Author Topic: Nature journal  (Read 19497 times)

Offline Fran

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #40 on: September 16, 2006, 10:45:46 am »
If you're wondering what a kookaburra sounds like, there is a sound link online.  I couldn't get the link to work right, but you can find it this way:  Google "kookaburra lyrics."  You'll see at least two references to the NIEHS Kids' Pages for the song.  Once you get to the Kookaburra song lyrics, under the photo of the bird is the sound link.
« Last Edit: September 16, 2006, 05:28:17 pm by Fran »

Offline opinionista

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #41 on: September 16, 2006, 11:52:09 am »
Nice thread! Here are a few nature pictures of Puerto Rico, where I'm from



This is Camuy's cave. Well a small part of it that is open to the public. It's actually a huge cave, with a river that runs through it. You are not allowed to touch anything while there. If you wish to see the rest of the cave, a visit can be arranged with Puerto Rico Department of Natural Resources. However, before actually visiting it you have to take a training course about safety measures, how to walk there, respect the environment, learn some rappelling, and such.


This is "Manglillo" a mangrove swamp beach at the south of Puerto Rico. You can actually swim there if you aren't afraid of fishes, turtles, manatees and other sea creatures. It's a actually a safe beach, no sharks or anything there. The water doesn't smell funny either. It's regular sea salted water.



Some sea turtles at Culebra, east of Puerto Rico. They nest on some beaches, and people organize events to help the youngs get safe to sea.
« Last Edit: September 16, 2006, 01:40:18 pm by opinionista »
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

injest

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #42 on: September 17, 2006, 01:14:30 am »
Nice thread! Here are a few nature pictures of Puerto Rico, where I'm from



This is Camuy's cave. Well a small part of it that is open to the public. It's actually a huge cave, with a river that runs through it. You are not allowed to touch anything while there. If you wish to see the rest of the cave, a visit can be arranged with Puerto Rico Department of Natural Resources. However, before actually visiting it you have to take a training course about safety measures, how to walk there, respect the environment, learn some rappelling, and such.


all your pictures are beautiful...but this one is truly spectacular..thanks for sharing it with us

Offline ffrn

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #43 on: September 17, 2006, 05:28:23 am »
I've posted these before in Jess's Feedstore thread but thought they may fit here too.  This is my front gully and if you look carefully, you can see a wallaby.



This is about as close as I could get before she took off with her joey and hopped through the fence.




Offline Katie77

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #44 on: September 17, 2006, 07:31:56 am »
Oh yes, those pictures from Porto Rico are really beautiful......

And Jocelyn, thanks for the aussie touch......I dont know if you are like us, and it might amaze the people from other countries on here, but when we see a kangaroo in the wild, we always stop and watch it, whether it is in our back yard,(if we live on a property), or in the bush on the side of the road....it is still a lovely sight to see them in their mobs out in the wild.....and to some of us, still very unique......contrary to what a lot of overseas visitors envisage,  when they think we have kangaroos jumping down the main streets of our towns.....as we know, that doesnt happen....
Being happy doesn't mean everything is perfect.

It means you've decided to see beyond the imperfection

Offline opinionista

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #45 on: September 17, 2006, 10:01:49 am »
I'm glad you guys liked my pictures. I no longer live in Puerto Rico, but I visit frequently since my family is still there. Here are a few other pictures. I'm just showing the wild part of the island.



This is the river that runs through the cave showed in my previous post. The Camuy River.



This is a small water fall at the Yunque Rain Forest at the east of the Island.



Another view of the Yunque Rain Forest. We tried to take a picture of the Puerto Rican parrot when we were at the rain forest. The parrot is different to the ones you regularly see around, but they're hard to see. I'm going back in december, maybe I'm lucky and I come back with a picture!



And this is one of my favorite beaches, Flamenco Beach in Culebra Island which belongs to Puerto Rico.


All pictures were taken by my sister and a friend of ours. Don't worry, I got permission to post!  :D
Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgement. -Mark Twain.

Offline Katie77

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #46 on: October 02, 2006, 10:25:46 pm »
Just wanted to share some pics in this thread of my day at Australia Zoo yesterday....if you want to read about my day, its al in Katie77...just an Ausssie Sheila in the Daily Thoughts forum....

Anyway, heres one of a croc in action...and the others are of the koalas....just wanted you to see how they make themselves comfortbable in the fork of the trees to go to sleep (which they seem to do 23hours a day)....got one awake, as you can see....

Hope you enjoy..
Being happy doesn't mean everything is perfect.

It means you've decided to see beyond the imperfection

Offline Andrew

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #47 on: October 15, 2006, 04:04:13 pm »
Some pictures of fall colors near where I work in Andover, Massachusetts. 

The first is a cultivar of ash which gets a lot redder than many others:





This is a red maple in an oak forest.  The oaks turn a warm muted russet by mid-November, but by then the maples have dropped their leaves.  For now, the oaks are still in summer green




New England is famous for its sugar maples. The shape of sugar maple leaves is familiar from the Canadian flag, whereas red maples have leaves more like two-thumbed mittens.

According to Thoreau's journal, because maple syrup was so much more plentiful than honey in his time "they manufacture honey now from maple syrup, which you cannot tell from bee honey, taking care to throw some dead bees and bees' wings and a little honeycomb into it."  (Feb 13, 1853) Today maple syrup is more expensive than honey, unless perhaps you go to Vermont and buy a gallon container of the syrup.

Sugar maples tinge gradually from green to yellow to orange to a little red on the same tree, the more advanced colors coming on the tips of the branches where there is more sun.  Even individual leaves can look airbrushed with two colors.  The one in the picture got a lot of sun all over, so the green is hidden inside in its own shade:





And here is a red maple against the sky.  The stems of the leaves are usually bright red even in the summer, as if to warn us to enjoy the short New England summer while we can.  They are fond of moist locations, but do well in ordinary drier sites too.




moremojo

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #48 on: October 17, 2006, 08:27:35 pm »
Andrew, your beautiful maple-tree photos remind me of a reference I read recently in a book I bought this past weekend. This book is a children's book about the the Haudenosaunee, the confederation of Native American peoples more widely known as the Iroquois. Though a text oriented towards the needs and interests of children, I found the book a good introduction to a subject which interests me, and I have deemed it a worthwhile investment.

The Haudenosaunee were originally comprised of five nations, the Mohawk, the Oneida, the Onondaga, the Cayuga, and the Seneca. They were known to the British and British colonists as the Five Nations ('Iroquois' was an Algonquin term for these peoples that was appropriated by the French; these nations themselves referred to their confederation as that of the Haudenosaunee, or "the people of the longhouse"). In the early eighteenth century, the Tuscarora, an ethnolinguistically related tribe from the Carolinas that were fleeing poor relations with European settlers there, asked to be admitted to the confederation and were accepted. From this point, the British referred to the league as that of the Six Nations.

The Haudenosaunee were a highly developed culture, materially comfortable and enjoying a government of considerable sophistication and efficacy. All members were looked after and all had a productive, active role in the community and larger society. Intricate networks of clan kinship bound members of one nation to those of the others, further fostering the sense of fraternity that permeated the league. Clan kinship derived from the women, and the women chose the chiefs who would represent a particular community at league meetings, also having the authority to remove chiefs from office if they were deemed ineffective or negligent. The Haudenosaunee had no concept of land ownership; the land belonged to the community, and the people saw themselves as custodians of the land, whose bounty was to be shared by all. In all aspects of life, the Haudenosaunee were a radically democratic society, much more so than the early American republic (upon which much of the constitutional foundation was inspired by the Haudenosaunee example).

At any rate, I could go on with more detail on this fascinating society about which I am still learning, but right now I wanted to point out that the Haudenosaunee had six major annual festivals, and one of these was the Maple Festival in the spring. Maple syrup was collected and made into delectable foods to be enjoyed by the whole community. Communal feasting, game-playing (the Haudenosaunee developed the game of lacrosse), and visiting served to bolster the strength and love of the people. And this is what these gorgeous New England maple trees brought to my mind.

Edit: Correction of a minor typo.
« Last Edit: October 17, 2006, 08:42:03 pm by moremojo »

Offline Front-Ranger

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Re: Nature journal
« Reply #49 on: October 27, 2006, 04:39:59 pm »
DId they have any festivals in the fall, Scott?

I just wanted to show off this picture of a Sphinx moth with penstemon.

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