i want to start a post to benefit those burrow mates that don't have the book, and don't plan on getting it, but would like to hear some of the stories. i will make my first post in a few hours. if you are planning to get the book anytime soon, i would advise you to not read this thread, as i am going to tell you about my favorite parts of the book. i encourage anyone else who wants to share their favorite stories from the book to post on this thread also. also, i will be happy to answer any questions that anyone may have. stay tuned if you want to hear......

this is the story where zaphod a yossarian emmigrate to the whiskers and what happens to flower's cousin risca:

after holly's death risca became the dominant female, and dm (and flower's father) argon began roving frequently and eventually left the group. along came zaphod and yossarian and their 6 brothers! described by Mr. Clutton as being an unusually large roving group. all the whisker males happened to be away also looking for some action the vivian rovers took over the group without opposition. zaphod and yossarian were by no means top kats in the band of brothers. basil (mm's big si) was the oldest but izit was initially dominant. soon after it is stated in the book (without alot of details) that basil left to go back to the vivian and the other males in the group attacked izit in succession (more insight on this behavior in my next story). izit was exhausted after the many tussles and left the group, leaving zaphod, yossarian, alexander and zazu. zaphod came out on top. soon after vialli (flowers older sister) took dominance from risca and eventually evicted her permanently. risca and wahine (whiskers) were eventually joined by 2 vivian rovers and then by izit and 2 of his younger brothers. both risca and izit were not in good shape after their fights within the whiskers, and neither gained initial dominance. 3 months later, wahine was taken by an eagle and took dominance. the dm is not named, only described as one of izit's younger brothers. enter stage left.............STINKER. one of the famous meerkats in the kmp study. his dominant female in the vivian had recently died. he had no unrelated females in his group and moved on and quickly came across the new gattica group with his sons in charge. he took dominance without much opposition. what a kick in the gonads that must have been for whichever of izit's younger brothers was dominant........."F#$@, what's dad doing here?

risca lived for a long time and i believe died shortly before our beloved flower.

I too liked the mentions of Stinker ("Sondheim") and the story about Baddiel ("Tosca") moving her litter to the new burrow after Flower used that tactic to abandon them. That took guts!

I second that, Zero. I loved the story about Tosca moving her litter.

I also loved the story of Flava Flav on a roving trip to the Commandos when he was just a year old. He wasn't careful, and ended up getting attacked by a group of Commando males.
He ended up with...

" a dislocated shoulder, large slashes to his legs and belly, a torn left eye socket and a ripped scrotum......
Flava staggered to his feet and dragged himself to the Whisker's range. On the way, he found an unused porcupine burrow where he was safe from eagles and ground predators. He spent the night there and did not emerge for the next two days. After this, he began to forage in the vicinity of the burrow and was able to find enough food to keep from starving. Six days later, when Whiskers were grooming at their sleeping burrow before going for the night, he hobbled into the group and was reaccepted. Over the next three months, he made an astonishing recovery. His shoulder mended and he regained the use of his left eye. He even started to join his older brothers on roving trips again - though he was now much more circumspect in his courtship of strange females." This story is one reason that Flav is one of my favs!

I responded to this with a favortie story of mine from the book about Flava Flav's roving trip with Youssarian and Big Will. It contained a trigger word, but I hope it gets added later. It's a good story.

[quote]I too liked the mentions of Stinker ("Sondheim") and the story about Baddiel ("Tosca") moving her litter to the new burrow after Flower used that tactic to abandon them. That took guts![/quote]
I'm totally confused here (so what else is new) about this. Tosca moved her litter to the new burrow after Flower moved to burrow because of Tosca's pups? Tosca moved her pups to the new Whiskers burrow? I don't remember that. Maybe I missed that episode? What happened when she did.

Bischonmom,

Tosca's litter, including Bad Boy Bubby, Arrested Development, De La Soul, and Flava Flav was only two weeks old when Flower's litter was old enough to forage. After the foaging trip, Flower did one of her famous burrow moves. Tosca managed to move her pups to the new burrow, one by one. They all survived.

Here is the story I was going to tell ( I guess it's never going to show up).

Directly quoting from the book, Meerkat Manor Flower of the Kalahari by TCB:

This happened when Flava Flav was only a year old. He saw a female during a roving trip to the Commandos. Unfortunately, he didn't see the Commando male nearby. The Commandos caught Flav,

"leaving Flava with a dislocated shoulder, large slashes to his legs and belly, a torn left eye socket and a ripped s-c-r-o-t-u-m.

When they had finally gone, Flava stagered to his feet and dragged himself off towards the Whiskers' range. On the way, he found a unused porcupine burrow where he was safe from eagles and ground predators. He spent the night there and did not emerge for the next two days. After this, he began to forage in the vacinity of the burrow and was able to find enough food to prevent himself from starving. Six days later, when the Whiskers were grooming at their sleeping burrow before going for the night, he hobbled back into the group and was reaccepted. Over the next three months, he made an astonishing recovery. His shoulder mended and he regained the use of his left eye. He even started roving again - though he was now much more circumspect in his courtship of strange females."

My favorite story.

[quote]"leaving Flava with a dislocated shoulder, large slashes to his legs and belly, a torn left eye socket and a ripped s-c-r-o-t-u-m.[/quote]

Poor Flav, I felt so bad for him when I read that.

yes zero, as a male, i totally sympathise with anyone or any animal that suffers a "ripped scrotum" my second story tells of how yossarian took dominance from zaphod, and how zaphod took it back. you certainly can't say yossarian didn't have heart! this takes place in early 2003, the year before filming of meerkat manor began:

zaphod is dm, flower is df and gave birth to 3 pups about 3 weeks ago, but they were not sired by zaphod, but by a roving male from the gattica. the whiskers had several tussels with the young ones and zaphod wasn't in the best of shape. feb. 12, 2003 alexander decides to challenge zaphod for dominance and held his own before zaphod opened a deep gash from his younger brother's shoulder to his elbow. as zaphod rested, yossarian siezed his opportunity and attacked zaphod. zaphod eventually snared yossarian's head in his jaws and dragged him around for a while. this is how yossarian attained his famous scar over his left eye. that settled that, zaphod had to think........ but later that day, phooey, a younger brother who had joined the group attacked returned from a roving trip and seeing the situation immediatley attacked zaphod. phooey was less experienced but heavier than zaphod. zaphod's guts and savvy proved to be too much for his young challenger and he again prevailed. this is the amazing part right here..... yossarian attacks zaphod again than evening with no clear winner. the next day yossarian again attacks zaphod and after a couple attempts, he finally defeats his litter mate to claim male dominance of the whiskers. about a year later, alexander attacked yossarian in an attempt to supplant him as dm, and although unsuccessful, he managed to soften him up enough for zaphod to return the favor (after a year's waiting) and he successfully attacked and took back his dm role from his brother. this was definately my favorite part of the book. what determination on both zaphod's and yossarian's part. first, zaphod to fight off 3 challengers (yossarian twice) to retain dominance, and then yossarian to still take the fight to zaphod (and win) a day after suffering such a gruesome injury.

Ninjamom,
I didn't know that. She actually stood up to Flower! That Tosca is some kind of woman!

Zero and Bischonmom,

Yes, these are two stories that made Flav stand out. And what can you say about Tosca? She was one special mom to move her pups like that. Flava is the only survivor of that litter.

Roving is a dangerous business! I think of what happened to Youssarian, Tarzan and Flava every time I hear of Zaphod out roving. Then I push it out of my mind! I hope he stays safe.

One of the great things about the book was that it was filled with these kinds of stories.

Thanks for sharing your favorite stories, everyone! Great topic. I'll try to think of an upbeat story to add.

I agree, ninjamom -- TCB is a great storyteller as he gently educates us about meerkat society. That's a rare combination of talents for a scientist.

FYI: the TCB "Meerkat Manor: Flower of the Kalahari" book will be released in paperback in the US and UK on April 15. It costs only $12.24 US on amazon.com, with free shipping for orders over $25. A fantastic deal, IMHO!

just to add a little insight about badiel/tosca moving her pups to the new burrow. as df (in this case flower), her pups are most important. flower had it all figured out. if a subordinate female was going to give birth before her, flower would evict them. they would usually abort and if not, her pups would still have a low chance of survival. if her subordinate daugheters were to give birth after flower, she would just change burrows after 3 weeks (which is normal behavior). meerkats only spend that long in one burrow when there are newborn pups. in a way, i like what flower did. she said "tosca, if your 2 week old pups can keep up with my 3 week old pups and the rest of the group, they my live". tosca outsmarted her (and out "gutted" her) and retrieved her pups from the prior burrow one by one and carried them to the safety of the new burrow. and flower made no further attempts to cause their demise. and tosca/badiel lives on as does mozart. our beautiful tosca made every effort to save her litter, and she was rewarded. long live flava flav!

For me, the two most inspiring stories from the book have already been shared. Tosca displayed extraordinary determination when she carried her pups one by one to the new burrow. It is not surprising that a couple a years later, Flava Flav, one of those pups, was able to survive a brutal attack.

The only difference between four legged and two animals is speech. These kats are such an inspiration. What beautiful stories. Thank you! As you can see, I have not yet bought the book, but I will.

One of my favorite parts in the book is where Stinker was curious about all the cameras, so he anal- scent marked a camera leaving a sticky brown residue! I love that Stinker!

that is clearly the fault of the researcher that originally named stinker. he had to spend his whole life trying to live up to it

great point kach, about TCB's writing style in the book. he goes through situations with the whiskers and then will stop and give a quick explanation into general meerkat behavior relating to the situation. this is what i feel i got most from the book. it is just incredible how complicated these little animals' lives are on a daily basis.

Nazareth,

I'm not sure of the whole story behind Stinker's name, but Pronker posted months ago that his name was Tinker Young Ones and he really earned the "S" in front of his name. So probably one person started calling him Stinker and it caught on.

I've got to get this book. I love how lusty these guys are. Male and female. They are really complicated little creaturs. What really amazes me is that they get togeather and pair up for years at a time.

You know how peoples eyes look when they get old sometimes, like the light is on but no one is home. When you look at a meerkats eyes, they look intelligent and they look like they are living in the moment, and in total control of their element. If I didn't know they were only 12 inches high I'd think they were much larger.

I like this topic. thanks for posting it

beadart thank you for all your kind words about the thread. someone earlier on this thread pointed out that the paperback is available on amazon in mid april. i found out when i ordered but i couldn't wait that long at the time. i think the price was about $12 plus shipping. definately a great deal. TCB does a great job of explaining meerkat behavior thoughout the book, and if you are into cute pics you won't be disappointed.

Where can I get the book? I have looked every where. The people at the book store looked at me like I was speaking a different language when I asked her if she had the book! I found her to be very insulting.

Every story was precious to me, but somehow the birth of Flower, her mother Holly and siblings left me in tears. It was a treasure.

The male ground squirrels also held my attention!

Welcome to the burrow animal miracle

Here are several links to get the book. The first is paperback. The second is Amazon with great customer reviews. The third is in S. Africa. Maybe you can order it from one of these sellers.

Or go to a Borders and/or Barnes and Noble and ask them to order for you.

http://www.simonsays.com/content/book.cfm?tab=1&pid=626069&er=9781416587675

http://www.amazon.com/review/product/0297844849?showViewpoints=1

http://booksforafrica.blogspot.com/2008/01/meerkat-mano...-kalahari-by-th.html

Others who post may know better sources.
Good luck

Hi Animal Miracle-

Welcome! When I went to Barnes & Noble to order the book when it first came out, the woman at the info counter did all she could, but pulled up a bunch of children's books under Meerkat. I ended up ordering from Amazon UK and got the book in 2 weeks. Now I am sure you can order from Amazon US and recive quickly. The book is worth it.
Again welcome!

I just ordered the book today from Barnes & Noble today. Its not due out until May, but they said they'd early order it..I still won't get it until May though. Don't know the cost yet, but, it will be available this side of the big drink (USA) in May.