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s4L

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Posts posted by s4L

  1. Posted

    "U.S Forces give the nod

    It's a setback for your country"

    I remember listening to a podcast of this talk last year. Transcript of the fourth annual Michael Hintze Lecture in International Security Delivered by Professor John Mearsheimer

    Interesting to see what he talked about start to develop.

    I would like to argue tonight that Australians should be worried about China's rise, because it is likely to lead to an intense security competition between China and the United States, with considerable potential for war. Moreover, most of China's neighbors, to include India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, Russia, Vietnam, and yes Australia, will join with the United States to contain China's power. To put it bluntly: China cannot rise peacefully.

    It is important to emphasize, however, that I am not arguing that Chinese behavior alone will drive the security competition that lies ahead. The United States is also likely to behave in aggressive ways, thus further increasing the prospects for trouble here in the Asia-Pacific region.

    In particular, the power gap between China and the United States is shrinking and in all likelihood "US strategic primacy" in this region will be no more. This is not to say that the United States will disappear; in fact, its presence here is likely to grow in response to China's rise. But the United States will no longer be the preponderant power in your neighborhood, as it has been since 1945.
    • Like 1

  5. Posted

    The best way to go would be iron sulphate because it dissolves easily a watering can and then goes through the soil, takes a couple of days to see an effect. About $9 at cunnings hardware.

    Sulfur on the other hand needs to be dug in and takes about 3 months depending on temperature and how much life is in the soil.

  10. Posted

    What, so they can find the average climate of any year in Earth's history? That I find hard to believe...

     

    I believe one of the tools scientists use is isotope ratios to research ancient climates. I was reading yesterday about how this technique came about.

    A paper called "Pleistocene Temperatures" was published in the Journal of Geology in 1955 written by Cesare Emiliani at the University of Chicago. He had pioneered the modern use of sediment cores by crushing up the shells of a once living, group of singled celled marine animals called a foraminiferas.

    "...Washed them in distilled water, pulverised them in a mortar and baked them at 482 degrees C in a stream of helium gas. From that perfectly clean powder of calcium carbonate, Emiliani extracted the oxygen the forams themselves had built into their shells thousands of years ago when they were alive. With a mass spectrometer he counted how many of those oxygen atoms were the light isotope, oxygen 16 which makes up more than 99 percent of all the oxygen on Earth, and how many were the heavier and much rarer isotope, oxygen 18. Normally the heavy oxygen prefers to be in calcium carbonate over water, because that reduces the overall vibrational energy of the molecular system. But as the temperature of the seawater goes up, that slight preference goes down, and with it the ratio of oxygen 18 to oxygen 16 in the foram shells. That ratio was the thermometer Emiliani used to take the temperature of the Pleistocene..."

    Thats an except from a book called, Fixing Climate, The story of climate science - and how to stop global warming by Robert Kunzig and Wallace Broecker. It's a pretty interesting book which might answer some of your questions.

  15. Posted

    I'd say too little water probably, because they look like unglazed terracotta pots that dry out pretty fast.   And because of the warmer weather in the past month they've started to put on new growth, which you can see at the top where the glaucous sheen stops and the bright green growth is.  I'd move them gradually into more sun and only water after the soil has dried out, maybe remove a small area of the pebbles on the pot to monitor the moisture. 

  17. Posted

    Here's a story on a newly found species in Gove NT.

    Pics in this link

     

    Solitary survivor gives hope to threatened plant species

     

     

    Research scientists at Sydney's Royal Botanic Gardens have been able to show there's hope for the survival of rare plants despite climate change.

    Botanic Gardens Trust Executive Director Dr Tim Entwisle said in our modern botanic garden we not only collect and protect species but we want to understand how they interact with the environment and what 'makes them tick'.

    "We can now extract DNA from plants cells to test the health and viability of the population," Dr Entwisle said.

    Botanic Gardens Trust Principal Research Scientist, Dr Maurizio Rossetto said a year-long study of a rare plant in the Northern Territory, a new species of Erythroxylum, has shown plants can adapt and survive despite having been restricted to very small populations by long-term climatic change.

    "DNA investigations on the history of this small shrub first of all told us that it once was widely distributed across what is now the Gulf of Carpentaria. When the sea levels rose around 7000BP the NT and Cape York were separated. While the species remained locally common in Cape York, in the NT it only survived as a single genetically isolated individual," Dr Rossetto said.

    The study shows that although the single plant that survived in the NT could not produce viable seeds, it persisted and expanded through time by resprouting from underground shoots and by generating mutations. Although theory predicts that a single individual can survive in isolation by accumulating genetic mutations, this study provides unique empirical evidence.

    "From this study we've been able to show that some plants have a range of characteristics that enable them to persist even through extreme environmental change. However, this natural resilience does not make them less vulnerable to direct and indirect human activities, such as clearing or the pressure from introduced harmful species," Dr Rossetto said.

    Head Ecologist, specialising in Flora for MET Serve, Chris Spain was also a key player in the research of this plant.

    "When a plant has a genotype with some flexibility our study shows it might allow them to adapt to a changing environment. So if our climate becomes a few degrees hotter , this sort of adaptation can potentially take place in large areas of undisturbed vegetation," Mr Spain said.

    "We just need to be aware that these processes are most likely to take place within unfragmented landscapes which allow an increased ability for plants to spread over large areas."

    Please note: Botanic Gardens Trust's Marlien van der Merwe a specialist in genetics was lead author in the study and is now on maternity leave.

    The yet to be described Erythroxylum species is a small subshrub, that barely reaches a height of 30 cm and has inconspicuous white flowers and bright red fruit that can only be produced in the presence of two genetically distinct individuals.

    1_Erythroxylum1-420x0.jpg

  18. Posted

    Here is a link to AQIS's import conditons for spawn or cultures.

    AQIS

    I thought about importing some but take note of the fees at the bottom of the page. $40 per item, plus $85 for electronic lodgement fee.

  19. Posted

    I usually brew a tea with a couple of table spoons of calea and smoke a couple of calea rollies untill you can hear what sounds like your heartbeat, then theres a short window in which to catch the calea wave.

    Sleep is shallow and broken up by hypnopompic and Hypnagogia states with many vivid  detailed dreams.  Wake up feeling very tired.  Didn't get and deep sleep, just felt like REM.

    Sometimes it wont work at all, seems a bit hit and miss.

    Also cannabis inhibits or makes you unable to remember dreams usually.

  21. Posted

    Its better to make your mix uniform

    I wouldn't put sand at the bottom of the pot because all this will do is create a perched water table. Water won't move from a fine textured soil into a coarser material until the finer soil is saturated.  So it does the opposite of whats intended.

     

  24. Posted

    Hi there fellow mycology enthusiasts, 

    These mushrooms were growing from woodchipped garden beds.  I believe they are subs because they have all the features, mottled grey white hollow stipes that bruise blue, caramel brown caps with an umbo.

    But as I have never ID'd them before I want to be 200% sure.  

    Any comment would be much appreciated.

    SANY0327.jpg

    SANY0328.jpgSANY0329.jpgSANY0330.jpg

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