Archive for category Nature
Good bees and bad bees
People in my home state believe in a high degree of politeness which we deem Minnesota Nice. Thus it should be no surprise that entomologist Marla Spivak, who runs the Bee Lab at the University, has developed a trait for bees that she calls Minnesota Hygienic. These bees have been bred to detect and remove damaging diseases and parasites from the hive, thus lessening the likelihood of colony collapses that have confounded keepers nationwide. Spivak’s work came to my attention in this recent Washington Post article featuring beekeepers in nearby Maryland who get $165 for queens whose offspring do not tolerate parasitic mites and, hopefully, this zombie fly.
This concern over keeping bees healthy is not shared by everyone. For example, see this horrifying report from Florida (where I happen to be at the moment). If you fear bees (apiphobia), do not watch the video.
Why you should be very leery of forecasts
Check out this blog by statistician William Briggs that gives the heads up on how Hurricane Predictors Admit They Can’t Predict Hurricanes. Years ago as a chemical engineer working on process development I would be encouraged by plant personnel to crank old data through a regression analysis to model the operation, thus avoiding any work on their part to run designed experiments. The joke was that we got very good at predicting what would happen last month.
In this case the issue is hurricanes. As Briggs explains, the top experts can fit past data very well (r = 0.79 for 50-year period the last half of 20th century). He refers to this as a ‘hindcast’. But, as the hurricane forecasters themselves admit, these models predict so poorly (r = 0.04) that you may as well just use an average — what I call the ‘mean’ model as a double meaning (ha ha) because it is so disappointing for the analyst.
What it boils down to is that any forecasts on hurricanes this early before the coming season will really just be a lot of hot air, despite impressive statistics from models fit to prior years. The same goes for long-term outlooks on other natural phenomena.
Mind-reading fish know I am out to catch them
Last week I enjoyed a relaxing sojourn up in the north woods of Wisconsin. The resort encompasses its own pristine pine-ringed lake featuring a 26-foot fishing hole. Just before I headed off for my vacation I read this Scientific American report on The Mind-Reading Salmon: The True Meaning of Statistical Significance
. Although I think they meant to be disrespectful of p-values in this case, my feeling, based on empirical evidence from a large sample size – hundreds of unsuccessful casts of my lure around the shore and over the hole, is that some fish living in isolated areas have developed mental telepathy. How else do they avoid being caught?
PS. Here’s a picture of me in happier days at a different lake last summer. My brother-in-law insisted that the first one to catch a crappie would have to kiss it. Evidently this fish thought it might be fun to try, knowing I’d then release it back into the lake.
The chaotic, yet regular sounds of weeping waters and lapping waves inside Lake Superior sea caves
Earlier this month I enjoyed a wonderful sail out of Cornucopia, Wisconsin to Lake Superior’s Mawikwe Sea Caves — described nicely here in a pictorial blog by the Howder family.
Mawikwe means “weeping woman” in Ojibwe. Due to heavy rains in the days leading up to our voyage, the caves were weeping steadily, as you can see and hear in my video. I was fascinated by the cacophony of dripping water combined with the galumphing of the waves into the baby caves at water level. It provided a pleasing mix of randomness and rhythm. Turn up your volume and listen for yourself.
PS. By the way, I learned that by yelling into a sea cave you can (pun intended!) duet yourself.
How hot? 103 under our shade tree!
According to my morning newspaper (St. Paul Pioneer Press), yesterday’s record temperature made it hotter hereabouts than a billy goat in a pepper patch, or the devil’s underwear (I hope he is not a tweeter like that New York Congressman), or two bears fighting in a forest fire (down in Arizona, I suppose). Even so, a vestige of the once 60-foot high pile of snow dump in downtown St. Paul remained intact. Perhaps it will disappear today. I hope so, because it will be back in the 60’s by Friday – colder than a basement toilet seat as Minnesotans like to say.
Winter not loosening its icy grip on Spring
I woke up to snow yesterday morning. It couldn’t quite cover the greening grass underneath, nor did it seem to discourage the budding bushes. Today the snow has disappeared and the near 40 degree F temperature seems mild with the power of April’s sun and the abatement of fierce northern winds. However, our Canadian neighbors are not faring quite as well, as evidenced by this very cool (literally and figuratively) photo from my sister – a resident of Calgary. Notice how the snow fingers feature icy nails — chilling!
When will Winter finally loosen up and let Spring spring free, eh? Maybe May…
First signs of Spring – premature return home by robins
As you can see from this photo taken Friday while cross-country skiing, Spring has not sprung in my neck of the woods. However, just overhead as I took this shot were several dozen robins perched in the birch. They were chattering a great deal – I imagine in complaint about which bird brain thought it was time to migrate back north.
A couple of years ago at this seasonal juncture I wrote about phenology – the study of timing for nature’s ways. For us in Minnesota the robins’ arrival is a sure sign of warmer weather around the corner.
Having just returned from a Spring break in Florida, I wondered how these southerners can detect seasonal changes. My searching on internet reveals little, other than this announcement of the first phenology workshop in Florida in 2009. The one sure sign of Spring for Floridians is the hordes of Minnesotans coming down for a break. They probably trump anything more subtle from Mother Nature.
