The Best of the Daily Beast 2011

  AFP / JOHANNES EISELE

Heidi the cross-eyed opossum is pictured in her enclosure at the zoo in Leipzig, eastern Germany on June 9, 2011. Heidi moved to her new enclosure at the Gondwanaland tropical experience world, which will be inaugurated on July 1, 2011 and where Heidi will be presented to the public for the first time. Cross-eyed Heidi made the headlines in December 2010 and became an internet hit, winning more than 65,000 "friends" on social networking website Facebook.  

 

 

AFP PHOTO    JULIAN STRATENSCHULTE

Young antelope "Howard" has his leg in plaster as he hobbles through his enclosure at the zoo in Hanover, central Germany. The eight-week old Nyala (Tragelaphus angasii), who broke his leg while jumping about, will be taken off the plaster in two weeks and will completely recover, according to the zoo.   

 

AFP PHOTO / PATRIK STOLLARZ

Visitors look at a giraffe at the Duisburg Zoo on August 8, 2011 in Duisburg, western Germany.

 

REUTERS/Srdjan Zivulovic

Brown bear (Ursus arctos) cub Medo plays with the Logar family dog in Podvrh village, central Slovenia June 1, 2011. The Slovenian Logar family has adopted the three-and-half-month-old bear cub that strolled into their yard about 30 days ago. Although the family would like to prepare a fenced enclosure for it, veterinary authorities would prefer to move it into a shelter for wild animals.

 

REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson

A moose shakes water from its face in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming August 7, 2011.

 

     REUTERS/Peter Andrews                       

Ciuchcia (Steam train engine), a four-month-old dog, chases a cat in a courtyard after being helped onto a specially made wheelchair at Schronisko (Shelter), a shelter for homeless animals, near Piotrkow Trybunalski August 26, 2011. Ciuchcia's rear legs were paralyzed after it was physicallyabused and abandoned with its two siblings on a train track. The dog survived despite being run over by a number of trains, according to the staff at the animal shelter, who found Ciuchcia on July 7, 2011.

 

AFP PHOTO / MARTY MELVILLE

Little Blue Penguins runs towards the sea after being released by wild life workers and school children at Mount Maunganui beach in Tauranga on December 8, 2011. The Penguins were among those affected by New Zealand's biggest sea pollution disaster when the Monrovia-flagged container ship 'Rena' ploughed into a reef on October 5, 2011.

 

Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

Director and performer Bartabas trains 12 year old Le Tintoret on stage at the Sadler's Wells Theatre on March 1, 2011 in London, England.   Using four horses live on stage and performed by Bartabas himself, The Centaur and the Animal follows the interaction between man and horse during the process of dressage (the highest level of training a horse can achieve).

 

Philip Walker/ Record

Kitchener Waterloo Humane Society needs to adopt out dozens of dogs rescued from puppy mills by other shelters. They're helping house them, but it's costing a lot. Xena a 2 year-old female Wirehaired Jack Russell jumps for attention while Lady Bug a 4 year-old Pug, cross tries to grab the spotlight with her cute looks.    

 

AP Handout Photo/John Gomes, Alaska Zoo

One of three Alaska grizzly bear cubs orphaned when their mother was killed, will soon be calling the Detroit Zoo home. The 11-month-old brothers were orphaned in October when their mother was shot. After the hungry cubs were seen numerous times looking for food in backyards and around homes, the Alaska Department of Fish and Game decided to put them into custody.

 

AFP PHOTO / DAVID EBENER

One of two polar bear cubs namd Gregor and Aleut licks their mother Vera at the Tiergarten zoo in Nuremberg, southern Germany, on March 24, 2011. The two cubs were born on December 16, 2010 and left their breeding burrow for the first time on March 23, 2010.

 

Richard Gill/AFP/Getty Images

A handout photo taken on June 20, 2011 and released on June 22, shows an Emperor penguin in New Zealand, some 3,000 kilometres (1,900) from his Antarctic home.  The penguin, a juvenile male, arrived at a beach on the Kapiti Coast, 40 kilometres north of the capital Wellington on June 20, the Department of Conservation (DOC) said.  It was only the second sighting of an Emperor penguin in New Zealand, DOC spokesman Peter Simpson said, with the species' only previous appearance in the country recorded on the South Island in 1967, adding that officers were monitoring the penguin and expected it would eventually depart for the long swim home. 

 

REUTERS/Andrea Comas

A zoo keeper holds baby orangutan Boo, a 9-month-old orphan, as it plays with a toy during a presentation at the Madrid Zoo & Aquarium April 14, 2011. Boo, the first orangutan born at the zoo, has been adopted by a female orangutan and is bottle fed by one of the keepers, according to the zoo.

 

Houston Zoo photos

The Houston Zoo announced the births of two endangered maned wolf pups, Dora (l) and Diego (r), born December 30 to mom Lucy, 6 years old and father Seis, 8 years old.

 

Newspix / Rex Features

Volunteer wildlife carer, Kirsa Veal, with 'Tiny Teddy' the 5-month-old baby Koala who is being hand raised at the Kolora Wildlife Shelter in Victoria after it was found in its dead mother's pouch on the Princess Highway. Teddy the 5-month-old baby Koala who is being hand raised at the Kolora Wildlife Shelter in Victoria, Australia, June 6, 2011.

 

AFP PHOTO    BORIS ROESSLER

A fly gets some interest by a still nameless baby tiger playing in its enclosure on July 5, 2011 at the zoo in Frankfurt/M., western Germany. The six-week-old tiger was born at the zoo.    

 

 

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

Pigs with the All-Alaskan Pig Racing round the track during a race at the Alameda County Fair on June 23, 2011 in Pleasanton, California.

 

Robin Riggs

One of two Arctic Fox pups at The Aquarium of the Pacific.The two brothers who are just six-weeks old and can be viewed at the Aquarium’s Molina Animal Care Center. The animals were born at a facility in the mid west and have made Long Beach their new home.

AP Photo/Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium, Seth Bynum

Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium, staff biologist Andy Goldfarb feeds one of two endangered clouded leopard cubs born Tuesday, June 14, 2011, at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium, in Tacoma, Wash. Point Defiance says the birth of these cubs brings the total number of clouded leopard cubs born this year in the United States to eight.

 

AFP PHOTO    HOLGER HOLLEMANN

Cane toad Agathe sits on a toy balance during an inventory at the zoo in Hanover, central Germany, on January 5, 2011. All habitants of the zoo are to be counted, weighed and measured during the week long inventory. Agathe has a weight of 1850 grams.   

 

REUTERS/Jason Lee

A black-headed gull (larus ridibundus) swoops in for food at Dianchi Lake in Kunming, capital of southwest China's Yunnan province, November 29, 2011. Tens of thousands of black-headed gulls fly to Kunming from Siberia to spend the winter each year since 1985, local media reported.

 

REUTERS/K9 Storm Inc./Handout

U.S. Military Member Mike Forsythe, and his dog, Cara, break the world record for "highest man/dog parachute deployment" by jumping from 30,100 feet in this undated image released by the Canadian company "K9 Storm Inc." which manufactures tactical body armor for military dogs. The New York Times and other United States media have reported that a military canine accompanied Navy SEAL Team Six commandos into a compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan in a raid that killed al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

 

Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

A group of Ring Tailed Lemurs eat from a Thanksgiving spread at the San Francisco Zoo on November 23, 2011 in San Francisco, California. Fifteen lemurs at the San Francisco Zoo were treated to a Thanksgiving feast of green beans, a fruit salad made up of apples, bananas, grapes sweet potatoes and a turkey made out of monkey chow.

 

AP Photo/The Orange County Register, Mark Rightmire

Sgt. Major Michael Doris Long of Barstow, takes a spill off her surfboard near the Seal Beach, Calif. pier Wednesday morning, Nov. 16, 2011, as her dog Georgie, a medical service dog, hangs on for the rest of the ride. Long, with the Wounded Warriors program, was in Seal Beach to learn to surf and paddle board along with other veterans.

 

AFP PHOTO / Greg WOOD

Mammals keeper Kylie Hackshall gets close to a baby spotted-tail quoll at WILD LIFE Sydney on November 3, 2011. WILD LIFE Sydney has seen five nationally endangered spotted-tail quolls and four koala joeys born recently as part of their successful breeding program.

 

AP Photo/The Daytona Beach News-Journal, Nigel Cook

A surfer watches a pair of dolphins jump the waves at Daytona Beach Shores, Fla.  

 

AP Photo/Cliff Owen

Three black footed ferrets huddle in a temporary housing unit as animal keepers at the National Zoo’s conservation center in Front Royal, Va., rounded-up 26  ferrets for shipment to Fort Collins Colo., Sept. 28, 2011. This shipment marks an important moment in the recovery of a species once declared extinct. Researchers rediscovered the black-footed ferret in 1981 and collected the last 24 in Wyoming to try to save them. Now 1,000 are again living in the wild. Black-footed ferrets are the only ferret native to North America. At least a half million used to live on the Great Plains. Prairie dogs are their main food source. But development, disease and extermination of prairie dogs starved the ferrets.

 

AFP PHOTO/ MICHAL CIZEK

Two months old Sumatran tiger cubs play in their exclosure on September 2, 2011  in Prague Zoo in the capital city.

 

REUTERS/Chaiwat Subprasom

Dogs are seen on a motorcycle next to a flooded street at Don Muang district in Bangkok November 3, 2011. Authorities in the Thai capital repaired a damaged flood gate on Wednesday that has become the focus of anger, fear and rivalry between arms of government battling the country's worst floods in decades. 

 

 AFP PHOTO /BERND WUSTNECK

Bennett's wallaby baby Albert peers out of his pouch on April 7, 2011 at the Vogelpark Marlow animal park in Marlow, eastern Germany. Albino Albert, estimated three months old, has become the attraction of the park, due to his white coat and red eyes.  

 

AP Photo/Koji Sasahara

A capybara gets stream of hot water cascading onto it to keep warm during a cold snow day in their enclosure at Saitama children's Zoo in Higshimatsuyama, near Tokyo, Feb. 11, 2011.

 

AFP PHOTO / RONALD WITTEK

A Fennec Fox looks around its enclosure at the zoo in the southern German city of Heidelberg on May 13, 2011.  

 

Matt Cardy/Getty Images

One of the first cygnets to hatch early takes a dip in the water at Abbotsbury Swannery, on May 10, 2011 in Abbotsbury, England.

 

AP Photo/Six Flags Discovery Kingdom, Nancy Chan

Akasha, a two-year-old female Bengal tiger, eyeing a chunk of meat underwater that was thrown into her pool at Six Flags Discovery Kingdom in Vallejo, Calif. on Thursday, May 5, 2011. Unlike most cats, tigers enjoy the water and with the hot temperatures in the area, the park's cats can often be seen lounging in the water.

 

AFP PHOTO / DANIL SEMYONOV

A three month old bear cub who was born at the zoo in Stavropol takes a walk on May 5, 2011.

 

REUTERS/Ali Jarekji

Lolo, a black jaguar, plays with Ward, her 14-month-old spotted cub, inside their enclosure at the zoo in Amman May 12, 2011.

 

 

Papillon Usseglio

Meet the Cover Cat - Yapahuwa, a rusty-Spotted Cat from Le Parc des Felins, France who graces the cover of ZooBorns latest book.

 

AP Photo / Franklin Reyes

A man carries a lamb on a motorcycle in Havana, Cuba, Thursday, Jan 6, 2011.

 

AP Photo/Ng Han Guan

A rabbit trying to eat food gets stuck to the bottom of a cup during a snow carnival in Beijing, China, Monday, Jan. 31, 2011.

 

 

REUTERS/Nir Elias

Tzvika, an injured female turtle, walks with the aid of her newly attached wheels at the Wildlife Hospital in the Ramat Gan Safari near Tel Aviv January 5, 2011. About two months ago, Tzvika was run over by a lawn mower and suffered severe damage to her shell, and a spinal injury that affected her ability to use her rear limbs. The wheels, attached by veterinarians at the safari, elevate the turtle to keep the shell from being worn down and enable her to walk.

 

 AP Photo/dapd, Matthias Rietschel

Orang-utan baby Duran plays in its enclosure at the zoo in Dresden, Germany, on Friday, Jan. 28, 2011.

 

John Reed

A male Grevy’s zebra was born at the Jacksonville Zoo and Gardens on Saturday, February 26. Eclipse, the 17-year-old mother of the foal, came to the Jacksonville Zoo from White Oak Conservation Center, where she was bred in January 2010.   Officials from White Oak advised that the father of the foal is an unnamed resident stallion born in 1999.  This is Eclipse’s sixth birth.  The foal weighed 108 pounds and stood at three and a half feet tall at the shoulders at birth.  Guests can see the foal frolicking after his mother in the Zoo’s Plains of East Africa exhibit.

 

AP Photo/Michael Soh

A hippo blows air under water at the zoo in Berlin, Germany, Friday, Jan. 14, 2011.

 

AP Photo/Wilfredo Lee

An Atlantic bottlenose dolphin named Tanner glides just below the surface as he imitates the behavior of another dolphin  at the Dolphin Research Center in Grassy Key, Florida on January 11, 2011. During the study Tanner, who wore eyecups to block his vision, was able to copy the behavior of the other dolphin without the use of vision. 

 

 REUTERS/Scanpix Denmark

Polar bear Malik swims with her four-month old cub for the first time in a large outdoor enclosure with a huge pond at the Aalborg zoo on March 19, 2011.

 

AFP PHOTO    WALTRAUD GRUBITZSCH

Eight months old baby sloth Camillo yawns as he is pictured on May 17, 2011 at the zoo in Halle, eastern Germany. In the wild, sloths live mainly in tropical rainforests of Central and South America.    

 

AFP PHOTO    PATRICK PLEUL

A young boar stands next to its mother on March 28, 2011 at a deer park in Klaistow, eastern Germany. The piglets loose their characteristic striped coat after approximately three to four months and replace it with a unicolored brown coat.  

 

 Paula Bronstein/Getty Images

A mahout removes the prosthetic from Motala, age 50, at the Friends of the Asian Elephant (FAE) elephant hospital in the Mae Yao National Reserve August 29, 2011 Lampang,Thailand. Motala lost a foot many years back after stepping on a land mine and now is on her third prosthetic, as they need to be changed according to the weight of the elephant. The world's first elephant hospital assists in medical care and helps to promote a better understanding of the elephant's physiology, important in treating them for illness. For generations elephants have been a part of the Thai culture, although today the Thai elephant mostly is domesticated animal, since Thailand now has few working elephants. Many are used in the tourism sector at special elephant parks or zoos, where they perform in shows. In some cases Thailand is still deals with roaming elephants on the city streets, usually after the mahout, an elephant driver, becomes unemployed, which often causes the elephant serious stress.  

 

 AFP PHOTO / Hector Guerrero

A two-week-old newborn female Common chimpanzee plays with her mother Zuri at Guadalajara Zoo on March 31, 2011. The young chimpanzee is the first to be born in the "tropical rainforest" village opened six years ago, and the first chimpanzee born at Guadalajara Zoo.

 

AP Photo/Javier Galeano

A street dog popularly known as "Lengua," or "Tongue" sits on a sidewalk in Havana, Cuba, Friday Sept. 2, 2011.