Missouri Institute of Natural Science

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My daughter and I visited the Missouri Institute of Natural Science on Black Friday! Neither of us had been there before even though both of us had heard about it and were interested. We got there just after 11 and spent about 45 minutes looking at their exhibits and shop.

Their triceratops (name Henry) dominates the center of the largest space they have. It is part fossilized bones and part 3-D printed ‘bones’ to make a complete skeleton. Awesome!

There were some 3D printers to the side of the displays…it probably takes considerable time to create the pieces of a complete skeleton; there are pieces of a second dinosaur that they are printing and collecting under Henry.

A prehistoric fish was still in rock. I zoomed in for a closer view of the front fins.

Evidence of past eras of plants were also on display. Pinecones and dawn redwood!

A raptor (dinosaur…not modern bird) egg nest was in one of the cases.

And, of course, there were shark teeth…and modern shark jaws to compare. There were obviously sharks in the past that were much larger than any we have today!

Ammonites….the rock was donated and there no indication where it was found.

The display case of coprolites (dung that has been fossilized) was in a corner of one the museum bathrooms!

There was a case of trilobite fossils. I remember one of my teenage friends being keen to find them!

There is a display of lead mining equipment – part of the history of this part of Missouri.

It was worth the visit and I might take guests from out of town to the place (a good choice on a rainy day!).

There were more people arriving as we were leaving…we headed to lunch. The timing was great since by the time we finished our lunch there was a line out the door of the restaurant (the Black Friday shoppers had worked up an appetite).

Project FeederWatch

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My husband signed us up for Project FeederWatch and we are counting our feeder birds together – 2 days a week, an AM and PM time each day for a total of 2 hours. We have comfy chairs situated at a large window and leave our binoculars within reach. I do the logging into the app on my phone as we observe – no paper involved at all. This is the view from our window. I moved the chairs from around the table before our latest count. It’s a very calming activity. I usually have a cup of hot tea at my elbow.

We’ve had several rainy days. The light was poor enough that we opted to take the screens off the window (no bird strikes there so far). It made photography a little easier too.

A squirrel has come through may times while we’ve counted; it only stopped at a feeder once (didn’t manage to get anything) since there were plenty of acorns around and it’s the squirrel’s time of year to bury them!

The most numerous birds are sparrows (white throated and white crowned) and finches (gold and house). There are a couple of juncos but we had more last year so maybe they have not all arrived in our area yet from their breeding areas to the north. There are occasional titmice, chickadees, and a red-bellied woodpecker. The grackles are also occasional….they are too big to get much from our feeders; one or two come around to try but don’t stay long fortunately.

Our holly tree has berries, but we haven’t had any hard frosts yet…haven’t seen any birds eating the berries.

Registering for a College Class

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I registered for a class at Missouri State University last week – Identification of Woody Plants. It has been over 40 years since I did this last! Lots has changed in those years.

  • I didn’t need to go through an admissions process ahead of time or get transcripts sent because I am part of the cohort of people over 62 years old that can attend classes at much reduced cost (MSU 62). I called their office a week before the registration day to confirm. I also asked about the pre-req for the class I wanted to take; I had the pre-req in my long-ago college experience but without the transcript, how would they know? I was advised to email the instructor to get a waiver…which I did and they waived the pre-req for me.

  • The course catalog and schedule are all online now rather in paper/soft cover books. I knew that there were only 7 slots remaining in the course I wanted to take before I headed to registration.

  • The registration for the MSU 62 cohort was held the week before classes started which is later than I usually registered back in the 70s. I arrived just after they opened. The receptionist for the event handed me forms and sent me to tables/chairs to fill them out. The course I wanted to take was not on the paper version of a course list on the tables, so I was glad I had the numbers for it written down to enter in the appropriate places on the form. I also had the printed version of the email exchange with the instructor. I was so focused on the requirements for my degree 40 years ago…now I am just taking whatever interests me and not for credit.

  • When I finished the forms, I joined the queue in chairs waiting for advisors…and thoroughly enjoyed a donut while I waited. I don’t remember ever having food provided when I registered for college classes before!

  • The advisor got me admitted and registered very quickly. She discovered that I already had a number with the university (maybe because I had donated back in 2020).

  • After that I was routed to a second person that printed out my concise schedule and talked to me about setting up my computer accounts, books and parking permits. It appears that the only cost is going to be for the parking pass – quite a bargain even compared to the costs I had in the 1970s. In addition, the textbook for the class I am taking is listed as ‘optional’ so I am waiting to buy it until after I hear what the instructor says in the first session.

Less than an hour after I entered the building, I was walking back to the parking garage. Along the way I photographed the colorful school mascot (bear) at the corner of the building. I am looking forward to this course…not so different from the way I always looked forward to the fall during my education-intense years…but savoring that I won’t be taking any tests!

Museum of Osteology…then Ducks

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The Museum of Osteology is another museum my daughter and I visited on July 4th. It is a short drive from the First American’s Museum in Oklahoma City. It is a small museum with lots of skeletons; I was glad we were there when it wasn’t crowded. I found myself doing comparisons – which animals have the more neck vertebrae (hint: it isn’t the giraffe) and which animals walk on their toes. There was a whale skeleton mounted from the ceiling that brought back memories of the one in the Smithsonian’s Natural History Museum. There was a case of cat skulls whose health problems manifested in their bones and sclerotic rings of owls that prevent their eyes from moving within the socket. I didn’t see any bird skeletons with spurs although I don’t thing the collect included a peacock skeleton.  I also noticed that the skull of a gila monster has bumps that seemed to match the bumps of its skin!

After the Osteology Museum we headed to Norman to check in to our hotel then to Brandt Park where my daughter had seen a lot of ducks during a previous visit. There were more ducks that she remembered and almost all of them seemed to rush toward us when we got there! There were a lot of juvenile ducks and maybe they thought we were bringing food?

There was a white domesticated duck – and one that might have been a daughter of that duck.

There was one female with a juvenile that looked a lot smaller than the other young ducks and the female seemed very attentive: maybe the last of a late brood?

We headed back toward Oklahoma City to visit the memorial there when it began to sprinkle in Norman. The clouds were very thick. With my daughter driving, I was free to photograph the sun just barely showing from the edge of the cloud layer.

Gleanings of the Week Ending May 11, 2024

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

A new way to quantify climate change impacts: 'Outdoor days' - Noting the number of days per year that outdoor temperatures are comfortable enough for normal outdoor activities. In the North, in a place like Russia or Canada, you gain a significant number of outdoor days. And when you go south to places like Bangladesh or Sudan, it's bad news. You get significantly fewer outdoor days.

Is filtered water healthier than tap water? - Water filters, it seems, are having a heyday – particularly in North America, Europe, and China. I was a little surprised that the article did not mention microplastics in water – even in countries that have relatively high standards for their water supplies.

Baltimore’s Toxic Legacies Have Reached a Breaking Point – “Normal” southwest of the collapsed Frances Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore…one of the most polluted places in the U.S. – a different perspective on the bridge collapse.

European ruling linking climate change to human rights could be a game changer — here’s how - On 9 April, the European Court of Human Rights delivered a groundbreaking ruling: states are obliged to protect their citizens from the threats and harms of climate change. And in that regard, judges said, Switzerland’s climate action has been inadequate. Without prescribing specific years or percentage reductions, the ruling set out how a nation can show it is compliant. It must set out a timetable and targets for achieving carbon neutrality, and pathways and interim targets for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Measures must be implemented in a timely, appropriate, and consistent manner. Governments must also provide evidence that they have complied with targets, and update targets regularly.

Positive perceptions of solar projects - A new survey has found that for U.S. residents living within three miles of a large-scale solar development, positive attitudes outnumbered negative attitudes by almost a 3-to-1 margin.

18th-Century Foundation Uncovered at Colonial Williamsburg – Even in much studied areas, there are still new things to discover!

Metabolic health before vaccination determines effectiveness of anti-flu response - Metabolic health (normal blood pressure, blood sugar and cholesterol levels, among other factors) influences the effectiveness of influenza vaccinations….even in people with obesity which the vaccine had previously been documented as being less effective.

The environmental cost of China's addiction to cement - Today, China still accounts for just over half of the world's total annual 4.1bn tons of cement production (52%) – followed by India (6.2%), the EU (5.3%) and the US (1.9%). Little of that cement produced in China is exported. In 2020 the country used an estimated 2.4 billion tons of cement, 23 times the amount used in the US in the same year.

Teotihuacan's Pyramids Damaged by Ancient Earthquakes – Damage from megathrust earthquakes at the site between about AD 100 and 600: fracturing and dislodging of large masonry blocks used to construct the buildings, as well as chipping of blocks that comprised the pyramids' outer stairs.

Mini-colons revolutionize colorectal cancer research - Scientists have combined microfabrication and tissue engineering techniques to develop miniature colon tissues that can simulate the complex process of tumorigenesis outside the body with high fidelity, giving rise to tumors that closely resemble those found in vivo….offering a new path to research colon cancers and their treatment.

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 13, 2024

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Touching Image of Intergenerational Love Wins Black and White Minimalist Photography Prize – Minimalist…but powerful.

How an English castle became a stork magnet – 30 White Storks from a rescue project in Poland introduced in the rewilded habitat at Knepp Castle in southern England in 2016. At one point, storks even built nests on Knepp Castle itself although they usually build their nests in the crown of huge oak trees. The young storks started migrating in 2019. The colony has grown to about 80 storks…and is the first breeding colony in Britain in 600 years.

Evidence for Domesticated Chickens Dated to 400 B.C. - A study of eggshell fragments unearthed at 12 archaeological sites located along the Silk Road corridor in Central Asia.

Noisy Summer Ahead for U.S. as Dueling Broods of Cicadas Emerge - It is the first time these two broods are going to be emerging in the same year since Thomas Jefferson was in the White House. Mating season will last until July.

California’s Live Oaks in Focus - Some centuries old, the oaks are magnificent giants that can grow up to 100 feet tall and are what remains of a forest that once blanketed the region.

New approach to monitoring freshwater quality can identify sources of pollution, and predict their effects - Analyzing the diversity of organic compounds dissolved in freshwater provides a reliable measure of ecosystem health. Microparticles from car tires, pesticides from farmers' fields, and toxins from harmful algal blooms are just some of the organic chemicals that can be detected using the new approach.

Cars & Road Trips Made a Huge Difference in Women’s History – One of the first cars ever built got taken by a woman, without permission, on the world’s first road trip! Bertha Benz wanted her husband’s invention to be seen out in the country so people would buy it, but her husband Karl Benz was being timid about it. So, she took the car out on a road trip with her kids.

Common household chemicals pose new threat to brain health - The new study discovered that some common home chemicals specifically affect the brain's oligodendrocytes, a specialized cell type that generates the protective insulation around nerve cells. Loss of oligodendrocytes underlies multiple sclerosis and other neurological diseases. They identified chemicals that selectively damaged oligodendrocytes belong to two classes: organophosphate flame retardants and quaternary ammonium compounds.

The Soundtrack of Spring on the Platte River – Sandhill cranes staging last month along the Central Platte River in Nebraska. So many birds….lots of sound.

These Are the Most Polluted National Parks – Many national parks are suffering from air pollution and facing threats stemming from human-caused climate change. 98 percent of parks suffer from visible haze pollution, while 96 percent are grappling with ozone pollution that could be harmful to human health. Four of the nation’s parks with the unhealthiest air are in California: Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, Mojave National Preserve and Yosemite National Park. Another California site, Death Valley National Park, also made the top ten list. 57 percent of national parks are facing at least one threat stemming from climate change that could permanently alter its ecosystems, with many parks grappling with multiple issues at the same time. Invasive species were the most prevalent issue.

Slime Mold

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One morning when I came back through our back gate after walking around the neighborhood ponds, I saw something unexpected in the grass. At first, I thought it was some escaped packing peanuts.

I took a closer look. Not packing peanuts. I took pictures….and later put them into iNaturalist. It identified it as a slime mold! I think I had expected slime molds to be shiny…and yellow…because that is how they were depicted in my biology textbook (many years ago when I was in college). But – it turns out that they dry out and are no longer slimy and they are other colors beside yellow too!

It’s thrilling to see something in my own yard that I’ve known about only from books previously….another thing to like about my move to Missouri!

Gleanings of the Week Ending August 13, 2022

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What a decade of Curiosity has taught us about Mars – Looking for signs of life.

Zion National Park, Utah – A view of the park from the International Space Station. A piece of trivia from the post: Cyanobacterial blooms are a threat to hikers and wildlife – exacerbated by intense summer heat.

Air pollution, including during wildfires, shows ill effects in children -So many questions popped into my mind as I read this article: Does keeping children indoors with modern air conditioning/heating filtered air help? Further air purification required? The children in the study were 9-11 years old; are some of the markers also indicators of stress they may have developed knowing there were wildfires?

Ultra high-speed photography captures hidden human figures in moving water – Eye candy

Heat pumps prove themselves during a harsh Maine Winter – Modern heat pumps do the job even at -21 degrees in Maine!

Neolithic Watermelons may have been valued for their seeds – Snacks! And now most watermelons we buy in stores doen’t have seeds at all!

Nahuku Lava Tube in Hawai’i Volcanoes National Park Closed to study its stability – Also known as Thurston Lava Tube. I walked through it when we were in Hawaii several years ago.

Vitamin K prevents cell death: New function for a long-known molecule – Important for blood clotting….but new research shows it is also a potent antioxidant that ameliorates cellular iron’s role in cell death (ferroptosis). There will probably be a lot of subsequent research following up this finding.

The science of making cheese – Infographic that shows the 4 steps: acidification, coagulation, reducing moisture content, and maturation.

The mysterious inner life of the octopus – Interesting article….or just look at the pictures!

Patuxent Research Refuge – Misc.

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Of course, there are other things besides waterlilies, milkweeds and goldenrod to see this time of year at the South Tract of Patuxent Research Refuge. I did some experimental photography with some grass seed heads and asters…liked the results.

The cattails are exploding with fluff. If it doesn’t float away fast enough it becomes matted around the stalk.

Many plants are going to seed in the meadow.

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In the forest there are hits of color…just a few leaves at this point. Green still dominates.

There was an old jumble of trunks…some upright and others leaning over…with shelf fungus in profusion.

There is a bird blind around a collection of feeders but I wasn’t quiet enough to walk up to it without all the birds taking flight. I managed to notice finches on the feeders and mourning doves below.

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Sometimes something appears that I don’t expect – like this fire hydrant in the meadow. It isn’t that far from the visitor center but far enough that I would have thought one closer would be more useful and it was surrounded by wild vegetation – a little surprise. It was rusted enough that I wondered if it was still functional.

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Overall – every time I got to the refuge, I notice something that I haven’t seen before!

Gleanings of the Week Ending June 5, 2021

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Infographic: Animals of Different Species Hybridize | The Scientist Magazine® - Hybrids that fill a new environmental niche.

Britain’s Medieval Population Suffered From Cancer - Archaeology Magazine and Cancer rates in medieval Britain were around ten times higher than previously thought, study suggests | University of Cambridge – The same story from two sources. Cancer rates prior to the modern tumor-inducing chemicals from industry and tobacco were higher than previously thought.

Cities Have Distinct Microbial Signatures: Study | The Scientist Magazine® - Samples collected between 2015 and 2017 in transit stations in major cities. More than 4,000 known species…and 14,000 species that had DNA sequences not found in any database!

Top 25 birds of the week: Resident Birds! - Wild Bird Revolution and Top 25 birds of the week: Bird Biodiversity! - Wild Bird Revolution – So many bird pictures! I’m doing a little catching up this week.

The Blooming Mid-Atlantic – Near where I live…places I have been for vacation/birding.

Photography In The National Parks: Seeing The Forest For The Trees – A little lesson in photographing forests and trees and leaves from Rebecca Lawson

Greenland glacial meltwaters rich in mercury -- ScienceDaily – The study looked at nutrients in glacier melt…not expecting to find the high level of mercury. Now there are lots of questions about the potential impact on fishing – Greenland’s primary industry.

The nature reserve with a 500-year plan - BBC Future – Zealandia, an ecosanctuary in Wellington, New Zealand enclosed by a 5.3-mile predatory exclusion fence.

Arizona’s Meteor Crater – Another place I’ve visited… as seen by an instrument on Landsat 8.

Cicadas Fall Prey to a Psychedelic-Producing Fungus That Makes Their Butts Fall Off | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – I think I saw one with a white butt on my first walk around my yard!

The Royal Natural History from the late 1800s

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The Royal Natural History series was published in the mid-1890s by Frederick Warne & Co. – the publisher of Beatrix Potter’s books a few years later in the early 1900s.

These natural history books were edited by Richard Lydekker with a long list of illustrators. I enjoyed browsing through 5 of the volumes back in November: one, two, four, five and six. Two sample images from each volume are below.

As I was looking at these volumes again for this post, I discovered that there were a lot more books to look at. They were published as 6 volumes, 12 sections….many of the ‘volumes’ are multiple books! So – I’ve bookmarked the Internet Archive list again…planning to go back to look at the books I missed on the first pass!

Reeve’s Conchologia iconica

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I usually select three eBooks to feature in a monthly post…and I’ll do that in a week or so. Today I want to feature a series of books I found recently on Internet Archive: Conchologia iconica, or, Illustrations of the shells of molluscous animals by Lovell Augustus Reeve. There are 20 volumes (Vol v.01 (1843), Vol v.02 (1843), Vol v.03 (1845), Vol v.04 (1847), Vol v.05 (1849), Vol v.06 (1851), Vol v.07 (1854), Vol v.08 (1855), Vol v.09 (1856), Vol v.10 (1858), Vol v.11 (1859), Vol v.12 (1860), Vol v.13 (1862), Vol v.14 (1864), Vol v.15 (1866), Vol v.16 (1866), Vol v.17 (1870), Vol v.18 (1873), Vol v.19 (1874), and Vol v.20 (1878)) all published in the mid-1800s. The author died in 1865 and the series was continued by George Brettingham Sowerby. Soweby did the plates for most of the volumes. I found a reference about the books that said: It will always remain a standard work, although many of the species which Reeve created are now held to be invalid. That’s probably to be expected given the many years since they were published; science is always learning more. Still – the plates are beautiful and provide a broad view of the variety of shells known at the time. I collected one plate from each volume to use with this post.

The question that I wonder about is how many of the mollusks that produced these shells have gone extinct in the intervening years. How many types of shells represented in the books are no longer grown? The International Union of Conservation of Nature lists 310 recently extinct species.

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 14, 2019

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The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The Two Genomes in Every Eukaryotic Cell | The Scientist Magazine® and Infographic: How the Mitochondrial and Nuclear Genomes Interact | The Scientist Magazine® - A lot has been discovered about mitochondrial DNA (and genetics) since I was in college in the 1970s!

Yellowstone's Wolves: Infusing Wildness into The Landscape – The story of wolves in Yellowstone over the past 25 years – the positive impact on the ecosystem as a whole

Sunlight-Tracking Polymer, Inspired by Sunflowers, Could Maximize Solar Power | Smart News | Smithsonian – Another way that solar panels can gain efficiency.

Springfield Plateau: Yellowjacket Nest – A yellowjacket tale from Springfield MO. I was surprised that ice was the treatment for a sting. I’ve always used baking soda with ice as the backup plan if there isn’t any baking soda available.

Why biodegradables won’t solve the plastic crisis - BBC Future – There are only pieces of a solution at this point….nothing comprehensive. It seems like the best strategy for at home is to reduce all single use plastic as much as possible. There are some easy things like reusable shopping and produce bags, but it becomes hard quickly. So many groceries and toiletries only come in plastic containers.

Remote Sensing Data Advances Soil Health Science – Cover crops and no-till practices were an advantage in record-breaking rainfalls of spring 2019.

How the House Finch Conquered Your Feeder…and A Continent – A little history of House Finches – originally from the southwest and Mexico…now in found widely across North America.

How the Aztecs could improve modern urban farming: Chinampas: An old technique might provide new solutions to sustainable urban agriculture -- ScienceDaily – The article made the multiple harvests per season seem feasible in tropical wetlands…not so much in the temperate zone where the artificial islands would go through a real winter although maybe it would just mean the use of cover crops during that time period.

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week: December – Bird photography to enjoy!

Listening to Nature: The Emerging Field of Bioacoustics - Yale E360 – An up and coming technology for remote sensing of birds, insects, frogs and other animals.

Bugs 101

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I took a lot of Coursera courses between 2015 and 2017….then I got so busy with other things that I didn’t do any in 2018. Now I am back to an occasional course when I have a lull in other activities.

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The most recent course was in August – Bug 101: Insect-Human Interactions from University of Alberta.

I enjoyed the course beyond the content too. It was more thought provoking that I thought it would be.

  • It was very evident how much has been learned since my biology undergraduate courses in the 1970s and I found myself thinking more about taking some biology courses again – challenging myself to identify all the deltas between the first time I took them and now.

  • The world has changed too…much caused by what we have done (or were doing prior to 1970 but didn’t quite realize the impact of our actions at the time). We were just beginning to fully understand the impact of DDT on the environment when I was in school.

  • Scanning ScienceDaily in my news feed helps keep me updated at a ‘headline’ level but having a course integrate the topic is something I should pursue for areas I am really interested in.

  • It’s good to know that Integrated Pest Management is pushing toward more sustainable agribusiness.

3 Free eBooks – October 2017

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I am always thrilled to find a new source of eBooks. This month it was the Smithsonian making 1,000 illustrated Japanese Texts available online. I’ve just started making my way through. Here are three eBooks I’ve enjoyed so far.

Kono, Bairei. Bairei gafu. Yamada Unsodo, Kyoto, Meiji 38 [1905]. Three volumes available from Smithsonian Libraries here. Birds!

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Utagawa, Sadahide. Bansho shashin zafu. Sonoharaya Shosuke, Toto, Bunkyu 4 [1864]. Available from Smithsonian Libraries here. Nature and art…a great combo.

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Kobayashi, Bunshici. Bansho zukan. Kobayashi Bunshici, Tokyo, Meiji 34 [1901]. Two volumes available from Smithsonian Libraries here. More plants and animals...the bamboo images would make an elegant wallpaper.

3 Free eBooks – August 2017

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I’ve been enjoying colorful magazines on various topics that are from 2016 and available on Internet Archive. It’s like browsing through a stack of periodicals in the dentist’s office!

House Beautiful (from US and UK) from 2015 and 2016. Available from Internet Archive here. Lots of food for thought if you are redecorating, renovating, or moving to another house and wanting to add something to make it ‘home.’

World of Animals from 2014 and 2017 available from Internet Archive here. Great pictures of animals – many in action – from all over the world.

Canadian Architecture and Design 2009 available from Internet Archive here. Again – great photography…beautiful places. I hope pocket doors become popular again!