dilophoraptor reblogged
dilophoraptor reblogged
This machine kills AI
dilophoraptor reblogged
You wouldn’t think that flamingoes are extremophiles just from looking at them. It’s like somebody tried to build the vertebrate equivalent of that fungus that lives inside nuclear reactors, and ended up with a gangly pink dinosaur with a spoon for a face.
For everyone in the comments asking how flamingos are extremophiles:
Flamingos can survive in low oxygen, high altitude, high temperatures, low temperatures, high alkaline, they can and will drink boiling water and they can be completely frozen at night and still get up the next morning
Don’t fuck with flamingos
….. Didn’t know most of that
Huh… so that’s why zoos don’t put them somewhere warm during winter.
Oh yeah, this leaves out what I *did* know about them–they can also survive hypersalinity. That is, water so salty it kills practically everything else–water so salty it burns your skin.
American flamingos just drink that shit
(animal death) this is a real undoctored photograph (*though the body was stood up for the shot) of a dead flamingo on the surface of lake natron, a lake so salty and so alkaline that it’s naturally carbonated like soda and would eat through your stomach lining if you drank from it.
When this photo went viral years ago, most people assumed this poor flamingo must have been killed by the lake.
It is actually the lake where 75% of its global population are hatched. This is a photo from the same lake:
Some species of flamingo actually subsist almost entirely on a diet of bacteria! In other words, there is a species of dinosaur that eats only bacteria and lives in lakes so toxic they would kill almost anything else—and it is best known to the average person as a kitschy lawn decoration.
requested by anonymous:
RATING: RELIABLE
Flamingos can survive in high altitudes, hypersaline conditions, and caustic lakes.
Source: ‘All flamingo species have evolved to live in some of the planet’s most extreme wetlands, like caustic “soda lakes”, hypersaline lagoons or high-altitude salt flats.’
They can survive water so alkaline it burns human skin.
Source: ‘More than a million lesser flamingos breed in Tanzania’s Lake Natron, for instance, a lake fed by hot springs with water so alkaline that it can strip away human skin (one pioneering flamingo researcher named Leslie Brown spent months in Nairobi General Hospital after burning his legs wading out to observe where the birds nested).’
They can drink water at near-boiling temperatures.
Source: ‘They can drink water at near boiling point to collect freshwater from springs and geysers at lake edges. If no freshwater is available, flamingos can use glands in their head that remove salt, draining it out from their nasal cavity.’
The lakes they inhabit can freeze overnight, and the flamingos can survive once it thaws in the morning.
Source: ‘The birds may seem to epitomize the tropics, but they also live in the Andes, 15,000 feet above sea level, where they rest on lakes that freeze around them overnight.
“You’ll see them sitting there like snowballs, frozen on ice,” Dr. Arengo said. “And as the temperature warms up, they thaw out, fluff themselves up and go about their business.”’
The photo is indeed from Lake Natron, taken by photographer Nick Brandt. The content of the lake chemically preserves animal corpses that die there. You can see more photos of this here.
It is also true that 75% of Lesser Flamingos are hatches on Lake Natron.
Source: ‘The lake’s landscape is surreal and deadly—and made even more bizarre by the fact that it’s the place where nearly 75 percent of the world’s lesser flamingos are born.’
Some species of Flamingo eat cyanobacteria or algae.
Source: ‘Flamingos have very specialised diets. And their food is responsible for their famous pink colouration. The two species in Planet Earth II eat a lot of floating microscopic algae, which contains carotenoid pigments, the same types of chemical that make carrots orange. These pigments turn their feathers pink, orange and red – without them, flamingos would be white.’
… @todaysbird ??
yeah they’re just like that
information that is also important
I’m pretty sure that this just makes all flamingos qualify as “horrible things with legs” on principle alone. @elodieunderglass
One of the archetypal horrible things!
dilophoraptor reblogged
Oh to have a dinosaur that behaves like a big, friendly Golden Retriever.
Do you think I wouldn't forfeit all of my worldly possessions to Lucky? You'd be wrong. The Rancher literally upped moved to find a bigger home for their prehistoric child and that is a VALID life choice.
dilophoraptor reblogged
Last minute DnD prep and I DO NOT HAVE A NAME PREPARED FOR THIS GUY
(context, minor antagonist and one of the player character’s dad, this guy will not show up again. OwO is the placeholder name because I needed to add something)
dilophoraptor reblogged
Let us suppose that the "average" horse would have equal proportions of all these parts. The degree to which each part in this poll deviates from the "average" size (20% of total) will determine how large or small that part of our horse will be (i.e a horse with only 10% in Legs will have legs half the size of the average horse).
I will draw a picture of the horse we make!
dilophoraptor reblogged
Anonymous asked:
Do you have any cool bird facts
- female raptors (eagles, hawks, falcons, etc) are larger than male raptors in pretty much all species. this happens even in groups not closely related to each other (ex: hawks and falcons), so its beneficial enough in their niche that its evolved independently a few times, though its unsure exactly what that benefit is atm (bc unlike males being larger in a lot of mammals, female raptors dont make a habit of fighting each other or using size to attract mates as far as we know). ex: heres a male and female Cooper's Hawk
- somewhat mentioned above but falcons are more closely related to parrots than they are to hawks
- Gray Catbirds and American Robins have been witnessed raising young in the same nest at the same time. In one instance (reported by Mulvihill and Murray), they were recorded caring for the young of both species in the nest, and when the Catbird young fledged, the adult Catbirds continued to provide food for the not-yet-fledged Robins. heres a pic of the nest from the report
- the worlds oldest known bird as of 2024 is a wild Laysan Albatross named Wisdom who's 72-73 years old (at minimum, we dont actually know her birth date, just that she was at least 5 years old when she was banded in the 50s) and still raising chicks. here's her with one of her chicks
- also Albatrosses have wingspans of up to 3.5m/11.5ft and have been recorded flying 49,700 miles without touching land (they do land in the water to eat tho)
- this is from personal experience but if you walk around in a north american grassland for long enough, you Will get jumpscared by a Mourning Dove bc they make their nests on the ground in the grass and like to hang out on the ground in the grass and they also like to wait until youre right overtop of them to freak out and fly away from you
- Bald Eagles don't get their fully white heads and tails until theyre about 5 years old
- A lot of birds have been observed incorporating cigarette butts into their nests, and a study in Mexico on House Finches found that this actually results in drastic decreases in parasites affecting young compared to nests without them
- Cedar Waxwings (and Waxwings in general) just look so smooth. they look like someone airbrushed them. look at this shit
- in Jacanas, females lay eggs in multiple males' nests, and then the males raise the young by themself. Also they carry their babies under their wings like this
- Horned Guan. Theyre endangered and live in a small area of central america. both the males and females have the little horn fez, the males just have taller ones
dilophoraptor reblogged
i adore bugs. you're telling me THIS
is a real, living animal. and what is it called?
Gongylus gongylodes
dilophoraptor reblogged
Anonymous asked:
do millipedes spray cyanide? i relocated a couple while cleaning my yard and now i'm mildly concerned
the millipedes that release hydrogen cyanide release it as a gas. these include various flat-back millipedes, although there’s plenty of flat-backs that just use a benzoquinone-based fluid defense chemical, which is what many other common millipedes produce (including the round-backed juliforms one often finds in the yard). in either case, you’d need to swallow a millipede for it to do you any great harm.
Apheloria virginiensis is one local to me, and I am guilty of picking them up when on walks in the woods to smell the cyanide: it’s a fragrant scent of almonds or cherries.
cyanide-producing millipedes, since their defense chemical is gaseous, really can’t hurt you unless you’ve already ingested the millipede or are like huffing dozens of them, which would both be probably be actions deserving of consequences.
other millipedes’ liquid chemicals usually just smell foul, like burning rubber. most millipedes under 3-4 cm aren’t going to pack much of a toxic punch at all. some of the larger tropical species in the Spirobolida and Spirostreptida can cause caustic burns if it isn’t washed off soon with detergent or if you have very sensitive skin. I’ve harassed plenty a Narceus and gotten some yellow, later dark purple stains on my hands, but that was the extent of it.
as for “spray,” again, only a handful of tropical species can (anecdotally) fire their benzoquinone liquid in a stream; usually it just oozes from holes in their sides called ozopores. very few millipedes have ranged or AOE attacks
dilophoraptor reblogged
The whole Polybius thing is my favourite conspiracy theory because nearly every individual element of the story is absolutely true, but not for that reason.
Did some early arcade games cause people to suffer hallucinations, memory loss, and short-term personality changes? Yes, they did – because many folks who played them were experiencing close range exposure to bright, rapidly flashing lights for the first time in their lives, and – at the time – public awareness of photosensitive epilepsy was practically nonexistent. Most who had it were undiagnosed, and its symptoms often weren’t recognised when they arose – and if you have no idea what photosensitive epilepsy is, those symptoms might look a lot like alien mind control!
Were early video arcades frequented by serious-looking men in dark suits? Again, yes they were – because they were suspected of being money-laundering fronts for illegal gambling rings, and thus were routinely placed under federal surveillance. And those suspicions weren’t unfounded – it later transpired that many early video arcades were, in fact, money-laundering fronts for illegal gambling rings.
Did arcade cabinets with strange titles and indecipherable gameplay quietly pop up in out-of-the-way places, then vanish shortly thereafter, never to be seen again? Absolutely – because a thriving black market in off-brand bootlegs arose almost immediately. Quality control was nonexistent, so many such cabinets had operational lifespans measured in weeks, and you’d most often see them in arcades with poor locations simply because they were cheap.
It was a perfect storm of largely unrelated factors that added up to the convincing appearance of a shadowy conspiracy, even though each element by itself had a fairly boring explanation.
dilophoraptor reblogged
an interesting take on this from matt braly, creator of amphibia
Imagine being a business that has managed to get THE MAXIMUM NUMBER OF CUSTOMERS IT IS POSSIBLE TO HAVE, and you've managed to make it so this is a bad thing.
You did it. That's late stage capitalism in one sentence.
"What was promised as infinite growth proved to be finite" feels like a very concise summary of every business person ever everywhere.
dilophoraptor reblogged
So I just saw a post by a random personal blog that said “don’t follow me if we never even had a conversation before” and?????? Not to be rude but literally what the fuck??????????
I’ve had people (non-pornbots) try to strike conversation out of nowhere in my DMs recently, and now I’m wondering if they were doing that because they wanted to follow me and thought they needed to interact first. I feel compelled to say, just in case, that it’s totally okay to follow this blog (or my side blog, for that matter) even if we’ve never talked before.
Also, I’m legit confused. Is this how follow culture works right now? It was worded like it’s common sense but is that really a thing?
Saw a sharp increase in my follower count after posting this. The legitimacy of it is driving me nuts so I also feel the need to say that you can follow anyone on here regardless of whether you’ve interacted with them or not. People like the above mentioned blog are exceptions. Perhaps they themselves think they aren’t and therefore will act like they aren’t, but they are, trust me.
Just follow anyone you wanna follow. The worst thing that can happen is maybe getting soft-blocked by the other person, but if they do soft-block you, then they were never that worth following in the first place.
wow. really hope this isn't actually a norm taking hold with new users! this isn't facebook, you don't need to know people before following them
this is the '10 year mutuals you've never spoken to once' site
dilophoraptor reblogged
Never liked you anyway
Now draw them kissing
dilophoraptor reblogged
dilophoraptor reblogged
Dinocephalosaurus, a strange, viviparous reptile from the Triassic, gives live birth in the shallows.
oh he’s just a little guy
It was actually quite a bit bigger than that comparison shows! At least 6 meters in length, although a lot of that is neck.
It’s great because here you see the two strategies for making a long neck: add more bones or make your bones tubes
dilophoraptor reblogged
Electric blues for breeding season! During this time, the inside of a double-crested cormorant's mouth turns bright blue, like this one captured...
by Tammy Ascher
dilophoraptor reblogged
What’s everybody’s most useless skill? If you show me any picture of Godzilla I can tell you exactly which Godzilla suit it is and who was wearing it.
What about this one
This is from Godzilla Minus One and it’s CGi. No suit actor involved in this movie (but the big Godzilla head in the water was a practical effect).
I welcome anyone to challenge me on this
How about this one??
Oh shit now this is a challenge! I’m 100% sure that the suit is the SoshingekiGoji suit, but this suit was used in like 4 different movies, so the real challenge is figuring out which movie this is.
I’m pretty sure this shot is from Godzilla Destroy All Monsters (the first movie that this suit was used in), because of the lack of wear and damage to the suit.
And we know that Godzilla is being played by Haruo Nakajima in this shot because of which movie this is (but it’s also extremely obvious based on Godzillas posture)
That is:
A: 100% correct
B: Incredibly hot
damn right
A challenge from my friend!
This is KiryuGoji (the first one) played by Tsutomu Kitagawa
I really like this one! At first glance it looks like it could be a Heisei era suit, but this is one of the KiryuGoji suits from Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla, and Godzilla Tokyo S.O.S!
The spines are the dead giveaway for this suit! They have the same shape as MireGoji but without the purple tint that we see in the image below. We only ever saw this style of spine in the Millennium era films.
The only other suit with the millennium era spines in this color is the FinalGoji suit. We can rule out this being FinalGoji by comparing FinalGojis face to the one in the picture.
KiryuGoji has larger eyes and the whites of his eyes are more visible. FinalGoji (on the right) has more prominent ears, and you can’t see the whites of his eyes.
Here’s the thing though, there are actually 2 KiryuGoji suits. The second suit looks a lot like the first one, but it had a big scar on its chest. The lack of scar on this suit means that this is a picture from Godzilla Against MechaGodzilla, and not from Tokyo SOS, and that is how we know that this is the first KiryuGoji suit.
Oh I've got this really hard one. Can you figured out where it game from ?
I sure can! It’s a fan design made by tumblr user @yagamimi-aka-mimi and it’s one of my favorite Godzilla designs that I’ve ever seen!
also hey are you brainrotted enough to know which suit this one is lol
Oh!! Oh!! I know this one!! It looks kinda like GyakushuGoji but this is the T-Rex suit from “The Volcano Monster” (I think it’s called GigantisGoji).
I mainly know this because I’m familiar with this photo. (This is the only known photo of this suit in America!) but you can also tell because he doesn’t have ears!
The volcano monster suit (on the left) has no ears, while GyakushuGoji (on the right does).
Other than a few similarly small differences, the Volcano Monster suit is nearly identical to GyakushuGoji. This because it was going to be used for an American movie (called The Volcano Monster) that was planing to also reuse special effects shots from Godzilla Raids Again.
Ok ok I fully intend to stump you with this one. If it doesn't, I'll uh. I'll say "aw shucks".
Awwww heck. You have in fact stumped me. What is this from? Is this a fan animation?
I tricked u it's my own thing I made a few years ago. I figured it's extremely unlikely you'd possibly come across it before but the chances weren't zero lol