voltagegate | October 9, 2007Things will be a bit slow on TVG this week. My mother was pulling weeds a bit too hard, fell back and snapped both her radius and ulna in half. The doctors had to bolt and plate the bones, and needless to say, she's out of commission for the next couple of months.
But, mom being mom, she was not going to let little things like broken bones and surgical wounds stop her from spending her vacation in Western PA this week, and I volunteered to help her out around the cabin while she's up here. I'm home briefly to toss up a few reposts of the ecology basics from the beginning of the year (I've…
voltagegate | October 6, 2007I've been on a serious pigment kick lately (reinforced by my little art excursion last night and my review of all of the fall leaf literature), and rhodopsin came to mind, a light absorbing pigment found in animal eyes, archaea and bacteria (often referred to as bacteriorhodopsin in the case of the archaea).
While chlorophyll is capable of absorbing red and blue light from the sun for much of the year (all year for evergreens), bacteriorhodopsin can absorb wavelengths that much of the plant world reflects, from 490 - 550 nm, or the color green (see chart below).
Bacteriorhodopsin is…
voltagegate | October 4, 2007
Heather just finished her self portrait assignment in printmaking, and while others studied pictures of their faces from all angles, she picked up a cell bio text and studied other aspects of self. Her rationale and a few of my thoughts about science and art are below the fold.
I thought her statement was both insightful and poetic:
I am an animal. I am a human. I come from a long branching line of beings, descending in a progression from prehistoric, mammalian, ancestors. Before those ancestral creatures, existed an even longer, and more branched, line of prehistoric plant, and bacterial…
voltagegate | October 3, 2007I've been reading up on this critter for the past few days, ever since I pulled out some old mammal texts I had sitting on the shelf. I got sucked in and thought I would share a bit of what I've read.
The volcano rabbit, Romerolagus diazi, is found on the slopes of only four volcanoes in Mexico, south of Mexico city. These four - Pelado, Iztacohuat, Tlaloc and Popocatepetl - are part of the transvolcanic belt (TVB; also called the trans-Mexican volcanic or transverse neovolvanic belt), a biogeographic zone in the center of the country that exhibits a high level of endemism; in other words,…
voltagegate | September 28, 2007I've been tagged!
It's cool, it's about animals and I've only got an hour to blog this morning before work, so let's do it.
An interesting animal I had
All of the animals I've made friends with over the years have been a bit weird in their own way, I suppose. When you get the chance to get to know something with such a different brain, you're bound to be surprised by its behavior.
About five years ago, I took my friend's tarantula under my care since he had been "joking" about letting it go in his suburban backyard. Tarantella is a Chilean rose-haired tarantula, fairly commonplace as far as…
voltagegate | September 27, 2007Martin has Tangled Bank #89 up at Aardvarchaeology. Bring a packet of something light; a vinaigrette perhaps, but never something as uncouth as ranch or blue cheese. The shoots are tender, after all.
voltagegate | September 26, 2007
Bora has linked the final scientific paper by Steve Irwin on crocodilians (what else?) over on his blog, and I just finished giving it a good read over coffee. A brief review below the fold.
The experiment was thrillingly simple. Three estuarine giants of the species C. porosus were captured at certain abundant spots in Queensland, transported to new locations by helicopter and net sling and released. Irwin and his colleagues tracked their movements back to the capture spot via satellite (the first time satellite telemetry was used in a published study on crocs).
They seemed confused, if…
voltagegate | September 26, 2007WWF is running their latest holiday animal adoption campaign, and have some interesting critters up for adoption just in time for Halloween, including the hellbender, octopus and of course, the vampire bat. Cute idea, and I love the teasers, but... THERE'S NO CANDY IN THE BAG???
Guess I'll have to stuff that little orange bag full of Endangered Species Chocolate myself.
voltagegate | September 24, 2007Here's a clip from Wild America illustrating the incredible agility of the lynx and the snowshoe, predator and prey. The full documentary about the Canada lynx is below the fold. It's not the greatest quality, but the footage does the animals justice.
voltagegate | September 24, 2007
A stand of Dahurian Larch beginning to change color in Northeast Siberia.
Between 50 and 65 degrees N latitude lies a globe encircling band of forest dominated by conifers and chilly winds called the boreal forest (boreal is from the Greek word for north) or the taiga (Russian for "marshy pine forest"). From Iceland's wiry birch forests to the larch covered northern areas of Siberia, the boreal forest grows in a climate where extremes are commonplace, and where much of the wilderness remains preserved.
The boreal forest is generally a cold place; it is winter in these areas for over half the…
voltagegate | September 19, 2007"...there are no coyotes in the [Sierra Madre Occidental] mountains, whereas with us there is universal complaint from Alaska to New Mexico that the coyote has invaded the high country to wreak havoc on both game and livestock. I submit for conservationists to ponder the question of whether the wolves have not kept the coyotes out?"
-Aldo Leopold, in 1937
voltagegate | September 19, 2007
Coyote population densities are much lower in areas where their territory overlaps with wolves, according to a study done by the Wildlife Conservation Society. It's not pure numbers that they're talking about here, it's how many animals can be found within a certain area, and when there's wolves about, the density drops by about 33 - 39 percent for coyotes (percentages from different study areas). Despite the lower densities, coyotes still far outnumber wolves in these areas.
So what's going on here?
It's not predation. Wolf predation on coyotes accounts for only about 16 percent of…
voltagegate | September 17, 2007About a century and a half too late for John Franklin, I'm afraid.
The fact that the sea ice is melting in and around the NW Passage is not news; scientists have been following that progression for many years now, which according to this PR from ScienceDaily has been measured at a average rate of 100,000 square kilometers lost per year. The big news here is that the very latest results are in: the Passage has lost one million square kilometers of sea ice cover just last year. It is currently at its lowest level since the original satellite assessment in the 1970's.
According to a spokesman…
voltagegate | September 15, 2007Another kind comment from a student reader on one of the older biomes posts:
Thanks for posting this! It really helped me get some info for MY "Tropical Dry Forest Biome" project for biology class. I couldn't find any info at the library or on any other sites! So I thank goodness this was here....
You're welcome Haley! Keep up the blogging (and the blogging).
So why haven't I written any basics posts in a while? Well, to be honest, much of my time and energy in the past few months has been focused on getting a job in my field. I've recently had to pick up a few shifts doing catering locally…
voltagegate | September 15, 2007Sarda has some great posts for this months edition, perfect with a cup of coffee on a cool Saturday morning.
voltagegate | September 14, 2007Get your last minute submissions to Sarda now - sardasahney [at] gmail.com.
voltagegate | September 11, 2007Oekologie #5 is coming to Fish Feet in just a few days. Have you submitted your best ecology/environmental science posts yet?
voltagegate | September 11, 2007Shelley, Orli and Grrl have amply discussed the untimely death of Alex and the history of his relationship with Irene Pepperberg, so I will say nothing more than how much of an inspiration he was to my fiance. She has been working on a series of paintings depicting animals in famous experiments, and was immediately taken by Alex's charm.
Three cheers to Alex! You taught us much, and will be remembered.
voltagegate | September 10, 2007Bill Moyers wrote a piece about surface mining the other day, talking about a recent change to the policy in 2006:
The proposed new rule codifies the 2004 buffer zone proposals and, according to THE NEW YORK TIMES, "seems specifically to authorize the disposal of 'excess spoil fills,' a k a mine waste, in hollows and streams."
THE NEW YORK TIMES in reporting the proposed changes stated: "The Office of Surface Mining in the Interior Department drafted the rule, which will be subject to a 60-day comment period and could be revised, although officials indicated that it was not likely to be…
voltagegate | September 10, 2007
Perhaps the best fair in all of Western PA is the Somerset Historical Society's Mountain Craft Days, which finished up yesterday, under the threat of looming rain clouds. Fortunately, we didn't need to break out the umbrellas this year (nor did I break out the camera - I forgot it, sadly).
It's set on the SHS's ground outside of the town, and is more or less a showcase of the cream of local artisans selling their wares, combined with demonstrations of how people lived in the 18th Century Appalachians - they have replicas of cabins, cooking & laundry methods, musicians playing period…