This month’s big word is not that obscure or difficult to pronounce but the concept behind it can be a bit large to grasp. Biodiversity is a word and idea that tries to capture the complex relationships among different forms of life. It came into widespread use beginning in the 1980’s in scientific and political circles as an organizing theme in discussions of conservation. The rise of the word coincided with a change of focus for environmental groups from theRead more
Posts tagged: #Larry
Water Bears in Space!!
This post is not directly related to any of our animals here at the museum but I thought it was cool enough to squeeze in anyway. One group of animals you’ve probably not heard of are the water bears which belong to the phylum Tardigrada. (If you don’t remember your taxonomy you can read my earlier post.) They are one of the few microscopic things that people regularly refer to as “cute”. You can see from this micrograph from theRead more
Big Word of the Month: Cryptozoology
This month’s Big Word post will allow me to rant about one of my pet peeves while also reporting on some recent discoveries in Biology. The term cryptozoology is rooted in the Greek word “kruptos” which means “hidden”. So cryptozoology literally means the study of hidden life; sounds pretty cool, huh? Unfortunately, folks who call themselves cryptozoologists usually spend there time looking for animals like Big Foots and Loch Ness monsters. Even more unfortuately, major news outlets spend way tooRead more
Summer breeze, makes me feel fine . . .
Those who know me know that I’m not a big believer in signs and omens. However, I was greeted with this site on a recent morning upon entering the yard of Max the Steer. I thought maybe this was a warning about something bad, but in reality it never hit the fan and the day was uneventful. If you are not sure what you are looking at, this is the fence around the steer/goat yard and the large cooling fanRead more
Big Word: Microclimate
This month’s Big Word of the Month is not really that big. You can probably figure out what it means even if you have never heard it used. A microclimate is simply a small area that has different temperature and/or moisture conditions than the surrounding area. Many factors can contribute to microclimatic conditions within an organism’s habitat. For instance, south-facing hillsides (in the northern hemisphere) receive more solar radiation than nearby north-facing slopes. Therefore, southern exposures tend to be warmerRead more
Time to crawl out of my skin
This video was captured by Katy when she noticed our canebrake rattlesnake shedding (also known as moulting) early one morning. Snakes, along with some other reptiles and amphibians, moult periodically throughout their lives. For snakes, this means that the outer layer of skin is shed, typically in one whole piece. Shedding serves a few different purposes: 1) It allows growth for the snake, 2) The older and worn skin is replaced with new healthy skin, and 3) It helps theRead more