Favoritos de mabrybiggs

This one is an insane story. I got a tip that a male sperm whale had beached down in Venice Beach FL, just about an hour south of where I live. Took the chance with two of my friends and we ended up staying the night. We were essentially the only ones that saw him pass away. Once the officials started gathering, (MOTE, CMA, FFAW, etc.) we heard that they had no idea what happened during the night. We were able to inform them and once they found out how long we had stayed they asked if we wanted to help out with the necropsy! One of the most beautiful animals I’ve ever seen. We also got to fill out a Mortality report, fully documenting the events that happened during the night, including video, illustrations, and images.

The three of us named him “Orion” due to the constellation that was above him while he was still alive. We miss you Orion.

The final statistics was that he was a male individual, that was 44 feet long, and weight approximately 70,000 pounds. He was also underweight, most likely due to the still as of yet undetermined cause of death.

Bird was reported yesterday by an Alabama kayaker Will Wiggins (he actually had the bird Wednesday). It was relocated this morning by Victor Stoll, Ruben Stoll, Alan Troyer, and Phil Friesen. The bird was very weak so we decided to capture it. Alan threw his shirt on it and carried it by kayak 8.5 miles down the river where Ruben picked us up in his truck. Ruben & Victor then carried the bird to Walden’s Puddle wildlife rehab in Joelton, TN. This is the first Tennessee record for Snail Kite! Hopefully the bird recovers and can be released back into the wild.

This bivalve is from an old museum collection. It may be 100 to 150 years old. It is labeled as Unio orbiculatus, and from the Cumberland River, Nashville, Tennessee. There is no date. The identification has me stumped and I haven't been able to track down Unio orbiculatus and what the updated name has become.