Cavendish banana (Musa acuminata)

Pisang or cavendish banana (Musa acuminata) is a plant species in the Musaceae, a banana with small or seedless seeds, a evergreen perennial plant, the stems are composed of a layer of leaf sheaths that are tightly closed and emerge from completely buried tubers.

M. acuminata is formed as a pseudostem with a pile of leaf sheaths and is watery, soft, upright, up to 3 meters high, white or green to black in color and dries to brown, forming dense colonies by producing shoots around it.

The leaves are elongated, 120 cm long, 45 cm wide, watertight, a midrib in the middle and light green, the upper surface is dark green, the lower surface is whitish green with a flour coating.

Inflorescences grow horizontally or obliquely from the ends of the stems. Individual flowers are white to yellowish in color and are negative geotropic. The female flowers are located near the base and develop into fruit, the male flowers are located at the very top and are bud-shaped between the coarse bracts.

The fruits grow in bunches of up to 20 groups and each group has up to 20 fruits. Each fruit is up to 23 cm long, up to 4 cm in diameter and weighs up to 200 grams. Each fruit contains up to 62 small seeds or no seeds at all depending on the cultivar via natural mutations resulting from vegetative propagation.

Kingdom: Plantae
Phylum: Tracheophyta
Subphylum: Angiospermae
Class: Liliopsida
Order: Zingiberales
Family: Musaceae
Genus: Musa
Species: Musa acuminata
Subspecies: Musa acuminata ssp. acuminata, Musa acuminata ssp. errans, Musa acuminata ssp. flava, Musa acuminata ssp. halabanensis, Musa acuminata ssp. malaccensis, Musa acuminata ssp. microcarpa, Musa acuminata ssp. siamea, Musa acuminata var. sumatrana, Musa acuminata var. zebrina

Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) manufacture bubble-nets as tools to increase prey intake

NEWS - Humpback whales ( Megaptera novaeangliae ) create bubble net tools while foraging, consisting of internal tangential rings, and actively control the number of rings, their size, depth and horizontal spacing between the surrounding bubbles. These structural elements of the net increase prey intake sevenfold. Researchers have known that humpback whales create “bubble nets” for hunting, but the new report shows that the animals also manipulate them in a variety of ways to maximize catches. The behavior places humpbacks among the rare animals that make and use their own tools. “Many animals use tools to help them find food, but very few actually make or modify these tools themselves,” said Lars Bejder, director of the Marine Mammal Research Program (MMRP), University of Hawaii at Manoa. “Humpback whales in southeast Alaska create elaborate bubble nets to catch krill. They skillfully blow bubbles in patterns that form a web with internal rings. They actively control details such ...

Red costate tiger moth (Aloa lactinea)

Red costate tiger moth ( Aloa lactinea ) is an animal species in the Erebidae, a moth with a wingspan of 40 mm, a yellow belly, black antennae with red basalt joints, dark red palpi on the sides and white below, black terminal joints, living in forests and agriculture in the lowlands to mountainous areas. A. lactinea has a white head with a red stripe on the back. Thorax is white. The wings are predominantly white in color with black dots on each corner of the cells and a red margin. The wings have branched pulse lines and a starchy surface. The wing-covered upper abdomen is black with large elliptical plots and is colored yellow forming cells. The lower abdomen is white and has fine hairs that fall out easily. A pair of antennas is black. The forelegs are red, white and black. The other legs are white on the top and black on the bottom. The final joints are white and black which form alternating rings. Tip and sole black all over. The larvae are black in color with a lateral crest ...

Javanese grasshopper (Valanga nigricornis)

Wooden grasshopper or Javanese grasshopper ( Valanga nigricornis ) is an animal species of Acrididae, grasshoppers that have at least 18 subspecies, insects with very wide diversity in color and size, sexual dimorphism in which females are larger in size and paler in color. V. nigricornis in males has a length of 45-55 millimeters and females 15-75 mm. The head is square and green or yellow or brown or black in color. A pair of antennas has a black color. The eyes are large and gray or white or brownish. The hind legs are very large and have a green or yellow or brown or black color, plain or brindle. The limbs have two rows of large and long spines with black tips facing backward. The wings have a length exceeding the belly, a rough surface and are brown or green or yellow or black in color with pulse lines forming spaces filled with black color. The hind wings are rose red which will be visible when flying. Nymphs are pale green or yellow or brown or blackish in color. Javanese gr...

Dlium