i (heart) odd-toed ungulates

Tapir Redux

Got a little kick out of addressing this envelope to the "Hooves and Carnivore Team" at the Twycross Zoo in England (winners of my Paper Tapir Challenge). If I weren't working diligently in a one-woman art dept, I'd definitely want a desk next to those fine folks...

Paper Tapir Challenge Results!

Thank you to everyone who submitted a tapir-mask photo in celebration of World Tapir Day! Each and every image made. my. day. There can be only one winner of my book givaway, however, and the hands down champion is shown above - I can't even begin to explain how thrilling it was to receive this image in my inbox. From the Twycross Zoo in Warwichshire, UK, this enthusiastic crew of tapir-keepers not only made 3 tapir masks (colored to differentiate between species!), they got their beautiful ungulate charges to pose with them for a photo!! It simply took my breath away - thank you to Sarah and her co-workers for the phenomenal submission, and for all of your dedication and hard work as caretakers and conservationists for such amazing critters.

Below, a few more of my favorite paper tapirs - BIG thank you to little Amaya, who patiently modeled the below series of photos on a rather unpleasant day to be outside... and I don't know about anyone else, but I'm already looking forward to World Tapir Day 2013!

World Tapir Day 2012

Hello, FRIDAY! And for those not already in the know, there's another, much more novel reason to delight in this fine 27th of April, 2012... it's World Tapir Day!! Oh yes. You heard that right - today is World Tapir Day - a most fitting occassion (if one needs an excuse) to celebrate, raise awareness, and otherwise spread the good word about one of the coolest odd-toed ungulates to saunter the underbrush of equatorial rainforests: the TAPIR. *Don't be fooled by the 4 toes on each front foot - they only have three on the back! Taxonomically speaking, they are odd-toes, and all 4 species are simply amazing...

I've posted on tapirs previously, having been aquainted a few summers ago with the brilliant family of 3 living at the Franklin Park Zoo - Milton, Annie, and Tupelo are Baird's tapirs, and Tupelo, like all baby tapirs, was a heart-breakingly cute wee thing covered head to toe in spots and stripes when she was born (few things rival newborn tapirs on the squee scale...). Baird's tapirs are one of the 3 tapir species native to Central and South America, where they are the largest land mammal (Baird's are smaller than the Malayan, but larger than the Brazilian and Mountain species). The fourth species, the Malayan, or Asian tapir, calls Malaysia, Thailand, and Sumatra it's home. There is some size range between tapir species, though all fall somewhere between 300 and 750lbs in adult weight. Crepuscular or nocturnal forest dwellers, they spend most of their time forraging for vegetation with their great ungainly snout, and contrary to their somewhat dumpy appearance (and I use that term only in the most affectionate way), they are marvelous swimmers. Favorite food (in captivity, at least)? Bananas.

Below, a visual summary of Tapirdom:


In honor of this wonderous day - and the magical fantastical tapir! - I've designed a template to make your very own tapir mask out of paper! It's super simple - you just need paper to print on, scissors, glue (tape will work in a pinch, but it won't look nearly as dashing), and some string. Click the SINGLE mask graphic below for a SMALL template (will print on one 8.5 x 11 sheet and fit only a very small child's head... To make a mask of more adult-noggin proportions, click on the DOUBLE mask graphic for a LARGE template - this will print on 2 letter-sized sheet which can be cut, afixed together, then traced onto a larger, single sheet of paper before assembling). *You can print on any color paper (brown craft looks surprisingly "tapir-y") or print on white and then color to match your favorite tapir species... seriously fun stuff here - go to it!





*CONTEST EXTENDED*
And in the spirit of craft and contest - I'm going to add a twist - anyone who sends me a photo of themselves - or their little ones - wearing the above tapir mask, will be entered into a drawing to win a copy of my illustrated zoo book, Tropical Forest! Milton, Annie, and Tupelo are featured on page 5... so get crafting! Customization to resemble any of the 4 tapir species is encouraged... This contest will be open for 5 days 7 DAYS - I'll pick the winner at 12 noon EST next Tuesday THURSDAY! Please email your photo submission to: natalya (at) natalya (dot) com - OR tweet it to @natalya_zahn

...And for further reading/viewing: discover the tapir's propensity for "tantrums"; check out a (not too rosey... and I would 100% agree) review of the taxidermied tapirs at my beloved HMNH; and explore research and conservation efforts, because all 4 tapir species are highly endangered due to habitat loss and hunting. Most of all, have fun - tapirs are awesome!  

*For more paper tapirs, check out this Japanese paper-craft website (downloadable pattern), and this origami animal site. And oh how I wish I were better at knitting... HAPPY TAPIR DAY!

Special Delivery

I'm a big fan of mail art - nothing says happy day like coming home to find a personalized envelope waiting in the mailbox. Call me crazy, but I also love the concept of creating something that will be "enhanced" by the environment I send it off into. The USPS may not be often credited with enhancing anything it gets it's grubby paws on, but all the nicks and scrapes, stickers and stamps, water damage and bootprints that befall those utility bills and boxes of cookies from grandma are a wonder to me when they become part of a randomly generated composition. I'm lucky if I get to see the final product (since I've never sent anything to myself!) but when I do, I'm rarely dissapointed - so it was with giddy surprise this week when I got a lovely update on one very special delivery...

The extraordinary Jean Aw - powerhouse behind the NOTCOT empire - just became the proud recipient of a member of the mail art menagerie. She was also kind enough to give me an exceedingly generous post on the subject, which you can check out here. Many thanks, NOTCOT - for the Tropical Forest love, and the reveal on how my Takin fared on her epic cross-country journey in a mailbag!

Origami Rhino Unfolding

A simple, silent little treat... by Mabona Origami of Switzerland. "Stills" from previous Mabona projects below. *I'm so in love with the character of that pink rhino - wish it were life-sized and made out of fabric... just look at the focus in those perky little ears!

Celebrate: National Day of the Horse

That's right - it's probably not on your calendar, but as of 2004, there is an official "National Day of the Horse", and that day is today, December 13th. Having grown up utterly horse-crazy (like 90% of adolescent girls) I find such a day of remembrance and appreciation very much well-deserved, and no doubt centuries overdue - human-kind simply wouldn't be where it is without the strength, speed, willingness, and impeccable grace of the horse.

The illustrations above I created in 2003 for a website devoted to the history of Frank T. Hopkins: fabled cowboy, endurance rider, and champion of the Spanish Mustang breed. While history rightly credits Spanish explorers with introducing the horse to the New World (and simultaneously forever changing Native American culture), a more accurate term for this action would be re-introduction. The evolution of the horse actually happened largely throughout the North American continent, just after the massive extinction at the end of the Cretaceous period (the one credited with wiping out our dear dinosaurian friends).

Roughly 54 million years ago, mere dog-sized Mesohippus slowly emerged from the forest and began sizing-up it's petit frame, lengthening it's limbs, eliminating most of it's toes (from 5 down to 1 per foot), and remodeling the structure of it's teeth, to handle the tough, fibrous new grasses of the expanding Great Plains. Eventually, the little woods-browser became what we know as Equus (a genus that would continue to evolve for many more millions of years) and the first horses made their way to Asia (along with various other American megafauna) via long-since-dissolved land bridges. Then, about 12,000 years ago (the end of the Pleistocene), for reasons still debated, Equus disappeared from North and South America, leaving it's Asian transplants to continue their development, and eventually intersect with the ancestors of modern humans. It would take those Spanish Conquistadores back in the late 1400s, crossing the oceans with domesticated animals in their ship's holds, to finally reintroduce the horse to it's indiginous continent of the New World.

The chart above is a visual comparison of today's Spanish Mustang next to two classic breed types: the Arabian Horse and the Quarter Horse. Compact, a touch coarse, and exhibiting a proportionately larger, more primitive head than his cousins, the Spanish Mustang reflects the same balanced but rugged anatomy that carried his ancestors through ice ages, extinctions, and much of human civilization - with strength, speed, and impeccable grace.

Here's to the one and only: the Horse.

From You Have I Been Absent

From you have I been absent in the spring,
When proud-pied April, dress'd in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in everything,
That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him.
Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell
Of different flowers in odour and in hue,
Could make me any summer's story tell,
Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew,
Nor did I wonder at the Lily's white,
Nor praise the deep vermilion in the Rose;
They were but sweet, but figures of delight,
Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.
Yet seem'd it Winter still, and, you away,
As with your shadow I with these did play.

~William Shakespeare, Sonnet XIII
 

Holmedown Arizona

Holmedown Arizona, aka "Rhea", is a Highland pony - hers being one of a handful of hardy breeds native to the British Isles (she happens to live in England). Highlands come in a variety of colors, including a broad range of shades comprising my favorite equine coat color affect - dun (Rhea is a beautiful example of a yellow dun). Since dun genes dilute solid colors, they can create all kinds of lovely, soft variation and gradients in the coat; dun is also considered a very primitive equine coat trait, as evidenced by the retention of "dun factors" like dorsal stripes, zebra striping/barring on the legs, shadowing on the neck and shoulders, and an unusual effect on the forehead known as cobwebbing (I'm a wicked sucker for stripes).

The Highland pony was  originally developed in the late 1800s as a compact, all purpose workhorse for the challenging landscape and somewhat severe environment of the Scottish Highlands. In addition to farm work, one of it's trusted tasks was also to serve the unique role of deer pony on red deer "stalks". Stalking deer over the rugged Scottish hillside was much more pleasant with a vehicle for traipsing the carcass out on, and the Highland, at roughly between 13 and 14.2 sure-footed, quiet, and steady hands high, made a perfect companion for a hunter - special saddles were even developed that could both comfortably seat a hunter on the trek out, but securely strap down and distribute the weight of a full grown Cervid elaphus (Red deer are one of the largest deer species) for the march home.

Red deer culls continue to this day, for the maintenance of herd populations on many Scottish estates, and the tradition of deer ponies is still strong; technology has improved firearms, technical gear and clothing, and navigation tools, but good old fashioned ponies are still more reliable, less obtrusive and destructive (delicate pony hooves vs. ATV tires), and actually better equipped for the terrain than motorized forms of transport - they also make much better trekking companions than anything with an engine. I love to see working domesticated animals doing what they were bred for (within the realm of humane purpose or duty), and while I'm not a hunter by any stretch, there's something wildly romantic in the image of a tweed-decked man leading a stout, wooly pony through the treeless hillsides with a single stag arched over the saddle... swoon...

Below: two photos of modern deer stalks, assisted by Highland ponies, from the website of accomplished hunter and pony fancier, Heather Mitchell, aka The Frilly Ghillie (more great images can be found on her blog); and a painting titled Return from the Hill, by Richard Ansdell, 1868.
 

Must Love: Lisa's Booby Trap

Think what you will about racing horses for sport, but one thing is certain - no other athletic pursuit has quite the same tendency to consistently produce wildly compelling stories surrounding it's players. It's a hard knock life for most, a high-stakes hobby for some, and the Sport of Kings to those of us who watch vicariously every summer as beautiful people in extravagant hats, sipping tall cocktails, pile into the stands of the Kentucky Derby, betting tickets hot in their hands. I suppose there are an awful lot of intertwined lives behind every race entrant: between the owners, the trainers, the jockeys and the lithe equines, there's boundless room for sentimental drama. That said, I don't think I've ever come across a tale as good as the one playing out this summer regarding a fleet-footed filly with the word "booby" in her name.

Meet Lisa's Booby Trap: a half-blind, 3 year old, Florida-bred filly with one club foot, one flat foot, and aprevious reputation for being exceptionally slow (after working her for the first time, trainer John Tebbutt remarked, "She couldn't outrun a fat man."). Given up on by multiple consecutive owners, Lisa's Booby Trap, then unnamed, was offered last January to lifelong horseman and racetracker, Tim Snyder. Based out of the modest Finger Lakes Racetrack in upstate New York, 56 year old Snyder had no other horses of his own at the time and had only recently returned to the track, to work for Mr. Tebbutt, from a three year hiatus from all things horse, after the death of his wife left him heart-broken. He had all of $2,000 in worldly wealth (which he kept in his boot for safety) but when a longtime friend offered him the less than promising filly for $4,500, something compelled him to say yes. Not able to pay the whole sum, and without even a trailer to collect his new purchase, Snyder took a leap of faith and bought the horse, agreeing to pay back the extra $2,500 from prize money, if the horse ever won a race. And with a little special attention, the help of Snyder's keen eye for equine orthopedics, and a whole lot of love, win a race she did.

Named after his beloved late wife, Lisa, who passed away in 2003 at just 38, from ovarian cancer, Lisa's Booby Trap not only overcame the crookedness in her stride after Snyder had special shoes fit for her front feet - once on the track she showed impressive speed and great willingness to RUN. In her first race at the Finger Lakes track at the end of May she completely obliterated her competition, winning by a brilliant 173/4 lengths. In her second race she crossed the finish line with a 10 1/2-length lead... extraordinary results for a horse with no stunning pedigree, and so many physical imperfections; so great, in fact, that just before her third career start Snyder was offered a bid of $500,000 by a bloodstock agent to buy her if she won again... and she did, but Snyder kindly turned down the offer.

It was about this time - early last week - that the story of this big-hearted underdog and her hard-working, most likable owner/trainer hit the news. It would have made a great headline on it's own, but the real drama was due to the fact that Snyder had entered Lisa's Booby Trap in the August 6th Loudonville Stakes - her first "big" race, run at the prestigious Saratoga Race Course... for a purse of $70,000. She would need to beat 5 other fillies of classy Kentucky breeding in order to win the Loudonville - a prospect even admiring fans who know horse racing were reluctant to believe she could do. But once again, Lisa's Booby Trap overturned expectations - not only did she come up from dead last to streak past the two horses that had led the race from the gate, she surpassed them handily in the back stretch and roared to an effortless win by six-lengths.

In an interview after the race, Lisa's jockey for the Loudonville, Hall of Famer Kent Desormeaux, explained the special connection his mount had with her namesake: apparently, one of Lisa Snyder's last wishes before her death was to return to the world as a horse. The idea of reincarnation may be a stretch for most, but considering the circumstances here, I'd like to believe anything's possible. Snyder will likely enter Lisa in the Victory Ride Stakes race at Saratoga on August 28th - mark your calendars. And in the words of a stunned Michael O-Farrell (assistant manager at Ocala Stud, Lisa's breeder), "I'm still rooting for her. How can you not?". 


Photo above by Adam Coglianese, courtesy of Bloodhorse.com. Read the NY Times write up on Lisa's Booby Trap here, watch her terrific performance at the Loundonville here, and for a nice extended interview with Tim Snyder, check out this YouTube clip.

Merlin

Between the time I first learned to hold a pencil correctly and the day I left for college, horses were far and away my favorite subjects and I drew and painted them tirelessly. Art school encouraged/demanded me to branch out, and my professional life as an artist has since been filled with countless wonderful opportunities to turn my focus in all number of animal directions; though without question, there will always be a spacious sweet spot in my soul for equines and their reliable creative inspiration. The painting above is my first horse portrait in years, and it's been a pleasure, sweet Merlin... 

Merlin was a beloved member of the Dream Catchers therapeutic riding center in Williamsburg, Virginia. A stately Tennessee walking horse gelding - calm, willing, and ever patient - he offered special needs children the opportunity to improve their motor skills, self-esteem, and confidence, through the simple act of riding. Climbing aboard a horse is immediately empowering, and forging a working partnership with a 1,000+lb animal is a lesson in courage, subtlety, and unspoken communication. Each Dream Catchers student had a chance to literally leave their disability on the ground when they settled onto Merlin's back... a magical, awe-inspiring feat, indeed. Merlin leaves 16 gentle stablemates to carry on their proud task without him, but he will be dearly and forever missed. *More of my animal portrait work can be viewed here.