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Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
Only counting books I read (or soon-ish will have read) in their entirety…
Below are starting dates, titles, authors, and some quotes / comments that I could think of. :p Hopefully I have not typo-ed up the quotes too badly.
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22-Jan-2025: 1. Högt bland Saarijärvis moar (a.k.a. Under the North Star #1) by Väinö Linna
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26-Feb-2025: 2. The precipice: Existential risk and the future of humanity by Toby Ord
Weeeee: Morbidly fascinating disaster scenarios. Deep time. Mindfucks. Toby seems like a kind guy really, but -
Meh: A pronatalist position (unsurprisingly, heh), though he acknowledges the existence of antinatalism. Sometimes TTFMDA (Too Technical For My Dumb Ass).
“[The] passage of a star through our Solar System could disrupt planetary orbits, causing the Earth to freeze or boil or even crash into another planet. But this has only a one in 100,000 chance over the next 2 billion years.”
“On average, mammalian species last about one million years /.../ What can happen over such a span, ten thousand times longer than our century?
Such a timescale is enough to repair the damage that we, in our immaturity, have inflicted upon the Earth. In thousands of years, almost all of our present refuse will have decayed away. If we can cease adding new pollution, the oceans and forests will be unblemished once more. Within 100,000 years, the Earth’s natural systems will have scrubbed our atmosphere clean of over 90% of the carbon we have released, leaving the climate mostly restored and rebalanced. So long as we can learn to care rightly for our home, these blots on our record could be wiped clean, all within the lifespan of a typical species /.../
About ten million years hence, even the damage we have inflicted upon biodiversity is expected to have healed. This is how long it took for species diversity to fully recover from previous mass extinctions and our best guess for how long it will take to recover from our current actions.”
“But there is an alternative approach to population ethics according to which human extinction might not be treated as bad at all. The most famous proponent is the philosopher Jan Narveson, who put the central idea in slogan form: ‘We are in favor of making people happy, but neutral about making happy people.’ Many different theories of population ethics have been developed to try to capture this intuition, and are known as person-affecting views. Some of these theories say there is nothing good about adding thousands of future generations with high wellbeing – and thus nothing bad (at least in terms of the wellbeing of future generations) if humanity instead went extinct.”
“Investigate possibilities for making the deliberate or reckless imposition of human extinction risk an international crime.”
Me in margin: “Prison is better than breeding.” :D
NB: My non-breeding is extremely deliberate. Human extinction is a feature, not a bug, of my non-breeding. (Although I would remain childfree even if I knew Homo sapiens would “never” die out.) No, you can’t have my eggs for growing humans in vats. No, you can’t have my uterus after I die.
“Cosmologists believe that the largest coherent structures in the universe are on the scale of about a billion light years across, the width of the largest voids in the cosmic web. With the accelerating expansion of the universe tearing things apart, and only gravity to work with, lifeless matter is unable to organise itself into any larger scales.
However, there is no known physical limit preventing humanity from forming coherent structures or patterns at much larger scales – up to a diameter of about 30 billion light years. We might thus create the largest structures in the universe and be unique even in these terms. By stewarding the galaxies in this region, harvesting and storing their energy, we may also be able to create the most energetic events in the universe or the longest-lasting complex structures.”
...
Me in margin: “WOW! But, eh, meh, personally I kind of just want to upload photos and drink Monster.”
Toby: *disappointed noises*
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2-Mar-2025: 3. Sunnanäng by Astrid Lindgren
Collection of 4 Swedish fairytales, all of which begin with ”A long time ago, in the days of poverty…”
- Sunnanäng
- Spelar min lind, sjunger min näktergal?
- Tu tu tu!
- Junker Nils av Eka
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8-Apr-2025: 4. Röde Orm by Frans G. Bengtsson
Fave! Viking novel. Archaic language (as in, from the early 1900s or something…) and a number of Cool Girls^TM, but pretty funny. Also, they make a trip to Ukraine. :O
“Svarte Grim, hans fader, satt grinande i stor belåtenhet; han sade att han själv stundom känt sig lagd för skaldskap i sina unga dagar, fast annat kommit emellan.
- Men likväl är detta ett märkligt ting, sade han; ty pojken är folkskygg, och allra räddast är han när det finns flickor i närheten, fast han gärna själv ville ha det annorlunda.
- Dem behöver han inte vara rädd för nu längre, tro du mig, Grim, sade Ylva. Ty nu, sedan han visat att han är skald, komma de att hänga om halsen på honom, så många det finns plats till. Mer än en gång hörde jag min fader säga, och han var full av vishet i alla ting, att liksom flugorna kretsa kring all slags föda, och villigt smaka på allt, men lämna allt annat när de få lukt på honungskrukan, så är det också med ungmör när en skald kommer i närheten.”
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18-Apr-2025: 5. The fifth gospel by Ian Caldwell
Audiobook read by Jack Davenport, who has the second most beautiful voice in the world. (After Alan Rickman… D’: ) Haven't finished the book yet. I only listen to it at home where I can hear and fully concentrate on THE VOICE. :q
“On the bottom floor of our apartment building is Vatican Health Services. When Simon and I were boys, American priests would fly back to New York for their checkups rather than risk a trip to the Vatican doctors. Horror stories have followed every pope for half a century. Fifty years ago, Pius XII came down with recurring hiccups, so his doctor prescribed injections of ground lamb brains. Another papal doctor sold Pius’s medical records to newspapers and embalmed his dead body using an experimental technique that made the pope’s corpse bubble and fart like a tar pit while pilgrims queued up to view it. Ten years later, Paul VI needed his prostate removed, so Vatican doctors decided to perform the operation in his library. His successor, John Paul I, died thirty-three days into his papacy because our doctors didn’t yet know he took pills for a blood condition. So you might think our Vatican morticians would be world class, considering all the practice they get. But there’s no such thing as a Vatican mortician, and no such place as a Vatican morgue. Popes are embalmed in their apartments by volunteer undertakers from the city, and the rest of us settle for the back room at Health Services.”
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5-May-2025: 6. Superbugs: The race to stop an epidemic by Matt McCarthy
Fave!
“[It] turns out that humans have been consuming antibiotics for millennia, whether they knew it or not. Significant levels of tetracycline, a broad-spectrum antibiotic still used today, have been found in the skeletal remains of Sudanese mummies dating back to AD 350 to 550. (Beer brewed at the time appears to have been the source.) And in Egypt, samples taken from femoral bones of skeletons from the late Roman period at the Dakhla Oasis also show traces of tetracycline. (It’s unclear if booze was served there.) Not surprisingly, the rate of infectious diseases documented in these disparate populations has been exceedingly low.”
“[Henry Beecher] noticed that nurses were able to calm injured soldiers with injections of saline when they were administered as if they were shots of morphine. A single infusion of salt water enabled young men to tolerate agonizing surgeries without anesthesia, and it introduced the young doctor to the power of the placebo effect.”
“The FDA recently announced that there was insufficient evidence to recommend over-the-counter antibacterial soaps over washing with plain soap and water.”
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23-May-2025: 7. Radicalized by Cory Doctorow
Fave! A collection of 4 dystopian novellas. Short summaries from the book sleeve or whatever it’s called:
“If you want a better future tomorrow, you’re going to have to fight for it today. Here are four urgent stories from author and activist Cory Doctorow, four social, technological and economic visions of the world today and its near – all too near – future.
- ‘Unauthorized Bread’ is a tale of immigration, toxic economic stratification and a young woman’s perilously illegal quest to fix a broken toaster.
- In ‘Model Minority’ a superhero finds himself way out of his depth when he confronts the corruption of the police and justice system.
- ‘Radicalized’ is the story of a desperate husband, a darknet forum and the birth of a violent uprising against the US health care system.
- The final story, ‘The Masque of the Red Death’, tracks an uber-wealthy survivalist and his followers as they hole up and attempt to ride out the collapse of society.”
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27-May-2025: 8. Butcher by Joyce Carol Oates
Fave!
“It was rare that I did not closely consult with a husband, a father, or a brother after having examined a female patient of a genteel background, before revealing my diagnosis to the patient; where coarser females seemed to wish to be confronted with the truth, more genteel females shrank from it, as from a blinding light. Every detail of the genteel woman’s treatment was with the approval of a husband or a male relative, of course, for it would be he who would be paying my fee, & it would be his satisfaction I would have to provide, particularly in the case of certain “controversial” surgeries with which I began to be entrusted: requests by husbands of women concerned for their well-being, whether extreme agitation in the woman, or lassitude; manic laughter, or helpless tears; “frigidity” of the lower body inhibiting conjugal relations, or, perversely, an unnatural “avidity” of the lower body during conjugal relations – all these, forms of hysteria.”
“Removal of the ovaries was frequently prescribed in medical journals for the cure of neurasthesia; in more extreme cases, the removal of the entire uterus (thus, “hysterectomy”) was advised; in other cases, the surgical removal of the vaginal “clitoris,” like the appendix a functionless part of the female body described in Galen as hypersensitive to any touch, with a propensity to exacerbate excitation, anemia, sleepwalking, hyperventilation, overeating, anorexia, morbid thoughts, migraine, insomnia, atheistical tendencies, madness, & certain unspeakable habits of a degenerate nature more often associated with the adolescent male of the species.”
“(Indeed, it should be noted here, how, if they were well enough, the Laboratory patients cared for one another; a feature of female patients in general, that, in dire situations, in which they themselves might well be afflicted, they will set aside their own discomfort, to care for others more in need. Thus it has long been recognized by the medical profession, that females are natural-born nurses, midwives, & caretakers; & much of this labor is out of pure charitable instinct, with no need for financial remuneration.)”
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29-May-2025: 9. Monstergeschichten by Cornelia Neudert & Betina Gotzen-Beek
Kiddy book in German…
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14-Jun-2025: 10. Upp, trälar (a.k.a. Under the North Star 2: The uprising) by Väinö Linna
“Björkdungarna hade fått en lätt rodnad. Vattenfåglarna skriade på sjön och Varg-Kustaa dök trumpen och sturande upp vid den ena dörren efter den andra med ett vidjefång präktiga gäddor i näven. Han bytte dem mot bröd hos kvinnfolket. Aldrig hände det att han själv sa hur mycket han ville ha för en gädda. Kvinnorna kämpade med sig själva där de stod i skafferiskrubben och gjorde i ordning brödknytet:
- Bord man lägg dit ett till . . . så int han blir arg.
Kustaa tog knytet utan att se åt innehållet, morrade någonting och gick sin väg.”
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24-Jun-2025: 11. Im Labyrinth der Finsternis by Fabian Lenk
Kiddy book in German.
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18-Jul-2025: 12. The future of life by Edward O. Wilson
Fave! And a re-read.
“[The] human population exceeded Earth’s sustainable capacity around the year 1978. By 2000 it had overshot by 1.4 times that capacity. If 12 percent of land were now to be set aside in order to protect the natural environment, as recommended in the 1987 Brundtland Report, Earth’s sustainable capacity will have been exceeded still earlier, around 1972.”
“Is the Sumatran rhino dying of old age? Has its time come, like Great Aunt Clarissa on her deathbed, and should we therefore just let it slip away?
No, absolutely not, ever. Banish the thought! The premise of such a notion is demonstrably and dangerously false. The Sumatran and every other species that disappears typically dies young, at least in a physiological sense. The idea that species pass through natural life stages is based on an erroneous analogy. An endangered species is not like a dying patient whose care is too expensive and futile to prolong. The opposite is true. The great majority of rare and declining species are composed of young, healthy individuals. They just need the room and time to grow and reproduce that human activity has denied them.”
“In 1997 an international team of economists and environmental scientists put a dollar amount on all the ecosystem services provided humanity free of charge by the living natural environment. Drawing from multiple databases, they estimated the contribution to be $33 trillion or more each year. This amount is nearly twice the 1997 combined gross national product (GNP) of all countries in the world, or gross world product, of $18 trillion. Ecosystem services are defined as the flow of materials, energy, and information from the biosphere that support human existence. They include the regulation of the atmosphere and climate; the purification and retention of fresh water; the formation and enrichment of the soil; nutrient cycling; the detoxification and recirculation of waste; the pollination of crops; and the production of lumber, fodder, and biomass fuel.
The 1997 megaestimate can be expressed in another, even more cogent, manner. If humanity were to try to replace the free services of the natural economy with substitutes of its own manufacture, the global GNP would have to be raised by at least $33 trillion. The exercise, however, cannot be performed except as a thought experiment. To supplant natural ecosystems entirely, even mostly, is an economic and even physical impossibility, and we would certainly die if we tried.”
“Today about 10 percent of the land surface protected on paper. Even if rigorously conserved, this amount is not enough to save more than a modest fraction of wild species. /.../ At the risk of being called an extremist, which on this topic I freely admit I am, let me suggest 50 percent. Half the world for humanity, half for the rest of life, to create a planet both self-sustaining and pleasant.”
“Ranching and mining also commonly benefit from perverse subsidies. In Germany government support for coal mining is so high that it would be more economical to close all the mines and send the workers home at full pay.
In an analysis published in 1998, Norman Myers and Jennifer Kent of Oxford University placed annual subsidies worldwide at $390 billion to $520 billion in agriculture, $110 billion in fossil fuels and nuclear energy, and $220 billion for water. All these and other subsidies combined exceed $2 trillion, much of which is harmful to both our economies and our governments. The average American pays $2000 a year in subsidies, giving the lie to the belief that the American economy runs in a truly free competitive market.”
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2-Aug-2025: 13. Veterinary technician’s manual for small animal emergency and critical care by Christopher L. Norkus
Textbook that I bought for school ca 2017, but I only read the 1-2 chapters we were told to read. Now I’m gonna read the whole thing. Slowly. I hope it isn’t 100% outdated. Anyway, I don’t see a shitload of emergency cases at work, but it isn’t a huge book and I’ve vaguely been meanin’ to read it because I suck and… Anyway, I haven’t finished it yet, unsurprisingly. :p
“Acknowledgment:
A special thank you is necessary to my best friend Mark Holloway for his superior IT support in rescuing a majority of this book off of my dead laptop after I clumsily spilled soda on it.
C.L.N.”
(DO YOUR BACKUPS, PEOPLE, AND KEEP ONE COPY OF YOUR COMPUTER ON THE OTHER SIDE OF TOWN IN CASE OF A HOUSE FIRE)
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15-Aug-2025: 14. Pope Joan by Donna Woolfolk Cross
Fave! And a re-read.
“In Winnemanoth, Gisla was married to Count Hugo. There had been some difficulty finding a date suitable for the immediate consummation of the marriage. The Church forbade all marital relations on Sundays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, as well as for forty days before Easter, eight days after Pentecost, and five days before the taking of communion, or on the eve of any great feast or rogation day. In all, on some two hundred and twenty days of the year sexual intercourse was prohibited; when these, as well as Gisla’s monthly bleeding time, were taken into account, there were not many dates left to choose from. But at last they settled on the twenty-fourth of the month, a date that pleased everyone save Gisla, who was impatient for the festivities to begin.”
“’Your brother is skillfully attended, I trust?’
‘He is surrounded night and day by holy men offering prayers for his recovery.’
‘Ah!’ There was a silence. Both men were skeptical of the efficacy of such measures, but neither could own his doubt openly.”
“Rebuilding the aqueduct would be a monumental, perhaps impossible, undertaking, given the sorry state of engineering of the day. The books which had preserved the accumulated wisdom of the ancients regarding these complicated pieces of construction had been lost or destroyed centuries ago. The parchment pages on which the precious plans were recorded had been scraped clean and written over with Christian homilies and stories of lives of saints and martyrs.”
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13-Sep-2025: 15. Something happened by Joseph Heller
Fave!
“I know so many people I want to be mean to, but I just don’t have the character.”
“I have this constant fear something is going to happen to him. (He’s the kid who gets stabbed to death in the park or falls victim to Hodgkin’s disease or blastoma of the eyeballs. Every time I know he’s gone swimming. Every time he’s away from the house. Every time I know my daughter is driving in a car with older kids I expect to be told by telephone or policeman of the terrible automobile accident in which she has just been killed. There are times I wish they would both hurry up and get it over with already so I could relax and stop brooding about it in such recurring suspense. There are times I wish everyone I know would die and release me from these tender tensions I experience in my generous solicitude for them. /.../
I think about death.
I think about it all the time. I dwell on it. I dread it. I don’t really like it. Death runs in my family, it seems. People die from it, and I dream about death and weave ornate fantasies about death endlessly and ironically.”
“[Human dicks] are such fractional parts of the total construction they might easily be overlooked if we did not dwell on them. They are arrogant and absurd in their haughty, sniffing, pushy, egotistical pretensions. (We let them get away with an awful lot.) They can’t even hold their lordly pose for half a day a week. What a feeble weapon indeed for establishing male supremacy, a flabby, collapsing channel for a universal power drive ejaculated now and then in sporadic spoonfuls. No wonder we have to make fists and raise our voices at the kitchen table.”
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2-Oct-2025: 16. The showman: The inside story that made a war leader of Volodymyr Zelensky by Simon Shuster
Fave!
“For the moment, Zelensky had not attained enough confidence or experience as a wartime leader to override the decisions of the military brass. His role had less to do with the war itself than with the way it was perceived, and he had the skills to play it well. At the same time, he seemed to treasure the opportunity not only to witness history but to shape it. Many of his aides felt the same way; one told me that he derived a kind of ‘masochistic pleasure’ from his life in the bunker and the vantage it afforded onto world-shaping events. Zelensky rarely talked about these feelings. But he also found it gratifying to be in this singular position of power and influence. Despite the danger and the stress, the separation from his family, the weight of the responsibility he bore, and the horrors he witnessed each day, the president felt privileged, even happy, to do the job that fate had put in front of him. Even on the hardest days it gave him a profound sense of purpose, and it made him feel alive.
‘My life today is beautiful,’ he said at the end of the press conference, when a reporter asked how he was holding up. ‘I feel that I’m needed.’ The previous week, as horrifying and tragic as it had been for him and his country, was also among the most exciting and fulfilling of his life. He would not trade it for any of the comfort and security he knew in his old life as a movie star. ‘I think the main purpose in life is to be needed, not just to be a blank space that breathes, walks, and eats. But to live, to know that certain things depend on your being alive, and to feel that your life matters to others.’”
“The battle of Kyiv, which raged through the end of March 2022, had a greater impact on the course of European history than any since the end of World War II. Had it ended differently, the Kremlin could have replaced Zelensky with a marionette and pushed the edge of Moscow’s dominion right up to Poland’s eastern border, effectively erasing Ukraine from the map. Instead the defense of Kyiv shattered Russia’s image as a military powerhouse, an image that had shaped the balance of power in Europe for generations.”
“[Olena Zelenska] set up training programs for Ukrainian trauma counselors and hotlines to make their services widely available. Convincing Ukrainians to seek psychological support turned out to be a major challenge. When we talked about it, Olena borrowed the English phrase ‘mental health’ because the concept is hard to describe in Ukrainian. ‘We have a particular distrust for terms that include the word psycho,’ she said. The term psychotherapy often evokes images of state-run asylums in Ukraine, places that are designed to isolate the ill from society. A lot of that stigma, Zelenska told me, has its roots in the Soviet Union, where generations of Ukrainians were raised to deal with trauma by hiding it away. The attitude, she said, was: ‘Deal with it, get over it, and if you complain, you’re weak.’
/.../ The Ministry [of Health] estimated that /.../ a third of the population, or fifteen million people, would require some form of mental health care. Olena and her husband were no exception. ‘You absorb it,’ she said of the war. ‘Each of us, including myself, have felt that our psychological state is not what it should be.’ Four months into the invasion, she said ‘None of us are okay.’”
“A special forces commando turned spymaster, [Kyrylo] Budanov cut a dramatic figure, appearing frequently on television to issue vague threats and dark hints of his plans. /.../ He promised to hunt down and ‘physically exterminate’ the perpetrators of the Bucha massacre, and he said it gave him pleasure to hear Russian propaganda refer to him as a terrorist. His deputy later declared /.../ that GUR agents were plotting to assassinate Putin and a long list of his lieutenants, including the heads of the Russian military-industrial complex.
GUR’s handiwork soon became the subject of fervent speculation, which earned Budanov a kind of cult following in Ukraine. In the early months of the invasion, explosions and fires often ripped through Russian military sites and fuel depots in the regions closest to Ukraine, and Russian officials blamed these incidents on Ukrainian drone strikes or saboteurs. At least twice in April, low-flying helicopters swept across the border and struck targets in the Russian region of Belgorod. Ukraine denied responsibility for these attacks, and the Kremlin tended to downplay them to avoid embarrassment. At the end of summer, as President Zelensky and his team grew impatient for the start of a major counteroffensive, these covert strikes became more daring and dramatic. They reached deeper into Russian territory, while official denials of responsibility from Kyiv became halfhearted, routinely accompanied by a wink and a mischievous smile.
Oleksiy Arestovych, a former officer of the GUR and an adviser to Zelensky at the start of the invasion, mentioned some of these attacks when we met in early August. Then he leaned back in his chair, looked at my audio recorder, and silently mouthed the words: That was us.”
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31-Oct-2025: 17. Bröderna Lejonhjärta by Astrid Lindgren
Fave! And a re-read. Swedish kiddy novel. Some dark shit. Just like the above book, it’s about a really brave, young, handsome guy who stands up to a psychopathic old tyrant with nukes. Wait, what -
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8-Nov-2025: 18. Die Brüder Löwenherz by Astrid Lindgren
The above book in German… :B Thanks to having read it in Swedish so recently, I didn’t have to look up every other word. :p I'm... I'm gonna finish it this evening.
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22-Nov-2025: 19. Rare earth frontiers: From terrestrial subsoils to lunar landscapes by Julie Michelle Klinger
I haven’t finished it yet... Fun fact: Rare earths are not literally rare. :)
“Toward what end is the Brazilian government undoing its own indigenous and ecological protection laws to mine São Gabriel da Cachoeira, a historically contested border region, shared with Venezuela and Colombia, when there are more easily accessible deposits under production in existing mining sites elsewhere in the country? And why have NASA and the US Department of Defense chosen to partner with Silicon Valley start-ups to mine these elements from the Moon, while the United States throws away hundreds of tonnes of rare earths annually in mine tailings and e-waste?”
“This definition of the greater good sets up a false notion that terrible health and environmental devastation are the unavoidable price to pay for sourcing rare earths. Abundant research on recycling and flex mining shows otherwise /.../.”
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Vegan FAQ! :)
The Web Site the Meat Industry Doesn't Want You to See.
Please watch Earthlings.
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You can reach me at yoze83 [AT] yahoo.com
Salamanders may actively defend themselves once they are grasped by a predator. Besides various antipredator postures, S. salamandra adults are able to exude toxic skin secretions such as the neurotoxic alkaloid Samandarin. This alkaloid causes strong muscle convulsions and hypertension combined with hyperventilation in all vertebrates. The poison glands of the Fire Salamander are concentrated in certain areas of the body, especially around the head and the dorsal skin surface. The coloured portions of the animal's skin usually coincide with these glands. Compounds in the skin secretions may be effective against bacterial and fungal infections of the epidermis; some are potentially dangerous to human life.
Health physicians and doctors often talk about preventing #stress. When we talk about stress prevention, it would be worth mentioning that our body is well structured to handle the short term stress. However, when the stress level increases drastically, the problem would have the tendency to convert into a #chronic issue, leading a person to have serious kinds of other #illnesses which are never good to even hear.
When you feel stressed, your #nervoussystem gets directly impacted. In this situation, nervous system instructs adrenal systems to release adrenaline and cortisol. The consistent release of these hormones makes a person unable to think and learn.
Furthermore, higher stress levels cause the liver to release more blood sugar, increasing the risk of type-2 diabetes.
Taking too much pressure from stressful situation can result in faster breathing, short breathing and even #hyperventilation. As a result, the chances of chest infections can increase. Furthermore, faster breathing is perceived by your body as a signal that you are stressed. As a result, nervous system is triggered to release more stress hormones.
And, stress also causes the heart beat rate to increase alarmingly. It means that heart has to work harder, enhancing the chances of heart failure.
Here, it would be worth mentioning that short-term stress is not something to worry about. As a matter of fact, short term stress can boost the #immune-system. However, it’s quite contrary when we talk about long term stress.
Stress can cause dry mouth, indigestion and #gastrointestinal #disorder. #Diarrhea or constipation can also occur as a result of stress because it stimulates the muscles of intestines. Other disadvantages of stress include severe heartburn and ulcer.
The reason of stress
Anything which is bad can cause stress at different levels. If we simplify it, the stress can be resulted due to mental and physical changes which we find hard to anticipate. For instance, environmental changes such as pollution and/or consistent noise can cause great disturbance which we often find hard to cope with. Exposing ourselves to such environmental hostility makes our minds and bodies to work hard to get adjusted. That process of adjustment is attributed to stress. Other kinds of stress include nutritional stress, working postural stress, emotional stress and oral stress.
Oral stress is the kind that basically involves difficulty in biting due to jaw position. As a result, the oral health is devastated.
Stress and its effects on infections
The #cortisol released as a result of short term stress can be helpful when it comes to healing infection and inflammation. However, when the infection turns chronic, the enhanced release of cortisol can be devastating. The immune system gets weaker and body becomes prone to several other serious infections.
Another very dangerous aspect of stress is that it can make the body flush out vital #minerals without which survival of body can become questionable. For instance, release of calcium due to stress can weaken the bones and teeth.
*Walking Around Santiago de Cuba On Tuesdays *
* By Gardenia de la Caridad Hung Fong*
Last April, I visited my Cuban-Chinese family in Santiago de Cuba with my
youngest brother Roberto Santiago Hung Fong who wanted to see our family
relatives living in this historic city founded in 1614, five hundred years
ago by Don Diego Velázquez de Cuellar. On the 500th Anniversary of the
founding of Santiago de Cuba, I returned to visit my Aunt Xiomara Fong
Ramos and her husband Pedro Rafael Zayas Guerrero who still live at my
Grandfather Alberto Fong’s Grocery Store and Butcher Shop, at the corner of
Calle 3 No.119 entre Calle 2 y Reparto Maria de la Torres, next to my
Mother’s oldest brother José “Pepín” en Carretera del Morro y La Trocha.
At the Antonio Maceo International Airport, we were welcomed by my cousin
Dr. Santiago Mock and his wife Ileana Castillo Revé, as well as by my Aunt
Xiomara Fong Ramos and her husband Pedro Zayas Guerrero who brought a
Spaniard friend of the family, “Gallego” as our private driver. We arrived
on Friday morning, April 1st, 2016, returning as adults to visit Santiago
de Cuba and our Cuban-Chinese family, after 45 years living Chicago,
Illinois as U.S. residents.
At the airport in Santiago de Cuba, my cousin and his wife told us that
they had to go on their own car and would see us later at their home in
Carretera del Morro and La Trocha.
Before they left, I asked Ileana Castillo Revé for their telephone number
in case I had to get help from her and my cousin Santiago Mock Hung during
my family reunion in Santiago de Cuba with Aunt Xiomara and Uncle Pedro
Zayas Guerrero. They only talked about my youngest brother Roberto
Santiago Hung Fong staying with them in the back bedroom with a single
bed. I knew that their Cuban home is rather small and narrow in Santiago
de Cuba since it has been restored and remodeled from my Grandfather
Alberto’s grocery and hardware store where customer could get their food,
groceries, as well any type of household tools, fishing tackle, fishing
hooks, construction tools, like in a General Store.
During the drive back from the airport, the four of us, Aunt Xiomara, me
and Robert were sitting in the back and Pedro Zayas Guerrero sat in front
with the driver, we were all sitting close and tight in the Cuban car,
while our Spaniard driver took us sightseeing on Carretera del Morro in his
old vintage car, bouncing on the road, up and down the hills.
I began to be concerned because there was no room or bed for me at my Aunt
Xiomara’s Cuban home in Santiago de Cuba. “*Where was I going to stay or
sleep in Santiago de Cuba?” *
Pedro Zayas Guerrero suggested to use a portable open bed cot, known as a
“catre” which they use for their grandson Rafael Alejandro Zayas Rojas when
he visits them. I did not like the idea of sleeping in the living room or
next to their bed in the same room.
Upon arrival, I called my cousin Santiago Mock and his wife Ileana Castillo
Revé on their mobile cellular telephone for help in providing lodging
accommodation at their home in Reparto Sueñ near the Ciudad Escolar by the
Cuartel Moncada. My cousin Santiago and his wife Ileana were willing to
accommodate me in Chaguín’s bedroom, their first son who is already married
and has a Cuban home with his wife Ileana. Cousin Chaguín inherited my
Aunt Luz “Leing” home in Rastro.
I was glad that Dr. Santiago Mock and his wife Ileana offered their
hospitality like my oldest Aunt Luz “Leing” Hung always has done for our
family—she is kind and generous like my Grandmother Salustiana Gertrudis
Mustelier Baró used to be with family relatives. They offered to pick me
up in their car at Xiomara and Pedro’s house in Calle 3 and Avenida Eduardo
Chibas, Carretera del Morro y La Trocha which is quite a distance and a
long way from Reparto Sueñ where they still live in Santiago de Cuba.
On Tuesdays, my cousin Santiago “Chago” goes to visit the family farm near
El Cobre which used to belong to his father Guillermo Mock who was a Master
Freemason at the Lodge Prudencia in Santiago de Cuba.
My cousin Santiago Mock asked Pedro Zayas Guerrero to pick me up on Tuesday
in person and take me back to his Cuban home on Calle 3 y Carretera del
Morro in the morning because he was going to be busy all day during his
trip near El Cobre while he visited the family farm there.
During my April 2016 stay in Santiago de Cuba, the first Tuesday my cousin
Santiago Mock left early for the family farm near El Cobre, Pedro Zayas
Guerrero offered to pick me up in person and he arrived on a motorcycle
share ride which costs $20 CUC or Cuban pesos. So, Pedro thought I would
get on a shared motorcycle ride from Reparto Sueñ near Ciudad Escolar
Cuartel Moncada, all the way to Carretera del Morro y Calle 3, with my two
(2) shoulder hand bags strapped on my back. I did not want to share a ride
on a motorcycle by myself in Santiago de Cuba and Pedro share another
motorcycle ride for $40 CUC Cuban pesos, instead of taking a Cuban Yellow
Taxi for the same amount with less concern over travel safety along the
way. I wanted to share a taxi ride, instead of a motorcycle on Tuesday.
Pedro Zayas Guerrero pretended not to understand my concern over the shared
motorcycle ride and my two (2) handbags strapped on my shoulder. So, I
walked over to Avenida Garzón and hailed and waived a Cuban Yellow taxi
myself. The Cuban cab driver took me with Pedro to my Aunt Xiomara’s home
on Calle 3 and Carretera del Morro in Santiago de Cuba. I told Pedro that
I have travelled around the world by myself and always call for a Taxi Cab
Driver to take where I am going to go. There are always taxis available
for travelers and visitors in town or out-of-town.
Afterwards, I told Pedro Zayas Guerrero not to pick me up again at the home
of Santiago Mock and Ileana Castillo Revé. I wanted to prevent any other
misunderstandings or problems between him and me during my stay in Santiago
de Cuba. I told him that I was not a child any more and knew how to travel
and call a taxi in town.
The second Tuesday, Aunt Xiomara had to pick me up at cousin Santiago and
Ileana’s home in Calle E #53 near Ciudad Escolar Cuartel Moncada in Reparto
Sueño. Since cousin Lilita Sánchez Fujishiro had called cousin Chago and
Ileana to invite me to visit her at the Plaza de Marte where her daughter
lives, we walked on the way back on Avenida Garzón to the Plaza de Marte to
find her home across the street. So, Aunt Xiomara began walking back from
Reparto Sueño all the way to Carretera del Morro y La Trocha to Calle 3 No.
119—around noon in the tropical scorching heat of Santiago de Cuba, my feet
began to blister, swell, and hurt all the way back to the house. I even
got sunburnt from the exposure to the sweltering Cuban sun. Aunt Xiomara
made me walk all the way from Reparto Sueño all the way to her home in
Carretera del Morro y La Trocha. There was too much walking long distances
in the sultry Cuban heat at noon time.
When I returned, I was already perspiring, dehydrated, overheated, annoyed
and irritated by the time I got back to Aunt Xiomara’s home for lunch
time. So, my youngest brother Roberto Santiago Hung Fong began to scream
that I had to see the doctor at the Clinic for my traveler’s medical check
up for blood pressure and temperature. Roberto began to grab, touch and
feel my skin and two arms, telling me that I had to go to the doctor
immediately. I was already angry enough to tell him off, *“Don’t touch
me!”* I just got here after walking all the way from Reparto Sueño with
Aunt Xiomara who did not take a taxi cab back home.
Then, I told Roberto Hung Fong:
*Why do I have to go to the doctor right now? *
*I can go when I can and I just got here from walking a long distance. I
am already suffocating, hyperventilating, and dehydrated from the excessive
heat in Santiago de Cuba. I go to the doctor when I can get there, not
right now. *
*Robert, Can’t you see that we just got to the house. From now on, I am
going with Aunt Xiomara to the Clinic when we get there.*
These two incidents did take place on Tuesdays after walking long distance
from Reparto Sueño by the Ciudad Escolar Cuartel Moncada all the day to
Carretera del Morro and La Trocha in Santiago de Cuba. Afterwards, I was
able to go with Aunt Xiomara, with her neighbor Delia Margarita Lozada
Guerra or on my own in Santiago de Cuba.
Excessive walking in the noon-time scorching heat can cause the skin to
sunburn, the feet to blister, swell, and damage toes and skin tissue. In
addition, beware of fatigue, dehydration, sunstroke, hyperventilation, and
perspiration in the heat of the Cuban tropical sun. Even when walking can
be the best way to sightsee in Santiago de Cuba, please take a taxi to your
destination and save yourself the consequences of over walking long
distance in the Cuban tropical sun.
Carretera del Morro and Avenida Eduardo Chibas in Santiago de Cuba, Cuba
Gardenia C. Hung, M.A., B.A.
Consulting Social Media Arts Communications
www.intranslations.blogspot.com
www.linkedin.com/in/gardeniahung
Effective Home Remedies for Anxiety
Anxiety is a psychological problem that has become quite common these days. Doubts, fears and phobias can lead to panic attacks. Some common anxiety symptoms are muscle tension, feeling of impending death, heart palpitations, inability to concentrate, dry mouth, sweating, hyperventilation and nausea. There are many useful home remedies for anxiety that can be done safely at home.
One of the oldest and most popular home remedies for anxiety is tea. It helps to reduce stress and calm the mind, body and soul. Lavender, thyme, chamomile, cloves and orange flowers are some of the common forms of tea that can help reduce anxiety.
You can even try to have a conversation with her parents, brother, sister or best friend whenever you feel anxiety. This will calm you and make you feel better. Try reading something interesting to relieve the tension that can cause anxiety.
Take a relaxing bath with relaxing music has always been a good choice and is one of the effective home remedies for anxiety.
Hydrotherapy is one of the effective home remedies for anxiety. It is also known with the name of water therapy that involves the use of water in various forms (hot, cold, ice or steam) to give relief from the discomfort of anxiety.
Exercise is considered one of the best home remedies for anxiety. Delete the endorphins in your body. You can take a walk or do some basic exercises or can also try breathing exercises like Ramayana in yoga. Make it a daily routine and see the changes.
Bring a small change in your lifestyle. Avoid alcohol and caffeine as they can worsen your condition. Aromatherapy is also one of the effective home remedies for anxiety. The scented candles or baby powder smells can help you relax. You can also try other scents like geranium, marjoram, Bertram, lemon, lavender and sandalwood.
Doctor Who is owned by the BBC. No copy right infringement intended. Please give credit if you use any of these designs.
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Slashing wildly backwards, Will felt his blade collide with it's target. Reginald backed away as he clenched his bleeding arm. Rising from the river, Will brought the flat side of his blade against Reginald's face, leaving a long, red gash across his face. In pain, Reginald stumble backwards, fumbling for his sword that he carelessly tossed aside. In two fluid swipes, Will kicked the sword away and slashed upwards at Reginald's torso. Two more jabs, and Reginald was crippled, kneeling as he bled from several wounds. Heaving and coughing up water, Will held the blade against Reginald's throat. In the corner of his eye, he could see his aunt give a sigh of relief as she leaned against her sword. Reginald looked hatefully at both the blade and the boy.
"You won, Will," he said through hyperventilation. "I have been disgraced. I am defeated. Do me my destiny and finish me off. I have nothing left, and it is better to die in battle than to live by my disgrace and-"
"Oh shut it," Will said as he brought he butt of his sword down on his head, rendering him unconscious. Kicking the slumped over body, Will sheathed his sword.
"Everybody deserves a second chance."
Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
This ladies and gentlemen is Michelle, she is getting married to Rob tomorrow and guess what- I am their official photographer!!! *hyperventilation!* yep, quite some months ago now, Michelle asked me repeatedly about when I am going to get into wedding photography. Now this has always been my ambition, but I guess it has been a case of it just not happening yet. Somehow, at our original "Lets have a chat then" meeting, my opening gambit of "Well, I haven't done a wedding before" was met immediately with "Yeah, that doesn't put us off". I didn't have a Plan B and so, here we are doing this thing!
I would be totally lying to say I am cool, calm and collected.....but I am sort of glad I am not- because I really want to do them a great job. Surprisingly, its really easy to get caught into looking at the zillions of wedding blogs and photographs and begin planning a 'copycat' style. I have had to step away from that and really instill that they chose me because of my style. That doesn't mean change it.
This was Michelle's third and final Hen -Party last Friday, pretty much SOOC other than a bit of colour balance (I didn't use flash). Michelle has the best teeth ever!
Wish me luck Flickr! XX
Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
Panic disorder is an anxiety disorder characterized by recurring severe panic attacks. It may also include significant behavioral change lasting at least a month and of ongoing worry about the implications or concern about having other attacks. The latter are called anticipatory attacks (DSM-IVR). Panic disorder is not the same as agoraphobia, although many with panic disorder also suffer from agoraphobia.
Panic disorder sufferers usually have a series of intense episodes of extreme anxiety during panic attacks. These attacks typically last about ten minutes, but can be as short-lived as 1–5 minutes and last as long as twenty minutes or until medical intervention. However, attacks can wax and wane for a period of hours (panic attacks rolling into one another), and the intensity and specific symptoms of panic may vary over the duration. Common symptoms of an attack include rapid heartbeat, perspiration, dizziness, dyspnea, trembling, uncontrollable fear, hyperventilation, etc. Some individuals deal with these events on a regular basis, sometimes daily or weekly. The outward symptoms of a panic attack often cause negative social experiences (e.g. embarrassment, social stigma, social isolation, etc.). As many as 36% of all individuals with panic disorder also have agoraphobia.
__
The name doesn't really mean anything, other than it's the name of the lead singer of "Hey Monday".
This isn't really what i was hoping for when I thought of this picture, but I didn't come up with anything better. Added the grain because I thought it would work with the whole concept, being fuzzy in the head, which is usually how I feel when I'm panicking. (This is the first time I've tried to explain the concept of a photo for this set, because of the poor quality).
This was actually a test shot to see if the whole cabinet was in the shot.
Well-- rainbow socks!
when you say love is a simple chemical reaction, can't say i agree
'cause my chemical, yeah, left me a beautiful disaster
still love's all i see
--"catalyst," anna nalick
i promised beca i would go outside today... tomorrow, i promise i will.
today was a bad day. i fought with my roommates. i can only hope everything is resolved now.
she's coming back, i can feel her. she embodied today: the stillness, the hyperventilation, the breakdown, the calm before the storm, and again in the explosion. i'm bottling everything up again because i don't want to be a burden to anyone else. i'm putting up walls after i just got done tearing them all down. i am perpetually stuck in reverse, stuck in neutral, stuck in drive and then back again. you are coming back to haunt me, and maybe you are the reason i fled 1000 miles from home, just like maybe you're the reason i'm longing to be home again.
my eyes hurt from crying so much today.
and if anyone has any input on my portfolio, i'd appreciate it!
Since 2005, Seattle based punk band Nazca Lines have been piecing together songs which combine emotionally charged lyrics and a loud post-rock/punk instrumentation. Having stuck it out through a number of lineup changes since the band's formation, founding members and guitarists Cory Alfano and Brett Wedeking have recruited Andy King and Ryan Minch on drums and bass, respectively for their upcoming full length album, "Hyperventilation."
Twittered 04:50 PM, 10 Dec 2007: Why in hell did my order from Amazon shipped on Nov 29 from California go through Missouri? No wonder it's already five days late!
Maybe they mistook AK (=Alaska) was AR (=Arkansas), which is right next to Missouri? There's a whole database on Ancestry.com that puts zillions of people's Arkansas ancestors in Alaska for that same reason. Folks, there is no "LIttle Rock, Alaska." Duh.
But this is the Post Office! They are the ones who made up those two-letter abbreviations for the states to begin with! What is the problem here, people?
And also: Why in hell did it then take them 6 days to send it from Missouri to Federal Way, Washington, where it still was when I wrote that Twitter?
Twittered 08:27 AM, 13 Dec 2007: Whaddaya know. My Amazon order shipped from California Nov 29 through Missouri of all places is finally in Anchorage, a week late.
Funny thing too. When I twittered that yesterday, the scan on Dec. 12 at 9:25:00 said it was a Departure Scan not an Arrival Scan as it appears now.
Twittered 15 minutes ago (~1.00 PM, 14 Dec 2007) What in hell is it w/ the post office with this order? It's now been in Anchorage for two days -- but they still haven't delivered it!
Or maybe they have, but I'm not home to see it. But why is it taking them two days?
Okay... okay... [taking deep breaths, hyperventilation prevention]. People make all kinds of jokes about the U.S. Postal Service being slow, but they're not. Not usually. Why, just this past Monday at 5:45 PM I sent out an Express package to my sweetie in Seattle that I was supposed to have sent Saturday. She had it in her hands before I left work they next day. I've ordered stuff zillions of times from Amazon that has come via USPS in a prompt & timely way.
So... why this time? Will it be there when I get home?
And why am I making such a big deal of it?
Because it's Battlestar Galactica Razor, that's why!
Salamanders may actively defend themselves once they are grasped by a predator. Besides various antipredator postures, S. salamandra adults are able to extrude heavy toxic skin secretions, e.g. the neurotoxic alkaloid Samandarin. This alkaloid causes strong muscle convulsions and high-blood pressure combined with hyperventilation in all vertebrates. The poison glands of the Fire salamander are concentrated in certain areas of the body, especially around the head and the dorsal skin surface. The colored portions of the animals skin usually coincide with these glands. Most of these secretions might be effective against bacterial and fungal infections of the epidermis, but some secretions could also be dangerous to human life.
-- from Wikipedia.org
Richard Shapiro takes a moment to hyperventilate in gratitude on the steps of the Wawona Hotel knowing he has pulled off an amazing coup having dumped his railroad car load of luggage onto a porter to bring upstairs...
models: greg and karen
photography, styling and editing: bronwen hyde
location: royal botanical gardens, melbourne
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
Great Tit - adult female
"The lights are on but its not at home"
Flew into the sunroom and in escaping the attentions of the Broon Dug, concussed itself on the windows.
Having instructed the dog “NO” I was able to pick it up in a towel and keep it calm inside the towel until it started to move a little. It then spent about 10 minutes in my hand, then perched, as the shocked hyperventilation slowly gave way to normal alertness.
After I wielded the macro flash camera in one hand with it now perched on a finger of my other hand, It shat on me three times, and flew off.
Of course all the settings were entirely wrong, but there is a strict limit to what one can adjust with one hand only. Twin flash macro and sun all evident in the eye reflections.
After Dr Serenity Hawkfire untaped and released Graham White, he scoots off leaving her to self-treat hyperventilation - unless she's using that "instrument" to commune with the spirit world.
I have a phobia of people touching my dolls so when Rubee wanders over for a sniff I almost go into hyperventilation mode. She's harmless but she is SO nosey!
In this case I think she just wanted to give Abbey Rhoda a little kiss.
Max and I spent the day hiking in El Yunque rainforest. It's amazing. First off, we had a crazy adventure trying to find it. The main road was closed (landslide?), so we had to take some back roads. Thankfully, I had bought a Lonely Planet book and they had a decent map of the area. So we drove and drove and drove until we realized we had missed a turn and were kind of lost. But don't worry, there was another way to get there, that wasn't too far out of the way. Little did we know, that way was a trecherous, teeny tiny road that twisted up through the mountains. Barely two cars could fit on it, so if someone drove past you, you had to hold your breath and hope you didn't get hit.
After nearly dying of hyperventilation from the drive, we made it to El Yunque. We decided to hike down to La Mina Falls and go swimming down there. Along the way, I saw a spider off to the side, and decided to take its photo. When I saw the photo, I realized there was a whole web I hadn't even seen before. I've always wanted to take a spider/web photo, and Max convinced me it should be the photo of the day.
The rest of the day we spent avoiding the rain, swimming in a pool at the bottom of a water fall, and eating delicious food! You should check out the photos of one of the most beautiful places ever. Here's the link to my shots (it starts about halfway down the page).
In between bouts of hyperventilation from spraying giant biscuits (ever used a spray diffuser?), I am recovering by framing prints and drinking endless cups of tea. All in preparation for the Arts Market at St. George's Hall, Liverpool this coming Sunday. I believe this is known as suffering for one's art... www.howardgardener.co.uk/
Anger, Stress and Epilepsy are closely connected. Angry, stressed man. This media is part of the Stress and Epilepsy | Does Stress Cause Seizures? article. The picture was found on brain stunts website.
Dinner @ '海碗居' [www.haiwanjv.com/default.aspx], a very traditional Beijing 'Zhajiangmian' (炸酱面) restaurant.
(This photo was taken with an iPhone and so the quality suffered unfortunately - phones are not cameras)
A terribly taken photo and a pungent hit up the nostrils. It's 'WOAH' with multiple exclamation marks. Think: !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! A tower of boiled Chinese cabbage is smouldered in a pungent fiery kicking mustard sauce. Cabbage shares some chemical components with mustard so it is a natural pairing but the synergy packs a deadly wallop. I love wasabi and mustard but this sauce takes it to a new level of shock. I felt my nasal passages were under a ruthless attack, with the brain telling me that they are seizing up and going into hyperventilation. And then suddenly it was all over and I fell into a vacuum of sensations. Thereafter, I felt a creepy compulsion to want to go back to have a second, a third, a fourth go.....the 'torture' was additive.......
Grafik 3: Fast normale Leistungsfähigkeit, VO2max. 80% vom Soll. Im niedrigen Leistungsbereich übersteigt die CO2-Abgabe die O2-Aufnahme. Später fällt die CO2-Abgabe wieder ab. Die Anaerobe Schwelle wird später erreicht. Dann steigt die CO2-Abgabe wieder über die O2-Aufnahme.
Grafik 9: Normoxämie, normale AaDO2.
Grafik 7: normales Atemmuster.
Grafik 6: in der Anfangsphase der Belastung hohes VE/VO2 und gleichzeit von VE/VCO2. Das Atemäuqivalent für O2 beträgt ca. 55 ! Später fallen die Atemäquivalente wieder in den Normbereich.
Grafik 2: normaler Anstieg des O2-Pulses.
Hier lässt sich gut das Konzept der Anaeroben Schwelle nachvollziehen.
Die Anaerobe Schwelle - oder ventilatorische Schwelle 1 (VT1) - wird erreicht, "wenn das Atemäquivalent für Sauerstoff ansteigt, aber das Atemäquivalent für CO2 noch konstant bleibt." (Wassermann)
Betrachtet man Grafik 3, so sieht man, dass im niedrigen Leistungsbereich VE/VO2 zwar ansteigt, aber VE/VCO2 ebenfalls zunimmt - keine Anaerobe Schwelle (VT1), sondern Hyperventilation. Nach 12 Minuten steigt VE/VO2, aber VE/VCO2 bleibt konstant. Hier liegt die Anaerobe Schwelle (VT1).
PT: Salamandra Comum
English–Common Fire Salamander
Spanish–Salamandra Común
Status Livro Vermelho/Red Book (IUCN): Least Concern (Menos preocupante)
Mapa de distribuição / Distribution Map: www.iucnredlist.org/apps/redlist/details/59467/0/rangemap
Presente em grande pare da europa do centro e do sul, vive até 20 anos em estado selvagem. Em cativeiro há relatos de exemplares que chegaram os 50 anos! De movimentos lentos a salamandra defende-se dos predadores usando a samandrina, uma substância tóxica que segrega através de diversas glândulas concentradas no pescoço, mas presentes igualmente noutras partes do corpo do animal, geralmente nas áreas mais coloridas. Se ingerida a samandrina provoca convulsões musculares, hipertensão e hiperventilação. Moral da história: Nunca morder a uma salamandra :) Manuseada e desde que haja o cuidado de lavar as mãos após o manuseamento, é perfeitamente inofensiva.
Present in a large part of Central and South Europe, it lives up to 20 years in the wild. In captivity there are reports of specimens that lived 50 years! With slow movements, salamander defend themselves from predators using samandrina, a toxic substance that secretes through various glands concentrated in the neck, but also present elsewhere in the body of the animal, usually in the most colorful areas. If ingested the samandrina causes muscle convulsions, hypertension, and hyperventilation. Moral: Never bite the salamander:) Otherwise and providing that you wash your hands afer handling, it is perfectly harmless.
Living life daily is really a struggle whenever you cope with anxiety issues. You might find yourself creating different excuses to prevent doing things because of the way you can experience in social situations. Consequently, you are going to feel lonely and alienated from everybody else. Thankfully, you might have discovered this short article.
Exercises are a terrific way to calm your anxious feelings. Physical exercise can produce endorphins, that help cause you to feel more positive whilst keeping your thoughts far from stressful thoughts. Additionally, frequent exercise is required for general health.
Laughter may not appear to be a cure to anything, however it does fight anxiety very well. Catch a comedy on tv, read an amusing short story, or visit having a friend to be able to start to see the brighter side of things.
Always think about the positive areas of life. Try listing things each night and each morning. When you can concentrate on the positive, it can chase away those negative opinions which lead to anxiety.
Check out relaxation to ease heavy breathing during panic and anxiety attacks. Anxiety may cause hyperventilation, so that you should make sure to breathe deeply from the diaphragm. Whenever you take deep breaths, you force oxygen into your computer. Just count to five or six as the inhale, and perform the same whenever you exhale.
Consider using proteins to assist you cure anxiety. Often, individuals will find they have a nutrient deficiency and therefore are with a lack of serotonin production. Lots of good books, like Mood Cure, discuss plans that you might do in order to eliminate or lower your anxiety.
Consult with a trustworthy friends concerning the anxiety you are feeling. Referring to negative thought you might have, will assist you to lessen them, just so long as your thoughts is obvious and you are searching for ways to eliminate your anxiety. A good thing to accomplish is to speak to somebody who has already handled an identical situation.
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Beautiful pic but it was taken after visiting a hospital (I thought I just caught a cold) and a several hours later, I was admitted to the same hospital due to a high fever (>42C) and hyperventilation, which is due to unknown viral infection. I nearly died....
Oh, my. I thought I sent this out today at about 5 p.m. from my Treo, but I see it didn't go through. So here it is... Brace yourself.
John had a big neuro-test done on him this afternoon as part of the 24-hour study he agreed to do at Beth Israel. Now, what you're about to read will probably shock you and appear to be bad news, but it's actually potentially good news: Amazingly, a three-minute hyperventilation test brought on a significant brain seizure(!!), and a strobe exam a few minutes later brought on a second, smaller one. John was understandably exhausted afterwards, and immediately began experiencing the same kind of left-side paralysis that he had last week (and last October).
At first he was a little disoriented, and couldn't speak, though he could write messages using his right (non-dominant) hand. His speech returned gradually, as shown by this photo of him using his cell phone. As I write this he is quite fluent now.
The best news is, of course, that it all happened *in* the hospital, with multiple sensors to record his brain activity. Now they can sort it all out and figure out a course of action. He's going through the admitting process now. Not sure just how long he'll be here at Beth Israel, but I'm guessing offhand that it won't be more than a couple of days. He doesn't want to miss more school than he has to.
More news as things develop!
Nerium oleander most commonly known as oleander or nerium, is a shrub or small tree cultivated worldwide in temperate and subtropical areas as an ornamental and landscaping plant. It is the only species currently classified in the genus Nerium, belonging to subfamily Apocynoideae of the dogbane family Apocynaceae. It is so widely cultivated that no precise region of origin has been identified, though it is usually associated with the Mediterranean Basin.
Nerium grows to 2–6 metres (7–20 feet) tall. It is most commonly grown in its natural shrub form, but can be trained into a small tree with a single trunk. It is tolerant to both drought and inundation, but not to prolonged frost. White, pink or red five-lobed flowers grow in clusters year-round, peaking during the summer. The fruit is a long narrow pair of follicles, which splits open at maturity to release numerous downy seeds.
Nerium contains several toxic compounds, and it has historically been considered a poisonous plant. However, its bitterness renders it unpalatable to humans and most animals, so poisoning cases are rare and the general risk for human mortality is low. Ingestion of larger amounts may cause nausea, vomiting, excess salivation, abdominal pain, bloody diarrhea and irregular heart rhythm. Prolonged contact with sap may cause skin irritation, eye inflammation and dermatitis.
Description
Oleander grows to 2–6 metres (7–20 feet) tall, with erect stems that splay outward as they mature; first-year stems have a glaucous bloom, while mature stems have a grayish bark. The leaves are in pairs or whorls of three, thick and leathery, dark-green, narrow lanceolate, 5–21 centimetres (2–8 inches) long and 1–3.5 cm (3⁄8–1+3⁄8 in) broad, and with an entire margin filled with minute reticulate venation web typical of eudicots. The leaves are light green and very glossy when young, maturing to a dull dark green.
The flowers grow in clusters at the end of each branch; they are white, pink to red, 2.5–5 cm (1–2 in) diameter, with a deeply 5-lobed fringed corolla round the central corolla tube. They are often, but not always, sweet-scented. The fruit is a long narrow pair of follicles 5–23 cm (2–9 in) long, which splits open at maturity to release numerous downy seeds.
Taxonomy
Nerium oleander is the only species currently classified in the genus Nerium. It belongs to (and gives its name to) the small tribe Nerieae of subfamily Apocynoideae of the dogbane family Apocynaceae. The genera most closely related thus include the equally ornamental (and equally toxic) Adenium G.Don and Strophanthus DC. - both of which contain (like oleander) potent cardiac glycosides that have led to their use as arrow poisons in Africa. The three remaining genera Alafia Thouars, Farquharia Stapf and Isonema R.Br. are less well-known in cultivation.
Synonymy
The plant has been described under a wide variety of names that are today considered its synonyms:
Oleander Medik.
Nerion Tourn. ex St.-Lag.
Nerion oleandrum St.-Lag.
Nerium carneum Dum.Cours.
Nerium flavescens Spin
Nerium floridum Salisb.
Nerium grandiflorum Desf.
Nerium indicum Mill.
Nerium japonicum Gentil
Nerium kotschyi Boiss.
Nerium latifolium Mill.
Nerium lauriforme Lam.
Nerium luteum Nois. ex Steud.
Nerium madonii M.Vincent
Nerium mascatense A.DC.
Nerium odoratissimum Wender.
Nerium odoratum Lam.
Nerium odorum Aiton
Nerium splendens Paxton
Nerium thyrsiflorum Paxton
Nerium verecundum Salisb.
Oleander indica (Mill.) Medik.
Oleander vulgaris Medik.
Etymology
The taxonomic name Nerium oleander was first assigned by Linnaeus in 1753. The genus name Nerium is the Latinized form of the Ancient Greek name for the plant nẽrion (νήριον), which is in turn derived from the Greek for water, nẽros (νηρός), because of the natural habitat of the oleander along rivers and streams.
The origins of the species name are disputed. The word oleander appears as far back as the first century AD, when the Greek physician Pedanius Dioscorides cited it as one of the terms used by the Romans for the plant. Merriam-Webster believes the word is a Medieval Latin corruption of Late Latin names for the plant: arodandrum or lorandrum, or more plausibly rhododendron (another Ancient Greek name for the plant), with the addition of olea because of the superficial resemblance to the olive tree (Olea europea) Another theory posited is that oleander is the Latinized form of a Greek compound noun: οllyo (ὀλλύω) 'I kill', and the Greek noun for man, aner, genitive andros (ἀνήρ, ἀνδρός). ascribed to oleander's toxicity to humans.
The etymological association of oleander with the bay laurel has continued into the modern day: in France the plant is known as "laurier rose", while the Spanish term, "Adelfa", is the descendant of the original Ancient Greek name for both the bay laurel and the oleander, daphne, which subsequently passed into Arabic usage and thence to Spain.
The ancient city of Volubilis in Morocco may have taken its name from the Berber name alili or oualilt for the flower.
Distribution and habitat
Nerium oleander is either native or naturalized to a broad area spanning from Northwest Africa and Iberian and Italian Peninsula eastward through the Mediterranean region and warmer areas of the Black Sea region, Arabian Peninsula, southern Asia, and as far east as Yunnan in southern parts of China. It typically occurs around stream beds in river valleys, where it can alternatively tolerate long seasons of drought and inundation from winter rains. N. oleander is planted in many subtropical and tropical areas of the world.
On the East Coast of the US, it grows as far north as Virginia Beach, while in California and Texas miles of oleander shrubs are planted on median strips. There are estimated to be 25 million oleanders planted along highways and roadsides throughout the state of California. Because of its durability, oleander was planted prolifically on Galveston Island in Texas after the disastrous Hurricane of 1900. They are so prolific that Galveston is known as the 'Oleander City'; an annual oleander festival is hosted every spring. Moody Gardens in Galveston hosts the propagation program for the International Oleander Society, which promotes the cultivation of oleanders. New varieties are hybridized and grown on the Moody Gardens grounds, encompassing every named variety.
Beyond the traditional Mediterranean and subtropical range of oleander, the plant can also be cultivated in mild oceanic climates with the appropriate precautions. It is grown without protection in warmer areas in Switzerland, southern and western Germany and southern England and can reach great sizes in London and to a lesser extent in Paris due to the urban heat island effect. This is also the case with North American cities in the Pacific Northwest like Portland, Seattle, and Vancouver. Plants may suffer damage or die back in such marginal climates during severe winter cold but will rebound from the roots.
Ecology
Some invertebrates are known to be unaffected by oleander toxins, and feed on the plants. Caterpillars of the polka-dot wasp moth (Syntomeida epilais) feed specifically on oleanders and survive by eating only the pulp surrounding the leaf-veins, avoiding the fibers. Larvae of the common crow butterfly (Euploea core) and oleander hawk-moth (Daphnis nerii) also feed on oleanders, and they retain or modify toxins, making them unpalatable to potential predators such as birds, but not to other invertebrates such as spiders and wasps.
The flowers require insect visits to set seed, and seem to be pollinated through a deception mechanism. The showy corolla acts as a potent advertisement to attract pollinators from a distance, but the flowers are nectarless and offer no reward to their visitors. They therefore receive very few visits, as typical of many rewardless flower species. Fears of honey contamination with toxic oleander nectar are therefore unsubstantiated.
Leaf scorch
A bacterial disease known as oleander leaf scorch (Xylella fastidiosa subspecies sandyi) has become a serious threat to the shrub since it was first noticed in Palm Springs, California, in 1992. The disease has since devastated hundreds of thousands of shrubs mainly in Southern California, but also on a smaller scale in Arizona, Nevada and Texas. The culprit is a bacterium which is spread via insects (the glassy-winged sharpshooter primarily) which feed on the tissue of oleanders and spread the bacteria. This inhibits the circulation of water in the tissue of the plant, causing individual branches to die until the entire plant is consumed.
Symptoms of leaf scorch infection may be slow to manifest themselves, but it becomes evident when parts of otherwise healthy oleanders begin to yellow and wither, as if scorched by heat or fire. Die-back may cease during winter dormancy, but the disease flares up in summer heat while the shrub is actively growing, which allows the bacteria to spread through the xylem of the plant. As such it can be difficult to identify at first because gardeners may mistake the symptoms for those of drought stress or nutrient deficiency.
Pruning out affected parts can slow the progression of the disease but not eliminate it. This malaise can continue for several years until the plant completely dies—there is no known cure. The best method for preventing further spread of the disease is to prune infected oleanders to the ground immediately after the infection is noticed.
The responsible pathogen was identified as the subspecies sandyi by Purcell et al., 1999.
Cultivation
Nerium oleander has a history of cultivation going back millennia, especially amongst the great ancient civilizations of the Mediterranean Basin. Some scholars believe it to be the rhodon (rose), also called the 'Rose of Jericho', mentioned in apocryphal writings (Ecclesiasticus XXIV, 13) dating back to between 450 and 180 BC.
The ancient Greeks had several names for the plant, including rhododaphne, nerion, rhododendron and rhodon. Pliny confirmed that the Romans had no Latin word for the plant, but used the Greek terms instead. Pedanius Dioscorides states in his 1st century AD pharmacopeia De Materia Medica that the Romans used the Greek rhododendron but also the Latin Oleander and Laurorosa. The Egyptians apparently called it scinphe, the North Africans rhodedaphane, and the Lucanians (a southern Italic people) icmane.
Both Pliny and Dioscorides stated that oleander was an effective antidote to venomous snake bites if mixed with rue and drunk. However, both rue and oleander are poisonous themselves, and consuming them after a venomous snake bite can accelerate the rate of mortality and increase fatalities.
A 2014 article in the medical journal Perspectives in Biology and Medicine posited that oleander was the substance used to induce hallucinations in the Pythia, the female priestess of Apollo, also known as the Oracle of Delphi in Ancient Greece. According to this theory, the symptoms of the Pythia's trances (enthusiasmos) correspond to either inhaling the smoke of or chewing small amounts of oleander leaves, often called by the generic term laurel in Ancient Greece, which led to confusion with the bay laurel that ancient authors cite.
In his book Enquiries into Plants of circa 300 BC, Theophrastus described (among plants that affect the mind) a shrub he called onotheras, which modern editors render oleander: "the root of onotheras [oleander] administered in wine", he alleges, "makes the temper gentler and more cheerful".
The root of onotheras [oleander] administered in wine makes the temper gentler and more cheerful. The plant has a leaf like that of the almond, but smaller, and the flower is red like a rose. The plant itself (which loves hilly country) forms a large bush; the root is red and large, and, if this is dried, it gives off a fragrance like wine.
In another mention, of "wild bay" (Daphne agria), Theophrastus appears to intend the same shrub.
Oleander was a very popular ornamental shrub in Roman peristyle gardens; it is one of the flora most frequently depicted on murals in Pompeii and elsewhere in Italy. These murals include the famous garden scene from the House of Livia at Prima Porta outside Rome, and those from the House of the Wedding of Alexander and the Marine Venus in Pompeii.
Carbonized fragments of oleander wood have been identified at the Villa Poppaea in Oplontis, likewise buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. They were found to have been planted in a decorative arrangement with citron trees (Citrus medica) alongside the villa's swimming pool.
Herbaria of oleander varieties are compiled and held at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C., and at Moody Gardens in Galveston, Texas.
Ornamental gardening
Oleander is a vigorous grower in warm subtropical regions, where it is extensively used as an ornamental plant in parks, along roadsides and in private gardens. It is most commonly grown in its natural shrub form, but can be trained into a small tree with a single trunk. Hardy versions like white, red and pink oleander will tolerate occasional light frost down to −10 °C (14 °F), though the leaves may be damaged. The toxicity of oleander renders it deer-resistant and its large size makes for a good windbreak – as such it is frequently planted as a hedge along property lines and in agricultural settings.
The plant is tolerant of poor soils, intense heat, salt spray, and sustained drought – although it will flower and grow more vigorously with regular water. Although it does not require pruning to thrive and bloom, oleander can become unruly with age and older branches tend to become gangly, with new growth emerging from the base. For this reason gardeners are advised to prune mature shrubs in the autumn to shape and induce lush new growth and flowering for the following spring. Unless they wish to harvest the seeds, many gardeners choose to prune away the seedpods that form on spent flower clusters, which are a drain on energy. Propagation can be made from cuttings, where they can readily root after being placed in water or in rich organic potting material, like compost.
In Mediterranean climates oleanders can be expected to bloom from April through October, with the heaviest bloom usually occurring between May and June. Free-flowering varieties like 'Petite Salmon' or 'Mont Blanc' require no period of rest and can flower continuously throughout the year if the weather remains warm.
In cold winter climates, oleander is a popular summer potted plant readily available at most nurseries. They require frequent heavy watering and fertilizing as compared to being planted in the ground, but oleander is nonetheless an ideal flowering shrub for patios and other spaces with hot sunshine. During the winter they should be moved indoors, ideally into an unheated greenhouse or basement where they can be allowed to go dormant. Once they are dormant they require little light and only occasional watering. Placing them in a space with central heating and poor air flow can make them susceptible to a variety of pests – aphids, mealybugs, oleander scale, whitefly and spider mites.
Colors and varieties
Oleander flowers are showy, profuse, and often fragrant, which makes them very attractive in many contexts. Over 400 cultivars have been named, with several additional flower colors not found in wild plants having been selected, including yellow, peach and salmon. Many cultivars, like 'Hawaii' or 'Turner's Carnival', are multi-colored, with brilliant striped corollas. The solid whites, reds and a variety of pinks are the most common. Double flowered cultivars like 'Mrs. Isadore Dyer' (deep pink), 'Mathilde Ferrier' (yellow) or 'Mont Blanc' (white) are enjoyed for their large, rose-like blooms and strong fragrance. There is also a variegated form, 'Variegata', featuring leaves striped in yellow and white. Several dwarf cultivars have also been developed, offering a more compact form and size for small spaces. These include 'Little Red', 'Petite White', 'Petite Pink' and 'Petite Salmon', which grow to about 8 feet (2.4 m) at maturity.
Toxicity
Oleander has historically been considered a poisonous plant because of toxic compounds it contains, especially when consumed in large amounts. Among these compounds are oleandrin and oleandrigenin, known as cardiac glycosides, which are known to have a narrow therapeutic index and are toxic when ingested.
Toxicity studies of animals concluded that birds and rodents were observed to be relatively insensitive to the administered oleander cardiac glycosides. Other mammals, however, such as dogs and humans, are relatively sensitive to the effects of cardiac glycosides and the clinical manifestations of "glycoside intoxication".
In reviewing oleander toxicity cases seen in-hospital, Lanford and Boor concluded that, except for children who might be at greater risk, "the human mortality associated with oleander ingestion is generally very low, even in cases of moderate intentional consumption (suicide attempts)." In 2000, a rare instance of death from oleander poisoning occurred when two toddlers adopted from an orphanage ate the leaves from a neighbor's shrub in El Segundo, California. Because oleander is extremely bitter, officials speculated that the toddlers had developed a condition caused by malnutrition, pica, which causes people to eat otherwise inedible material.
Effects of poisoning
Ingestion of this plant can affect the gastrointestinal system, the heart, and the central nervous system. The main effect of cardiotoxic glycosides is positive inotropy. Glycosides bind to the sarcolemma transmembrane ATPase of cardiac muscle cells and compete with K+ ions, inactivating the enzyme. This results in an accumulation of Na+ and Ca2+ ions into the cardiac muscle cells, leading to stronger and faster heart contractions. Moreover, the increased amount of extracellular K+ ions may lead to lethal hyperkalemia. Therefore, clinical features of oleander poisoning are similar to digoxin toxicity and include nausea, diarrhea, and vomiting due to stimulation of the area postrema of the medulla oblongata, neuropsychic disorders, and pathological motor manifestations. Cardiotoxic glycosides are also responsible for stimulating the vagus nerve (leading to sinus bradycardia) and the phrenic nerve (leading to hyperventilation), and lethal brady- and tachyarrhythmias, including asystole and ventricular fibrillation. Oleander poisoning can also result in blurred vision, and vision disturbances, including halos appearing around objects. Oleander sap can cause skin irritations, severe eye inflammation and irritation, and allergic reactions characterized by dermatitis.
The severity of the intoxication can vary based on the quantity ingested and an individual's physiological response, as well as the time of symptom onset after oleander ingestion: they can rapidly occur after drinking teas prepared with oleander leaves or roots or develop more slowly due to the ingestion of unprepared plant parts.
Treatment
Poisoning and reactions to oleander plants are evident quickly, requiring immediate medical care in suspected or known poisonings of both humans and animals. Induced vomiting and gastric lavage are protective measures to reduce absorption of the toxic compounds. Activated carbon may also be administered to help absorb any remaining toxins. Further medical attention may be required depending on the severity of the poisoning and symptoms. Temporary cardiac pacing will be required in many cases (usually for a few days) until the toxin is excreted.
Digoxin immune fab is the best way to cure an oleander poisoning if inducing vomiting has no or minimal success, although it is usually used only for life-threatening conditions due to side effects.
Drying of plant materials does not eliminate the toxins. It is also hazardous for animals such as sheep, horses, cattle, and other grazing animals, with as little as 100 g being enough to kill an adult horse. Plant clippings are especially dangerous to horses, as they are sweet. In July 2009, several horses were poisoned in this manner from the leaves of the plant. Symptoms of a poisoned horse include severe diarrhea and abnormal heartbeat. Aśvamāra (अश्वमार) in Sanskrit refers to this plant, meaning Aśva ‘horse’ and Māra ‘killing’. There is a wide range of toxins and secondary compounds within oleander, and care should be taken around this plant due to its toxic nature. Different names for oleander are used around the world in different locations, so, when encountering a plant with this appearance, regardless of the name used for it, one should exercise great care and caution to avoid ingestion of any part of the plant, including its sap and dried leaves or twigs. The dried or fresh branches should not be used for spearing food, for preparing a cooking fire, or as a food skewer. Many of the oleander relatives, such as the desert rose (Adenium obesum) found in East Africa, have similar leaves and flowers and are equally toxic.
Research
Drugs derived from N. oleander have been investigated as a treatment for cancer, but have failed to demonstrate clinical utility. According to the American Cancer Society, the trials conducted so far have produced no evidence of benefit, while they did cause adverse side effects.
Culture
In a research study done by Haralampos V. Harissis, he claims that the laurel the Pythia is commonly depicted with is actually an oleander plant, and the poisonous plant and its subsequent hallucinations are the source of the oracle's mystical power and subsequent prophecies. Many of the symptoms that primary sources such as Plutarch and Democritus report align with results of oleander poisoning. Harissis also provides evidence claiming that the word laurel may have been used to describe an oleander leaf.
Folklore
The toxicity of the plant makes it the center of an urban legend documented on several continents and over more than a century. Often told as a true and local event, typically an entire family, or in other tellings a group of scouts, succumbs after consuming hot dogs or other food roasted over a campfire using oleander sticks. Some variants tell of this happening to Napoleon's or Alexander the Great's soldiers.
There is an ancient account mentioned by Pliny the Elder in his Natural History, who described a region in Pontus in Turkey where the honey was poisoned from bees having pollinated poisonous flowers, with the honey left as a poisonous trap for an invading army. The flowers have sometimes been mis-translated as oleander, but oleander flowers are nectarless and therefore cannot transmit any toxins via nectar. The actual flower referenced by Pliny was either Azalea or Rhododendron, which is still used in Turkey to produce a hallucinogenic honey.
Oleander is the official flower of the city of Hiroshima, having been the first to bloom following the atomic bombing of the city in 1945.
In painting
Oleander was part of subject matter of paintings by famous artists including:
Gustav Klimt, who painted "Two Girls with an Oleander" between 1890 and 1892.
Vincent van Gogh painted his famous "Oleanders" in Arles in 1888. Van Gogh found the flowers "joyous" and "life-affirming" because of their inexhaustible blooms and vigour.
Anglo-Dutch artist Sir Lawrence Alma-Tadema incorporated oleanders into his classically inspired paintings, including "An Oleander" (1882), "Courtship", "Under the Roof of Blue Ionian Weather" and "A Roman Flower Market" (1868).
"The Terrace at Méric (Oleanders)", an 1867 Impressionist painting by Frédéric Bazille.
In literature, film and music
Janet Fitch's 1999 novel White Oleander is centered around a young Southern California girl's experiences growing up in foster care after her mother is imprisoned for poisoning an ex-boyfriend with the plant. The book was adapted into a 2002 film of the same name starring Michelle Pfeiffer and Alison Lohman.
In the 17th century AD Farsi-language book the Jahangirnama, the Mughal emperor Jahangir passes a stream overgrowing with oleanders along its banks. He orders the nobles in his train to adorn their turbans with oleander blossoms, creating a "field of flowers" on their heads.
Steely Dan's 1973 song "My Old School" contains the line "Oleanders growing outside her door, soon they're gonna be in bloom up in Annandale" in the second verse. It has been theorized that this reference is either a metaphor for a harmful relationship, or marijuana, which is the subcontext of the song.
The Yeasayer song "I Am Chemistry" contains the refrain "My momma told me not to fool with oleander, and never handle the deadly quaker buttons again".
Indie rock band Mother Mother has a song called "Oleander" on their 2011 album Eureka.
In video games
Red Dead Redemption 2 features a deadly plant, oleander sage, which may be used to craft poisonous weapons, and is based on nerium oleander.
1929, when Mr. Wiener- pictured above- died (unfortunately, I could find NOTHING on this enigmatic fellow) was one of those moments in history that replaced one view of the world with another- just like 1974 or 2001.
On August 10, the Stock Market Crash that began the Great Depression hadn’t happened yet, that would be in October. Neither had the Hebron Riots, which were the kindling of what would become the Israel/Palestine conflagration. It would be the end of August when the crushing Young Plan of reparations for World War 1 were enacted, in which the interests of the United States were represented by J.P. Morgan, whose provisions set Germany on a course toward World War 2. It would be November, after a total global annular eclipse on All-Saints Day, that saw the opening of The Museum of Modern Art with its lunatic futurism, and the aerial navigation of the fabled South Pole and its lunar Mountains of Madness by the redoubtable Admiral Byrd and the intrepid Floyd Bennett. It’s would only be 2 weeks until Yasser Arafat was born.
from wikipedia
Phobophobia is mainly linked with internal predispositions. It is developed by the unconscious mind which is linked to an event in which phobia was experienced with emotional trauma and stress, which are closely linked to anxiety disorders and by forgetting and recalling the initiating trauma. Phobophobia might develop from other phobias, in which the intense anxiety and panic caused by the phobia might lead to fearing the phobia itself, which triggers phobophobia before actually experiencing the other phobia. The extreme fear towards the other phobia might lead to make believe the patient that his condition can develop into something worse, intensifying the effects of the other phobia by fearing it. Also, phobophobia can be developed when anxiety disorders are not treated, creating an extreme predisposition to other phobias. The development of phobophobia can also be attributed to characteristics of the patient itself, such as phylogenetic influence, the prepotency of certain stimuli, individual genetic inheritance, age incidence, sex incidence, personality background, cultural influence inside and outside the family, physiological variables and biochemical factors. Phobophobia shares the symptoms of many other anxiety disorders, more specifically panic attacks and generalized anxiety disorder:
Dizziness
Heart Pounding
Sweating
Slight paresthesia
Tension
Hyperventilation
Angst
Faintness
Avoidance
newtownpentacle.com/2009/12/03/mt-zion-3-threading-precip...
hyperventilation (noun) :
1.
excessively rapid and deep breathing.
2.
a condition characterized by abnormally prolonged and rapid breathing, resulting in decreased carbon dioxide levels and increased oxygen levels that produce faintness, tingling of the fingers and toes, and, if continued, alkalosis and loss of consciousness.
sometimes I hyperventilate over silly things.
Aren't they troopers? I think I had to edit out more mosquitos here then anything. I literally have an image where he is getting divebombed as it comes in for a landing!
Oh! Another little story about this. So when I was scouting out this area I ended up wandering through these before realizing just how many bees there were around. Now for an ordinary person that isn't a big deal - but, for me, I am terrified, petrified, out-right chicken of bees/wasps/hornets etc. Spiders, flies, scorpions, lizards, snakes (I actually almost stepped on one leaving this area, but that's another story) I am fine with, but bees *insert hyperventilation here*. To leave I literally had to call my mother (that's right) to talk me through this patch.
PS. I survived
Yellow-billed stork
Geelbek ooievaar
Nimmersat
(Mycteria ibis)
The yellow-billed stork (Mycteria ibis), sometimes also called the wood stork or wood ibis, is a large African wading stork species in the family Ciconiidae. It is widespread in regions south of the Sahara and also occurs in Madagascar.
The yellow-billed stork is closely related to 3 other species in the genus Mycteria: the American woodstork (Mycteria americana), the milky stork (Mycteria cinerea) and the painted stork (Mycteria leucocephala). It is classified as belonging to one clade with these 3 other species because they all display remarkable homologies in behavior and morphology. In one analytical study of feeding and courtship behaviours of the wood-stork family, M.P. Kahl attributed the same general ethology to all members of the genus Mycteria, with few species-specific variations. These four species are collectively referred to as the wood-storks, which should not be confused with one alternative common name (wood-stork) for the yellow-billed stork.
Before it was established that the yellow-billed stork was closely related to the American woodstork, the former was classified as belonging to the genus Ibis, together with the milky stork and painted stork. However, the yellow-billed stork has actually long been recognised as a true stork and along with the other 3 related stork species, it should not strictly be called an ibis.
It is a medium-sized stork standing 90–105 cm (35–41 in) tall. The body is white with a short black tail that is glossed green and purple when freshly moulted. The bill is deep yellow, slightly decurved at the end and has a rounder cross-section than in other stork species outside the Mycteria. Feathers extend onto the head and neck just behind the eyes, with the face and forehead being covered by deep red skin. Both sexes are similar in appearance, but the male is larger and has a slightly longer heavier bill. Males and females weigh approximately 2.3 kg (5.1 lb) and 1.9 kg (4.2 lb) respectively.
Colouration becomes more vivid during the breeding season. In the breeding season, the plumage is coloured pink on the upperwings and back; the ordinarily brown legs also turn bright pink; the bill becomes a deeper yellow and the face becomes a deeper red.
Juveniles are greyish-brown with a dull, partially bare, orange face and a dull yellowish bill. The legs and feet are brown and feathers all over the body are blackish-brown. At fledging, salmon-pink colouration in the underwings begins to develop and after about one year, the plumage is greyish-white. Flight feathers on the tail and wing also become black. Later, the pink colouration typical of adult plumage begins to appear.
These storks walk with a high-stepped stalking gait on the ground of shallow water and their approximate walking rate has been recorded as 70 steps per minute. They fly with alternating flaps and glides, with the speed of their flaps averaging 177–205 beats per minute.They usually flap only for short journeys and often fly in a soaring and gliding motion over several kilometres for locomotion between breeding colonies or roosts and feeding sites. By soaring on thermals and gliding by turns, they can cover large distances without wasting much energy. On descending from high altitudes, this stork has been observed to dive deeply at high speeds and flip over and over from side to side, hence showing impressive aerobatics. It even appears to enjoy these aerial stunts.
This species is generally non-vocal, but utters hissing falsetto screams during social displays in the breeding season. These storks also engage in bill clattering and an audible “woofing” wing beat at breeding colonies Nestlings make a loud continual monotonous braying call to beg parental adults for food.
The yellow-billed stork occurs primarily in Eastern Africa, but is widely distributed in areas extending from Senegal and Somalia down to South Africa and in some regions of western Madagascar. During one observation of a mixed species bird colony on the Tana River in Kenya, it was found to be the commonest species there, with 2000 individuals being counted at once.
It does not generally migrate far, at least not out of its breeding range; but usually makes short migratory movements which are influenced by rainfall. It makes local movements in Kenya and has also been found to migrate from North to South Sudan with the rainy season It may also migrate regularly to and from South Africa. However, little is actually known about this bird’s general migratory movements. Due to apparent observed variation in migratory patterns throughout Africa, the yellow-billed stork has been termed a facultative nomad. It may migrate simply to avoid areas where water or rainfall conditions are too high or too low for feeding on prey. Some populations migrate considerable distances between feeding or breeding sites; usually by using thermals to soar and glide. Other local populations have been found to be sedentary and remain in their respective habitats all year round.
Its preferred habitats include wetlands, shallow lakes and mudflats, usually 10–40 cm deep but it usually avoids heavily forested regions in central Africa. It also avoids flooded regions and deep expansive bodies of water because feeding conditions there are unsuitable for their typical grope and stir feeding techniques.
This species breeds especially in Kenya and Tanzania. Although it is known to breed in Uganda, breeding sites have not been recorded there. It has been found to breed also in Malakol in Sudan and often inside walled cities in West Africa from Gambia down to northern Nigeria. Still other breeding sites include Zululand in South Africa and northern Botswana,[12] but are rarer below northern Botswana and Zimbabwe where sites are well-watered. Although there is no direct evidence of current breeding in Madagascar, young birds unable to fly have been observed near Lake Kinkony during October.
Their diet comprises mainly small, freshwater fish of about 60-100mm length and maximally 150g, which they swallow whole. They also feed on crustaceans, worms, aquatic insects, frogs and occasionally small mammals and birds.
This species appears to rely mainly on sense of touch to detect and capture prey, rather than by vision. They feed patiently by walking through the water with partially open bills and probe the water for prey. Contact of the bill with a prey item is followed by a rapid snap-bill reflex, whereby the bird snaps shut its mandibles, raises its head and swallows the prey whole. The speed of this reflex in the closely related American woodstork (Mycteria americana) has been recorded as 25 milliseconds and although the corresponding reflex in the yellow-billed stork has not been quantitatively measured, the yellow-billed stork’s feeding mechanism appears to be at least qualitatively identical to that of the American woodstork.
In addition to the snap-bill reflex, the yellow-billed stork also uses a systematic foot stirring technique to sound out evasive prey. It prods and churns up the bottom of the water as part of a “herding mechanism” to force prey out of the bottom vegetation and into the bird’s bill. The bird does this several times with one foot before bringing it forwards and repeating with the other foot. Although they are normally active predators, they have also been observed to scavenge fish regurgitated by cormorants.
The yellow-billed stork has been observed to follow moving crocodiles or hippopotami through the water and feed behind them, appearing to take advantage of organisms churned up by their quarry. Feeding lasts for only a short time before the bird obtains its requirements and proceeds to rest again.
Parents feed their young by regurgitating fish onto the nest floor, whereupon it is picked up and consumed by the nestlings. The young eat voraciously and an individual nestling increases its body weight from 50 grams to 600 grams during the first ten days of its life. Hence, this species has earned the German colloquial common name “Nimmersatt”; meaning “never full”.
Breeding is seasonal and appears to be stimulated by the peak of long heavy rainfall and resultant flooding of shallow marshes, usually near Lake Victoria. This flooding is linked to an increase in prey fish availability; and reproduction is therefore synchronised with this peak in food availability. In such observations near Kisumu, M.P. Kahl’s explanation for this trend was that in the dry season, most prey fish are forced to leave the dried-up, deoxygenated marshes that cannot support them and retreat to the deep waters of Lake Victoria where the storks cannot reach them. However, fish move back up the streams on the onset of rain and spread out over the marshes to breed, where they become accessible to the storks. By nesting at this time and providing that the rains do not end pre-maturely, the storks are guaranteed a plentiful food supply for their young.
The yellow-billed stork may also begin nesting and breeding at the end of long rains. This occurs especially on flat extensive marshlands as water levels gradually decrease and concentrate fish sufficiently for the storks to feed on. However, unseasonal rainfall has also been reported to induce off-season breeding in northern Botswana and western and eastern Kenya. Rainfall may cause local flooding and hence ideal feeding conditions. This stork appears to breed simply when rainfall and local flooding are optimal and hence seems to be flexible in its temporal breeding pattern, which varies with rainfall pattern throughout the African continent.
As with all stork species, male yellow-billed storks select and occupy potential nest sites in trees, whereupon females attempt to approach the males. The yellow-billed stork has an extensive repertoire of courtship behaviours near and at the nest that may lead to pair formation and copulation. Generally, these courtship behaviours are also assumed to be common to all Mycteria species and show remarkable homology within the genus Mycteria. After the male has initially established at the nesting-site and the female begins to approach, he displays behaviours that advertise himself to her. One of these is the Display Preening, whereby the male pretends to strip down each of his extended wings with the bill several times each side and the bill does not effectively close around the feathers. Another observed display among males is the Swaying-Twig Grasping. Here, the male stands on the potential nesting-site and bends over to gently grasp and release underlying twigs at regular intervals. This is sometimes accompanied by side-to-side oscillations of the neck and head and he continues to pick at twigs in between such movements.
Reciprocally, approaching females display their own distinct behaviours. One such behaviour is the Balancing Posture, whereby she walks with a horizontal body axis and extended wings toward the male occupying the nesting-site. Later, when the female continues to approach or already stands near an established male, she may also engage in Gaping. Here, the bill is gaped open slightly with the neck inclined upward at about 45o . and often occurs in conjunction with the Balancing-Posture. This behaviour ordinarily continues if the male accepts the female and has allowed her to enter the nest, but the female usually closes her wings by this time. The male may also continue his Display-Preening when standing next to the female in the nest
During copulation, the male steps onto the female’s back from the side, hooks his feet over her shoulders, holds out his wings for balance and finally bends his legs to lower himself for cloacal contact, as happens in most birds. In turn, the female holds out her wings almost horizontally. The process is accompanied by bill clattering from the male as he regularly opens and closes his mandibles and vigorously shakes his head to beat his bill against the female’s. In turn, the female keeps her bill horizontal with the male’s or inclined downward at approximately 45 degrees.] Average copulation time in this species has been calculated as 15.7 seconds.
The male and female build the nest together either in high trees on dry land away from predators, or in small trees over water. Nest building takes up to 10 days. The nest may be 80–100 cm in diameter and 20–30 cm thick. The female typically lays 2-4 eggs (usually 3) on alternate days[ and average clutch size has been recorded as 2.5. The male and female share duties to incubate the eggs, which takes up to 30 days. As in many other stork species, hatching is asynchronous (usually at 1- to 2-day intervals), so that the young in the brood differ considerably in body size at any one time. During food shortage, the smaller young are at risk of being outcompeted for food by their larger nest-mates.
Both parents share duties of guarding and feeding the young until the latter are about 21 days old. Thereafter, both parents forage to attend to the young’s intense food demands. Alongside parental feeding by regurgitation of fish, parents have also been observed to regurgitate water into the open bills of their nestlings, especially on hot days. This may aid the typical thermoregulatory strategy of the young (common to all stork species) to excrete dilute urine down their legs in response to hot weather. Water regurgitated over the young serves as a water supplement in addition to fluid in their food, so that they have sufficient water to continue urinating down their legs to avoid hyperventilation. Additionally, parents sometimes help keep the young cool by shading them with their open wings.
The nestlings usually fledge after 50–55 days of hatching and fly away from the nest. However, after leaving the nest for the first time, the offspring often return there to be fed by their parents and roost with them for another 1–3 weeks. It is also thought that individuals are not fully adult until 3 years old and despite lack of data, new adults are thought to not breed until much later than this.
Fledglings have also been observed to not differ considerably in their foraging and feeding strategies from adults. In one investigation, four adult, hand-reared yellow-billed storks kept in captivity showed typical grope-feeding and foot stirring shortly after they were introduced to bodies of water. Hence, this suggests that such feeding techniques in this species are innate.
These birds breed colonially, often alongside other species; but the yellow-billed stork is sometimes the only occupant species of a nesting site. A subset of up to 20 individuals may nest close together in any one part of a colony; with several males occupying potential nest sites all in the same place. If many of these males do not acquire mates, the whole group moves on with the unpaired females to another tree. These “bachelor parties” are a noticeable feature of colonies of this species and usually consist of 12 or more males and at least as many females. As many as 50 nests have been counted all at once in a single breeding area.
Despite their gregariousness during breeding, most individuals generally ignore each other outside nesting-sites; although some hostile encounters may occur. Some of these encounters involve one individual showing an unambiguous attack or escape response if there is a large difference in social status between the two individuals. However, if two individuals are equally matched, they slowly approach each other and show a ritualised display called the Forward Threat. Here, one individual holds its body forward horizontally and retracts the neck so that it touches the crown, with the tail cocked at 45 degrees and all feathers erect. It approaches the opponent and points its bill at it, sometimes gaping. If the opponent does not capitulate, the attacker may grab at it with its bill and the two may briefly spar with their bills until one retreats in an erect stance with compressed plumage.
Hostility can also arise between opposite sexes when a female approaches a male on a potential nest site. Both sexes may display a similar aforementioned Forward Threat, but clatter their bills after grabbing with them at the other stork and extend their wings to maintain balance. Another hostile behaviour between sexes is the Snap Display,whereby they snap horizontally with their bills while standing upright. This may occur during and immediately after pair formation, but subsides later in the breeding cycle as the male and female become familiar with each other and it eventually disappears.
Nestlings show remarkable behavioural transformations at 3 weeks of age. During the constant parental attendance before this time, the young show little fear or aggression in response to intruders (such as a human observer), but are found to merely crouch low and quietly in the nest. After this time, when both parents go foraging and leave the young in the nest, a nestling shows strong fear in response to an intruder. It either attempts to climb out of the nest to escape or acts aggressively toward the intruder.
WIkipedia
I got this tattoo after my first field experience in the world of paleoanthropology. I spent 2 months in South Africa and Botswana, learning about human origins and ecology of southern Africa.
This piece itself is rock art of a San shaman in trance. They would enter a state of altered consciousness by intense dancing, audio-driving, and hyperventilation (not hallicinogenics). They likened this state to flying or swimming. Therefore, this image has subsequently been interpreted as a man-bird or man-fish.
Grafik 3: Eingeschränkte Gesamtleistungsfähigkeit (VO2max vermindert)
Grafik 7: kleines Atemzuvolumen Vt, rasch einsetzende Hyperventilation, Atemfrequenz längere Zeit um 50/min.
Grafik 9: hohe AaDO2, welche unter Belastung zunimmt. Dabei schwergradige Hypoxämie PO2 um 40 mmHg. PETCO2 über 40 mmHg (kein Hinweis auf PAH).
Grafik 2: O2-Puls steigt linear an, erreicht aber nicht den Normbereich (sekundär bei insgesamt verminderter Leistungsfähigkeit).
i started this cardigan last year, based on an interweave knits pattern. i basically had to resize it due to gauge issues, add pockets, and pick up way too many ends and seam for the zillionth time (the sleeves were a major pain).
and? when i put it in the washer to drain and spin, it felted. i have no idea why- the washer has drained several of my handknits with no effect. I guess it just didn't like this one. And as a consequence... the cardigan shrunk. by a lot. I would have to revert to my six-year-old self to wear this.
sigh. on the bright side:
-a potential holiday gift completed (if it ever dries in this lovely southern humidity)
-i learned why seamless sweaters rock.
-i cut into my own knitting and other than some hyperventilation i discovered it is not a big deal (steeks, I'm looking at you).
-i can rewrite patterns to suit the yarn/taste.
-my washer gets its annual cleaning (ha! more like an exorcism).
This is my friend Fred, whom I've known for over a half century. This was taken in September of 1968 in Gloucester, Massachusetts at the home of a friend and mentor, Davis Carter. Fred was very close to Davis and we both worked with him in Washington, DC in 1972 - 73 filming for congressmen and for for news people. We got to wander around the Congressional office buildings fairly freely, despite the fact that we were long haired 'hippies' and I had a scruffy beard.
Fred has always been involved with music, and still plays guitar, keyboard and sings. He also has an enormous music collection and has been keeping his programming skills honed by continuously updating and rewriting his music cataloging software. Seldom will a week go by without us discussing some finicky wierdness about Perl or VB or [insert development tool of choice here].
This day he picked up the flute and played. I had played saxophone for a while and was familiar with the fingrering for the flute, but when I tried to get a sound out of it, all I got was hyperventilation. Fred made music.
We are still in constant contact even though now we live on opposite sides of the country. We have both been involved with photography all of our lives, both in collaboration and independently. If you are reading this, you know where my stuff is displayed, but check out his at Fred's Daily Pictures. Sometimes it seems as if Fred is the only one looking at and commenting on my blog, but you know what? That's good enough for me
Arachnophobia:
- an abnormal and irrational fear of spiders
- symptoms include excessive sweating, excessive crying, hyperventilation, a quickened heartbeat, and several hours of psychological paralysis following a spidery encounter
On a day I will never forget, I was trapped in a terribly spidery situation. A spider in my room. A big one. The usual spider-killers of the family were not home. I had no choice but to kill him myself. But contact is impossible. I stood on a chair, clutching the big red spray can. I got as close as I could before trembling to the point of dropping the can. I aimed. No air. No balance. But no choice. I sprayed. He fell. I jumped and continued to spray. He crawled as fast as he could, looking for shelter. I kept spraying. Still no air. He twitched. I watched in horror. He shriveled up into a ball of black legs. No movement on his part, no need for continued observation on my part. I won. One gasp for air. Tears. Screams. Sweat. Trembles. Eight more hours of emptiness, incomprehension, trauma, lack of movement, lack of concentration, disbelief... Eight hours - one for each of his fascinating legs.
"there's spiders in your room
but there always will be"
--editors