Animal Tales

Once in a while you need to be reminded that no matter how bad things seem, they could be worse:

Wanted: Mate for lovesick giraffe in Mexico park

MONTERREY, Mexico (Reuters) - Keepers of a small menagerie at a Mexican park are looking for a mate for a lovesick giraffe after the 15-foot-tall beast tried to make love to a tree and a garden shed.

The director of Central Park in Ciudad Juarez, south of the border from El Paso, Texas, said on Friday they have been looking since last month for a mate for the five-year-old giraffe, named Modesto.

"He's driving us crazy," Juan Aragones told Reuters in a telephone
interview. "He's mounted a tree, a fence and even a shed."

Aragones said Central Park had begun contacting animal dealers in
Mexico to find a mate for Modesto, who was born in captivity and has lived alone at the recreational park for three years. He has never had a sexual partner.

The park is home only to Modesto and a few ducks.

I can certainly empathize. But why use Lavalife when a shed will do?

And here's a story about a moose raising her offspring to be a delinquent:

Drunk Moose Invade Swedish Seniors Home

STOCKHOLM, Sweden (AP) - They rarely have problems with drunks or rowdy animals, but residents of a retirement home in southern Sweden had to deal with both: A pair of intoxicated moose invaded the premises.

The moose — a cow and her calf — had become drunk over the weekend by eating fermented apples they found outside the home in Sibbhult, said employee Anna Karlsson.

Police managed to scare them off once, but the tipsy mammals returned to get more of the tempting fruits. This time the moose were drunk and aggressive, forcing police to send for a hunter with a dog to make them leave.

Police did not pursue the culprits, but made sure all apples were picked up from the area, police chief Bengt Hallberg said. No one was hurt.

What kind of example is the mother setting for her calf? Getting drunk, and showing no respect to the elderly? No wonder the new generation of moose is full of drunken hedonists with no manners. It goes to show you, moose can only be effectively raised in a two parent, heterosexual family.