Now 93

The cover for Now 93 is very crowded, with blue sky, rainbows, cobwebs covered in dewdrops, daisies, a ladybird, a blue butterfly and multicoloured umbrellas. It’s seems to be going through a sort of Springtime/April Showers theme. Though the past few months the weather in the seasons has been jumbled up. While we had warm autumn, spring
has been snowy, with the weird sight of snow and blossom on trees at the same time.

A singles chart tradition over the past few years is for a number one single which dominates the early months of the year. Last year it was ‘Uptown Funk’ by Mark Ronson feat. Bruno Mars, the year before it was ‘Happy’ by Pharrell Williams. This year it’s ‘7 Years’ by Lukas Graham, and like the previous two, ‘7 Years’ is track one on CD one of the first Now! release of the year.

Lukas Graham are a Danish band rather than a solo artist (though you could hardly blame anyone for being confused, as they are named after the lead singer). ‘7 Years’ is about going through a life story, from 7 years old, 11 years old, 20 years old, 30 years old and 60 years old, childhood, having your own children, the inevitability that life ends and the death of the lead singer’s father. So you can see why it struck such a chord with people.

A song with a similar theme about time passing and life advancing is ‘Stressed Out’ by alternative hip hop act Twenty One Pilots. This track is a little more upbeat than ‘7 Years’, and is just about being an adult and having nostalgia for your childhood. You played as a kid, but now you’re an adult you have to go to work. But it’s quite a fun track in its own way.

Justin Bieber has two of the seven number one singles on this CD. ‘Love Yourself’ was co-written by Ed Sheeran, and sounds more like an Ed Sheeran song than a Justin Bieber song. The title might imply it’s one of those love songs crossed with a confidence booster song that have been popular in recent years, but it’s in fact the exact opposite, a bitter break-up song about someone who has too high an opinion of themself. Resisting temptation to say whether Justin Bieber and Ed Sheeran are guilty of that…

Justin Bieber’s other charttopper on this compilation is ‘Sorry’. I really like it, which is the first time I’ve ever been able to say that about a Justin Bieber song. Maybe it helps that he isn’t in the video. But seriously, it is good. He still can’t really sing I suppose, but let’s face it, that’s hardly an exclusive club when it comes to popstars. It’s the production that is the best part of it, which is by Skrillex, and I love the tropical house sound this track has.

Shawn Mendes, a newcomer is like Justin Bieber a Canadian popstar who’s a favourite with teenybopper girls. His track on here ‘Stitches’ also sounds like it could be an Ed Sheeran song, but Ed Sheeran didn’t have anything to do with it. To be honest, it is a lot better than ‘Love Yourself’.

Zayn Malik from One Direction has turned out to be the Robbie Williams/Geri Halliwell, as being the the first member to scarper from a big bubblegum pop group as such does well in their a solo career. Not only has he left the band, he’s jettisoned his surname as well, and is just going by Zayn. Or rather, ZAYN, written all in capitals. The track ‘PILLOWTALK’ is written all in capitals too. Is this going to be his “thing”?

‘PILLOWTALK’ has been a hit, it got to number one in the UK, and it was also a number one in the US, something One Direction never managed (or Robbie Williams, or Geri Halliwell for that matter, well unless you count ‘Wannabe’ when Geri was still part of the Spice Girls). I don’t care for ‘PILLOWTALK’ myself though, it’s a random mess of production and vocally it meanders all over the place. 1)

Another number one single on this CD got there on the same day this compilation was released! That is ‘I Took A Pill In Ibiza’ by Mike Posner. Though it’s titled ‘In Ibiza (SeeB Remix)’ on the CD back cover. Which is a bit odd, as they don’t censor the lyrics on the CD track itself. Who would have predicted Mike Posner would get another hit, let alone a number one?! Certainly not me, as I think ‘I Took A Pill In Ibiza’ sounds awful.

The final number one single is 2015’s Christmas number one, ‘A Bridge Over You’ by The Lewisham And Greenwich NHS Choir. It’s a medley of Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’ and Coldplay’s ‘Fix You’. Ironically, the song is a bit sickly to be honest, but it was definitely for a good cause, so I’m pleased it got the Christmas number one.

Jess Glynne also has a charity record on this compilation, for Children In Need. ‘Take Me Home’ is not a cover of the Cher and later Sophie Ellis-Bextor song, in fact it’s not a cover at all, which is rare for charity records. Jess Glynne co-wrote it herself, and once again gives a great vocal performance.

Another trend on the first Now! album of the year is to include the winners of the BBC Music Sound of [the year] and the BRIT Awards Critics Choice, and in 2016 both are one and the same, Jack Garrat, whose track ‘Worry’ is intriguing enough. He’ll probably be more of an albums artist than a singles one though.

‘Army’ by Ellie Goulding contains the lyrics “army of two”, which reminds me of the Dum Dums song ‘Army Of Two’. What an underrated band the Dum Dums were, and what an overlooked classic ‘Army Of Two’ was! They were ahead of their time really, Busted and McFly did a similar guitar-pop thing four years later and did very well. McFly’s bassist is Dougie Poynter, who was the long-term boyfriend of Ellie Goulding but they recently split up. Sorry, I don’t really have anything to say about Ellie Goulding’s ‘Army’ in its own right. 2)

Immediately after ‘Army’ on Now 93‘s tracklisting is ‘History’ by One Direction, which contains the lyrics “a whole lotta history”, similar to ‘A Whole Lotta History’ by Girls Aloud. ‘History’ is kind of their goodbye single for when they are “on hiatus”. I imagine they’ll get back together at some point, but yes whatever your opinion on One Direction
it’s definitely a bit of an end of an era.

Little Mix and Jason Derulo seem like a random collaboration, but then Little Mix have released a song with Missy Elliot before. Is that more strange or less strange than when she dueted with Mel B? I’m not sure. Anyway, Little Mix and Jason Derulo’s track ‘Secret Love Song’ is very, very overwrought and melodramatic. 3)

Quite a few songs on here have a bit of an alternative R&B feel to them. For the last couple of decades genres in pop music have all been borrowing from each other, and with R&B there is a lot with dark, eerie production and singing almost as if in a drunken haze. ‘The Hills’ by The Weeknd is perhaps the biggest example, but it is shown throughout this compilation.

While Beyonce doesn’t technically have a song of her own on this CD, she has a couple of guest appearances. Coldplay’s ‘Hymn For The Weekend’ (that’s as in the end of the week, not The Weeknd the popstar), features Beyonce on uncredited backing vocals. It’s alright, but as far as Coldplay working with a pop-R&B diva goes, I think I prefer Coldplay’s collaboration with Rihanna, ‘Princess of China’, or even when Chris Martin wrote and played the piano on ‘See It In A Boy’s Eyes’ for Jamelia. Coldplay, Beyonce and Bruno Mars performed ‘Adventure Of A Lifetime’ at the American Super Bowl half time show, though the version included on this CD is the original Coldplay studio version.

Beyonce’s second appearance on the CD is on ‘The Girl Is Mine’ by 99 Souls feat. Destiny’s Child and Brandy. It is not a cover version of the Paul McCartney and Michael Jackson track of the same name, which isn’t a very good song really. I mean, there’s a reason why their much better duet ‘Say, Say, Say’ is remembered and ‘The Girl Is Mine’ isn’t so much.

This ‘The Girl Is Mine’ is a mash-up of ‘The Boy Is Mine’ by Brandy & Monica and ‘Girl’ by Destiny’s Child by production duo 99 Souls. It had sampled the two tracks and been released as a bootleg before, for this commercial release Beyonce gave permission for her sampled vocals to be used and Brandy re-recorded hers. ‘The Girl Is Mine’ got to number 5 in the charts. It isn’t the first time ‘The Boy Is Mine’ has been sampled for a mash-up though. Stuntmasterz got to number 10 in 2001 with ‘The LadyBoy Is Mine’, a mash-up of ‘The Boy Is Mine’ and ‘Lady (Here Me Tonight)’ by Modjo.

I did wonder if ‘Me, Myself and I’ by G-Eazy x Bebe Rexha would turn out to be a cover of Beyonce’s song of the same name, but it isn’t.

I was surprised that ‘Sax’ by Fleur East didn’t appear on Now 92. It is on here. While ‘Sax’ is a good, fun sassy pop song, it feels like it came and went ages ago. Even odder that the booklet calls it “Fleur’s hugely anticipated single”. 4)

Chainsmokers were infamous for their irritating novelty track ‘#SELFIE’. On their song on this compilation, ‘Roses’, they’ve collaborated with a singer called… ROZES. Yes, it is spelt and typed like that. To be fair, I have heard one song from her before, ‘Burn Wild’, which I liked. ‘Roses’ has been a big hit in the US, and I hadn’t heard it before listening to this CD, but on first impressions I like it. The production is good and her vocals suit the song.

If ‘I’m In Control’ (which features Popcaan) is anything to go by, AlunaGeorge are going in a slightly more poppy direction. The song is nice enough, but a bit less interesting compared to what they did before.

There are a lot of tracks I love on this compilation.

‘Ex’s & Oh’s’ by Elle King is great, one of the best pop-rock hits in a long time. I kind of love the campy, trashy video with shirtless men, a barbecue and a trailer park in a desert.

‘Here’ by Alessia Cara is refreshing. With so many “in-your-face” PARTYPARTYPARTY songs out there, it’s nice to have one for those of us who are introverted and can end up being wallflowers sometimes. I like ‘Here’ because I felt just like that when I was younger and dragged along to clubs and parties I didn’t like. I don’t feel like that so much these days, but it’s always pretty good to know others have felt a similar way to you even if it’s how you felt in the past.

Tropical house is a popular trend I like at the moment. I adore ‘Sweet Lovin’ by Sigala feat. Bryn Christopher, a very uplifting and soaring dance track.

One I’m not so keen on is the tropical house covers of ‘Fast Car’ by Tracy Chapman. It’s one of my all-time favourite songs, but it seems to be getting covered in a tropical house style which I’m not sure fits. The one that has been the biggest hit is by Jonas Blue feat. Dakota, and to be honest I think they turned what was a very poignant song into a vapid, air-headed disposable one.

My favourite, in fact my favourite track of the year so far, is a tropical house one, ‘Lush Life’ by Swedish singer Zara Larsson. While it’s been a big hit, it’s one of those songs that should have been a summer anthem. I’ll probably listen to it a lot during the summer.

Now 93 had a few problems to contend with. One is how the singles charts are currently. With the introduction of streaming it has become a bit frozen in time, with the top 40 remaining unchanged and no new entries for weeks. It also seems to be getting difficult for them to licence songs from the biggest stars. Adele and Rihanna are noticeably absent despite having big hits. You can tell they were struggling for stuff to put on, with many of the songs not even making the top 40. ‘Stevie Knows’ by Olly Murs didn’t even chart at all! But, in a strange way, Now 93 doesn’t feel like it has as much filler as some previous early year Now! compilations have. The good stuff on here is very good. Maybe the key is finding interesting, varied songs that are “relevant”, for want of a better word.

NOTES

1) ‘PILLOWTALK’ is a random mess, but it’s a coherent neat freak in comparison to ‘Hands To Myself’ by Selena Gomez. Put it this way, if a room was as messy as this
song is, you’d be better of demolishing it than attempting to tidy it.

2) ‘Faded’ by Alan Walker features an ethereal female vocal, which isn’t Alan Walker himself obviously, he’s the producer. The voice sounds very like Ellie Goulding, but it isn’t her, it’s a singer named Iselin Solheim.

3) Jason Derulo has a song of his own on here, ‘Get Ugly’. The chorus goes “diddly-diddly-diddly-diddly”. I’m not sure Ned Flanders would care for it though. To be fair, ‘Get Ugly’
is hard to actively dislike. I mean, it’s crap, but it’s hard to actively dislike.

4) Still, at least Fleur East can say her single was included. That’s more than last year’s winner Louisa Johnson can say! Her X Factor winner’s single bombed spectacularly,
not even making the top 8 let alone number one, it’s still a shock to see it not included. The X Factor winners single is usually a certainty to feature on the first Now! album of the year. Even more of a snub when you consider how slow-moving the charts are these days and how the first one of the year is a struggle to fill anyway. Don’t get me wrong, Louisa Johnson’s single was awful, The X Factor winner’s song always is, but it does increasingly look like The X Factor is just going to pretend series 12 never happened.

5) Zara Larsson has another track on this compilation, featuring on ‘Girls Like’ by Tinie Tempah. I like the lyric “I can make a honey give away her last Rolo” and the shout-out to ‘Sing It Back’ by Moloko.

6) Craig David appears on here with ‘When The Bassline Drops’. The CD booklet says he had “returned to his childhood love of DJ-ing”. I’m sure it doesn’t mean this, but it makes me think of a sort of Fisher-Price toy mixing desk or turning the radio on and off during
Musical Chairs.

7) ‘Coming Home’ by Sigma & Rita Ora is OK I suppose, but I had a mondegreen with the lyric “all I got left is rubble and dust”. For a second I thought she sang “all I got left is rubber ducks”!

8) The compilation ends with a tribute to the late David Bowie, by including the classic ‘Heroes’.

The Secret Life Of The Zoo

CONTAINS SPOILERS

It’s a shame they only made one series of the BBC drama Our Zoo, about how Chester Zoo was established in the 1930s, but Channel 4 did a documentary series about modern day Chester Zoo, so you could view it as a sequel of sorts.

This documentary series was narrated by Olivia Colman and showed behind the scenes of Chester Zoo. It is one of the world leaders in preserving endangered species. 99% of the animals there were born in captivity, and some have been at Chester Zoo for 60 years!

An elephant herd in the zoo includes a large adult male, Aung Bo. In the wild this would be unusual, as elephant herds are adult females and calves. Although apparently adult male
elephants aren’t quite as solitary as you might think, while they aren’t part of herds they spend time socialising with other adult male elephants. The programme gave a reason that in the wild males are ousted from the herd. As they become adults they become too much trouble and don’t co-operate like the females do, so it’s better for the herd if they
aren’t in it.

The matriarch of the herd, Thi, is pregnant and due to give birth. 11 years ago she gave birth to a stillborn calf, and the zoo keepers had to remove it as Thi didn’t want to leave it. We see the birth of Thi’s new calf, and luckily it is healthy. It is a very cute baby elephant who the keepers name Nandita.

Another baby elephant Hari was shown kicking a large metal ball around almost like he was playing football. He was a bit of an “annoying little brother” type to his older sister Sithami, and when his younger sister Nandita is born he becomes jealous that he’s not the baby of the family any more, and all the adult females in the herd are fussing over her. He kicks her, it reminded me a bit of Harry and Lulu in Harry Enfield and Chums. But eventually Hari and Nandita appear to get on better and play together.

There will be more going on with the animals than we can understand. Elephants for instance communicate with low-frequency sounds which we can’t even hear.

Sadly, this herd suffers a lot of tragedy, as they have lost two young male elephants to a virus. We see another elephant succumb to it, Bala. She had been quite close to her brother Hari and had been learning to be a mother from looking after Nandita. But at some point she contracted the virus. She didn’t want to spend time with Hari or Nandita anymore.
When she passed away Hari tried to get her back up, apparently for quite a long time. We then learn in the final episode that Hari caught the virus and passed away too.
The only bit of good news we get is that two of the elephants in the herd are pregnant.

Meerkats are a popular attraction. They look funny stood upright, their heads popping up behind tree logs. They see a passing aeroplane and run back to their burrows. But it’s all for a good reason. In the wild they have lots of predators they have to look out for, so from their point of view an aeroplane could be some sort of predatory bird.

Reptiles and invertebrates aren’t as popular. They are often cast as villains in children’s programmes. Beast Wars is an example, when the Predacons are all dinosaurs
and invertebrates, in contrast to the good Maximals who are all mammals and birds. But this is mainly down to appearance. Scales and exoskeletons might not look as cute as fur and feathers, but this is inherently superficial. It doesn’t mean those animals are any nastier, and reptiles and invertebrates are just as important to the ecosystem.

As cute as penguins are, it’s largely due to their appearance. A keeper, Mark, said the penguin enclosure was like a strange village where everyone wears a dinner jacket. They can get aggressive. They have a lot of muscle, as a keeper Andy puts it they have “a very sharp, serrated bread knife on the front of the face”. They also aren’t as monogamous as you might think, but one couple in the zoo is an exception. Spike, a 19-year-old female and Rud, a 22-year-old male are very faithful to each other and spend all their time together. By penguin standards, they are very elderly. In the wild, most penguins only live to about 15 years old.

Rud’s advanced age is taking its toll on his health. He has arthritis and can’t move about as much. The zoo has to often take the difficult decision of putting animals to sleep if they are in pain and suffering. Rud had to be taken to the vets. Happily, the vet found that Rud was still healthy enough to return to the enclosure. After waiting for the anesthetic to wear off, he was reunited with Spike. There had been younger male penguins trying to get with Spike while Rud was gone, and sometimes even when Rud was there, pushing him aside, but Spike wasn’t having any of it. This old penguin couple seem devoted to one another.

Anne, the keeper in charge of the penguin enclosure, said it was like in the wild, but safer. They try to get it like their natural environment, but keep an eye on them and make sure if one is struggling or ill they can help it out. Anne has been working with penguins for 18 years, and said that penguins may look cuddly and cute, but they can whack you with their flippers which feels a bit like being hit with a ruler. They are also very solid muscle rather than fluffy. But she also said you become almost like a foster parent. “You get the odd greedy one” and we see her feeding the penguins and her telling them “Penguins in Africa would love this fish!”. Breakfast for penguins is provided at the zoo – fish and vitamin supplements.

Anne noted that they have to be careful how they teach the penguins, as they don’t realise at first that if she leaves the fish underwater rather than feeding them directly, they can get the fish for themselves, so they have to make sure they learn it. Even if the fish is left in the water, we see a heron come and gobble it all up!

We see some penguin fledglings who are kept in a separate baby pool away from the main penguin pool. They are eager to go in the big pool though! Sulawesi, the most
cocky one and leader of the fledgling group, even escapes and goes into the big pool by himself. However, he can’t compete for fish with the adults yet, so Anne retrieves him and takes him back to the baby pool.

Despite wanting to go into the big pool, when it is time to go the fledglings don’t want to leave! They want to stay in their box. The first to venture out isn’t Sulawesi, but another fledgling, Panay. He ventures out into the deep end and is there for 2 hours on his own. The keepers decide they have to overturn their boxes and drain the nursery pool to get them to leave. That doesn’t work, so they have to carry them to the big pool themselves and lock the gate. Apparently, they all settled in OK though.

Phillippine cockatoos have a problem with the males getting aggressive and sometimes even killing the female, but a couple we see don’t have that problem. Renton is
very gentle, and he and his mate Maganda get on well. They “allopreen”, preening each others feathers on the back of their neck. The only problem is Renton is quite a bit older than Maganda, he has a bad hip and he may even be too old to still breed. But they seem to love each other.

Aardvarks, known for being one of the first words in the dictionary, are one of the quirkiest creatures in the animal kingdom. Describing them to someone who hasn’t seen one before is a bit like when Greek mythologies described their mythical monsters. Ears like a rabbit, tail like a kangaroo, snout like a pig, claws like a mole and tongue like a lizard. The first time I’d ever heard of an aardvark was from ’90s Children’s BBC puppet Otis the Aardvark, and at first I thought he was meant to be some sort of hybrid creature. Aardvarks are very cute though, and they do look adorable sleeping, which they do during the day as they are nocturnal animals. The zoo gives them “termite soup” for lunch. It’s difficult to tell males and females apart. The zoo thought Tatsu and Himba were male and female, but it turned out they were both female! Added to this group is another female, a juvenile named Onni who is usually the first to wake up.

Naked mole rats live in a eusocial colony, rather like bees and ants, and have different roles, a queen, workers and soldiers. In their native East Africa they live in underground burrows. Here they are in clear tubes, which is surreal to see, and they are very strange looking anyway. Queen Janet is pregnant with 28 babies(!) which she has to give birth to on top of whole colony.

We have three generations of chimp. Boris, 49, used to be the dominant male but is now more of an elder. He used to be aggressive, but has mellowed with age. Dylan, 28,
is the current alpha male, and upstart teenager Eric keeps trying to push him off his throne.

A keeper, Niall, has known Boris for 44 years and they have developed a bond. He can negotiate with Boris more. Boris likes to take stuff like stones or even ducklings
and moorhen chicks to exchange for food! They know Boris was caught in the wild, as his one-time owner took him to the vet thinking he had a boil on his eyebrow, but it turned out to be a shotgun pellet. What often happens is that hunters shoot the mother and pull the baby chimp off the mother’s dead body, then sell the baby as a pet to unsuspecting customers.

The chimps generally don’t like the vets. One of them, Rosie, is particularly hostile. She throws cups of water, her own crap and other chimp’s crap at the vets.

Orangutans are naturally inquisitive. One of the keepers, Chris said “It doesn’t really matter if it’s the smallest bug or a robot dinosaur, if it’s new they’ll take an interest in it”.
In the wild, female orangutans only have five babies in their whole life, with about nine years between them. But a female, Subis, unexpectedly gives birth just under
3 years from having her last baby. The keepers think it might be because she knows the zoo is a safe environment. It can be a problem though, as in the wild chimp infants
stay close to their mothers for 10 years. Her older daughter, Tuti isn’t getting as much attention. So she goes to see her father, Puluh, but he isn’t interested. However, after a while Subis finds a way to make sure she gives enough time to both Tuti and her new daughter Siska.

There are some cute scenes of Tuti climbing straps almost like a tightrope walker.

Some otters share an enclosure with some babirusa, but the two families don’t get on. The babirusa steal the otter’s fish, and the otters actually seem to have the upper hand despite being much smaller, regularly nipping at the babirusa and driving them away.

One otter family is a mother, Icana, and two daughters Maxa and Ruma. Their father Xingu died when they were still pups, and it was mentioned that there was a poignant moment when one of the pups kept trying to feed their dad bringing him food after he had died.

There is a family of Sumatran tigers. Father Fabi, mother Kirana, sons Topan and Jaya and daughter Kasarana. In the wild, tigers don’t raise families in pairs, the female does it on her own, but this couple raising the family appears to work well. Topan and Jaya are quite boistrous and spend a lot of time with their father and seem to see him as a role model and like to copy him. Kasarana is smaller, and very nervous and keeps close to her mother, who seems to have more patience with her than she does with her sons.

They are being moved to a larger enclosure, and there is months of training for them to get used to moving crates, as that experience is likely to be quite frightening. All animals, including humans, can be dangerous when they’re frightened. Tigers have been known to kill zoo keepers, and there is a danger they can turn on each other. Fortunately, the move for this tiger family goes smoothly.

Moving into the tiger’s old enclosure are two Malayan sun bears, Milli and Toni. Their parents were shot and killed, and they were taken as cubs to be sold as pets, so have spent most of their lives in captivity. Milli took to the new location straight away, Toni was a bit more nervous at first, but he got used to it. The keepers had to hide food around the enclosure to encourage the two bears and find it for themselves.

There is a danger of overpopulation too, with two jaguars Napo, a male golden jaguar, and Goshi, a female black jaguar, living and playing together, but kept as a non-breeding pair. Napo was described as “chilled out”, while Goshi was described as “feisty”. They were shown playing with a big ball of lavender hanging from a string. Napo tried to open it, but gave up. However, when Goshi tried to go for it, Napo ran to grab it right back!

We see a giraffe Orla in the final stages of her 15 month pregnancy giving birth to a son, Kidepo. The baby giraffe tries to get up on his long legs and trips up several times, which is normal. They have to stand quickly, as they need to reach their mother’s udder. Newborn, he is already taller than the zoo keepers! His father, Meru, isn’t welcoming to his new son. He starts swinging his neck and kicking him. This is common with bull giraffes, they are keen to show their dominance and can be aggressive towards other males, even if it is a baby.

Black rhinos are in danger of extinction, with only 600 left in the wild. The zoo tries to get Kitani to breed. She had a calf which died, and they had to remove it, but she kept looking for it, and has been depressed ever since. They want to try to get her to mate again, bringing in Magadi, who is a stud in the literal sense, having fathered many calves in the zoo. They put a barrier between Magadi and Kitani just to be on the safe side. There doesn’t seem to be a spark at first. He gives her hay and branches through the gate. Eventually something seems to develop, and they are introduced properly.

They have three zebra mares. Florence, Nadine and her daughter Merida. They want to introduce a stallion, Mac to them for them to breed. Zebra mares seem to like “bad boys”. The stallion has to be aggressive towards them or they lose respect for him and won’t let him mate with them. Mac seems this way at first, but at some point something goes wrong, because the mares gang up on him. They chase him, bite him, won’t let him near the food and water. The keepers decide to remove him for his own good. In the wild, he could just walk away, but he can’t at the zoo. He is moved to a separate field, and seems very happy to be away from the mares. But we later find out he did eventually get somewhere with the mares, and two are pregnant by him!

Komodo dragon siblings Jantan and Ora have to be separated after Jantan attacked and nearly killed Ora. The keepers don’t think it was intentional, even that he might
have been trying to win her respect. They try to get the dragons to make up with a reconciliation dinner of a calf carcass, and they seem to get on.

There is an attempt to get tarantulas to mate in captivity.  Tarantula mating is tricky though. The male has to make a “sperm web” and gather it up! He is also risking his life if he mates. 50% of male tarantulas are killed by the females during or after mating! A male, NT16 manages to mate with a female, named W6, and escapes with his life, but it doesn’t result in a pregnancy.

Mountain chicken frogs, also known as the giant ditch frog, are extremely rare. They are only found in Dominica and Montserrat, and in the latter there are only 2 left in the wild.
So zoos all over the world are trying to breed them, which has been difficult. They try to set a male and female up as a sort of blind date in a love nest, but after 2 weeks they don’t seem to get on. In fact, the female tries to escape several times! They remove her, and try another female, but things take a tragic turn when they find that this new female has a disease that has become so advanced and no treatment will help, so they have to euthanise her. It is always sad when they have to take that decision, but given that this species is on the brink of extinction it is even harder for the keepers.

There is the crocodile couple that were brought in from a French zoo, Francois and Francoise. Like all crocodiles, one way they communicate is by blowing bubbles! Francoise loves the attention of the public, but Francois doesn’t seem to trust humans. So the keepers have to stay out of his eye line and put a plucked chicken on the end of a piece of string – essentially, as if they were fishing for crocodiles!

A similarly surreal scene is seeing the keepers trying to catch fruitbats in a big net like butterflies.

The keepers at Chester Zoo try not to interfere too much, hoping the animals can sort things out for themselves and can raise their own young, and they try to create an environment that will be close to what the animals would find in the wild. However, they try to help them out medically as much as they can. Despite it being advised not to get
too attached to the animals, as they have to be professionals, it can be difficult not to. A keeper Andy notes that it isn’t really possible to not form a connection, because you get to know their personalities. Niall also said that obviously you’re going to have favourites because you are drawn to individuals.

A keeper Kirsten said “The more time I spend working with animals the more it actually teaches me about humans” and “We are just another species in the animal kingdom”. Like animals, we have our own relationships and social hierarchies.

The Secret Life of The Zoo was quite sweet, and interesting. While there was a lot of anthropomorphism, I think it was partly to get the audience to understand what is going on. Individual animals all have different personalities, and while they are far from as advanced as humans are they have their own societies and relationships. In any case, it was a good programme. It may have better fortunes than Our Zoo and get a second series.

headphonedaydreams – 4th year anniversary

4 years of blogging already. So I’ve been doing this quite a while really. 4 years is enough for one US Presidential term! I might just make it to the big ‘5’.

I just found out that, more importantly, today is the 100th anniversary of the birth of Harold Wilson, a Labour politician who was Prime Minister of the UK from 1964-1970, and again from 1974-1976. The famous quote “A week is a long time in politics” is attributed to him. He was from Huddersfield originally. I’m not, but I lived and went to college there for some of my late teens, so I saw the statue of him in St. George’s Square very often. I think his governments bought in a lot of great reforms for the UK, and he’s probably my favourite Prime Minister, even though he was before my time.

Anyway, back to blogging about my blog.

Here are the top ten posts written during that time that had the most views.

1) Peter Kay’s Car Share

One of the best new sitcoms in a long time, this has been a hugely popular. Very funny and poignant at times, great soundtrack and you find yourself getting into the “will they, won’t they” storyline. Sian Gibson has been a revelation.

2) Now 90

I thought this compilation was average at the time, but with hindsight, it was quite a good one in the Now! series.

3) The X Factor (Series 12)

Do you reckon they’ll try and retcon this series altogether (other than maybe bringing Reggie n Bollie back to present The Xtra Factor or something?)? It was supposed to be
a big revamp, but with Nick Grimshaw, Olly Murs and Caroline Flack all leaving and it currently being rumoured that Dermot O’Leary and Louis Walsh might be coming back, the show might end up reversing most of the changes made for series 12. That and winner Louisa Johnson’s single only getting to number 9. This series wasn’t even the worst, but surely one of the most forgettable. I loved Lauren Murray though especially her performance of Ariana Grande’s ‘One Last Time’.

4) My Mad Fat Diary (Series 3)

The final series was only three episodes long, so was a bit rushed, it would have been nice for it to have been a full series, but better than nothing I suppose. It concluded things fine and I am very pleased My Mad Fat Diary existed and stopped when it was still good.

5) The Apprentice (Series 11)

This was a very dull series, and The Apprentice, like The X Factor, is another reality TV franchise which has probably had its day.

6) Top Ten Favourite ‘The Key of Awesome’ Pop Song Parodies

Self-explanatory really. My at the time top ten favourite pop song parodies from the online comedy video series The Key of Awesome.

7) Birthday TV List

One way to celebrate 30 years on the planet, 30 TV shows which debuted on every year I’ve been alive, all of which I was a fan of or impacted me in some way.

8) Celebrity Big Brother 17

The longest Celebrity Big Brother UK series ever, it had some very memorable moments, but was a bit up and down.

9) An Inspector Calls

A very good BBC adaptation of the classic J.B. Priestly play where an Inspector comes to an upper class family dinner investigating the suicide of a young working class woman, and secrets begin to unravel.

10) Inside No. 9 – ‘The 12 Days of Christine’

An excellent episode of TV, ‘The 12 Days of Christine’ was part of the anthology series Inside No. 9, written by Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith and starring Sheridan Smith. It’s very rare I cry at television, but this episode made me cry.

These posts are ones which didn’t quite make the top ten most viewed, but were ‘liked’ by other bloggers.

Doctor Who – series nine

Most of my reviews of this series were liked by other bloggers, so thanks for that!
One of the most sophisticated series of Doctor Who to date. There were some very strong episodes. Peter Capaldi came into his own more as the Doctor, and a sad farewell to Clara, played by the brilliant Jenna Coleman. There was also a return of Michelle Gomez as Missy and a good new addition of Maisie Williams as Ashildr. Overall, a very strong series indeed.

Summertime

An animated cartoon short from 1935 by Ub Iwerks, a very important figure in the early years of Disney cartoons. Despite the title, it’s about winter going into spring. What this cartoon lacked in budget it made up for with ideas.

Cats Vs. Dogs – Which Is Best?

The two popular choice of pet battle it out via scientific experiments to see who is ‘best’.

So overall if there is a theme, I’d say that last year was good for TV drama and comedy, but terrible for reality TV.

Two as a bonus – they were technically part of the third year of the blog, but had more views in the fourth year of the blog.

Animals In Love

Liz Bonnin, who also co-presented the Cats Vs. Dogs programme, here presents an interesting scientific documentary on whether animals feel love.

UK Singles Chart Journey Through the Solar System

I wrote something about how pop songs which have entered the UK Top 100 singles
chart have represented the planets in our solar system. As you do.