Category Archives: Froggy Foibles

Amazing photos show how caterpillars totally took over a tree and covered it in a web of silk. The cherry tree, on the banks of the River Wharfe, near Kilnsey, in North Yorkshire, is now the spawning place for an army of caterpillars while they undergo their transformation into moths. They weave the webs in a bid to protect themselves from predators. Paul Kingston, who captured these pictures, said: ‘It truly was a weird and wonderful sight. ‘It was like something out of a fantasy novel or horror film. ‘It is absolutely incredible to think that such tiny creatures are capable of creating something so huge and beautiful.’

Japan has one surefire sign of spring every year: the bright, gorgeous petals of the cherry blossom trees floating in the air. It may be part of their beauty that the cherry blossom blooms are short-lived, but you can’t help wishing they would stay around a little bit longer. So why not build an everlasting tree out of thousands of LEGO bricks? That’s just what they did at LEGOLAND Japan in Nagoya to celebrate their first year of operation, and the result is stunning.

It’s not uncommon for cartoon characters to find themselves unwittingly dragged through all the chaos of a saw mill. From the audience’s perspective, it’s usually hilarious. But when you send a small camera on a log through a saw mill, scary doesn’t even begin to describe the experience of being pulled through all that machinery. 

https://youtu.be/635mkALoXFw

An eagle-eyed Tesco worker was shocked to find a live frog hidden in a bunch of bananas. The tree frog, native to the Dominican Republic, is better known for hopping from tree to tree in the rainforest – rather than turning up in a bag of fruit in Blackburn, Lancashire. The worker immediately contacted the RSPCA, whose staff advised her to make tiny air holes in the plastic and add some water for moisture. Staff then took the frog to an exotics rescue centre Reptilia, which identified the critter as a Dominican tree frog and fittingly named him Nana.

A video of a wild elephant in India blowing out ash from a fire has baffled wildlife experts around the world. [Scientist] Vinay Kumar…filmed the 48-second video during a work trip to Nagarhole forest in Karnataka state in April 2016. …”What we saw that day almost appeared as though the elephant was smoking – she would draw up a trunk full of ash close to her mouth and blow it out in a puff of smoke!” Mr Kumar said.  Elephant biologist Varun R Goswami, …believes that “the elephant was trying to ingest wood charcoal… blowing away the ash that came along with it in her trunk, and consuming the rest”. “Charcoal has well recognised toxin-binding properties… wild animals may be attracted to it for this medicinal value,” he said. “It can also serve as a laxative, thereby doubling its utility for animals that consume it after forest fires…

Blue Orange Games launches Photosynthesis. Players take control of species of trees, all vying to dominate a woodland canopy. You’ll compete to plant seeds in prime spots on the forest floor, growing your tiny saplings into towering giants. It might all sound very sedate and gentle, but this is a game as fiercely competitive as natural selection itself. You’ll need to aggressively seize space on the board, thinking several moves ahead and cutting off opportunities for your rivals. You’ll aim to tower over your opponents’ trees, soaking up life-giving sunlight while casting them into shadow. It’s simple and elegant, but it squeezes some real thought out of its straightforward design. It’s also visually striking. As you play, you’ll place three-dimensional cardboard trees on the board, creating a dense, colourful forest. It’s a pleasing combination of looks and brains, and it will bring you back to the table time and time again.

Karl Lagerfeld has been accused of “environmental heresy” after he created a forest with chopped-down trees for a Chanel fashion show in Paris. …His apparent ode to nature for Chanel’s autumn and winter ready-to-wear parade used tonnes of dry leaves strewn on the floor, forest scents and woodlands with a centre-piece of nine oaks. …France Nature Environnement accused it of destoying century-old trees for a three-hour show that amounted to “a heresy which shows the luxury trade’s failure to take the environment into account”. …Chanel said that none of the oak and poplar trees which it acquired from a forest in the Perche region in Normandy had been a century old. “In buying the trees Chanel also promised to replant 100 new oak trees in the heart of the same forest,” it said.

Eight years ago, the production team at Midleton Distillery in County Cork, Ireland, set out to experiment with finishing techniques featuring toasted virgin Irish oak casks. Midleton’s team—conjectured that the source of an oak cask, specifically the region from which the wood was forested—even the individual tree that produced the barrel’s staves—could inject unique personality into an Irish whiskey… To make 29 hogshead casks, six oak trees—all 130 years old—were cut from the Bluebell Forest on the Castle Blunden Estate in County Kilkenny. Each cask was made from the wood of just one of those trees. Subsequently, each bottle of this cask-strength whiskey, which costs $300, can be traced back to one of those Irish oaks—and that lineage is prominently displayed on the label.

Antarctica as we know it is a frosty wilderness covered in thick compacted ice. But a recent scientific discovery suggests that the vast white continent was home to leafy forests, some 280 million years ago. During the last Antarctic summer, geologist Erik Gulbranson and a team of polar scientists chanced upon fossils from the oldest polar forest found on the continent — before the first dinosaurs walked the Earth. Now the team is braving the land of ice once more to uncover clues as to how forests once flourished there. …According to Gulbranson the southernmost part of the continent would have been carpeted in seed ferns extending up to 40 meters tall. These trees would have been able to survive approximately four to five months of absolute darkness, followed by four to five months of continuous light.