...Calves might also need time to learn how to play — music, that is. It turns out that Odobenus is an acoustic genius, its body an all-in-one band. Males woo females with lengthy compositions that have been compared in the complexity of their structure and phrasing to the songs of nightingales and humpback whales, but that use a greater number of body parts.

Walruses sing with their fleshy and muscular lips, tongues, muzzles and noses. They sing by striking their flippers against their chests to hit their pharyngeal pouches, balloon-like extensions of the trachea that are unique to Odobenus and that also serve as flotation devices.

In full breeding tilt, the bulls sound like a circus, a construction site, a Road Runner cartoon. They whistle, beep, rasp, strum, bark and knock. They make bell tones, jackhammer drills, train-track clatters and the rubber-band boing! of Wile E. Coyote getting bonked on the head. They mix and match their boings, bells and knocks, they speed up and slow down, they vocalize underwater, in the air, at the bubbly border between. They sing nonstop for days at a time, and their songs can be heard up to 10 miles away. They listen to one another, take tips from one another and change their tune as time and taste require.

Nobody yet knows what a female listens for while she hears one or more suitors singing, but listen she apparently does, for she eventually dives from her icy perch and into the water to mate with a well-tempered male, and evidence suggests she will shun anyone who can’t carry a tune. And though females in the wild do not sing as the males do, they have the anatomical chops to make music and will happily perform the entire walrus Billboard chart if given the right incentive — like the promise of food or affection from Leah Coombs, one of the masterly trainers at Six Flags.

Reporting in the December issue of the journal Animal Cognition, Dr. Schusterman and Dr. Reichmuth described their efforts to explore the extent of the walrus’s vocal talents, its capacity to invent acoustical sequences when given the cue.

Experienced trainers worked with two 12-year-old walruses, Sivuqaq the male and a female named Siku (both names are Inuit), reinforcing the mammals’ behaviors by dispensing or withholding food rewards and demanding that the walruses strive ever harder to generate innovative sounds and sound combinations.

The breadth of the walruses’ creativity exceeded all expectations, not only during training sessions but also during downtime. Dr. Reichmuth said one walrus figured out how to use a rubber toy in the pool as an instrument by pressing it against a window and blasting air through it until it sounded like a bugle. Soon two other walruses in the pool had learned to do the same thing.

“To use a tool to produce an innovative sound, and to learn about that behavior socially,” Dr. Reichmuth said, “now that is impressive.”

"If your car is covered with a layer of sand or dirt today, it may have come all the way from the Sahara desert".

"The Saharan dust itself is not responsible for the thunderstorms forecast for Britain today, but the hot air from Africa is what will provoke the torrential downpours".

"Areas affected by heavy rain may experience localised flooding, the Met Office has warned".

But there is good news for later this week, when the Sun is expected to come out

May I humbly suggest the You stick to the tried and trusted Morning Star like Me and Brother Pace.

The article has a very serious subject.