The surveys have flaws, but many of them over the last decade have found that over 50% of Icelanders say they either believe in elves or say it’s possible they exist.
Source: “Elves and hidden people: Do Icelanders really believe in elves? — Iceland Magazine
Okunoshima (aka Rabbit Island) is a small island located in the Inland Sea of Japan, 43 miles east of the city of Hiroshima. It used to be used for weapons testing but is now inhabited by adorable bunnies.
Source: “EVERYTHING YOU NEED TO KNOW ABOUT VISITING OKUNOSHIMA RABBIT ISLAND” — Wander Eat Write
a group of porcupines is called a prickle
Source: “Porcupine – Erethizon Dorsaum” — AZ Animals
You probably already know your dog is happy to be around you. They’re pretty good at showing it. Your behavior towards your dog is what matters most. But once they feel secure in your presence, your scent makes dogs feel safe.
Have you ever smelled a scent that reminded you of someone (perfume, for example) and had it stir your emotions?
Gregory Berns, a neuroeconomist at Emory University, performed functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) on dogs (don’t worry, he taught them to sit still).
“We started the dog project about three years ago to get around this problem that we really don’t know what dogs are thinking or what they’re experiencing,” Berns said, according to National Geographic (cited below).
The goal was to see the activity of the brain’s nerve cells in order to get a hint of what they might be thinking. Of course, there’s a lot of interpretation to do to turn those images into ideas about doggy feelings. But they studied the part of the brain that is associated with reward.
According to NatGeo: “In the new study, Berns and his team performed fMRI on 12 dogs, including 5 service or therapy dogs and his own dog, Callie, to test their response to biological odors. The experiment dogs were presented with five scents on gauze pads: a familiar human, an unfamiliar human, a dog that lived in their household, an unfamiliar dog, and their own scent. The researchers found that the dogs’ caudate nucleus, an area of the brain associated with positive expectations, was most activated by the scent of the familiar person.”
The results suggested that dogs can pick out their owner’s familiar scent, AND it tends to produce a positive reaction that shows up in the reward center of the brain.
The dogs didn’t react to the other scents in any way that would indicate they had an emotional reaction to them.
While this is sweet and all, the research will be beneficial for service animals.
“What’s more, scanning potential service dogs for enhanced brain responses may pinpoint canines that are most up to the task. Training service dogs is very expensive, he said, and only 30 to 40 percent of those trained are placed with a person. Overall, Berns believes the dogs experience something akin to pleasure when they smell their owners.” — WTF fun facts
Source: “Dog Brains Link Pleasure With Owner’s Scent” — National Geographic
From physical photo albums to scrolling far back in your social media history, there’s something about looking at old photos that tends to make us happy. In fact, research has shown it can be downright relaxing. For those not skilled at meditation, looking at old photos can be even more relaxing than meditating!
Make fun of photo-takers all you’d like (and we’ll join you for the ridiculous Instagram posers), but there’s some serious value in documenting happy moments.
In an article posted about the research on Digital Camera World (cited below), UK behavioral psychologist Jo Hemmings noted that “Taking the time to look back on our treasured memories can be truly beneficial for our wellbeing as it can help to evoke feelings of positivity and happiness. Because of this, and especially at times like this, we should take more time to appreciate and look back on them.”
If you want to crush your stress and boost your well-being, try a few tips that have made people happy during research studies:
Source: “It’s official! Looking at old photos is more relaxing than meditating” — Digital Camera World
The WLCoWSVoWLT stands for the World’s Largest Collection of the World’s Smallest Versions of the World’s Largest Things. It was created by a woman named Erika Nelson who travels the country looking for roadside marvels that have set a record for “world’s largest.” Then she photographs them and builds her own miniature version.
It’s unclear if creating the world’s smallest version of any world’s largest thing is a full-time job, but her collection has become a museum that she runs. You can visit it in Lucas, Kansas. What you’ll find on the walls are photos of Nelson’s replicas next to their giant inspirations. Often, she’ll have the miniatures displayed as well.
According to Atlas Obscura, “Nelson is an artist, educator, and one of America’s foremost experts and speakers on the World’s Largest Things. In addition to visiting communities with her own unique traveling museum, which acquired a permanent base in 2017, Nelson is a consultant to cities seeking to create their own ‘World’s Largest Thing’ or roadside attraction to increase tourism, marketing, and economic development for their community.”
This is just another testament to how incomplete Career Day at school really is. Just think of the jobs people create for themselves that no one ever dreamed of!
Nelson makes the World’s Smallest Versions of The World’s Largest Things from a medley of materials. For example, when replicating the world’s largest ball of rubber bands, she used the miniature rubber bands you’d find at an orthodontist’s office.
Nelson spends most of her time on the road. The museum itself is stationary since it’s found a new building in Lucas, Kansas. It used to be housed in a van. — WTF fun facts
Source: “World’s Largest Collection of Smallest Versions of Largest Things” — Atlas Obscura
Newborns are tiny. That certainly doesn’t come as a surprise. But the relative tininess of some creatures is truly stunning. For example, newborn panda size really made us think about the logistics of things like feeding. These teeny creatures are about the size of a mouse – between three and five OUNCES.
For further information on this fun fact and other questions we had about baby pandas, we turned to National Geographic, a trusted source for all things nature (and cited down below).
In 2020, NatGeo wrote about newborn panda size after the birth of a new cub at the zoo in Washington DC. The reason? People wanted to know its sex. But panda cubs are so small that only a genetic test can determine their sex. (It was a boy.)
“That’s not all they’re missing at birth. Newborn giant pandas are almost completely unrecognizable. Rather than sporting their iconic black-and-white markings, pandas emerge from their mothers as pink, wrinkly, blind, squealing creatures roughly the size of a stick of butter,” noted the magazine.
Conservationists who want to save pandas have always had questions about how their size at birth might work for the species, especially since they’re so fragile:
“Pandas are born fragile and underdeveloped. Weighing between three and five ounces, newborn pandas are 1/900th the weight of their mother. This places them among the smallest newborns compared to their mother of any mammal: Human mothers are only about 20 times heavier than their babies, and killer whales are 50 times heavier. Only marsupials emerge smaller‚ and that’s because their babies get to hole up in their mothers’ pouches to finish developing. Red kangaroos, for example, are born at 1/100,000th the weight of their mothers.”
We’re still trying to figure out what makes a newborn panda size any kind of advantage. (Then again, pandas are notorious for not doing much to keep their species going on their own.)
Researchers have found that the bears gestate for just 1 month! They don’t even have fully developed skeletons. Even their bear relatives that are born very tiny emerge with skeletons, whereas pandas are born a bit “undercooked” (that’s the word used by the authors of a study in the Journal of Anatomy).
Our best guess is related to just how poorly suited panda bears are to…well, life.
“The short gestation likely has to do with the bamboo that makes up most of the bear’s diet, says Laurie Thompson, assistant curator of giant pandas at the National Zoo. Bamboo doesn’t have many nutrients. Rather than expend the enormous amounts of energy needed to grow a fetus, female pandas can focus on developing the high-fat milk that will help their cubs grow outside of the womb.” — WTF fun facts
Source: “Born blind, pink, and entirely helpless, here’s how giant pandas grow up” — National Geographic
