The Things I've Learned...

Wow, apparently a Praying Mantis can catch and eat a hummingbird. Check out the link below for some pictures of this. Hummingbirds are small I know, but Praying Mantis' aren't very big either.

Link: Praying Mantis Eats Hummingbird

Labels: insects, wildlife

All but Ageless is the title of the New York Times article I just read. It is an article about turtles and their unique physiology. Apparently turtles rarely, if ever, die from old age. They are killed either by disease, starvation, or by getting squashed. According to the article studies have shown that an old turtles organs are virtually the same as a young turtles organs. They do not show the signs of aging as organs do in humans and most other animals. Interesting. As I was reading this I was thinking, "Man, I wish we could learn from this and make our organs live forever." Reading further I, of course, discover that scientists are working on this right now. Perhaps we can learn something from studying the turtle genome that we can apply to our own species. That would be cool.

Anyway, the article also goes on to say that even though turtles are awesome creatures and can live for extremely long times, they are starting to die off due to loss of habitat and due to being crushed by automobiles. That seems to be a theme for most all animals in today's world.

The article contains lots more good info and many cute turtle pics (the image here was "borrowed" from the article. You can view the article here.

Labels: turtles, wildlife