Humane Society One Good Place to See Variety Within Species

Visiting a Humane Society shelter can be a sad affair, and one that can make animal-lovers angry. See that tiny dog in the photo? Its owner gave it up for "lack of space." LACK OF SPACE?! That little guy could have lived in a shoebox!


Having said that, animal shelters (and adoption days that pet stores sometimes sponsor) are great places to see the incredible amount of variety that exists within one species of organism. Charles Darwin, writing in "On the Origin of Species," used dogs as an example of this sort of variation:

But let us look to the familiar case of the breeds of dogs: it cannot be doubted that young pointers (I have myself seen striking instances) will sometimes point and even back other dogs the very first time that they are taken out; retrieving is certainly in some degree inherited by retrievers; and a tendency to run round, instead of at, a flock of sheep, by shepherd-dogs. I cannot see that these actions, performed without experience by the young, and in nearly the same manner by each individual, performed with eager delight by each breed, and without the end being known--for the young pointer can no more know that he points to aid his master, than the white butterfly knows why she lays her eggs on the leaf of the cabbage--I cannot see that these actions differ essentially from true instincts. If we were to behold one kind of wolf, when young and without any training, as soon as it scented its prey, stand motionless like a statue, and then slowly crawl forward with a peculiar gait; and another kind of wolf rushing round, instead of at, a herd of deer, and driving them to a distant point, we should assuredly call these actions instinctive. Domestic instincts, as they may be called, are certainly far less fixed than natural instincts; but they have been acted on by far less rigorous selection, and have been transmitted for an incomparably shorter period, under less fixed conditions of life.

How strongly these domestic instincts, habits, and dispositions are inherited, and how curiously they become mingled, is well shown when different breeds of dogs are crossed. Thus it is known that a cross with a bull-dog has affected for many generations the courage and obstinacy of greyhounds; and a cross with a greyhound has given to a whole family of shepherd-dogs a tendency to hunt hares. These domestic instincts, when thus tested by crossing, resemble natural instincts, which in a like manner become curiously blended together, and for a long period exhibit traces of the instincts of either parent: for example, Le Roy describes a dog, whose great-grandfather was a wolf, and this dog showed a trace of its wild parentage only in one way, by not coming in a straight line to his master, when called.

So consider visiting a pound, shelter, or adoption day and observing, drawing, describing or photographing the differences among breeds (and crosses!), to help fulfill this standard:

1. Structure and Function in Living Systems
1. Living things are diverse with many different observable characteristics.

The following short video clip from HHMI helps tell the story very well:

http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/dog-breeding

The very next weekend, Mr. Li goes to the Great Lakes Aquarium...and Squiggle and Ollie stow away again.

http://glaquarium.org/exhibits-species/fire-ice-and-the-rise-of-life/

"This place is pretty cool," said Squiggle, after the long ride from Mr. Li's home in Minneapolis to Duluth, 90 minutes north. "It's not very big, but there sure are some interesting things here. The very first exhibit explains evolution, and I know Mr. Li's students struggle with that idea. And it has a South American Lungfish. I had heard of these fish before but had never seen one. I guess seeing examples of animals caught in the act of becoming something else is a good way of showing how evolution works. The lungfish is only a few hops away from being something like an amphibian--like a salamander that has to live near water and lay its eggs in the water, but can breath out of the water. And this exhibit has some wonderful fossils, too, like one of an ancient turtle."

"What?" Ollie said, as he continued to stare out across the enormous Lake Superior horizon from an aquarium window.

"Never mind."

Squiggle and Ollie sneak a ride on a field trip to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum.

Ollie! Ollie! OLLIE!! GET OUT HERE!"

Ollie stirred and wiggled and pulled himself from the middle of a book on snakes and lizards, frogs and turtles, and had a bit of toad photo hanging from his mouth when he peeked out. "Yeah, Squig?"

"Mr. Li is getting ready to go on a field trip!"

"Where to?"

"The Minnesota Land Escape Breetum."

Ollie laughed. "Oh, THAT. I saw it on his calendar, Sis. It's the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum."

"What's a Landscrape Breetum?" Squiggles asked, her eyes narrowing slightly because if there's one thing Squiggle hates, it’s not knowing something, and if there’s one thing she hates even more than that, it’s not knowing something that Ollie DOES know.

Ollie said very slowly, very clearly--maybe a little TOO slowly and clearly, because it almost seemed like he was making fun of his sister, "LandSCAPE ARboretum. That's a place that has all kinds of plants. Grasses, flowers, trees, vegetables, hedges, all that. And of course the animals that go with the plants, like hummingbirds and bees and gophers and carp."

"Carp!"

"Well. I imagine if they have any water plants, there could be carp."

"Oh. Right. So I guess we don't get to learn stuff from Mr. Li today, huh?" Squiggle said a little disconsolately.

Ollie got an expression that said he was up to something--or thinking about getting up to something.

"Unless we stowaway."

"What is 'stowaway'?" Squiggle asked, afraid that once again, her brother knew something she didn't yet.

"I might be using that wrong," Ollie said. "What I mean is, maybe we can sneak into something that Mr. Li carries with him, and go along on the field trip with the kids. All of his students are going on this one, so we could see them all together. Sound fun?"

"It sure does," Squiggle said. "But what the heck can we 'stowaway' in?"

Ollie looked around the room, and his eyes fell on the desk, which was sort of a neat mess. Piles, yes, but carefully stacked piles that seemed arranged so that the person who made them could extract what he wanted with ease. And on the shortest pile near the computer, the pile of things that Mr. Li used often, at the very top, flopped open to today's page, was Mr. Li's journal and appointment book.

Squiggle must have noticed it at the same moment, because she and Ollie looked at each other and smiled and nodded together. They both noticed, too, that there was just enough space for a couple of not-very-large bookworms to hide out in the thick zip-up cover--which had one finger-poke size hole that could be used for exits and emergency escapes.

The plan worked. The drive was long and dark and it was hard to hear the kids talk in the car, although they did catch them singing "Happy" from Miserable Me 2 at one point, with Mr. Li joining in at the top of his lungs. He got most of the words wrong, which made the students laugh for the rest of the trip.

Good thing Mr. Li carries his journal with him wherever he goes. Ollie and Squiggle are safe inside, carried along, until Mr. Li sits down at a picnic table with the students to discuss the day. It is then that Squiggle pokes her head out of the hole and looks around. After giving Ollie the "all-clear," she inches the rest of the way out of the book into Mr. Li's backpack pocket. Now she can look around of without being seen.

One of the things they--Mr. Li, his students, Ollie and Squiggle--did was to take the tram that circles the arboretum, with a guide pointing out the many kinds of plants along the trail.

There were many flowers in full bloom, and thanks to all the rain, the trees and bushes were lush and beautiful. But the tour guide kept saying things like, "You should have seen this area in the spring, around Mother's Day, when the lilacs were in full bloom," and "Wait until fall when all these maple trees will be brilliant crimson." Mr. Li smiled, but it seemed like he might have been happier not to know how nice the place was during the times he and his students were not there.

Even if other times of the year might be better for this or that reason, there is ALWAYS something unusual and memorable to see at the arboretum. They saw dragonflies chasing other insects, and bees and butterflies flitting among the flowers, pollinating them. And there was an exhibit that showed how a caterpillar changes into a butterfly.

"Ugh," said Squiggle.

"What?" asked Ollie.

"Why would anyone want to turn from a beautiful worm-like animal into a...a...GARISH butterfly?"

"What does 'garish' mean?" Ollie asked.

Finally. Squiggle knew something that Ollie did not.

"Look it up," she said.

Ollie shows Squiggle a lizard lab from HHMI:

"As long as I'm jumping all over Mr. Li's computer keyboard," Ollie said, "would you like to see something else cool? Check this out--a lizard evolution lab!"


http://www.hhmi.org/biointeractive/lizard-evolution-virtual-lab




"Uh, Ollie? That is The Awesome! Thanks! But just how long was I asleep? Seems like you saw a LOT of stuff!"

"It's not how long, sis, it's when. Mr. Li has students he tutors every weekday from around noon to three or four in the afternoon. You just happened to sleep right through that part, while he was showing his students some neat resources online."

"How many students does he have?"

"Mm," said Ollie. "Hadn't really counted them. Well--there was a girl, Ellie, who was probably in first or second grade. She liked the spider song. And then there was Tomas, a little older--like maybe fifth or sixth grade? He saw the lizard thing. And then there was Shanya. Mr. Li talked to her about plants or something. And then the last one was Cheryl, about fifth grade too, I think, and they were going over some experiment she was working on with tardi...tarda...tardasomethings. I didn't quite catch what they were. We can find out more tomorrow."

Squiggle and Ollie watch a nursery rhyme cartoon about violet spiders on purple trees.

Ollie said, "The first thing I heard was Mr. Li playing a nursery rhyme for one of his students--the one named Ellie."

"Playing how?" Squiggle asked.

"On the Interwebs!" said Ollie. the made-up word Interwebs always made them laugh, so that took a few seconds. And then Ollie crawled onto the keyboard and carefully tapped in the address so Squiggle could see and hear the nursery rhyme, too.


http://www.npr.org/blogs/13.7/2014/07/14/331328580/sex-death-and-evolution-nursery-rhyme-style


"This is my favorite part," Squiggle announced.

Two violet spiders on a purple tree
Both were dark and hard to see
They had lots of babies in their family
And just like their parents, they were hard to see!

Squiggle and Ollie Wake Up In Mr. Li's Office

Is there any better thing than to wake up in a book? A good book. Tasty and colorful and not too thick, but not so you finish it too soon, either.

I'm Squiggle, a bookworm, about 10 years old in bookworm years. A few months ago I woke up in a book--The Origin of Species--on the bookshelf of Mr. Li. I was nestled in the middle of the book, in a cozy space I don't remember making, with my brother, Ollie. After we'd stretched and yawned and eaten two nouns and a verb each for breakfast, we crawled to the edge of the shelf and looked out into the wider world we found ourselves in.

Straight below us was Mr. Li's desk, messy with delicious papers, with a giant old-school computer right in the middle. An overstuffed swivel chair sat in front of the screen, with a window off to the left that Mr. Li could twist around to look out when daydreams called. The right side of the room had four tanks. One had an old, gnarled tortoise that Mr. Li called Turtillian. Another had an aquatic salamander, called an axolotl, named Rose. One had a python Mr. Li called Pythonicus. And the last one had two enormous Madagascar hissing cockroaches. The walls were covered in posters and prints and signs with clever sayings. The floor was covered with musty old carpet. Now it was mostly quiet in the office, except for the hum of Rose's filter pump and faint scurry of roaches in moss. From my perch on the shelf, the view was of a pleasant, inviting place that belonged to a curious and intelligent man.

Just how intelligent, I had yet to learn. But Ollie had awakened on this shelf a full three days earlier than I had, and so he knew much more about the room and Mr. Li than I did. Still groggy, * and wiping part of the letter "r" from the corner of his mouth, Ollie crawled out beside me and said, "Hey Squig. I thought you'd never get up."

"Ollie, how did we get here?"

"Mm mm. I don't know--I think we were in a garage sale and Mr. Li bought our book? I'm not sure. But I've learned some things about Mr. Li, and about our new home. Wanna hear?"

"Sure!"