Honey badger

The honey badger (Mellivora capensis), also known as the ratel (/ˈreɪtəl/ or /ˈrɑːtəl/), is the only species in the mustelid subfamily Mellivorinae and its only genus Mellivora. It is native to Africa, Southwest Asia, and the Indian subcontinent. Despite its name, the honey badger does not closely resemble other badger species; instead, it bears more anatomical similarities to weasels. It is classed as Least Concern by the IUCN owing to its extensive range and general environmental adaptations. It is primarily a carnivorous species and has few natural predators because of its thick skin and ferocious defensive abilities.

Etymology

Ratel is an Afrikaans word, possibly derived from the Middle Dutch word raat for honeycomb (either because of its cry or its taste for honey).

Taxonomy

The honey badger is the only species of the genus Mellivora. Although in the 1860s it was assigned to the badger subfamily, the Melinae, it is now generally agreed that it bears very few similarities to the Melinae. It is much more closely related to the marten subfamily, Mustelinae, but furthermore is assigned its own subfamily, Mellivorinae. Differences between Mellivorinae and Melinae include differences in their dentition formulae. Though not in the same subfamily as the wolverines, which are a genus of large-sized and atypical Mustelinae, the honey badger can be regarded as another, analogous, form of outsized weasel or polecat.

Honey

Honey /ˈhʌni/ is a sweet food made by bees foraging nectar from flowers. The variety produced by honey bees (the genus Apis) is the one most commonly referred to, as it is the type of honey collected by most beekeepers and consumed by people. Honeys are also produced by bumblebees, stingless bees, and other hymenopteran insects such as honey wasps, though the quantity is generally lower and they have slightly different properties compared to honey from the genus Apis. Honey bees convert nectar into honey by a process of regurgitation and evaporation. They store it as a primary food source in wax honeycombs inside the beehive.

Honey gets its sweetness from the monosaccharides fructose and glucose, and has about the same relative sweetness as granulated sugar. It has attractive chemical properties for baking and a distinctive flavor that leads some people to prefer it over sugar and other sweeteners. Most microorganisms do not grow in honey because of its low water activity of 0.6. However, honey sometimes contains dormant endospores of the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, which can be dangerous to infants, as the endospores can transform into toxin-producing bacteria in infants' immature intestinal tracts, leading to illness and even death.

Badger

Badgers are short-legged omnivores in the family Mustelidae, which also includes the otters, polecats, weasels and wolverines. They belong to the caniform suborder of carnivoran mammals.

The 11 species of badger are grouped in three subfamilies: Melinae (Eurasian badgers), Mellivorinae (the honey badger or ratel) and Taxideinae (the American badger). The Asiatic stink badgers of the genus Mydaus were formerly included within Melinae (and thus Mustelidae), but recent genetic evidence indicates these are actually members of the skunk family, placing them in the taxonomic family Mephitidae.

Badgers include the species in the genera Meles, Arctonyx, Taxidea and Mellivora. Their lower jaws are articulated to the upper by means of transverse condyles firmly locked into long cavities of the skull, so dislocation of the jaw is all but impossible. This enables the badgers to maintain their hold with the utmost tenacity, but limits jaw movement to hinging open and shut, or sliding from side to side without the twisting movement possible for the jaws of most mammals.

Nat Geo Wild

Nat Geo Wild (stylized as Nat Geo WILD or abbreviated as NGW) is a cable/satellite TV channel focused primarily on wildlife and natural history programming. It is a sister network to National Geographic Channel and it is the latest channel to be jointly launched by the National Geographic Society and Fox Cable Networks.

It first launched in Hong Kong on January 1, 2006. The channel later launched in the United Kingdom, Turkey, Ireland, Romania, India, Vietnam, and Poland replacing the now defunct Adventure One. The channel remains the world's first bilingual wildlife service, available in English and Cantonese in the Hong Kong market as well as Tagalog in The Philippines. The channel launched in Latin America on November 1, 2009 as a high definition channel. In 2010, it launched in the United States.

As of February 2015, approximately 57,891,000 American households (49.7% of households with television) receive Nat Geo Wild.

Programming

Availability

Africa

The channel launched in South Africa in mid-2009, and is available on the South African Satellite Network DSTV.

Nick Cummins

Nick 'The Honey Badger' Cummins (born 5 October 1987) is an Australian rugby union footballer who plays for Western Force in the Super 15 and for the Wallabies in international matches. On 4 July 2014 Nick announced that he would leave Western Force and move to Japan at the end of the super rugby season due to family reasons. His usual position is wing.However, after a season in Japan he returned to Western Force for the 2014/15 season.

Cummins answers to the nickname 'The Honey Badger', bestowed on him after he drew inspiration from the fierce nature of the honey badger and attempted to think like the animal in defence.

Early life

Nick Cummins was born in Port Macquarie, New South Wales. One of eight siblings, he was raised in Logan City south of Brisbane by his father Mark Cummins, who was a single dad. He attended St Francis' College in Crestmead, where he starred in the swimming pool and on the athletics track, as well as on the rugby field.

In 2005, Cummins represented Queensland at the Australian Schools Rugby Championships in Canberra. He moved to Sydney in 2006, where he joined the Randwick rugby club and played for their grand final-winning Colts side that year.