UTMWWoQS, Installment the First.
Hello, and welcome to the first installment in my new quasi-informative series of weekly blog entries I'd like to call Uncle Travelling Matt's Wild Word of Questionable Science, or UTMWWoQS, for those of you out there who enjoy assimulating unpronouncable acronyms.
Since this is the inaugral issue of this blog, I thought I'd start off with a subject we could all relate to. Llamas. Everyone loves llamas. Their long bushy tails, soft fuzzy coats, their delicate paws. But I bet as you pass by your local llama ranch you wonder to yourself, "where did all these llamas come from?" which is inevitably followed by the followup, "and why are they hanging out with all those sheep?"
The answers to these questions are both closely linked and extremely shocking to the average person. With that in mind, the following paragraphs should only be read when your parents are out of the room, or you might get in trouble.
If you're still reading this (which I assume you are, if you can make sense of this sentence), I will reveal the truth that has been closely guarded by the close-knit cult of sheep and llama farmers for generations: Llamas are actually the rarely-reached adult stage in the life cycle of everyone's favourite ruminant that goes "baaa".
I know what you're thinking... "lamb, llama... A llama is just a lamb with an extra syllable! Why didn't I notice this before?"
Don't worry, this is an oversight common to over 99.9 percent of this country's population, which is probably due to the vast influence the wool industry has over the international media.
Unknown to most, the life cycle of the llama is such: A sheep is born. In the wilds of Southnorthern China, where the species originates, a llama would spend a year or two in this larval state before entering the chrysalis stage of development, from which would emerge a small llama. However, in the captivity of the sheep and llama ranching industry of Northern America, this process is thwarted at every attempt by the shearing of the animal's wool.
Naturally, during the autumn months, the wool would grow around the animal's body until it was entirely encased within a blanket its own hair. At this point, the sheep would secrete various natural chemicals which cause the hardening of the woolen layer into a cocoon, just in time for the winter hibernation period where the sheep undergoes the major structural and hormonal stages of the metamorphosis into the llamaform state.
Unfortunately, the shearing of sheep for the wool industry has the tragic side effect of keeping millions of these animals in the larval state for the entire duration of their lifespan. An interesting biological fact about sheep is their ability to reproduce large numbers of hatchlings without progressing to the full adult state, which is largely unheard of in mammals with metamorphic life cycles. Since the nature of the llama's lifecycle is largely unknown to the general population, it has only been in recent years that animal rights activists have made the alteration of the llama's progression to adulthood a major point of their campaigns.
Well, it seems my crew is here to take me to the airport, where we'll be embarking on a long and dangerous scientific expedition that should last for at least an hour or two, so that's all I can write for today. However, there is much more to learn about the llama, which you can discover by browsing the internet or perusing the resources at your local library. Areas of interest include Stephen Hawking's recent investigations into trans-temporal llama physics and the special quantum interactions of the llama's inherent magical field upon the motion of subatomic particles. You may also want to see if your dad has a copy of Monty Python's llama sketch, which covers many areas of llama physiology not examined in this blog.
Fare thee well, until we meet again,
---Uncle Travelling Matt
Since this is the inaugral issue of this blog, I thought I'd start off with a subject we could all relate to. Llamas. Everyone loves llamas. Their long bushy tails, soft fuzzy coats, their delicate paws. But I bet as you pass by your local llama ranch you wonder to yourself, "where did all these llamas come from?" which is inevitably followed by the followup, "and why are they hanging out with all those sheep?"
The answers to these questions are both closely linked and extremely shocking to the average person. With that in mind, the following paragraphs should only be read when your parents are out of the room, or you might get in trouble.
If you're still reading this (which I assume you are, if you can make sense of this sentence), I will reveal the truth that has been closely guarded by the close-knit cult of sheep and llama farmers for generations: Llamas are actually the rarely-reached adult stage in the life cycle of everyone's favourite ruminant that goes "baaa".
I know what you're thinking... "lamb, llama... A llama is just a lamb with an extra syllable! Why didn't I notice this before?"
Don't worry, this is an oversight common to over 99.9 percent of this country's population, which is probably due to the vast influence the wool industry has over the international media.
Unknown to most, the life cycle of the llama is such: A sheep is born. In the wilds of Southnorthern China, where the species originates, a llama would spend a year or two in this larval state before entering the chrysalis stage of development, from which would emerge a small llama. However, in the captivity of the sheep and llama ranching industry of Northern America, this process is thwarted at every attempt by the shearing of the animal's wool.
Naturally, during the autumn months, the wool would grow around the animal's body until it was entirely encased within a blanket its own hair. At this point, the sheep would secrete various natural chemicals which cause the hardening of the woolen layer into a cocoon, just in time for the winter hibernation period where the sheep undergoes the major structural and hormonal stages of the metamorphosis into the llamaform state.
Unfortunately, the shearing of sheep for the wool industry has the tragic side effect of keeping millions of these animals in the larval state for the entire duration of their lifespan. An interesting biological fact about sheep is their ability to reproduce large numbers of hatchlings without progressing to the full adult state, which is largely unheard of in mammals with metamorphic life cycles. Since the nature of the llama's lifecycle is largely unknown to the general population, it has only been in recent years that animal rights activists have made the alteration of the llama's progression to adulthood a major point of their campaigns.
Well, it seems my crew is here to take me to the airport, where we'll be embarking on a long and dangerous scientific expedition that should last for at least an hour or two, so that's all I can write for today. However, there is much more to learn about the llama, which you can discover by browsing the internet or perusing the resources at your local library. Areas of interest include Stephen Hawking's recent investigations into trans-temporal llama physics and the special quantum interactions of the llama's inherent magical field upon the motion of subatomic particles. You may also want to see if your dad has a copy of Monty Python's llama sketch, which covers many areas of llama physiology not examined in this blog.
Fare thee well, until we meet again,
---Uncle Travelling Matt
posted by Forkimified at 10:49 AM
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