Forget about all the ballyhoo on celestial events like eclipses, meteorite showers, or the passage of comets. Get tickets to a natural event in the US Midwest and Southeast this May-July - an event that only occurs every on one in 221 years. Periodical Cicadas (Magicicada), appearon stable, multi-year cycles. After hatching, the grubs drop from the bark where mum has laid them and burrow into the soil, where they remain for many years feeding off tree roots. At the allotted time they…
A suburban street in Mexico with dead blackbirds scattered around. What happened? It was none the obvious causes: chemicals, shooting, lightening, an aircraft, or even aliens. Understanding the cause first requires a diversion. Murmurations are large flocks, usually of starlings, that gather around sunset above their roosting sites. There, they twist and turn into fantastical shapes - they even may fold back and through each other. Click on the image to see a spectacular video. This remarkable…
In Jules Verne's classic tale, Journey to the Centre of the Earth, a German professor and his nephew follow directions from an ancient manuscript to journey deep into the earth. There, they find a fabulous, but dangerous, maze of seas, larva eruptions, and prehistoric animals. A sci-fi classic that could not possibly be true! Science moves on and we now know that deep-down below the mantle lie large amounts of water, liquid rock, and even a real ocean bed. How could it be? The…
