Nature & Wildlife
Deserts are far from the lifeless, slow-growing and always arid places they’re often depicted to be. For example, even in Chile’s ultradry Atacama Desert, tiny soil-dwelling nematodes (roundworms) are thriving in surprising diversity.
Galapagos Islands
If you’re a lover of books (or a bibliophile) like me, you’ll appreciate Charles Darwin, the biologist famous for his Theory of Evolution that was formulated while visiting the Galapagos Islands. Arguably the most influential man of science in history, Darwin accumulated a vast personal library throughout his working life.
Nature & Wildlife
From birds to flowers, the majority of the Earth’s species stem from a few evolutionary “explosions,” where new habitats or traits sparked rapid diversification. These bursts, in fact, explain most of the planet’s biodiversity. Some of those new habitats were ignited by glaciers.
Nature & Wildlife
Do chimpanzees experience grief, do crows seek joy and do elephants show affection?
Conservation
Found along 25% to 30% of the world’s coastlines, kelp forests are the most extensive marine vegetated ecosystems in the world. A type of seaweed, kelp attaches to rocky surfaces on the ocean floor and—like terrestrial plants and trees—grows upward toward the sunlight. Some experts even call kelp “the sequoias of the sea.”
Conservation
Ever since the HMS Beagle arrived in the Galapagos Islands with a young Charles Darwin aboard—who was soon to meet a fateful family of finches—ecologists have struggled to understand a particularly perplexing question: Why is there such a ridiculous abundance of species in some places on Earth and a scarcity in others?
Nature & Wildlife
Throughout time, reindeer have been used for economic purposes by various circumpolar peoples, including the Chukchi, Evenks, Khants, Nenets and Sami. Long heralded for their dependable and docile natures and their dexterity in a range of tasks, reindeer were even widely used during World War II by the Soviet forces to help transport injured soldiers.
Galapagos Islands
“Happy Easter” Read the cryptic note left by an anonymous source on March 9, just outside the Cambridge University Librarian’s office, on the fourth floor of the 17-story tower.
Conservation
As we begin to close out the days of 2021, it’s only natural to take a look back at the year that’s about to end and dream of what we’d like to see change and what we hope will happen in 2022.
Conservation
[Excerpts from Adventure Guide to Ecuador & the Galapagos Islands, by Peter D. Krahenbuhl] One of the most amazing and interesting facts about the Galapagos Islands is their role in influencing our understanding of the evolution of life on Earth.
Galapagos Islands
A visit to the Galapagos Islands can provide one of the most magical life-changing experiences for anyone, not the least of which was its influence on Charles Darwin and the development of his theory of evolution.
Galapagos Islands
In our last article in a series of Galapagos Islands fun facts, we learned about “enchanted” islands born of fire, as well as who discovered them and other interesting facts about the national park and island geography.
