Yesterday, I attended a most wonderful lunch. We were a disparate bunch of females who included a professional French horn player and her girlfriend, a pretty young Italian academic, a pyschotherapist, a teacher, an animal communicator and a nun. It sounds like the cast of a sit-com but in fact all, barring myself and my friend Mo, had one thing in common - rabbits! The wonderful, sparkly, twinkly nun kept rabbits in her convent. The animal communicator boarded rabbits. Most had adopted rabbits from a well-known animal rescue charity, the Mayhew.
I have lived a rabbitless life. The nearest I came to them, pet-wise, was when I owned a guineapig as a child. My friend Mo is allergic to them. Indeed, when our hostess's house rabbit hopped towards her, her nose twitched more than the rabbit's. But I have to say that I can see their attraction. They are clean, they don't smell, they are cuddly and furry, cheap to feed and, with their floppy ears and wiffly noses, quite adorable.
But I must say I have fallen for the little creature in the photographs. It's called an aye-aye and I'm sure they must have modelled ET on it. They are native to Madagascar and eat fruit and grubs. I think an aye-aye would do well in my garden, which has spiders, caterpillars and slugs galore, not to mention loads of windfall apples. However, the garden is also the territory of five foxes and Flad so sadly, I must resist otherwise it would soon be a case of aye-aye, bye-bye.
2 comments:
They've got two aye-ayes at Bristol Zoo, Hydra. Apparently, they can live up to 23 years in captivity. Don't think you'd want one in your garden, though; they're noisy at night - tapping on trees to see if they are hollow and ripping off bark to get at grubs inside the tree. They also call at night during the mating season.
They're on the endangered species list, partly due to persecution by Madagascan tribes, who thought them so ugly they used to beat them to death in the past and, mostly due to deforestation.
Aaah, how could they think such a cute little creature was ugly? Thanks for all that interesting info, though.
Post a Comment