Ferocious Aardvark wrote:
I know the answer to this, as i researched it for my Masters. It's when they need to take a dump so bad , they're too heavy to fly. Ealing and Acton are so full of shiitt they have to go somewhere with more space and underneath the flyover is ideal.
Not sure how far your research went but did it cover other vermin on the underground too?
In this case, mice.
Two things really ...
1. It was noticed in the early 1990's that many of the genuine underground mice (i.e. not mice on the 60% or so of the so-called underground that is actually above ground - [surprised? stick with RLFans.com, you learn all sorts]) have only a short pink stub instead of a tail. I read about it in the Evening Standard where a guy had observed such mice on the Victoria Line at Oxford Circus.
Not long after reading that I got quite excited when I spotted one at the Angel (I guessed it would have changed to the Northern Line at Kings Cross).
The question being, then, is this an evolutionary result and we are seeing a multiplication in stubby-tailed mice or just that they commonly get their tails accidentally amputated by leaving them on the rail or in some crevice between pieces of concrete or metal that closes up with the weight of the train when it goes by.
2. Again, relating to genuine underground-dwelling mice. They only come out at night-time. How do they know when night-time is? Circadian rythms? In mice that have never even seen daylight in their brief lives?
It's a puzzler.
