Snails Go west ! Funny TimeLapse from www.time-lapse.fr on Vimeo.
Hat tip to Unique Daily.
“Every evening, after my automatic water system stops, all the snails who where hidden behind flowers go out and go on the grass to make parties, eating and drinking! They move from east to west!”
Just so you know, Belizean arachnids ain't messin around.
See the rest of the challenges!
Monday needs some joviality! What would you do if you saw a giant octopus flying overhead?
I just hope it was all recovered and none ended up in the sea!
I have just a few moments of free time to post something up, so thought I would point everyone in the direction of some good invert posts from some of our friends form the past two weeks or so.
The Brine Queen highlights the first species of marine invertebrate protected under ESA as endangered - Haliotis sorenseni
Chris, of the Echinoblog, has two recent posts on my favorite echinoderms, the feather sea stars.
Rick MacPherson has a molluscan species ID request and brings us some good news – there is a strong coral conservation bill making it's way through the house. Of course the bill could always always use a little help by emailing/calling/writing your rep and letting them know that the bil is important to you.
KaylinQ pointed me to Pagan Wanderer Lu, who reveals what happened to the plans for a Bathynomus Giganteus CD - then uploads all 17 tracks for your free listening pleasure! If you like any of the songs, please contribute at least $12 (~ cost of a average CD) to the Marine Conservation Society, or another ocean conservation group of your choice.
Another wave of the tentacle to KaylinQ for exposing me to a brilliant new (well new too me) online comic with a recent panel featuring what happens when a cephalopod meets Descartes' Cogito, ergo sum.
Hoxful Monsters has news of a study in which sponges are the base of the metazoan tree not ctenophores and the nervous system evolved once. That suggests however that hox genes evolved multiple times or evolved once and were lost several times. It'll be interesting to see how this one sorts out.
Finally Christie pulls out the invert Ewwww! with the Loa Loa worm (a real must see!) and Miriam confounds invert cool with baby mammal cute with a Puppy that glows from cnidarian red fluorescent proteins.
In case you didn't know, today has been declared International Earthworm Day!
Of course it's a great invert to choose for it's own day. Aside from Barnacles (we all know how wonderful they are) and evolution, nothing seemed to occupy Darwin's curiosity as much as earthworms. For over three decades he studied them, off and on, and wrote papers and books about them and their effects in the soil.
Unfortunately today is a chock-a-block, with end of semester work and a seminar tonight so I doubt I'll be able to put together anything new. But here a link to all our past earthworm ramblings here and of course...
Earthworm Porn by a true friend of the invertebrates Isabella Rossellini.
La Princesse, part of Les Mécaniques Savants by La Machine, makes it's way through the streets of Yokohama. It is all part of celebration of the 150th Anniversary of the Opening of the Port of Yokohama.
I would dearly love to see them marching down the streets of Mystic with the spider. Even better a shrimp or crab, or maybe, a deep sea isopod!
Just one of many lectures available at the new Pulse Project site. Looks like I can keep up with a weekly lecture series even when I am away from university!
A TED talk on one of my favorite invertebrate outreach projects out there. A favorite because it is viral, involves textiles and it's working! Thousands of participants have gotten involved in the project and come away with a far greater understanding of the issues facing our reefs.
A brief departure from our normal programming to ask your support for one of our regular "friend of the inverts" Jeff Ives and the New England Aquarium.
The aquarium was recently listed as an historic building by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, a fitting designation considering it was the world's first modern aquarium, with a unique and remarkable architecture. As Jeff points out, this designation puts the aquarium in the company of the Old North Church and Paul Revere's House. Environmental conservation meets cultural preservation! 
More to the point though, it opens a new avenue of grants and financing to the Aquarium as it celebrates its 40th anniversary. There is currently a grant that will be awarded to one of the historic landmarks of Boston based on a vote. We get to chose which historic landmark in Boston gets the money. How original and refreshing! From today (17 April) to the 17th of May we can all vote once per day for the landmark we want to see get the grant.
So check out all the historic landmarks and cast your vote. Then cast a vote each day until May 17th. I hope you will agree with Jeff and vote for the aquarium. If the aquarium does get the grant, Jeff has promised a special surprise for Kevin and The Other 95% starring some of the New England Aquarium's most charismatic residents!
