Shark Week In July 1988, Discovery Channel launched a programming block based on sharks. The first iteration of the theme began with a piece called Caged in Fear, about abalone divers who developed a contraption to keep them safe during their harvests. Now in its 36th season, Shark Week is the longest-running cable television event in history. The
Mocha Dick Consider the subtleness of the sea; how its most dreaded creatures glide under water, unapparent for the most part, and treacherously hidden beneath the loveliest tints of azure. — Herman Melville, Moby-Dick Instead of projecting his spout obliquely forward, and puffing with a short, convulsive effort, accompanied by a snorting noise, as usual with
Porphyrios Of what precise species this sea-monster was, is not mentioned. But as he destroyed ships, as well as for other reasons, he must have been a whale; and I am strongly inclined to think a sperm whale. — Herman Melville, Moby Dick The Gladises – a family of orcas likened to the combatants of the Roman
Orcas Attacking Boats Most fears associated with denizens of the deep are largely overblown, perhaps due to the unseen nature of the threat. Sharks, for example, despite Jaws and all the negativity associated with them, have only killed 633 people since records on the subject began in 1958. That’s under 10 per year. Documents indicate at least
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The Wallace Line & Biogeography When the age of exploration yielded to a period not simply of unlocking new areas of the globe, but of serious, timely examinations of those areas, the study of Earth’s biology began in earnest. In the middle of the 18th century, Carl Linnaeus noticed patterns in the similarities and differences
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Black Robins In 1976, conservationist Don Merton disembarked from a boat in tempestuous seas and ascended 600 feet up a rock stack known as Little Mangere Island. This spit is a tiny member of the Chatham Islands, which rest 400 miles east of New Zealand’s South Island. Little Mangere covers just 37 acres, a mere blip
An Entire Species in Two Buckets [The naturalist] looks upon every species of animal and plant now living as the individual letters which go to make one of the volumes of our earth’s history; and, as a few lost letters may make a sentence unintelligible, so the extinction of the numerous forms of life which
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The Frog Romeo This handsome fella is Romeo: Romeo – photo by Matias Careaga His bio features the following info: Height: 0′ 2″ Build: Stocky Status: Never married Children: No Want children?: Definitely Location: Bolivia Smoker?: No way Drinker?: Moderately For fun I like to: Leg days at the gym If you’re part of the
Mojave Max Many Americans are familiar with Punxsutawney Phil, the prognosticating groundhog of Pennsylvania, and a slew of other weather-predicting rodents, including Buckeye Chuck, Wiarton Willie, Dunkirk Dave, and Staten Island Chuck. We rouse these groundhogs from hibernation on February 2 for the purpose of telling us the future of the struggle between winter and spring.
Flaco, the Owl of Central Park On the night of February 2, workers at the Central Park Zoo, a 6.5-acre facility in the southeast corner of New York City’s famous garden, started the rounds to check on the animals. When they approached the enclosure that housed a Eurasian eagle-owl, named Flaco, they discovered a gaping
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