Monday, August 9, 2010

bioengineering

I do like the term bioengineering which I first came across the other day. The way I'm meaning is engineering of the environment by animals and plants. The classic example is a pair of beavers and their dam. But an example closer to home the spiral burrows of bilby acting as a nutrient trap to enrich our deserts.



footnote:
I did learn some interesting facts about beavers in the process of writing this entry. There were 200 million of them in North American when Europeans arrived (and there'snow a great deal less), they mate for life, and the females are a little heavier than the males.

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