tagged w/ caves
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Lake Namtso, one of two holy lakes in Tibet, forms the centre of the valley floor and is surrounded by the Nyanchen Tanglha mountain range. In 1986, Robert Hefner, President of the Bradshaw Foundation, found himself standing here on top of the world (or what felt like it) a little while before he made a remarkable discovery. This is how he described it: "The deep blue Tibetan sky encompassed barren, craggy, rocky peaks, full of spectacular geological structures typical of the Tibetan plateau. Beside the road was a pile of carved religious rocks and a pole with many fluttering prayer flags. Only 300 metres below was a sapphire lake enclosed by snowy peaks: the great valley of Lake Namtso." http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/section-blog/42989-a-note-on-the-rock-art-of-lake-namtso-tibetLake Namtso, one of two holy lakes in Tibet, forms the centre of the valley floor and... more
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worrg
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added this
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7 months ago
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Click on link to watch video
PART ONE...
Fungus sweeps across the country, killing bats
Biologists believe the long-range consequences could be dire, but the remedies could be just as dangerous.
By Louis Sahagun, Los Angeles Times
April 3, 2011
Reporting from Ruidoso, N.M.—
More than 100 hibernating bats hang from the vaulted ceiling of a chilly gallery in central New Mexico's Fort Stanton Cave, seemingly unaware of the lights from helmet lanterns sweeping over their gargoyle-like faces.
The mood is heavy with anxiety as biologists Marikay Ramsey and Debbie Buecher search for signs of white-nose syndrome, a novel, infectious and lethal cold-loving fungus that digests the skin and wings of hibernating bats and smudges their muzzles with a powdery white growth.
"These bats look fine, which is a relief," U.S. Bureau of Land Management endangered animal specialist Ramsey said as she prepared to log the humidity and temperature of the cave in a hand-held computer. "But we still worry that the disease could hit New Mexico this winter or the next. If that happens, we may have to close every cave and abandoned mine in the state."
Biologists across the nation are facing a similarly grim scenario. Since it was discovered in New York four years ago, the fungus has swept across 17 states as far west as Oklahoma, killing a million bats. A majority of the dead were little brown bats, which have lost an estimated 20% of their population in the northeastern United States over the last four years. The fungus seems to prefer the 25 species of hibernating bats, but each of the 45 species of bats in the United States and Canada may be susceptible to white-nose syndrome.
Geomyces destructans was first documented in 2007 in New York's Howe Caverns, commercial attraction visited by thousands of tourists from around the world each year. As the disease began to spread, researchers learned that a similar fungal growth had long been seen on the faces and wings of hibernating bats in Europe.
Now scientists are scrambling to figure out whether the fungus was introduced by a bat or a caver from Europe. If it is from Europe, they wonder, has the fungus killed bats there or have they adapted to living with the pathogen? Or did the fungus already live in North America but recently mutate to become the virulent wildlife disease?
"It is unbelievably sad and disheartening, and we can't seem to move fast enough to get ahead of it," said U.S. Geological Survey wildlife biologist LeAnn White. "We may be looking at phenomenal losses across the country with unknown ecological consequences."
Bats have always existed at close to the numbers seen prior to the arrival of white-nose syndrome, feasting on such night-flying insects as mosquitoes, which transmit West Nile virus, and agricultural pests damaging to cotton and corn crops. They also pollinate plants, including the saguaro cactus. "We don't know what will happen if they disappear," said USGS biologist Paul Cryan. A recent study published in Science estimates that the value of pest control provided by bats each year is at least $3.7 billion nationwide.
As the syndrome continues to spread westward along migratory flyways, Thomas Kunz and Jonathan Reichard of Boston University's Center for Ecology and Conservation Biology have urged the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to list the little brown bat, one of the most common mammals in the United States, as endangered.
The listing would provide the greatest legal protections — on both public and private lands — for the chocolate-colored, mouse-sized insectivore which, the biologists are virtually certain, is facing regional extirpation in the northeastern United States within 15 years.
Greg Turner, an endangered animal specialist for the Pennsylvania Game Commission, knows the sickening feeling of discovering hundreds of carcasses of these nocturnal animals in caves he has monitored for decades. "There are a million bats in Pennsylvania alone, and half of them are dead," he said. "I'd be surprised if the disease hasn't taken up half the nation by the end of this winter."
Hibernation, Turner pointed out, is essential for the survival of individual bats during a portion of the year when there are no insects to eat. It is also why the disease has been so successful. During hibernation, a bat's body temperature drops to the ideal range for growth of the fungus.
"A mammalian fungus would be expected to have a restriction for cold growth because mammals require warmth, but that's where the novelty of this fungus comes in," said Carol Meteyer, a pathologist with the geological survey's National Wildlife Health Center. "It occurs in caves and requires cold temperatures, and when a bat hibernates, it becomes the temperature of its environment."
And because a bat's immune system is suppressed during hibernation, its body does not fight off the fungus.
"So when I look at bat tissue under the microscope," said Meteyer, "there are no signs of inflammatory response to defend the body from the infection. The body is not recognizing it as foreign."
CONTINUED...
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IMPORTANT NOTE FROM EthicalVegan: I see that comments and replies have "cut apart" Parts One and Two. So -- and because this is that important -- please scroll down to see Part Two of this article.Click on link to watch video
PART ONE...
Fungus sweeps across the country,... more
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Dr. Berger used Google Earth technology to map identified caves and fossil deposits and to discover new caves via satellite imagery: “With the help of the navigation facility and high-resolution satellite imagery in Google Earth, Professor Berger went on to find almost 500 previously unidentified caves and fossil sites, even though the area is one of the most explored in Africa. One of these fossil sites yielded the remarkable discovery of a new species, Australopithecus sediba. http://www.makeahistory.com/index.php/your-details/296-with-the-help-of-google-earth-new-hominid-species-discovered-in-south-africaDr. Berger used Google Earth technology to map identified caves and fossil deposits... more
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worrg
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1 year ago
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You know what's really annoying? Teenagers. Even more annoying? Teenagers inventing legitimately useful things and getting awards for it. Meet Alexander Kendrick, the 16-year old inventor of a new low-frequency radio that allows for cave-texting, which isn't some fresh new euphemism, it just means people can finally text while deep underground. How deep, you ask -- well, Alexander's team of intrepid explorers went far enough (946 feet) to record the deepest known digital communication ever in the United States. What you see the young chap holding above is the collapsible radio antenna, though plans are already afoot to ruggedize and miniaturize the equipment to make it more practical for cave explorers and rescuers. Way to go, kid.
http://www.engadget.com/2010/02/01/teenager-invents-low-frequency-radio-for-underground-communicati/You know what's really annoying? Teenagers. Even more annoying? Teenagers... more
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In March of 1994 some spelunkers exploring an extensive cave system in northern Spain poked their lights into a small side gallery and noticed two human mandibles jutting out of the sandy soil. The cave, called El Sidrón, lay in the midst of a remote upland forest of chestnut and oak trees in the province of Asturias, just south of the Bay of Biscay. Suspecting that the jawbones might date back as far as the Spanish Civil War, when Republican partisans used El Sidrón to hide from Franco's soldiers, the cavers immediately notified the local Guardia Civil.
But when police investigators inspected the gallery, they discovered the remains of a much larger—and, it would turn out, much older—tragedy.
Within days, law enforcement officials had shoveled out some 140 bones, and a local judge ordered the remains sent to the national forensic pathology institute in Madrid. By the time scientists finished their analysis (it took the better part of six years), Spain had its earliest cold case. The bones from El Sidrón were not Republican soldiers, but the fossilized remains of a group of Neanderthals who lived, and perhaps died violently, approximately 43,000 years ago. The locale places them at one of the most important geographical intersections of prehistory, and the date puts them squarely at the center of one of the most enduring mysteries in all of human evolution.
The Neanderthals, our closest prehistoric relatives, dominated Eurasia for the better part of 200,000 years. During that time, they poked their famously large and protruding noses into every corner of Europe, and beyond—south along the Mediterranean from the Strait of Gibraltar to Greece and Iraq, north to Russia, as far west as Britain, and almost to Mongolia in the east. Scientists estimate that even at the height of the Neanderthal occupation of western Europe, their total number probably never exceeded 15,000. Yet they managed to endure, even when a cooling climate turned much of their territory into something like northern Scandinavia today—a frigid, barren tundra, its bleak horizon broken by a few scraggly trees and just enough lichen to keep the reindeer happy.
By the time of the tragedy at El Sidrón, however, the Neanderthals were on the run, seemingly pinned down in Iberia, pockets of central Europe, and along the southern Mediterranean by a deteriorating climate, and further squeezed by the westward spread of anatomically modern humans as they emerged from Africa into the Middle East and beyond. Within another 15,000 years or so, the Neanderthals were gone forever, leaving behind a few bones and a lot of questions. Were they a clever and perseverant breed of survivors, much like us, or a cognitively challenged dead end? What happened during that period, roughly 45,000 to 30,000 years ago, when the Neanderthals shared some parts of the Eurasian landscape with those modern human migrants from Africa? Why did one kind of human being survive, and the other disappear?
Continued...
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2008/10/neanderthals/hall-textIn March of 1994 some spelunkers exploring an extensive cave system in northern Spain... more
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Into the Earth is a table book that goes in depth into wine caves in the Napa Valley, for the first time you get an indepth look at some extraodinary wine caves. Three story high caves, Ballroom, and much more. If you are into Wine then this book would be somthing of interest. Some have seen Napa on the surface but this book allows you see what goes on beneath the surface. Photographer and writer Daniel D’Agostini shares truly engaging stories of his explorations into wine caves for the last several decades, and Molly Chappellet is his creative partner for layout. This book is the culmination of their journeys and explorations.Into the Earth is a table book that goes in depth into wine caves in the Napa Valley,... more
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Walking down the Suck Creek Mountain Road in Prentice Cooper State Forest, I was on my way to the see kayaking, but I never made it. However, I took some time to enjoy some of God's beautiful nature. I have seen this little hole in the side of this rock more than a hundred times, but never got in it, so today I did. I like the scenery and the way the trees enclose you with all of the leaves still on them is kind of neat.Walking down the Suck Creek Mountain Road in Prentice Cooper State Forest, I was on my... more
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Awesome! Another reason to visit Mexico!
The Crystal Cave of Giants was accidentally discovered in 2000 by miners working in the silver and lead mine at Naica, Mexico. It lies almost 300 meters (900 feet) below the surface of the Earth and it contains the largest crystals known in the world, by far. The largest crystals are over 11 meters long (36 feet) and weigh 55 tons.Awesome! Another reason to visit Mexico!
The Crystal Cave of Giants was... more
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Smoo
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added this
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2 years ago
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Amazing to think that we have such a mysterious and beautiful world beneath us on our own planet.Amazing to think that we have such a mysterious and beautiful world beneath us on our... more
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CBoldt
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added this
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2 years ago
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So, imagine that one day you find yourself sitting on your 17-acre plot of land in Napa Valley, California, and you're, like, "WTF. I have too much priceless contemporary art to fit in my 1887 original farmhouse. I know...I'll drill a 4,500 sf tunnel through my hillside vineyard and put my art in it! La!"
Apparently, people like you exist in this funny world of ours. Behold:
"Taking advantage of economical cave-drilling technologies developed for the local wine industry, the Art Cave is conceived as a large-scale, passively conditioned, subterranean space. The site is beneath a north-facing slope formerly terraced for prune orchards. The spaces of the Art Cave are designed to respond to and complement the domestically-scaled display spaces of the farmhouse. The inherently curvaceous geometry of the cave is exploited to create a space lacking the familiar architectural cues of corner, edge and detail. This zone of the middle scale is occupied by art. Inside the seemingly boundless space of the cave, the encounter with art occurs in a context unencumbered by traditional functions or associations."
Four words: art in a hole. I wonder what Plato would say about this...So, imagine that one day you find yourself sitting on your 17-acre plot of land in... more
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At a starting bid of $300,000 this Missouri home inside of a cave has three bedrooms, and three freshwater springs. It was formerly a concert-venue, that hosted MC5, Ted Nugent, and Ike and Tina Turner. I would like to live here.At a starting bid of $300,000 this Missouri home inside of a cave has three bedrooms,... more
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