WTF_Nature

From Canada To The Caribbean: Tree Leaves Control Their Own Temperature
The temperature inside a healthy, photosynthesizing tree leaf is affected less by outside environmental temperature than originally believed. (...) Tree photosynthesis, according to the study, most likely occurs when leaf temperatures are about 21°C, with latitude or average growing-season temperature playing little, if any, role.

 So, this is my first post, and this isn't as WTF as a lot of the other things in here, but I thought it was pretty interesting.

A plant called the searocket (these guys) have been shown to give preferential treatment to family members, while attacking unrelated roots. 

From the NYT:

"The finding is a surprise, even a bit of a shock, in part because most animals have not even been shown to have the ability to recognize relatives, despite the huge advantages in doing so....

Since the research on sea rockets was published in August in Biology Letters, a journal of the United Kingdom’s national academy of science, Dr. Dudley and colleagues have found evidence that three other plant species can also recognize relatives."

So y'all remember Eagle vs Swan.

Here's ( Collapse )

I've been lurking here for a while after finding you guys on wtf_omgz, and just thought i'd post something to settle myself in.

Not sure if this is old or not but for a few years now i've been studying the Morning Glory cloud which can be found in Australia during September and October.



Burketown, in Australia’s northern Queensland, is not the sort of place you’d expect people to travel thousands of miles to visit. With a population of just 178, Burketown sits in one of Australia’s most remote shires. But every September and October, a small group of individuals journey from all corners of the country for the appearance of a remarkable and dramatic cloud called the Morning Glory. Clouds don’t usually have names, nor are they normally linked to a particular location, but then the Morning Glory is no normal cloud. Looking like a huge white roll of meringue, it stretches up to 600 miles (about the length of Britain) and sweeps over Burketown at speeds of up to 35mph. The visitors who come to marvel at this beautiful and awe-inspiring meteorological phenomenon are an intrepid group of glider pilots, for whom the cloud promises the most unique and thrilling flying conditions of anywhere in the world. Each year they come to this sleepy town in the hope of ‘soaring’ the Morning Glory, an exhilarating gliding adventure that can only be described as cloud-surfing.