Mastodons are about as common in Pleasanton as the legendary T. Rex, and that makes them about as endangered as a species can be. But long ago rumors spread that mastodons were discovered frozen in ice, and ever since then Pleasantonians have lived in fear of winter. "You just never know," explained Merle Alouette, "when you might wake up one morning after a blue norther moves through and find ice outside. My .357 Weatherby will drop a Cape Buffalo at 300 yards, but I don't know how effective it is against mastodons." Does the mastodon really deserve to be on the endangered species list? "Of course they're endangered," claims Merle's sister Elouise. "There's so few of 'em left that you might go a whole lifetime and not see even one!" Others think they're already extinct. "I ain't never seen a manatee," offered Merle, "but that don't mean they're extinct." And so, the debate rages....
Pleasanton's endangered fish is the extremely colorful humuhumunukunukuapua'a, a member of the triggerfish family. The humuhumunukunukuapua'a (pronounced who-moo-who-moo-noo-koo-noo-koo-ah-poo-ah-ah), which the locals simply call the humuhumunukunukuapuaa (dropping the final accent), is so rare in Pleasanton that it has never been seen there. Indeed, the entire membership of the Pleasanton Scuba Diving Club and Snorkling Association has combed the Atascosa River tirelessly looking for the beloved humuhumunukunukuapua'a without success. Some people (we call them skeptics) believe the humuhumunukunukuapua'a is extinct in Pleasanton, but others simply believe the fish is off vacationing somewhere very far away. But all true Pleasantonians keep an eye out at the riverbank for the elusive and rare humuhumunukunukuapua'a, for when it is finally sighted it will be a cause for wild and jubilant celebration.
Pleasanton's endangered flower is "the queen of the mountain flowers," the "noble and white" edelweiss. The edelweiss is so rare in Pleasanton that no known photo of it exists. The sketch you see above was drawn on an Eckto-Sketch 2000 by Pleasanton's resident naturalist artist, Audi Audubon. The edelweiss is a woolly flowering plant that grows high in the rocky cliffs of the Austrian and Bavarian alps and in Pleasanton, Texas. In the alpine tradition, one says that "Nur die Elite kann edelweiss erreichen" (only the elite can reach the edelweiss). The connotation and innuendo is that only the experienced mountain climbers--the elite--can climb up to the edelweiss. The Texas tradition is somewhat different. Here it is said, "Only patience and luck can find an edelweiss in Pleasanton," for, in truth, no one ever has.