Friday 9 April 2010 – Some great questions today – a real mix with some really interesting answers. My favourite question this week being the one about Bamboo. How interesting!
Sheila wanted to know if the saying was “he was a Cad of the highest order” or “he was a cad of the highest water”. Reason being she was reading an Agatha Christie novel and she had written “Cad of the highest water” but had not heard that saying before.
The actual saying is “Cad of the highest ORDER” and basically it means he’s the biggest cad of all. “Of the highest order” relates to orders of the Knighthood – and obviously the Knight of the Highest Order is the top Knight! And we all know what a Cad is … there are plenty I can think of, can you?
Brian asked where did the term “Hat Trick”, as in a bowler taking 3 wickets for 3 balls, originate?
At Sheffield’s Hyde Park ground in 1858, an all-England cricket team was engaged in a cricket match against the Hallam XI. During the match, HH Stephenson of the All-England XI took three wickets in three balls. As was customary at the time for rewarding outstanding sporting feats, a collection was made. The proceeds were used to buy a (reportedly white) hat, which was duly presented to Stephenson. Thanks to the BBC for that information.
Australia’s first hat trick occurred in January 1879, in Melbourne in a Test match between Australia & England. ‘The Demon’, Australian FR Spofforth clean-bowled Englishmen Vernon Royle and Francis Mackinnon before having Tom Emmett caught.
In interesting snippet in regards to unusal hat tricks. On 2 December 1988, Merv Hughes, playing for Australia, dismissing Curtly Ambrose with the last ball of his penultimate over and Patrick Patterson with the first ball of his next over, wrapping up the West Indies first innings. When Hughes returned to bowl in the West Indies second innings, he trapped Gordon Greenidge lbw with his first ball, completing a hat-trick over two different innings and becoming the only player in Test cricket history to achieve the three wickets of a hat-trick in three different overs.
Chris asked a very interesting question regarding Bamboo. He wanted to know if all bamboo dies every 60 years and if so what happens to animals/people who need bamboo?
I hope you find this answer as interesting as I did.
Bamboo is a member of the grass family and like grasses some bamboos grow and flourish until they are ready to flower; then they produce seeds and die. These particular bamboos are monocarpic – which means they flower and produce seed once in their lives and then die. Because bamboos flower so infrequently, every 60 to 130 years, they are usually propagated vegetatively – eg via cuttings because they only seed when they flower. Therefore, most varieties of bamboos in cultivation are clones derived from a single plant that may be traced back to one seed. This may explain why some cultivated bamboos have the same flowering cycle and all die at the same time on different continents. The majority of Bamboo is NOT monocarpic. Other species of bamboo will be greatly weakened when they flower and seed and die back, but they recover in a few years and can often bloom again.
When this massive die-off was observed in a panda reserve in 1983 the panda inhabitants faced starvation, while pandas on different mountains (with different bamboo species) had sufficient food. The Chinese launched a campaign to relocate about ten percent of the pandas in zoos; however, their failure to reproduce well in captivity further exacerbated the decline in panda populations. The birth of Hua Mei at the San Diego Zoo in the 1999 using artificial insemination was indeed a triumph for the panda breeding program.
Norman asked where the original signed surrender document by Japan from the end of World War II is currently located?
The Allied copy is located in the National Archives in Washington DC and the Japanese Version is in the Edo Tokyo Museum in Tokyo, Japan. The Battleship Missouri located at Pearl Harbour in Hawaii is where this document was signed and you can view plenty of memorabilia there. If you ever go to Hawaii I can thoroughly recommend a visit to Pearl Harbour. It is an amazing experience. Take a look here: http://www.ussmissouri.com/
Allan wanted to know what the deadliest animal or reptile in the world is?
The deadliest animal or reptile in the world is the Box Jellyfish and aren’t we lucky that it resides here in Australia, along with all the other deadly reptiles and spiders … eek!
A lovely listener asked via sms as to the origin of Thousand Island Dressing?
There are a couple of theories going around. They are:
- George Boldt – Owner of the Waldorf was cruising in his yacht around the 1000 Islands in the St Lawrences River in NY. His chef didn’t have the ingredients to prepare his usual dressing so he made up a new one. George liked it so much he put it on his menu at the Waldorf and called it 1000 Island Dressing.
- The other theory is that Sophia LaLonde who lived in the 1000 Island area served the dressing up to actress May Irwin. She loved it and christened it 1000 Island Dressing. She gave it to George Boldt who was building a castle in the area. He loved it and put it on his Waldorf Menu.
No one has been able to prove or disprove one or the other. Both seem quite reasonable and are quite similar.
Another lovely listener sms’d us a question – where do flies go at night?
Flies go up elderly men’s nostrils at night … you can see their legs hanging out the bottom! Seriously … they hang on the underside of leaves, or in dark crevices etc and become dormant as their body temp cools down. When the sun reappears they move to a warm surface and bask until their body temp reaches a level at which the flying muscles will function.
I also had a question from Scotty last week who wanted to know where does the State Government buy fluoride from and how much does it cost?
The Government supplied ‘fluoride’ includes ‘hexafluorosilicic acid’ – a toxic industrial waste by-product derived from the super-phosphate fertiliser, and aluminium, industries. Apparently it is safe for consumption once it has been treated etc. It appears to be quite the secret as to where it is purchased from. The approximate annual cost per person in Queensland is $2.50 - this is for the ongoing purchase of fluoride and ongoing maintenance of the infrastructure. It is approximately $10.5 million per year in total.
I hope you enjoyed the questions and answers and I hope I don’t spark a Fluoride debate here. Personally I wish it wasn’t in our water as I have a Thyroid condition and Fluoride consumption is not recommended.
Re fluoride: Time magazine has recently listed fluoride as one of the top 10 common household toxins along with perchlorate (a rocket fuel additive) -http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/completelist/0,29569,1976909,00.html .
The December 2006 issue of the medical journal The Lancet classified fluoride, along with perchlorate, as an ‘emerging neurotoxic substance’ due to studies linking it to brain damage in animals and lower IQs in children.
Fluoride can also lower IQ.
To date, a least twenty-three published studies report an association of reduced IQ and high fluoride exposure (http://fluoridealert.org/iq.studies.html).
Iodine deficienct humans can have adverse thryoid effects from 4 to 5 times less fluoride than iodine-adequate humans (NRC 2006). It might pay to check your iodine level!