Each spring, the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary plays host a series of spectacular natural events as the cycle of birth and death plays out for its inhabitants.  Monterey Bay is a wide bay along the central coast of California, bisected by the largest and deepest submarine canyon in the Pacific.  This canyon draws deep pelagic water within a few miles of shore and generates the forces that lie at the base of these annual events.  The Monterey Canyon begins at Moss Landing, located at the middle of Monterey Bay and extends about 95 miles out into the Pacific Ocean ending in the Monterey Fan nearly 12 000 feet below the surface. (more…)

I am just returning from two weeks in Monterey photographing the areas inhabitants hunting around the deep submarine canyon.  A new gallery has resulted entitled Spring in Monterey.  The photos are accompanied by a new article detailing the many fascinating animals that live in this region and the forces that bind them together and drive this magnificent system.  I will endeavor to publish several more articles on the site in the coming weeks or months catching up from the trips last fall to Alaska and Africa.  It was a busy fall and winter and I am now striving to bring the site up to date.  In addition I will be heading back to South Africa in July and August to once again photograph white sharks in their annual pursuit of the cape fur seals.  In addition to the new photos that result, I have several new articles planned that will be published with the new photos upon my return in August.

• голова болит секс

голова болит секс

• голова болит секс
• шлюхи ярославля

The year begins for a Kodiak bear deep below the Alaskan snow.  Within the den, a Kodiak bear spends the winter months in hibernation.  During these months, the hibernating bear does not eat, drink, defecate, or urinate.  As winter progresses, the bear’s body temperature drops slowly reaching a low of 12 ° C (21.6 ° F) below its normal active temperature.  Through some miraculous adaptations, the bear is able to minimize toxic waste products in its system by reabsorbing toxic protein breakdown products through the walls of the bladder and bowel and forming new tissue from these simple building blocks.  This biochemical marvel also mitigates much of the need for urination and keeps the bears body fluids in perfect balance through the cold winter months.  The bear’s heart rate also slows from a normal rate of 40 beats per minute to as little as eight beats per minute and then back to 40 for a short time each day due to spontaneous arousal mechanisms.  Oxygen consumption drops by 50% or more and carbon dioxide production decreases.  Somehow through these mechanisms the bear’s muscles do not waste; its bone remain mineralized and strong. (more…)

At up to 30 feet in length and weighing up to 10 tonnes, the intelligent and pack-hunting orca (or killer whale) is unrivaled as the ocean’s top predator.  Over the past million years, orca populations have subdivided into groups they may ultimately be designated as different species.  The most genetically separate group, known as the transients, appear to have diverged from other orcas about 700 000 years ago.  The transient orcas share much of the same range as the so-called residents along the west coast of North America. . While living in the same habitat, these groups have developed differences in social structure, anatomy, diet, and hunting strategy.   Resident orcas live in larger, life long groups of a mother and her generations of offspring.  These highly vocal orcas seem to feed entirely on fish.  Transient orcas on the other hand have a more fluid social structure and silently hunt primarily mammalian prey in smaller groups, vocalizing primarily after or between hunts.  Observations of the transients hunting and killing large whales provided the source for the common name “killer whale”. (more…)

For a cheetah on the Serengeti plains, life is hard.  These graceful predators are killed and displaced by larger predators and the odds of survival are heavily stacked against them.  As a result, the population density of cheetahs in the Serengeti is low.  Estimates in the 1990s put the number of cheetahs in the whole of the Serengeti at 500 to 900 individuals compared with about 2500 lions and 5000 spotted hyenas. (more…)