animals
tqa | February 29, 2008
I took the picture below at Ka'ena Point, Oahu in January of 2006. In this picture, there are two Hawaiian Monk Seals. (They can be hard to spot, so I've marked the two animals in a second version of the picture below the fold.) Here's the quiz question that goes with this image: without recourse to Google, estimate the percentage of the total population of the species that can be seen in this one picture.
(Click on the pictures to view larger versions.)
edyong | February 28, 2008
Chimpanzees may not be able to recite Hamlet or giving rousing speeches but there is no doubt that they are excellent communicators. They exchange a wide variety of sophisticated calls and gestures that carry meaning and can be tailored to different audiences.
The sophistication of chimp communication doesn't stop there. Jared Taglialatela from the Yerkes National Primate Research Center has found that chimp signals and human speech are both strongly influenced by the same area in the left half of the brain - a region called the inferior frontal gyrus (IFG).
In humans, the left IFG is home…
edyong | February 27, 2008
Male insects have a tough time of it. Aside from the usual threats of predators, competitors and the odd hungry female, many are plagued by discriminatory parasites intent on killing them, while leaving their female peers unharmed. These "male-killers" are incredibly successful and infect a wide range of insects, who are themselves a very successful group. One of these killers, a bacteria known as Wolbachia, may well be the world's most successful parasite.
The male-killers are paragons of selfishness. Their success hinges on successfully infecting females, for whithin egg cells, they find…
edyong | February 25, 2008Humans have explored the entire face of the planet, but we haven't done so alone. Animals and plants came along for the ride, some as passengers and other as stowaways. Today, these hitchhikers pose one of the greatest threats to the planet's biodiversity, by ousting and outcompeting local species.
Islands are particularly vulnerable to invaders. Cut off from the mainland, island-dwellers often evolve in the absence of predators and competitors, and are prone to developing traits that make them easy pickings for invaders, like docile natures or flightlessness.
Two years ago, I wrote about…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2008tags: lynx, Lynx canadensis, mammals, Image of the Day
I have been digging through my image archives in my gmail account and found some real treasures that my readers sent to me. Unfortunately, I overlooked quite a few images that were sent when I was in the hospital and had poor computer access. So let me fix this oversight during the next few weeks;
Lynx, Lynx canadensis.
Orphaned image. [larger view].
grrlscientist | February 14, 2008tags: pangolin, animals, photography, subway art, AMNH, NYC, NYCLife
I think this is a species of pangolin, Manis species,
as portrayed in tiles on the walls of the NYC uptown subway stop (A-B-C)
at 81st and Central Park West. (ISO, no zoom, no flash).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
Read more about the AMNH tile artworks and see the AMNH tile artworks photographic archives -- with all the animals identified.
grrlscientist | February 9, 2008tags: Gavial, Gharial, Gavialis gangeticus, reptiles, photography, subway art, AMNH, NYC, NYCLife
I think this is a Gharial (also known as a Gavial), Gavialis gangeticus,
as portrayed in tiles on the walls of the NYC uptown subway stop (A-B-C)
at 81st and Central Park West. (ISO, no zoom, no flash).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
Read more about the AMNH tile artworks and see the AMNH tile artworks photographic archives -- with all the animals identified.
grrlscientist | February 8, 2008tags: hedgehog, mammals, animals, photography, subway art, AMNH, NYC, NYCLife
I think this is a species of hedgehog,
as portrayed in tiles on the walls of the NYC uptown subway stop (A-B-C)
at 81st and Central Park West. (ISO, no zoom, no flash).
Image: GrrlScientist 2008. [wallpaper size].
Read more about the AMNH tile artworks and see the AMNH tile artworks photographic archives -- with all the animals identified.
voltagegate | January 28, 2008Man am I not on top of things. EDGE released its list of evolutionarily distinct and Globally Endangered amphibians last week, and I just read the press release with the top 10 (actually nine, but it says 10) on the list. If you want a brief explanation about how EDGE prioritizes conservation, I blogged the PLoS paper released by EDGE scientists last year.
Without further ado, the list:
Chinese giant salamander (salamander that can grow up to 1.8m in length and evolved independently from all other amphibians over one hundred million years before Tyrannosaurus rex)
Sagalla caecilian (limbless…
voltagegate | January 14, 2008This week we have our first avian reference, a strange genus of heron.
In WoW, Nyctanessa is a level 44 demonology lock from the guild "42". There is only one other toon with the name, a 38 undead lock with the traditional spelling, but three others with the alternative genus name of Nyticorax (see below).
I'm assuming the GM is a Douglas Adams fan:
"Forty two?!" yelled Loonquawl. "Is that all you've got to show for seven and a half million years' work?"
"I checked it very thoroughly," said the computer, "and that quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite honest with…
grrlscientist | January 11, 2008tags: Friday Ark, blog carnivals
The 173rd edition of the Friday Ark is now available. If you like looking at photographs of animals, then this is the place to go!
voltagegate | January 9, 2008Man that's an ugly title.
Not much time to post today (until later perhaps) but I did come across an interesting study that improves on geographically-driven predictions of adaptations to climate change. I blogged about a paper on British butterflies earlier this year that studied how much each species depended on the particular climate, and whether or not they would be susceptible to a climate shift based on their environmental preference.
This new study is trying to make migratory predictions based on the organism's physiology, rather than the changing climate of a particular habitat:
Most…
grrlscientist | December 28, 2007tags: blue poison dart frogs, Dendrobates azureus, Dendrobatidae, NewScientist, Image of the Day
Blue Poison Dart Frogs, Dendrobates azureus.
Dendrobates azureus is a species of poison dart frog found in the Sipaliwini District in Suriname of South America.
Image: Gail Shumway/Getty Images 2007 (NewScientist calendar 2008). [Much larger view]
The poison dart frog is the common name for the Dendrobatidae family of small, diurnal frogs that are endemic to Central and South America. These frogs are widely referred to as poison arrow frogs or poison dart frogs, which reflectes the widespread…
voltagegate | December 24, 2007To put it mildly, the cards are stacked against the blue crab population in the Chesapeake Bay area. In the past 60 years, the human population of the area has jumped from 3.7 million to almost 18 million and, subsequently, farming and industry has exploded (it is often joked that everyone on the eastern shore of Maryland is a chicken farmer), leading to waterways filled with ferrous compounds, nitrates and phosphates.
Essentially, the Chesapeake has become a sink for these pollutants running through 141 streams and five rivers from six states--New York, Delaware, Pennsylvania, Maryland,…
grrlscientist | December 20, 2007tags: Friday Ark, blog carnivals
This week's edition of the Friday Ark is now available for you to enjoy, and just in time, too, WHEW!
voltagegate | December 19, 2007The University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science recently published an article discussing some progress in blue crab research and conservation, and mentioned a related report:
The Chesapeake Bay blue crab population has stabilized, but at historically low levels according to a recent report by the Chesapeake Bay Commission's Bi-State Blue Crab Technical Advisory Committee.
Though the news isn't quite heartening, it's better than nothing.
Blue crab populations have been declining tremendously over the past few decades, not only threatening a population of the animals, but also…
voltagegate | December 17, 2007
There's been a big windfarm project in the works for Shaffer Mountain in PA, which has met with some of the strongest resistance in the area, including an entire resistance organized by a gentleman named Jack Buchan, a resident of the area. From what I've seen, Buchan and other members of Sensible Wind Solutions, a local group, has been a constant thorn in Gamesa's side, publishing giant full page ads opposing the project in local newspapers (more or less like this).
The latest transgression is a supposed suppression of data obtained by Gamesa on the land designated for development. Two…
voltagegate | December 12, 2007This week I did a little search for Lycaon, one of the many suggestions given to me in the comments of the introductory post. This one came from Brian from Laelaps, who had a brief affair with World of Warcraft that his computer did not particularly like.
Lycaon is a popular name. There are 77 toons named Lycaon on the North American servers, and another 51 in Europe. From the European server Doomhammer, we have a troll hunter named Lycaon who seems to have recently hit level 70 (grats!).
IRL, Lycaon is the genus name of Lycaon pictus, the African wild dog, the beautifully mottled pack…
grrlscientist | December 7, 2007tags: Friday Ark, blog carnivals
The 168th edition of the Friday Ark is now available for you to enjoy. This blog carnival specializes in linking to images of animals, although some of these images also have stories that accompany them. They included some of my contributions, too!
voltagegate | December 5, 2007
My fiance's art show was a huge hit. Her and the other artists had a great turnout despite the chilly Friday night, well over 100 visitors. I basically didn't see her for the two weeks prior as she prepared for the show, painting, scraping and filling walls in the gallery, building a base for and finishing construction of her installation piece, and figuring out placement. She was literally still painting - on walls and on canvas - the day of the show.
(Before I show any pics, I want to make sure that everyone knows that my camera sucks, and the blurriness is my fault, not hers. I wish they…