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HomeMy WebLinkAboutZurich Herald, 1956-09-13, Page 2Zoo Keepers Have Lots Of Troubles If you want a Wee quiet job, free from worries, don't run a zoo. Keeping several thousand wild animals alive and well is a job with plenty of headaches. Some animals are very difficult to keep, and demand the ut- most care if they are to survive. Take king penguins, those curi- ously human birds that look so much like dignified old waiters. They come from the Antartic, where they thrive in the great wastes of ice and snow. Bring them to another country and, during the summer, they are al- most overwhelmed by the heat. After an acclimatizing period, though, they get used to it, so some zoos have managed to keep a small flock; some have even succeeded in rearing an occa- sional chick, a pretty good ach- ievement. Until recently, however, the New York Zoo was out of luck with king penguins. The trouble lay in the very high summer temperatures. All kinds of things were tried, even the frequent ad- dition of blocks of ice to their pool, but the results were always disappointing Within a week or two of the arrival of hot weather the birds were dead. Much thought was given to the problem, because king pen- guins are a most popular ex- hibit. But it was not until just after the war that someone had the right idea. Why not build a large refrigerator, similar to those in which butchers keep their meat fresh, and let them live in that during the months of hot weather? So an experimental refriger- ator was set up in the spring of 1948. It had observation win- dows along the sides and a small pond let into the floor. Early in June three king pen- guins that had arrived the pre- vious autumn were placed in it for a sort of summer holiday, and to everyone's delight remained fit and thriving through the hot- test weather. Penguins are about the only animals that find the British cli- mate too warm for them. Polar bears seem quite satisfied with it, even on hot summer days. Fortunately the majority of ani- mals soon become accustomed to a change of climate. Many tropical animals can be kept out of doors right through the winter and seem to thrive en it. At Whipsnade you can watch lions playing in the snow like kittens, and the tigers some- times break the ice on their bathing pond in order to have a mid -winter dip. Some animals from warm countries, though, are extremely sensitive to changes in climate. Some of the most difficult of these to keep are humming birds. -Among the most beautiful of nature's creatures, they are well worth the trouble of keeping them alive in this country. They are very tiny - some no bigger than a large bee — and they can only maintain their high .body temperatures if their MERRY MENAGERIE "He's getting rich! Gets paid by the quart for trampling grapes!" surroundings are kept warm. The humming bird house at the London Zoo is kept at 75 deg. F., and even at this temperature the tiny birds have . to spend much of their time feeding to maintain body heat, To give them plenty of time to eat, the lights are left full on until 8.30 at night. After that blue lamps are switched on so that any bird feeling hungry can always feed. Even at 75. deg., a fast of more than a few hours can result in death from star- vation. Climate, though, is only one of the zoo man's anxieties, Certain animals are tricky to keep be- cause they are food faddists. Giant pandas must have plenty of fresh bamboo shoots, and Aus- tralia's delightful little Koala bears demand eucalyptus leaves. Bamboo shoots are scarce in this country, and eucalyptus leaves unobtainable in any quantity. So giant pandas are not easy to keep here, and koala bears im- possible. In the late summer of 1953 a kiwi was flown over from New Zealand as a Coronation gift to the London Zoo from the New Zealand Government. Its feeding at once became a problem, not so much for the Zoo keepers as for the gardeners. Kiwis live almost entirely on earthworms, so the gardeners had to dig in every available spot to supply the new arrival with something Iike 300 worms 'a day.' Fortunate- ly, after a few weeks they were able to have regular supplies of worms sent from Scotland. A few years ago New York Zoo faced a similar worm prob- lem. In 1948 they received three duck-billed platypuses, the curi- ous Australian egg -laying ani- mals that are now extremely rare. To keep them going, the Zoo had to find about 1,000 worms a day. To meet this colossal demand, a worm farm was set up in a cellar beneath the lion house. Here adult worms are kept in small breeding boxes filled with rich soil, the temperature and dampness of the boxes being carefully regulated. Under these conditions the worm eggs take about three weeks to hatch, when the wormlets are then transferred to growing pits. All kinds offood for the worms are added to the soil of • these pits. Fortunately, worms are not fussy. They will thrive on almost any kind of garbage. Every .day keepers are faced with the tedious job of going through some of the soil in these pits and sifting it until they have picked out 21/2 Ib. of worms —something like 1,000 average size worms. Sometimes animals develop in- explicable food fads that can be most irritating. Snakes are not the sort of animals you might expect to be temperamental, but some of the large pythons in the reptile house have occasionally developed a most unusual food preference. These larger snakes are gen- erally fed on freshly killed tame rats. Now some pythons devel- op a preference for rats of a certain colour, so that one will only eat white rats, while an- other will look at nothing but brown 'ones. Some really diffi- cult individuals will not touch rats at all, but will only eat birds. Once it has made up its mind a snake seems to stick. to its decision. These choosey in- dividuals will starve to death rather than eat anything other than the food of their choice. The largest meteorite on ex- hibition, which weighs 361/2 tons, is now in the American Museum of Natural History. TRUCKIN' ON DOWN --• Carlos Londono, his wife and four chil- dren, and a 36 -year-old White truck finally arrived in Cleve-. land, Ohio, after nearly 27 months of travel through steaming jungles, across plains and mountains from Bogota, Colombia. -Beginning in May, 1954, when Londono decided to head north, the saga has included an attack by a jaguar in the jungles of Costa Rica, crossing through a No Man's Land in a shooting skirmish between Costa Rica and Nicaragua, d violent storm that upset their truck, and two children born along the way. The truck was plastered with advertisements en route to help pay travel expenses. Having been nomads for so long, the Londonos are planning to settle in Cleveland, He presented the truck to the White Motor Co., with which he hopes to get lab as a machinist. LEATHERNECK ,ON LEATHER STOMACH — The marines have landed. -- right on the tummy of Elaine Maibin. At attention on her abdomen is 1/Sgt. James R. Pippin, a 200 -pounder. Elaine was crowned Queen of the 2nd Marine Division at the unit's seventh annual reunion. Her strong stomach was developed by singing exercises—Miss Malbin is also an opera star. TABLE TALKS �Jans Andtews, Pickling time already? Hardly seems possible, does it? How- ever, no use worrying about the • flight of time — so here are some recipes that have been thoroughly tested and which I can highly recommend. * * * GHERKINS 4 quarts cucumbers 2 to 3 inches long 4 quarts (20 cups) boiling water 1 cup table' (bag) salt or 11/ cups coarse salt 8 cups blended vinegar 3/ cup salt 1/ cup sugar .- Spices (see Note below) 7 cups sugar ' Wash cucumbers, scrup well, rinse, drain well and place in a crock. Cover with. -hot•• brine made by combining water and salt. Pour over cucumbers, cover and let stand overnight. Drain cucumbers thoroughly and place in clean, dry crock. Prepare pickle mixture by com- bining the cold vinegar, salt, the ee, cup sugar and spices. Pour over cucumbers. Each morning for the next 14 days, add Y2 cup sugar, stirring well to dissolve the sugar. When last of sugar is added, remove pickles from liquid and pack in- to sterilized jars. Strain pickle mixture to remove spices, pour over pickles and seal. Yield: Approx. 4 quarts. * * * NINE DAY PICKLES 4 quarts cucumbers 2 to 3 inches long 4 quarts (20 cups) boiling water 2 cups table (bag) salt or 3 cups coarse salt 1. teaspoon alum 4 quarts (20 cups) boiling water 8 cups blended vinegar 6 cups sugar spices (see NOTE below) Wash cucumbers, scrub well, rinse, drain well and place in a crock. Cover with hot brine made by combining 4 quarts boiling water with salt. Let stand 3• days. Drain cucumbers from brine, bring • to boiling point, 'pour over cucumbers and again let stand 3 days. Repeat this and again let stand 3 days. Drain cucumbers and place in a crock. Add alum to remaining 4 quarts boiling water and pour over . cucumbers. Let stand 6 hours, then drain and rinse thoroughly, Pack pickles into sterilized jars. Prepare pickle mixture by combining the vine- gar, sugar and spices. Boil mix- ture for 5 minutes. Strain through ccheesecloth, pour over pickles and seal. Yield; Approx. 4 quarts. NOTE:— Suggested combina- tions of spices: •(1) 3A cup mustard seed and Y2 cup mixed pickling spice (2) 1 ounce cinnamon stick and 2 tablespoons celrey seed (3) 1 tablespoon celery seed and 3 tablespoons whole cloves (4) 1 ounce cinnamon stick and 2 teaspoons evhole cloves k r* DILL PICKLES Use freshly picked cucumbers 3 to 5 niches long. Wash, soak overnight in cold water. Drain thoroughly. Place pieces of dill in the bottom of clean jars. Pack cucumbers into jars and place more dill on top. Com- bine: 342 cup table (bag) salt or 3/4 cup coarse salt 2 cups white vinegar 6.eups water Bring to boil and pour hot liquid over cucumbers. Seal. Let stand in a cool place at least 6 weeks .before using. Yield: sufficient liquid for 4 quarts pickles. If ; desired, a small piece of garlJ may be added to each quart ,of pickles. * * * ,. .. - BREAD AND BUTTER PICKLES 6 quarts small cucumbers 1 to 11 inches in diameter 1 quart small white onions 4 green peppers 1 sweet red pepper 1 cup table (bag) salt or 11/2 cups coarse salt 9 cups water 8 cups vinegar 4 cups sugar 1 tablespoon tumeric 1 teaspoon mustard seed 1 teaspoon celery seed Wash all vegetables. Slice cumumbers and onions thinly. Remove seeds and dice peppers. Make a brine of the salt and water. . Cool and pour over vegetables. Let stand overnight. Drain thoroughly. Combine vinegar, sugar and spices. Bring to boil and add vegetables. When thoroughly heated, pack in hot, sterilized jars and seal. Yield: about 6 quarts. * * CBILI SAUCE 1 tablespoon whole cloves 3 tablespoons whole allspice 1 gallon peeled, chopped ripe tomatoes (8 lb.) 2%% cups chopped, peeled onions (6 medium) 21/2 cups chopped, seeded green or sweet red peppers (.6 medium) 134 cups sugar 2 tablespoons salt 4 cups vinegar Tie spices in a cheesecloth bag, Combine with remaining ingedients in saucepan. Cook, uncovered, 2;12 to 3 hours or until quite thick, stirring fre- quently. Remove spice bag. Pour into hot sterilzed sealers or jars and seal. Yield: about 12 cups. * 0 0 GREEN TOMATO PICKLES 30 medium green tomatoes 6 large onions % cup table (bag) salt or 3f cup coarse salt 1 tablespoon mustard seed 1 tablespoon whole allspice 1 tablespoon celery seed 1 tablespoon whole cloves 1 tablespoon dry mustard 1 tablespoon peppercorns % lemon 2 sweet red peppers 21/2 cups brown sugar 3 cups vinegar Slice tomatoes and onions thinly and place in a crock or enamel vessel in alternate lay- ers with the salt. Let stand overnight. In the morning, drain thoroughly, rinse in cold water and drain well again. Tie all spices loosely in a cheesecloth bag; slice lemon thinly; remove stem and seed cores from pep- pers and slice thinly. Add spice bag and sugar to vinegar, bring to boiling point, then add to- matoes, onions, lemon and pep- pers. Cook for 1/2 hour, stirring gently to prevent sticking. Re- move spice bag and pack pickles in hot, sterilized jars and seal. Yield: about 12 cups. When Stars Fall On 26 April,- 1803, at one o'clock in the afternoon, the in- habitants of the little French village of L'Aigle were disturb- ed by .a strange sound. It was not unlike a violent roll of thunder—yet the skies were al- most cloudless, and there was no sign of any storm in the vicinity. As the villagers rushed out of their houses in alarm, they caught sight of an immense ball of fire darting across the sky, and as it vanished from their view there came a series of violent explosions audible for over fifty miles around. A few minutes later, a great number of stones fell to the earth, land- ing at speeds great enough to cause them to bury themselves deeply in the ground. Up to that time, the old stories of 'stones from heaven" had been disregarded as strictly non- proven, but tbe�,',L`Aigie affair could not be ' eXplained away. Jean - Baptiste Biot, one of France's ' leading astronomers, was sent to the village to draw up a report. Biot was suitably conscientious. He interviewed witnesses, collected all the facts he could, and — most important of all - recovered some of the strange stones that had fallen. The heaviest of them weighed 11/2 pounds .. , Further research into the na- ture of ordinary meteors, or shooting -stars, provided a clear answer. Meteors, ranging from gigantic masses weighing many tons down to tiny particles smaller than sand -grains, re- volve round the Sun just as the planets do, though in orbits that are generally more elliptical. So long as they keep in airless space, they are safe, as there is nothing to impede their move- ment; but if they venture too close to the Earth, and are drawn "downwards" by the powerful gravitational pull, friction is set up, and heat results , . . Over a hundred years after L'Aigle, an even greater monster landed in Northern Siberia. It was fortunate that Siberia is not a densely populated place; , about mid-day 'on 30 June, 1908, a bluish disk about half the size of the Moon appeared in the sky, accompanied by a terrific noise like a cannonade. This was followed by an explosion audible hundreds of .miles away, and trees were blown flat for .a dis- tance of fifty miles round the spot where the impact occurred, seared by heat and stripped of their bark and branches Ordinary shooting -stars have been known from ancient times. Now and then, magnificent dis- plays are seen, and A.D. 902 was named the Year r of the Stars, be- cause on one night "there were seen lances, an infinite number of stars, whichscattered them- selves like rain to the right and the left". The showers of 1202, 1366 and 1833 were no less re- markable, while another major display occurred in 1799. Sig- nificantly, all these showers oc- curred in the month of Novem- ber, as did the lesser but still brilliant display of ] 866. It be- came clear that this was no mere coincidence. Every November, the earth approached a shoal of meteors, and once in 33-1/3 years passed right through the thick- est part of the celestial swarm.— From "The Story of Man and the Stars," by Patrick Moor e F.R,A.S. THIRD -PARTY NOMINEES — The Republicans and Democrats are not alone in their campaigning. At a convention in New York, the Hobo Party nominated Boxcar Betty, left, for vice president and Bozo, right, for president. They have not, as yet, announced their platform. WHOSE PICTURE ARE YOU DIALING? The hear -and -see telephones of the future aren't far away any more. Floyd K. Becker, a Bell Telephone Laboratories engineer, demonstrates a successful modes of a picture -phone system. A twa-by•three-inch screen and small transmitter left, are the principal components of the system, which uses only one extra telephone line on Customer's premises. Itwill be possible to dial a caller's picture like an ordinary telephone call. Bell engineers have transmitted recognizable pikturet'balween New York and Los Angeles.