Category: Animals & Nature

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People Are Surprised About Where Cashews Really Come from

Prepare to be deeply confused and a little scared about where cashews come from. The truth is so weird that people on Twitter can’t stop talking about it.

First of all, these delicious nuts grow on trees. That in itself is not so surprising, as many types of nuts grow on trees—but it’s not the weirdest part by far.

Nope, that would be the fact that they grow from these things.

Excuse me, is that a nut or a monster?! I don’t know anymore.

That apple-looking thing is apparently called a “cashew apple,” which grows from the branches of the cashew tree. The shell below the apple contains the actual cashew.

To get to the nut, you have to pick the entire thing, cashew apple included, from the branch. Then you pull off the shelled nut, dry it, steam it, freeze it, and boil it to remove the shell. The shell is filled with caustic acid, so this is no joke—in fact, the extracting the nut is so grueling and dangerous that picking cashews is sometimes used as penal work in south- and southeast Asia where they grow.

Cashews are delicious and healthy, but are they really worth all this effort? Whose idea was this, anyway?

People on Twitter are understandably freaking out about the news.

“Who knew cashews look like angry, old men yelling at you to get off their lawn as they grow?” one user wrote.

Others pointed out that the middle cashew in this photo looks like it has a face.

FYI, you can eat cashew apples, too. The flesh is quite bitter, though, so it’s best to process it for jam or juice.

Now, excuse me while I go have nightmares about cashews for the rest of my life.

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10 Facts for You to Chew On

Let’s celebrate some great facts!

You can share them with your friends, families, and enemies, and you can whip them out at your next dinner party so people get really impressed with you.

Trust me, it works.

Now memorize these facts!

1. Those programs don’t work.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2

2. Bring this to the USA!

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2 Source 3

3. Wow, that’s quite a story.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2

4. She did what she wanted.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2

5. Here’s the real math.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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6.  Well, that’s disgusting.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source

7. Have you seen these?

Photo Credit: did you know?

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8. That’s just a myth.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2

9. All kinds of weird hybrids.

Photo Credit: did you know?

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10. Runs in the family.

Photo Credit: did you know?

Source 1 Source 2 Source 3

Hip, hip, HOORAY!

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Giraffes Hum to Each Other at Night and How Adorable Is That?

Researchers have always assumed that, given their 13-foot-long tracheas, giraffes were silent beings. There has been some speculation that the gentle, odd-looking vegetarians might produce infrasonic sounds too low for the human ear to catch, but it’s never been proven.

At least, until now.

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Dis you know?⬇⬇ Giraffes are very social animals and roam around in groups. These groups, called towers, typically have around 15 members led by an adult male. The other members are females and young males. Tag a friend that needs to see this⬇⬇ Follow @natureeslife Follow @natureeslife • • • • • • Dm your wildlife video for a chance to get featured🐯📩 Tag a friend and follow @natureeslife for more 📈 Credit:@paultje_nl • • • • • • #wildlifeonearth #wildlifeowners #wildlifephotography #wildlifeaddicts #wildlifeindia #seewildlife #destination_wild #ourwildlifedays #wildglobe #natgeowild #tigers #animalelite #giraffe #wildgeography #thedodo #naturelife #wondermore #folkcreative #animals #fantasticearth #earthscope #stayandwonder #discoverearth #roamtheplanet #moodygrams #giraffes #exploretocreate #artofvisuals #visualambassadors #fantasticearth

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Researchers at the University of Vienna have spent the last 8 years gathering 947 hours of giraffe noises from zoos around Europe, and have come out with some very interesting – and unexpected – findings.

Not only do giraffes hum to each other at night, but they hum at frequencies that humans can actually hear (around 92 Hertz).

The report in BMC Research Notes, expands:

“Based on their acoustic structure, these vocalizations might function as communicative signals to convey information about the physical and motivational attributes of the caller.”

According to Wired:

“Giraffes have excellent vision, so their primary means of communication is thought to be visual signals during daylight hours. As prey animals, it also makes sense that they might not want to make loud noises that can attract the attention of predators. But when vision is impaired at night, low frequency humming might be a great way to make sure the herd stays together.”

More research is needed to correlate the sounds to giraffe behaviors, but scientists suspect the humming might convey information about age, gender, sexual arousal, dominance, and other things that are less understood.

Researchers more firmly believe that the sounds could be meant to keep the herd together at night, or help wanderers find their way back to safety.

Take a listen:

It’s pretty cool, if you ask me. Were I a giraffe, there would be something reassuring about knowing the others would be there all night, making it easy to get some rest.

There’s safety in numbers, after all.

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A Woman Spotted a Rare Bug That Looks like a Piece of Art

This is really extraordinary.

Margaret Neville was walking through her garden at her farm in South Africa when she noticed an extraordinary creature.

A highly unusual insect perched on a branch in her lavender bush. “I was amazed at first sight,” Neville told The Dodo.

“Amazed,” just about covers it.

What a wonderful world! This beautiful flower mantis was found in Nkutu Valley, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa on Sunday….

Posted by Waterfall Retreat & Environmental Centre on Tuesday, September 3, 2019

The incredible insect had delicate green and white wings with an artistic swirl on top. Little purple petals seem to be clinging to her sides, head and legs.

What Neville found is called a flower mantis, a type of praying mantis that is specially camouflaged to live safe from predators among flowers.

Neville returned the magnificent mantis to the lavender. But not before giving her a name—Miss Frilly Pants.

This video shows Miss Frilly Pants enjoying her natural habitat:

Miss Frilly Pants – The Flower Mantis

Miss Frilly Pants the Flower Mantis of Nkutu Valley, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa makes her first short film. Here you can see she is a natural born beauty with not a smudge of photoshop needed for her debut roll.

Posted by Waterfall Retreat & Environmental Centre on Thursday, September 12, 2019

Neville brought the flower mantis to a world of people who didn’t even know they existed until she posted her pictures online.

Miss Frilly Pants even got a date out of her image going viral.

Newsflash: Miss Frilly Pants, Flower Mantis of the Nkutu Valley, KwaZulu Natal, South Africa has attracted a special friend.

Posted by Waterfall Retreat & Environmental Centre on Tuesday, September 24, 2019

We all know how this is will end for mister. The females of the species are infamously unforgiving of their mates. But, hey, look on the bright side: Miss Frilly Pants may soon have little frilly pantses.

How much more beautiful the planet for them?

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Here Are Some Tweets About Dogs Who Might Melt Your Damn Heart

Pretty much every dog puts a big smile on my face, but these puppers are really going above and beyond the call of duty.

They deserve a day of snoozing in the sun and belly rubs for their efforts.

11. Why sleep in a bed when you have a dog?

10. They’re going to be best friends for life.

9. The dog, yes, but also the caption.

8. This guy is not quite as slick as he’d like to think.

7. You’ll get no argument from me!

6. This is just like having kids.

5. You’re going to want to make sure your sound is up for this.

4. My heart cannot take it.

3. I’m sure they thought no one was looking.

2. Whose day wouldn’t be brightened by Max?

1. They both look so proud of each other!

 

I hope their owners are ready to pamper these little sweeties!

Do you love browsing the web for cute dogs? Show us your favorite below!

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15 Times People Did Their Part to Help out the Environment

These gestures might be small, but small things add up in the end. And we all need to do our part to help out the environment cause it is not doing great, folks.

Whether it’s recycling, using less water, cutting down on electricity, or any number of things, DO YOUR PART.

These people sure did, and the ideas are wonderful.

Take a look.

1. A great idea.

The Cafe at my closest beach gives free drinks to people who collect a bucket of litter from the beach from mildlyinteresting

2. That is very impressive.

Turns out my pencil is made of recycled newspaper! from mildlyinteresting

3. Good beer, too!

Carlsberg using glue to make six packs instead of plastic. from mildlyinteresting

4. Plant it when you’re done with it.

Got an event bracelet that can be planted from mildlyinteresting

5. Get rid of those pesky cups.

An ice cream cup made of banana leaves from mildlyinteresting

6. Bake some bread!

My grocery store started selling overripe bananas for cheap with a recipe for banana bread on the bag from mildlyinteresting

7. Keep it going.

You can charge this battery with a micro USB from mildlyinteresting

8. Eliminates so many bottles.

Refill Station at Simon Fraser University, Canada. from ZeroWaste

9. Not plastic, but plant starch.

This cup is made from plant starch, not plastic from mildlyinteresting

10. Plant your pencil.

My pencil has seeds on the tip, so when it’s too small to use it you can plant it and a tree will grow out of it from mildlyinteresting

11. Reducing more waste is crucial.

This super market had tiny paper bags instead of plastic containers to reduce waste from mildlyinteresting

12. Much better than discarding it.

Every day after closing, this local bakery leaves out a bag of their unsold pastries that people can take from freely instead of throwing them away and make unnecessary waste from mildlyinteresting

13. These look great!

The bowling alley in my neighbourhood tore up old lanes and used them to renovate the washrooms. from pics

14. Get rid of those butts.

I bought a pack of cigarettes and they came with a postage paid recycling pouch. from mildlyinteresting

15. This is awesome!

I don’t know about you, but I find all of those examples very inspiring.

What are you doing to help out the environment? Share your ideas in the comments!

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Scientists Say That North America Has Lost 3 Billion Birds in the Last 50 Years

We’ve heard all about the plight of the bees that are disappearing at an alarming rate across the world, but the situation with birds doesn’t look too great, either.

A new article in the journal Science estimates that North America has lost a quarter of its bird population – roughly 3 billion birds – in the past 50 years. The researchers looked at populations of 529 different bird species since 1970 to reach their conclusion. They collected data from surveys with the help of volunteer bird spotters and combined that with ten years worth of data on flocks of migrating birds detected by 143 different weather radar installations.

Ken Rosenberg of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology said, “We saw this tremendous net loss across the entire bird community. By our estimates, it’s a 30% loss in the total number of breeding birds. But we also knew that other bird populations were increasing. And what we didn’t know is whether there was a net change.”

The data showed that more than 90% of the losses came from only a dozen bird families, including warblers, blackbirds, finches, and sparrows. Meadowlarks and red-winged blackbirds are two examples of common birds that have seen their numbers decrease.

The news isn’t entirely bad, though; some bird populations have increased, such as raptors (influding bald eagles), and waterfowl. Rosenberg continued, “The numbers of ducks and geese are larger than they’ve ever been, and that’s not an accident. It’s because hunters who primarily want to see healthy waterfowl populations for recreational hunting have raised their voices.”

Mike Parr, another one of the study’s authors, said, “We’re making the wrong moves now to sustain nature for the future, and this is an indication that nature is unraveling and that ecosystems are highly stressed. Our generation is going survive it, and probably the next generation will, but who knows where the tipping point is.”

The researchers say that climate change played only a small role in the overall loss of the birds so far, but it is likely to become more of a threat in the future because of rising seas, draughts and wildfires.

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The Nearly Extinct Northern White Rhino Might Live on Thanks to Lab-Created Embryos

Finally, some good news!

For all the destruction and mayhem that humans have caused around the planet, sometimes we actually do some good things, too. Things like preventing (hopefully) the complete extinction of the northern white rhino.

The last male northern white rhino died in 2018, and only two females, Fatu and Najin, remain of the species. Neither of them are capable of bearing a child. It was believed that once the two females passed away, that would be the end of the northern white rhino.

But scientists recently announced they were able to extract immature eggs from the two remaining females, and the eggs were flown to a laboratory in Italy.

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BREAKING NEWS – WE NOW HAVE TWO NORTHERN WHITE RHINO EMBRYOS! We are happy to announce that two northern white rhino embryos have been successfully matured and fertilised. This development marks a turning point in the race to save the northern white rhino from near extinction. The two embryos were created using eggs collected from Fatu, the youngest of the two northern white rhinos and frozen sperm from Suni a deceased northern white rhino male. The embryos are now stored in liquid nitrogen and will be transferred into a surrogate southern white rhino female in the near future. To make this procedure a reality, Fatu’s eggs were injected with Suni’s sperm while Najin’s eggs were injected with Saut’s sperm. Saut’s semen was of really poor quality and scientists had to thaw additional samples to find viable sperms for the procedure. Unfortunately, Najin’s eggs did not make it to a viable embryo despite the fact that one egg initiated segmentation. This landmark effort was achieved at Avantea Laboratories in Cremona, Italy thanks to Prof. Cesare Galli and his team. We have only gotten this far because of your unending support. To be part of the journey towards making a northern white rhino, go to donate.olpejetaconservancy.org/projects/sudan 🦏 📷 Jan Zwilling, Ami Vitale, Cesare Galli @kenyawildlifeservice @tourism_wildlifeke @leibnizizw @biorescue_project @bmbf.bund @leibnizgemeinschaft @safariparkdvurkralove #OlPejeta #NorthernWhiteRhino #OvumPickUp #NorthernWhiteRhinoRecovery #NajinandFatu

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The eggs were then injected with sperm from two dead male northern white rhinos. Only two of the eggs from one of the rhinos developed into viable embryos, and they were immediately frozen. Because Fatu and Najin can’t carry a pregnancy, the embryos will be transferred to a surrogate mother—a southern white rhinoceros.

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With Najin and Fatu, the last two northern white rhinos, unable to carry a pregnancy, the future of the northern white rhino species solely depends on artificial reproduction. 🦏 Over the past few years, scientists have been working very hard on perfecting a procedure for both harvesting and fertilisation in vitro. 🦏 The successful harvest of 10 eggs from the northern white rhinos yesterday (August 22nd, 2019) means that scientists are now closer to saving the species from complete extinction. 📷 @amivitale ——————————————————————— @kenyawildlifeservice @tourism_wildlifeke @leibnizizw @biorescue_project @bmbf.bund @leibnizgemeinschaft @safariparkdvurkralove 🦏 #OlPejeta #NorthernWhiteRhino #OvumPickUp #NorthernWhiteRhinoRecovery #NajinandFatu #SaveOurRhinos #OnlyTwoLeft #EndExtinction

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Jan Stejskal, Director of Communication and International Projects at the zoo in the Czech Republic where Najin and Fatu were born, said:

“Five years ago it seemed like the production of a northern white rhino embryo was [an] almost unachievable goal — and today we have them. The technique for collection of eggs was developed in cooperation with many European zoos and we are happy that this unique cooperation can continue even with attempts at successful embryo transfer.”

Scientists must now transfer the embryos to a surrogate mother and track the embryos’ development into fetuses. From there, scientists still face an enormous uphill climb—the species lacks genetic diversity, and there are very few ways to get it back once there are so few individuals left. Plus, rhinos are slow developing creatures, so to rebuild the population in any meaningful way will take decades.

Sadly, the northern white rhino reached this point mainly due to poaching—they were targeted for their horns, which, though they have no medicinal properties of any sort, are highly prized in traditional Chinese medicine.

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A Tiny Fish That Weighs Less Than 1 Gram Became UK’s Smallest-Ever Surgery Patient

Every being on Earth deserves a second chance at life — even a teeny-tiny fish.

This tiny molly fish weighs less than one gram. After its owners noticed a large lump on its belly, they rushed it to the veterinarian. Highscoft Vets in Bristol, U.K. diagnosed the lump as a tumor right away, and soon after, the fish became the UK’s smallest-ever surgery patient.

In the emergency procedure, vets catheterized the fish’s mouth, anesthetized it, and removed the mass. The surgery took about 40 minutes, and it cost the owners less than £100 (or about $123).

So unbelievably small

Posted by Highcroft Rabbit, Small Mammal & Exotic Vets on Friday, August 30, 2019

The vets say that the fish is the smallest patient they’ve ever worked on, as they usually operate on animals like snakes, rabbits and iguanas.

“It’s not common across the UK to bring your fish to the vets but it is here. We are seeing more and more fish which is great,” exotic species vet Sonya Miles told The Daily Mail. “It was definitely the smallest animal we’ve seen here. It barely registered on our scales.”

She added that the operation required “steady hands and good eyesight.”

The mass being removed.

Posted by Highcroft Rabbit, Small Mammal & Exotic Vets on Friday, August 30, 2019

Luckily, the surgery was a success. The tiny fish made a full recovery and went home the same day, with no clue that it had just made national history.

Since it’s a fish.

“The little one is now back to normal and eating well,” Highcroft Vets wrote on Facebook.

Once the mass was removed the deficit if coated in waterproof gel to protect the area.

Posted by Highcroft Rabbit, Small Mammal & Exotic Vets on Friday, August 30, 2019

“We’re glad to have been able to help the fish before the tumor started to upset its balance.”

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The Loch Ness Monster Might Just Be a Giant Eel

Nessie fans, pay attention.

The first sighting of the rumored monster swimming in Loch Ness dates back to the 6th century; since then, scientists and regular people alike have been searching for answers.

Sturgeons, trees, elephant trunks, dinosaurs and just about everything else you can think of has been blamed at one point or another, but one New Zealand scientist is claiming he’s come up with the most plausible answer – an oversized eel.

Neil Gemmell of the University of Otago made the assertion after a recent environmental DNA project analyzed the genetic material of everything living in the loch. Gemmell and his team collected 250 water samples from various spots in the lake – no small feat given that the lake is 23 miles long and 788 feet deep – and came up with 500 million gene sequences.

They then compared the sequenced DNA with global databases of known organism, and found nothing to suggest there’s anything new or unknown in the lake. Their findings also ruled out some previous guesses, like Greenland sharks, catfish, and sturgeon.

What they did find, however, were unusually high amounts of eel DNA.

“The remaining theory that we cannot refute based on the environmental DNA data obtained is that what people are seeing is a very large eel,” the project’s website reads. “Eels are very plentiful in Loch Ness, with eel DNA found at pretty much every location sampled – there are a lot of them.”

We also know that the British Isles are home to some pretty large eels. Conger eels can grow up to 10 feet or longer in length, and in 2001, two 7-foot eels were discovered on the loch’s shores. Gemmell and others maintain that an eel near the surface could be easily mistaken for the back of a larger, bulkier “monster.”

The evidence, while compelling, doesn’t prove anything conclusively, which means believers are still likely to traipse out to the lake in search of the elusive and enduring mystery of Nessie.

That said, the eel theory is pretty interesting…

Just not as exciting as a mythical monster emerging from the depths and stunning tourists year after year.

Sometimes the mystery is better than the truth.

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