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Some bats have been getting nailed by wind turbines, but not in the typical bloody mass way birds get canned. Folks at the University o Calgary collected 188 bats in Alberta… 90% of them had internal trauma without damage to their outsides. They’re lungs busted. It seems the turbines’ drop in pressure directly by them makes the batty lungs pop, similar to a diver coming to the surface too quickly after a deep dive. The bats are dying from the bends, and they don’t “see” it coming. The turbines are screwing with their echolocation.

This part of the article in NewScientist that got my attention most:

Bats eat nocturnal insects including agricultural pests, so if wind turbines affected their population levels, this could affect the rest of the local ecosystems. And the effects could even be international. “The species being killed are migrants,” says Baerwald. “If bats are killed in Canada that could have consequences for ecosystems as far away as Mexico.”

Well. Crap. One solution to the banged-up bat debacle would be to increase the minimum speed requirement to get the turbines turning.

spotted on wtf_nature.

This ten minute video posted to wtf_nature was originally aired on Discovery Channel. Esref Armaga, a Turkish man born without eyes, is painting with his fingers. Basing his images off of what he’s “seen” with his hands, Armaga paints landscapes. Professor John Kennedy at Harvard University creams his undershorts about this guy. I’m not going to ruin the video for you so you can be surprised. They give him a test.

This dude gets perspective without ever having been able to see visual relationships. They scan his brains while he draws and his visual centers act as if he was seeing. He’s a pretty cool guy who wants people to focus on what he creates rather than how.

(3:38:17 PM) dmkun: yeah… mac like things are becoming more and more popular
(3:38:29 PM) dmkun: people like their eye-candy
(3:38:41 PM) dmkun: (I happen to fall into that group to some degree)

Yes it’s true. Even computer geeky guys are interested in a visual interface like the Macintosh of now. The pinwheel of doom can suck my nonexistent dick.

Aurora (Part 1) from Adaptive Path on Vimeo.

This concept is definitely fun to look at and probably the user gets a little thrill at orchestrating the prettiness, watching the flow of it all. Okay great, it’s fun to look at. Things that piss me off:

-hesitation
-lack of organization
-distraction

The browser is using the cloud float technique when viewing all open programs or files on the computer’s hard drive, similar to how Macs currently can view all open programs in a neat placemat setting regardless of the number of windows. i like the way Mac has it: take the cascaded windows and separate them all to be viewed at the same time in an ordered manner. This floaty shit, while pretty, is fairly disorganized, probably leading the user to constantly be using the search feature. Is searching bad? Definitely not. But. If we’re going to use the search feature all the time, why waste space on having little pictures of files float around the screen at different “depths?” Doesn’t make sense to me.

With the clouds, the way to select a file is to hover the cursor to wait for it to be highlighted (that is my impression anyway). Hovering wastes time. It takes a moment for the computer to recognize if this is the file to be selected when there are five files in one spot (at different depths).

Everything rimmed the outside of the browser when the correct button was pushed. That part is orderly. The cloud that poofs into view when a folder or whatever is selected is a mess. That’s where that searching thing comes into play again. Why bother with the pretty?! Pretty leads to distraction, which leads to slowing down. When you have to get shit done, the distraction time can add up in a day’s time. I thought using computers was supposed to be a speedy-type deal.

Floaty cloud shit is a good idea for a website, something that isn’t used constantly. I’ve seen it on art portfolios before (with cute music no less) but for a browser… idk you guys.

The iPod phone thing at the end was a nice touch. Hah.

the dog just haaad to be named something silly.

Bernann McKinney paid RNL Bio, a South Korean company, to clone her now deceased dog. She has five puppies genetically the same as her pit bull, Booger. How much for the quints? $50,000US. McKinney plans on keeping three of the pups for herself and donating the other two to a service program.

The cloning charge is to be up to $150,000US, but McKinney being the first and also the public figure for the process was only charged one third of the pricetag.

The piglet was born in the Fengzhang village of Xiping township. The family of the mother sow flipped their shit when they saw it, but their son likes it and has been feeding it. Aside from the obvious cranial deformities, its hind legs are longer than its front, leading the baby hopping rather than walking to get around. The neighbors are curious to see what it will look like as it ages. I hope it can last!

a source

from wtf nature!

This owl is a Southern White Faced Scops (Ptilopsis granti). Originally from South Africa, the little dude reacts to threats on a scale level. If it appears it can take on the enemy, he poofs up his plumage and puts on a badass face. If he doesn’t, he shrivels up and looks as little as he can. These little dudes are from a big family of 45 genus or so and are closely related to the American Screech Owl compared to, say, the Great Horned Owl.

The Japanese commentary is awesome.

Darren Couchman is walking around with giant pink balls under his arms so guys get it that they need to check for testicular cancer. Like a lady who does self-examinations of her bazoombas to look for lumps, guys can consider doing the same with their berries.

They’re stopping at 66 locations on tour over in his neck of the woods. It’s cute, it works, it’s from deadspin. Check out Darren’s book One Lump or Two? to really get the jokes rolling.

GUYS CHECK YOUR BALLS OKAY

check out this article on popgadget for a picture of an egg being excreted by an ovary. has even more info and pictures. The doctors stumbled upon this during a hysterectomy. You’d think they would have considered this gal’s time of the month.

This clip is taken from National Geographic’s Animals in the Womb, a series about looking at babies of all types before they are born. This particular section shows human kiddos — twins, triplets, and quadruplets. They’re calling it 4-D because it’s in real time.

Found while wandering in an entry on womb animals in wtf nature on livejournal. That community may not be safe for work. Take care when clicking links to pictures.