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1. |
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Let’s take a fact-checked trek through the animal kingdom.
If you know a fan of animals then grab ‘em by the hand and bring them.
I’ve written twenty-six little animal songs,
And you’re about to listen to me sing them.
Let’s place our bets that our quest will turn up some surprises.
We’ll meet a wide variety of weights, gaits, shapes and sizes.
But this slick quipster’s strictly sticking to his script… except when he improvises.
It’s an Ensonglopedia –
One song for each letter because two would be greedier.
But instead of ordering them alphabetically,
I’ve sorted the creatures phylogenetically,
Which means that they are rated
By how closely they’re related,
By how recently their latest common ancestor is dated.
Don’t worry – it’ll all become clearer with the help of multimedia.
It’s an Ensonglopedia –
And I will start with the only animals
Who have chosen to meet here.
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2. |
Homo Sapiens
01:21
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Ho, ho, ho, ho, Homo sapiens,
We’ve got a body shape that looks a lot like an alien’s,
And of all the species who are living today,
We’re the only ones who play croquet.
Okay, let’s take a closer look
At the only living thing who can read a book,
At the only animals who choose to tattoo their own skin,
And apart from elephants the only one with a chin.
Let’s glance askew at the brainy crew,
Although our brains are not as big per body weight as the tree shrew.
We’re the upright ape whose backbone has uncurled
And who, for better or for worse, can reshape our world.
Ho, ho, ho, ho, Homo sapiens,
We’re the only ones who build spaceships and stadiums.
But bear in mind while bragging about how unique you are,
You share half your DNA with a banana.
And over ninety-six percent with a chimpanzee.
And over ninety-nine point nine percent with me.
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3. |
Aye-Aye
02:09
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I-I I-I am a primate, a primate.
Aye-aye aye-aye is a pri-pri-pri-pri-primate.
Before we get too far out of the gate,
Let’s get our fact straight
On how all of these primates relate.
In the last few million years there were lots of human species –
Homo ergaster, antecessor, heidelbergensis, rudolfensis –
of which we’ve found pieces,
But we've got to accept
There's only Homo sapiens left.
Aye-aye aye-aye, we’re getting our facts straight.
7 million years ago, we had descended from the trees,
And we had the same parents as the chimpanzees.
40 million years ago, an African monkey escapes
To South America, leaving behind the soon-to-be apes.
60 million years ago, the theory supposes,
Primates split in two – those with dry and those with wet noses.
And let’s look closer at one wet-noser,
A Madagascan lemur who’s a strict day-dreamer.
It’s the aye-aye aye-aye aye-aye and it’s a primate
The aye-aye aye-aye is a pri-pri-primate.
This tree-clinger’s middle finger is exceptionally long
Which it uses as a hammer and then uses as a prong
To extract the larvae underneath the bark of the tree,
Which is quite the feast, I’m sure you’ll all agree.
Local people think that it can be a bad omen
To spot an aye-aye wandering near to your home and
Will kill it on sight and hang it upside-down
To avoid bad spirits from visiting the town.
No wonder that there aren’t so many aye-ayes around.
It’s the aye-aye aye-aye:
Not a monkey nor an ape,
Aye-aye aye-aye aye-aye:
But it is a primate.
Aye-aye-aye.
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4. |
Meerkat
01:46
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A head pops up from a hole in the ground,
With ears that are crescent-shaped and eyes that are round,
And the edges of its mouth pulled up in a grin,
And wrists held close to its chinny-chin-chin,
And a look so innocent and frightened and sweet
That you’d think it the friendliest creature to meet,
And you’d never suspect that an animal like that
Could murder its mates at the drop of a hat.
Meet the meerkat.
The meerkat
Is no mere cat.
In fact, it’s not a cat at all.
To further its cause
It has sharp curvy claws
With which the meerkat can maul
Any meerkat baby
From its community
Who presents its own kids a threat,
Then, mean as can be,
It’ll eat it for tea.
How cruel can a carnivore get?
Meet the meerkat.
The head pops up from a hole in the earth
Of a lucky meerkat who wasn’t eaten at birth
But though they may have shocking ways of settling their disputes
Boy oh boy are they cute!
Meet the meerkat.
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5. |
Narwhal
02:08
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Did anyone ever tell you that unicorns don’t exist?
Well you tell them they’re in for a surprise.
They just weren’t looking close enough, and somehow must have missed
Seventy-five thousand unicorns living underneath the Arctic ice.
It’s a unicorn!
But in truth
That horn’s a tooth.
Unicorns are real
They live up near the polar bear, the walrus and the seal.
You may guess they use that tooth to spear themselves a meal,
But now science can reveal
That they just use them to feel.
It’s a unicorn!
But of course,
It’s not a horse.
Interestingly though, both horses and this type of animal that I’m talking about, which obviously isn’t called a ‘unicorn’ by scientists, are classed as ungulates, which means “hooved”, though it’s through water this one moves
So it has no need for knees nor legs nor hooves.
Nor can it trot nor gallop, nor swat flies with its tail,
For the real unicorn’s a type of whale.
It’s a unicorn!
But we call it a narwhal.
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6. |
Quokka
02:03
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Not long ago, I became a father,
And carrying my daughter around has been rather
A strain for the back of this poor ageing rocker.
I wish I were a quokka.
I’ve spent far too many years slouching on the couch
And when I pick my baby up you’ll hear me yelling “Ouch!”
Chances are that I would not be such a grumpy grouch
If I had a pouch.
The quokka lives exclusively down under in Australia,
Like most members of the infraclass marsupialia.
Marsupials have pouches where they hold their joeys close,
And I want one of those.
Don’t mock a quokka!
A quokka is a proper little cute Aussie hopper
With a sprog in the locker.
Do not kick a quokka,
Though some rotters play quokka soccer.
I think that’s a shocker.
If you mock a quokka,
You must be off your rocker.
They’re fluffy and they’re friendly,
And they care for their kids gently.
Consequently, I want to be a quokka.
Oh please let me be a quokka.
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7. |
Duckbilled Platypus
01:55
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When I say “Duckbilled”, you say “Platypus”!
Duckbilled! (Platypus) Duckbilled! (Platypus)
When I say “Ornithorhynchus”, you say “Anatinus”!
Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus) Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus)
Duckbilled! (Platypus) Duckbilled! (Platypus)
Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus) Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus)
Duckbilled! (Platypus) Duckbilled! (Platypus)
Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus) Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus)
Whoever would believe a
Tail from a beaver
And the beak of a duck
Would be discovered stuck
To an animal who’s got a
Foot like an otter
With quite a snake-like
Venomous spike?
With which to poison its foes?
And if you then heard
It laid eggs like a bird
You’d think that I was being absurd.
CHORUS: Duckbilled! (Platypus) etc.
Ducky-ducky-duckbilled platypus!
You’re the very definition of randomness!
You’re a monotreme
From a madman’s dream,
Something I’d hallucinate
In a stupefied state.
You’re somewhere in the range
Between crazy and strange,
And that’s why I think you’re fabulous.
CHORUS: Duckbilled! (Platypus) etc.
Duckbilled Platypus, you’re really wild!
You’ve been my favourite animal since I was a child!
You’ve got lots of bits that just don’t belong,
As though you’ve been put together wrong.
Duckbilled! (Platypus) Duckbilled! (Platypus)
Ornithorhynchus! (Anatinus)
You bring me happiness.
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8. |
Promenade 1
01:10
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If we’re asked“Can you name any type of animal?”,
It’s unlikely we’d name non-mammalian species at all.
And yet less than half a percent of the world’s species
Are mammals, so how come we just think of these?
This has to do with something called the Bambi effect
Which says we tend to express more tenderness and respect
To an animal who’s cute with big eyes, which may be
Because they look a bit like a human baby.
But this show ain’t Bambi, it’s science communication,
And it’s time the animal kingdom had some de-Disneyfication,
So with six songs down, that’s it for the mammals,
Though we’ve skipped swine, porcupine, canines, cats and camels.
We’ll continue with the mammals’ closest living relatives,
Known collectively to scientists as the sauropsids.
These include all the reptiles, and of course,
The only living relics of the dinosaurs.
And one.
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9. |
Verreaux's Eagle
02:41
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Everybody thinks
Dinosaurs are extinct,
But some of them survived and they’re not even on the brink.
They’re just called by different words, now.
That’s right, we call them birds now.
From the owl to the stork
To the fowl to the hawk
To the wren to the quail
To the hen to the rail
To a bird of a more majestic scale…
Everybody’s heard about the bird
With talons so sharp and a beak so curved
Oooh-oooh, it’s the eagle
It’s the bird of prey with no equal
Everybody knows all
About the bald.
Our knowledge of the crowned
Is reasonably sound.
Everybody’s partial
To the martial.
Everybody is besotted
With the greater spotted.
Knowledge of the crested
Is well-attested.
We all know exactly where the wedge-tailed’s nested.
But nobody in the whole world knows
A single damn thing about the eagle called Verreaux’s.
I’m putting ignorance to rest one species at a time,
In the only way that I know how – and that’s rhyme!
Verreaux’s Eagle is entirely black
Except for two strips of white along the sides of its back,
And the odd white feather,
And a beak that is yeller.
Verreaux’s likes eating rock hyrax.
And like every other eagle they don’t go quack.
Now everybody’s heard about the bird
Whose skills are finally revered throughout the world
Oooh-oooh, Verreaux’s eagle
It can catch rock hyrax by the beak-full.
Oooh-oooh, Verreaux’s eagle
It’s the eagle with no equal.
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10. |
Leafy Seadragon
02:11
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Beautiful Madam
Leafy seadragon,
Why do you sport such fanciful fashions?
These leaves that I’m wearing
Do not aid seafaring,
Nor help attract mates, nor aid with childbearing,
But you must concede, they help me succeed
In looking a bit like seaweed.
Beautiful Madam
Leafy seadragon,
Who will look after your eggs ere you hatch ‘em?
To save from mislaying
These eggs that I’m laying
I’ll put them on the tail of the male with whom I’m staying,
And if he cares for them until they’re ready
Then I might consider going steady.
Beautiful Madam
Leafy seadragon,
Once they’ve been born, say what will then happen?
Every son and every daughter
I spawn in the water
Will look after themselves, like a good child ought’a.
But here’s a sadistic statistic: just five
Out of every hundred eggs that I lay will survive.
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11. |
Wobbegong
00:45
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“I could be wrong,”
Said the Wobbegong,
“But isn’t it time for my song?”
Hark!
It’s a shark!
It’s a shark that comes out after dark!
It’s a shark that’s about to make its mark,
And its bite is worse than its bark!
As sharks go, it’s pretty damn weird –
With its flat body-shape and its wobbly beard,
And its subtle mottled back all phantasmagoric
Like something left over from a time prehistoric.
But don’t be mislead
By its odd-shaped head:
It’s still a shark when it comes to how it likes to be fed,
And if some nice juicy toes
Get under its nose,
It’ll still say, “Hey, I’ll have me some of those!”
“I won’t be long,”
Said the Wobbegong,
“I’ll just keep nibbling till the end of this song”
Well the song’s done,
And you’ve had your fun.
Now off you run… I mean, swim.
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12. |
Klamath River Lamprey
01:31
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In Northern Californ-i-ay,
The redwood forests
Are popular with tourists,
But not one of them is here today
To see the Klamath River lamprey.
It’s goin’ surfin’,
Surfin’ on a bigger fish,
Oh yeah!
The lamprey’s greatest wish
Is to surf on a fish
That will serve as a delicious and nutritious dish.
If you’re goin’ fishin’,
You better start a-wishin’
For an extra-special two for one –
The Klamath River
Will deliver
A fish with another fish on.
Admit it:
Yeah, life’s terrific
When you’re livin’ it lawless
As a sucker-mouthed jawless
Surfer with a lifestyle parasitic.
Surfin’
Surfin’ on a bigger fish,
Woah yeah!
The lamprey’s greatest wish
Is to surf on a fish
That will serve as a delicious and nutritious dish.
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13. |
Promenade 2
00:45
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Every animal that we’ve covered thus far
Is a member of the phylum Chordata.
And next we’ll meet a species shaped like a star,
Who belongs to phylum Echinodermata blah blah blah.
Here’s another way to put it: we’ve had the vertebrates.
They’ve all got a back-bone.
And now we move on to the invertebrates,
And then you can all go back home.
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14. |
Chocolate Chip Sea Star
00:53
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Table manners table manners
How do you eat up your dinners?
I bet you don’t regurgitate
Your stomach lining on your plate
Then let your dinner part-digest
Before you gobble up the rest?
Well starfish do! Yes starfish do!
And don’t even ask how they poo!
All right – the starfish have no bums;
Instead, all up each of its arms,
It has hundreds of small tube feet,
And it’s through these that they excrete.
Now please excuse my snobbishness
But I think that is vomitous.
The chocolate chip sea star
Is a cookie-look-alike if seen from afar,
But I wouldn’t dip this one in your tea,
Because it’s not really a choc chip cookie,
It’s a little star in the sea!
Sea! Star!
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15. |
Spanish Shawl Nudibranch
01:43
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You must be
The most beautiful slug in the sea.
Are you the slug for me?
When you crawl,
You resemble a Spanish shawl,
And I hope you don’t mind if I call
You the sweetest slug of all.
People tell me that it’s odd
To fall in love with a gastropod,
But those who so demean you,
Clearly haven’t seen you.
To be frank,
If I had you in my tank,
You’d outrank every other nudibranch.
What a sight!
You’re exciting my appetite:
An exquisite hermaphrodite
In which both boy and girl unite.
Your rows of bright orange cerata
Extract oxygen from the water,
But perhaps I should beware of your cnidosacs
With which you sting anything that attacks.
I’m in thrall
To the call of the Spanish Shawl
And I hope you evade the fisherman’s trawl.
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16. |
Flamboyant Cuttlefish
01:09
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Get a load ‘a
This cephalopoda,
It’s the cleverest creature
Who’s ever gonna meet ya.
And it’s about to treat ya
To a very special feature.
Introducing the aptly named Flamboyant Cuttlefish!
You must be proud
To be endowed
With such a loud
Multicolour dreamcoat.
What a suit!
There’s no dispute
That you’re a beaut.
You’re like a disco dreamboat.
Aah, ooh, yeah, the shimmering, glimmering
Razzmatazz and dazzle
Of your colour-changing mantle
Will captivate and baffle
Like a hypnotist’s candle,
With waves of colour,
One replacing the other,
Spreading down from you neck,
And you’re a-lighting up the ocean floor like a discotheque.
You may be a cuttlefish,
But you are not a very subtle fish.
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17. |
Promenade 3
00:11
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Now we have arrived at the arthropods.
How many of them are there? Lods and lods.
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18. |
Bee-Like Flower Scarab
00:41
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Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome to the stage: The Bee-like Flower Scarab Beetles!
Let a bee
Be a bee
Let a bee
Be a bee
Let a Bee-like Flower Scarab
Be a bit
Like a bee
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19. |
Japanese Spider Crab
02:37
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Down in Japan,
Out in Suruga Bay,
There’s a crab with a plan
To make the whole world sway.
It’s got a lengthy lifespan -
Lots of time in which to cabaret,
And if it’s okay
We’re gonna learn its dance today.
You gotta start off really, really small,
I mean smaller than that, like a tiny tiny ball,
And then grow, grow, grow ‘til you’re the biggest arthropod of all.
Now you shuffle side to side on your spindly legs.
I swear it doesn’t much care where it treads.
Now snap, snap, snap with your razor-sharp chelipeds.
It’s time to feed, eat anything you find:
Fish, slugs, seaweed, or if you’re so inclined,
A carcass a shark has been kind enough to leave behind.
Do the crab,
Do the Japanese spider crab!
That’s fab, come on, everybody have a stab!
You gotta shuffle side to side on your spindly legs
And snap, snap, snap with your chelipeds
And then grow, grow, grow a new layer of exoskeleton
And the sing, sing, sing the chorus of the Japanese Spider Crab song
Which goes like this… “I am the Japanese Spider Crab!”
Everybody now… “I am the Japanese Spider Crab!”
Do the crab,
Do the Japanese spider crab!
That’s fab, then for the fun of it, dab dab dab!
Now you shuffle side to side on your spindly legs.
And snap, snap, snap with your chelipeds
And raise your shoulders cos you’ve got no neck to link your bodies to your heads
Once a year, you all gather close to the shore
In a throng of two thousand crabs or more
And clamber all over each other like some kind of King Kong
And then shed, shed, shed that old layer of exoskeleton
And then have another go at the chorus of the Japanese Spider Crab song!
“I am the Japanese Spider Crab!”
And again now… “I am the Japanese Spider Crab!”
Final time now… “I am the Japanese Spider Crab!”
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20. |
Giant African Millipede
01:22
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Leggy leggy leggy
Leggy leggy leggy
Four hundred million years ago,
Animals first gave land a go.
They needed legs,
They needed feet.
One of the first to come ashore
Went a little overboard.
It was a type
Of millipede.
Now, ‘pede’ means ‘legs’ and ‘milli’
Means one thousand, but really
This is quite a lot
More legs than they have got.
The record’s seven fifty,
And this one has two fifty,
But despite that figure,
This one’s bigger.
And last year at Drusillas,
I met one of these fellas,
And he just ran
All over my hand.
I was tickled by his tiny toes
And his back felt like a shower hose,
And then he crawled
Into a ball.
And it was quite amazing
Being so near that strange thing,
And if I can
I’ll do it again.
But next best thing, I s’pose,
To holding one of those
Is spending all day long-a
Doing the conga.
But now we really have to end
This ode to the giant African
Millipede.
That’s it – you’re freed!
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21. |
Togo Red Jewel Damselfly
01:19
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It’s time to launch an expedition
To go to Togo, cause there’s a suspicion
That the Togo red jewel damselfly
Could be gone forever without saying goodbye.
It’s time to go to Togo.
No, no, we will not rest
Until we’ve done our best to address this rescue request
From a damsel in distress.
She’s not been seen since eighteen ninety-eight,
And she may have suffered from a terrible fate.
We must go straight away, not wait –
We might already be too late.
It’s time to go to Togo:
There’s a damsel in distress.
There’s been lots of deforestation
All across the Togo nation,
And it may have placed our damsel in a perilous situation.
It’s time to go to Togo:
There’s a damsel in distress.
Chances are that you’ll
Never see a Togo red jewel.
If she’s not already extinct
She’s definitely definitely definitely definitely definitely
On the brink.
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22. |
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Usambara Baboon Tarantula
Usambara Baboon Tarantula
Usambara Baboon Tarantula
This strange orange tarantula
Is a very skilful ambusher,
With eight fat hairy legs
And eight big scary eyes.
But before you have a massive fit,
It’s more scared of you than you of it.
Don’t pick on Usambara;
Pick on someone your own size.
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23. |
Promenade 4
00:40
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And as if all of those weren’t weird enough,
Now we’re down to the really far-out stuff.
To find out if a species has a thing called a coelom
All you have to do is chop ’em up and peel ’em,
And ask, upon a closer look at their anatomy
If the organs are protected in a body cavity.
If the answer’s yes, it’s a coelomate, mate.
If the answer’s sort of yes, it’s a pseudocoelomate.
If the answer’s no, it’s an acoelomate.
End of the debate.
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24. |
Portuguese Man-o-War
01:54
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Take it easy
If you see me
On the seas or on the shore.
Though I look plasticky,
I am actually
The Portuguese Man of War,
And I’m the King of Sting.
I’m the real thing.
My tentacles have nematocysts
With a venomous mix that assists
Me when I wish to shock my prey.
I always get my way.
I’m not a jellyfish,
Nor indeed any fish,
Nor am I even a single living thing.
I am four individual creatures,
Each with individual features.
We’re the Man of War:
The King of Sting.
It’s clever
To work together.
It’s a scream
Operating as a team.
It’s good science
To form an alliance,
Even if your crew
Are stuck to you like glue.
The Portuguese Man-of-War
Functions as an army corps,
Co-operating
To be the King of Sting.
I got my martial name
Cos someone thought I looked the same
As a 16th-century warship sailing by,
And you’d better be alarmed,
Cos like that warship, I am armed,
And I am dangerous, and someone’s gonna fry.
So don’t go snorkelling
Near the King of Sting.
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25. |
Zoanthus Gigantus
02:40
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I will not roam.
I’ve chosen my premises,
And set up home
On the skeletons
Of my relatives.
If they chose to live here, then that’s good enough.
The seas can be rough,
And I’m lukewarm about all that travelling stuff.
And when I die,
My body shall remain
Where I lie,
And it won’t be in vain
If it helps this coral reef
To grow sky-high.
And it’s very hard to overemphasise
The enormous proportion of life that relies
On the coral reef,
And it beggars belief
How hard man tries
To pulverize
My prized high rise.
It took ten thousand years
To create this monument,
Then mankind interferes
And it’s gone in a moment.
I’d be sad if I had a brain.
If I could, then I would feel pain.
But I am Zoanthus gigantus
And I’m about as sentient as a plant is
My ancestors built this Atlantis
And I hope our descendants supplant us
But frankly I fancy our chances
Are slim to grim in these circumstances.
If you’re hoping for a moral
There’s no need to quarrel
Because one day we’ll all be buried on the bones of our ancestors,
Just like the coral.
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26. |
Row Pore Rope Sponge
02:34
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The riddle’s not solved
Of how we evolved
From our single-celled ancestors,
But zoologists have hunches
That the first ones were the sponges ,
And that we are all their sisters.
Gimme S! Gimme P! Take O N G! Gimme E!
And what have you got? Sponge!
It’s the root of our family tree!
Gimme ROW! Gimme PORE! Gimme ROPE! Gimme SPONGE!
And what have you got? Row pore rope sponge!
It’s the coolest cat in the sea!
The sponge deserves a double clap
For being the first to take the step
Towards feeding on organic material,
And that’s what differentiates
Us from all of our equally great
Cousin clades arboreal and bacterial.
Give it up for the sponge!
It’s not just a thing that you have in the bath
Let’s grab that sponge by its pores and plunge
Down our evolutionary path.
The sponge deserves a double clap
For putting animals on the map
By forming spheres of cells they call the blastula
A step that we now recognise
As ultimately giving rise
To a kingdom so diverse and so spectacular
Gimme S! Gimme P! Take O N G! Gimme E!
And what have you got? Sponge!
Most animals move but you can’t!
Gimme ROW! Gimme PORE! Gimme ROPE! Gimme SPONGE!
And what have you got? Row pore rope sponge!
You may look like a plant but you aren’t!
And now in ¾ row pore rope sponge
Gimme more, row pore rope sponge
I adore row pore rope sponge
Encore! Row pore rope sponge
Not poor row pore rope sponge
But cor! Row pore rope sponge
I adore row pore rope sponge
Encore! Encore! Encore! Encore!
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27. |
Theme (Reprise)
01:07
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That’s the end of our fact-checked trek through twenty-six critters.
Some are cute and cuddly, some are ugly, some will give you the jitters.
And they all have vital roles to play,
Though very few would qualify as babysitters.
I know my Ensonglopedia
Was unable to cover every single creature,
But if you know an animal who ought to belong,
Then it’s up to you to write that song,
And post it, hashtag Ensonglopedia, on social media.
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