LizardGuy

@lizardguy.bsky.social

562 Followers 274 Following

Ecologist, poet, environmental educator, concerned about the future. Recognises that we're an ecosystem in an ecosystem. Socialist (not when it comes to billionaires though).

A star-filled sky with a backdrop of purple to orange-pink near the horizon. Image includes the southern cross.
Velvet The Velvet Worm (From the book “Faunaverse Wildlife in poetry Tasmania”) You may know worms that wriggle and squirm with slimy skin that's sticky, without a head or single leg, all pinkish, long and icky. You also might know centipedes, long legged hunting creatures, but it's time to meet another beast with different sorts of features. Velvet is a Velvet Worm, from an age that's long forgotten, she's soft and cute and velvety, her home's in old logs rotten. Her legs are short and many, her antennae wave and wriggle, and as she moves across the log she looks like a small squiggle. Although she's small and soft and cute, Velvet is carnivorous, and smaller creatures sadly find her appetite is ravenous. But how can Velvet catch them? She's certainly not quick. Well, Velvet has a most amazing unexpected trick. She pins her victims to the log with sprays of sticky thread, which form an instant zig-zag net from nozzles on her head. Her victims struggle feebly but they know their time is up, As Velvet says "It's dinnertime!" and she begins to sup. Some Velvet Worms live socially and share a territory, And if others cross the border, the fights can get quite gory, The biggest female rules the roost and though they share the hunt, She'll be the first to have a feed, she'll be the one up front. She's soft and cute and looks just like a tiny plushy toy, But Velvet is a creature I would not like to annoy.
An Apostlebird (Struthidea cinerea) running across the ground. These birds spend a lot of the time on the ground foraging for insects and seeds. They're a communal species that all share the task of raising the young.
A very small creature which looks like a shrew but has larger ears, slightly larger eyes- and the female has a pouch, because it's a marsupial. These little carnivores live in earth cracks in inland eastern Australia.
A dragonfly emerging from its aquatic nymph shell into its adult winged form. The wings have yet to be pumped open and its exosceleton is pale and soft, in stark contrast to the rough, sand-encrusted shell it has just escaped from. North-west slopes of NSW, Australia.
A large frog with uneven dark brown blotches over pale brown skin, large eyes and an enormous mouth, which is the widest part of the frog. These burrowing frogs are able to survive long droughts by burying themselves beneath the ground and remaining immobile for months or even years, emerging following prolonged rain events to eat and breed. They eat any animal they can fit in their massive mouths.
A small yellow-brown spider approaches a much larger female St. Andrew's cross spider, her eight legs in four pairs in an X configuration, from the opposite side of the web.
A small, thin, glossy-scaled skink with short limbs, a long tail and a linear pattern which includes a white midlateral stripe that begins under the eye and ends on the anterior flank behind the forelimb. Its eye is covered by a transparent scale, a condition known as "ablepherine".
A mug with a rainbow-colored poo motif labelled "Unicorn Poop"; The implication that only a unicorns poop would be able to cure a disease thought to be incurable by the medical establishment. This references the Fecal Microbiota Transplants that restored a healthy gut microbiome to my wife, putting her Bipolar I Disorder into remission for over seven years now. She no longer requires psych medications, and has no bipolar symptoms at all. Prior to the treatments if she missed her medications for even two days, she would be off to a psych ward within a week. This transformation has been miraculous and absolutely life-changing. We need fully-funded RCTs to work out why this worked for my wife and make such treatments safely and cheaply available to those with Bipolar Disorder.
A view from the top of a vegetated hill showing large patches of cleared land with at most widely-scattered trees, too far apart for most small birds to safely traverse and way too big for most flying invertebrates. As we haven't catalogued most of the invertebrate species in Australia (and new vertebrates continue to be described) we don't even know what we're losing. We are facing a loss of #biodiversity with huge implications for our own survival.
An Australian Owlet-nightjar, looking more like a mammal than a bird with its large dark eyes and small beak, peers timidly out of a tree hollow. Its beak is surrounded by sensory feathers which almost obscure it, but they have a very large yellow gape for their size which is very alarming if you ever actually get your hands on one.
A small cute spider with ridiculously large eyes and strong black and white transverse bands looks like an Anime cartoon- but it isn't.
A plowed, laser flattened paddock of bare earth stretches kilometers to a treeline barely visible on the horizon near Mungindi NSW. This would have been a thriving mixed woodland containing koalas, parrots, possums, bats, frogs, lizards, and a huge diversity of invertebrates. It is now a monoculture where only one species is allowed to flourish, which requires large quantities of water and pesticide to survive. The photograph is taken at 50mm equivalent, so the perspective isn't skewed. This is what it looks like to the human eye. An ecological desert. As an ecologist I have to justify why I need to put animals through the "trauma" of finding them, with spotlights, camera traps or live trapping. If I do this without a permit, I face serious consequences that can include a jail term. The people responsible for this destruction, from which the environment is unlikely to ever recover, will not have faced any consequences apart from financial enrichment. People need to be aware of the cost of their clothing choices, and mouch of the clothing that is produced ends up in landfill. We need to do better.
The Australian Magpie Cracticus tibicen, a species in which some individuals, usually males, take a particular dislike to certain people, or people who look or act like certain people, and which will defend its territory from such with aggressive swooping. Several people have lost eyes and at least one person has been killed as a result of attacks by these zealous birds.
A brown huntsman spider eating a rainbow skink (Carlia amax).
A Rainbow Skink, Carlia amax, with a paralysed spider it has stolen from a parasatoid wasp.
A small bird with a black upper body, caerulean blue cheeks, cap and reversed cravat, skinny orange legs and a long narrow tail stands facing away from the photographer, its beak open as it trills maniacally into the void, asserting its role as the king of the vegie garden.
Large book with a picture of the curve of Earth from space and the title "The Home Planet Images and reflections of Earth from Space Explorers." Conceived and edited by Kevin W. Kelly for the Association of Space Explorers.
Adult male water dragon with black chest and orange, brown and duck-egg blue stripes on its chin, a deep, muscular head and a bright orange eye looks at the photographer from on top of a rock.
A small cute rodent with large black eyes, large ears, a fawn-orange coat and a white belly, looks over its long whiskers at the photographer from a rock crevice.
A yellowish-coloured Dingo half-submerged in a muddy pool, its tongue protuding as it laps water and its tail held up in a curve.
Bare-nosed wombat reaching around to place its right paw on its backside, while facing away from the viewer.
A man representing greedy humans looks at an attractive woman representing unsustainable growth economy while his girlfriend representing an inhabitable planet looks at him appalled.
Image labelled "cockatoo" with cockatoo going left over image labelled "Cockafro" with a cockatoo going right.
A rough-skinned gecko with deep orange eyes and spines running along its body onto its tail.