Sengi Stud Supplies Steady Sexitimes
Chester Zoo's Elephant Shrew is a Mating Marvel
Today’s header gif features one successful seducer elephant shrew (a.k.a. a sengi). The Nature Bites YouTube channel video I sourced this from is really quite sweet. The small mammal keeper at Chester Zoo in Cheshire, England interviewed for his work with The Stud is clearly quite fond of his little friend.
Sengis are native to southern Africa and within that area genus have evolved to survive in the varied habitats within the six countries in that region, grasslands to sandy deserts to forests. They are not actually shrews, being more closely related to the evolutionary branch that includes elephants, aardvarks and manatees. They are also one of the fastest small mammals alive and can reach running speeds of almost 30 kilometers per hour. Sadly, habitat loss both from climate-warming drought and human deforestation have led to population decline and population segmentation. Luckily for the Chester Zoo, The Stud has had no problems keeping his end of the re-population equation up, having fathered at least 16 babies since the zoo’s breeding program began. We can only hope his son will someday learn from his example. Although as of the making of the Nature Bites video, things are not looking great in that regard as The Son seems to be a bit shy around the ladies.
Sources and more info: