The name “fire shrimp” is a misnomer. You can’t actually burn shrimp when they’re underwater. Well, unless you make them out of magnesium, I guess, but then they’d be called “magnesium shrimp”.
Tag Archives: Denver Zoo – Denver
Siamese Crocodile (Crocodylus siamensis)
Crocodiles evolved to have all the bits that need air above the water because the ones that didn’t do that became fish.
Clown Fish and Anenome
If you had a venomous lawn, you wouldn’t have many visitors either.
Prevosts Squirrel (Callosciurus prevostii)
Thankful for the RAW file format.
Not the squirrel, me. Black and white mammals are hard to light properly in the limited time you have before they stop posing for you.
Micronesian Kingfisher (Todiramphus cinnamominus)
Thankful that bird jocks don’t taunt bird nerds for having underbites.
Spangled Cotinga (Cotinga cayana)
Thankful for the feast.
Golden Poison Frog (Phyllobates terribilis)
Thankful for (and looking for) all the ladies.
Green Araçari (Pteroglossus viridis)
Thankful that the carbon-12 nucleic resonance is 7.6 million electron-volts, but somewhat bothered at the anthropocentric bias of the theory.
Red-fan Parrot (Deroptyus accipitrinus)
Thankful that time exists, so that artificial narratives may be imposed upon a chaotic and capricious world.
White-eared Catbird (Ailuroedus buccoides)
Thankful not to be a turkey.
Blue-breasted Kingfisher (Halcyon malimbica)
Two different materials comprise the bill. This is why it curves up in the summer and down in the winter.
No longer
It had started out fun, but it had never felt right to her.
The warning sign, really, should have been his friend. Always hanging around the two of them, at first she’d thought he was an awkward “third wheel”, but he’d been his friend longer than she’d been with him, so she tried to keep an open mind.
She’d tried to set him up with some of her friends, and try the couple of couples thing. Neither of her friends lasted more than two dates with him. She’d thought it odd that when she asked why, they had both gotten quiet, looked away and mumbled something about him not really being interested in them.
So, it was back to three for a while, though she tried to make dates for just the two of them when she could. It was hard to play along with the charade of being a happy couple when he was sitting nearby, watching them. Something was wrong with those eyes, looking at his own reflection when he wasn’t staring at her.
She knew he was trying to be friendly. Telling jokes, trying to be witty. Still, it felt forced. Eventually, it felt creepy.
Last night was the last straw. It was just a movie, but he sat a little too close to her. She felt trapped between the two of them, unable to enjoy the night at all. When he’d left and was just the two of them, she tried to talk about but her boyfriend brushed the topic off yet again. She’d tried to make him see, but he wouldn’t.
This morning she sat, phone in hand, thinking, trying to work up the energy to have the discussion. To tell him that he had to make a choice. That it was him or her. But in the end, she decided the point was probably moot. She’d already made her decision.
Today, she was going to break up with Jessie.
She was going to be her own girl.
Blind Cave Fish (Astyanax mexicanus)
You know how, when you go camping, people complain about all the noseeums? This is what they look like.
Black and White Colobus
What’s black and white and pink inside?
Snow Monkey
“I don’t understand it. We all went trick-or-treating. They got candy apples, chocolate bars and popcorn. I got a rock.”
Palm Cockatoo (Probosciger aterrimus)
In honor of Halloween, I present to you, a dinosaur dressed up as a bird.
African Rock Python (Python sebae)
Some snakes don’t need the protection of overlapping scales and just deck themselves out in semi-precious stones instead.
Mudskipper
It is believed that the first fish to move onto land did so to avoid increased predation in the seas. This makes sense, because if there was little on land but plants and insects, it would be a safe place to be, so long as you could handle the sun. Today’s fish, not so much. If you’re leaping out of the water, you’re coming into a land that has birds, cats and crabs to eat you as well as the same sorts of insects that existed millions of years ago. This is of particular interest because those three types of animals (avian, mammal, insect and arthropod) have different kinds of eyes. Thus, if you want to be safe, you have to be able to see them without them seeing you. On top of that, you want your camouflage to work underwater as well. Thus, you get this type of patterning, where the top and sides match the rocks on which the fish sits and the bottom is lighter to blend in with the brightly-lit surface. You can also see a light speckling presumably helps to break up the pattern for those predators with eyes tuned for smooth expanses (such as the compound eye on an insect, I hypothesize).
One thing I’ve long wanted to do is get cameras that can see the infrared (like snakes) and the ultraviolet (like birds and insects). The camera helps you to see things you otherwise wouldn’t, and by adding things like macro lenses and microscopes, you can see closer like smaller animals do. Telephotos let you see like some birds. A polarizer can help you to see like some crustaceans and mollusks. But it takes different technology to extend the spectrum and, even then, it’s only an approximation. Still, I think it’s one worth (eventually) pursuing.
Black-necked Swan (Cygnus melancoryphus)
This black necked swan distrusts your intentions.
Throwback Thursday
This royal gramma inadvertently brushed its tail against against King Midas and will soon be completely unsuitable to eat. It should be thrown back.