Which is Which???

______________________________

The Rafflesia arnoldii.

The flower with the world's largest bloom is the Rafflesia arnoldii. This rare flower is found in the rainforests of Indonesia. It can grow to be 3 feet across and weigh up to 15 pounds! It is a parasitic plant, with no visible leaves, roots, or stem. It attaches itself to a host plant to obtain water and nutrients. When in bloom, the Rafflesia emits a repulsive odor, similar to that of rotting meat. This odor attracts insects that pollinate the plant.

Another enormous flower found in Indonesia is the Amorphophallus titanum, or Titan arum. It is also known as the "corpse flower" for its unpleasant odor. Like the Rafflesia, the Titan emits the smell of rotting flesh to attract pollinators. Technically, the Titan arum is not a single flower. It is a cluster of many tiny flowers, called an inflorescence. The Titan arum has the largest unbranched inflorescence of all flowering plants. The plant can reach heights of 7 to 12 feet and weigh as much as 170 pounds!

_____________________________________________________

World's Largest Flower Mystery Solved

The world's largest flower, called Rafflesia, can have a diameter up to one meter and can weigh up to 10 kilograms. It also smells like rotting flesh. Discovery News tells us that its genetic roots have been uncovered and that this plant that smells so bad is related to delicate flowers such as poinsettias or violets.

The flower, which is one of 20 species collectively called Rafflesia, is related to poinsettias, violets, passionflowers, and other members of the order Malpighiales, according to a paper published in the current Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Researchers also have some intriguing theories as to why Rafflesia smells so awful, why its flowers bloom only once a year and live for five to seven days, why the plant is a parasite, and why it likes to attract flies that normally go for mounds of dead flesh.

Before going further, here is a photo showing a man surrounding a rafflesia (Credit: Bruce Coleman Collection, photo by Allain Compost).

How did the researchers proceed?

Rafflesia is a parasitic plant that lacks roots, stems, and leaves. Usually botanists trace plant orders using chloroplast DNA, but since Rafflesia does not have chloroplast genes, Todd Barkman, assistant professor of biological sciences at Western Michigan University, and his team instead analyzed the Rafflesia's mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), which corresponds to chloroplast DNA.

The mtDNA studies revealed that the large, stinky flower is related to more normal-sized, pleasantly fragrant posies. Despite its enormity, Rafflesia does resemble passionflowers, according to Barkman. Both have their stamens and pistils fused together in a central column, and both produce a corona, or crown, in the shape of a ring.

Rafflesia did not begin its life as a parasite, but likely evolved this lifestyle in Southeast Asia as it began to depend upon a variety of grape, Tetrastigma. Now Rafflesia lives inside of the grape plant and only reveals itself once a year when it produces the smelly blooms.

"By human standards, the large, lumpy, mottled, stinky flowers could be interpreted as mimicking rotting flesh," Barkman told Discovery News. "The fact that flies are highly attracted to the flowers suggests that they think the flowers look and smell like rotting flesh too!"

For more information about the rafflesia, you can look at this definition on Wikipedia and at this Rafflesia gallery.

Finally, here is the abstract of the paper published by PNAS, "Mitochondrial DNA sequences reveal the photosynthetic relatives of Rafflesia, the world�s largest flower."

All parasites are thought to have evolved from free-living ancestors. However, the ancestral conditions facilitating the shift to parasitism are unclear, particularly in plants because the phylogenetic position of many parasites is unknown. This is especially true for Rafflesia, an endophytic holoparasite that produces the largest flowers in the world and has defied confident phylogenetic placement since its discovery >180 years ago. Here we present results of a phylogenetic analysis of 95 species of seed plants designed to infer the position of Rafflesia in an evolutionary context using the mitochondrial gene matR (1,806 aligned base pairs). Overall, the estimated phylogenetic tree is highly congruent with independent analyses and provides a strongly supported placement of Rafflesia with the order Malpighiales, which includes poinsettias, violets, and passionflowers.

The Large Squid

_____________________________________________________

The Colossal Squid

BREAKING NEWS - February, 2007. Scientists have known about the existence of a species of squid that is reported to be significantly larger than the giant squid, but had not seen or collected a complete specimen of the Colossal squid, named Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni. This species of squid was first identified in 1925 after two arms were recovered from a sperm whale's stomach. In 2003 a virtually intact specimen of this never-before-seen squid had been brought up in Antarctic waters from an estimated depth of 2,000 to 2,200 meters. And recently, in February of 2007 a live colossal squid was brought to the surface in Antarctic waters by a New Zealand fishing boat. This time video was taken and the squid was captured for scientific study. This enormous squid, which was determined to be a male of the species, was 10 meters (32.8 feet), and weighed 1,089 pounds, making it the largest squid (the largest invertebrate) ever captured. What was even more astonishing is that, from what scientists know about squid species in general, there is great sexual dimorphism in squids, with females being significantly larger than the males. If that holds true for the Colossal squid, this male specimen that was captured could very well be dwarfed by a much larger female of the species.

Colossal squid are known to inhabit the abyssal depths of the ocean primarily in the Southern Ocean that circumnavigates Antarctica. Evidence of their existence has been obtained from the stomachs of the largest predatory carnivore in the sea - the mighty sperm whale. Many Sperm whales carry scars on their backs believed to be caused by the hooks of Colossal Squid. One of the significant morphological differences between the giant squid and the colossal squid is the existence of swiveling hooks on each of the sucker discs in the clubs at the ends of the colossal squids' feeding tentacles. The giant squid merely have a circular, serrated row of 'teeth' inside each of their sucker discs. Either way, both of these species of squid make for formidable and terrifying predators of the deep.

Colossal Squid are a major prey item for Antarctic sperm whales feeding in the Southern Ocean; 14% of the squid beaks found in the stomachs of these sperm whales are those of the Colossal Squid, which indicates that Colossal Squid make up 77% of the prey consumed by these whales.

Not only are the Colossal squid the largest invertebrates in the world, they have the largest eyes of any living on earth - even bigger than the blue whale. Much of the evidence of these squids that has been gathered from the stomachs of sperm whales have been the enormous beaks of the colossal squid.

The Oldest National Park in the World

________________________________________

Yellowstone National Park

Yellowstone National Park, set aside as a national park on March 1, 1872, is located mostly in the U.S. state of Wyoming, though it also extends into Montana and Idaho. The park was the first of its kind, and is known for its wildlife and geothermal features, especially Old Faithful Geyser, one of the most popular areas in the park.

Aboriginal Americans have lived in the Yellowstone region for at least 11,000 years. The region was bypassed during the Lewis and Clark Expedition in the early 1800s. Aside from visits by mountain men during the early to mid-1800s, organized exploration did not begin until the late 1860s. The U.S. Army was commissioned to oversee the park just after its establishment. In 1917, administration of the park was transferred to the National Park Service, which had been created the previous year. Hundreds of structures have been built and are protected for their architectural and historical significance, and researchers have examined more than 1,000 archaeological sites.

Largest Snake in the World

The Secret Life of an Anaconda

Anacondas in the wild spend most of their time hanging out in rivers hunting for their food. They are solitary creatures that are somewhat shy and not many of them are easily seen. They are very well camouflaged in the swamps and bogs in which they thrive. There are some historical reports of early European explorers of the South American jungles seeing giant anacondas up to 100 feet long and some of the native peoples of the South American jungle have reported seeing anacondas up to 50 feet long. No one has caught and measured an anaconda anywhere near that size. It is important to note that when a dead anaconda's hide or skin is laid out it can be stretched very easily, expanding to much longer lengths than the snake exhibited when alive. Reports of outsize anacondas that cannot be verified are usually due to distortions in perception, or a snake skin being disproportionately stretched and inaccurately measured. People are generally really bad at estimating length, especially for larger snakes. In fact, the larger the snake, the larger the margin of error.

Largest Butterfly and Moth in the World

____________________________________________________

Queen Alexandra's Birdwing

Queen Alexandra's Birdwing is the largest butterfly in the world, with a wingspan up to 1 foot (30 cm). This tropical butterfly is from the rainforest in northern Papua New Guinea. The caterpillars eat the pipevine plant, which contains poison; this makes the butterfly toxic to predators, which will get sick if they eat it. So they quickly learn to leave these huge butterflies alone.

____________________________________________________

Atlas Moth

The Atlas Moth is found throughout the jungles of Southeast Asia, and particularly in Indonesia, Sri Lanka, and Malaysia. The Atlas Moth adult has a wingspan of 1 foot (30 cm). This moth is so big, it is often mistaken for a small bird when it is flying! The Atlas Moth's cocoon looks like a piece of fruit hanging from a tree. The moth uses the markings on its back, which resemble a snake, to scare away predators. The Atlas does all its eating as a larva; the adult moth has no mouth, and cannot eat.

Info' you need to know

Blue Whales are True Giants

Imagine if you were sailing the ocean for the first time, venturing into a place you'd never seen before, and you look over the side of your boat into the water and see the creature in the photo at left. Imagine that you know almost nothing about what lives in the sea, or what to expect from any creatures you might see. This strange creature swimming near the surface is longer than the ship you are sailing on. You might be a little scared, especially having never seen it before and not knowing what it is capable of. You might even be worrying about whether this creature eats humans. The sheer size of it makes you wonder if it can capsize your ship in pursuit of a meal. But you have nothing to fear for this enormous animal is merely a whale.

For many, many years ancient sailors had rare encounters with these with these gigantic ocean mammals and were terrified by their overwhelming size and powerful tails. You can understand a little of the fear and trepidation they might have felt upon seeing these huge, mysterious creatures for the first time. Today we know them to be virtually harmless to humans and that they have quite a bit in common with us – they, too are warm-blooded mammals that must breathe air. They are highly social animals with complex languages and intelligence. Most importantly, they are not monsters at all, but gentle giants we’ve come to respect, admire and protect.

A picture taken during the Christmas Party of our school: Agoo Computer College/Phil.






During the parlor games of Christmas party.