Sunday, January 17, 2010

The Beast of Baton Rouge

It's difficult to describe the pride I feel to share this picture with you all.

My girls ran to me recently as I parked the car after work: "There's a dead animal in the ditch. Come see! It's SO COOL!"

Here's B with with her prize find. Can anyone identify the dead beast? This looks like a job for Darren...















19 comments:

Heather Houlahan said...

From what I can make out of the skull, raccoon. But I can't embiggen your photos, and my eyes aren't what they once were.

Annie D said...

Chupacabra

Isaac said...

Awesome! How did your wife feel about such a find??

Max Inclined said...

Matt, if you're on Facebook, check out the "You know you're a redneck falconer when" group, especially Niki Peretta's posts. She's got some great things about what falconers' kids learn ;)

Chas S. Clifton said...

Great photo. Save it for blackmail purposes later.

Viktoria G said...

Hello,
I am most curious about your dogs. Do you have website with more pictures of them? What are their pedigrees? They look like COO Salukis, am I right?
I would be most thankful for your answer.
viktoria[dot]guwallius[at]gmail[dot]com

Neutrino Cannon said...

Here is a picture of a raccoon skeleton, clean, for comparison:

http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/resources/anatomical_images/raccoon_skeleton.jpg

Raccoon seems to be a reasonable identification, but it's a little bit small. Do you have ring-tails or cacomistles or anything like that out East? If not, I would hazard that it's a small raccoon.

They have much longer leg bones than I would have thought just looking at the living animals.

Steve Bodio said...

I tend toward raccoon-- maybe ask Darren?

Matt Mullenix said...

Darren suspects raccoon also (although sloth and chupacabra are both strong contenders at this point).

Bob and Aliette Gold said...

It is definitely a squirrel, rabbit or a small dinosaur.

Anonymous said...

Oppossum? They are toothy creatures.

Annie in VA

Marnie said...

Bigfoot, clearly. (but seriously, Dave might know. I'll send him a link.)
We needed you yesterday, when Zach wanted to bring a dead bird home that we found while waiting for the MLK march to start. I just wasn't equipped . . .

Marnie said...

Dave's guess: "Not a rodent, too long a skull for a cat. Possum I’d say, or perhaps a mustelid of some sort (weasel or skunk)."

Neutrino Cannon said...

Here's an opossum skull for comparison:


http://aardvarks.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/opossum_skull.jpg


The opossum's skull is nearly flat on top, and it has some strange, snaggly looking (premolars?) right behind the (canines?).

Rodents and rabbits have a big gap in their tooth rows right behind the incisors (diastema), so it's surely not one of those.

Upon close inspection, there appear to be long, straight bones near the spine. Probably wing elements. This is either a raccoon or a juvenile sphinx.

Doug said...

I've never seen one (dead) - but maybe armadillo?

Anonymous said...

Damn. It's my Avatar.

Annie in VA

shadygrove said...

I haven't seen a live armadillo, sadly, in years! I'm thinking skunk although after last nights news cast it COULD be a Chupacabra. They just found one here in East Texas! Mystery solved. lol Here's the link: http://www.cbs19.tv/global/story.asp?s=11846643

Unknown said...

Iguana?

Russ London said...

The skull and sleleton are coon like see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Raccoon_skull_Pengo.jpg for an see also http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/resources/anatomical_images/raccoon_skeleton.jpg

however the size indicates (unless your daughters are alot bigger than last I saw them )that it is either a young raccoon or a skunk as the skeletons are quite similar.
seehttp://www.museumofosteology.org/images/hooded-skunk-lg.jpg. Both are very common around here although I rather run across a racoon.
Russ London