Romans ate stuffed dormice on a fairly regular basis, to the point that there is a species of mouse called the "edible dormouse." Then people in Europe finally went, "ew, that's gross and not even a challenge. Let's eat innocent songbirds instead."

(Ortolan says hi.) 

Some poorer nations in Africa and Europe still eat mice, but, largely because of the rodent's reputation as unclean, eating them is considered taboo in many parts of the world. They're adorable, too, but when has cuteness ever stopped someone from eating an animal? Should you wish to try mouse meat, there are still plenty of places in which to eat them; not many of them are well-off countries.

Oh, except for China, Vietnam, and Korea. (We could debate about how poor or not they are until the cows come home; Korea and China are industrialized, at least.) What, are you guys going for some sort of "Place With the Weirdest Food" record?



China and Korea make the ancient Romans look like wusses for eating cute, fuzzy dormice. Besides using mouse meat in several dishes, they put regular mice on skewers along with snakes, lizards, and scorpions. This bizarre buffet is usually found in Chinese-style night markets. Take your pick of odd eats there. Name it and if it is small enough to put on a stick, they have put it on a stick.

It gets worse/better, depending on how you see these entries: Do you know what a pinky is?


Not THIS Pinky.

If you are not in the reptile or bird of prey trade, a pinky is a baby mouse no more than 2-3 days old. It is furless with closed eyes and no more than an inch or two (a few centimeters) from head to skinny tail. Pinkies are commonly used to feed baby snakes and other small carnivorous animals in captivity. In Korea, they are also put in wine.



Korea takes eating mice the extra mile by taking not just one, not two, but a whole mountain of baby mice and drowning them in wine. The resulting mixture is left to brew for a year. It supposedly tastes like gasoline and, according to Korean folk medicine, can cure asthma, liver problems (cure or cause, guys?) or...well, anything else that ails you. Baby mouse wine is a common health tonic there; I have heard that China does this as well, but Korea remains more notorious for it for whatever reason.

Congratulations, Korea: You have officially won the "Place With the Weirdest Foods" award. Take a bow; you deserve it for swallowing baby mice to cure asthma.


Next week: Enough about Korea. There's plenty of gross stuff in the States, too.

"They Actually Eat That:" Dog.

The video speaks for itself, really. I do, however, have to add that that is an INTENSE test of courage; after all, it takes balls to kill a friend.


Hey, hey...did you guys name me Courage just to be ironic, or...?

They Actually Eat That?!

If the video above did not tip you off, yes, the rumors about Vietnam and Korea are true: They actually eat dogs.


One WONDERS how hellhound stories got started...

I hate to sound like a bitch (hah), but can you blame them? Dogs are almost everywhere. Somebody, somewhere, had to have eaten them at some point. It just took a creative soul to turn dog meat into culinary art.

Eating Fido is a LOT more common than you think it is. Seriously, the better question is why not eat dogs? The ancient Romans, French and Mexicans ate (and in Mexico, possibly STILL eat) dogs; China, Vietnam and Korea are notorious for canine cuisine. If we want to get really nasty, weak dogs have been fed to their own pack on several occasions. This is nothing new; pretty much as long as people have had dogs, people have eaten them. Whether they have kept up the tradition or not is another story.

So why does the tradition persist in Asian culture? It depends on where you go. The Chinese cite their old medicinal practices; many of them relate to retaining body heat. In Korea, they have been eating dog meat since the Neolithic and show no signs of stopping- if anything, some of them want canine cuisine to become more and more mainstream. It has a really nice taste, apparently.

Even in these countries, eating dog is not without controversy. "Dogs are friends, not food" gained ground with animal rights movements. Korea still asserts that at least some dogs are livestock, even though no legal yes or no has ever been given.

Korea in particular has had issues with whether dogs are food or not. There are always new lines being drawn regarding dog's status on Korean livestock and food lists. Nonetheless, many dog owners feel no inner conflict about eating dog meat.

The question is, how far do you go with something like this? One of the investigations in China only took hold because of how the dogs were treated - if cows were being skinned alive, a similar objection could have been reached. HOWEVER, people like PETA would like to cease human-animal interaction entirely. What's the stopping point? After all, chickens and cattle make fine pets, too. (Remind me to do a post on mini-cows...)

Then again, I'm all for consumption as a means of trimming away excess mammal populations. Hint, hint.

Creature Feature: Tokay Gecko.

Geckos are already pretty darn weird. They are the only lizards that make any sort of noise besides hissing. They can walk on walls thanks to special pads on their feet. They have eyes that stare into your soul as they tell you how to save money on car insurance. (In that case, it's usually in a good way.)

The only way to make them weirder? Give them chicken pox:


No PhotoShopping required.

The Tokay gecko's scientific name is Gekko gecko. That's right, this colorful little fellow is what gave all geckos their scientific and common names; it has all their superpowers and then some. Strangely, this one's probably the last lizard people picture when they hear the word 'gecko,' even though it looks pretty trippy for a lizard. Yes, that is their natural coloration; several morphs have nonetheless been developed in captivity.

Tokay geckos are native to many parts of Asia, including Thailand, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines. The lore around them varies depending on whom you ask, but some places realize that these geckos eat far more dangerous invertebrates such as centipedes and scorpions. More recently, they have also taken up residence in Texas, Hawaii, Belize and Florida as an invasive species. (Given all the reptile issues that Florida has, I STILL wonder why they host a GIANT REPTILE SHOW there every year. No offense, I LOVE reptiles, but the whole python ban thing was basically Florida's problem.)

Geckos got their name from the sounds that the Tokay gecko makes. As I said earlier, geckos are the only sort of lizard that make any noise besides hissing; geckos make clicky little sounds like this:



They are also vicious little biters. Once they bite down on, say, your hand, they do not let go for up to an hour. Tokays have been dubbed the "pitbulls" of the reptile world for their nasty, nasty bites. Holding the gecko in cold water and putting a bit of vinegar on the gecko's nose are both valid methods of getting these nippy critters off.



Yeah, I wouldn't ask these guys for car insurance if I were you.