Lanscapes carved into books by Guy Laramee

Infrared video shows bees "cooking" wasp invader

 It's an unlikely way to deal with an intruder but some honeybees cook wasps that invade their colony. The tactic is usually invisible to the naked eye but now a new infrared video captured by Barrett Klein and colleagues from the University of Wuerzburg in Germany exposes the thermal assault involved.

The video, filmed through an observation window let into the wall of a hive, follows the bees as they mob the wasp. Then a close-up shows them generating heat by contracting their wing muscles to suffocate the intruder.

Melissani Cave, Greece

 Melissani cave can be found on the east coast of the island of Kefalonia in
Greece. It is located about 2 km from the town of Sami and 10 km from the
town of Argostoli. The caves are surrounded by forests, while a mountain
slope is located to the west.

The Day Niagra Falls Went Dry

 In 1965 a local newspaper editorial was published discussing the destruction of
the American Falls (one of three waterfalls that together make up the Niagara Falls).
It was believed that the destruction was being caused by previous rock debris that
had gone over the falls and that the continued erosion would eventually lead to the
American Falls’ destruction.

To address this concern, the International Joint Commission created a board called
 the American Falls International Board in 1967. After two years of deliberation on
what to do, the Board appointed the task to the Albert Elia Construction Company of
Niagara Falls, New York. Their job was to build a 183-meter cofferdam that stretched
 from mainland to Goat Island. This would block water to the falls so workers could
 clear the debris from the top of the falls.

 Once complete, they would then remove the cofferdam and restore waterflow to the
American Falls.

The cofferdam took thirty workers three days of working two 11-hour shifts in
mid-June of 1969. The cofferdam consisted of 1,264 truckloads of boulders and fill
 and weighed 27,800 tons. A fence was also erected. With the falls now dry, workers
 set to remove debris while scientists performed geological studies to determine
ways to slow and prevent future erosion.

Source: http://www.niagarafrontier.com/dewater.html

Super Moon May 5, 2012

A supermoon is the coincidence of a full moon or a new moon with the closest approach the Moon makes to the Earth, resulting in the largest apparent size of the moon's disk as seen from Earth. This results in a moon that is 14% larger (closer) and 30% brighter than other full moons of 2012.

 The scientific term for the phenomenon is "perigee moon." Full Moons vary in size because of the oval shape of the Moon's orbit. The Moon follows an elliptical path around Earth with one side ("perigee") about 50,000 km closer than the other ("apogee"). Full Moons that occur on the perigee side of the Moon's orbit seem extra big and bright.

Beachy Head Chalk Cliff

"Beachy Head is a chalk headland on the south coast of England, close to the town of Eastbourne in the county of East Sussex, immediately east of the Seven Sisters. The cliff there is the highest chalk sea cliff in Britain, rising to 162 m (530 ft) above sea level. The peak allows views of the south east coast from Dungeness to the east, to Selsey Bill in the west. Its height has also made it one of the most notorious suicide spots in the world."

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beachy_Head

Textile Artist Mister Finch

Here's more Mister Finch

Photographer David Fleetham

In the waters around the Galapagos Islands a hungry sea lion appears to swim
through a tunnel of fish as it searches for its supper.


A Great White Shark (Carcharodon carcharias) near the surface of the sea,
Guadalupe Island, Mexico.

Giant Squid Eyes

 


The giant squid sees the world with eyes the size of soccer balls. They’re at least 25 centimetres (10inches) across, making them the largest eyes on the planet.
Why does the giant squid have a champion eye that’s at least twice the size of the runner-up?

Dan-Eric Nilsson and Eric Warrant from Lund University, Sweden, suggest that the world’s biggest eyes evolved to spot one of the world’s biggest predators – the sperm whale.

Using a mathematical model, they found that in the deep ocean, eyes suffer from a law of diminishing returns. Small eyes can see dramatically further if they grow a bit bigger.

Using their model, Nilsson and Warrant found that enormous eyes have advantages over eyes that are merely large. Specifically, they’re much better at spotting other large objects that give off their own light, in water deeper than 500 metres. There’s one animal that fits those criteria, and it’s one that giant squids really need to see: the sperm whale.

But in the dark oceans, how could the squids see them? Nilsson and Warrant note that while sperm whales don’t produce their own light, they frequently disturb animals that do. When they dive, they knock tiny animals like jellyfish and crustaceans that flash in response.
These shimmering outlines would be too faint for most animals to see, but not the giant squid. Nilsson and Warrant showed that its huge eyes could pick up this light from 120 metres away, and they can scan a huge sphere of water for those tell-tale flashes.

From: http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscience/2012/03/15/giant-squid-what-big-eyes-you-have-all-the-better-to-spot-sperm-whales-with-my-dear/

Mike Libby creator of INSECT LAB

More of Mike's Work at: insectlabstudio.com

Son Doong Cave, Vietnam

"Sơn Đoòng (meaning "Mountain River cave" in Vietnamese) is located near the
Laos-Vietnam border. It has a large fast-flowing underground river inside. Sơn Đoòng
overtakes Deer Cave in Malaysia to take the title of the world's largest cave."

 From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Son_Doong_Cave

Basque photographer Mikel Uribetxeberria

 More of Mikel Uribetxeberria can be found at http://www.mikeluribetxeberria.com/

The Amazing Mantis Shrimp

"Mantis shrimp or stomatopods are marine crustaceans, the members of the order Stomatopoda. Mantis shrimp sport powerful claws that they use to attack and kill prey by spearing, stunning or dismemberment. Although it happens rarely, some larger species of mantis shrimp are capable of breaking through aquarium glass with a single strike from this weapon."


"One species possess a developed club and rudimentary spear; the club is used to bludgeon and smash their meals apart. These two weapons are employed with blinding quickness, with an acceleration of a .22 calibre bullet."
The mantis shrimps' eyes can perceive both polarized light and hyperspectral colour vision. They are considered to be the most complex eyes in the animal kingdom.

Some species have at least 16 different photoreceptor types, which are divided into four classes (their spectral sensitivity is further tuned by colour filters in the retinas), 12 of them for colour analysis in the different wavelengths (including four which are sensitive to ultraviolet light) and four of them for analysing polarised light. By comparison, humans have only five visual pigments, four dedicated to see colour but the lens block ultraviolet light.

Slightly confused tree frog

This is a Cuban tree frog on a tree in the backyard of James Snyder, in southern Florida. How and why he ate this light is a mystery. It should be noted that at the time James was taking this photo, he thought this frog was dead, having cooked himself from the inside.

 “I’m happy to say I was wrong. After a few shots he adjusted his position. So after I was finished shooting him, I pulled the light out of his mouth and he was fine. Actually, I might be crazy but I don’t think he was very happy when I took his light away.”