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Champis is a dwarf rabbit in Sweden who think he’s a sheepdog! He belongs to Nils-Erik and Greta who have a farm near the village of Käl. That’s about all I can get from the Swedish, but you can read more at Gårdsbacken’s blog. Link -via Metafilter
No cartoon bunnies were harmed in the making of this violent cartoon by Dylan Vanwormer and Logan Scelina. Carrot Crazy was their senior thesis film at Ringling College of Art and Design. -via the Presurfer
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This short film is subtitled “A quick tale of violence,” but it’s more odd than violent. A driver picks up carrots off the highway and eats them. Then it gets weird. Produced by Cedric Nicolas-Troyan. -Thanks, Benjamin Hertel!
One day, the O’Rourke family of Tucson, Arizona, found a couple of abandoned bunnies in their backyard. Joe, one of the bunnies turns out to be a paraplegic, so young Liam O’Rourke designed this clever little device: the ATB (All Terrain Bunny).
Check it out:
There was a reason the mother rabbit abandoned them. Paul O’Rourke realized one bunny they named Joe had no use of his hind legs. Paul and his family helped nurse the bunnies back to health, but then they went one step further to help the paraplegic bunny.
Paul’s son Liam designed and built a small cart for Joe to help him move around a little easier. The red wagon with yellow wheels took some getting used to, but ultimately seemed to improve his mobility.
Joe is a young paraplegic rabbit. Liam designed a way to put wheels on him so he can get around without dragging his hindquarters. This is just one of the many cute stories at NeatoBambino you might miss if you don’t check it out every day. Link
What could be more pleasant than a bevy of bouncing bunnies? This collection of pictures at The Ark in Space is just the thing to put a smile on your face! Link
(Image credit: Flickr user Jannes Pockele)
Simon’s Cat encounters a bunny in this new animation from Simon Tofield. Could it be the Easter Bunny? -via The Daily What
Rabbit Feet - $17.95
Are you still looking for the perfect Easter gift for your favorite 18-months to 3-year-old? Well, look no further! You need the adorable Rabbit Feet slippers from the NeatoShop!
The Rabbit Feet appear both cute and menacing just like a typical toddler. Roar! Hop! Hop! Roar!
Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more crazy Footwear!
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Paleontologist Josep Quintana Cardona of the Mediterranean island of Minorca and colleagues have discovered the fossils of the largest rabbit that ever lived on Earth:
The new hunk of a rabbit, now named Nuralagus rex, shows the kind of unusual turn that evolution can take on islands. “Gigantism happens,” explains Brian Kraatz of Western University of Health Sciences in Pomona, Calif. When pioneer animals start colonizing an island, rates of evolution typically speed up at first, he explains. Small creatures can supersize, and big ones can shrink. [...]
So far no plausible rabbit-eaters have turned up among fossils from the same stretch of time on Minorca, so the big bunnies could have evolved larger and larger body size without pressure to maintain speed and agility to escape predators. The relatively short, stiff spine of the fossils suggests that Nuralagus didn’t hop much, if at all, say Quintana Cardona and colleagues. They describe its pace as “low-gear walking.” [...]
What the rabbit king of Minorca did have were paws adapted for digging, a help in finding food to sustain its regal size. So far, though, there’s no sign of giant carrots.
Rabbit Ears Salad Servers – $11.95
Hippity, hoppity Easter is on the way! Embrace your inner rabbit with the Rabbit Ears Salad Servers from the NeatoShop. Eating healthy has never been so fun.
Remember, all that healthy eating makes it that much easier to justify snacking on all that yummy Easter candy! Bring on the salad!
Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more outrageous Kitchen Stuff!
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The idea of giant bunny rabbits may remind you of Night of the Lepus, but this is no movie -it’s prehistory. A new species called the Minorcan King of the Rabbits (Nuralagus rex) has been discovered on the island of Minorca. It weighed over 26 pounds and had rather small ears compared to rabbits we know today. These rabbits flourished on the Mediterranean island between 5 and 3 million years ago.
“N. rex was a very robust and peculiar rabbit,” project leader Josep Quintana told Discovery News. “Surely he was a very calm and peaceful animal that moved with slow, but powerful, movements.”
Quintana, a scientist at the Catalan Institute of Paleontology, and colleagues Meike Kohler and Salvador Moya-Sola describe the giant fossil rabbit in a Journal of Vertebrate Paleontology paper. They believe the rabbit lost the ability to hop, because the long, springy spine typical of modern bunnies was replaced by a short, stiff backbone.
The researchers think N. rex spent most of its days peacefully digging, searching for roots and tubers to eat.
Link -via The Daily What
(Image credit: Meike Köhler)
Lil’ Ballerina Backpack – $23.95
Are you looking for the perfect Easter gift for the little ballerina in your life? Check out the Lil’ Ballerina Backpack from the NeatoShop.
You want to know the best part about the Lil’ Ballerina Backpack from the NeatoShop? It encourages that adorable child to carry her own stuff! Yippee!!
Be sure to check out the NeatoShop for more adorable Bags and Backpacks!
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Bottle Bunny – $19.95
Show your favorite Easter Bunny how much you care with the Bottle Bunny, wall mounted bottle opener, from the NeatoShop. They will be so touched by your thoughtful gift that they will be forced to reward you with a basket of tasty treats. Hip-hip Hooray! Easter candy is on the way!
Be sure to check out all the fabulous Kitchen Stuff available at the NeatoShop.
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Although the Lunar New Year doesn’t begin until February third, 2011 will be the Year of the Rabbit. Pink Tentacle welcomed the year by posting several beautiful antique bunny illustrations from the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. The rabbit shown dates from 1903. Link -via Right Brain Terrain
If you have a rabbit phobia, it’s best that you don’t teach high school. Here’s what happened to one teacher in Germany:
A German court on Tuesday threw out the case of a schoolteacher against a pupil who allegedly tormented her by scrawling pictures of rabbits on the blackboard to aggravate her rabbit phobia. [...]
Witnesses had told the judge that the teacher ran sobbing out of the classroom when she saw the image of a rabbit on the blackboard. The girl denied making the drawings.
It’s Woodward the tortoise against a rabbit named Lady Bunbun. How the winner is declared can be a point of controversy, but as you will see, the old fable is true. The tortoise keeps a steady pace while the hare barely shows up. -via Buzzfeed
We're excited to feature National Geographic photographer Joel
Sartore's new book Rare:
Portraits of America's Endangered Species
Joel has been on a 20-year personal mission to photograph the world's most endangered species. His new book, RARE, presents a multi-year project documenting Earth's vanishing biodiversity. The photographs, needless to say, are exquisite.
The first animal featured, Bryn the Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbit, died while Joel was working on the book. She was one of the last two of her species. Shortly afterward, the last of the breed died as well, and the Columbia Basin Pygmy Rabbit went extinct:
Bryn the pygmy rabbit died in 2008, marking the end of her genetic line. This subpopulation lost its sagebrush habitat as the land was developed for agriculture. Key features of Bryn's genetic material survive in hybrid pygmy rabbits; a breeding and reintroduction program holds out hope for her kind.
In an off-exhibit room at the Oregon Zoo, the staff was quiet, even reverent, as they brought in Bryn. She was one of two Columbia Basin pygmy rabbits left, and since both were old females, this was a solemn occasion.
A keeper placed her gently on my black velvet background, and i began to take photos. I stopped to watch her from time to time, but she didn't move much. She wasn't even scared. Nearly blind, missing half an ear, and with fur falling out onto the cloth, she seemed to have already given up.
The whole experience left me morose and extremely disappointed. We'd done it again, this time by converting sage habitat to agriculture in western Washington. Our photo session was one of the last chances Bryn had to be noticed. She died a few months later, and then Raphaela, the last of the breed, died as well. The Columbia Basin pygmy rabbit is now extinct, a passenger pigeon for the 21st century.
Don't miss this one (particularly the behind the scenes "making of" video clip!)
Links: RARE Feature on Spotlight | RARE Book Official Website | Joel Sartore's Website
P.S. Joel and National Geographic are kind enough to provide 3 copies of RARE, which we will send to commenters with the best comments on the Spotlight post. Visit the RARE Post on Spotlight to leave your comment: Link
Be sure to visit the gallery in Joel's Website for more amazing photographs.
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Good news, ladies (and gents)! Thanks to science, you will soon have what is called "Viagra for women":
Researchers tested the drug by simulating arousal in female rabbits and then administering the drug to the animals. As hoped, the prototype mimicked the human body’s natural processes in bolstering arousal.
By specifically blocking the enzyme in the body that checks blood flow to this region, the drug could allow for greater blood flow and greater physiological arousal, said Chris Wayman, the lead researcher on the project.
The drug would not create arousal out of nowhere, however, but would boost blood flow when accompanied by desire and sexual stimulation, Wayman said.
Don’t we already have female viagra in the form of jewelry? Link
Annette Edwards, who has worked for years to breed the world’s biggest rabbit, and was recently in the news for having plastic surgery to look more like Jessica Rabbit, is looking for help. Edwards is holding auditions for the position of rabbit handler, to help with Alice, her rabbit that holds the world’s record for the longest bunny, as they made public appearances. Think you have the stuff for this £70,000 a year position?
Current Guinness World Record title holder Annette Edwards, 57, a real-life version of Jessica Rabbit, is looking for a handler to show big bunny Alice over the next year. Whoever gets the role can expect a life-changing year, travelling with Annette to far-flung corners of the globe.Already booked are personal appearances in Paris at the end of April on a television show and the heart of fashion, Milan, in May.
The two-and-a-half year old bunny also weights a whopping three-and-a-half stone so some
strength will be needed. The ideal candidates needs to be someone who can handle the rabbit and loves pets, with a big personality and not be shy in front of the camera.
Om nom nom! This wild bunny lives only temporarily at a Animal Advocates wildlife rehabilitation center in Los Angeles. It will be released back to nature when it’s old enough. Don’t miss the washing up at the end! -via Cynical-C
(Links open in a new browser window/tab)
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Guy makes a Hovercraft in his Garage … and it flies! No, I don’t mean it goes really fast. I mean it flies. Link |
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QI: “What happens if you eat nothing but rabbit?” The QI panel is talking about rabbits in the “Eating” episode from the E series, where the question is: What happens if you eat nothing but rabbit? Link |
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How to Win Chatroulette This is a neat short film wherein the director turns the tables on the rouletters. Link |
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Scout the fennec makes cute noises when tired! Little scout makes awfully cute sounds after a long day of playing. This is quite possibly the cutest mammal ever to roam the Earth. Link |
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First Images From WISE – The Wide-field Infrared Survey Presented by Amy Mainzer – the new space telescope is starting to open its eye. Link |
Run Wrake made this very strange, yet very intriguing short called “Rabbit.” Like the Dick and Jane books of yesteryear as seen through the eyes of a madman, the style is unique, and the moral of the story is poignant. (Warning: animated animal slaughter.)
Scientists from Wake Forest University in North Carolina aroused the world’s interest by successfully performing the world’s first replacement of erectile tissue of the penis. And yes, it’s somewhat fitting that they chose the rabbit to perform the Frankenweenie experiment:
In a previous study, the researchers engineered short segments of rabbit erectile tissue with 50% of full function.
In the latest work, they harvested smooth muscle cells and endothelial cells from the animals’ erectile tissue.
These cells were multiplied in the laboratory and used to seed a three dimensional scaffold, which was implanted into the animals’ penis.
Organised erectile tissue with blood vessel structures began to form as early as a month later.
The researchers believe the key was the fact that the cells were injected into the scaffolds on two separate days, enabling them to hold almost six times as many smooth muscle cells as in previous studies.
Artist Amy Rawson (previously at Neatorama) has created a cute-as-can-be needle felted zombie bunny for Halloween. Or at least, it’s cute on the side its eyeball isn’t falling out of! See more pictures at eBay. Link
If the folks at Carlos Marreiros architecture firm have their ways, the Macau Pavillion at the Shanghai World Expo 2010 will be in the form this glorious giant rabbit:
… the pavilion will be wrapped with a double-layer glass membrane and feature fluorescent screens on its outer walls. Balloons will serve as the head and tail of the ‘rabbit’, which can be moved up and down to attract visitors. The building will be constructed with recyclable materials and consists of solar power panels and rain collection systems.
