THIS CAN'T BE GOOD

(Thanks to KCSteve)

Comments

[Addicted to 24]

I warned mankind that no good would ever come of letting stars sance on TV.

[Brainy Jello]

What's next, chicken fingers?!

[Sarah J]

At least it's dead and won't be breeding Mutant Alligator Chickens!

[pogo]

I would think the chicken's lips would have hidden the teeth. "Scarcer than hens teeth." (old folkism)

[mudstuffin]

I once managed a restaurant. One waitress that worked there used to write "Chicken Snake" when she meant to be ordering a "Chicken Snack". I, of course, made fun of this, making hissing sounds, elaborately avoiding walking near a plate of chicken, etc. When I later fired her, she accused me of discrimination.

Good times.

[Gonzo_Jones]

Perhaps it's "The Mark of the Beak"?

Colonel Sanders was truly a great man for his efforts to save us from them by slaughtering and frying these vicious monsters.

[TCK]

so why are we wastin' our time trying to grow chickens with teeth? ya cut the heads off anyway. if they could grow a chicken with four drumsticks, well then they'd have done somethin' worth braggin' about

[DDi]

Gonzo, my compliments. Reading that story all I could think about was 11 herbs and spices... Thank goodness the good Colonel had the sense to slaughter the little beasts, aye?

[Betsy]

'Nevertheless, the underlying genetic mechanism that produces teeth in mice, alligators and mutant chickens remains the same.'

Something to cling to in these troubled times.

[Texas]

We could grow mutant chickens and have them invade France or French Canada. Most of the country would immediately surrender anyway and the remainder would be caught trying to make a sauce out of the chicken stock.

[CoastRaven]

(With apologies to Bobby Boris Pickett)

I was working in the lab late one night
When my eyes beheld an eerie sight
The chicken on my slab had lost his beak
And suddenly - I really freaked

*He did the gnash*
It was the bird flu gnash
*the bird flu gnash*
It was an avian smash
*He did the gnash*
In a blast from the past
*The bird flu gnash*
He had enamel held fast

Out from his beak grew a little spoke
Which birds only have when their in the yoke
Alligators have teeth that grow like it
So when you prick your finger it hurts like **it!

*It was the gnash*
He did the bird flu gnash
*the bird flu gnash*
It was an avian smash
*He did the gnash*
In a blast from the past
*The bird flu gnash*
He had enamel held fast

[CoastRaven]

*tosses YOLK up there to replace the ugly error in the parody*

[crossgirl]

first hen's teeth, then frog hair.

[Lairbo]

I'm not gonna worry about this until chickens mutate lips. Once that happens, I'll have the boys in the lab doublecheck the Pope's religious affiliation and where bears poop.

ps: Fastest-growing new profession: Poultry dentist?

[daisymae]

Eeeeuw! *snork* @ CoastRaven...I DON'T like that song and now it's in my hdad.

Earwig alert!

[Betsi]

hey, i sent that in too, and no thank you from Dave?! :(

[Lisa Bisa Fo Fisa]

*snork* at Coast and Brainy Jello.

Birds with teeth? Next thing ya know pigs will fly.

[queensbee]

Lairbo - inspired. Sorry hennypenny, you'll need a ROOST canal.
sorry.
as my lil grammma used to say - if we wouldnt eat the chickens they would eat us.... deeeee-lish. just hold the teeth please.

[CoastRaven]

Not the biggest fan of the song either, but when the story starts out "Working late in the developmental biology lab one night" it was screaming for that treatment.

[reneviht]

I think most've you are missing an important part of the article...

Previous efforts to produce teeth in chickens had relied on introducing genetic information from mice, resulting in chickens growing mammalian molars.

That's right... there are mad scientists out there, deliberately trying to make toothy roosters. And after this discovery, they'll probably try to make them with alligator teeth instead of mice teeth.

[Blue Meanie]

Scientific American.com - SCIENCE NEWS February 22, 2006

Mutant Alligator Grows Chickenlike Feathers

Working late in the developmental biology lab one night, Harry Matthews of the University of Florida noticed........

[Mahatma Kane Jeeves]

'Quand les poules auront des dents' (French expression, similar to the hen's teeth one from pogo above, means 'never.' Well so much for THAT.)

[Mahatma Kane Jeeves]

"C'mon over here, and I'll gnaw on 'ya . . . "

[Blue Meanie]

Scientific American.com - SCIENCE NEWS February 22, 2006

Mutant Raven Reveals Song Parody Talent........

[insomniac]

(channeling Yacov Smirnov)
in soviet russia, chicken picks bits of you out of its teeth!

[Mr. Completely]

TCK - If they COULD grow a chicken with four legs, they'd never be able to catch it.

[daisymae]

*snork* @ Blue Meanie LOL

[Kathy P.]

Holy cow! No, that's another thing altogether.... Chicken teeth? Who knew? Besides mother chickens and scientists who check into this sort of thing. When you think about it, the dinosaurs developing into birds doesn't seem so far-fetched, does it?

[JT]

Freakin' global warming...

[southerngirl]

CoastRaven, I'm lttg, but you had the same first thought as me. Maybe my ponytails a little too tight, too. ;)

[Somewhere North]

Kathi, if we continue on that theme, since they are apparently growing their teeth back any day now chickens should be back to 35 feet high with crocodile teeth. Then they'll be raptors instead of roosters.

I'm going to eat all the KFC I can now! From underneath my bed since this has to a sign of the Apocolypse.

[Lisa Bisa Fo Fisa]

Kathy P-Yes, but what I dread is birds turning BACK into dinosaurs!!

[CoastRaven]

*snork* @ Blue Meanie - but really... you call that "talent"? Poor reporting if you ask me.

[Annie Where-but-here]

CoastRaven - you're poultry in motion. Now get outta here. ;)

[Prairie Dog]

Well, if they can give an alligator a hen's beak, then they'll have something.

[J M Walker]

Alright: Cross chickens with alligator teeth with dumpy tree frogs, and you could have a household pet who could lay eggs, savage burglers, and keep mosquitos away. Now if I could teach one to get me a beer, I could dump the old lady . . . sigh.

[Christobol]

"I thought you said we were having chicken tonight?"
"Well...no."
"What happened to your hand?"
"Just shut up and eat your beans."

[Hanna]

Welllll, I had a little chicken and he wouldn't lay an egg...
So I poured hot water up and down his leg,
And the funny little chicken, welllll he hollered and he begged,
And the funny little chicken bit the h*** out of my finger.

[Hanna]

cuold not think of anything to make it rhyme sigh

[Annie Where-but-here]

Hanna - I like it. It has the element of surprise.

[City Girl]

Chickens don't have teeth????

Who knew?????

How do they chew????

[Annie Where-but-here]

City Girl - they prefer protein shakes. Gives them the energy they need to cross the road.

[Edgar Greenberg]

hey, i sent that in too, and no thank you from Dave?! :(

Posted by: Betsi | 03:12 PM on February 22, 2006

I believe I pulled the same thing a couple of months ago, and it didn't go over very well.

Watch it or angry blogger will throw tyrannosaurochickens at you.

[City Girl]

That makes sense, AnnieWBH - thanks for the explanation. :)

[TCK]

so, City Girl - whaddya think of country boys? you know, like in the John Denver song?

[Betsy]

Citygirl...Off topic: Mission completed. See ice worm post.

That is all.

Back to chicken dentition.

[Blue Meanie]

City Girl watches the Odd Couple?

[U.O]

I'm wonderin' if attempts to cross-breed chickens with alligators would encounter problems similar to those cited earlier on another thread, with the mating of lions (or tigers) with goats ...

I'm guessin' ... yes ...

[Stupendous Man]

All avians are born with a tooth...called the egg tooth. Otherwise they'd have to gum their way out of their shells. The egg tooth falls off the beak shortly after birth so the young avians can suckle at their mothers' ramparts. Yes, students, all avians have nipples...called egg nipples. Otherwise their young would have to seek sustenance from the soil, scratching for it like chickens, which, by the way have breasts...oh, look! There's a shiny 25 cent piece! Gakkk!
(wipes hand)
Okay, who spit like a quarter?

[Ernie G]

Previous efforts to produce teeth in chickens had relied on introducing genetic information from mice, resulting in chickens growing mammalian molars

They had better be careful with them mammalian genes. It could give a whole new meaning to the phrase "breast of chicken."

[Annie Where-but-here]

"Introducing Disney Nuggets - taste like Mickey."

[Mad Soapboxer]

"...there are mad scientists out there, deliberately trying to make toothy roosters..."

reneviht, you touched on what really made me MAD about that article: here we are as a world, going to heck in a handbasket, and there are fool scientists wasting time and money on researching BS like this! How the $%^#@#%^& did they ever get the FUNDING for it? Oh yeah, it had to be Federally funded... any government that will spend a bazillion bucks studying cow farts will SURELY pay a bazillion bucks for hen's teeth research.

Hmmmmmmmm, now how can WE cash in on this? Anyone got the grant forms handy? I'm thinking of research that cries out to be done: "The Medicinal Properties of Elephant Boogers"; "The Long Term Effects of Addiction to '24'"; "Just When DOES Jack Bauer Pee?"; "My Oosik Is Bigger Than Yours"; "The Economic Impact of Adulterated Dalda on the World's Ghee Supply"... there (not they're, not their) must be more we can use to get some of our tax money back where it belongs (in OUR wallets)...

"It's morally wrong to allow a sucker to keep his money." W. C. Fields

[Blue Something]

MadS - I suggest an investigation into why it is that when I check the box for "Remember Personal Info?" in these threads that I still fail on a regular basis to remember key birthdays, anniversaries, names of close friends, where my car keys are, what I said three minutes ago, whose turn it is to make the coffee, PIN numbers, what I said three minutes ago, and my blog screen name.

[U.O]

BS'er ... I know whut you ... um ... whut wuz the question?

[Betsy]

Mad...I totally sympathize, but in the interests of accuracy I have to point out that the feds don't fund the study of cow FARTS: it's actually cow BURPS that are the problem.
Hmmmm...*applies for federal funding to study 'farts v. burps: public perceptions as a barrier to methane research'*.

[Mad Soapboxer]

Betsy, if one hangs around cows, my guess is that BOTH cow burps and cow farts are gonna be a problem, but I'll defer (from upwind) to your expert knowledge of the subject. I'll add your application to the pile. Of course, you've touched another nerve: the government has taken a half-a$$ed approach here, studying only one end of the "issue"...

"There comes a time in the affairs of man when he must take the bull by the tail and face the situation." W. C. Fields

[D. Esker]

Given the unfairly negative reaction to this story, I'm afraid at the backlash the following development is going to produce . . .
Brainy Jello, I'm afraid that the days of chicken fingers have already arrived. Chickens are already theropods -- the primitive condition in chickens is to have three fingers, each with a claw. Chicken embryos already have these, but one finger is lost and the other two are fused before the chick hatches. Except in chickens that have been engineered by Hans Larsson of McGill University. They've got FIVE fingers, the primitive number not for theropods, but thier tetropod ancestors. They've also got long tails (the tail is normally reabsorbed before hatching). Put that together with the teeth, and you've got something right out of Jurassic Park. Only small. And with the brain of a chicken. What the hell, I want one anyway.

P.S. Dear Mad Soapboxer: Most paleontological research is privately funded. In defense of the very few publicly funded projects, I would note that if the public kept money, they would probably spend it on singing robotic fishes. Anyway, if you really want to save money, how about stoping the government from 'liberating' miserable little desert nations that express thier gratitude by blowing us up? That costs 100,000 times more than a whole army of toothy, long-tailed, five-clawed chicken monsters, and isn't nearly as much fun. I really don't know why we mad scientists get such a bad rap when its the mad lawyers and the mad politicians that cause all the problems.

P.P.S. Go here (http://www.mcgill.ca/reporter/35/10/newprofs/larsson/) for a short biography on Larsson.

[Mad Soapboxer]

D.E., your scienterrific info on the bizarre embryonic development of a chicken has reinforced my firm belief that chickens DESERVE to be marinated in 11 herbs and spices, breaded and deep fried. (That works for ‘gator too, in fact – GOOD eatin’!)

BTW, I am not a mad scientist, I’m just MAD. My daughter is one of those mad scientist types though, but I have it on good authority that SHE has no part in any effort to develop unnecessary body parts in chickens or any other edible critter.

I beg to differ on what we here at Dave’s Blog would do with newfound riches, however. WE would not spend it on singing robotic fishes, but would apply every dime wisely and effectively on BEER! Beer and pretzels. And oosiks. And blue shirts. And thongs. And Dave’s books.

I am in favor of deep frying the mad lawyers and the mad politicians as well, but I don’t think we could get even cockroaches to eat them…. Bleaugh!

[Stupendous Man]

By now scientists studying the alleged ill effects of bovine flatulence have probably noted by now what any dairy farmer would have told them for free: A cow only burps when its asshole locks up.

[KCSteve]

Yay - I got a 'thanks'!

Of course it would be on one of my rare off-line days.

Ah well, it's still good.

And Betsy, I sent this in when I saw it in Scientific American whereas most of the others probably didn't see it until it got picked up elsewhere.

Or I just got lucky.

[jeremy]

Welllll, I had a little chicken and he wouldn't lay an egg...
So I poured hot water up and down his leg,
he screamed and he hollared and he hollared and he begged,
that little chicken laid a hard boiled egg... whith teeth

see, that rhymes