Review and images by Fembrogon; edited by bmathison1972
Is there any animal more perfectly suited as the poster child of nature’s weirdness than the duck-billed platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus)? …Well, okay, there probably is; but the platypus is almost certainly the most ubiquitous. When it was first discovered by the Western scientific world, many did not believe this “flat-footed” mammal was real; of course, today we know clearly otherwise.
In addition to being a country, Australia is also a continent, but the continent of Australia is not just composed of Australia itself. The Australian continent includes mainland Australia, Tasmania, New Guinea, the Aru Islands, the Ashmore and Cartier Islands, and most of the Coral Sea Islands as well as a smattering of other islands.
Review and images by Suspsy; edited by bmathison1972
When I began amassing an animal figure collection for my boys to play with and learn from, my goal was for a wide diversity of genera from across the globe. Popular beasts like the lion, the tiger, the elephant, the giraffe, the hippo, the crocodile, the kangaroo, and the wolf, of course, but I also wished to include odder ones like the Komodo dragon, the sloth, the cassowary, and the platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus).
Review by Lanthanotus; edited by bmathison1972
If there are oddballs amongst mammals (and there certainly are), the monotremes are heavy competitors for first place. The order Monotremata includes only five extant species, all of which are threatened to different degress. Most popular is the improbable platypus which was first thought to be a faux by those Europeans who only knew it from imported, stuffed specimens.
If you wanted to see mammals as they were when they started to differentiate from reptiles, the best place would be to look at the monotremes. These mammals lay eggs, sweat milk, and the one we will look at here, the platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus) even still has venom.
Review and images by jumboplayset; edited by bmathison1972
Ornithorhynchus anatinus!!! If this animal doesn’t send an electromagnetic current of the gleeful excitement of discovery up and down your spine, then you may be an invertebrate 🙂 ! Along with the short-beaked and long-beaked echidnas, the platypus is the last of the monotremes.
Australia, like all islands, is an isolated laboratory of sorts, one that offers a look at what the world might be like under different evolutionary pressures. The rest of the world at large operates in much the same way, no matter where you go; the placental mammals (cats, dogs, deer, antelope, etc.) dominate top tier niches.
Review and photos by Suspsy; edited by bmathison1972
In 1798, a specimen of a most unusual Australian animal perplexed a great many scientific minds in Great Britain. Some even went so far as to suspect that it was a hoax. And really, who could fault them for being suspicious of a small, furry mammal with a duck-like bill, a beaver-like tail, otter-like feet, venomous spines, and the ability to lay eggs like a reptile?
