Arctic Sea Creatures Photography
Wired hat eine schöne Galerie mit Fotos von Alexander Semenov, der in der Arktis Unterwasserfotos von Viehzeugs schießt. Die Schönheit oben ist ein „Jellyfish parasite, Hyperia galba inside the jelly“, der Kollege rechts ist ein „Red bull (Amphipoda Acanthonotozoma inflatum)“. Hier seine Website, sein Blog, hier isser auf Behance und noch mehr Bilder gibt’s auf Flickr.
Arctic Biologist Shares Astonishing Sea Creatures With the World
Ernst Haeckels Jellyfish Christmas-Cards
Vor drei Jahren bloggte ich Ernst Haeckels Naturillu-Klassiker „Kunstformen der Natur“ und ich wusste auch, dass der Mann als Grußkartenillustrator angefangen und auch einige Weihnachtskarten gestaltet hatte. Gesehen hatte ich die aber noch nie – bis jetzt.
Ernst Haeckel’s 1904 “Kunstformen der Natur” [Artforms of Nature] is a classic of biological illustration. What is less generally known is that the artist started as a Christmas card designer. The book was originally simply an album of holiday designs. “All the sweet things that the Squiddies/Twittering in the dewy spray/Wish each other in the springtime/I wish you this happy day.”
During the Victorian era Christmas was indeed regarded as a ‘happy’ day, but one of uncanny terror; accordingly, cards and ornamentation featured strange creatures with too many tentacles. But then Santa Claus became popular, and many of these older designs ‘fell out of fashion’.
Commercially marooned, unable to draw anything except tentacles and congeries of pustules/bubbles, Haeckel wandered into natural ‘science’ – almost as an afterthought – when he discovered that the stuff he had been drawing actually existed, give or take a tentacle. Isn’t that interesting?
A Very Haeckel Christmas (via Retronaut)
Vorher auf Nerdcore:
Ernst Haeckels „Kunst-Formen der Natur“ (1898) komplett in HighRes auf Flickr
Ernst Haeckels „Kunstformen der Natur“ im Fraktalfilter
There’s no such thing as a jellyfish
(Youtube Direktjelly, via io9)
Schönes Video vom Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, das die tausenddreihundertvierundachtzig Millionen verschiedenen Quallen-Arten erklärt. Von Youtube:
By all accounts, jellyfish are creatures that kill people, eat microbes, grow to tens of meters, filter phytoplankton, take over ecosystems, and live forever. Because of the immense diversity of gelatinous plankton, jelly-like creatures can individually have each of these properties. However this way of looking at them both overstates and underestimates their true diversity.
Taxonomically, they are far more varied than a handful of exemplars that are used to represent jellyfish or especially the so-called “true” jellyfish. Ecologically, they are even more adaptable than one would expect by looking only at the conspicuous bloom forming families and species that draw most of the attention. In reality, the most abundant and diverse gelatinous groups in the ocean are not the ones that anyone ever sees.
Diving thru the Jellyfish Lake on Palau
(Vimeo Direktjelly, via Geekosystem)
Sarosh Jacob ist einmal durch den Jellyfish Lake auf Palau getaucht. Der See hatte sich vor zwölftausend Jahren gelbildet und darin wurde ein Schwarm Quallen vom zurückweichenden Meer eingeschlossen. Die entwickelten sich in diesem See zu einer eigenen Spezies, verloren ihre Verteidigungsmechanismen, da sie sich nicht mehr gegen Raubfische wehren mussten und bildeten eine Symbiose mit den Algen im See. Mehr Infos auf Wikipedia, Google Images findet tausende Bilder zum Quallen-See. Snip:
Jellyfish Lake is located on Eli Malk Island in The Republic of Palau. Twelve thousand years ago these jellyfish became trapped in a natural basin on the island when the ocean receded. With no predators amongst them for thousands of years, they evolved into a new species that lost most of their stinging ability as they no longer had to protect themselves. They are pretty much harmless to humans although some people with very sensitive skin may get a minor irritation from them.
These fascinating creatures survive by sharing a symbiotic relationship with algae that live inside of them. At night, the jellyfish go down to the depths of the lake where the algae feed on nutrients. During the day, the jellyfish come back to the surface and follow the sun across the lake in a massive migration. The algae convert the energy of the sun via photosynthesis into a sugar that feeds the jellyfish.
It is not possible to scuba dive in this lake because the nutrient rich layer at around 50 feet and below contains hydrogen sulphide which is highly toxic to humans. If a scuba diver was to swim in that layer, the toxins would enter the body through the skin and that exposure could be fatal. Snorkeling however, is perfectly safe and if you ever find yourself in Palau one day, you should make your way to this special place. The experience of swimming through millions of jellyfish is quite surreal and Palau is the only place in the world where you can do just that!
It’s the dreaded Killer Jellyfish of Graphic Design Favors
Alles schon gemacht auf die eine oder andere Art.
Killer Jellyfish of Graphic Design Favors (via Clients from hell)
Fleischfressende Seesterne und gigantische Quallen
(Youtube Direktseestern, via io9)
Mal wieder ein bisschen Seamonster-Action: Oben ein weiteres Video aus der BBC-Naturdoku „Life“, diesmal mit Timelapse-Seesternen und gigantischen Würmern, die einen toten Seehund fressen. Seesterne fressen übrigens wie Fliegen: „Three-foot nemertean worms and carnivorous sea stars prowl the Antarctic in search of flesh. Finding a dead seal, the sea stars inject it with digestive juices … then suck it up like soup.“
Bonustrack: Ein Video mit gigantischen Quallen, die Boote kentern lassen und „bigger than Sumo-Wrestler“ sind. Only in Japan.
(Youtube Direktjellyfish, via Japan Probe)
Vast numbers of Echizen jellyfish have appeared on Japan’s Pacific coast this year, apparently after drifting from spawning grounds in Chinese and Korean waters.
An Echizen jellyfish can measure up to 2.2 meters in diameter and weigh up to 300 kg.
The non-edible creatures have caught fishermen in their grip, as the monster invertebrates clog nets and poison and crush catches with their stingers.
“I had never seen anything like this big before.”
Some experts say the outbreak of jellyfish this season has cost Japan’s fishing industry more than 100 million dollars.
Jellyfish even sank one Japanese fishing boat in the Pacific recently, after the vessel capsized because the weight of the creature stuck in its net.
Bloodybelly Comb Jelly
(Youtube DirektBloodbelly, via Feingut)
Hier ein Video mit der Bloodybelly Comb Jelly in Action und nein, das sind keine LEDs, die da rumblinken.
Vorher auf Nerdcore:
Lightshow aus der Tiefsee
Glow in the Dark-Shrimps
Deepsea Jellyfish Discolights
Quallen-Fotografie
James Pan hat ein paar sehr schöne Shots von Quallen am Start. Und an dieser Stelle möchte ich nochmal meine Neigung zur englischen Sprache erklären. Qualle. Jellyfish. Nuff said.
Jellyfish Series (via KFMW)
Tentakelwürste (2)
Als ich vor ein paar Wochen die Tentakelwürste bloggte, meinte die Hälfte von Euch, die schon zu kennen, weil Mutti die früher auch schon so gemacht hätte. Nun, ich wette meinen Arsch darauf: Das hier kennt Ihr noch nicht. In Bock- oder Fleischwurststücke einfach ein paar ungekochte Spaghetti stecken und zusammen kochen, voila: Tentakelwürste, die wie Quallen aussehen. Das werde ich demnächst auf jeden Fall mal ausprobieren.
Deepsea Jellyfish Discolights
(Liveleak Direkt, via Growabrain)
Das hier ist keine regenbogenfarbene LED-Lampe und auch kein Alien aus Camerons „Abyss“, sondern eine rote Qualle in der Tiefsee, die offensichtlich für die Beleuchtung in „Saturday Night Fever“ verantwortlich war. Blink, blink!
Vintage Deepsea-Creatures aus Glas
io9 hat im Science Museum ein paar über einhundert Jahre alte Glasfiguren gefunden, alles Viecher aus der Tiefsee. Glas-Kraken, Glas-Quallen, Glas-Korallen… Aaaaaw! Ich liebe es!
This gorgeous glass sculpture of an Actinophryid, an ocean microorganism, is over 100 years old. It’s one the few surviving scientific models of tiny, swimming creatures created by a father-son team of glassmakers.
A few years ago, Wisconsin Zoological Museum worker Paula Holahan opened some cabinets that hadn’t been touched for decades. Inside, she found several boxes of delicate glass replicas of ocean life.
Box Jellyfish (Chironex fleckeri) The Most Venomous Creature In The World!
The Box Jellyfish or (Chironex fleckeri) is actually just one of the 28 species of Box Jellyfish. The Chironex fleckeri is the most famous of the Box Jellyfish due to its large appearance and deadly sting. The venom from one of these creatures is strong enough to kill up to 60 humans in as little as 3 minutes from just one of its up to 60 tentacles. This makes it the most venomous jellyfish in the world! In fact, this creature’s venom is so quick to act that it is actually the most venomous creature in the entire world! Quicker than any snake, spider or insect anywhere on planet earth.
Robot Jellyfish
Aqua-Jelly ist im Rahmen des Bionik Learning Networks entstanden, Vorbild für diesen wunderschönen Robot ist wie so oft die Natur – in diesem Fall: Quallen.
Killer jellyfish population explosion warning
It could easily have been the role model for the terrifying creature in the film ‘Alien’. A perfect toxin-loaded killing machine, there is no creature on earth that can dispatch a human being so easily or so quickly. The box jellyfish is so packed with venom that the briefest of touches can bring agonising death within 180 seconds. And if comes under sustained attack it responds by sending its compatriots into a super-breeding frenzy in which millions of replacements are created. The really bad news is that the box jellyfish and another equally poisonous species, Irukandji, are on the move. Scientists are warning that their populations are exploding and will pose a monumental problem unless they are stopped.
