ecosystems

Umwelt

The depths of the hearts
Of humankind cannot be known.
But in my birthplace
The plum blossoms smell the same
As in the years gone by.

~Ki no Tsurayuki

shapes-22webshapes-23web

The video below was created by Yoshiyuki Katayama and cited at Aeon.com.  Please gift yourself with this amazing visual journey with nature.

A term introduced by the Baltic German biologist Jakob von Uexküll in 1909, Umwelt refers to an organism’s internal and limited perceptual experience of the external world. This stunning experimental exploration of the concept from the Japanese artist Yoshiyuki Katayama contrasts flowers blooming at time-lapse speeds with insects and spiders atop them, captured in real time. As these two organisms move at what appear to be similar speeds, the viewer is reminded of the disparate timescales on which they usually operate, and the very different evolutionary goals that they pursue even as they interact with one another.


Umwelt from Yoshiyuki KATAYAMA on Vimeo.

white waves

Over the wide sea
As I sail and look around,
It appears to me
That the white waves, far away,
Are the ever shining sky.

~Fujiwara no Tadamichi (1097-1164)

horizonallines-2web

Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin : Exactly how do you mean?
Mr. McGuire: There’s a great future in plastics.
Think about it. Will you think about it?  ~The Graduate

trees talk to…

Though we are parted,
If on Mount Inaba’s peak
I should hear the sound
Of the pine trees growing there,
I’ll come back again to you.

~Ariwara no Yukihira

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Nikon D750   f/4.5   1/40   56mm

The National Forest Foundation will plant a tree for every $1 you give to their tree-planting programs. Their website notes a goal of planting 50 million trees by 2023.

Suzanne Simard’s research has given us insight into how trees communicate their needs and send each other nutrients through an elaborate system which she has compared to neural networks in the human brain.

I hope you enjoy this TED Talk, How Trees Talk to Each Other