Boycott Iceland

This story is all over the news. Iceland has resumed murdering whales, calling the atrocity "whaling," as if historical murdering of whales qualifies the behavior as other than criminal.

The whale that was killed this weekend, aside from being a 'red list' endangered Fin Whale, according to reports, suffered horribly.

Besides the fact the Fin whale is being carefully monitored for being near to eradicated, this whale has a brain that weighs in at 15 lbs, a frontal lobe at least as developed as homo spapiens, a six-phase neocortex (same as homo sapiens), and twice the number of brain folds as us. All of these are indicators of potential intelligence and capacity.

There is every indication that the fin whale is at least as intelligent as any land-based human, yet one was murdered this weekend to sell and eat.

How there is any doubt that two separate species of homo sapiens now occupy the planet earth - one remarkably more similar to our simian ancestors - is beyond me.

Link.

http://science.reddit.com/

Reddit is like the news of the moment for the entire world.

But due to an unusually popular request this morning on the site itself, a new "sub-reddit" has been created.

Introducing science.reddit.com.

Link.

Jean-Michael Cousteau "rides" Great White

You have to see it, not only to believe it, but to make sense of it.

In a nutshell, Cousteau is a trained professional in his element and "in the zone." He hitched on what I would describe as a "zen-state," and then commented on the worthiness of the Great White, and on the shark's importance to the general environment (as a cleaner) and of being as non-judgmental as possible with regards to this majestic and powerful species.

Link.

Great White Shark Cam - LIVE at Monterey

This is one of the most exhilarating uses of internet technology yet.

It's a live web-cam, with no delay in streaming, of a captive Great White Shark at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, the second time ever one has been key in captivity

Here's the link.

Man Kisses Shark - Shark Bites Man

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Dave Marcel is his name, and he lives in Key Largo (not Key West).
Here's the direct link!

Guy Gets Attacked By An Octopus

Not exactly true - the guy made first contact - but fun to watch anyhow!

Link (via Netscape).

Baby Stingrays Born In Captivity

A pair of darling baby roughtail stingrays were born in captivity, surprise guests of the Virginia Aquarium & Marine Science Center.

Apparently, a male who had been brought in earlier to mate with a female who has lived in captivity for ten years at the aquarium had the right chemistry. But according to the details of the report, no one at the facility knew the mother was pregnant.

Thus, surprise!

Link (via reddit).

Artificial Reef Declared "Ecological Disaster"

This is interesting but would be less so if not for the video footage linked to the end of this entry. In Miami, an attempt at creating an artificial reef - which to me looks more like a dumping of tires as opposed to an actual effort, having created successful reefing structures from used auto tires myself at Danger - has been declared unsuccessful and in fact a threat, due to loose tires being propelled by strong storm conditions into actual coral reefs.

But the footage below shows that while it is definitely in need of maintenance, the environment is indeed creating a habitat. (Also, oddly, one quoted person says with authority that "it wasn't deep enough," when the setting is over 60 feet down!)

Video link; Story link.

Dolphin Minds, Thinkers of the Deep

This is the post I have been waiting for, something that elaborates on the unusual intelligence of dolphins.

See, dolphins are proto-humans, that is, creatures early in their own human* development.

Link via Reddit.

*Important note. I use the term human here in a context parallel to Orson Scott Card's Utlanning, Framiling, Ramen, Varelse divination of human kinds, ie...

Utlanning- A human we recognize as part of our same world and species, yet from another town or country.

Framling- A human we recognize as part of our same species, yet from another world or planet.

Ramen- When a lifeform is considered human, but is of another species. Being able to think and behave at a human level and act civilized.

Varelse- A creature with whom communication is impossible. If such a creature is belligerent, then it is the only time when war is truly unavoidable and necessary.

It is my deepest impression that human is an unlimited state of being, and that homo sapien is merely a single expression of the kind, human.

Deep-Sea Whales

According Paul J. Ponganis and Gerald L. Kooyman of the Center for Marine Biotechnology and Biomedicine at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, some cetatceans (whales, orca, dolphins, porpoise) have a number of unique physiological adaptations enabling seep sea dives.

How deep? Sperm whales - which have the largest brain of any animal so far discovered...at 15 lbs! - have been recorded making hour long dives as deep as 6000 feet, over a mile down.

Link via reddit.

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

Did you know the planet earth now has a floating garbage "patch" at least the size of Texas, floating in the middle of the Pacific Ocean? Well, we do.

Here is the link from reddit which led me to research the story in the first place. One of the comments on the hyper-linked piece stated that the above was an "urban myth," and I became interested enough to follow up. I found out the report originates from this piece in the LA Times (specifically this report), and is anything but urban myth.

There is really a massive swirling amassment of man-made refuse in the center of the Pacific Ocean. Unbelievable!

I tracked the source of all of the above to this piece in Natural History magazine. Worse, I located this entry in Wikipedia, and the true name of this developing challenge. It is The Great Pacific Garbage Patch.

Now you know.

Willy Fish

Ohmigod, the fish, six and a half inches long, it swam up his peepee!

Complete with dramatic re-enactment

Link (via reddit).

Antarctic Sea Spider

To tell you the truth, this creature sort of flips me out.

It's an Antarctican sea spider, it has a proboscis mouth (such as a housefly does) which it uses to suck the juices from sponges and sea slugs, and it lives on the ocean floor between 6000 to 7000 metres (!) beneath the ocean's surface. That's over three miles down! That ain't exactly the most bright-lighted place in the world for this sort of creature to be crawling around sucking the vital juices from soft and squishy living things.

And they're big enough to be creepy, most about two and half feet across!

Ohmigod, can you imagine being a dive specialist three miles down below the Antartic Ocean (temp −2 °C), pitch black except for your own light, and you step and crunch on one of these things, and then look down and start to see a bunch of them crawling around you? Gasp swoon faint.

Just to balance things out a little, the Antartic Ocean is also home to the largest and most song-singingest whales alive, the blue whale. So...

...I guess, as far as blood-sucking spider creatures go, it actually is nicely packaged. I mean, orange? Why orange? What set of circumstances inspired that evolutionary leap?

Link via reddit.

Monster Catfish

Growing up in Florida, I have heard my share of "monster catfish" stories, tales in which catfish exist "big enough to swallow a man whole." Considering the size of catfish I have seen (and even caught) myself cane-fishing on Lake Seminole, in Seminole, FL, and all the way down to the Florida Everglades, I always judged these tales to true, and based in reality somewhere down the line.

Nonetheless, they are some big catfish!

Link.

Eric Cheng, shark swimmer and photographer

Eric Cheng is an underwater photographer. He swims with sharks.

Big, big sharks.

Link.

Rare Whales Can Live to Nearly 200

Bowhead whales live to be 200 years old! And their brains are larger than humans!

Link via Reddit.

Turtle Hospital and healthy Hawksbill Turtle...on Release Day!

I ran into these folks from the Turtle Hospital of Marathon a few mornings back, as they were stepping aboard the Yankee Freedom boat to head to the Dry Tortugas to release this young hawksbill turtle who had spent some recovery time at the hospital after an sea accident.

Everybody was happy and excited, even the young turtle, who was wiggle wiggle wiggle and raring to go.

Small Crab in Key West Salt Flats

Here's a small spider crab I found while examining an unusual piece of blueberry-colored sponge.

"Record" Hammerhead Shark carried 55 Baby Sharks

It ain't tragic - idiot humans need love,too - but it's highly unfortunate.

Tragic is commercial overfishing.

(Courtesy Swim At Your Own Risk)

Hammerhead Attacks Tarpon

(Courtesy Swim At Your Own Risk)