To all new members who have joined our burrow, we welcome you. This thread is for all your questions about MM. Please post your questions on this site so that there is not so many threads that have the same topic. We will try our best to answer your questions as best we can. Please post away. Thanks!
This isn't a question, but add a bit of information to help.
Q: Do Tosca & Carlos have a mob(I've read stuff like this on another site, people seem to believe it.)?
A:No.This is a rumor. People have been spamming wikipedia to add this. Rumor relating to it will say that the Young Ones has a pup that saved a younger pup from the Commandos, and that a female that was evicted from the Lazuli is in it. When Tosca was evicted from the Whiskers, they even said it was imposable for a female to join a other group, even if it was low on members. Also, when Mozart was trying to rejoin the group in season two, Carlos was watching her. If he was dominate male of his own group, he wouldn't leave his group to look for females. Also, the rumor says the Young Ones have nine members, despite the fact they actually have at least 16 members in 2005, and the Young Ones are leaded by Asterix and Alexander.
Q:WHERE IS SHAKESPEARE!?!?
A:THERE NEVER WAS ANY SHAKESPEARE! ITS A MYTH! I'M SHAKESPEARE! HE'S SHAKESPEARE! YOUSSARIAN IS SHAKESPEARE! Sorry, I've always wanted to do that. But anyway, none of us know what happened to him, we each have our own opinion about it. I'll post Tom Flower's letter here, if it helps some people:
From Tom Flower, Field Project Manager of the Kalahari Meerkat Project
"You want the truth….you can’t handle the truth.
Sorry, only joking. In answer to your questions, I can reassure you that the makers of ‘Meerkat Manor’ haven’t been mocking up their story lines, in fact i personally have a great deal of respect for the sincere effort they make to incorporate factually accurate story lines into the series. It is not a case of them writing a few ideas down, coming out to the Kalahari and hoping to pick up enough shots to make up what they want. In fact the ‘Meerkat Manor’ production has committed huge amounts of time to just being out in the wilderness with the Whiskers group recording the true stories that occur in their lives. To be honest the meerkats may even do a better job of making the script than any writer could.
We the Kalahari Meerkat Project, have been here for 13 years and are fully aware of the fascinating little soap opera that is played out in the population of meerkats we study. The ‘Meerkat Manor’ producers have taken on ex-meerkat project research staff to correctly inform them about everything they are seeing and have thus far not included any factually inaccurate stories. In fact, they more than any other film production have illustrated the startling conflict within and between meerkat groups as well as their amazing cooperative behaviour. As a scientist i am not so keen on the anthropomorphism involved in creating and developing the characters in the series, scientists tend to avoid assuming animals feel in exactly the same way as humans, we just don’t know, however, the events are accurate.
With regards to Shakespeare’s story, he was bitten by a snake and did fully recover to become one of the best helpers in the group, in fact it was more spectacular than was conveyed in ‘Meerkat Manor’. But we just do not know what his ultimate fate was, meerkats are often killed defending pup’s, Shakespeare was a babysitter the day before and Lazuli were in the area. However it is equally possible that he was killed by a predator, dispersed to another group, or was killed by another group whilst trying to join them, we just weren’t there on that particular day. This is unfortunate, but we cant know everything about each meerkat. The film producers were stuck and probably drew inspiration from an incident at two other groups in the population of over 250 meerkats, where a meerkat was killed defending pups successfully.
What i can inform you off, is that just as much has happened since and will continue to happen in the future, there are still many frankly amazing events that occur in a meerkats life that have not been covered. I am delighted that you have been able to draw as much entertainment out of the meerkats lives as we do when studying them. I my self have spent over 4000 hours observing meerkats, that’s an awfully long time and they need charisma and entertainment to keep you here that long."
Also, knowing that Shakespeare wasn't babysitting that day, look at the DVD(if you have it) and you'll see it was a female babysitter that day. Since they didn't find a body, the babysitter probably survived the attack. The most likely thing that happened is Shakespeare left the mob to start a group of his own. Note: None of us know what really happened, I don't know if this is true, and we'll probably never know what happened. But remember, we probably won't find out by aimlessly starting topics like "I SAW SHAKES IN MY TOAST!".
In regards to the first question about Carlos and Tosca: Today on wikipedia someone put down that Carlos was dead, then later on someone said that he was the leader of the starkies. YAAAARRRGGG!
Always take what you see on wikipedia with a grain of salt. wait, better make that a whole box of salt.
First of all, thank you mod-kelly for putting this thread at the top. I appreciate it. Hopefully new memebers will see it.
People will post anything on that wikipedia site that is not true. Carlos is a rovering male. He is not a particular meerkat in fact I don't think there is a meerkat named Carlos as I understand it. Sometime it is JD Lazuli. Ap does a switch-a-roo game. I hope all you new members will read the letter from Tom Flower and as you read it, remember male meerkats do not babysit two days in a row. Shakespeare was babysitting the day BEFORE the Lazuli came calling, so it was not Shakespeare babysitting that day. It was an unknown female meerkat. Look closely if you have the DVD for season one. There was no fight between Shakespeare and Big Sy. Big Sy was put to sleep sometime later for TB. I am assuming that Big Sy may have had the fight with that unknown meerkat and as to what happened to her, we do not known. As with Shakepseare and Tosca we do not know what happened to them either. we hope they are alive and have a family of their own.
Sorry I do not have a question either. You can rest awhile eruth66.
No one respects the words of Tom Flower more than I, but I also think it is important for those interested in the fate of our C L Shakespeare to read these letters. This is the the explanation I hold onto for dear life.
It was originaly posted on the Bill Nighy forum in the UK.
Here is the letter from Alex Thornton of Cambridge:
"Dear Deidre,
I’m sorry I have taken so long to get back to you. I am very happy to hear that you have enjoyed watching Meerkat Manor. I do my research at the field site where the programme is filmed and have got to know the various film crews pretty well. The crews come out in groups of two (one camera man and one sound assistant) for six week stints. They spend practically the whole time with Whiskers, one of the fourteen groups of habituated meerkats on the reserve. I don’t know much about how the programme is put together and edited, but the sequences shown in the episodes I have seen are all footage of things that actually happened.
I was collecting data on Whiskers on the day Shakespeare was bitten and called the film crew over to have a look when the group started mobbing a puff adder. Shakespeare looked pretty bad after the bite (puff adder bites can be fatal to humans), but eventually recovered, as they showed on the programme. Because they are wild animals, it is impossible to know for certain what happens to all of them. Sometimes individuals disappear and it is very difficult to know whether they were predated or joined another group.
Shakespeare disappeared from Whiskers some time after he recovered from the snake bite. It is possible that he has become dominant in an unhabituated group outside our reserve (an individual of his size has been seen in one of the neighbouring groups), but we can’t say for certain if it is Shakespeare.
I suppose Meerkat Manor didn’t go into Shakespeare’s fate for the simple reason that we don’t honestly know what his fate was. The same is true of Tosca. I hope that this clears things up a little. I’m sorry I can’t give you more specific information on Shakespeare or Tosca, but that is the nature of working with animals. I hope you enjoy the new series.
All the best, Alex – Alex Thornton Large Animal Research Group Department of Zoology University of Cambridge Cambridge"
From the same site we have this post.
Sarah is Sarah Hodge of the KMP.
"hi, i just got this from the people who actually film the meerkats check it out
Dear Jordan,
Tim Clutton-Brock passed your e-mail about Tosca and Shakespeare on to me. Shakespeare recovered from the snake bite but then left Whiskers during the filming of meerkat manor 1 (male meerkats leave their group when they are adult and look for groups of their own). We don’t know what happened to him, as he left the study site, but it quite likely that he is now dominant in a group of his own somewhere. As for Tosca, she is still a subordinate females in whiskers.
I hope that answers your questions!
Best wishes
Sarah"
Do we know that these words are fact? Each of us will have our own perception of what is being said.
But as I said, I will always believe our Shakes is alive.....I owe him that.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: ccatz,
This post was a good idea, and thank you Mod Kelly for a prompt response too - I get a bit annoyed with the same questions and/or statements over and over again - hopefully this will make it easier for the new members.
Of course I can't help but remember all the questions, thoughts, comments and more questions I had, and now, those of us who started with MM in 6'06, are the meerkat *elders*. Since we seem to have soooooooooooooooo many new kats on the forums this is a great idea for a lot of the more common FAQs, but do keep those new creative threads coming.
Hi there! Was wondering where did Flower come from? If wandering females can't start their own clan, how did Flower come about to start her own clan? Was she next in line after a different dominant female die (from the Whiskers clan)? Also, how did she get together with Youssarian and then with Zaphod? And were they already members of the Whiskers clan?
Flower - I think she came from the Young Ones, the Whiskers were started by some Young ones females and Lazuli males. Youssarian and Zaphod came from the Vivian(The commandos are the Vivian, names were changed for the show). And in 2001, they thew over the Lazuli males and became dominate.
I wonder when Sarah wrote that email? She says something interesting about Tosca. "Tosca is still a subordinate female in the Whiskers." It sounds like she is saying Tosca is still with the Whiskers. Do you know when that was wrote???
I noticed that too Eruth66 - I was wondering when that was written but it was obviously sometime after Shakespeare and Tosca "went missing" - all the letters from the producers and such keep stating "there are big surprises in Season 3" wouldn't that be a great big one -
As for the Tosca and Shakes story, please remember that Meerkat Manor is showing us meerkat behavior. They may not always catch the same kat doing what they need to show, so they must edit and use other shots of other kats to complete the sequence.
I'm also confused by what Sarah said about Tosca but I have an idea and I don't know if its correct. Tosca was a stage name. It is possible that after the original Tosca (stage name) left another kat was named Tosca. Therefore there could still be a Tosca in the Whiskers mob. She's just not the Tosca we came to know and love. Remember I am just conjecturing here. I don't know that as fact.
Hi, again! Do they microchip all the meerkats or just the ones from the Whiskers clan? The reason that I ask is because if they microchip all of them, then why would it be so difficult to identify individual meerkats? In other words, if they THINK that they saw Shakes (or whomever), why don't they just scan the chip? By the way, thanks for this thread because its really helpful for beginners (like myself).
Ok, you know probably not to trust me after the last one, but I think they are, I think I watched a documentary about meerkats that said they have microchips on them, but I'm not sure.
It may be they are all *chipped*, but reading above it says, "...he left the study site..." and " unhabituated group outside our reserve...".
The researchers remain on the reserve...outside of it is private property and they may not be allowed there, although perhaps since this information was received, they may have obtained permission to investigate the meerkats there. Shakes would remember them. This has been documented in other studies; after several years, the meerkats have remembered the researcher(s).
So who knows what we will see come Season 3? Season 4? We will most certainly need some good news.
This message has been edited. Last edited by: ccatz,
Thanks for this thread, it is even helpful for *elders* like myself. It is a refresher course. If Tosca should appear if season 3, I wonder how we would know if it is truly our beloved Tosca? I would hope the producers would not try and fool us again. I would rather them say it is a different meerkat, then try and pretend it is our Tosca. =^..^=
