Sad to say, I’ve seen a grand total of ONE monarch butterfly here in Morris this fall. When I moved here in 2000, we’d see them in swarms — there were scattered spots around town where clusters of monarchs would drape the trees and flutter about. Now…nearly nothing.

How can you resist a post about chimaeras and their amazing forehead specializations?

The picture tells the story.

Be sure to follow the link to see the gear used to take the picture!

There’s a familiar beast plaguing the fish of the Jersey coast: a tongue-eating isopod.

Mr Chambers told BBC Jersey: “When we emptied the fish bag out there at the bottom was this incredibly ugly looking isopod.

“Really quite large, really quite hideous – if you turn it over its got dozens of these really sharp, nasty claws underneath and I thought ‘that’s a bit of a nasty beast’.

“I struggled for weeks to find an identification for this thing until, quite by chance I stumbled across something that looked similar in a Victorian journal.

“Apparently there’s not too much ill effect to the fish itself except it’s lost its tongue.”

As we scientists like to say in our inimitably technical manner: ewwwww.