Mimic Octopus

Video of the always-interesting mimic octopus:

50-Million-Year-Old Insect Trove Found in Indian Amber

A collection of amber deposits unearthed in northwest India has opened a spectacular window into insect life some 50 million years ago.  Amber is the geological name for fossilized tree resin, which often preserves insects that get stuck in it.

Although the new amber didn’t yield bizarre new species, it’s still loaded with fossil treasures. More than 700 insect species representing 55 families of insects have been identified inside. Among them are ancient bees, termites and ants — highly social insects that form some of the world’s most complex societies.

In the years to come, scientists will compare these ancient specimens to modern forms and develop a deeper understanding of how these creatures have evolved.

Original article here.

Happy Halloween from One Spooky Sugar Glider

Read more about Sugar gliders here.

Physics of Wet Dogs Shake Out in High-Speed Videos

Scientists have written "The Wet-Dog Shake,” where they attempt to calculate the optimum speed at which dogs should shake to most efficiently dry their fur.

The team built a mathematical model of the processes involved, reasoning that surface tension between the water and the dog’s hair is what keeps the dog wet. Overcoming that tension requires a centripetal force that exceeds it.  As centripetal force varies with distance from the centre of the creature, its radius is therefore crucial to work out the speed of the oscillations.

Check out the above video to see the slow-motion dog shaking, and read more about the experiment in the referenced article here.

Sloth’s Strange Walk Is Really Just Upside Down

Two-toed sloths spend a lot of time hanging upside down from tropical tree branches in Central and South America, and looking very odd. But new research suggests they move just like a mirror image of many upright four-legged creatures.

Mammals seem to move their legs in very standardized fashion during locomotion, whether walking on land, on branches or suspended under branches.  What differs is the way muscles are arranged and attached, which can completely alter the functionality of limbs.

Sloths don’t grasp branches but instead suspend themselves from tree limbs with long, hook-like claws on their sideways-oriented hands and feet. Given how weird sloths are, it seemed possible they may have evolved a different way of moving from other mammals.

To investigate whether strange anatomy translated to strange locomotion, scientists used video and x-rays to see inside sloths as they moved along a wooden pole and a motorized “treadpole” they were trained to move along for a snack.

They found that the sloths didn’t simply lumber along the branches at a slow-and-steady pace.  Their velocity varied, and they used several different gaits while moving. In the “exploratory gait,” the sloths assumed an inverted crouch position in which they held their nose close to the pole, while in the “traveling gait” they extended their arms further to increase their stride.

Read more in the original article here.

Most Overlooked Endangered Species Candidates

Think of endangered species, and you probably think of Florida panthers or blue whales or California golden condors -- big, charismatic animals.  But endangered species can be small, odd and unappealing, too. These animals are no less special.

Below are pictures of some of the animals that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided this year to consider for endangered status. Many steps remain in their bureaucratic journey to protection, which can take years, even decades, and may end with a decision that they're not endangered.
 
Read and see more in the original article here.

Below are the Altamaha spinymussel, the Berry Cave salamander,the Golden-winged Warbler, the western Gull-Billed Tern, and the Hawaiian Scarlet Honeycreeper.

Owl Landing

Island of plastic drink bottles and foam installed at Hoover Alabama's Veterans Park

Crews from the city of Hoover launched and anchored manmade floating island in the lake at Veteran's Park. The 480-square-foot island is made by Floating Island Environmental Solutions of Baton Rouge, La., and is constructed out of recycled plastic drinking bottles, bouyant marine foam, PVC pipe and stainless steel cables and connectors. There are 12 modules that make up the entire island with pre-drilled holes allowing the root ball of the plants to reach the water underneath requiring no chemical fertilization.

See more pictures at the original article here.

Alabama Wildlife Center releases 3 rehabilitated owls at Turkey Creek Nature Preserve

Three young great horned owls were released today back into the wild at the Turkey Creek Nature Preserve near Pinson in northeast Jefferson County.

Two of the birds had suffered injuries this spring and the third was found separated from its parents. Each spent five months in rehabilitation at the Alabama Wildlife Center located at Oak Mountain State Park in Pelham.

One bird was found near Childersburg on April 10 with a possible bite mark on its right wing. The second bird was brought to the center from Tennessee on April 29 after it was found alone. The third bird was found May 19 in Huntsville after possibly being hit by a vehicle.

After weeks of care and training to survive in the wild, wildlife center officials picked the preserve as a release site. The preserve consists of 462 acres of wooded land purchased under Alabama's Forever Wild program. The land is co-managed by the state and the Southern Environmental Center. It is open to the public.

Original article here.  Click on the thumbnails below to see the full size pictures:

New, Cat-Sized Carnivore Found in Madagascar

An unknown, mongoose-like creature has been discovered in the wetlands of Madagascar.

Biologists photographed the creature while surveying lemurs in 2004. It resembled the brown-tailed mongoose, an inhabitant of Madagascar’s eastern jungles that was first described in 1837 by French zoologist Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire.

Further inspection, however, revealed differences between skulls, paws and teeth. The new creature is formally described in the journal Systematics and Biodiversity.

Because it was discovered by researchers from the Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, the new animal has been named Salanoia durrelli, or the Durrell’s vontsira.

That the vontsira would be found on Madagascar is unsurprising. While most new land-dwelling species are small and easily overlooked, tropical jungles contain Earth’s last few unexplored and uninhabited pockets of terrestrial life. Madagascar is a biodiversity hotspot with no fewer than 15 unique families of animals.

Original article here.

Why Male Spiders Are So Small

Male spiders may be tiny compared to their female counterparts in part because it makes it easier for them to get around and spread their genes.

Scientists studied different spiders’ aptitude for bridging — sending out strands of thread that get carried by the wind to another spot, and then crawling across — by placing them in a wind tunnel and watching them move around. They discovered that smaller spiders made bridges more often, and that the technique was more common in spiders with a pronounced difference in size between the sexes.

In species where bridging is a very common mode of locomotion, small males, by being more efficient bridge builders, will enjoy more mating opportunities and thus will be better at competition to reach receptive females.  This may lead to a selective pressure for smaller size.

The picture on the right is of a female and male orb-weaver spider.

Original article here.

Rare, Tiny, Baby Seahorse Found in British Waters

The Seahorse Trust, after years of surveying the fish in British waters, has finally found, measured and photographed a baby seahorse, which is also called a fry.

Despite finding many adults, plenty of pregnant males (female seahorses transfer their eggs to the male, who fertilizes them in his pouch) and juveniles, the trust had previously failed to find any babies.

Baby seahorses are left entirely on their own after being born, and rarely survive long enough to become an adult. Due to their premature independence and underwater predators, less than one in a thousand will survive into adulthood. Not good odds, even though about 100-200 eggs are hatched at a time.

But the trust finally found a fry in the waters at Studland in Dorset. Despite poor weather and only 3 feet of visibility, scientists spotted a tiny seahorse clinging on to a piece of seagrass. They managed to measure the 1.6 inch creature, and snap the photograph above, before the baby returned to the sea bed.

In the first few weeks of a seahorse’s life, it will live predominantly in the plankton layer of the ocean, gobbling up an astounding 3,000 pieces of plankton every 24 hours.

Original article here.

200 New Species of Frogs, Spiders, Mammals and More Discovered

In just two months of searching through a remote, mountainous rainforest in Papua New Guinea, scientists discovered 200 new species of animals and plants, including spiders, frogs, insects and mammals.

The surveys were done in 2009 in the Nakanai Mountains on the island of New Britain, which the country has nominated for World Heritage status. The new species could offer a boost to that effort.

For more information, and pictures of additional discoveries, read more in the original article here.

Antarctic Octopuses Discovered With Sub-Zero Venom

A research expedition to Antarctica to study the region’s octopus life has returned with descriptions of four new species, and the first known sub-zero venoms.

Antarctic octopuses eat a wide variety of animals, from clams to fish. They catch their prey with their tentacles and use their venom to kill them, much like snakes.

The venoms are being studied as potential sources of pain-killers because they work on the nervous system. So far, analysis of the venom has revealed two toxins that are new to science.

The scientists still don’t know what biochemical tricks the octopuses use to keep their venom working at freezing temperatures.

For more information, see the original article here.

Video Roundup: Interspecies Friends

The videos below are from this roundup of interspecies friends: