Postcards from the Planet

Ben Franklin, an astute observer of the weather, believed that the settling of North America had changed the weather: “cleared land absorbs more heat and melts snow quicker.” He also thought that volcanoes led to cool weather. In both of these observations, he has been proven to be correct.

In today’s New York Times, this article: Ben Franklin on Global Warming talks about the writings of our founding fathers on weather and climate.

*Quotation from Mark Twain

Craters are clearly visible in this NASA photo of the Earth's Moon.

People have always said that the moon is dry and barren – no ice caps, no water. But recently scientists began to think that might not be true. So NASA researchers came up with the idea of crashing a spacecraft into a lunar crater and then analyzing the dust from the impact. The crash  took place October 9th, 2009. Now NASA has  announced that there is definitely water (in the form of ice) on the moon! Check out the story here: Water on the Moon!

There is a garbage patch in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, and it’s getting bigger and bigger. Made of little pieces of plastic, it’s created by the currents in the Pacific sweeping the plastic into one area. You can read more about it here: Afloat in the Ocean, Expanding Islands of Trash.

International Space Station Using this link, you can figure out when the International Space Station will be passing over your area. Don’t miss the chance to see it go over you some dark evening! Then you can run back inside to your computer and see the live camera footage from the Space Station — just click here: Space Station camera.

Spiders are carnivores. We all know that. But a Mexican jumping spider turns out to be an omnivore that prefers leaf tips to meat. In an article in last week’s New York Times , Jumping Spider Prefers Green Leaves to Meat, scientists explain how the spider takes advantage of the mutualistic relationship between acacia trees and ants.

Acacia trees provide shelter and food for ants by secreting a sweet nectar that the ants eat; thorns protect the trees from most herbivores and the ants sting other herbivores that approach. But this particular spider–Bagheera kiplingi–dodges the ants and eats the leaf tips of the acacia.

Bagheera is the name of a black panther–a particularly stealthy predator–in Rudyard Kipling’s Mowgli stories, part of The Jungle Book, first published in 1894. The person who first describes and names a new species of plant or animal gets to choose the name. The two people who named this spider–George and Elizabeth Peckham, who described the spider in 1896–must have liked the book!

Part of the 11-foot-long cloth woven from spider silk. Photo from AMNH.org

One of my favorite places is the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. If you’ve seen the movie “Night at the Museum” you might think you know something about the museum – but reality can be even weirder than the movies. Right now at the museum, for example, you can see an eleven foot long golden piece of cloth, made completely from (TA DA!) spider silk. Even the gorgeous golden color of the thread was supplied by the female spiders, since they are  a species from Madagascar known as the golden orb spider. The collection of the spider silk  and the weaving of the cloth was done by teams of humans. To find out more about it, check this out: One Million Spiders.

One more thing to think about – how did spiders get named Arachnids? Look for the story of Arachne in Greek mythology to find out.

Scientists  working in the Arctic have found evidence that climate changes – particularly ice coverage – are having effects on the walrus populations there. The retreat of the sea ice, and the fact that fewer ice floes are available as nurseries for walrus pups, are causing difficulties for walruses. Biologists are beginning to consider whether the Pacific walrus should be named an endangered species. This article details some of what the researchers report: Walrus .

Are we living in the Anthropocene age? That would be the time when humanity’s influence becomes the main geological influence on the earth. In this post, Andy Revkin of the New York Times, talks about a new study which seems to show how deeply human influences on the climate – including greenhouse gas emissions and air pollutants – are affecting the Arctic. Check it out here: Humans may have ended long Arctic chill .

The New York Times recently reported that oysters, long in decline in Chesapeake Bay, are at long last recovering.
Oysters are on the Rebound in Chesapeake Bay reports that

After decades of overharvesting of oysters in the Chesapeake Bay and many fruitless efforts to replenish them, scientists have re-established a significant population of the shellfish along the Virginia shore.

A few videos of the total solar eclipse in Japan and India yesterday:

Japanese eclipse video

BBC News video on the eclipse