Whales and Wiener Dogs

You could put all kinds of stuff in it. Perhaps even a wiener dog.

27 bucks. It pays for itself basically.

This painting (well, a copy of it) is hanging on the wall of my office. If you don’t believe me, just come to New York City and ask for the guy that runs WhalesAndWienerDogs.com and I’ll prove it to you. It’s a whale fighting a squid who’s being attacked by some sort of Jesus-y “I can walk on water” T-rex.

"Bad Day On The High Sea" by Brandon Bird

Here’s an explanation from the artist’s web sheet.

Here, raw sexual aggression is symbolized by the sperm whale, while the squid acts as a thinly-disguised metaphor for the multi-armed oligarchies of Rockefeller, Hearst, and Morgan. Their battle plays against the backdrop of the sea, standing in for–what else?–the vastness of the unconscious mind.

Buy your own copy or tshirt here.

A "Small" Giant Squid On A New Zealand Beach (CRAIG SIMCOX/The Dominion Post)

A dead three meter long giant squid washed up on Island Bay beach in New Zealand yesterday.

The specimen, which was probably only dead for a couple hours when it was discovered, will be preserved and displayed at Te Papa museum with the colossal squid that’s on display there now.

Giant Cephalopod

• The largest known species of octopus has not eight arms, but seven.
• The Dana Octopus Squid attacks prey with blinding flashes of light emitted from its arms.
• The colossal squid’s esophagus runs through its brain, and if it tries to swallow something too big, it will die.
• Females are larger than males, some as long as 46 feet
• Colossal Squid arms and tentacles are equipped with sharp hooks: some swiveling, others three-pointed
• They can have eyes more than 16 inches across - the largest in the animal kingdom.
• Much of what scientists know about giant cephalopods comes from examining beaks found in sperm whale stomachs.

Answers after the jump. Continue reading True Or False: Giant Cephalopods (Squid and Octopus)

An Entangled Humpback Whale Near Alaska

Whale rescuers in Provincetown, Mass. received $500,000 in funding via President Obama’s omnibus appropriations bill. This came as a relief to The Atlantic Large Whale Disentanglement program, which finished 2008 a quarter million dollars in the hole. Even with the influx of cash, they will still have to operate with 3, instead of 5, rescuers.

The program has rescued over 100 whales and believes that the cash will allow them to operate uninterrupted for the foreseeable future.

A giant Humboldt Squid found along the California coast. (© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

According to Stanford University, there are millions of Humboldt squid off the coast of California, and they are consuming the native fish populations at an alarming rate.

Humboldt Squid can grow up to six feet long and weigh over a hundred pounds. Typically found from Chile to Mexico, their numbers off the California coast have increased dramatically in the last decade. They are now often caught in the lines of deep sea fisherman.