Barracuda Circle

My mom used to tell me stories about swimming with massive schools of juvenile barracudas when she was young, but I could never imagine what it would be like until I saw this photo. Although I’ve never heard of barracudas attacking swimmers, they certainly have the teeth to cause some serious damage and being surrounded by this many of them has got to be pretty unnerving!

Photograph by David Doubilet

via National Geographic

Behold The Canoe Made From Chopsticks

We recently discussed Campion’s efforts to produce a boat made an environmentally friendly boat made from bio-resin, but what about making boats from recycled materials, or maybe just materials that would otherwise go to waste. For example, what if you made a boat out of the chopsticks people throw away after meals!

A former city employee in the Fukushima prefecture town of Koriyama has built a 4-meter (13-ft) long canoe from thousands of used disposable chopsticks recovered from the city hall cafeteria. Bothered that perfectly good wood was going to waste after a single use, Shuhei Ogawara — whose job at city hall involved working with the local forestry industry — spent the last two years of his career collecting used chopsticks from the cafeteria. An experienced canoe builder, Ogawara spent over 3 months gluing 7,382 chopsticks together into strips to form the canoe shell, to which he added a polyester resin coat. The canoe weighs about 30 kilograms (66 lbs), which is a bit heavier than an ordinary cedar canoe, but Ogawara is confident it will float. A launching ceremony is planned for May at nearby Lake Inawashiro.

via Pink Tentacle

Best Movie of 2009 – The Cove

I’ve heard a lot about The Cove over the past couple of months. The movie made its round in theaters last year, but I couldn’t find any local shows to go see. As of December, the film was released on DVD and I’ve been wanting to get my hands on it – today I finally did. There are a lot of things to be said about this film, but all I have to say is go and buy this movie, or rent it, or do whatever you need to do to watch it. Not only was this the best documentary of 2009, but in my opinion, the best movie of the year too.

Oarfish Filmed in Natural Habitat

This is the first video evidence I have ever seen of a live Oarfish swimming in its natural habitat. They truly are remarkable creatures and one can certainly imagine that these are one of the possible explanations for sea serpent stories. One of the strange things is that the fish’s body does not move in a serpentine motion, but instead the very thing and elongated dorsal fin dances back and forth in a fluid wave propelling the fish forward.

Using a remotely operated vehicle, they caught a rare glimpse of the huge oarfish, perhaps the first sighting of the fish in its natural setting.

The oarfish, which can reach 17m long, has previously only been seen on a few occasions dying at the sea surface, or dead washed ashore.

Their strange appearance may have provided the basis for the sea serpent myths told by early ocean travellers.
Not only are they elongated, they also have a prominent dorsal fin which gives it an unusual “serpent” appearance.
Recalling the event Professor Benfield explained how at first, they thought the fish was simply a drilling pipe called a riser being lowered into the water.

“We saw this bright vertical shiny thing, I said ‘are they lowering more riser?’ as it looked like they were lowering a huge pipe.”

“We zoomed in a little bit and we said ‘that’s not a riser that’s a fish!’”

On another ROV survey in the Gulf of Mexico, the team came across the deep sea manefish (Paracaristius sp.).

This observation enabled the scientists to get a rare insight into the behaviour of the fish in its natural environment.

That gave them a further understanding of how it lives and what it looks like.
“When you see manefish collected in trawls they are incredibly beat up, they don’t look like much of a fish at all,” said Professor Benfield.

“So to actually see this fish in its natural habitat with its fins beautifully splayed out almost as a parachute, we get an idea that it’s a really good swimmer.”

Manefish are thought to steal food from or feed on a jellyfish-like animal called a siphonophore.
This may explain why the fish needs to swim so accurately.

“This fish has very precise control over its orientation and position, so if you are in very close proximity to an animal with tentacles that could potentially damage you, you want to able to really precisely control your locomotion.”

via BBC News

Fly Fishing Arm

It not often we see prosthetics designed solely for fishermen. We did see an awesome childrens casting arm a while back, but this fly fishing arm looks a little more hi-tech!

Quick-attach arm for fly fishing, designed by Josh Levinger.

via Moldy Chum