Frozen bubbles in Calgary | Nature

Last winter Chris Ratzlaff took some photos of blown bubbles freezing in the Calgary temperatures. This video is mesmerizing.



thanks CalgaryBuzz. and Chris Ratzlaff!

DangerWatch | Animals

I have been collecting odd tidbits about animals for a while... animals are odd, and interesting. And sometimes dangerous! Here's a bit of it all.

First, let's get to the scary ThreatWatch-type bits, so we are not lulled into letting our defenses down out of sheer cute-ness.

An ancient antibiotic-resistant bacteria was found in an isolated cave. Let's hope it never gets out. or breeds. [cbc]

But some may be trying to communicate, like this beluga whale [bbc] and this elephant [cbc]. In fact, animal speech may be more complex than we ever thought. [cbc]

Speaking of elephants... here is one painting a picture... of an elephant.



This video about the anatomy of an ant colony is cool.



And some mourn their dead, like these giraffe. [bbc] Some hold funerals, like these western scrub jays. [bbc] Let's hope the fore-mentioned ant colony never gets it together enough to exact revenge for pouring concrete down one of their cities.

And I find crows amongst the scariest of animals... they can reason about causes. [bbc] Wasps are right up there, but just because they're nasty. And becoming more populous. [cbc]

But don't forget the animals close to home... here is a video of a feral cat hunting birds.



Then again, they could all just be dizzy nuts, like this confused duck.



Speaking of ducks... this is totally heartwarming and cool... this is a video of ducks that had been rescued from a hoarder that kept them in pens, without access to adequate water of nutrition... and this is the first time they have ever been introduced to life in a pond.



Finally... here is a video of a squid's membrane pulsing along as it listens to Insane in the Membrane by Cypress Hill.

ThreatWatch | Planet of the Apes

Apes can recognize themselves in mirrors. "The image there is a representation of the body here."

Nature | Starlings vs. Falcon

ThreatWatch | Global Warming and Rising Seas

This has been a ThreatWatch trend I've been following for a while, and seems to keep popping up in Mainstream Media. It can be broken down into two lines: celestial activity further erodes our protective atmosphere ("further", being "in addition to human activity") and the water levels rise as the temperature goes up.

The Threat from Space:

First, let's go way back, when the early Earth had an "alien atmosphere" with high CO2 levels that contributed to melting the "snowball Earth" and making the planet lifeform-friendly in more areas. (NatlGeo)

But to our current predicament: Bummer: Cracks in the magnetic shield may bring on massive solar storms during the next expected peak activity cycle of solar wind, starting in about 2012. (NatlGeo) Cool: But scientists have also discovered a new layer of the magnetosphere they're descibing as a "warm plasma cloak". (NatlGeo) Bummer: But the sun may be "stealing" our atmosphere...! (NatlGeo)

The worst part: we may already be screwed. (good) (NPR) But the optimists at Wired are still looking for solutions, in their The 2012 Apocalypse, and How to Stop It. (wired)

Or, of course, we could also be screwed by a gamma-ray burst. But let's keep our Threats From Space separated, shall we? (NatlGeo)



And move on to the Threat From Rising Water...

A study of Coral canyons in Mexico indicate sea levels can rise quite rapidly. (nyt)

And studies indicate North America is at greater risk of an Antarctic ice-sheet-melt than other regions of the world. (CBC) And I keep wondering if I'm over 1.2 metres above sea level, in my fine abode in sunny Kitsilano. (straight) But we're not alone: New York and Boston are reportedly "directly in the path" of a sea level rise. (NatlGeo) Except we may still be worse off: Insurance Bureau of Canada warns that flood damage is not covered in this country. (cbc)

The ironic part is the concept of water stress: water availability against water demand. (H604) Is it time for a National Water Policy...? Is access to water a Human Right...? (straight)

Let's add the consideration that rising heat also threatens the world's food supply. (wired) In fact, we could see a global food crisis before the end of this century. (CBC)

Plus global warming leeches oxygen from the ocean, creating "dead zones" where no life can survive. (NatlGeo) Just for fun, I should also throw in mention of the areas of "toxic algae" that contaminate shellfish, another frightening development surrounding food supply. In fact, there's a toxic bloom just off the coast of British Columbia. (cbc)

Or, of course, we could all just get wiped out by a tsunami, like the one that hit ancient New York. (bbc) Which reminds me, for the "travel advisory threatwatch" section: if you're going to Guadeloupe, be aware that part of the island of Dominica (about 50km away) may fall off and trigger a deadly tsunami. There will be less than 10 minutes of warning. Or would be, rather, considering there are no warning systems set up for tsunamis in the Caribbean. (NatlGeo)

And, as if the current climate condition doesn't already fill you with hope and optimism, here's a Seed article with five scientists talking about Geo-Engineering. (seed) Great. I swear, first one-way ticket to the uncharted stars and I sign up.

Or I could go surfing. Waves are so purdy.

ThreatWatch | Rabbits! (at least to this... snake!)

citiZEN | Vancouver

Jackson Murphy over at The Vancouverite has a nice round-up of the Olympic Village debacle that unfolded over the last weekend, along with some insightful insights of his own. (vancouverite)

And for those following along at home, Vancouver recorded the first two homocides of the year on January 8th and the 11th. The first murder last year wasn't until January 19, 2008. (ctv)

Maggie Chandler, on her Vancouver Reflections site, posted the average price graph of Vancouver real estate. Sales decreased by 35%. And while prices are down over the previous year, house prices are up 64% for the Vancouver West Side over the last five years. Maple Ridge comes out on top on "Best Value" for houses, townhomes and condos in Greater Vancouver. (vanreflections)

According to Tourism Vancouver, the number of tourists that are visiting Vancouver has gone down since the Summer of SARS in 2003, for reasons that can be easily guessed: the economy has tanked. But the good news is that more people are choosing to spend their time and money at home, paticularly on local restaurants and attractions. Ticket sales at the Vancouver Aquarium are actually up. (ctv)

Even though I hardly ever leave my warroom, or go out of the bunker, or even step foot off the compound, I'm a huge supporter of local neighbourhood attractions. Even in (supposedly) laid-back Lotus-Land, we seem to forget most of the amazing sights and places that surround us. Sure, Grouse Mountain and the Stanley Park Seawall are all sexy for getting the outdoorsy-types and therefore all the press, but many of us are (particularly the born-and-bred, or close-at-hand born-and-bred) very much like those lifer New Yorkers that have never been to the Statue of Liberty or into the Empire State Building: it's always been there, so we figure we'll get to it eventually. Yet that visit to the Vancouver Police Museum or lunch at the Jericho Sailing Club never seems to come by.

Sean Orr at Beyond Robson has posted an interesting review on the Vancouver Museum's new exhibit called The Unnatural History of Stanley Park. (br) If you have a chance to watch the youTube video and Mr. Orr's Flickr set, please do. The silent video is particularly relaxing.

From the Civic-Duty citiZEN files comes an article via Megaphone, Vancouver's Street Paper, called 50 Ways to Help the Homeless: A Practical Guide to What the Experts Say Can, and Must, Be Done. (megaphone) (tyee)

And more from the General-City-Improvement files, take a look at this bicycle-storage unit that's being used in Japan. It can store up to 144 bicycles at a time. For a view of how it works, here's dannychoo.

headspace | Nature Can Save the Environment

...who would have guessed?

Janine Benyus discusses sustainable design ideas from nature.



Robert Full talks about how engineers learn from evolution.

FearWatch: Methane

Image via WikipediaToday's fear-monger hell-in-a-handbasket threat comes from under the sea... the East Siberian Sea, to be exact.

National Geographic reported that a recent expedition travelled along the Siberian coast monitoring methane concentrations in the air and observing the seas. According to the data collected by the University of Alaska expedition on the 22,000km journey, more than 50% of the Arctic Siberian shelf is serving as a source of methane to the atmosphere. Methane gas is currently "bubbling" up from the undersea permafrost. (NatlGeo)

While carbon dioxide gets all the press, methane gas is 20 times more powerful as a greenhouse gas. And when you take into account this earlier story, where geologist Tessa Hill, at the University of California, Davis, stated that more methane is released into the atmosphere from ocean deposits during periods of warming than previously thought, the implications for our future are not rosy. As the expelled methane increases temperatures it proceeds to release more methane, creating a positive feedback loop. (NatlGeo)

The Result: Doom, the crispy-planet version.

Please ignite your Terror immediately.

Chickens break up a rabbit-fight...

Bobcat vs Rattlesnake

Saw this a while back on X-Max... absolutely amazing wildlife fight between two fierce animals. If you're not into seeing nature in all its brutality (as in: something dies), please don't watch this!