@sixth-extinction / sixth-extinction.tumblr.com
Ko'ko' bird (Guam Rail) is a critically endangered species in the Mariana Islands. Once considered extinct in the wild, a few are now found on Cocos Island off Guam. Currently the bulk of the population is in captive breeding programs. They are mainly threatened by invasive snakes & feral cats.
Raaahr
ʻAkohekohe By: Richard E. Warner From: The Fascinating Secrets of Oceans & Islands 1972
Sawfish By: Unknown photographer From: Disney’s Wonderful World of Knowledge 1971
Excerpt from this story from the Associated Press (AP):
More than 80 years ago, a beautiful butterfly called Xerces Blue that once fluttered among San Francisco’s coastal dunes went extinct as stately homes, museums and parks ate up its habitat, marking the first butterfly species in the United States to disappear due to human development.
But thanks to years of research and modern technology a close relative of the shimmery iridescent butterfly species has been reintroduced to the dunes in Presidio National Park in San Francisco. Dozens of Silvery Blue butterflies — the closest living relatives of the Xerces Blue — were released in the restored habitat last week, officials said Monday.
Scientists with San Francisco’s California Academy of Sciences utilized the Academy’s genetic sequencing capabilities and analyzed Xerces Blue specimens in their vast collection to confirm a group of Silvery Blues in Monterey County, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) south of San Francisco, could successfully fill the ecological gap left by the Xerces Blue.
“This isn’t a Jurassic Park-style de-extinction project, but it will have a major impact,” said Durrell Kapan, a senior research fellow and the lead Academy researcher on the project. “The Silvery Blue will act as an ecological ‘stand-in’ for the Xerces Blue, performing the same ecosystem functions as both a pollinator and a critical member of the food web.”
Next week, I graduate with my BFA in Art. This was my final piece of Illustration coursework. Hoping that it'll be part of the pitch package for a real book before long. 😊
Billions of Mouths to Feed Like most birds, the passenger pigeon was omnivorous, feeding on a wide variety of plant and insect matter. The most important of its food sources were mast-producing trees. A single pigeon could eat half its body weight in a day, and flocks wandered thousands of miles in search of a bountiful harvest; it was this habit of travel that gave the bird its name. Pigeons showed a preference for the mast of the American beech, the white oak, and the American chestnut (a tree whose own catastrophic population collapse, resulting from imported disease, may have played a role in the concurrent decline of the pigeon).
Taxidermy quagga at the Natural History Museum of Milan By: Unknown photographer From: Le Zebre 1913
Looks like this specimen has faded quite a bit in the last 110 years
Hello, April is my birthday month, and I have another comic to share with you. This one is called Fossils, and it's about digging things up.
Physical copies of Fossils are read by unfolding a single sheet of paper, as can be seen in the video below. Fossils was risograph printed in four colorways, the one shown is federal blue and aqua on brown paper. You can buy a copies in my online store.
My other paleoart minicomics:
Back from vacation! Real hard picking a favorite thing from Japan, but one of the faves for sure was seeing Japanese Giant Salamanders at the Kyoto Aquarium. Will be slowly getting back into them ceramic things.
Bovine figure of the day: Signatustudio Aurochs
i learned about Tim Wong who successfully and singlehandedly repopulated the rare California Pipevine Swallowtail butterfly in San Francisco. In the past few years, he’s cultivated more than 200 pipevine plants (their only food source) and gives thousands of caterpillars to his local Botanical Garden (x)
Sometimes, people are really great.
Mammoth Cube Mammoth Cube Mammoth Cube
Known as the Jarkov Mammoth, this specimen was found in Siberia. The 23 tonne block of mud and ice was lifted to an ice cave where the mammoth inside was recovered and studied.
Chaeropus ecaudatus the Southern Pig–footed Bandicoot
Pig–footed bandicoots (genus Chaeropus) were so called because of their hooflike forefeet. They had relatively slender legs compared to other bandicoots, allowing them to move quickly through the landscape.
Although initially designated as a single species, Chaeropus yirratji was split from C. ecaudatus in 2019 on the basis of morphological differences. Both species became extinct by the 1950s due to habitat loss from land clearing for agriculture and predation from cats and foxes.
My sleep deprived mind came up with this. I haven’t even had any oarfish related dreams recently.
You mean there are other people that dream about oarfish regularly?
I want to see a live (or recently beached) one SO BAD but I figure I’d have to live or work on/near a beach to increase the odds of that happening because the chances are so remote ugh
Bachman’s Warbler (Vermivora bachmanii).
Two colorized "Magic Lantern" slides of extinct species at the London Zoo: the quagga (Equus quagga quagga) and the Syrian onager or wild ass (Equus hemionus hemippus). [x]
The slides date from the late 1800s and went on auction after their rediscovery in 2018.
Photo of a Barbary lion at the Bronx Zoo (dated May 1904). ( x )
