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Anorak News | Survival Of The Unfittest

Survival Of The Unfittest

by | 19th, March 2004

‘IT turns out that when Charles Darwin came up with his theory of natural selection, he was not talking about the survival of the fittest as we now understand it.

The man with the biggest belt wins

The continuing existence of the Feltz dynasty should have been proof of that.

In fact, in the animal kingdom it appears that it’s a real advantage to be a bit of a minger.

When it came down to a battle between beautiful British red squirrels and ugly Yankee grey ones, we’re sad to say the latter won hands down.

There’s a reason that pigeons proliferate, while golden eagles are rarer than an uncooked sirloin steak.

When permatanned Grant Bovey stepped into the ring with Ricky Gervais, he should have known that he would be no match for the overweight comic.

And so it is that we read on the front of the Guardian that the butterfly population in Britain is in mass decline, while moths continue to flourish.

The paper says that in the past 20 years, about 70% of all butterfly species in Britain have shown signs of decline.

In the same time frame, 28% of plant species and 54% of bird species have also declined.

“The lesson and the warning are there for all to see,” says Sandra Knapp, a botanist at the Natural History Museum.

“Britain, by virtue of its well-known and well-studied biodiversity, is the canary for the rest of the globe.”

The only trouble is that the rest of the world has to listen before the canary goes the same way as so many birds before.’



Posted: 19th, March 2004 | In: Broadsheets Comment | TrackBack | Permalink