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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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  How El Niño and La Niña Cause Extreme Weather – The Economist (2023)

  June 1, 2023 at 4:47 pm / Global Patterns, Video

  El Niño and La Niña are opposite states of one of Earth’s most important climate processes together constituting the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO. It can lead to devastating weather events all over the world. But how does it work, what kinds of extreme weather does it cause and how is global warming affecting it? The ENSO observed during the 1997/1998 period was a legendary one. It appears 2023/2024 could be another significant ENSO event. Since 1950 the amplitudes […]

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  FAST: The World’s Largest Telescope | China Icons (2016)

  June 1, 2023 at 1:48 pm / Cosmological, Video

  Large scale project management is in the tradition of China. Construction of impressively large Junk ships in dry dock environment, the terra cotta army with uniquely sculpted soldiers and the Grand Canal is just a few examples among many. Large projects also require risk management skills enabling adapting to inevitable series of changes as the timeline advances. Yet, here we see another recent marvel proudly created by the Chinese. The Five-Hundred-Metre Aperture Spherical Telescope, known as FAST had been constructed […]

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