This handsome critter (and I use the term loosely) is the Northern Collared Lemming (Dicrostonyx groenlandicus). Yucetun, it's just avelngaq (I took forever to spell that one out. Clearly, I'm not as literate as I hoped. :( ), which covers anything small brown and furry. There's another word for it that starts with ug-, and one that I prefer, but I can't spell it out. It's still `mouse/vole type thing.`Something I didn't know, but male Collared lemmings scent mark (urinate) on everything, yeah? But they especially like scentmarking bone. We tried to extract DNA from some bony material, and were successful. But when we studied the DNA, we found that it was these guys, and not our species' DNA.
Interesting, there were not supposed to be any Northern Collared lemmings in the area we got the material from. We never quite trust locations people tell us for this sort of stuff, but this is the first time we caught someone blatently lying to us. But not a lot we can do about it! ;)
There's no guessing thing for this week, since I won't be home next Tuesday. So here's an ice age bison (Bison latifrons) from Utah:
Shame these guys are extinct.
1 comment:
dang it, I guessed lemming on a previous animal adventure, but didn't think of it this time -- I am beginning to see why, much as I love it, I didn't study science the first time around . . .
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