tremoctopus (cape octopus) defense mechanism

this octopus, when threatened, lets out a long cape which trails behind it creating the most beautiful effect, but performs several functions- making it seem much larger, confusion, and as a sort of decoy. the cape tears away fairly easily and can wrap up around the face of the predator. pretty cool.

wild whale shark footage

divers off thailand encounter and film a whale shark, the worlds largest fish. beautiful creature. what an amazing experience it must be to dive with something that huge.

ecosphere ecosystems

this is kinda cool, a great teaching aid for understanding ecosystems.
" The Original EcoSphere® is the world's first totally enclosed ecosystem - a complete, self-contained and self-sustaining miniature world encased in glass."
"Unlike an aquarium, this little world is a closed ecological system. Light gets in, but nothing else - no food, no water, no nutrients. Everything must be recycled. Just like the Earth. In our larger world, we also - plants and animals and microorganisms - live off each other, breathe and eat each other's wastes, depend on one another. "

eco-sphere.com

realtime earthquake resources

weve had a couple nice little 3.7 shakes over the past few days centered in berkeley on the hayward fault. ive felt a ton of minor shakes and shimmies since ive been in san francisco, but few substantial ones yet. pretty wild. its insane, once you start paying attention, just how many little earthquakes are happening every day all over the world.
anyway, if anyone is intersted, heres a link to realtime earthquake info, shakemaps and seismographs.
quake.wr.usgs.gov
wheeeeee!

blue planet- the deep

nature is creepy. really, really creepy. particularly in the deep deep sea. this series explores the freakiest of freaky creatures that live down there. narrated by our old chum david attenborough.
part 1 of 5

pt 2
pt3
pt4
pt 5

edo-period wildlife illustrations

pretty substantial collection of links to book scans featuring all sorts of different wildlife.
link
kind of difficult to navigate unless you know japanese, but all you need to do is click on
this icon-and youll find it.
lifted from boingboing who lifted it from pink tentacle. i dont know who they lifted it from. =]