This is a closeup of the tentacles of Portuguese Man O’War (Physalia physalis)
Photo by Simon de Glanville
(Source: , via ichthyologist)
HYBRIDISM [aka HYBRIDITY]
[noun]
1. the quality or condition of being hybrid; composite; formed or composed of heterogeneous elements.
2. the production of hybrids; the offspring of two animals or plants of different breeds, varieties, species, or genera, especially as produced through human manipulation for specific genetic characteristics.
Etymology: Latin hybrida, hibrida - a crossbred animal.
DID SOMEONE SERIOUSLY JUST MASH UP TWO OF MY FAVORITE ANIMAL GROUPS <3
MOTHTOPUSES
(via ichthyologist)
The Chevron Snakehead (Channa striata)
Distributed across a large area of South and SE Asia. This species may be a species complex, and not a single species. This fish has been introduced to a variery of places around the Pacific rim, as well as the United States.
They grow to a length of 90 cm. They inhabit mainly freshwater ponds and streams, usually in stagnant muddy waters. Besides breathing through the gills, Channa striata is an obligate air-breather, as well. They tend to prefer laying eggs in a shallow depression nest amongst or near aquatic vegetation. Carnivorous, feeding on worms, prawns, frogs, and especially other fishes. A with other snakeheads, they are known to have voracious appetites, and thus negatively affect eco-systems in which they are introduced…
(readmore: USGS - SE Ecological Science Center)
(via ichthyologist)
(Source: pinec0nez, via theoceanrolls)
![rhamphotheca:
This is how sperm whales sleep. Yes, really.
by Robert T.Gonzalez
Ever fallen asleep standing up? Then you know what it’s like to snooze like a sperm whale.
This image, captured by photographer Magnus Lundgren for Wild Wonders of Europe, is actually a few years old, but it highlights an interesting bit of cetacean neuroscience that’s definitely worth sharing, and explaining in greater detail. Until just a few years ago, it was thought that sperm whales, like other cetaceans, only allowed one side of their brain to rest at a time, “keeping one eye open,” as it were, in order to do “important things that require physical activity, such as coming to the surface to breathe or avoid predators,” explains Nature’s Matt Kaplan. “They never fully let their guard down.”
But in 2008, a team of researchers off the coast of northern Chile happened upon a pod of vertically bobbing sperm whales that seemed completely oblivious to its presence. Not a single whale responded to the team’s boat until one of them was accidentally nudged, at which point it awoke and fled, along with the rest of the group. The team’s findings suggest that, unlike other cetaceans, sperm whales appear to enter short, but periodic, bouts of sleep throughout the day — an observation that Kaplan says could hint that sperm-whales are actually “the least sleep-dependent mammals known.”
(article via Io9) [info via: Current Biology; via: Nature]](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m8m4oeEYRQ1qc6j5yo1_500.jpg)
This is how sperm whales sleep. Yes, really.
by Robert T.Gonzalez
Ever fallen asleep standing up? Then you know what it’s like to snooze like a sperm whale.
This image, captured by photographer Magnus Lundgren for Wild Wonders of Europe, is actually a few years old, but it highlights an interesting bit of cetacean neuroscience that’s definitely worth sharing, and explaining in greater detail. Until just a few years ago, it was thought that sperm whales, like other cetaceans, only allowed one side of their brain to rest at a time, “keeping one eye open,” as it were, in order to do “important things that require physical activity, such as coming to the surface to breathe or avoid predators,” explains Nature’s Matt Kaplan. “They never fully let their guard down.”
But in 2008, a team of researchers off the coast of northern Chile happened upon a pod of vertically bobbing sperm whales that seemed completely oblivious to its presence. Not a single whale responded to the team’s boat until one of them was accidentally nudged, at which point it awoke and fled, along with the rest of the group. The team’s findings suggest that, unlike other cetaceans, sperm whales appear to enter short, but periodic, bouts of sleep throughout the day — an observation that Kaplan says could hint that sperm-whales are actually “the least sleep-dependent mammals known.”
(article via Io9) [info via: Current Biology; via: Nature]
