Rattus Norvegicus (a book report)

The Norway Rat, or Rattus Norvegicus, is the common brown rat, which was originally native to China. They now live on every continent but Antartica. An albino strain of this rat is bred for laboratory study. In fact, it was the first animal which was domesticated primarily for use in science.

Fun Rat Facts:

The norway rat is unique in that it possesses acute hearing which allows it to pick up ultrasounds.
Rats are color blind.
Their tails are the main organ in heat exchange, and their hearts beat between 300 and 400 beats a minute.
Unlike other species of rats, the ears of the norway rat do not cover its eyes when pulled down (thank you, modern science).

Gross Rat Facts:

The skin of a rat's tail can be stripped if picked up by a human hand.
They have even been known to attack infant human beings.
According to the Wikipedia entry on the Norway Rat, "Martin Schein, founder of the Animal Behavior Society in 1964, studied the diet of Brown Rats and came to the comclusion in his paper "A Preliminary Analysis of Garbage as Food for the Norway Rat" that the most-liked food of Brown Rats was (in order) scrambled eggs, macaroni and cheese, and cooked corn kernels. Their least-liked food was raw beets, peaches, and raw celery." (Read More!)


Some Weird Restraint Devices for Scientific Study:

gelatin

the gelatin has a tendency to melt a bit when electrified:
Watch!

i don't think the melting will be much of a problem as long as the gelatin is inside a latex enclosure.
that is the next step for me to test, i suppose.

salty stuff

so the pickle is cool. it sparkles when you plug it into a socket:



i am gonna try salty gelatine tomorrow...