Genesis Nature Blog

Thursday, January 2, 2014

This video is a small glimpse into the beauty of a coral reef. Here you can see some of the incredible diversity of beautiful animals that can be found in just a small area on a coral reef.

Monday, August 5, 2013

Coral Reef Habitats

Coral reefs are some of the most unique and beautiful habitats on earth. While coral reefs make up less than 0.1% of the Earth's oceans, over 25% of all species of marine life can be found there. The majority of these unique and beautiful species cannot be found in any other place on earth.

Most of the animals found in a coral reef are very brightly colored. This serves to confuse predators as the brightly colored marine life fades into a brilliant and beautiful blur. In any other environment, such flashy colors would stand out and make the bright fish an easy meal, but in a coral reef it is very hard to distinguish from the rest of its colorful neighbors.

A coral reef is actually built by tiny animals called coral. These little soft creatures create a protective home for themselves out of calcium. This will grow into a large, strong structure that can provide shelter and a home for fish and other animals.

Coral reefs thrive in shallow, warm, clear waters found in tropical oceans. They actually do best in clear water, which is strangely low in nutrients. This is because they have tiny plants called algae growing in their bodies. During the day, the plants give corals energy by photosynthesis. The coral also eats tiny bits of food passing by in the current.

Many species of coral will actually glow in beautiful neon colors under ultra-violet light.

Coral reefs are essential to the protection and sometimes even formation of many tropical islands. A coral reef will absorb much of the impact of waves and storms that could otherwise erode away the shoreline. A large amount of the sand on the beaches of tropical islands is actually ground up coral that washes ashore. In some cases, the sand from a coral reef can actually pile up to the point that a new island will rise out of the ocean.

Monday, July 29, 2013

Arctic and Antarctic Habitats

The Arctic region is defined as the area of the world North of the Arctic Circle (60 degrees North Latitude). This includes the area around the North Pole. The Antarctic region is defined as the area South of 60 degrees South Latitude. This includes the area around the South Pole.

The Arctic and Antarctic regions receive much less direct sunlight than the rest of the world, so their climate is very cold. Most of these regions seem locked in an eternal winter. Because of the extreme temperatures, any life that can survive here must have very specialized adaptations to the cold. For example, penguins are covered in a thick layer of insulated fat, with dense, fluffy feathers which act like a warm winter coat. This allows them to keep as much heat as possible close to their bodies.

Because of the tilt of the earth, days are longer in the summer and shorter in the winter. At the polar edges of the earth, days are often very short during some months, and extremely long in other months. In the summer, a single day can last for months, and the sun can often be seen well past midnight.