Volume 6 included two birds seen frequently in North America: the coot and the Canada goose.
Morris was an Irish clergyman – a ‘parson-naturalist’ of the 1800s; his professional role accommodated his natural history interests. According to the Wikipedia entry about him, he was a pioneer of the movement to protect birds from the plume trade…refused to accept the theory of evolution.
The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.
Can cloud seeding help quench thirst of the US West? – New research on an old idea…many states increase their use of the technology.
Fresh water from thin air – Another technology that might help dry regions….using hydrogels (like the ones currently used in diapers!).
What’s The Construction Industry Blueprint to Cut Carbon? – I wanted more specific examples…was a little disappointed that this article did not provide them, but maybe that would have made it a long article! I hope to see more on this topic.
Higher education must reinvent itself to meet the needs of the world today. Enter the distributed university – The pandemic has highlighted the challenges the current higher education model is facing. The ideas in this post are a start but don’t seem to be fully developed to push into full implementation. More work needs to be done to enable transition from the existing model to a new one that is more responsive to the needs not only of undergraduate students but for graduate students and continuing education. The sources of money in the current model don’t match up well. For example – in the US the sports programs (football) is a big money maker for many universities; how does that map into the new model (or do we want it to).
Upcycling plastic waste into more valuable materials could make recycling pay for itself – Hope this research can be transitioned into commercial use….we have to improve the recycling processes that are being used today. Too much is still ending up in landfills.
Fossil pollen reveals the African origins of Asia’s tropical forest – Research on Borneo’s Dipterocarps (very large trees with buttress roots, smooth/straight trunks, high crown) using fossil pollen reveals their origins in Africa…spread through India before it crashed into Asia…and then to Southeast Asia. The forests in India shrank as the climate became drier. These trees need a wet, seasonal climate to survive.
Mummification in Europe may be older than previously known – Analysis of bodies found in Mesolithic shell middens in Portugal reveal that they were probably mummified before being placed there 8,000 years ago. The description of the way the researchers came to that conclusion was interesting…a lot has been learned about forensics since the 1960s when the bodies were originally found. The oldest intentional mummification known before this finding was from the Chinchorro hunter-gatherers living in the coastal region of the Atacama Desert in shell middens (around 7,000 years old).
Lake Powell Reaches Lowest Level Since 1980s – The drought continuing in the west….
The myths and realities of modern friendship – Thought provoking. The ways we communicate with each have changed a lot over my lifetime!
The climate math of home heating electrification – The rationale for moving to heat pump heating/cooling as quickly as possible.
The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.
Top 25 birds of the week: October 2020 – Starting out the weekly gleanings with birds.
Linking calorie restriction, body temperature and healthspan -- ScienceDaily – Interesting research. I went off on a tangent thinking about “up to half of what we eat every day is turned into energy simply to maintain our core body temperature.” Many people in the developed world spend the majority of time in temperature-controlled buildings or homes…and that means we probably expend a lot less calories warming or cooling ourselves than we did prior to efficient heating and cooling systems. Just one more way we are changing our environment in a way that will tweak our future evolution.
The super-adaptable chimps that can withstand climate change - BBC Future – I didn’t realize how many different habitats chimpanzees are found in…and that the ones that live in environments with greater seasonal change have more varied behaviors to respond to those changes than chimps that live in an environment that doesn’t change much.
Environmental Education Goes Virtual: Creating Meaningful Learning Opportunities at Home: The National Wildlife Federation Blog – So many good online resources…they’ve been developed over years but are probably getting a lot more use during this pandemic year.
It's Tarantula Season At Bandelier National Monument – I’ve not been to Bandelier during tarantula season! The last time I was there was in March 2005 and that was before I started taking a lot of pictures….this article reminded me that I want to go again. Maybe we’ll plan to go in the fall and be on the look out for the male tarantulas trying to find a mate. Here are a couple of pictures my husband took when we visited in 1980!
Are we living at the 'hinge of history'? - BBC Future – It’s difficult not to look at current trends and think the future will be a dystopian one with or without seeing this as a ‘hinge.’ The last paragraph was the best of the article: “So, while we do not know if our time will be the most influential or not, we can say with more certainty that we have increasing power to shape the lives and well-being of billions of people living tomorrow – for better and for worse. It will be for future historians to judge how wisely we used that influence.”
Why is America Running out of water? – Shortages are not everywhere…but there are places in the US that are already problematic…and there are a lot of people living in those areas.
Raptor Rescue: When Bird Injuries Warrant Rehab – This article was a good summary of things I’ve heard about before re injured birds.
Unusual climate conditions influenced WWI mortality and subsequent influenza pandemic -- ScienceDaily – Something new about the 1918 flu…torrential rains and unusually cold temperatures kept Mallard ducks from their normal migration…and thus spread the virus more broadly in the battlefields of the Western Front.
What 'net-zero carbon' really means for cities - BBC Future – Using London as an example: no/fewer cars and all transport EV, less concrete…more timber, buildings reused/retrofit, green roofs and walls, renewable energy, reduced waste through recycling and energy production, urban farms. It’s technology that exists now…and already is being applied…ramped up, of course.
The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.
When 136 Bird Species Show Up at a Feeder, Which One Wins? | All About Birds – Interesting article. I’ve been thinking about the birds at my birdbath rather than my feeder (since my feeder only works for small birds that like the seeds). The blue jays are dominate bird at the bath…when they are around the others wait for their drink!
The lost art of looking at plants – Molecular tools and DNA sequencing overwhelming the detailed analyses of plants’ physical traits…but not there is a rebalancing; both are required to dive deeper into the many questions we still have about plant.
Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #124 – National Geographic – The first one in this series is a barn swallow…one of my favorite birds to watch. And there are three different kinds of kingfishers later in the post.
How Technology Is Creating a Generation of Adult Babies - The Ringer – Another way technology is either giving us what we want or convincing us that it is what we need.
The Dangers of Keeping Women Out of Tech | WIRED – An interview with Maria Klawe, President of Harvey Mudd College. She has increased the number of women in the school’s computer science program from 10% to 40%.
Every study we could find on what automation will do to jobs, in one chart - MIT Technology Review – It seems like almost everyone thinks automation will reduce the number of jobs….but the studies are remarkably different. It would be useful if there was enough consensus for people to make decisions about education and careers – but there just isn’t.
Fingerprints of Ongoing Human Evolution Found | The Scientist Magazine® - A study using large data sets with genomic information looked a gene variants less common in older people than younger people….and there are probably more coming soon because the data is ripe for analysis. So far they’ve discovered gene variants in Alzheimer’s and smoking related genes appear to be under selection pressure…i.e. that there are fewer old people with the variants than young (i.e. they tend to die earlier).
Gold crown of Hecatomnus returned to Turkey: Culture minister – Sometimes stolen artifacts are found and returned….Kudos to the authorities in both Scotland and Turkey for this result.
Parts of U.S. Saw an Increase in Zika-Linked Birth Defects in 2016 | The Scientist Magazine – Data from 2017 is not available yet. The researchers found 3 of every 1,000 babies born in Puerto Rico, southern Florida, and a portion of south Texas had a birth defect that could have been linked to Zika infection of their mothers.
Entomologist discovers millipede that comes in more color combinations than any other -- ScienceDaily – Pretty and covered in cyanide that will kill any bird that eats it.
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Celebrating the whole of life....
Thanks for visiting my blog! Enjoy the photo picks from 2023:
Copyright © 2024, Gwen Morrison. All rights reserved.
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