FERNS... AND DINOSAURS

["D.W.Naish" <dwn194@soton.ac.uk>]

Guess I'm out of touch writing this now, but, well... free speech and all..

OK, so certainly no tree ferns or nothin' in this part of the world, but we do
have fern meadows which are, I think, extremely interesting. There are several
of these in the heathier parts of the New Forest and they cover literally
acres/hectares in extent. You can walk through them and get completely
surrounded by nothing but these ferns, and they're not really that small - most
are around mid-chest height. Walking amongst them isn't a good idea though as
they harbour all kinds of deer and sheep parasites. Last time I visited one I
picked up a parasitic Deer fly which had designs on living in my left ear. I
didn't realise that something was there till the evening when I was back home, 
eventually I had to (sadly) kill it - but it wasn't easy (it's body was very
flat and it could withstand direct blows). However, these fern meadows are
composed entirely of a single species, here just called Bracken, and no-one
really likes it. It quickly takes over heathland, displacing other plants, is
poisonous to livestock, its spores are carcinogenic, and NOTHING eats it, bar
two extremely rare, extremely small aphid species. Farmers here are talking
about introducing some fern-eating caterpillar from South America. Frankly, this
idea stinks as introduced species like the New Zealand flatworm and the Jungle
cat already cause enough ecological problems. Just listen to me! Err..
dinosaurs..

THE BIGGEST GLICH IN JURASSIC PARK has to be the Parasaurolophus. Just listen
to this:  "...surely not the ones that bred in the wild..."  "Actually, they
can't breed in the wild"  "Why not?"  "Because all dinosaurs in Jurassic Park
are female.... There's no unauthorised breeding in Jurasssic Park......."
"We engineered them that way.. blah blah blah - - "

Have you worked it out yet? Look at the Parasaurolophus, and you'll see that a
great many of them are definitely not female....

DARREN NAISH