Dec 29, 2009: Indoor Stars
 

Classicman wanted you to see these indoor "stars". The link is to a Pravda photo gallery, which says; Not much information.

http://cellar.org/2009/glowworms.jpg

I believe the pictures were probably taken at Waitomo cave, in New Zealand.

If anybody has more, or different, information feel free to chime in.

I love me some caves. Great pics.

Sorry there wasn't any more info . . . Perhaps one of you internet search nerds might find something to share.

I recall going on a hike through an unfamiliar park one time.

It was a conditioning hike, but wound up being tougher than expected. The heat was a bigger factor than we thought it would be, and we were somewhat out of shape, with our heavy packs.

So we're nearing our campsite - someplace up ahead, but the sun has set and it is a moonless night. Hard to follow the trail, although the terrain was almost flat now.

We stopped to take a break, and have some water. We were sure tired.

Then we saw them - little green glowing things, and they were sprinkled sparsely near the trail! They were worms of some kind. They were attracted to the sides of the trail, where people had disturbed the ground with their hiking boots.

In all my years of hiking, I never saw those glowing worms in any other park.

The greatest "glow" story I've heard is the one about a fighter pilot trying to find his way back to his carrier. It's now a moonless night, and his plane has been shot up rather badly. Also, he's very low on fuel.

The carrier has it's lights out to prevent becoming an easy target for submarines that might be in the area.

As he's approaching where the carrier should be, his electronics wink out, and he's left flying blindly with no lights on his displays/gauges.

He figures "that's it, I'll have to try and ditch in the ocean", but then he see's this faint green glowing ribbon up ahead of him, in the water.

If his instrument lights had stayed working, or the moon had risen already, he'd never have seen it. Only in near total darkness, could he see the faint glow of the photoplankton than have been stirred up by a very large ship's propellers.

He followed that phosphorescent green ribbon, right to his carrier, and landed. (When the carrier deck crew heard his engine, they turned on the landing lights).

Back when I lived in Escondido, CA we went to visit the beach next to San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (nuclear power plant) at night. The hot water output from that power plant makes the algae much more plentiful than other locations. This leads to numerous occasions where you will see bioluminescent waves rolling in. It is just amazing to see the lit up ocean water rolling in.

The pilot story was also a scene from the movie "Appollo 13", told by Tom Hanks character.

I didn't go in these caves when I was in New Zealand ages ago, but I heard about them. If I remember correctly, these worms are moth larva. The have these long sticky strings that they hang down in order to trap flying insects to eat. They glow in order to attract the insects. Then I think they turn into moths (I'm sketchy on that detail) and sometimes get caught and eaten by their siblings.

They are beautiful to us, but they are like the Sirens to other insects. Deadly and beautiful.

Amazing! Thanks for posting Bruce! I'd love to see those in person. And the phosphorescence in the ocean too. For that matter, I'd just like to SEE the ocean sometime...

Eh, the ocean is just a bigass pond. ;)

lol - btw, thanks Bruce.

When I did the night dive for my advanced scuba, you could run your hand through the water and make thousands of tiny lights. It was beeyooteeful!

Is this how you forget the apex predator, chomping jaws, thrashing, and the blood-filled water? :eyebrow:

Thanks, Willie. I'm sure that's where I heard the carrier story. Just couldn't remember the source. :headshake

Sea-critters love me. I am one of them. The albatross and the whale, they are my brothers.

:mermaid:

The barracuda didn't even bother us. We don't look like something they want to eat, what with all the prime little fishies running around.

In that case, RichLevy has an Otter for you. :lol: