Cranberries. An interesting account about Cranberries and other Vaccinium species. (I know – I should have included this before the holidays.) Lots of interesting information about the fruit, its history, uses and related species. (link)
The Curious Strength of a Sea Sponge’s Glass Skeleton.
The Georgia Museum of Natural History has been sponsoring a monthly series of “Turtle Pond Talks” on the first Monday of each month. These are aimed at a general audience and are now being offered as live Zoom virtual meetings. The next talk is Monday, January 11 at 10am. The Zoom information to participate is available here. The speaker this month is Dr. Jim Hamrick, professor emeritus at UGA (Plant Biology). His talk is “What Makes a Tree a Tree.” His research has been on southeastern as well as tropical plants. This is a chance to hear the real deal!!
DNA “barcoding” reveals more hidden species, sometimes a lot more.
The evolution of sleep: 700 million years of melatonin.
Few of us have been to New Zealand, but, if you manage to visit, here is a sight you might want to see. These “glowworms” hang from the ceiling of caves and attract their prey with blue light.
A little closer to home, in northwest Alabama, there is a similar light display by relatives of the New Zealand insects. It’s in Dismals Canyon. More information about the insects and tours is available here.
Jellyfish swim by creating an invisible “wall” of water and then pushing against it.
Will global warming make animals darker-or lighter?
Dismay greets end of U.S. effort to curb devastating forest pest.
Unexpected gorilla snacking behaviors make scientists question what we know about early humans. Gorillas’ eating habits don’t match their tooth specializations, raising questions about determining early human diets from fossil records.
Rising temperatures are altering the sex ratio of sea turtles. Researchers are exploring one possible fix.
I do a lot of random browsing on the internet – it’s fun to suddenly stumble across something that is totally unknown (to me, anyway). This blog post is one such example. It has two terms that were new to me: xerochastic and hygrochastic. Are you curious? Go ahead. One click will satisfy your quest for knowledge.
“Murder Hornets” were in the news this year and people were anxious about them becoming the next terror insect. Here’s a video showing one approach to dealing with unwanted hornet nests.
That’s all for this week.
What I’ve read:
WORLD OF WONDERS: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments, by Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Milkweed Books, 2020.
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by Tim Homan
Early morning mid-May, 1990. Cohutta Wilderness. I started walking East Cowpen Trail * from its southern, Three Forks Mountain end in gray-out conditions, the sky thick and cool with blowing mist. I carried my measuring wheel and a small, moving pocket of visibility with me as I hiked hard and fast toward Panther Creek Trail **, my work for the day.
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With the arrival of winter weather roosting cavities become important for bird survival. Find out more about the birds that use them in this article by Terry Johnson.
Martha Walker, a Nature Rambler from the very beginning, but now a vicarious Rambler, recommended this article:
The Serviceberry: An Economy of Abundance by Robin Wall Kimmerer, author of Braiding Sweetgrass and Gathering Moss, books you should read if you haven’t already.
Glacier mice revisited! An earlier post in this Nature Rambling blog introduced you to the mystery of these mossy formations. Now the New Scientist has more details about them, plus, their associated glacier fauna: glacier “fleas”, glacier worms, and other animals associated with glaciers, including a glacier finch.
Hakai Magazine weekly contents.
Bioluminescence! Two videos of “sea sparkle.” I’ve only seen sea sparkle once. It was on a small, outboard powered boat going to an island off the coast of El Salvador. As the sun set and the sky darkened the wake of the boat came alive with light. I dipped my hand into the ocean and a similar, smaller wake appeared.
This video shows you the organism that causes sea sparkle and this video shows you what Sea Sparkle is like.
Seeing these videos, I’m reminded of a passage from Dylan Thomas’ A Child’s Christmas in Wales:
“And books which told me everything about the wasp, except why.”
My holiday gift to you is magic by British magician Michael Vincent performing at the Magic Castle. Be amazed!
The Werewolf Plant: “It’s a warm, moonlit night in the Balkans. The landscape is crisp and dry, the rocks underneath sinuous and jumbled, the product of the ancient Himalayan Orogen and millions of subsequent years of erosion and tectonic activity. The Mediterranean breeze permeates the air, and the sky is a cobalt blue, framing the opalescent corona of the moon. But the moonlight is strangely refracted from a million crystal spheres hidden among the rocks, each visited in turn by moths, expertly navigating the night sky using the azimuth of the moon. This was the scene recently faced by a team of researchers studying the pollination mechanisms of the genus Ephedra, a type of Gymnosperm common in arid environments.”
The Ugliest Orchid in the World, plus other new and unusual plants discovered in 2020. Kew Gardens reports on more species described by Kew scientists.
These lizards lost their legs, but don’t call them snakes.
The Botanist in The Kitchen: Favorite Christmas Posts from the Past. (If you haven’t seen this blog before, you’re in for a treat. It deals with edible plants or plant parts and presents the botanical background behind the usage and preparation of food from the plant. Recipes sometimes included.) This is a really cool blog!
I hope each and everyone of you have a wonderful holiday!
See you next year,
Dale
by Tim Homan
Because I have often walked slowly and pushed a clicking measuring wheel in front of me, giving the chitin-covered warlords — yellowjackets and hornets — a little more time to sound their silent alarms and release their safeties, and because I have frequently stood stock still taking notes, giving them plenty of time to launch a sortie against a stationary target, I have been stung far more than most hikers per walked mile. The following story recounts my most painful experience with the hardwired warriors of the hymenoptera tribe.
I’ve missed the weekly readings we used to have at the start of each Ramble. You may not have had a reading since early March, either, so I’m happy that Jan Coyne sent me this link to a poem by Robyn Schiff titled: Oak Gall Wasp. (There is also a link on that page to the author reading the poem herself.) While you’re there you could explore a little and find some other, worthy, nature-related poems and send the link to me.
Dan Williams is back! Many of you will remember Dan. For several years before he retired he conducted free tree identification classes at the Oconee forest (Lake Herrick) on the UGA campus. He also presented geology courses for OLLI and the State Botanical Garden. Now he is back with a You Tube series: “The Geologic History of Georgia.” This is a series of short (~15 min) videos that, in Dan’s own words: “Begins with Rodinia’s rifting and will cover all 3 major mountain building events affecting Ga. and the eastern U. S. Brevard fault zone mystery is explained and the diagnostic stages of mountain building. It’s quite informal, with a few old man burps, but should be informative to rock fans.”
“A World of Plants” symposium sponsored by the National Geographic Society is now available in a special issue of Plants, People, Planet journal from New Phytologist Foundation. You can find the full special issue, at this link.
How You Can Help Count and Conserve Native Bees. Honeybees and their problems get the most attention, but scientists are using tactics learned from bird conservation to protect American bees.
Many good stories are to be found in this week’s Hakai Magazine; the highlights are:
1) On the Trail of the Giant Squid. Advances in genetic research are creating new ways to hunt for this most mysterious of creatures. 950 words / 4 mins
2) Gods of the Storm Two books offer perspectives on how humans shape the fate of whales and influence the weather. 1,300 words / 6 mins
3) Who Will Save the Slender Yoke-Moss? In the crush of conservation priorities, scientists grapple with how to help an endangered species with no obvious value. 1,000 words / 5 mins
4) The Military Wants to Hide Covert Messages in Marine Mammal Sounds. The human fascination with hiding military messages in whale and dolphin sounds has led to US military Cold War experiments and modern Chinese research. 1,200 words / 6 mins
5) Sunflower Stars Now Critically Endangered. Though sunflower star numbers have plummeted, scientists are holding out hope for these once-common denizens of the Pacific. 2 min 40 sec
6) Plus six more links to articles from The Conversation, Washington Post, National Observer, The Intercept and New York Times .
Video: Fire and the Future of Pinyon-Juniper Woodlands; presentation by Dr. Lisa Floyd-Hanna. Dr. Floyd-Hanna has done extensive research on the impact of fire in the Mesa Verde region of SW Colorado. Presentation begins at 9:44; duration 1:13:44, including Question & Answer at end.
By
now almost everyone has heard of the wildfires that have swept across
California this year, threatening beloved ecosystems like the redwood
and giant sequoia forests. Other, less iconic, areas in the arid
southwest are also threatened by fire. This video
discusses the effect of fire and its frequency on the widespread
pinyon-juniper woodlands. (The P-J woodland covers much of the 4 corners
states: Colorado, New Mexico, Arizona and Utah, as well as Nevada and
Oregon.)
How Non-Native Plants Are Contributing to a Global Insect Decline.
The impact of introduced plants on native biodiversity has emerged as a hot-button issue in ecology. But recent research provides new evidence that the displacement of native plant communities is a key cause of a collapse in insect populations and is affecting birds as well.
Natural Debate: Do Forests Grow Better With Our Help or Without?
Nations around the world are pledging to plant billions of trees to grow new forests. But a new study shows that the potential for natural forest regrowth to absorb carbon from the atmosphere and fight climate change is far greater than has previously been estimated.
The Missouri Prairie Foundation has recorded 3 webinars that may be of interest to Nature Ramblers. This link will take you to their You Tube channel where you can view all their webinars. The most recent are on Growing native plants, Gardening for beneficial insects, and Identifying winter sparrows.
by Dale Hoyt
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| Water Moccasin in threat position, exposing the white lining of the mouth. Note the stout body, distinctly narrower tail and the dark cross-bands. Cross banding usually becomes less obvious with age (size). Source: CDC/ Edward J. Wozniak D.V.M., Ph.D., John Willson at the University of Georgia, at the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory (SREL), Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons |
In the late 1950’s I was an undergraduate at The University of Kansas and worked as a curatorial assistant in the division of reptiles and amphibians. This gave me the opportunity to meet a lot of herpetologists who visited the museum. One of my professors told me this story about a herpetologist I’ll call Bill.
Bill was originally from West Virginia and would often return home to visit his family and hang out with old friends. On one of these occasions Bill and a friend were fishing from a boat in a lake in the mountains of West Virginia. Suddenly, his friend spotted a snake swimming in the water near the boat.
“Watch out Bill! There’s a moccasin right in front of you!”
Water moccasins are a coastal plain snake and are not found in the mountains. Also, non-venomous water snakes are often misidentified as moccasins. Plus, as a herpetologist, Bill knew how to tell a harmless water snake from a moccasin. So, he tells his friend, “That’s not a moccasin; it’s just a common water snake.”
His friend insists that it’s a moccasin.
To prove his point, Bill reaches over the side of the boat and grabs the water snake. Water snakes, although not venomous, have a nasty disposition and will bite viciously when caught, as this one does. Bill holds up his hand which the snake is busy chewing on and turns to his friend, “See, it’s harmless.”
He then detaches the snake from his hand and throws it back into the water. His friend is stunned into silence. Bill is feeling smug. He’s vividly demonstrated his superior knowledge of snakes and taught his friend a lesson as well.
The two men continue to fish in silence. Fifteen or twenty minutes pass and Bill’s friend finally breaks the silence:
“Bill, if that moccasin had been sunning itself before it bit you, you’d be dead by now.”
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Here is a website that will help you learn how to tell the difference between Water Moccasins and harmless water snakes.
https://ufwildlife.ifas.ufl.edu/water_moccasin_watersnake_comparison.shtml
By Tim Homan
From late May to early September of 1984, I worked for the concessionaire at Lake Hotel in Yellowstone National Park (1*). My first two days off, I lit out on a solo backpacking trip tramping the Yellowstone River Trail (2*). I chose the route because it traversed some of the lowest elevations in the park and offered some great views of the Yellowstone as it roughly paralleled the Black Canyon of its namesake river. The snow was completely melted, the ground nearly dry, the grades mostly easy — a good spring warm-up hike while I was still acclimating to the park’s high elevations (3*). The ranger station weather forecast called for warm and sunny both days.
The Most Beautiful Experiment. If you’ve ever taken a biology course within the last 60 years you’ve been exposed to an experiment that showed how the DNA molecule is replicated. The famous, among biologists, “Meselson-Stahl” experiment. Those of you who only vaguely remember how DNA is replicated will enjoy this video in which Matthew Meselson and Frank Stahl, reminisce about how they met and how their “most beautiful” experiment came to be.