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A Yellow-throated Warbler Collecting Nesting Material

May 7, 2024 at 6:41 pm / Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video

In this short observation recorded on May 19th 2012 you can watch a a yellow-throated warbler (Setophaga dominica) collecting plant fibers for nest construction. This bird constructs cup-shaped nests very high up in the canopy of mature forests. As can be seen in this recording, it particularly developed a search image for collecting fibers of specific quality used in a two-layered nest architecture. Nest construction in birds is not all instinctive and has a consirable learning component. Urban birds can […]

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Eyed Click Bug (Alaus oculatus) Ovipositing

January 20, 2024 at 10:01 am / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Molecular Nature, Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video

On May 26th 2012, this click beetle began laying her eggs on a log along the Orange trail of the State Botanical Garden of Georgia in Athens, GA. These beetles are quite noticeable due to their large size and distinctive eye patterns on their pronotum. At the beginning of the video (while she is stationary), you can see some very tiny red mites walking across her body. She wondered around on a downed tree and assessed possible egg laying sites. […]

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Cannonball Tree – Couroupita guianensis (Lecythidaceae) – Singapore Botanical Gardens

June 28, 2023 at 9:59 am / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

Filmed on location at the Singapore Botanical Gardens on Nov 22nd 2016. The cannonball tree (Couroupita guianensis) from the Lecythidaceae (Brazil nut family) family is native to Neotropical forests. Its flowers are adapted for bat pollination possibly from an ancestral state of euglossine bee pollination. Here far away from its natural home, the flowers are being visited by stingless Meliponini bees. The flowers produce impressive levels of fragrance but yield no nectar. Therefore the reward for its visitors comes in […]

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Acid Attack

September 22, 2022 at 10:22 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

Nectar is an effective concoction for establishment and maintenance of plant-animal interactions. Using nectar, plants can build a community of allies for defense and even manipulate the behavior of pollinators. We are accustomed to nectaries found in flowers. Plants however, have evolved nectaries in other locations in their above-ground parts including the base of the flowers and petioles. These are called extrafloral nectaries. The sugary reward coming from the extrafloral nectaries invites ants to defend them. Here we can see […]

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NatureDocumentaries.org Showcase

August 26, 2022 at 9:51 am / NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video

This is a playlist of a subset of minimally edited footage showcased in Short Observations category of NatureDocumentaries.org. Most observations have been registered in the iNaturalist global biodiversity database. You can find links to some of the individual observations that have been detailed in a post from the list below. Short Observations category aims to bring out the beauty of mostly overlooked casual observations with an unofficial motto “Let’s heal the world with daily dosage of natural history… An extended […]

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A Frequently Yawning Rough Green Snake (Opheodrys aestivus)

March 4, 2022 at 8:25 am / Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

This beautifully bright green snake is a master of disguise. Although they are fairly long (can be up to 81 cm) it is almost impossible to notice them unless you have been curiously scanning the vegetation with a purpose. The Rough Green Snake (Opheodrys aestivus) is behaviorally very docile. It must be a slow day for this particular individual since s/he was frequently yawning. The observation was recorded on 9th of September 2012 at the Georgia State Botanical Garden in […]

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Grey Reef Sharks Mating – Yann Hubert

March 1, 2022 at 1:11 pm / Natural history, Short Observations, Video

Shark life cycle has many elusive stages. Mating is one of these secretive moments. Here in this short observation filmmaker Yann Hubert captures a pair of Grey Reef Sharks (Carcharhinus amblyrhynchos) during copulation. Characteristic clasper organs used by the male to latch onto the female during copulation is very striking. The location and time of the year in this extremely serendipitous encounter is not specified perhaps to avoid disturbance from many curious divers. Grey Reef Sharks are common and live […]

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Australian Walking Stick Insects are Three Times Weirder Than You Think | PBS – Deep Look (2022)

February 11, 2022 at 3:20 pm / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, PBS Nature, Short Observations

It is a seed, no it is an ant, no it is a leaf, no it is a stick,… Actually, it is all of the above through a temporally spaced sequence of disguises (*): It is the Australian walking stick (Extatosoma tiaratum). This insect is indeed a master of deception. It is a fascinating example of a series of adaptations that maximized its survival by multiple versions of mimicry successfully fooling predators at every stage of their life cycle. (*) […]

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Cone-headed Planthoppers (Acanalonia conica) on Passion Flower

February 5, 2022 at 2:11 pm / Evolution, Natural history, Short Observations, Video

This observation has been registered in the iNaturalist database with the following accession 105647409. Observed on August 9, 2014 at the Georgia State Botanical Garden in Athens, GA, USA. Here, you can see a number of cone-headed planthoppers (Acanalonia conica) feeding on a passion flower vine (Passiflora incarnata). The passion flower family (Passifloraceae) is well known for its sugar producing glands called extrafloral nectaries. These nectaries attract ants and here in this observation we see two species of ants (Formica […]

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The Science in Saving the Fowler’s Toad – Ryan Mariotti (2017)

June 19, 2021 at 11:15 am / Ecological Documentaries, Natural history, Short Observations, Wildlife Documentaries

Like many amphibians, Fowler’s Toad (Anaxyrus fowleri) is facing myriad threats caused by Human activities. Filmed and directed by environmental filmmaker Ryan Mariotti this short documentary follows Canadian herpetologists Dr. David Green & Dr. Katherine Yagi from McGill University studying populations of this sand specialist frog on Lake Erie. Researchers identify the threats facing the Fowler’s Toad and how to save it. These threats include habitat alteration due to invasive Phragmites plants and demographic bottlenecks arising from low recruitment rates […]

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Horseshoe Crabs Mating in Maine

April 9, 2021 at 11:25 am / Ecological Documentaries, Evolution, Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

This is a quite rare footage of Atlantic horseshoe crabs (Limulus poyphemus) recorded during high tide about 10:00 am in Recompence Shore, Freeport Maine on May 26th 2010. Mating mostly happens in moonlit nights (romantic animals) on sandy beaches. Here they are mating in broad daylight on a rough pebble beach. External fertilization is one of the ancestral ways to produce offspring however it can be rather costly. Egg production requires more resources compared to sperm. Females therefore need more […]

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Baby Ground Squirrels Endemic to Anatolia – Hakan Gür (2020)

July 10, 2020 at 8:09 am / Natural history, Short Observations, Video

They indeed are Meerkat look-alikes. But no they are not Meerkats. Locally they are known as “Gelengi”. Scientifically, they are the Anatolian ground squirrels (Spermophilus xanthophrymnus). In this short observation you can see 5 juveniles that are reported to be approximately 5-6 weeks old hanging out in their nest entrance. A Turkish research team lead by Dr. Hakan Gür who studies their population dynamics recorded the observation on May 8th 2020 near Ankara. Female ground squirrels mate soon after they […]

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A Red Shouldered Hawk (Buteo lineatus)

July 7, 2020 at 4:41 pm / Natural history, NatureDocumentaries.org, Short Observations, Video

It appears like nothing too exciting is going on in this short observation but in reality there’s a lot happening inside that brain of this bird perfectly chilling with the self confidence of a top predator. The confidence is well earned: they are the descendants of dinosaurs. Looking and seeing are two separate actions. In order to “see” a higher order brain function called “attention” is needed. Scientists define the foundation of attention with two concepts called Context Generalization and […]

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Mediterranean Stony Corals (Phyllangia americana mouchezii) – Mert Gökalp (2018)

May 6, 2020 at 9:56 pm / Natural history, Short Observations, Video

When we talk about corals we always conjure up the iconic image of highly fragile tropical reef-building symbiotic organisms in crystal clear shallow waters. The stony corals living in cold waters are striking in this matter. They show that this symbiotic relationship between the two evolutionarily distant partner organisms can break down (coral bleaching) or never evolve when conditions are less than optimal. The Mediterranean is a rather nutrient poor sea with low productivity. Lacking a photosynthetic partner stony corals […]

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Snakes in a Cave – Nate Dappen & Neil Losin (2014)

January 24, 2020 at 8:36 pm / Natural history, Short Observations, Video, Wildlife Documentaries

As the world is shaking with the news of a new corona virus outbreak in China, researchers have quickly identified the potential source of 2019-nCoV based on the spike forming glycoprotein structure. Just like the hugely informative movie Contagion (2011) depicting a realistic scenario this new virus was a bizarre sounding recombinant. The corona virus SARS-CoV-2 appeared to be a recombinant of a bat and a snake virus. At first, you may naturally ask how could this weird merger have […]

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