Feb. 9, 2024
Friday Open Comments
Stop looking at me, Abyss!
Look over here instead:
It’s a rerun of sorts. I shared it with Brian in comments the other day when the topic of empty and meaningless corporate jargon came up. Words that end in “-ity” feature prominently.
Kudos for your ingenuity and perspicacity, Weird Al.
Today’s special animal friends are all over the map. First, here’s a nice manul teenbro named Shu enjoying some winter weather in the Leningrad Zoo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OaxdScxHE7Y
Regular readers of TSAF will recall that the manul, or Pallas’s Cat, is our spirit animal. At the other end of the world, the Golden-Tailed Sapphire, Chrysuronia oenone, is a particularly lovely hummingbird found in the hummingbird-rich forests where the Andes drop down to the Amazon basin in Ecuador, Peru, Colombia, and Venezuela. We could spend our whole lives learning about this insanely biodiverse region.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iCPiIrtS7sc
Golden-tailed sapphires are a species of Least Concern. They feed on the nectar of a variety of flowering vines and trees, and they have adapted to second-growth forest as well as coffee and cacao plantations.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EpYFKnMGomQ
Meanwhile, in Australia, you could find a diamond python, Morelia spilota spilota, in your suburban backyard or garage. A subspecies of the carpet python, M. spilota, the diamond python has a cool diamond pattern and grows up to 13 feet long, making it a medium-sized python.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5CtZOF-46rM
Carpet pythons are nonvenomous, but carpet vipers, Echis pyramidum and Echis ocellatus, will kill you. In fact, they cause most of the world’s snakebite deaths, even though they are not found in Australia. Carpet vipers are native to Arabia and northeastern Africa. If you feel you must go to these places, please take a supply of Polyvalent Anti-viper Venom.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCBkKStLXRE
Finally, we have the Golden Snub-Nosed Monkey, Rhinopithecus roxellana, an endangered primate native to central and southwestern China. These monkeys can be found in forests at altitudes up to 11,200 feet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yARtExKaIH8
Feeding mainly on lichens, they live in polygamous family groups that can combine to form bands of up to 600 members. Predators include large raptors such as the Northern goshawk, Accipiter gentilis, and wild canines, such as yesterday’s dhole, and the Asiatic golden cat, Catopuma temmincki. Rated Near Threatened by IUCN, the Asiatic golden cat is found over a wide range, but most local populations are small.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJmibGbUs6A
Editorial note: TSAF will be going on hiatus for the season of Lent, during which the author will work on her soul and her Envirothon teams and her gardening.
That was an excellent video. Great artwork. I really respect people who can just think up stuff like that.
Here's a new song from The Dead South:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pb4EobvSJk4
They're coming to Charlotte later this month, but not to a venue I will go to, plus we don't go out Sunday nights due to Envirothon on Mondays.