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Squirrels Evolving to Suit Global Warming?
Gavinsblog writes "New Scientist is reporting
that using a technique called quantitive genetics, researchers have found that
due to the effects of global warming, female squirrels now give birth on average
18 days earlier in the year than their great-great-grandmothers. Is global warming
also affecting human evolution?
"
"
For NASDAQ that is, they have been hit twice by those cute furry things. Once in 1987 and then again in 1994.
:)
In the UK office we still joke about it, much to the annoyance of the management
Yes. We get hungry for squirrel chili about 18 days sooner 'round here.
Huh! I thought squirrels were doing well by foecasting if we would have a bad winter; now they are telling us we're going to have a tough millenium!!
-------------------------
A person of moderate zeal
Thanks to human inginuity, we can bottle ourselves up in nice little climate-controlled houses, eat carefully prepared and nutritionally balanced foods, get regimented exercise, and receive all manner of medical treatment that cancel out pretty much everything that evolution has to work with.
all humans have SUVs and AC?
That actually sums up pretty nicely why the rest of the world don't like americans:
if they haven't got a SUV with AC they're not really human.
=>If they're not really human why don't we shoot them and take their oil for our SUVs?
"I don't know that Atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots." -George H.W. Bush
Clearly GAWD-DUH is changing these little squirrels to fit his heavenly PLAN-NUH. Oh, he works in mysterious WAYS-UH. All of those SINNERS who believe in EVOLUTION-NUH will be shown the folly of their ways when the find themselves burning in the unholy HELL-FIRES of HELL-UH!!
Anyone notice that city squirrels sometimes now pause on the dividing lines on streets? It would be an interesting experiment to transplant some UK city squirrels with US city squirrels to see if the side of the street we drive on is being genetically encoded.
Do you honestly believe that legless girls with three noses get laid as much as the more conventional folk?
There is this Polish saying: ``kazda potwora znajdzie swego amatora''. Loosely translated it means ``every monster's gonna find itself a mate''.
And I've seen several times, that they really do find a mate and often produce lots and lots of offspring.
Robert
Bastard Operator From 193.219.28.162
Generally, one cannot claim that species evolve for some purpose
;- )
My dad claims the human body evolved so it would fit perfectly on a motorcycle...
You can't take the sky from me...
I have a small ($3 million) study grant from the E.P.A. and after careful study and review I've determined that global warming is caused by squirrels having their litter earlier and earlier.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
...I hear that they're less likely to be married at the time. ;)