eggs and I

[PWSPARKS@aol.com]

Mickey will probably knock me out but.... [Given the drift of past
conversations, this seems appropriate enough for me to let it pass.
Y'all know where to complain if you disagree.  -- MR]

I saw what I think is a very interesting bit on eggs versus prey. The eggs
belonged to a sea going bird (can't remember the name) and the predator was a
variation of the tiger snake a very dangerous viper. They live on an island
between austrlia and tasmania. Now here's the kicker. The snake cannot digest
an egg so it will not eat one (can't seem to crack one either). The adult is
too big for the snake to eat so the snake will only kill an adult if it is
getting in the way. After a few weeks the baby is too big for the snake to
eat. The snake only eats these baby birds and only eats one month out of the
year. So the evolution strategy of the snake is to get bigger (its twice the
size of the tiger snake that lives on the mainland of australia). The bird's
strategy is to grow faster. If a snake finds a too big baby bird it will
leave it alone.

I think in all of this that there is a lot of evolutionary "room" for the egg
and the predator to duke it out but not loose either one (unless the external
environment changes real fast).

paul sparks