The Blues VII

Image: Cláudio Dias Timm
Porphyrospiza caerulescens

Uh oh! It's that time of year again when all looks lost, all looks cold, all looks... blue. Blue Monday strikes again. The attic groans under the weight of Christmas decorations already laden with a thin layer of dust. Christmas gifts have lost their lustre and joined the rest of your belongings as mere possessions cluttering your life. And if you don't follow through with your New Year's resolutions this time, you'll have to get a new Christmas jumper to ease over that ever-expanding belly.

But worry not! Or continue worrying, just be sure to do it with friends. Friends like the Blue Finch.

Seventh Seal of the Hallowe'en Horrors

It's Halloween! That time of year when we eat humble pie with death, eat a whole bottle of bitter pills with darkness and eat lead with evil. Woo!

Veils From the Crypt

Video: Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI)

Cryptic monsters... undercover horrors... sleeper creepers... From the monsters under the bed to the ghosts in the attic, the vampire on the board of directors to the werewolf in the historical reenactment society, there's no getting away from them. Is your paperboy a ghoul? Is your sister-in-law a zombie? Are you absolutely sure you're not a fish-person?

The Blues VI

Image: Bernard DUPONT
Corythaeola cristata

It's Blue Monday! Mathematically proven to be the most depressing day of the year by qualified PR professionals who believe the best way to defeat it is with a holiday package bought from their clients. But there's no defeating it. It looms. It impends. It soon comes to a dark night of the soul near YOU! And there are no holidays from one's own soul.

And the Number of the Hallowe'en Horrors is 666

Its Halloween! That time of year when we draw black waters from the well of cosmic truth with death, draw deep breaths of chill, grave-leaden mist with darkness, and draw white, chalk outlines around corpses in the alleyway with evil. Woo!

Behold Death. He's wearing his Loch Ness Monster costume this year. Basically it's a dark green robe, a dark green handle for his scythe and a kind of lizard mask on the blade. It looks great and boy is he committed to the role. We've been trying to get him out of the swimming pool for hours!

Here be Darkness. She's been trying to teach the zombies about the miraculous power of make-up. I don't think it's going too well. Lipstick is supposed to stick to lips, not the other way round. There's bits of face everywhere!

Yonder is Evil. He's dressed up in a long, white robe with a little cardboard halo fixed onto his head with a piece of wire. He does that every year but it's hilarious every time!

The Blues V

Image: Hiyashi Haka
Lamprotornis caudatus

It's time for the blues! Either that or I'm a week late... Oh dear. Failure upon failure! Blues upon blues! Well, I guess it makes sense, really. Blues are eternal, after all. Haven't you heard? It's blues all the way down! At least on this page...

Pentagrammatical Décor of the Hallowe'en Horrors

It's Halloween! That time of year when we kick the bucket with death, kick our heels with darkness, and kick angelic beings in the shins with evil! Woo!

REAL monstrosa

Image: Jakob Fahr

Everyone knows beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but what about monstrousness? Surely monstrousness is far more substantial and objective than the wispy, nebulous beauty that exists nowhere but our own minds? It's all about the bulging body parts and too many legs. Even scientists can see that.

Thus we have monstrosa, Latin for monster.

So let's check out some scientifically confirmed (with real science and white lab coats) monsters. By their name we shall know them. Or their face.

What's up with all these pigfish?

Image: Kevin Bryant

Are pigs and fish natural bedfellows? I never thought so. I always imagined them in separate beds, separate rooms, separate homes and quite possibly separate landmasses. Like a proper, aristocratic marriage. Except one of them wouldn't be on a landmass. So... some kind of mer-people thing, I guess? Or dolphins. I bet loads of people have married dolphins by now.

It seems not everyone agrees about the merging of pig and fish. Apparently, some people see a fish and immediately think pig. We learned about the Hogfish before. They were those members of the wrasse family who used their elongated snouts to snuffle through the sea floor, searching for snails, crabs and other shelled creatures to crack open with their canine teeth.

As it turns out, this particular species of Hogfish is but the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the meeting of the porcine and the piscine.

The Blues IV

Image: Ted

Uh oh! It's that time of year again - Blue Monday! The worst Monday of them all.

Call Forth the Hallowe'en Horrors

It's Halloween! That time of year when we listen for the lifting of coffin lids with death, eavesdrop on the whispering chants of mournful forests with darkness and hear the lamentation of our enemies as we drive them before us and crush their women with evil. Woo!

Behold Death. He's taken up gardening. Or so he claims. I don't think he's supposed to bury the seeds 6 feet deep. And aren't you meant to take them off the tree first?

Here be Darkness. She's teaching the ghouls how to cook. It's quite easy because the ghouls eat raw meat but her three-tier offal cake with carved bone colonnade is quite a sight!

Yonder is Evil. He's dressed up in a long, white robe with a little cardboard halo fixed onto his head with a piece of wire. He does that every year but it's hilarious every time!
Let's see who joined the party this year!

The Blobs!

Check out this beautiful octopus! Is that a devil costume?

Venom in Furs

Image: David Haring / Duke Lemur Center

Venom: a fang's best friend. If you want to ruin someone's day, it's hard to beat the one-two punch of a piercing tooth and a high-quality toxin. We got toxins for instant death, toxins for festering wounds, toxins for paralysis and many more! Whether you want to swiftly despatch your enemy with a minimum of fuss or simply leave him helpless while you explain your villainous plans and the deep-seated psychological issues that led up to them, there's always a toxin to suit your needs.

For the rest of us, it seems the best we can do is be scared of the guy with venomous fangs and run away as fast as we can. Some people are REALLY good at that. Maybe even too good. It's called arachnophobia and ophidiophobia. Probably if you're sweating and shivering at the sight of a photograph of a spider or snake, you're too good at being scared.

But not all venomous animals have too many legs or no legs at all. There are venomous mammals out there. Soft, fluffy mammals with big, brown eyes. Actually they almost all have tiny eyes but even if they have difficulty seeing us, we can still see them. So let's do that!

Frogs With Sticky-out Bits

Image: Alex Figueroa

Horns! Spikes! Sinister bulges that throb and pulsate when no-one's looking! I just love a good set of sticky-out bits!

Turns out quite a few frogs and toads are partial to a bit of sticking out, too...

Journey to the Back Passage of Holothuria

Image: Klaus Stiefel

We're talking anus. Sea Cucumber anus.

Anthuriums of Anguish

Image: Reinaldo Aguilar

For many, the word Anthurium means just one plant: the Flamingo Flower. It's one of the most popular tropical plants in the world; add a Heliconia and a palm leaf and you're instantly teleported to the Caribbean. That's just science.

The Blues III

Image: JJ Harrison

It's the most mis'rable time of the year!
When your tears are upwelling
And everyone's telling you be of good cheer
It's the most mis'rable time of the year!

Arums of Abhorrence

Image: sarah faulwetter

Good, ol' Arums! They're always there for you. What tropical bouquet would be complete without a few shiny Anthuriums bringing their deep red and pink colours to the mix? And if you want something more subdued and chaste then you need look no further than the beautiful arum lily. There's an arum for every occasion!

The Arum family is not famed for its Wolffia Duckweeds, the smallest flowering plants in the world, but they're exceedingly famous for containing the Titan Arum. That monstrosity can reach 3 metres (10 feet) tall but, as we have already learned, its close relatives are no less eye-catching for their smaller size!

Did you know that the arum lily is native to south Africa and is known as varkoor in Afrikaans? It translates to "pig's ear". So lets take a look at some more arums that make a pig's ear of it!

Thrice-damned Hallowe'en Horrors

It's Hallowe'en! That time of year when we trip the light phantasmic with death, trip and fall with darkness and "accidentally" trip and fall while holding a knife inappropriately in a crowded area with evil. Woo!

Behold Death. He's trying out a clown costume this year. He's really enjoying the red wig. I've never seen anyone put so much hair gel on a wig before! He needed every drop to comb it into the shape of his own scythe. He says he might laminate it!

Here be Darkness. She's taken up baking cupcakes and brought some along for us to try. They're delicious! They practically stand up and walk right into my mouth of their own accord. In fact, the legs are my favourite bit!

Yonder is Evil. He's dressed up in a long, white robe with a little cardboard halo fixed onto his head with a piece of wire. He does that every year but it's hilarious every time!

Let's take a look at some of the ghosts and ghouls who haunt our world all year round:

Wings of a Feather

Image: George Poinar Jr. & John T. Huber

Disney's Dumbo was a silly, little elephant who thought he could fly by means of a single feather. It's an understandable delusion, given his situation. He was raised by a mouse in a circus after his mother was deemed clinically insane. From an early age he was ostracised by his own kind, bullied, abused and forced to work a humiliating job which he hated.

No wonder the wretched cherub wanted to fly away.

Except that he could fly away. But not because of the feather. It was much more to do with his gigantic pair of ears and a peculiar cessation of reality and physics. Because all things are possible when you have truly gigantic ears.

But there are creatures out there who really can fly using nothing but a couple of feathers. They don't require a cessation of reality and they don't even need ears of any size whatsoever...

MIRACLE!