<3 The Internet: Dolphin Voices in the Sea

Dolphin Voices in the Sea is one for all the lovers of marine life. This lovely web based app is a bit dated but still delivers the goods with intriguing tidbits on different species of dolphins and spectograms of dolphins communicating with each other in the wild. The website features videos and scientists talking about their research efforts andContinue reading “<3 The Internet: Dolphin Voices in the Sea”

Seawalls: Artists for Oceans in Quirky Napier, New Zealand

On a recent cycling trip to Napier, the Polish Bear and I were astonished to find the most amazing street art in the side alleys, shop fronts and carpark walls. Art Deco Napier is a place full of surprises. Seawalls Napier: Bringing the oceans to the streets Sea Walls: Murals for Oceans is a groundbreakingContinue reading “Seawalls: Artists for Oceans in Quirky Napier, New Zealand”

<3 The Internet: eSkeletons of primates, monkeys and homo sapiens

eSkeletons is an ingenious online resource that compares the skeletons of primates and including the most notorious of the bipeds homo sapiens. Created by the Department of Anthropology at the Univrsity of Texas in Austin, eSkeletons provides an interactive environment where visitors can examine skeletal anatomy through an osteology database. It’s a very engaging andContinue reading “<3 The Internet: eSkeletons of primates, monkeys and homo sapiens”

Film Review: Voyage of Time: Life’s Journey (2016) Terrence Malick

The other night Terrence Malick’s new film Voyage of Time: Life’s Journey screened at the New Zealand International Film Festival Autumn events in Auckland. Although I’ve found Malick’s films a little too long and ponderous, this one I enjoyed more than his others because of its sparseness and its lack of human narrative and human characters.Continue reading “Film Review: Voyage of Time: Life’s Journey (2016) Terrence Malick”

Grandscale Beauty: The Overview Effect: Cyanobacterial Bloom in the Baltic Sea

Map makers, Google Earth developers, astronauts and those who gaze at the earth and universe for a living are already convinced of the tremendous beauty of large places seen from space. For most of us mere mortals we won’t ever get the chance to see the earth from space.  The ‘Overview Effect’ was a term coinedContinue reading “Grandscale Beauty: The Overview Effect: Cyanobacterial Bloom in the Baltic Sea”

Travel: Mudlarking for treasures on the River Thames

A Mudlark while being a species of Australian bird’, is also a curious river-side rambler. Over several millennia of habitation, London’s River Thames has collected many layers of mud-addled refuse of varying degrees of value. Although one man’s trash is another’s treasure and the shores of the Thames are still a magnet to curious folkContinue reading “Travel: Mudlarking for treasures on the River Thames”

A piano reverberates over collapsing glaciers

Earlier this year, renowned Italian composer Ludovico Eindaudi performed his ‘Elegy for the Arctic’ on a small floating platform in Wahlenbergbreen glacier in Svalbard, Norway. Around him glaciers crumbled and collapsed into the pearlescent water and the pristine quiet was pierced with the deafening sound of a fragile environment on the verge of implosion. HisContinue reading “A piano reverberates over collapsing glaciers”

Microscopic treasures: Abstract art discovered under the microscope

Sometimes the most unimaginable beauty comes from the world cannot be seen with the human eye, but yet still exists in the invisible netherworld of the microscope. Here are some artistic treasures, spied on the Reddit Microporn page, have a look and you will become hooked. Crystalline acetylsalicylic acid viewed under polarised light at 10XContinue reading “Microscopic treasures: Abstract art discovered under the microscope”

Say hello to the slimy end of cute: the Californian Sea Hare

The California sea hare is also known as the California sea slug. It’s a gigantic marine opisthobranch gastropod mollusk and is cute in a slimey, sluggish way.   Found around the Gulf of California and Mexico these adorable slime-balls chomp on algae and live in intertidial zones usually not deeper than 18–20 m.[ Creepy and adorable sea hares  TheyContinue reading “Say hello to the slimy end of cute: the Californian Sea Hare”

Arctic foxes are the artisans of their own vibrant gardens

Beyond cutely frolicking through meadows in Iceland and Scandinavia, arctic foxes are also aiding the local ecological balance in the way they keep house underground. Their dens are often a century old and topped with lush gardens and dune grass. The domains of arctic foxes are a splash of colour in an otherwise dull brownContinue reading “Arctic foxes are the artisans of their own vibrant gardens”