Mid-Week Mellow

Time for some animal antics....


Oh my God! Edgar Allan Poe was right!

A Manitoba wildlife centre has an unusual bird on its hands – a talking crow named Jet.
 
The crow came to Wildlife Haven Rehabilitation Centre in Ile Des Chenes, Man., as an injured fledgling about four years ago.

Staff determined he couldn't be released due to a damaged wing, which hadn't healed right.

They started spending more time with him, to socialize him in the hopes he could be one of their ambassador animals.

Those animals are used in education in the community, travelling to places such as schools and seniors homes. But while working to see if they might be able to crate train him, something amazing happened:  Jet started to talk.

Shauna Hewson co-ordinates educational programs for the centre. She said last winter, a volunteer was alone with Jet in the barn when she heard someone say, "Who's outside?" 

The volunteer was amazed to realize it was Jet, mimicking a phrase the volunteer often used.

Hewson said Jet can also say "hello" and he laughs.

"Nevermore!"

Is she making a snow-tiger?

Keepers at Kaliningrad Zoo were stumped: who was heaving giant snowballs into the tiger enclosure after hours?

Turns out, the impressive snowballs were the work of Tanya the tiger herself. 

Security cameras caught the cat in the act. 

"One morning, zoologists came to work and found snowballs in Tanya’s cage. Naturally, no one thought that the tigress was able to make them by herself. Zoologists decided that someone joked and threw large snowballs into the cage, but one evening she was caught," zoo spokesperson Ekaterina Mikhailova told the Siberian Times. 

"Our staff noticed it three years ago. They say that she doesn’t like making snowballs in the daylight, prefers doing this at night," added zoo director Svetlana Sokolova.

When no one is around, the tigress diligently goes to work gathering snow, rolling it from one side of her enclosure to another until it forms a large ball. She then starts work on another. 

If only she knew how to pile her snowballs into a snowman.