A lot of my friends seem to like owls, if their tendency to post photos of adorable fluffy feathered faces on Facebook is anything to go by. I rather like them too; we live close to a gully & it’s lovely hearing the moreporks calling at night. Once or twice one has sat in a […]
Continue readingCategory: animal behaviour
it’s the season for ‘best-of’ science compilations…
… and so here are a couple of compilations. The first is Sciencealert's top 10 animal videos for this year. They include a lone porcupine seeing off a pride of 17 (!) lions; an octopus 'walking' on land (which is really really strange: it must take an awful lot of effort to do this, unsupported […]
Continue readingthe amazingness of lyrebird vocalisations
This is one impressive lyrebird – laser guns and kookaburras! (Not quite at the same time.) I found him on a ScienceAlert page, which has more info and also links to other videos of these vocally talented birds.
Continue readingrapid evolution in cane toads
In her book Paleofantasy, Marlene Zuk discusses cane toads (Bufo marinus) as an example of just how rapidly evolutionary processes can work. These amphibian pests were introduced into Australia in 1935 to control borer beetles in sugar cane. Unfortunately the toads never got the memo about this expectation, and have spread rapidly across the continent, […]
Continue readingif fish had nightmares, these spiders would feature in them
If asked, "what do spiders eat?", my answer would probably include insects, spiders, other arthropods, and maybe birds. I'd never have thought of fish! And yet it seems that fish-eating by spiders is, if not common, then not exactly rare, although other food items still account for most of the spiders' diets. In a paper […]
Continue readingsomething reassuringly disgusting…
This post's title comes from Something Fishy where, talking about sea cucumbers, Illya wrote "But there's something else they can do. Something reassuringly disgusting. Something totally Sea Cucumber." I was mildly let down to find he was talking about bioluminescence, & not self-evisceration. Yes, that's right. When threatened (or repeatedly prodded by some uncouth human […]
Continue readinganother see-through animal (& a rather lovely image)
I saw this little critter a while back, over on Pharyngula, & put it on the list of Things To Blog About. Somehow, it took me a while to actually get onto it, but we've got there in the end 🙂 Image credit: Laurence Madin, Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution/CMarZ, Census of Marine Life I was […]
Continue readinga strange but beautiful bird
In terms of plumage and behaviour, some of the birds of paradise have to be strong contenders in any 'most unusual' list. I mean, take a look at this: (Image source: Wikpedia (Creative Commons)) This is a male Wilson's Bird of Paradise (Cicinnurus respublica), a species that's found only on a couple of small islands […]
Continue reading‘slow life’ – corals and anemones strut their stuff
When I was a kid we used to go to the beaches of the Mahia peninsula most weekends. (Well, memory says 'most weekends' – it might not have been that often!). Sometimes we'd stop at the sweeping sandy shores of Blue Bay, but on other days we'd go round to the exposed rocky coast & […]
Continue readingit’s not all fun & games being a crocodile, you know
Crocodiles (& their relatives, alligators) are generally viewed as top predators. They're 'ambush' hunters1, lunging up out of the water to snatch at their prey at the last moment. But sometimes, they come off second-best. Check out this video on the National Geographic site, of a jaguar stalking, catching, & killing a caiman. And how […]
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