Red Beach, Kaihalulu, Hawaii

(images via: Patrick Smith and Xigre)

The Red Sand Beach of Kaihalulu can be found on the Hawaiian island of Maui, south of Hana Bay on the far side of Ka’uiki Hill. The beach is relatively narrow, a factor which combined with its isolation makes it popular with nude sunbathers.

(image via: About.com/Hawaii)

From high overhead, the Kaihalulu Red Sand Beach takes on a rusty hue reflecting the high iron oxide (rust) content in the sand eroding from an inland cinder cone. Add water, as the Pacific Ocean does with each crashing wave, and the rust-red sands take on a darker, more rufous hue.

Shell Beach, St. Barts

(images via: TrekEarth, Completely Coastal and Amoeba Sailing Tours)

Every beachcomber enjoys searching for exquisite, exotic seashells while walking along the shore, and one won’t have to walk far if they happen to be at Shell Beach, near Gustavia on the Caribbean island of St. Barts. A fortuitous combination of abundant marine life, strong currents and the odd hurricane has, over the centuries and millennia, driven countless seashells onto the sands of this eponymously named beach.

(image via: Byron Jorjorian)

St. Barts boasts a surprising number of beautiful beaches for its size. Though none approach Shell Beach’s ratio of shells to sand, most offer a more pleasing surface for those who choose to go shoeless.

Hyams Beach, New South Wales, Australia

(images via: Rates to Go and Koti/mbnet)

Though many beaches sell themselves by advertising their pristine white sand, Hyams Beach in southern Australia takes the cake – with vanilla icing on top. Located 3 hours drive south of Sydney, the beach’s fine, soft, powdery white sands are recognized by none other than The Guinness Book of Records as having the whitest sand in the world. Those planning a trip should put both sunglasses and sunscreen atop their “to bring” list.

(image via: Grevillia Cottage)

The outstanding photograph above was taken by Bill Kaloudis on the north side of Hyams Beach on the shore of Jervis Bay. Even with limited light, the beach’s brilliant white sands manage to reflect enough sunlight to stand out from the darker rocks at the water’s edge.

Papakolea Beach, Hawaii

(images via: PBase, About.com/Chemistry, PBase and Big Island Divers)

“Sea of blue, and beach of green…” Apologies to The Beatles’ Yellow Submarine, but Hawaii’s Papakolea Beach would make even the bluest Meanie grin. This exquisite emerald beach can be found at South Point in the Ka’u district on Hawaii’s Big Island. Green sand beaches are exceedingly rare – the only other ones in the world can be found on the United States territory of Guam and in the Galapagos Islands.

(image via: Xigre)

The sands of Papakolea Beach are tinted green by crystals of olivine, a mineral common in igneous rocks but heavier and denser than black pyridoxine that is more easily washed out to sea.

Lyme Regis, Dorset, UK

(images via: Micbinks and Charmouth Fossils)

(image via: BrettB.com)

From time immemorial, fossils of extinct sea creatures dating back tens or even hundreds of millions of years have been eroding out onto the beaches of Dorset, England. One of the most famous sites is Lyme Regis where fossil ammonites – tentacled cephalopods that grew to astonishing sizes – literally litter the beach. The pyritized ammonite shell above lurks among grains of beach sand from the so-called “fossil beach” at Stonebarrow, Charmouth, Dorset in the United Kingdom.

(image via: The Dorset Coast)

Fossils aside, the beaches in south-west England are some of the prettiest in all Europe, especially those near the village of Charmouth beneath towering Golden Cap, the highest cliff in southern England.

Punalu’u Beach, Hawaii

(images via: Hawaii Resort Rentals, Igougo and This Is True)

The deep black sands of Punalu’u Beach in Hawaii were created when hot erupting lava met cold ocean water, exploding into tiny bits. The name “Puna’lu” means “diving beach” in the native Hawaiian tongue; referring to the practice by ancestral Hawaiians of diving down to where freshwater springs poured into the ocean and filling up water jugs in times of drought on land.

(image via: This Is True)

The black sands of Punalu’u Beach attract more than just us humans. At Punalu’u Beach Park, green sea turtles and occasionally hawksbill turtles heave themselves onto the beach to lay their eggs in the sun-warmed black sands. It’s against the law to interact with the turtles in any way, so visitors to the beach are advised to please look but don’t touch.

Pink Sand Beaches, Bermuda and the Bahamas

(images via: Seabird and Concierge)

The Pink Sands Beach in Harbour Island, The Bahamas is one of the most beautiful pink sand beaches in the world. Part of the allure is due to the pleasing combination of pastel pink sand and the shallow Caribbean water that provides a contrasting turquoise shade. The pink tint is derived from several sources, including finely ground coral and microscopic red plankton blending with white quartz and limestone sand.

(images via: Wandalust and Cruise Line Fans)

The island of Bermuda is also famed for its pink beaches, in fact they are one of the British-held island’s most enduring attractions.

Ramla il-Hamra Bay and San Blas Beach, Malta

(images via: Carmelo Aquilina, Gozo Farmhouse and My Malta Info)

Volcanic ash and golden limestone in the surrounding rocks combine to create the rich orange sands that distinguish the beaches at Ramla il-Hamra Bay and San Blas on the Maltese island of Gozo. San Blas beach is smaller and more isolated – all the better to enjoy this Mediterranean nation’s soothing sunlight and unique scenic vistas.

(image via: Tranquility)

Unlike some beautifully tinted beaches, the source of Ramla il-Hamra’s orange sand is unlimited, derived from the rock that makes up the island of Gozo itself. Future generations can enjoy these beaches, well, from here to eternity!

Pfeiffer Beach Big Sur, California, USA

(images via: Uptake Beach and Travelling Board)

Pfeiffer Beach is situated beneath crumbling hills that have released, over time, billions of tiny garnet crystals. The blood-red garnets shimmer in the sand, bringing it alive with reflected sunlight. The action of the waves shapes and twists the tiny crystals into ever-changing iridescent rainbow patterns glowing pink, red, magenta and purple.

(image via: Brendio)

Though the world isn’t necessarily as colorful as the above image would indicate, it doesn’t have to be – Mother Nature has plenty of special effects of her own!

Glass Beach, Fort Bragg, California

(images via: Fort Bragg Attractions and Oddity Central)

Looking out over Glass Beach today, it’s hard to believe the scenic location was used as the local dump for almost 20 years. Area residents used the beach, originally owned by a lumber company, as a de facto rubbish heap from 1950 through 1967 when municipal authorities finally moved to designate an official dump site inland. Most of the heavier garbage was removed but the mighty Pacific finished the clean-up by gradually grinding down tons of broken glass into pretty, rounded pebbles.

(image via: Xigre)

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, glass to sand? Both beach sand and glass are made of the same substance, silicon dioxide (SiO2) though sand contains bits of other rocks as well. The forces that have transformed man-made glass into natural looking pebbles and sand reflect the age-old weathering process that has occurred at the world’s beaches since long before human beings even existed.

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Albino Sea Turtle

(images via: Wallace044, Thai Photo Blogs and Nature’s Crusaders)

Sea turtles can live to surprisingly long ages but they suffer from high mortality when they’re young. Albinos are especially vulnerable due to their bright white color. The inquisitive-looking example above top was photographed at the Sea Turtle Sanctuary at Isla Mujeres near Cancun, Mexico.
(images via: Thailand Voice and Homo Symbolicus)

Every year around 15,000 Green and Hawksbill turtles are hatched and housed at the Thai Military Sea Turtle Conservation Center on Khram Island near Pattaya, and every so often an albino turtle turns up. The hatchlings are kept at the Center until they’re about 6 months old, at which point their shells have hardened enough for them to have a better chance of survival in the sea.

Albino Koala

(images via: Repubblica and BBC)

Onya-Birri, the only albino koala in captivity, was born September 1, 1997 at the San Diego Zoo. He spent the first six months of his life the way all baby koalas do – inside his mother Banjeeri’s pouch. When he emerged for the first time, zoo staff were likely as surprised as Banjeeri though she has raised Onya-Birri just as she would a non-albinistic cub.

(image via: Life In The Fast Lane)

Onya-Birri, whose name means “ghost boy” in the language of Australia’s aboriginal peoples, had orange-tinged fur in common with normal gray koalas when he was very young.

Albino Cobra

(images via: Strangezoo, Guidespot and Fotosearch)

Snakes on a plain? Albinism occurs in all snakes but it adds an extraordinary quality to cobras. Though they may lack pigment in their skin and eyes, potential owners should be aware that they’re just as poisonous as their more colorful cobra cousins.

(image via: Sharenator)

Since one albino cobra isn’t creepy enough for some, how about three? This toxic trio (shown at just 2 weeks of age) hatched at the National Zoological Gardens in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in June of 2005. Their albino mother laid a total of 20 eggs but only three hatched.

Albino Hedgehog

(images via: Underwhelmer, GregF69 and Meantux)

(image via: Life In The Fast Lane)

Hedgehogs are native to Europe, Asia, Africa and New Zealand (though not Australia), and they are extremely popular in the United Kingdom. The smaller African Pygmy Hedgehog subspecies make docile pets and albinism gives this already odd-looking creature an extra touch of weirdness.

(image via: Poisonfrogs)

Breeders who specialize in hedgehogs often offer a range of coloration that includes albinos, possibly because some potential owners may be averse to the glowing red eye effect that makes them look like miniature hogzillas. The cute critter above appears to be a “snowflake”.

Albino Lobster

(images via: Fisherman’s Catch and Deep Sea News)

Genetic mutations can result in lobsters being blue, yellow, orange, even two different colors (and sexes!) split right down the middle. But like the great white whale of the 19th century, the elusive white lobster is something extra special, mysterious and beyond just a novelty. Indeed, the odds of an all-white lobster occurring are estimated to be about 1 in 30 million! Odds or not, white lobsters have been caught before and will be caught again. The above specimen, “Lincoln the Lobster”, was trapped by Casco Bay lobsterman Bill Coppersmith in 1997.

(image via: Telegraph UK)

You know you’re thinking about it so let’s get it out: Will a white lobster still turn “lobster red” when plunked into the cookpot? According to Robert Bayer, director of the University of Maine’s Lobster Institute, Lincoln would end up a “sort of cooked white gray — not red.”

Albino Bat

(images via: Cellar, Grandpa Cliff and Conde Nast Traveler)

Bats exhibit albinism on occasion but anecdotal evidence seems to indicate the condition is more rare than in other mammals. The little guy above was rescued from a cat attack in early 2004 and it still looks freaked out, holding onto Pam Tully’s thumb for dear life! Tully, a carer at the Batreach Bat Rescue and Rehabilitation Centre located near Cairns in northern Australia, nicknamed the Little Northern Freetail bat Starshine.

(image via: i-Pets)

There’s only one known albino Leaf-nosed Spectacled Bat, and it lives at the Moscow Zoo’s Ekzotarium pavilion – as it should, being totally ekzotik. The bat was born in January of 2007 and has been named… wait for it… Angela!

Albino Axolotl

(images via: John Clare and Caudata)

Axolotls are neotenic – meaning they remain in their larval, gill-breathing form and usually do not metamorphose into lunged, land-living adult salamanders. Axolotls can assume various forms including Golden, Leucistic and Albino. The leucistic (white) form displays the dark eyes that many pet owners find more appealing than the blood red blinkers of the albino variety. Here’s a short video of a “dancing” axolotl complete with cute/annoying background music:

\”Axolotl Dance\”, via Punki80

(image via: EPOCA)

Popular as pets due in large part to their “smiley” faces, axolotls can grow up to a foot (30cm) long and are endangered in their primary habitat: Lake Xochimilco in and around Mexico City.

Understanding the scientific explanation for albinism will do much to eliminate harmful and discriminatory attitudes that unfairly target albinos of any species. Live and learn – and appreciate nature for its variety and wonder!

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Kebira Crater Field, Egypt and Libya

(images via: RST, Meta-Religion and Robert Kenneth Johnson)

Archaeologists over the centuries have wondered where the ancient Egyptians came by the beautiful yellow-green glass found in their most exquisite royal jewelry. The answer, it seems, is outer space… by way of a huge meteorite that blasted the Sahara sands into glass many thousands of years before the pyramids were a glimmer in Pharaoh’s eye. Out in the trackless wastes where the borders of Egypt and Libya meet lies an eroded crater and around it; pebbles, nuggets and boulders of translucent glass created when the interplanetary visitor slammed into the sands, instantly vitrifying them.

(images via: JAXA)

It’s estimated the Kebira Crater Field – more than one crater has been discovered – is about 28.5 million years old, with the largest intruder measuring about 3/4 mile (1.2 km) across. The energy released must have been in the order of 100,000 megatons.

Fraser Island, Australia

(images via: Travelblog and Rieckborn)

“If you were marooned on a desert island…” now what’s up with that? All those Crusoe types didn’t have much of a “desert” to contend with (beyond the beach, anyway), just the opposite in fact: lush tropical vegetation, forests of palm trees and so on. Where are the real desert islands? One candidate is Fraser Island, just off the eastern coast of Australia near the city of Brisbane. At 76.5 miles (123 km) long, Fraser Island is the world’s largest “sand island”. It does boast rainforests but they grow in sand, not soil. The surrounding seas are said to be rife with hungry sharks and deadly jellyfish, so you’d might as well stay on shore… listening to your selection of Desert Island Discs.

(image via: Elvis Payne)

What an actual Desert Island might look like – taken in or around Dubai by Elvis Payne, this timeless scene of a lone palm on a blindingly white sand beach gives one pause… and gives one minimal shelter from the searing Persian Gulf sun.

Monument Valley, Utah, USA

(images via: Wikipedia, Vegas-Dreaming, Norman Koren and Azgenweb)

Any Hollywood Western worth its oats was filmed at least partially in Monument Valley. Situated on Utah’s southern border with Arizona near the Four Corners, the area is resplendent in contrasting shades rust red and blue-gray derived from different layers of rocks eroded over millions of years. Even in black & white, the valley is magnificent – some of the more spectacular buttes have been named, The Mittens, the Totem Pole, the Eye of the Sun and the Ear of the Wind arch.

(image via: Flickr: Nature’s Best)

Monument Valley is located on the Navajo Nation Reservation and the Navajo name for the valley is Tsé Bii’ Ndzisgaii (Valley of the Rocks). Though extensively eroded by wind and water, the iconic buttes and mesas in the valley look much the same today as they did when the ancestors of the Navajo first set eyes on them many millennia ago.

Atacama Desert, Chile

(images via: Go Chile, Travel By GPS and Grassroots Adventures)

Sheltered from the rains by the Andes and influenced by coastal inversions created through interaction with the chill Humboldt Current, Chile’s Atacama Desert is widely recognized as being the driest desert in the world – 50 times drier than California’s Death Valley! The regions extreme aridity has allowed mummies left by the ancient Incas (including “Miss Chile” above) to exhibit a remarkable degree of preservation.

(image via: A Byte of News)

The Atacama may be both isolated and hostile to humanity, but that doesn’t mean it remains untouched by the hand of Man… literally. This monumental sculpture of a human hand rising out of the desert sands was created by Chilean sculptor Mario Irarrazabal and stands 11 feet tall. “Mano de Desierto”, or Desert’s Hand, is located about 46.5 miles (75 km) south of the city of Antofagasta, Chile.

Namib Desert, Angola and Namibia

(images via: Wikipedia and Trees Never Meet)

Hundreds of miles south of the Sahara lies one of Africa’s oldest and most beautiful deserts, the Namib. Like the Atacama, the Namib Desert’s exceptional dryness results from an offshore cold current that induces the constant descent of dry air. Currently the Namib receives a mere 1/2 inch of rain annually and it’s been this way for the better part of the last 55 million years. The Namib is in many ways a “living desert”, constantly changing its appearance due to huge roving dune fields driven by howling desert winds.

(images via: Namibia Safari and Grandpoohbah)

Where it meets the South Atlantic ocean, the Namib is often obscured by thick, impenetrable fogs that bring some moisture to the hardy plants and animals that live there. The fogs have also been the bane of seafarers for centuries, leading to innumerable shipwrecks and the forbidding name, Skeleton Coast.

Tabernas Desert, Spain

(images via: Rezoom and Getty Images)

A desert, in Europe? It’s not only more likely than you think, it’s actually there, in Spain. The Tabernas Desert in the Spanish province of Almeria is cut off from humid winds off the Mediterranean Sea by several long mountain ranges and receives a searing 3000 hours of sunlight annually. The area receives about an inch of rain every year, most of which arrives in the form of sudden downpours that have caused picturesque erosion and rugged badlands.

(image via: Cuellar)

The Tabernas Desert has often been used for location shooting of so-called Spaghetti Westerns including The Magnificent Seven and Sergio Leone’s 1966 masterpiece, The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

(image via: Trekearth)

Far north of Almeria in the province of Navarre, Las Bardenas Reales is another Spanish desert so distinctive that it’s been selected to be a UNESCO World heritage site.

Empty Quarter, Saudi Arabia

(images via: Virtual Tourist, Duneguide and Stylefrizz)

The Rub’ al Khali, or Empty Quarter, is one of the most forbidding deserts on earth. Daytime temperatures approaching 131°F (55°C ) and sand dunes towering 1,100 feet (330 meters) high make the Empty Quarter no fit place for man or beast.

(image via: Platform Zero)

The Rub’ al Khali was not always such an extreme environment and in ancient times a series of desert oasis’ allowed trading caravans to traverse its wide open plains. Rumors of “lost cities” have echoed through time and several have been found using high-tech imaging equipment aboardthe Space Shuttle and NASA’s Landsat satellites. One such city is Ubar, the “City of a Thousand Pillars”, estimated to have thrived from 3,000 BC until the first century AD.

Khongoryn Els (”Singing Sands”), Mongolia

(images via: Duneguide and Boston.com)

The Singing Sands of Khongoryn Els are located in Gobi Gurvansaikhan National Park in southern Mongolia. The dunes really do “sing” – the movement of trillions of tiny sand grains against one another under pressure of the wind results in sounds variously described as roaring, booming, barking and even squeaking. The sound is only audible under certain conditions with the size & roundness of the grains, the humidity of the sand, and the sand’s silica content being the most relevant.

(image via: 123People)

Khongoryn Els isn’t easy to get to – which is part of their attraction – and the area is home to rare wildlife such as the Gobi Camel and the snow leopard.

Death Valley, California, USA

(images via: UND, Destination360 and Marc Adamus)

No post on amazing deserts would be compete without mentioning Death Valley. Aptly named for its lack of water and sweltering heat – the temperature at Furnace creek reached 134°F (56.7°C) in 1913 – Death Valley is the lowest point in North America and the second-lowest in the world.

(image via: George Bell)

The depth of the valley produces a convection oven effect on hot days with superheated air becoming trapped within the valley and circulating into any shaded areas.

(images via: Mystic Bren and Gconnect)

By all accounts the most mysterious part of Death Valley is The Racetrack, a flat dry lakebed that features dozens of “sailing stones” of various sizes at the ends of tracks sometimes hundreds of feet long. The tracks are sometimes straight, occasionally sinuous and in some cases reverse themselves. These aren’t mere pebbles either: one sailing stone, dubbed “Karen” by researchers, weighs over 700 pounds!

Antarctica’s Dry Valleys

(images via: Ross Sea and GDargaud)

Deserts, technically, don’t have to be hot; just dry. A series of valleys near Antarctica’s Ross Sea have been virtually ice-free for 2, 3, perhaps 12 million years! On “warm” summer days, glacial rivers flow into ice-covered lakes, freeze solid at night, then flow again the next day. Mostly though, ice and snow sublimates directly into the exceedingly dry air blowing out of central Antarctica; to the point where glaciers dry out before reaching the sea. These so-called “katabatic” winds have sculpted rocks in the Dry Valleys into bizarre shapes somewhat resembling the arches and hoodoos of much hotter deserts. The Dry Valleys are so unlike more typical earthly environments that researchers consider them suitable analogs for studies of Mars.

(image via: Virginia Butler)

The extreme dryness of the air and the lack of rain or snowfall in the Dry Valleys acts to preserve any organic matter for startlingly long periods of time. Freeze-dried by the katabatic winds and then slowly sandblasted away, the corpse of the seal above will someday be worn completely away though that could take thousands of years!

Our planet is blessed (or cursed, depending on one’s point of view) with an abundance of deserts, each offering unique environments and scenic vistas that are in many cases, out of this world. The 10 amazing deserts described above are, to mix metaphors, just the tip of the iceberg and you can expect a future showcase to disclose more of the hot, the dry and the sandy!

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Jellyfish Lake, Palau

(images via: Ah Boon)

Most people first learned about Jellyfish Lake while watching Survivor: Palau or Survivor: Micronesia, in which a trip to swim in a secluded lake full of stingless jellyfish was the prize for winning a reward challenge. Rewarding it was – and is, if you’re ever in Palau! The lake is on Eil Malk, one of Palau’s Rock Islands and formed around 12,000 years ago, when geologic uplift raised the island sufficiently above sea level that water was trapped in its central depression. Here’s a short video taken at – and in – Palau’s Jellyfish Lake:

Diving Jelly Fish Lake in Palau, via Talk.pa

(image via: ECheng)

Millions of jellyfish live in the lake, subsisting via a symbiotic relationship with algae they host within their bodies. El Nino events which occur roughly once every decade tend to raise the lake’s temperature and this can cause severe die-offs of the jellyfish population – but the tough li’l guys always bounce back.

Mono Lake, California, USA

(images via: Art.com, Earth From Space and E.J.Peiker)

Mono Lake, located near the California-Nevada border east of Yosemite Nat’l Park, is superlative in a great many ways. Considered to be “hypersaline”, the lake has no outlet and evaporation over tens of thousands of years has concentrated salts and minerals to extremely high levels. Even so, life thrives at Mono Lake – as many as 6 trillion brine shrimp (yes, “Sea Monkeys”) provide migrating birds with a crucial food source and anchor an ecological niche found nowhere else. Mono Lake, with its trademark tufa towers and the look of what Mark twain called “the loneliest place on earth” has inspired generations of artists, photographers and filmmakers.

(image via: The Living Moon)

The above photo perfectly captures the near-surreal atmosphere surrounding Mono Lake; a combination of the otherworldly tufa formations, the ethereal high-altitude skies and the soothingly familiar rippling surface of the lake itself.

Diego de la Haya, Costa Rica

(images via: Costa Rica Tourism & Travel, Travelblog, Selling CR and TravelExperta)

Diego de la Haya is a crater lake that fills one of the 5 main craters of 11,260 ft high Mount Irazú. The lake has been known to change its color from its usual brilliant green to gray, pink, or red depending on the type of gas released by underlying volcanic activity inside the mountain.

(image via: Sanchiri)

Mount Irazú last erupted from 1963 through 1965, with the initial blast coinciding with President John F. Kennedy’s arrival in Costa Rica for a state visit. The volcano is very active, having erupted 23 times since historians first noted a major eruption in the year 1723.

Lake Nyos, Cameroon

(images via: Water Encyclopedia, Environmental Graffiti and Dibussi)

Usually “before & after” photos show an improvement in the subject but that’s not the case with Cameroon’s Lake Nyos. The lake’s sickly, greenish-yellow hue is visible evidence of a deadly 1986 eruption of carbon dioxide that killed upwards of 1,700 people by suffocation. Scientists believe that an underwater rockslide tipped the delicate pressure balance that had kept CO2 dissolved in the lake. Once gas bubbles formed and rose, the pressure was reduced, much like popping the cap on a shaken bottle of soda.

(image via: Pagesperso-Orange)

Could the August 21, 1986 disaster at Lake Nyos happen again? Perhaps not – thanks to several outgassing “autosiphon” pipes sunk vertically into the lake like, well, soda straws. The international Nyos Organ project has succeeded in reducing the Lake Nyos’ CO2 levels and has also done the same at nearby Lake Monoun, scene of a similar event in 1984 that killed over 30 people.

Lake Baikal, Russia

(images via: Baikal Adventure and Chargelife)

Lake Baikal is the Queen of lakes, holding more fresh water than all of North America’s Great lakes combined! It’s also the world’s oldest lake, 25 million years or so, and around 2,500 unique species (such as the Nerpa, or Baikal Seal) are found in and around Lake Baikal – and nowhere else. This presents a problem… global warming is threatening to change the environment at Lake Baikal, and change is not a good thing to the uniquely adapted plants and animals who call it home.

(image via: Daily Galaxy)

A rocky outcrop standing out from Olkhon Island in Lake Baikal symbolizes the rugged beauty and echoing isolation of this magnificent lake that holds 20 percent of the world’s fresh water.

Loch Ness, Scotland, UK

(images via: Solar Navigator, Naturephoto and Pibburns)

As Scotland’s second-deepest loch (lake), Loch Ness is estimated to hold more fresh water than all the lakes in England and Wales combined. Both the loch’s depth (754 feet) and constant murkiness (due to peat in the surrounding soil) have contributed to the legend of the Loch Ness Monster. Some say that what has occasionally appeared to be a prehistoric plesiosaur is merely the occasional sunken log floating to the loch’s surface but we know better, don’t we?

(image via: Modern Mechanix)

Though the first “reported” mention of the Loch Ness Monster dates from St. Columba’s encounter with it in the 6th century AD, modern reports date from the early 1930s and didn’t always depict the creature actually in the lake, er, loch. The above illustration was composed to complement a 1934 article about a motorcyclist who claimed Nessie crossed his path during a midnight ride. Was alcohol involved? Neither the rider nor Nessie are telling.

Dead Sea, Israel/Jordan

(images via: Standing With Israel and GSI)

The Dead Sea, regardless of its name rooted in ancient origins, is a lake with some very odd characteristics. Like Mono Lake and other hypersaline lakes, the Dead Sea has only one main inlet – the Jordan River – experiences minimal rainfall and has no outlet save for evaporation. It is also exceptionally low: at 1,385 ft below sea level, the shores of the Dead Sea are the lowest dry areas on earth. How low can it go? Step into the Dead Sea itself and you’ll find its deepest point 1,240 feet below the surface.

(image via: Travelblog)

The waters of the Dead Sea are over 8 times as salty as ocean water, though the “salt” in the seas are 97 percent sodium chloride… only 30.4 percent of the Dead Sea’s salts are NaCl with the rest being potassium chloride, calcium chloride, magnesium chloride and various bromides. With an average salt concentration of 33.7 percent, the Dead Sea is unusually dense and thus allows people to float much easier due to the property of natural buoyancy.

Lake Toba, Indonesia

(images via: Wayfaring and SkyscraperCity)

Located in northern Sumatra in Indonesia, Lake Toba is one of the most serene and silent places one could visit… 73,000 years ago, not so much. Lake Toba, you see, is a water-filled caldera formed after the largest volcanic eruption to occur in the last 25 million years. In the aftermath of the eruption, the Indian subcontinent was buried beneath an average 7 inches of ash and the entire planet entered into a “volcanic winter” for approximately 6 years.

(image via: The Travelrag)

The eruption of the Toba super-volcano had severe human consequences as well. It’s estimated that the population of Homo Sapiens was reduced to just a few tens of thousands, and that tribes living east of Sumatra migrated to Australia in an effort to escape the disaster.

Aral Sea, Russia

(image via: Think Twice)

Once one of the world’s largest lakes, the Aral Sea has become the poster child for environmental mismanagement. We can blame Soviet central planning for this one; though the present governments of successor states Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan have to share the blame for their reluctance to repair the damage. In a nutshell, a grand scheme to convert the wider region into a cotton-growing center saw the rivers which formerly fed the Aral Sea dammed and/or diverted to provide irrigation. Without incoming water, the sea began to evaporate, becoming progressively saltier and ever more polluted with agricultural runoff. The disappearance of the Aral Sea – over the course of a single human generation – is a shockingly sad story chronicled by orbiting satellites and spacecraft.

(images via: Global Vacations and TAMU)

Today the situation has somewhat stabilized though only the northern part of the lake (the North Aral Sea) stands a reasonable hope of survival over the long term. Effects on the region’s climate are mainly negative – reduced rainfall stunts non-irrigated crops while fierce westerly winds blow powdered pollutants and acrid, salty dust over urban and rural areas, contributing to a massive health crisis among the people living there.

Lake Vostok, Antarctica

(images via: LDEO-Columbia and Discover)

Deep beneath nearly 12,500 feet of Antarctic ice lies, improbably, a lake – Lake Vostok. Approximately the size and shape of Lake Ontario, this most isolated lake somehow manages to stay liquid while being totally deprived of sunlight for tens of millions of years.

(images via: Daily Cognition, Fabristol and Atomic Rockets)

A Russian expedition has been trying to drill down into Lake Vostok to sample the water and any possible bacteria it may contain. Perhaps more than just bacteria have managed to survive – lakes in caves often host specialized plants and animals who have evolved and adapted to survive extremes of heat, cold, darkness and pressure. Since it’s likely Lake Vostok had a varied and viable ecosystem when Antarctica began to freeze over 40 million years ago, one wonders what, if anything, has survived in its depths… and if so, will those lifeforms take kindly to being disturbed?

Our planet’s lakes have always been a source of fascination mixed with an undercurrent of fear – who can say what lurks unseen beneath their placid surfaces? Perhaps this combination of appreciation and anxiety is what draws us to lakes. According to Dr. Seuss, Luke Luck likes lakes… do you?

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Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA

(images via: Amazing Nature and Encyclopedia Britannica)

Mammoth Cave is one of the oldest and most well-known cave complexes in the USA. It’s also the longest cave system in the world with 365 miles of subterranean passageways. Having been made a national park in the summer of 1941, Mammoth Cave was discovered by American settlers in the late 18th century but was known to local native tribes for thousands of years. Highlights of Mammoth Cave include a giant sinkhole called Cedar Sink, and rather self-descriptive features dubbed Grand Avenue, Frozen Niagara and Fat Man’s Misery.

(image via: CardCow)

The above postcard showing the Hindu temple and Onyx Temple formations in Mammoth Cave must be very old, as the reverse indicates the sender should affix a 1-cent stamp.

Lascaux Caves, France

(images via: Darci Adam and HubPages)

The cave complex at Lascaux, in the Dordogne département of southwestern France, host some of the most magnificent prehistoric cave paintings yet discovered. Rendered in natural pigments and estimated to be 16,000 years old, the many hundreds of images in the caves depict some of the Ice Age creatures that were sources of fascination – and food – for the early modern humans who inhabited the area.

(image via: NationMaster)

The largest images located in the spectacular Great Hall of the Bulls measure up to 17 feet in length! Though we all can enjoy these incredibly lifelike depictions of paleolithic life by way of the Internet, it’s unfortunate that the caves themselves are now virtually off limits to tourists and even researchers due to a destructive fungus that has attacked the paintings. Even when removed, the damage is obvious and, at the present time, irreparable.

Galos Salt Caves, Chicago

(images via: TIME, DayLife and Nelswadycki)

Deep beneath Jolly Inn Banquets in Portage Park, Chicago, colored lights illuminate a scene few would expect to set their sights upon. Once an East European secret, the benefits of salt cave siestas have arrived in suburban Chicago. At Galos Caves visitors relax on incongruous lawn chairs, surrounded by salt stalactites and breathing in salt-saturated air while recorded seaside sounds soothe the psyche.

(image via: The Thief)

So-called “salt therapy” has legions of adherents who abide by the healing properties of natural salt. Whether it’s the salt itself, the iodine compounds within it or just the relaxing atmosphere inside a salt-lined cave, who can say? Well, owner Ewa Chwala can say – watch her do just that in the following video:

A visit to Galos Spa, via johnandmaddie39

Carlsbad Caverns, New Mexico, USA

(images via: Encyclopedia Britannica and Life In The Fast Lane)

Carlsbad Caverns is perhaps the most spectacular “classic” natural cave complex in the USA. Discovered accidentally by Jim White in the late 1890s, the cavern complex includes the Big Room, the second-largest cave chamber in the world. This huge, echoing natural limestone chamber is nearly 4,000 feet (1,219 meters) long, 625 feet (190.5 meters) wide and 350 feet (107 meters) high. Unlike many limestone caves, Carlsbad Caverns was carved out not by underground streams or mild carbolic acid but by strong sulfuric acid formed due to the close proximity of oil and gas deposits.

(image via: National Park Service)

Young local cowboy Jim White discovered Carlsbad Caverns from a distance when he espied from horseback what appeared to be a “volcano” of bats spiraling out from the cave entrance. At its peak, the population of bats residing in Carlsbad Caverns was estimated to be in the millions.

Ice Caves, Antarctica

(images via: WebEcoist and Wikimedia)

Antarctica’s Mount Erebus is, literally, the hottest thing in Antarctica and when piping hot meets icy cold, strange things happen. One result of Erebus’s steam heating are towering ice fumaroles and spacious ice caves.

(image via: World Oceans)

Then there is the oddly named Erebus Ice Tongue, a glacier that flows down the mountain’s flanks and into the frigid Ross Sea where interaction with waves and sea ice creates temporary ice caves of stunning beauty.

Kartchner Caverns, Arizona, USA

(images via: Terrain and University of Arizona)

Kartchner Caverns, which runs for over 2 miles beneath the desert sands around Benson AZ, was sealed off from the surface for about 200,000 years until one day in 1974, Randy Tufts and Gary Tenen became the first human beings to set foot inside. The cave system, which was designated Kartchner Caverns State Park in 1999, is exceedingly fragile and its existence was kept secret from all but a few until proper guardianship could be put in place to protect the exquisite formations inside.

(image via: California Literary Review)

The spindly formation above, called Soda Straws, is composed of hollow tubes that incessantly drip from the cavern ceiling. Each drop deposits a minuscule amount of minerals onto the end before falling to the cave floor. Considering that each “straw” grows by just 1/10 of an inch per CENTURY and the longest straw in the cavern is just over 21 feet long, well, you could do the math but I’ll make it easy by saying the Kartchner Caverns straws have been growing undisturbed for a good couple hundred thousand years!

Thylacoleo Caves, Australia

(images via: MuseumVictoria, Western Australian Museum, TV and Film Guy and Paleochick)

In 2002, an expedition from the Western Australian Museum set out to investigate reports of large skeletons in several caves out in the country’s forbidding desert wasteland, the Nullarbor Plain. Among the remains of dozens of extinct Australian megafauna dating back over 500,000 years were the first complete skeletons of Thylacoleo Carnifex – the Marsupial Lion – ever discovered.

(image via: BeingFrank)

Thylacoleo must have been a terrifying predator to behold, and having one drop in on you while exploring an Australian desert cave would rate rather high among any caver’s list of “what’s the worst that could happen”.

Cave Of The Swallows, Mexico

(images via: Rockhoppers Daily Grind and Kayak Huasteca)

At 1,200 feet deep, the Cave Of The Swallows (Sotano de las Golondrinas, in Spanish) in central Mexico is deep enough to, er, swallow the Empire State Building. It’s also conical in cross section with the base wider than the top. The cave was only explored recently, in the 1960s.

(image via: CHW)

Here’s a MUST SEE video narrated by David Attenborough showing what have to be the world’s most insane BASE jumpers leaping into the Cave Of The Swallows. Once you’ve done this (and lived), what else is there?

Sotano De Las Golondrinas, via garydelarosa

Cave Bacon

(images via: 1Sock, Trip Advisor, UT Grotto and California Literary Review)

No, not Bacon Cave, Cave Bacon… because face it, what self-respecting internet posting these days doesn’t pay homage to that most versatile (and delicious) member of the Pork food group? In any case, “cave bacon” is another, tastier word for layered flowstone formed by the incremental deposition of water-borne minerals along a repeated route. Variations in surface rainfall, mineral balance and other hydrological cum speliological phenomena can affect both the speed and the content of the water moving over the flowstone, leading to layering effects that remind some (heck, ALL) of bacon.

(image via: Diamond Caverns)

Imagine falling into a cave and, after several fruitless, foodless days have passed, finding THIS hanging over your head? Found in Kentucky’s Diamond Caverns, the calcite drapery formation above stimulates both imaginations and appetites along the New Discovery Passage.

Cave Of Crystals, Mexico

(images via: Environmental Graffiti, Life In The Fast Lane and CubeMe)

One of the world’s most magnificent caves is also one of the newest to be discovered. In April of 2000, miners at the Naica Mine in Chihuahua, Mexico, stumbled onto a vast, water-filled cave while exploring for lead and zinc. Upon pumping out the mineral-rich, extremely hot water from the underground space, the miners were amazed to find a fantastic lattice of gigantic Selenite crystals measuring up to 40 feet long and weighing as much as 55 tons!

(image via: Mystic’s Thought Garden)

Here’s a short video on the Cave Of Crystals:

Cueva de Los Cristales, via johnnygbc

Since the hot supersaturated solution flooding the Cave Of Crystals (or Cueva de los Cristales in Spanish) has been drained, the crystals will not grow any larger. On the bright side, the cave’s 43°C (109°F) plus temperature and 90 to 100 percent humidity ensures that unprotected intruders won’t stay long.

Through the modern technological marvels of video and photography, Earth’s deepest, darkest secrets are at last being revealed. In the case of these truly amazing caves, however, exposure only magnifies their mystery and wonder!

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Albino Alligator

(images via: Ripley BION, Animals / Pets and Mirror UK)

There are only about a dozen white alligators in the world and not all of them are strictly albinos. Bouya Blan (White Fog), above bottom, is a 22-year old leucistic alligator who lives at Gatorland in Florida. Leucistic animals have some, though very little pigmentation as can be seen in Bouya Blan’s icy blue eyes.

(image via: All Hat No Cattle)

From the bayou to the big time! “White Diamond” was born in Louisiana but wows crowds at Germany’s Serengeti Safari Park these days. The 15-year-old albinistic variant of Alligator mississppiensis is the only albino alligator in Europe. Judging by his toothy grin, you won’t want to tickle those ivories!

Albino Snake

(images via: Design Swan, Kizandjenn and Photographers Direct)

Snakes can display varying degrees of albinism and their skin will range from snow white to what looks like an image printed from a copier that’s running low on color ink. As stealth hunters, albino snakes are at a huge disadvantage in the wild and rarely live for very long.

(image via: Bluecavs)

The double-headed albino snake above was born double-unlucky and it’s a wonder it managed to grow at all. Likely the snake hatched in captivity and has been carefully monitored by its owner. One problem (out of many) two-headed snakes have is that the heads will often attack one another. At least the above specimen’s heads split off the body at a narrow angle, mitigating the problem.

Albino Peacock

(images via: Bod’s Blog, Super Stock, Tokyo Bling and Richmond Zoo)

Looking a lot like a scraggly chicken with its fan-like tail feathers folded, the albino peacock (and its all-white, non-albinistic variant above) becomes the price of poulty when it puts on a classic mating display to impress the lady peahens – and any other living thing in range.

(image via: Frakin Cool)

Who could imagine the male peacock, the poster-child for brilliant color and former mascot for the NBC television network, would look just as magnificent (if not more) as an albino decked out in lacy white plumage?

Albino Zebra

(images via: 1UP, Mongabay and Biomes Blog)

Better to burn out than fade away? Fine for Neil Young maybe but not for the albino zebra. It appears that in zebras, albinism displays as a range of severity that preserves much of the animal’s natural black & white striped pattern.

(image via: Asquared185)

Though they tend to stand out in the presence of normal zebras, most albino variants show a softer, tawnier coat that could possibly be MORE effective as camouflage on the dry, dusty savannah.

(image via: Uncommonpics)

A completely white zebra would be virtually indistinguishable from a white horse. The above image depicts the result of a mating between a white horse and a non-albinistic zebra – truly a “zorse” of a different color!

Albino Gorilla

(images via: Fed By Birds, Miko Lah and Gather)

As the only albino gorilla to be raised in captivity, Snowflake delighted visitors for nearly 40 years before dying of skin cancer in late 2003. Most gorillas only live about 25 years in the wild so Snowflake definitely beat the odds. Over the course of his adult life, Snowflake fathered 22 offspring though none of them shared his albinism.

Here’s a short video of Snowflake taken at his home in the Barcelona Zoo:

Snowflake late in life at the Barcelona Zoo, via Errha

(images via: Totally Looks Like)

In many ways, Snowflake looks more human than gorilla – perhaps because most of us have nothing else to compare him to. Contributors to the website TotallyLooksLike.com have picked up on this and have featured Snowflake not once, but twice.

Albino Dolphin

(images via: Snopes, One Man’s Blog and Marvillous)

(image via: Scholastic)

Albino dolphins were first sighted in 1962 and since 1994 three have been seen frolicking in or around the Gulf of Mexico. The latest is “Pinky”, a bottlenose dolphin of the Flipper variety that lives in Louisiana’s Lake Calcasieu. What’s up with Louisiana anyway? First albino alligators, now… in any case, Pinky is as pink as, well, the pink dolphin contestants on MXC must leap over while navigating the Rotating Surfboard of Death. Pinky owes her (his?) very unusual hue to blood vessels showing through blubber and unpigmented skin. If you think the pink dolphin has become a local tourist attraction, I’d say “Right you are, Kenny”.

(images via: Stormfront and Now Public)

Other types of dolphins have been known to display albinism, most notably the not-so-cute; not-so-pink albino dolphins living in Brazil’s Amazon River. That’s Amazon Pinky above left, American Pinky to the right… let the “USA!” chants begin!

Albino Whale

(images via: Life In The Fastlane and Cairns.com)

I see your Great White Shark and I raise you a Great White Whale! Albino whales are rare but not exceedingly so – then again, something that big and that white is going to attract a lot of attention. Take Migaloo, for instance. Frequenting the chill waters of the southern ocean around Australia, Migaloo is an albino Humpback Whale. Other whale species such as the Beluga are normally white and an albino would only be detected by very close examination of its eyes.

(image via: Sharkdivers)

By the way, there really is a Great White Whale Shark – a 30-foot, one-of-a-kind (as far as we know) female was photographed by diver/naturalist Antonio Moreano in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of the Galapagos Islands.

(images via: Environmental Graffiti, Isla-Mocha and Ox Bow Art)

Any discussion of white whales (or albinos in general) would be lacking without mention of the legendary Moby Dick, the cetacean scourge of maniacal Captain Ahab in the nineteenth century novel by Herman Melville and the 1956 epic film starring Gregory Peck. While Moby Dick was fictional, Melville likely based his character on a very real albino whale called Mocha Dick, who destroyed numerous whaling ships and whaleboats in the area of the Mocha Islands off Chile in the early decades of the 1800s. Mocha Dick was estimated to have been 70 feet long when he was finally killed and yes, his snow-white back was festooned with harpoons – though no furious, peg-legged sea captains were found among them.

The lack of skin pigmentation that is the distinctive characteristic of albinism and that gives these animals special appeal to humans is actually a drawback in the wild, since without visual camouflage they’re much more visible to predators and potential prey. Some may bemoan their perceived lack of freedom but in actuality, the safest place for these wonders of nature is in the “protective custody” of zoos.

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Opabinia: Hey Five Eyes!

(images via: Pleschbubble and Discover Magazine)

If Fifties crooner Sheb Wooley thought a “one-eyed one-horned flying purple people eater” was weird, he would’ve flipped his Brylcreemed lid over Opabinia, which was a five-eyed one-trunked swimming worm-bug hybrid thingy. It also had a backwards-facing mouth and a fan-shaped tail. Opabinia may seem exceptionally odd to us now but back in the Middle Cambrian era 510 million years ago, it was just another new squid on the block. Er, it also makes for an exceptionally odd tattoo.

(image via: WCU)

Just a few million years after the Cambrian Explosion (of life) began, creatures like Opabinia – and unlike anything alive today – lived their dog-eat-dog lives in warm shallow seas. An undersea landslide occurring in what is now British Columbia buried many of Mother Nature’s early wild experiments with body plans beneath fine-grained silt that solidified to form the Burgess Shale.

Giant Sea Scorpion: Big Bad Bug

(images via: NOVA Online, The Sun and Cochise College)

400 million years ago, the ancestors of today’s scorpions and spiders were the undisputed kings of their watery environment. Growing up to 8 feet (2.5 meters) long, the Eurypterids were mean, mad and VERY hungry – and they packed a pair of viciously serrated claws to back it up. We may have to extend our thanks to the Eurypterids… our very distant amphibian forbears may have finally made the leap to living on land partly in response to predation by these relentless killing machines.

(image via: About.com)

What if the Eurypterids had survived to the modern day? The above photoshopped image by Takeshi Yamada purports to display just such a creature – at just 15-inches long it STILL looks exceptionally freaky.

Ammonites: A Face Only Lovecraft Could Love

(images via: Bored of Jam, Cracked, Marshall’s Arts and CM Studio)

Cross a squid, a snail, Futurama’s Dr. Zoidberg and Great Cthulhu for good measure and you get something approximately like an Ammonite – and one heck of a mess to clean up. These extremely successful relatives of octopi, squids and the chambered nautilus had an exceptionally long tenure as lifeforms go, first appearing about 440 million years ago and vanishing along with the dinosaurs 370 million years later.

(images via: Wikipedia and Espy Jewelry)

Active carnivores and a major food source for ocean-dwelling Mosasaurs and Icthyosaurs, Ammonites are quite numerous as fossils and some of their shells are surprisingly large. Sometimes the mother-of-pearl lining of Ammonite shells fossilizes into “ammolite”, which is used to make distinctly colored jewelry.

Dimetrodon: Sail On Sailor

(images via: UFOnet and Palaeoblog)

Not only is there a sale at Penney’s, there’s a sail on Dimetrodon – get ‘em while they’re hot! Unfortunately Dimetrodon hasn’t been remotely warm for at least 275 million years, give or take a few million. So tell me, is Dimetrodon the weirdest dinosaur, yes or no? The answer is… there IS no answer. It’s a trick question – Dimetrodon isn’t a dinosaur. Living in the Permian period 50-odd million years before the Mesozoic Era even began, Dimetrodon was a synapsid, or mammal-like reptile. He and his kin were the world’s best and brightest until a massive extinction event known colloquially as The Great Dying wiped out 70 percent of the planet’s land-based vertebrate species.

(image via: Lost World Studios)

Oh, that sail? Dimetrodon employed it as an early and somewhat ungainly method of regulating its body temperature. Other mammal-like reptiles and even a few later dinosaurs used the sail method but Dimetrodon remains its fiercest proponent. Literally.

Raptorex: Prehistoric Pitbull

(images via: Daily Mail and The Money Times)

Say you’re the prehistoric version of an urban gangsta and you want an intimidating pet to put the fear of Thog into the ‘hood: you need a Raptorex kriegsteini, in other words, a mini T. Rex. Raptorex roamed what is now northern China 125 million years ago, and you can bet there weren’t any leash laws to hold it back.

(image via: Chicago Tribune)

Nine feet long from tooth to tail, this Mini Me of Master T weighed about 150 lbs (70 kg) but a lightweight it wasn’t – according to discoverer Paul Sereno (above), “What we’re looking at is a blueprint for a fast-running set of jaws.” Nice doggie, good boy.

Terror Bird: The Ostrich From Hell

(images via: Wikimedia, Paleofreak, Dear Kitty and North Florida Herald)

Anyone who thought the asteroid that ended the Age of Dinosaurs ushered in a lasting era of peace and quiet didn’t figure on the Terror Birds. Aptly named and fiendishly beaked, the members of the Phorusrhacid family resembled their dinosaur predecessors in body plan, feeding habits and bad attitude. The last Terror Birds died out a mere 2 million years ago, just before modern humans stepped onto the stage – an excellent bit of good timing if there ever was!

(images via: Boards IE and Scientist, Interrupted)

They say everything’s bigger in Texas… that goes for prehistoric meat-eating birds like 7-foot tall Titanis Walleri (skull shown above), who made life miserable for smaller creatures from Texas through Florida roughly 5 million years ago. “Polly want a cracker” indeed.

So hungry you could eat a horse? Here’s a short video of a Terror Bird running down a filly, sans steak & cheese:

Terror Bird video, via Tier-Welt

Megalodon: The Greatest White Shark

(images via: Vodnazona, Karen Carr Studio, San Diego Natural History Museum and Pibburns)

“You’re gonna need a bigger boat”… like, maybe an aircraft carrier, if you’ve got Megalodon in your sights. This 60-foot (18 meter) long extinct shark makes today’s Great White look rather piddling. Megalodon cruised the oceans from 18 million to 1.5 million years ago. What did such a monstrous shark eat? Anything it wanted!

(image via: Gen Con LLC)

Being the largest carnivorous fish ever to swim the seas, Megalodon economized by selecting very large prey, like whales. This begs the question: whales never died out, so why did Megalodon? It may be that warm-blooded whales avoided Megalodon predation by frequenting cold polar waters that were inhospitable to a shark’s cold-blooded metabolism. Better to be chilly than chili, I always say.

History’s freak show has played out for the better part of a billion years and we can be sure Mother Nature still has a few tricks up her sleeve. Even so, we can all be thankful some of the most bizarre and frightening creatures to have evolved on Earth survive only as bits of fossilized bone. Whew!

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Pacific Barreleye

(images via: National Geographic and Futurama Madhouse)

The Pacific Barreleye (Macropinna microstoma) is one of a group of deep sea fish that have evolved a unique set of anatomical accoutrements to fit their particular lifestyle. These fish are very fragile and specimens brought to the surface by fisherman and researchers were distorted by the pressure differential. This fish’s most unique features are its soft, transparent head and the barrel-shaped eyes within. Normally fixed in an upward-looking position with green “lens caps” to filter out sunlight, the Pacific Barreleye can swivel and telescope its odd eyes much like Bender of Futurama.

What appear to be “eyes” are sensory organs; the real eyes reside inside the fish’s fighter plane canopy style forehead. Below is a video of the Pacific Barreleye in its natural habitat, looking very UNnatural:

Macropinna microstoma: A deep-sea fish with a transparent head and tubular eyes, via MBARI

Bathysaurus

(images via: Discarded Lies and VIMS)

Bathysaurus sounds like a dinosaur and it looks like one too – and not one of the nice, gentle plant-eaters, either. The cutie above, Bathysaurus Ferox to be exact, is described as “the world’s deepest-living superpredator”: anything and everything it meets, it eats. Once Bathysaurus latches on to lunch it’s game over: the fiendish fish’s jaws and even its tongue are studded with razor-sharp fangs.

(image via: Skwirlinator)

With a face only a mother could love, one might think Bathysaurus Ferox might have a tough time getting a date. Not to worry; the fearsome-faced bottom dweller has both male and female sex organs. As CSNY used to say (or sing), “If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with”.

Viperfish

(images via: Whitman College, The Realm Of Science and Crappy Wildlife Photography)

How awesomely badass is the Viperfish? Maybe you can’t handle the tooth! If one glance at its fang-tastic kisser didn’t convince you it was the embodiment of evil, consider this: it preys on Dragonfish and we’re sure they’re no pushovers. Most Viperfish have expandable stomachs that allow them to ingest fish larger themselves in one bite… and WHAT a bite!

(image via: All Time Greatest Hits)

If you’re lucky, the closest you’ll come to being eye to eye with a Viperfish is by checking out the cover of Mr. Bungle’s 1995 album Disco Volante.

Deep Sea Anglerfish

(images via: GameSpot Forums, Whitman College and Arts On Earth)

A trademark of deep sea Anglerfish is their lure, which tends to resemble a tiny creature in upper ocean species but becomes bioluminescent in benthic species. One of the scariest scenes in Finding Nemo involved Dory being hypnotically drawn to a glowing light… which turned out to be attached to the toothiest Anglerfish EVAR! There are many different types of Deep-sea Anglerfish but the rule of thumb seems to be: the deeper they are, the uglier they are.

(image via: Magazine 13)

They don’t get much better once hauled to the surface either, as the unfortunate specimen above illustrates. The sudden reduction in pressure caused its stomach to balloon out into its mouth. Nice.

Piglet Squid

(images via: SERPENT and Seaway Blog)

Known officially as Helicocranchia Pfefferi, the cuter than cute Banded Piglet Squid is a welcome relief from the bug-eyed, big-toothed menagerie of horror that seems to typify deep sea life. The squid lives in the dim middle-ocean layer several thousand feet beneath the surface.

(image via: Seaway Blog)

Perhaps only the difficulty in creating a livable environment and the near-impossibility of finding suitable live food has prevented the Banded Piglet Squid from becoming a home aquarium superstar.

Japanese Giant Spider Crab

(images via: GameSpot Forums and HuckleBeary)

Spider crab’s big, yeah yeah yeah. It’s not small, no no no. Need some numbers? Try a 13-foot (4m) leg span, a 15-inch (37cm) wide body and a weight of up to 44 pounds (20kg). Japanese Giant Spider Crabs can live up to 100 years, similar to the largest and oldest lobsters. These spindly seafloor dwellers are the cleaners of the deep, making short work of the dead and dying alike. Those who’ve watched The Deadliest Catch know that crab traps are baited with cod carcasses to attract crabs from miles around. This is one case where, if attacked, playing dead is NOT recommended.

(image via: Vince Lewis)

Japanese Giant Spider Crabs are a delicacy though eating one requires about a cow & a half of butter. Good luck also finding the mother of all cooking pots.

Tongue Eating Louse

(images via: Practical Fishkeeping and Wellsphere)

Cymothoa exigua is a type of parasitic Isopod (crustaceans often called Sea Woodlice) with a very unusual lifestyle. After entering the mouth of a Spotted Rose Snapper, it attaches itself to the base of the fish’s tongue and derives nourishment by sucking its blood. Eventually the fish’s tongue atrophies and shrinks as a result of the chronic blood loss, at which point Cymothoa grasps the tongue-stub with its lower legs and effectively becomes the fish’s tongue!

(image via: Bugs In The News)

Once it replaces its tongue, Cymothoa does not eat leftovers from the fish’s meals, instead continuing to feed on fish blood or on mucus secreted inside the fish’s mouth. There are indications Cymothoa may be spreading – fishermen have recently reported finding Cymothoa infesting the mouths of Weaver fish caught off the Jersey (the UK island, not the US state) coast near Normandy, France. While not exclusively a “deep sea” creature, Cymothoa is bizarre enough to out-weird pretty much any other marine lifeform found at any depth.

As children we worried about monsters under the bed but luckily we grew up and found out they weren’t real. How disconcerting, then, to learn that a nightmarish house of horrors beyond anyone’s imagination lurks below the waves on the ocean’s bed. At the same time, one must admire the way nature has provided these creatures with the adaptations, bizarre as they might seem, to survive in the world’s most most hostile environment.

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Landscape Arch, Utah, North America

(images via: E. J. Peiker, Arches National Park and Igougo)

The highlight of Devil’s Garden, a protected area of Arches Natural Park boasting an abundance – over 2,000! – spectacular natural sandstone arches, Landscape Arch soars 290 feet (88 meters) through Utah’s dry desert air. A fun fact about this arch: some say the signs for Landscape Arch and nearby Delicate Arch were accidentally switched. It may be so – the former is visibly more “delicate” than the latter.

(image via: ADDI)

Carved incrementally over untold thousands of years by windblown sand and rare desert rainstorms, Landscape Arch is an ever-evolving testament to the inexorable pace of geologic change – which has its darker side. Visitors to Arches Natural Park should tread easy when observing Landscape Arch as recent rock falls from its underside raise questions as to how much longer this amazing natural wonder will exist to be appreciated.

Salar de Uyuni, Bolivia, South America

(images via: Marco Teodonio, Somethin’ Beautiful, POPFi and Viajejet)

The Salar de Uyuni is a dried salt lake lying 10,000 feet high in Bolivia’s Andes Mountains that is 25 times the size of the Bonneville Salt Flats in the USA. An estimated 10 billion tons of salt attest to the size of ancient Lake Minchin, now mostly evaporated into the dry mountain air. Salt isn’t the Salar de Uyuni’s main claim to fame, however. When the rains do come, the salt flat becomes the world’s largest natural mirror!

(image via: XRV)

The shallowness of the standing water combined with the stillness of the thin mountain air can disconcert visitors suddenly forced to wonder which way is up. Despite its remoteness, Salar de Uyuni plays host to a significant number of tourists who can stay at a Salt Hotel. This is one place you don’t want to forget to bring your camera – or remove the lens cap when you start snapping away!

Eye of the Sahara, Mauritania, Africa

(images via: Free Wallpapers, TurkceBilgi and The Sleeping Pharaoh)

Also known as the Richat Structure, this eerie, eye-like outcrop in the western reaches of the Sahara was virtually unknown until the Space Age when orbiting astronauts spied what appeared to be a huge eye staring back at them! At first thought to be a meteor crater, the 30-mile (50 km) wide feature may actually be nothing more exciting than an eroded rock outcrop.

(images via: Earth Snapshot and Viva NOLA)

Whatever it is, the Richat Structure has caught the imagination of artists, environmentalists and naturalists who see the gigantic “eye” as a symbol of our living planet and its ongoing ability to shock, surprise and amaze its very recent tenants, humanity.

The Gateway To Hell, Námaskarð, Iceland

(image via: Hottnez)

It may be called The Gateway To Hell, but Námaskarð is simply heavenly to those who seek the unearthly while still staying on Earth.

(image via: Hottnez)

Iceland is one of the world’s most volcanically active countries, which seems ironic considering its chilly name. One of the most powerful and wide-ranging volcanic events in modern history, the 1783 eruption of the Laki volcanic system, caused the deaths by famine of up to 25 percent of Iceland’s population and the loss of most of the island’s livestock. Things are calmer nowadays… enjoy Iceland’s wonders but keep your options (and travel arrangements) open!

Reed Flute Cave, Guilin, China

(images via: China Connection Tours and Vrodkaraf)

The magnificent underground cave system traditionally called Reed Flute Cave and known today as the Palace of Natural Art lies beneath the city of Guilin, China, and is over 750 feet (240 meters) long. The first recorded visits to the cave took place over 1,000 years ago during China’s Tang Dynasty. Artificial lighting is used to enhance the stunning rock formations in the cave, which has been officially open for visitors since 1962.

(image via: UNI Study Abroad)

One of the largest parts of the cave system is the Crystal Palace of the Dragon King, which can hold up to 1,000 people and was used as an air raid shelter during World War II. The grotto features a solitary stalagmite that resembles a human being – it’s said that a visiting poet attempted to write about the beauty that greeted his eyes but took so long to find the right words he turned to stone.

The Devil’s Marbles, Northern Territory, Australia

(images via: JPG, Travel Webshots and DomBea)

Known as Karlu Karlu to Australia’s aboriginal people and one of their most sacred sites, The Devil’s Marbles are huge blocks of 1.7 billion year old granite rounded by countless centuries of weathering. Wind, water, temperature and sunlight conspire to erode and, on occasion, split the massive ovoids which sit, individually or in groups, in a desolate Outback valley.

(image via: University of Michigan)

As can be seen above, some of the Devil’s Marbles are of a staggering size… which gives one a hint as to the proportions of ‘ol Satan himself!

Ice Towers of Mount Erebus, Antarctica

(images via: Neatorama and T.E.A.)

Hundreds of ice towers stud the flanks of 12,500ft. high Mount Erebus like day-old stubble on the face of a giant. The constantly active volcano is perhaps the only place in Antarctica where fire and ice meet, mingle and create something unique encompassing both their natures. The towers can be as much as 60 feet (20 meters) high and look almost alive as they huff and puff streamers of steam into the south polar sky. Some of the volcanic steam freezes onto the inner part of the towers, expanding and extending them.

(image via: Life In The Fast Lane)

If Antarctica’s ice towers look otherworldly, it’s no accident – similar structures may exist on Mars and the moons of Jupiter, Saturn and Neptune. Of course, those interplanetary ice towers don’t have penguins (or something like them) idly surveying the scene… of course they don’t.

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Truth is stranger than fiction, they say, and nowhere is this more true than in the natural world. Symbiotic pairs, camouflaged critters and color-changing animals are one thing, but what about exploding and raining animals? Oh yes, it happens. From the world’s weirdest team-ups to the most surreal self-detonating creatures on the planet, here are seven phenomenal wonders of the animal kingdom.

7) Symbiosis: Surprising Animal Team-Ups

Sure species work together, but they also work with other species in strange and unlikely ways. In the water, sharks hunt with sidekick fish, shrimp clean up eels and crabs use anemones as poisoned boxing gloves. In the air, some birds flit down to take scraps from the teeth of crocodiles while others sit comfortably on the backs of huge mammals from buffaloes to elephants. On the ground, keen-sighted zebras eat side-by-side with hearing-enhanced ostriches, each prepared to warn the other of danger.

6) Clever Camouflage and Colorful Animal Stealth

Animals adapt over time to their environments, some so much so that they begin to look like their surroundings – a helpful evolutionary advantage in the face of potential predators (or while stalking prey). There are octopi that blend in perfectly with sandy ocean floors, insects that look just like leaves and fish that resemble oceanic plants. There is even an octopus that can mimic nearly twenty other oceanic species to scare off attackers.

5) Color-Changing and Shape-Shifting Animals

Some animals require weeks to shift from one state to another while others can change color and even texture in a matter of hours or minutes. In some cases they blend in roughly with their surroundings while in others they are almost a carbon copy of what they are next to. Even when you are looking for them, some color-changers fit into their context so well you would never even see them at close range.

4) Cannibalistic Macabre Mate-Eating Animals

Scientists still do not know for sure what drives some animals to eat their mates. If they predominantly engaged in this behavior after mating one would assume they were getting sustenance for their newly-fertilized eggs – but most females attempt to eat the males even before mating. Scorpion males save themselves by stinging their partners into submission, mantises wait until a female has fed to approach her and spiders actually bring an offering of food in the hope that they themselves will not be the main course.

3) Group Builders and Animal Architects

Humans work together all the time to build incredible structures we could never have dreamed up, let alone construct, on our own – but some animal architecture is arguably even more impressive. There is a spider web built by a variety of species working together that spans much of a public park, an ant colony that extends for thousands of miles and birds nests built by entire flocks living together under one thatched roof.

2) Naturally and Artificially Exploding Animals

Yes, you read that right: some animals explode. In some cases they unfortunately have help – like the whale detonated to get it off a public beach or the tank-hunting suicide dogs from World War II. In other cases, though, it happens as a defense mechanism or the by-product of an unknown natural phenomena. One of the widest publicized cases of an exploding animal involved gaseous buildup inside of a giant whale being transported by truck down a busy city street – you do not want to see those pictures.

1) Raining Animals: Radical but Real

Raining animals … it sounds ridiculous, right? Nonetheless, it happens – albeit rarely. Fish, frogs and birds are the most common forms of animal rain. Sometimes the creatures land relatively unscathed but in others they are frozen or shredded to pieces. Theories vary in their details but generally it is assumed thatcertain kinds of strong winds lift up the animals with a volume of water (fish and frogs from ponds, for example) or sweep them out of the sky in the case of birds and then deposit them, often right before a major storm.

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