We’ve had cloud cover for a week now, which might be not the best light for photographs, but I’m trying to get the hang of consistent adding, anyway. So I played around with staged-in-my-room photos, too.
First, have a comic page:
I wonder if I can make that (“anything sequential art”) a regular thing, like with the microfiction. I really wish I could loosen up and not get lost in details too much.
Then, have some other stuff:
In case you didn’t know yet, I like insects, spiders and the like. So, bit of a themed post.
A short video I captured of an ant dragging a rather hefty lunch home:
Bits of my stuff:
Links:
Moths Use Sonar-Jamming Defense to Fend Off Hunting Bats
Dancing caterpillars put off predators (cute photo, found via neatorama)
a bug sculptures photoset on flickr
Origami arthropods found on deviantart, different creators:
That artist of the last one has a lot of other great models in his gallery, only with the thumbnail links disabled.
Well, what with cold and otherwise induced brainfog, this was a dead month, blogging-wise. Let’s start the next one off, then.
I’m way more proud than I should be about finishing the Zodiac Chickens series. If you want to see all on one view, try the “Zodiac” tag.
Insect Photos:
Stag beetles are supposedly very rare, yet we keep finding them in our garden. I think it’s because our family tends to leave treestumps in the earth; the beetles’ larvae feed on rotting wood.
Flowers and other Nature stuff:
And some old-ish buildings:
These are some photos I found on deviantArt and liked:
Last Monday was the last day of a two-weeks-straight frost spell, and I had a look around outside.
Frost itself can be stupendously pretty when you get up close:
Those were taken at the edges of the university parking lot. Since that one is pretty close to the Moselle, and since I’d heard that this not unimportant water-street had been closed for ships due to ice, I went and had a look. I stuck around for a short while, and saw an icebreaker pass through to push the floes around.
I can hardly believe it. Never seen anything like that before. Just for comparison I took some photos the day before yesterday, and yesterday as well:
And I got lucky in another way. I not only saw a kingfisher, but I even caught a photo! 
The photo’s not good, but here it is, anyway
On the way home I decided to have a look at the Wied, a small river – I don’t think anything bigger than a kayak goes there.
Excluding a few spots, it was frozen solid. Two people were ice skating – ON THE RIVER, I TELL YOU! I’ve never seen a river completely frozen before. And, well, while I don’t even have ice skates, I did take a walk. It did turn out a nice day for birdspotting here, too.
Around the edges I found some more wonderful ice and frost structures. I couldn’t really capture any properly… They were so amazing. You could see the water had been higher when the first layer of ice formed, then ther was another layer underneath that formed with lower water, and the structures that formed between, and the air bubbles, and the light, and the frost growing on the edges. Breathtakingly beautiful.
Nature is fucking amazing.
Poor Cats.
Mice strike back!
This looks relatively harmless:
This was more serious and sad.
Birds, too!
And then the cats’ humans get crazy ideas…
Mind you, that’s not limited to cats, but happens to dogs, too
Though this one may escape: fluffy, white, canine – but not a pomeranian
News story: Bored octopus juggles crabs, shorts out aquarium
| Art: Colourful cartoony octopi by Rawjawbone – sample: |  |
| Photo (via National Geographic, click for original) | |
Supposedly smiling octopus |
looks more like this to me |
Nudi Pixel is a website dedicated to become a spotter’s guide. They have over 10.000 (ten thousand) photos in their gallery.
more nudibranch links:
Another flickr set
Blog entry at Scienceray with a selection of photos
I don’t really understand why some people (who are not allergic to them) are afraid of wasps and bees. Maybe there are more aggressive species elsewhere in the world, or are there other reasons?
I’ve found the ones around here harmless, as long as you didn’t give them reason, like flailing at them, or getting them under your foot. (That happened to me with a bumblebee once – it was how I found out they could sting at all.)
For example:
A bee that first crawled on my camera, then on my hand, where it alternated between crawling around and cleaning itself (shown here)
I shoved the lens of my camera into the hole in which those two wasps were building or caring for a nest, and they didn’t even take notice.
Insects are cute.
