Here on Maud Island in the Marlborough Sounds we’re very excited and a little bemused at finding what could be the world’s first takapo eggs this morning.
ANZANG: Australia, New Zealand and New Guinea nature photography
I’ve always liked great photographs, especially nature photographs. The South Australian Museum owns and runs the annual ANZANG Nature Photography Competition. As you can guess from the title, photographs focus (pun intended) on the natural heritage of the Australia, New Zealand, Antarctica and the New Guinea regions.
Turtles! You are what your mum eats! POP’s passed from mother to egg to turtle
We all know marine turtles lay eggs and don’t provide any parental care for their turtle hatchlings. The mothers do leave some food for the hatchlings though, as yolk in the eggs. But how healthy is this yolk?
Mammals suckle their young and when they do, they can pass environmental pollutants from their bodies to their offspring’s. But are toxins that maternal turtles accumulate when feeding, passed on to their turtle hatchlings within the eggs? And if so, does it affect the turtle hatchlings’ chances of survival?
Anorexia when you’re pregnant? Sounds like an oxymoron unless you’re a sea krait!
Sea kraits (Laticaudine) are sea snakes. They’re front-fanged (proteroglyphous) venomous elapid snakes and are common through much of the Indo–Pacific region. When they’re pregnant, the females stop eating! Seems like a strange thing to do when you need energy and nutrients to make eggs.
Why would they do that?
Francois Brisçhoux, Xavier Bonnet and Richard Shine set out to find out why by studying two of these kraits; Laticauda laticaudata and L. saintgironsi, on small islets in the Lagoon of New Caledonia. What a cool field site
As “dry as” a dead dingo’s donger: or should it be as “old as”?
When something is really dry, Aussie’s might refer it as being “as dry as a dead dingo’s donger” after all, Australia is a pretty dry place. But if you’ve been around a bit and are clocking up the years, you could also be as “old as a dead dingo’s donger”! Some interesting facts about the dingo and a video of the New Guinea singing dog (no it’s not a cartoon character!)
In September the male brown antechinus will ponder the proverb ‘Carpe Diem’
When I was younger we learnt about proverbs at school. I always wondered about this one
“A bird in the hand is worth or two in the bush”. This proverb is probably rushing around the minds of male brown antechinus (Antechinus stuartii) during their September mating season. For these little carnivorous marsupials it’s now or never! It’s time for a lek!
Nest boxes make new homes for sugar gliders
Australia is well known for it’s marsupials and many of them live in the trees. It can get windy, wet and cold living in a tree so a little hollow inside a tree makes a perfect den. Over 300 species of Australian vertebrates use tree hollows as a home for shelter, sleeping, nesting, and escaping predators! But where can they live in a new forest with few old trees?
Watch a microdoc on the minke whale population
Dr Steve Palumbi of Stanford University in the USA is putting together a series of MICRODOCS. They’re pretty interesting so I thought I’d promote them here and encourage you to check them out.
The Forest Dragons (Hypsilurus spinipes) of the Border Ranges National Park
Have you ever walked through the forest and felt like you were being watched. Well if you were walking in the Border Ranges national park of New South Wales, you probably were being watched by forest dragons!
