Wildlife Returning To Chernobyl

The wilderness is encroaching over abandoned towns in the Chernobyl exclusion zone. One of the elderly residents who refused to evacuate the contaminated area says packs of wolves have eaten two of her dogs, and wild boar trample through her cornfield. Scientist are divided as to whether or not the animals are flourishing in the highly radioactive environment: "Robert J. Baker of Texas Tech University says the mice and other rodents he has studied at Chernobyl since the early 1990s have shown remarkable tolerance for elevated radiation levels. But Timothy Mousseau of the University of South Carolina, a biologist who studies barn swallows at Chernobyl, says that while wild animals have settled in the area, they have struggled to build new populations."

Wild animals?

[drgonzo59]

wild animals have settled in the area, they have struggled to build new populations

It's hard to attract females when you have 2 beaks, 3 hooves and only 1 eye.

Ob

[A.Chwunbee]

I for on am welcomming our're new three-headed frog overloads!

Re:Wild animals?

[Anonymous Coward]

This is /. breasts and a skirt will do.

Case in point

[packetmon]

Packs of wolves have eaten two of her dogs, the 73-year-old says, and wild boar trample through her cornfield. And she says fox, rabbits and snakes infest the meadows near her tumbledown cottage. ... Then we have... Others say animals may be filtering into the zone, but they appear to suffer malformations and other ills.. Inference: She saw what she thought was a pack of wolves when in fact it was a three headed wolf.

Great!

[spungo]

Finally a town I can look normal in!

Movies

[Lovedumplingx]

If movies have taught me anything it's that this is the start of the downfall of man.

In a few years we'll be herded into wooden pens by mounted apes and then experimented on.

Oh the folly of it all!!!

Re:Wild animals?

[Trigun]

And for the women of slashdot, those attributes listed in the GP would be a step up.

Photos

[suv4x4]

Any photos of giant insects or ninja turtles? At least maybe a cross between a spider and a man?

Damn. Radiation in real life is BORING.

Re:Isn't this really, really old?

[El Yanqui]

I swear I read about this a few years ago too. I had hoped this time around that we were talking about animals with superpowers.

Re:Counter t to Creation Museum?

[Bastard of Subhumani]

In [certain parts of] Soviet Russia, eyes mutate before animals!!!!!

Re:Same as in Bikini

[Dystopian Rebel]

Bombing and radiation is better for wildlife than sub divisions.

At last a solution for California that we can all accept.

Re:Wild animals?

[Mockylock]

2 tits, a hole and heartbeat will suffice.

Irregular heartbeat and small tits optional.

pointless blackadder quote

[Anonymous Coward]

Percy: "Only this morning in the courtyard I saw a horse with two heads, and two bodies"
Blackadder: "Could it have been...two horses perhaps?"

Anyway, they will adapt soon

[iamacat]

There are already bacteria living in active zones of nuclear reactors. Animals with fast reproductive cycle will likely adapt first, both because of faster evolution - especially in the face of accelerated mutations - and because they don't have to survive as long to produce offsprings. It's only a matter of decades before we catch 5 eared rabbits with ECC in their DNA in addition to RAID1 that we currently have.

Re:Returning only now?

[Trigun]

Truth is, even with a sufficient number of a-bombs accross the world, we'll have a very hard time wijping all of humanity and wild life. Life's a tough mother f*cker, hard to destroy.

I'll take that bet, sir.

Re:Isn't this really, really old?

[doombringerltx]

FTFA:

The return of wildlife to the region near the world's worst nuclear power accident, first reported more than a decade ago, is an apparent paradox that biologists are still trying to measure and understand.

Its just checking back on it. Like those those VH1 "Where are they now?" shows. One looks at Vanilla Ice's career today, this looks at Chernobyl. Pretty similar disasters

Re:Returning only now?

[Aladrin]

Noooo, God reached down his noodly appendage and made them healthy!

You thought I was going to say something else, didn't you? ;)

Re:Case in point

[Mockylock]

Using their x-ray laser vision to cut a hole in the wall... DUH.

Re:Case in point

[TheBeowulf]

Oh, you mean Fluffy?

--
Beats me how you ever even know about Fluffy! - Hagrid

Also spotted...

[markov_chain]

Mysterious coal deposits underneath compost piles, a crazy naked couple running around with the animals, and some doddering old man writing frantically into a journal.

Wildlife in the Zone?

[morari]

Us Stalkers have known this for quite some time. Just be sure to throw some nuts and bolts around in front of you!

Re:Returning only now?

[Anonymous Coward]

ahh. You must be part of the white house.

Re:Returning only now?

[mcmonkey]

yes, one generation was screwed up with cancers and freaks but the next generations seem to have overcome that.

Just like we overcame being children of the baby boomers. Neat.

Re:Ob

[Mercano]

All glory to the hypnotoad.

Whither the treehuggers

[democrates]

Boars are stomping her corn cobs? Better toughen up lady, any day Monsanto will sue for infringing their holy patents on mutant crops. It's Greenpeace who really confuse me though, they're always on about biodiversity, then we get lots of new lifeforms in Chernobyls valley of the muties and they're cribbing more than ever. No pleasing some people.

Re:Insect

[Chris Burke]

Thus the joke about the cockroach being the next master of earth in case the A,H and other 1 letter bomb start to fall ?

The F-bomb?

Re:Wild animals?

[corifornia]

Interesting, the fat guy in the cubicle next to me meets that description...

Re:Same as in Bikini

[zippthorne]

What are you.. a Bond villain? If you're going to start making statements like that, then you'll note that when the world actually had only a billion people, people were saying it should have less than 100 million.

Re:Same as in Bikini

[rleibman]

Most of the problems of the world can be traced to the fact that we have 6 billion humans instead of 1 billion humans. If there were only a billion of us, the world would be an abundant paradise.

Are you volunteering to get off?

Oblig. Eddie Izzard

[sakasune]

"Anything! Anything with a pulse! Or NOT! Pulse OPTIONAL!"
-Dressed to Kill

Re:We could wipe out life.

[suv4x4]

As another poster commented, without fresh DNA coming into the area, the local wildlife would not be as successful. Destroy all the ecosystems of the entire world, add a little nuclear winter and we will have created the worst extinction event the world has ever seen.

I think, however, that this epic tragedy will be offset from all the people who'll gain superpowers as a result.

Re:Its not old news if you're american

[MightyYar]

A smug cloud has been spotted over Europe, apparently impeding their ability to keep their G8 promises to Bono.

Re:Wild animals?

[Anonymous Coward]

>And for the women of slashdot, those attributes listed in the GP would be a step up.
OMG! The idea of a swimsuit calendar "The Women of Slashdot" has just created a singularity of desire and confusion in my mind!

Re:Wild animals?

[russotto]

Seeing how I've been composing a DnD book about undead sexuality

Tsukiko, is that you????