March 13, 2015 in Animals & Insects, Humans, Plants
A ‘threshold’ for deforestation’s effect on biodiversity in the Amazon rainforest has been uncovered by new research from Cambridge University.
When this newly revealed forest-cover deforestation threshold is exceeded, extinctions surge in the regions affected — with extinctions becoming both more rapid and also more widespread.
March 4, 2015 in Animals & Insects
What exactly is a Dragonfish? Well… any number of different species/types of fish actually — from a strange bioluminescent deep sea fish (Black Dragonfish), to a weird sea dragon looking thing that pair-bonds for life (sea moths), to an eel looking fish that you can actually raise on land so long as you keep them moist (Senegal Bichir), to a freshwater fish species that looks, in many ways, unchanged from how it looked during the times of the dinosaurs (Arowana).
While the focus of this article will be on the (perhaps) most recognizable of these fish — the deep sea Black Dragonfish — an overview of the other “Dragonfish” fish species will be given as well. Enjoy.
February 26, 2015 in Animals & Insects
Fangtooth fishes (Anoplogaster cornuta, Anoplogaster brachycera) are a genus of deep sea beryciform fishes, classified as being in the family Anoplogastridae (unarmed stomach). The common names for the two currently recognized species are: the common fangtooth, and the shorthorn fangtooth.
The two species of fangtooths possess a circumglobal distribution, and are found mostly in tropical and cold-temperate waters. The genus that contains the two species is the only one in the family, and there are no known close relatives.
February 9, 2015 in Animals & Insects
It’s been said before that the deep sea may as well be another world considering how distant it is from us, and how strange some of the life forms that live down may there seem to us.
And indeed in some ways the life-forms that live down there do seem strange, but at the same time they certainly do have something clearly recognizable about them do they not? Strange, but also familiar at the same time? Not quite truly alien — if it’s even possible for people to conceive of or imagine (or perhaps even be aware of?) the truly alien. Perhaps the world is filled up with the “truly alien” but it’s just that people aren’t aware of it?
After all, everything really just comes down to familiarity does it not? And people can get used to practically anything after all, even the rather strange ways that modern people live, for example.
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February 8, 2015 in Animals & Insects
The Horror Frog — a frog that breaks its own bones to make claws — perhaps you’ve heard of such an animal and questioned whether it’s actually real? After all what kind of animal would intentionally break its own bones?
Well, I’m here to tell you that it is real — and there are actually at least two species of frog that do, in fact, break their own bones intentionally to make claws that they then use in fighting. Making both species — the Hairy Frog of Central Africa, and the Otton Frog of southern Japan (Ryukyu Islands) — clearly deserving of the (somewhat humorous) moniker “the Horror Frog”.
This article will provide information on (and of course pictures of) both species — the hairy frog (Trichobatrachus robustus); and the Otton frog (Babina subaspera). Enjoy.
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