Dolphins are marine mammals that are closely related to whales and porpoises. There are almost forty species of dolphin in seventeen genera. They vary in size from 1.2 m (4 ft) and 40 kg (90 lb) (Maui’s Dolphin), up to 9.5 m (30 ft) and 10 tonnes (9.8 LT; 11 ST) (the Orca or Killer Whale). They are found worldwide, mostly in the shallower seas of the continental shelves, and are carnivores, mostly eating fish and squid. The family Delphinidae is the largest in the Cetacea, and relatively recent: dolphins evolved about ten million years ago, during the Miocene. Dolphins are considered to be amongst the most intelligent of animals and their often friendly appearance and seemingly playful attitude have made them popular in human culture.
Great photos from seascapes, mainly taken in Australia by TimboDon / Tim Donnelly and by brentbat / Brent Pearson.
Enjoy!
The transition between night and day, at the beach. Looking East of course. 30 seconds exposure just before Sunrise, nothing else here. Credit: lrargerich
Jellyfish (also known as jellies or sea jellies) are free-swimming members of the phylum Cnidaria. They have several different morphologies that represent several different cnidarian classes including the Scyphozoa (over 200 species), Staurozoa (about 50 species), Cubozoa (about 20 species), and Hydrozoa (about 1000-1500 species that make jellyfish and many more that do not). The jellyfish in these groups are also called, respectively, scyphomedusae, stauromedusae, cubomedusae, and hydromedusae; medusa is another word for jellyfish.
Beluga (sturgeon), the fish whose roe is sold asBeluga caviar
Airbus Beluga, an airplane
Beluga class submarine, Russian submarine class
Beluga, Alaska, a community in the United States
We are going to refer to the first aception and to find out why Airbus call its plane Beluga.
The Beluga or White Whale (Delphinapterus leucas) is an Arctic and sub-Arctic species of cetacean. It is one of two members of the familyMonodontidae, along with the Narwhal. This marine mammal is commonly referred to simply as the Beluga or Sea Canary due to its high-pitched twitter.
The global population of Beluga today stands at about 100,000. Although this number is much greater than that of other cetaceans, it is much smaller than historical populations before decades of over-hunting. There are estimated to be 40,000 individuals in the Beaufort Sea, 25,045 in Hudson Bay, 18,500 in the Bering Sea and 28,008 in the Canadian Low Arctic. The population in the St. Lawrence estuary is estimated to be around 1000. It is considered an excellent sentinel species and indicator of the health of, and changes in, the environment. This is because it is long lived, on top of the food web, with large amounts of fat and blubber, relatively well studied for a cetacean, and still somewhat common.
Listen to beluga’s twits 1 and 2 . Sound courtesy of Peter Scheifele, Department of Animal Science at University of Connecticut to DOSITS of the University of Rhode Island.
“Por una cabeza”, meaning “by a head [of a horse]” in Spanish, is the most famous and popular tango song conceived in 1935 by Carlos Gardel (composer) and Alfredo Le Pera (lyricist).
The lyrics of the song talk about a compulsive horse-track gambler who compares his addiction for the horses with his attraction to women.
It has been performed by numerous tango orchestras and is commonly featured in films and television. Tango scenes with “Por una cabeza” appear in Planet 51, Schindler’s List, Scent of a Woman, Delicatessen, True Lies, All the King’s Men, Bad Santa, Episode 37 of Nip/Tuck, Episode 9 of Sweet Spy, the beginning and ending credits of I’m Sorry, I Love You, and the CSI: NY episode “Down the Rabbit Hole”, and in the movie “Frida” (Salma Hayek), Gardel is heard on a radio singing it.
Le Carnaval des Animaux’ (The Carnival of the Animals) is a musical suite of fourteen movements by the French Romantic composer Camille Saint-Saëns.
Le Carnaval was composed in February 1886 while Saint-Saëns was vacationing in a small Austrian village. It was originally scored for a chamber group of flute, clarinet, two pianos, glass harmonica, xylophone, two violins, viola, cello and double bass, but is usually performed today with a full orchestra of strings, and with a glockenspiel substituting for the rare glass harmonica.
Saint-Saëns, apparently concerned that the piece was too frivolous and likely to harm his reputation as a serious composer, suppressed performances of it and only allowed one movement, Le Cygne, to be published in his lifetime. Only small private performances were given for close friends like Franz Liszt.
Saint-Saëns did, however, include a provision which allowed the suite to be published after his death, and it has since become one of his most popular works. It is a favorite of music teachers and young children, along with Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.
Today you can enjoy the 7th movement: The aquarium
Strings without double-bass, two pianos, flute, and harmonica: This is one of the more musically rich movements. The melody is played by the flute, backed by the strings, on top of tumultuous, glissando like runs in the piano. The first piano plays a descending ten-on-one ostinato, while the second plays a six-on-one. These figures, plus the occasional glissando from the harmonica, are very evocative of a peaceful, dimly-lit aquarium. This intermittent section where the pianos play high sixteenths is reminiscent of parts of Tchaikovsky’s ballet, The Nutcracker.
If you have heard the music before maybe due to the fact that “The Aquarium” is featured in the trailers for the 1994 film Only You, the 1974 film The Godfather Part II, the 1995 film Babe, the 2006 film Charlotte’s Web and the 2008 film The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, and appears to be one of the influences on the main theme in Walt Disney’s Beauty and the Beast and is especially prominent in the cue titled “The West Wing”. It is also the opening theme music to the 1978 film Days of Heaven and the opening and closing theme in the 1992 film documentary, Visions of Light. “Aquarium” is played throughout the Simpsons episode “The Wife Aquatic”, and can be heard in the episode of The Ren and Stimpy Show entitled “The Cat That Laid the Golden Hairball”. It is also heard in the video game Crash Tag Team Racing, and along with “Swan” is part of the soundtrack of the video game Burnout Paradise (2008 edition)….
Zach Cohen’s final project at Shenkar School of Design and Engineering, illustration department.
A short tale about politicians, seats and struggles in a Parliament far-far away.
Planck was selected as the third Medium-Sized Mission (M3) of ESA’s Horizon 2000 Scientific Programme, and is today part of its Cosmic Vision Programme. It is designed to image the anisotropies of the Cosmic Background Radiation Field over the whole sky, with unprecedented sensitivity and angular resolution. Planck will provide a major source of information relevant to several cosmological and astrophysical issues, such as testing theories of the early universe and the origin of cosmic structure.
Planck was formerly called COBRAS/SAMBA. After the mission was selected and approved (in late 1996), it was renamed in honor of the German scientist Max Planck (1858-1947), Nobel Prize for Physics in 1918.
The Mission
Planck was launched on 14 May 2009 together with the Herschel satellite. After 50 days, as foreseen, Planck entered its final orbit around the Second Lagrangian point of the Sun–Earth system (L2), at a distance of 1.5 million kilometers from Earth. Since the end of the commissioning and performance verification phases in mid-August 2009, Planck has been performing its planned mission. On 15th January 2010, ESA’s advisory bodies approved an extension of Planck operations by 12 months. Planck is now scheduled to continuously acquire high-quality science data until the end of 2011.
José Juventino Policarpo Rosas Cadenas (25 January 1868 – 9 July 1894) was a Mexican composer, violinist, and band leader.
Rosas’s best known work is “Sobre las Olas” or “Over the Waves” waltz. It was first published by Rosas in 1884 when he was in New Orleans, Louisiana with the popular Mexican band at the World Cotton Centennial World’s Fair. [wikipedia]
So this waltz is dedicated to my mexican readers and for those starting their summer holidays.
Dear Abyss
