WELCOME TO the 10th Annual March Mammal Madness Tournament! (1/N) #2022MMM
Everything is going great and some people are saying this is the best tournament launch ever. (2/N) #2022MMM
As of 2:22 on 2-22-2022, N=6000+ educators had requested curricular materials to use MMM with their N=540,000+ learners! Clearly, the tournament is doing numbers, as the kids say. (3/N) #2022MMM
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Traffic to the @ASULibraries March Mammal Madness KEEP collection was a teensy bit overwhelming last night and this morning, requiring a reboot of the servers. (4/N) #2022MMM
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Whether this is your 10th or 1st time playing March Mammal Madness, #2022MMM is going to be AMAZING!
And while you can be any level of high to ride this ride, there are different ways to play (5/N)
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STEP 1 for Everyone: Bookmark ASU LibGuide, curated by the brilliant Scholarly Comm Librarian Anali Perry @grumpator bc this has all the bracket links, the guidance on researching combatants, & finding out the tournament battle outcomes. (6/N) #2022MMMlibguides.asu.edu/MarchMammalMad…
STEP 2 for You
Follow @2022MMMletsgo. The account ONLY RTs & creates OFFICIAL MMM tweets, safe for classroom use, safe to direct your students to follow [7/N] #2022MMM
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Step 3 for We
BASK IN THE EPIC GLORY OF THIS TOURNAMENT TRAILER by @jengabrys (8/N) #2022MMM
Step 4 for More:
Get the key rules, some specifics about the 2022 Tournament, essential links, & meet the TEAM! (9/N) #2022MMMdrive.google.com/file/d/1PHXPzb…
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Okay, now it's time to choose your own MMM adventure...
you can casually pick your winners in the bracket, relying on familiarity & seedings #LevelBasic (10a/N) #2022MMM
[gif is Keanu Reeves saying "Just basic stuff"]
Or you can get very serious about your research with a deep knowledge of tournament game mechanics & past events #LevelSuperFan @NatickBobCat has a purrfect rundown here:
Feb 25th there's a #2022MMM Festival with @EBTSOYP: different panels each hour of so many amazing MMM Scientists and Artists. Learn about their adventures with animals, fossils, robots, and DIRE WOLF DNA! (14/N) #2022MMMdrive.google.com/file/d/1zg8fsX…
Got a 4th grader in your household? Help them sign-up for their FREE National Parks Pass with the Every Kid Outside program & you could even do the MMM lesson plan as a family (16/N) #2022MMM everykidoutdoors.gov/index.htm
In the lead up to the wild card, you can forget the tournament is going on, or get real serious about following and/or engaging in all the #2022MMM banter (17/N)
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Details about the week of Exhibition Games is forthcoming... I'll add it to this thread March 1. #StayTuned (18/N) #2022MMM
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And then once it's officially tournament time, again you have some options, outlined carefully in this thread from last year (19/N) #2022MMM
Figuratively speaking, whether you do a flailing bellyflop into the mighty river of MMM, or wade the tangled banks looking for crawdads, or just briefly dip your toes, we are so glad you are here. (19/N) #2022MMM
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So get ready rock-steadies, March Mammal Madness is going to be inTENse. (20/N) #2022MMM
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& always remember the March Mammal Madness Motto and Mantra-
If you're LEARNING, you're WINNING!
(21/N) #2022MMM
[gif is young Vietnamese-American girl in bright pink flower print dress with backpack & lunch bag running toward school saying "can't wait to learn!"]
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Last Up: #3-seed Wolverine (Gulo gulo) vs. #6-seed Bat-Eared Fox (Otocyon megalotis) #2023MMM
With more research projects of wolverine in North America, evidence is accumulating for male parental visits to dens of females with young in their territory, with the most visits occurring in March (Copeland et al. 2017) #2023MMM
Whether male wolverines are engaging in direct behavioral care is unknown, but researchers speculate that increased visits of male may deter predators or stranger wolverines from approaching the dens (Copeland et al. 2017). #2023MMM
AND THEN THERE WERE 32 #Round2#2023MMM (also, if you listen to music, this is the music for the intro: )
In Round 1, we learned about the division themes, met all the combatants, and went to habitats AROUND THE WORLD for some WILD action, and even traveled into deep time! #2023MMM
And can we give it up to the Genetics Team, the Art Team, the Narration Team, the Summary Team, the Library Team, @MC_Marmot@MMMletsgo & our backchannel stage manager Rick who keeps the wheels on the bus night after night! #2023MMM
NEXT UP: #6-seed Itjaritjari (Notoryctes typhlops) vs #11-seed Silky Anteater (Cyclopes didactylus) #2023MMM
Welcome back to the Itjaritjari!
First appearing as a combatant in 2017, Itjaritjari was a 16th seed who was dug up & scarfed by 1-seed Honey Badger.
Also, in 2022, Itjaritjari was Australia's MAMMAL OF THE YEAR! #2023MMM
The Itjaritjari, also called a marsupial mole, is SMOL (head & body length 121–159 mm, weight 40–70 g) & has big digging claws on front feet & a thickened "rostral horny shield" to protect its nose & front of its face (Bennison et al. 2014) #2023MMM
NEXT UP: #4 seed Mara v #13 seed Siberian Chipmunk #2023MMM (this battle narration crafted by @am_anatiala)
Here it comes, the rabbit-looking capybara relative that acts & moves like an ungulate! Pretty clear how it was in The Who in the What Now Division as a #15-seed in 2014. #2023MMM
The Mara, weighing in at 37 stoats (8.12 kg) hails from the shrub & grasslands of Argentina. #2023MMM#StoatsAsMeasurement
TONIGHT: Itty Bitty Come Back City Division!
Bringing back some beloved littles that were 14, 15, & 16 seeds early departed from tournament contention.
These mini mammals are back for another chance at March Mammal Madness glory. #2023MMM
We'll also take a bit of a stroll down MMMemory lane, revisiting the past battles of these teensy tinies & mighty minis and 10 years of learning! #DecadeOfWinning#2023MMM
Tonight's hurlyburly is writ in part from the dubious knowledge from Edward Topsell's History of Four-Foot'd Beasts (1607) & History of Serpents (1608) for 1658's then definitive 1000-page barn-burner of a natural history compendium #YeOldeTimeyBattle#ExhibitionGames#2022MMM
Topsell collected writings from Conradus Gesner & other authors to integrate & evaluate many terms & descriptions, at times appropriately skeptical but also at times overly credulous #YeOldeTimeyBattle#2022MMMloc.gov/resource/rbcto…
Although Topsell's Beastiary was not as systematic as the Bauhin brothers a hundred years before or Linnaeus a hundred years later... #YeOldeTimeBattle#2022MMM