Isn’t that something? The most beautiful sounds. That’s subjective of course, but it’s a good reminder of how important sound is, and the part it plays in most of our lives. For me, the most beautiful sounds will always be ocean waves, especially a thunderstorm breaking over the ocean, but there’s a world of sound, all of it beautiful.
Anan Kaewkhammul / Shutterstock.
Owls are, of course, amazing. They can rotate their head almost 360 degrees, they have lopsided ears – all the better for hearing you with, my dear – and are collectively known as a parliament.
The Internet, however, is freaking out at what they look like naked.
Twitter user Dana Schwartz is obviously of curious, and brave, mind as she googled the now immortal words “what owls look like without feathers”, which produced this image that you now cannot unsee.
TFW someone interrupts you when you're in the middle of the spookiest meeting of all time pic.twitter.com/RqojCv4R5S
— Dana Schwartz (@DanaSchwartzzz) January 8, 2017
People had all manner of fun in the tweet stream, happily obliging with photos of other naked beings:
@DanaSchwartzzz Bald hedgehogs are testicles with a face pic.twitter.com/v7VNUdHu9W
— James H (@angusprune) January 8, 2017
A hairless hedgehog. That’s something to curse about!
Via IFLScience!
I can sort of add to the nekkid animals. This is Rune, (pronounced Rooh neh) who has been hairless most of his short life, and just now has developed a very fine, sparse coat of sorts. There are two others like him, but Rune grabbed my heart from the start. He’s a sweet, shy boy, with a penchant for perching on top of my head, much like his grandmother, Grace. Somewhere in that line, there was a hairless rat or two.
From rq, more of her immortalization of the three lab cats, who continue to look as if their lives are pretty good. I wouldn’t mind playing with lab equipment, either. :D Click for full size!
© rq, all rights reserved.
Click for full size.
Astrophotographer Mike Killian took this image of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket blasting off on May 6 from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.
Greg Diesel Walck took the image from Moyock, North Carolina as a thunderstorm drifted across the horizon on Aug. 5. Read the full story here.
Y’know, we get serious weather here, but it never looks like this. Sigh.
Click for full size.
‘Shit, the monkeys are here…’
The Rock of Gibraltar is an imposing limestone monolith, towering 426 metres over the Mediterranean Sea on the southern coast of Spain in the British overseas territory of Gibraltar. Its prominent place in European myths and its impressive views have long made it a draw for tourists, as has the population of Barbary macaques inhabiting the Gibraltar Nature Reserve on the rock’s upper reaches. However, the macaques aren’t bothered by human-imposed borders, frequently venturing off the reserve and into town, where they wreak mischief on tourists and residents alike. Subtly and playfully observed, Eleanor Mortimer’s amusing short documentary Territory puts us on the ground in the ongoing, low-key turf war between the people of Gibraltar and the clever primate cousins who are utterly indifferent to their will.
Via Aeon, where you can see the video full size.
A treetop terrorist (Fox squirrel), who has designs on my bird food, waving the tail of war. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
Joy, a fluffy, happy dog, from Giliell. Click for full size.
© Giliell, all rights reserved.
From rq, whose dog is having a grand time in the snow, click for full size!
© rq, all rights reserved.
I couldn’t help be reminded of my Cachet, who loved a snow romp, that was second only to swimming:
© C. Ford.
From Hekuni Cat and her cat, to all. Click for full size.
© Hekuni Cat, all rights reserved.
Pan Pan at the China Conservation and Research Centre in Dujiangyan in September 2015.
The world’s oldest male panda, with more than 130 descendants — a quarter of all the captive-bred pandas on the planet — has died aged 31, officials said.
Giant pandas have a notoriously low reproductive rate, a key contributor — along with habitat loss — to their status as vulnerable on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List of threatened species.
But Pan Pan — whose name means “hope” in Chinese — was a prolific father, siring many cubs over the years that have gone on to have offspring of their own.
Announcing his death, the China Conservation and Research Center for Giant Pandas called it “heart-wrenching news” and said the “hero father” had been suffering from cancer.
[…]
The most recent estimates show a population of 1,864 adult giant pandas in the wild, up by more than a sixth over a decade, with experts crediting nature reserves, bamboo planting, farmer subsidies and commercial programmes for the increase.
Via Raw Story.
Beautiful shots from rq, click for full size.
© rq, all rights reserved.
Some more of rq’s fabulous art work! In this particular case, lab cats:
The story behind this is three black cats who visit the lab on a regular basis – they’re not quite strays but they don’t seem to have an actual home, and they’re our unofficial mascots.)
Sketch, line-drawing, painting, finishing touches. Plus a detail shot of mah favrit kitty.
Click for full size. I would be over the moon to have such gifts. My fave is the center bottom, that’s just wicked.
© rq, all rights reserved.
Kazuaki Horitomo is a California-based Japanese artist who combines two of his great passions – tattoos and cats – into one. As an illustrator and tattoo artist, Horitomo is steeped in the Japanese tradition of tebori (a technique of tattooing by hand) and his illustrations reflect that. Some of our favorites works are the humorous and surreal depictions of cats performing tebori on other cats.
Horitomo’s brand Monmon Cats derives its name from monmon, the old slang word in Japanese for tattoos. Horitomo currently works at State of Grace Tattoo in San Jose. But if tattooing isn’t your thing, you can also pick up his book, or buy prints from his shop. Or you can just follow him on Instagram.
Via Spoon & Tamago, where you can see much more! Now I want to tattoo one of the cats with rats.