This makeup artist’s skills are so good.

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7 Phenomenal Wonders of the Animal World

7) Symbiosis: Surprising Animal Team-Ups

Sure species work together, but they also work with other species in strange and unlikely ways. In the water, sharks hunt with sidekick fish, shrimp clean up eels and crabs use anemones as poisoned boxing gloves. In the air, some birds flit down to take scraps from the teeth of crocodiles while others sit comfortably on the backs of huge mammals from buffaloes to elephants. On the ground, keen-sighted zebras eat side-by-side with hearing-enhanced ostriches, each prepared to warn the other of danger.

6) Clever Camouflage and Colorful AniStealth

Animals adapt over time to their environments, some so much so that they begin to look like their surroundings – a helpful evolutionary advantage in the face of potential predators (or while stalking prey). There are octopi that blend in perfectly with sandy ocean floors, insects that look just like leaves and fish that resemble oceanic plants. There is even an octopus that can mimic nearly twenty other oceanic species to scare off attackers.

5) Color-Changing and Shape-Shifting Animals

Some animals require weeks to shift from one state to another while others can change color and even texture in a matter of hours or minutes. In some cases they blend in roughly with their surroundings while in others they are almost a carbon copy of what they are next to. Even when you are looking for them, some color-changers fit into their context so well you would never even see them at close range.

4) Cannibalistic Macabre Mate-Eating Animals

Scientists still do not know for sure what drives some animals to eat their mates. If they predominantly engaged in this behavior after mating one would assume they were getting sustenance for their newly-fertilized eggs – but most females attempt to eat the males even before mating. Scorpion males save themselves by stinging their partners into submission, mantises wait until a female has fed to approach her and spiders actually bring an offering of food in the hope that they themselves will not be the main course.

3) Group Builders and Animal Architects

Humans work together all the time to build incredible structures we could never have dreamed up, let alone construct, on our own – but some animal architecture is arguably even more impressive. There is a spider web built by a variety of species working together that spans much of a public park, an ant colony that extends for thousands of miles and birds nests built by entire flocks living together under one thatched roof.

2) Naturally and Artificially Exploding Animals

Yes, you read that right: some animals explode. In some cases they unfortunately have help – like the whale detonated to get it off a public beach or the tank-hunting suicide dogs from World War II. In other cases, though, it happens as a defense mechanism or the by-product of an unknown natural phenomena. One of the widest publicized cases of an exploding animal involved gaseous buildup inside of a giant whale being transported by truck down a busy city street – you do not want to see those pictures.

1) Raining Animals: Radical but Real

Raining animals … it sounds ridiculous, right? Nonetheless, it happens – albeit rarely. Fish, frogs and birds are the most common forms of animal rain. Sometimes the creatures land relatively unscathed but in others they are frozen or shredded to pieces. Theories vary in their details but generally it is assumed thatcertain kinds of strong winds lift up the animals with a volume of water (fish and frogs from ponds, for example) or sweep them out of the sky in the case of birds and then deposit them, often right before a major storm.

7 Amazing Transparent Animals – Wonders of Nature

1. Transparent Frog

Umm, not so fast, prof… have you seen the “glass frog” (above), native to the Venezuelan rainforest? Like the transparent frogs selectively bred in the lab from generations of pale-skinned Japanese Brown Frogs, the Glass Frog’s internal organs and eggs can be seen without too much trouble. Word to Professor Sumida: take the grant money and run!

2. Transparent Cave Crayfish

Caves are some of the darkest places on the planet  even sophisticated light-gathering instruments are unable to register a single photon in the deepest, darkest caves. Under these conditions, creatures including fish, spiders, insects and crayfish have evolved into “troglobites”: animals so precisely adapted to living in darkness that they cannot survive outside cave environments. Under such conditions, neither eyes nor pigmentation are necessary.

3. Transparent Sea Cucumber

Slow moving, soft bodied bottom dwellers for the most part, Sea Cucumbers are an ancient lineage of sea creatures who have evolved a variety of ways to survive and thrive over hundreds of millions of years of evolution. For some Sea Cucumbers, being transparent allows them to fly under the radar, as it were, of predators in search of a quick & easy.

4. Transparent Icefish

Fund in the cold waters around Antarctica and southern South America, the crocodile icefish (Channichthyidae) feed on krill, copepods, and other fish. Their blood is transparent because they have no hemoglobin and/or only defunct erythrocytes. Their metabolism relies only on the oxygen dissolved in the liquid blood, which is believed to be absorbed directly through the skin from the water. This works because water can dissolve the most oxygen when it is coldest.

5. Transparent Amphipod

Called Phronima, this unusual animal is one of the many strange species recently found on an expedition to a deep-sea mountain range in the North Atlantic. In an ironic strategy for survival, this tiny shrimplike creature shows everything it has, inside and out, in an attempt to disappear.

6. Transparent Squid

Found on the southern hemisphere’s oceans, the Glass Squid (Teuthowenia pellucida) has light organs on its eyes and possesses the ability to roll into a ball, like an aquatic hedgehog.

7. Transparent Siphonophores

Siphonophores belong to the Cnidaria, a group of animals that includes the corals, hydroids, and true jellyfish. Marrus orthocanna, a deep sea siphonophore. The combined digestive and circulatory system is red; all other parts are transparent.

10 most amazing natural wonders of the world: in pictures

1. Fly Geyser, Nevada, USA

OK, this geyser isn't 100% natural, but it was formed by accident. In 1964 drilling for sources of geothermal energy caused minerals to rise up into the strange-but-true form you can still admire today.

2. Great Blue Hole, Belize

This oddity is definitely all-natural. The hole, 300 meters across and up to 125 meters deep, is one of the best places on Earth for scuba diving.

3. Plitvicer Seen, Croatia

The 16 Plitvice Lakes in Croatia are arranged in steps, linked by waterfalls. You can explore them on walkways like in the photo, or by boat.

4. Zangye Danxia, China

The sandstone landforms of Zangye Danxia come in idiosyncratic and colourful formations, their layers revealing thousands upon millions of years of history and prehistory.

5. Striped icebergs, Antarctica

Antarctica pretty much has freehold on 'out-of-this-world' natural wonders, as long as you like your wonders to come in white, or maybe blue, or in some cases, stripes.

6. The Door to Hell, Turkmenistan

In a story that recalls the creation of the Fly Geyser, the Door to Hell in Turkmenistan's Karakum Desert has been burning brightly for over 40 years, ever since geologists tried to burn off natural gases discovered when drilling at the site.

7. Côte d'Albâtre, France

You've heard of the White Cliffs of Dover, but how about the 'White Cliffs of Normandy'? The chalk-white Alabaster Coast stretches for 80 miles are rises in cliffs up to 100m high, forming odd structures like the arch at Étretat.

8. Bryce Canyon, USA

There is of course the much-more-famous Grand Canyon, but Bryce Canyon, sitting at over 2000 meters above sea level in Utah, is very much a wonder of the world with its pyramid-like rock formations. And it's not actually a canyon...

9. Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia

Do not adjust your set. The largest salt lake in the world (covering 10,582 square kilometers, to be precise) resembles a mirror-smooth frozen lake, making possible perception-perplexing photos like this.

10. Pamukkale, Turkey

The surreal beauty of these mineral hot springs in Denizli Province in south-west Turkey draws so many tourists that access is now restricted in the hope that its natural wonder will be preserved for many more people to admire.

How to Create a Simple Compost Pile

                                         Location is everything, according to realtors, and so it is with your compost pile. An ideal spot is shady (so materials don’t dry out), doesn’t get inundated with rain (so materials don’t get soggy), and is within reach of your hose. It should offer sufficient space for you to work comfortably. Compost at least a few feet away from buildings so moisture from the pile doesn’t seep into foundations.
Chop, shred, or break as much of your organic matter as possible into small pieces. The smaller the pieces, the faster the rate of decomposition.
Here are the steps for creating a simple aboveground compost pile.

Spread 4 inches (10 centimeters) of woody, chunky, or coarse brown ingredients, such as straw, corn stalks, or dead perennial stems, as your pile’s base.

This rough layer promotes aeration.

Sprinkle each layer with water as you build the pile so that it has the dampness of a wrung-out sponge. Also sprinkle in a few handfuls (or shovelfuls) of native soil here and there.

You don’t have to add soil with every layer.

Spread 4 to 5 more inches (10 to 13 centimeters) of brown materials, such as dry leaves or shredded paper.

Spread 2 to 3 inches (5 to 8 centimeters) of green materials, such as spent garden plants and grass clippings.

Continue alternating layers of browns and greens, moistening as you build. Finish up with a layer of browns on top.

You have the option of covering the pile with a tarp. Doing so helps keep materials from drying out in arid regions. In rainy climates, it prevents the pile from getting too wet and turning anaerobic.
The length of time needed to obtain finished compost varies depending on how you mix up the original elements (types of ingredients, size of particles, and moisture levels) and how much turning and remoistening you choose to do after the pile is built.
 
If you’re in no hurry for compost, you can leave the pile sit as is. However, to jumpstart the decomposition process, turn the compost to mix materials on the outside of the pile into the interior so everything decomposes at a similar rate. If you do nothing further after building your pile, in three to six months you’ll be able to harvest some finished compost from the bottom and center.

10 love stories you’ll fall in love with

                               Cool stories for interesting people

                                

                             Prepare to swoon…

 

1)Henry and June, Anaïs Nin (1986)

If you want sauce, you’re in the right place: this is not quite a novel, but a selection from Nin’s unexpurgated diaries in which she details her not only her marriage, sex life and all, but also her involvement with Henry Miller and his wife, June. It’s all set in the early thirties and tells about Nin’s friendship with June and her subsequent affair with Henry an affair that started a friendship that would last them both the rest of their lives. So when we say it’s saucy, it’s also very sweets.

2)North and South Elizabeth Gaskell (1855)

A romance played out over political lines, this is the story of Margaret Hale, a clergyman’s daughter turned social campaigned, and John Thornton, mill owner. If you’re into the history of the manufacturing and trading industries in the 1850s, you’ll adore this, but even if you’re not, it’s a tense and classic love story to rival Pride and Prejudice.

3)The End of the Affair, Graham Greene (1951)

Fancy some infidelity and a lot of tortured soul-searching? Yeah, we thought so. Greene’s protagonist is a writer, Maurice Bendrix, and his lover, Sarah Miles, who refuses to leave her nonentity of a husband, Henry. When she breaks it off with Maurice, he is wracked with jealousy and she finds religion. Despair, longing, obsession: what’s not to love?

4)The Time Traveller’s Wife, Audrey Niffenegger (2003)

Claire, an artist, is married to Henry, a librarian, who’s got a rare genetic disease that causes him to travel through time; on one of his catapulting journeys he meets the young Claire and they conduct their relationship out of sync she gets older, but because he can’t control when he’s living, sometimes he’s a young man and sometimes he’s older. Complex? It is, rather, but it’s really intriguing and a really tender love-story. You’ll cry, though. We’re serious. It’s a fact of nature.

5)Bred, Eve45)

Depending on how you want to read this, it’s either a love story between Charles Ryder and Julia or Charles Ryder and Julia’s brother, Sebastian. Whichever way, it’s about religion and society and sin and thwarted desire and aristocratic life in Britain’s post-war twenties; it’s sumptuous and nostalgic and we love it.

6)Super Sad True Love Sy, Gary t (2010)

 In Shteyngart’s near-future world of smart-phone dystopia, middle-aged Lenny Abramov’s a nonentity while perky young Eunice Park fits right in but Lenny’s gonna give it a shot anyway. A social satire that is properly, truly funny  especially if you, like us, are soldered to your mobile devices it’s also a very touching story about a very unlikely relationship.

7)High Fidelity, Nick Hornby (1995)

Record store owning geek, Rob, has just been dumped by his girlfriend, Laura, and to help him cope and to help him try to figure out how to win her back he’s going though his inner list of his own top five all-time break-ups so as he can revisit the past for answers… It’s cringy and sad and you’ll totally relate to it (and the London setting is way better than the Chicago relocation in the film version much as we love the Windy City.).

8)The Post-Birthday World, Lionel Shriver (2007)

Have you ever looked at somebody other than your partner and wondered, what if…? Of course you have. Well, Shriver plays out the consequences of acting, or not acting, on that temptation, by following the same protagonist down two different paths: in alternating chapters, she either stays with her long-term partner, safe old Lawrence, or takes a chance on snooker-playing ruffian, Ramsey. What was the better choice? You decide!

9)Ali Smith, Girl Meets Boy (2007)

A modern-day retelling of Ovid’s myth of Iphis (born a girl but raised as a boy and falls in love with a girl) and Ianthe, Smith’s book is set in contemporary Inverness, and tells of Anthea and her love for her female colleague, eco-warrier Robin. Smith’s writing is about as energetic as it comes, and this is a beautifully hopeful tale.

10)Les Liaisos Da Pierre Cho (1782)

If any of this has been too soppy for you, here’s the antidote. You’ve probably seen Steven Frears’ 1988 film version of de novel, or the gloriously bitchy adaptation, Cruel Intentions (1999), starring Buffy herself, but you’ve really got to go back to the original the English translation, anyway to appreciate the full Machiavellian horror of this story: seduction, revenge, manipulation, degradation, and guilt! It’s decadent, it’s evil, it’s funny and superb!