I forget who told me that Bill Watterson was coming out of retirement to write an actual book. I was giddy enough to pre-order. I finished it in about two minutes and then really read it in about five-to-ten. The physical book itself, a hardcover, is very nicely done. Sturdy: excellent binding and…
twenty-six things tagged “nature”
Crinoids!
These are fossilized crinoids found in Western Australia by Tom Kapitany. Crinoids are animals and belong to the phylum Eichinodermata which includes starfish and sea urchins (and they all have “pentameral symmetry”). This is all well and good but these things, in their fossilized state, look like…
Bumblebee
Not really. Reminded me of that Transformer when I saw this macrophotograph of a Longhorn Beetle. Just amazing. Via and TD.…
Zephyr Howls
This is Zephyr, a “captive-born gray wolf” at the Wolf Conservation Center in NY. Below, you can hear him and his friends orchestrate some of the most beautiful sounds you will hear today. I’ve watched this five times and it was somehow even better with my eyes closed. He…
An Anglerfish
What a strange, strange creature. Those bumps remind me of rivets on a submarine. But because they are anglerfish, the bumps are even more bizarre than you’d expect: Since anglerfish are deep sea creatures, it took scientists years and years to figure this stuff out. They could never find a m…
Octopus Swims Around and then Enters Stealth Mode
This is indescribably badass.…
The Blanket Octopus
This is just indescribably beautiful.…
Tatanka
I love these paintings by Arturo Garcia. I saw them in Denver. They’re from a series called Tatanka - The Spirit of the Land.…
A Fever of Rays
A group of stringrays is called a fever (my head: “So that’s where that album name came from!”) This is what they look like:…
The Sand Octopus
Octopus kaurna lacks chromatophores like other octopuses. So it just burrows instead 😍🐙. It’s the only known octopus to bury itself completely like this. The process begins with the octopus using its siphon to inject water into the sand, creating quicksand-like condit…
A Tiny Finnish Island in Four Seasons
This is around Rovaniemi, Finland. By Jani Ylinampa, whose Instagram account is just magical. Here’s another picture. Looks like a highly detailed miniature.…
Two Owls
Don’t know if these are shopped but this is amazing.…
The Dracula Parrot
Also known as Pesquet’s parrot or the vulturine parrot. The Dracula parrot is a large, heavy bird, stretching to almost half a metre from beak to tail and weighing in at almost a kilogram. It maintains all that bulk by feeding almost exclusively on figs, which researchers suspect is why it e…
An Owl’s Eye Color is Related to When It likes to Hunt.
Dark Brown or Black: Nocturnal (helps with camouflage.) Orange: Dawn and Dusk. Yellow: Daytime. There are no Blue-Eyed Owls.…
How to Tell a Raven From a Crow.
By the Audubon Society cached. Ravens are beefier, gauche, and less ‘refined’. They’re also relatively solitary. They have curvier beaks, wedge-like tails, and soar instead of flap. Here’s what a raven and a crow sound like.…
Three Beautiful Paintings by Tomás Sánchez
Sánchez infuses his landscape scenes with what the Cuban art critic, Geraldo Mosquera, called “an almost metaphys- ical vision.” This is not surprising considering that Sánchez is ardently devoted to yoga and to meditation which he practices several hours daily. He also goes regularly to a Siddha…
Sleeping Octopus
You could almost just narrate the body changes and narrate the dream. So here she’s asleep. She sees a crab and her color starts to change a little bit then she turns all dark. Octopuses will do that when they leave the bottom. This is a camouflage like she’s just subdued a crab and now she’s goin…
Transparent Baby Octopus
(Source Unknown)…

My Octopus Teacher
(2020)
A beautiful story about my favorite alien told with phenomenally good camera work. Left me a bit misty-eyed1. Lovely stuff. Felt like kicking myself for reading a few comments about it on Hacker News later. Not sure why I did this but promised myself I’d stick to the topics that site is good for (…
Hammerhead X-Rays
And, of course, that’s all cartilage. Mama Nature is metal af. As she do 🙏…
The Blue Ringed Octopus
Some absolutely marvelous photos of a Southen Blue-Ringed Octopus by @SammyGlennDives Like she’s dancing! Would love to find out what kind of protective gear the photographer had on. But it seems like the octopuses are very shy and will attack only when provoked, which is when their rings be…
Expedition to the floor of the Mariana Trench finds plastic bag and sweet wrappers
Look we just wanted to make sure The Ocean would remember our species for having delivered value at any cost.…
Baby Chromatophores
I cannot get over how maddeningly cute this is. Reddit user pendragwen’s comment makes it even better: Awww! But look at how they test out their chromatophores first thing after hatching! It’s speculated that color-changing is how they communicate and show emotion. Almost like a little joyful str…
Fungi Are Horrifying
Every person I’ve sent this to has seen it. Not sure why my own internet excursions didn’t yield this manifestly horrifying video. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuKjBIBBAL8 The last few seconds reminded me of scenes from Annihilation. Like this one: Edit: It’s been used in Eastern Medicine f…
The Secretarybird
Behold the beautiful Secretarybird 🙌 – Source Unknown Way out of other birds’ leagues, eats venomous snakes, and “appears on the coats of arms of Sudan and South Africa” 🔥…