I have accumulated a few…
Federico sent these wonderful reconstructions of Pleistocene “Hominins”, saying “These are by far the most compelling reconstructions of ‘ancient’ people I have ever seen — admittedly one of the two is just an old school Homo sapiens… For whatever reason I do find both reconstructions so much more alive and true to life than anything I have ever seen: I can see that the old sapiens would have lots of stuff to teach *me*, and I can see that the neanderthal is just so close to us — I can feel how disappointing it would be if we could not communicate with someone like him.”
From “Lucas Machias”: patenting reconstructed species. Hoo! “What Brave New World…”
Keith Brady sent down this wonderful video on Chernobyl from Canada. I would have eaten the old lady’s vegetables– would you? As Keith said, “She’s a peach – got a lot of blood in her body….unlike the BBC guy.” If this were a YouTube I would have embedded it. Read Mary Mycio’s Wormwood Forest– in Amazon but the link won’t work– for more background.
Annie Davidson sent this pic– no link– via the San Diego Natural History Museum, of a horde of 33 round tailed horned lizard skulls found while cleaning out an America Kestrel nest box in the Chiricahua Mountains of southern Arizona. As we have both species, I must check out some nests; I would love to find a similar one. It looks like an Asian Buddhist skull rosary, and you could make a variant..
From Chas: vulture- safe zones in India. It may be the first positive sign for these necessary scavengers since I wrote up the problem in the Atlantic too many years ago. Wonder what the Parsees are doing…
Younger people don’t know, and older ones forget, that it was not only (or even) liberal Democrats who saved our wilderness areas in the last twenty or thirty years. The always contrary (and always interesting) Dave Foreman reminds us, here of what the PC would think of as some unlikely wilderness advocates. Remember (judge, senator) Jim Buckley? Libby’s late parents were of that ilk too.
More, and worse, soon.
These are wonderful! Thanks.
One observation: I, too, have uttered the line that old-school conservationists were of a different ilk than those of today, and they effectively saved many huge swaths of it, and water, too. But, political theology was different back then.
Today, I ask: where are the pro-environment ideas from those who've carried many patches on that political quilt of a banner? They are, with very few exceptions, sorely lacking.
For example: I often point out the origins of Pittman-Robertson; but, if that notion were floated today, do we honestly believe that gun owners would actively vote to tax themselves for conservation efforts? I'd like to think we would, but I'm really doubtful. I can just as easily hear cries of 2nd Amendment infringement.
You might enjoy this article which discusses just how damn close we are to the apes.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/01/bill-nye-creationism-evolution
A larger picture of the Kennis Brother's (http://www.kenniskennis.com/site/Home/) Homo reconstructions is below. Before you click, dear reader, please be aware that the the two models represent two males, who, according to the fashion of some parts of the paleolithic, are not wearing anything. You have been warned.
http://www.nhm.ac.uk/natureplus/servlet/JiveServlet/showImage/38-3428-65024/models-together-2.jpg
Sweet little lizard skulls. They would make good keychains if they were silver-plated.
on first sight I thought you were going to say they were a buddhist rosary – must find reading glasses clearly.
SBW
Teddy Roosevelt who was a Republican founded the National Park system, but he was a Progressive so I not sure if that counts.
Federico– I have seen a little of their work but its range and detail and "believability" is astonishing. I must do a post on their whole site!
I have found an individual horned frog skull like that, but never a big cache
Who'd a thunk a jaunty little sparrow hawk a souvenir-collecting serial killer…