Fossil evidence shows that the tadpole shrimp is one of the world’s oldest unchanged animals, remaining virtually the same for 200 million years.

Fossil finds show that the shrimp is virtually the same today as it was 200 million years ago, when the first dinosaurs evolved.

The shrimps are adapted to living in temporary water pools. When the water dries up, the adults die but leave behind eggs that can remain dormant for years until wet conditions return.

Understanding the animal’s unusual lifestyle helped researchers from the University of Glasgow make the discovery announced today.

Mud thought to contain tadpole shrimp eggs was sampled from pools around Caerlaverock, dried, re-wetted and placed in small aquaria.

The scientists were startled to find a large shrimp swimming in one of the tanks within a couple of weeks.

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The jawbone of a dog, which dates back 14,000 years, may be the oldest example of a domesticated dog.

Every dog has its day, but that day took more than 14,000 years to dawn for one canine. A jaw fragment found in a Swiss cave comes from the earliest known dog, according to scientists who analyzed and radiocarbon-dated the fossil.

Dog origins remain poorly understood, however, and some researchers say that dog fossils much older than the Swiss find have already been excavated.

An upper-right jaw unearthed in 1873 in Kesslerloch Cave, located near Switzerland’s northern border with Germany, shows that domestic dogs lived there between 14,100 and 14,600 years ago, say archaeology graduate student Hannes Napierala and archaeozoologist Hans-Peter Uerpmann, study coauthors at the University of Tübingen in Germany.

“The Kesslerloch find clearly supports the idea that the dog was an established domestic animal at that time in central Europe,” Napierala says.

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Researchers have found the earliest evidence of a pet tortoise at a castle in Staffordshire.

There has been evidence of turtles and terrapins in domestic situations dating back to the 17th Century – but it was believed that these animals were used for food.

The discovery of a 130-year-old tortoise leg bone at Stafford Castle, amongst the remains of cats and dogs, suggests that this animal was a pet kept by the castle’s caretakers.

According to Dr Richard Thomas of Leicester University, who led the research, the keeping of pets had until then been considered “morally suspect”.

“If you go back to the medieval period you can see that attitudes to animals in general were very much constrained by religious doctrine,” he said.

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A study of the nervous system of the might Tyrannosaurus Rex shows the dinosaur wasn’t necessarily quick and agile, but rather plodded along like an elephant.

When a vertebrate—an animal with a backbone—stubs its toe, electrical signals get carried from the toe to the spinal cord by a nerve, which is made up of bundles of long, fiberlike cells.

Since the researchers couldn’t study a T. rex’s nerves directly, the team looked at how nerves work in a range of modern animals, from the tiny shrew to midsize dogs and pigs to massive Asian elephants.

The scientists found that, for all body sizes, nerves have a basic speed limit of about 180 feet (55 meters) a second. That’s the fastest a signal can travel from an animal’s feet to its spinal cord—the kind of signal that’s essential for walking and running.

At that speed limit, big animals such as elephants can’t run too fast or they’re effectively running blind.

Suppose an elephant steps on a pebble, said study leader Max Donelan of Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, Canada. If the pachyderm was running fast, “its foot would be nearly off the ground before it could do something in response to that troublesome pebble.”

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The remains of animals sacrificed at seitas (stone monuments) in the 12th century have been found in Finland.

The studies have already produced some results.

“Based on radiocarbon dating, the oldest findings have been dated back to the 12th century”, says archaeologist Tiina Äikäs.

Next to most of the examined sacred places the bones of animals, such as reindeer, goats, sheep, or various types of bird and fish species have been located.

Animal offerings were presented to seitas in hopes for better luck with fishing or hunting. Sometimes such proceedings included brushing the stone with blood or fat.

This summer season the excavations will continue in Termisvaara in the far northern municipality of Enontekiö. Divers will start exploring the seitas surrounded by water.

Most known seitas are unusually shaped stones. At one time Christian priests destroyed seitas, but the indigenous Sámi people themselves are also known to have taken them apart, if they have not been propitious.

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