The purple-ring topsnail is a medium-sized sea snail with gills and an operculum.This is a sublittoral marine gastropod mollusk in the family Calliostomatidae. This snail lives off of the Pacific coast of North America.his species is fairly omnivorous, feeding seasonally on kelp, sessile fauna like bryozoans, and detritus.
Sometimes I wonder if animals ever conceive of monsters. What menaces my dog in her nightmares? Is it only real creatures that she’s familiar with, or does she ever dream about stranger beasts – bigger, meaner dogs with barks like fireworks? Things that come out of the bathtub drains? Humans that only look like her humans, but smell horribly, impossibly wrong?
my rabbits have never, as far as i know, and i got them young, met any actual predators, save for one kitten smaller than them, and nonthreatening dogs they liked, but they still have that instinctual fear for predators. lots of rabbit owners will say theirs do the same – if theres something new in their area and its dark, theyll start thumping and acting panicked, running at any movement or noise they perceive, because they think the new shadow is some looming, unknown predator. my one rabbit, when she was still a baby, would sometimes thump and dart from nothing at all, while the other was unfazed (or simply startled from the others panic). i wonder what she thought was there
I’m very curious about the extent of different animals’ imaginations. The human imagination is incredibly rich and overactive and probably oranges to crabapples in comparison to most non-human animals’, but I wouldn’t be surprised even rabbits’ brains supply them with some form of imagined danger beyond pure instinctual reactions.
Crows seem to be able to form mental images of tools they want to make. Certain other birds, when exposed first to a snake and then to snakelike things, will give the “snake” alarm call more easily than if they just see the snakelike thing, suggesting they have a mental image of what a snake is and are more alert for one if they’ve gotten the idea.
Photographer Tarek Mawad and animator Friedrich van Schoor just spent six weeks embedded in nature to create Bioluminescent Forest. The filmmakers state that everything you see was created live, without any effects added in post-production.
It looks like the raven really wants the owl to leave and is trying to intimidate it, but the owl doesn’t care because it knows the raven is all bark and no bite. Or all squawk and no peck. Erm…
Actually, it looks more like the raven is curious about the funny bird and wants to sit next to it, and the owl doesn’t wanna be friends :[ The raven’s body language isn’t aggressive at all — it’s backing down appropriately when the owl displays aggression. Notice the way it’s careful to draw back every time it gets too close to the owl. This is an animal that’s trying to establish it isn’t a threat.
Keep in mind there’s a huge intellect disparity here — ravens exhibit novel tool use and complex communication, whereas owls aren’t even as smart as ducks. We’re sort of trained to view crows and ravens as villainous, but really they’re very playful animals.
“HI YOU’RE PRETTY WANNA BE FRIENDS??”
“HISSS”
This is so cute ‘cause I can imagine the crow being the talkative, friendly one and he’s just like “hi gosh wow you’re pretty I’ve never seen a white crow before! How’d ya get your feathers so white? Do you eat a lot of marshmallows? I eat a lot of marshmallows! This human lady feeds me marshmallows–” and on and on and the owl’s probably just like “What no go away”
This is adorable
My whole childhood just got ruined by that “owls aren’t even as smart as ducks”
I’m so glad someone asked this – the cockeyed squid is one of my favourite molluscs for this exact reason. Here’s what they look like, for those who don’t know:
Cockeyed squid is actually a genus (Histioteuthis) that comprises quite a few species, including the one pictured above which is known by the adorable name, strawberry squid (Histioteuthis heteropsis), but they all have the famous odd-sized eyes – something that’s not seen in any other bilaterally symmetrical animal.
The reason for this is each of their eyes is adapted for a different type of vision. Cockeyed squid live in the mesoplegaic (or twilight) zone where sunlight is almost non-existent, and they generally float like in the picture above, with their large left eye facing slightly upwards, and their smaller right eye facing downwards.
The role of the fairly normal-looking right eye is to pick up up the bright bioluminescence of creatures in the dark below them. Their left eye, however, is specially adapted to break the counter-illumination of creatures swimming above them. Counter-illumination is a strategy adopted by many creatures in the deep sea, where they illuminate the underside of their bodies just enough to “counter” their silhouette made by the small amount sunlight coming from above. The squid’s large eye sees past this as it is very sensitive to light, and the greenish-yellow lens helps to filter out the sunlight, making the creatures stand out.
Naturally Erupted Elephant Rock in Heimaey in Iceland
I’ve often seen pictures of the elephant’s head, and have been amazed by it every time. But I’d never seen the picture from above, showing the whole body/tail and trunk. It’s incredible from this angle, and am convinced it is a real ancient mega elephant turned to stone by a dark or benevolent force long forgotten.
BettSplendens Tumblr Evac 