#antipodes island

[edinzphoto]

Ten ways to photograph an Albatross

Albatross, ten ways. There are more! How do we keep things fresh and creative when we're photographing the same subjects day after day?

Classic portrait Are we surprised that I took lots of albatross photographs during three months living and working on Antipodes island? Not really. But how do you keep things fresh and interesting from a photographic point of view? There are only so many ways to make images of big glorious birds causing around the landscape. Birdscape My most-used lens for the trip was the Nikon 28-200mm.…

[violetsandshrikes]

other lesser known parrot species i would love to see hyped up: Reischek's parakeet and Antipodes parakeet!! they’re hanging out down on the subantarctic islands and they are very cool

[herpsandbirds]

Antipodes Parakeet (Cyanoramphus unicolor), family Psittaculidae, endemic to the Antipodes Islands of New Zealand

photograph by Kimberley Collins

[tanadrin]

According to Wikipedia, the small volcanic island of Rapa Iti is the nearest island to the antipode of Jerusalem.

I don't know what to do with this fact, but it feels like it should somehow be significant.

[ketrinadrawsalot]

Little is known about the erect-crested penguin, because research is hampered by the remoteness of the two islands (Bounty and Antipodes Islands) they breed on and the difficulty of getting permits to visit said islands.

[scotianostra]

On March 23rd 1848, the Free Church of Scotland settlement at New Edinburgh, New Zealand was founded, it is known today as Dunedin.

It was the poet’s uncle, Rev Thomas Burns, who was among the first settlers to arrive in Dunedin, the Gaelic for Edinburgh, having been appointed by the Free Church to lead a new Presbyterian settlement in the South Pacific

One passenger on the John Wickliffe, the fist ship to carry Scottish settlers to the South Island of New Zealand, wrote in his diary: “All seemed pleased and called it a goodly land – Port Chalmers and around is truly beautiful – rich in scenery – its slopes and shores are fertile, and wooded to the water’s edge.”

Every year in Dunedin, the arrival of these first settlers from Scotland is marked by Otago Anniversary Day, the public holiday falling this year on Monday just gone.

A second boat sent by the Otago Association, founded by the Free Church to broker land sales in South Island for its followers, arrived on April 15 with more than 200 people on board. They had spent 114 days at sea since leaving Greenock.

On board were people such as Adam James, 25, a boatbuilder; James Blackie, 21, a school teacher, James Brown, 23, a calico printer and Mary Pollok, 19, a servant.

By the end of the 1850s, around 12,000 Scots had joined them in this new flourishing city, many from the industrial lowlands.

Artisans, small traders and industrial workers were to make up a third of all Scottish migrants to New Zealand with almost 70 per cent of this group coming from the Edinburgh and Glasgow area.

A number left Paisley in the early 1840s when its weaving industry was in trouble with the south part of the city to become known as “Little Paisley”.

It was George Rennie MP, born in East Lothian, who first proposed a Scottish settlement in 1842 when he declared “We shall found a New Edinburgh at the Antipodes that shall one day rival the old.”

Chief operators of the church-led plan included William Cargill, a former British Army captain who commanded the John Wickliffe and became the first superintendent of Otago.

Edinburgh solicitor John McGlashan, became the Otago scheme’s chief organiser and promoter who commandeered residents for the new colony and organised ships.

His office at 27 South Hanover Street was open 10 hours a day as people turned up at his door to organise their passage.

Conditions were tough on arrival with relentless hard graft required to transform mud and bush into even the most primitive settlement. A number of wattle and daub cottages were constructed with the place dubbed “Mud-edin” given the coarse conditions.

Still, the Free Church, in an 1853 publication, had the highest praise of the new Scots residents who were “mostly of the labouring classes who had the aim of becoming landowners.”

The author noted the “very high character” of the residents and the “very serious regard to their religious duties.”

The extreme piousness of the settlement is made startling clear.

“The silent religious aspect of our Sabbath, the solemn seriousness, the death-like stillness, and the reverential attention in the house of God strike every stranger and are unequalled by anything of my experience,” the account added.

Despite the growth of Dunedin, the Otago Association folded in 1852 after repeatedly failing to meet is sales targets with its assets and liabilities taken over by the British Government.

McGlashan took a ship to join the settlers in Otago. He and Captain Cargill were to become major players in the governance of the region with the moral authority delivered by Rev Burns, a foundation chancellor of the University of Otago who some disliked for his heavy handed puritanical ways. Anglicans were referred to as “Little Enemy” by the Ayrshire-born minister.

As Tom Devine noted in To the Ends of the Earth, one anonymous correspondent to the New Zealand Otago Times, writing under the pseudonym a Staunch Englishman, described the Scots settlers as a “mean, close, bigoted, porridge-eating” lot who were prone to “minding the sixpences.”

The legacy of those first settlers is, however, ample. Otago Boys’ High School was set up in 1864, the University of Otago in 1869 and Otago Girls’ High School, one of the first state-run schools of its type in the world, opened in 1871.

John McGlashan College, Dunedin’s Presbyterian boys’ school, was founded in 1918 from a bequest to the Church by McGlashan’s daughters.

The stiff presbyterian tone of Dunedin is also said to have spurred a “creative rebellion” with works by Dunedin poet James K Baxter considered among the country’s finest.

Today, whisky, pipe band sand the city’s own Haggis Ceremony continue to mark the impact of those first Scottish settlers who arrived.

Shops on the main street stock Dunedin tartan, tweeds and Scottie dog trinkets and sign posts point to places such as Leith Valley, Corstorphine, Musselburgh and Calton Hill.

Bars pride themselves on their selections of fine malts, churches have an air of architectural familiarity and the municipal chambers looks as if it could have been transported from any Scottish town. A statue of Robbie Burns stands in the main square.

Mark Twain, after visiting Dunedin in 1895, wrote of them: “The people are Scotch. They stopped here on their way from home to heaven thinking they had arrived.”

For millions of Scots scattered worldwide, Scotland remains the homeland. It's the place they look towards for inspiration, with affection, or with an air ticket to renew that sense of Scottish identity. The internet has made the world a lot smaller for us all, which is why many enjoy the posts here, it gives them a wee sense of belonging, even if it less than a dram of Scottish blood you have flowing through you.

[drhoz]

#2237 - Breutelia sp.

One of at least 200 species in the genus, from the family Bartramiaceae. One possibility is B. pendula, found in Australia and New Zealand, and the subantarctic islands of Macquarie, Campbell, the Aucklands and the Antipodes, but without seeing the spore capsules and having a microscope I really can't go further than genus.

The genus is found worldwide, and named after botanist Johann Christian Breutel (1788–1875).

Huka Falls, Taupo Volcanic Zone, New Zealand

[may-the-best-penguin-win]

Round 1 Match 1

The Erect-Crested penguin is one of many crested penguins. These guys live in the New Zealand region and are on the endangered species list. They only breed on the Bounty and Antipodes Islands near New Zealand. Erect-Crested penguins are around 20-28 inches (50-70 cm) tall.

The Little Blue penguin, also called the Fairy penguin, Blue penguin, or Little penguin, is the smallest penguin, standing at a height of about 12-14 inches (30-40cm). They also live in the New Zealand region. Little Blues earned their name with their bluish feathers. These penguins burrow for their nests, and lay two eggs, like most other penguins. The first part of their scientific name "Eudyptula minor" means "good little diver".

[pegasusdrawnchariots]

Lettre I

@ninadove

1F MADAME, Pour une personne aussi belle qu'Alcidiane, il vous falloit sans doute, comme à cette Heroïne, une demeure inaccessible; car puis qu'on n'abordoit à celle du Roman que par hazard & que sans un hazard semblable on ne peut aborder chez vous; je croy que par enchantement vos charmes ont transporté ailleurs, depuis ma sortie, la Province où j'ay eu l'honneur de vous voir; Je veux dire Madame, qu'elle est devenuë une seconde Isle flotante, que le vent trop furieux de mes soûpirs pousse & fait reculer devant moy, à mesure que j'essaye d'en approcher. Mes Lettres mesmes pleines de soûmissions & de respects, malgré l'art & la routine des Messagers les mieux instruits, n'y sçauroient aborder.

1A MADAM, For a person as beautiful as Alcidiane, you doubtless required, like this heroine, an unreachable dwelling; for since that of the novel was only reached by luck, and since without similar luck your home cannot be reached, I believe that, since my departure, your charms have magically transported elsewhere the province where I had the honour of seeing you. I mean to say, Madam, that it has become a second floating island that the too furious wind of my sighs pushes and retreats before me as I try to approach it. My letters even full of submission and respect, despite the art and the routine of the best instructed messengers, could not reach it.

2F Il ne me sert de rien que vos loüanges qu'elles publient, les fassent voler de toutes parts, elles ne vous peuvent rencontrer; & je Croy mesme que si par le caprice du hazard ou de la Renommée qui se charge fort souvent de ce qui s'adresse à vous, il en tomboit quelqu'une du Ciel dans vostre cheminée, elle seroit capable de faire évanouir vostre Chasteau. Pour moy, Madame, aprés des avantures si surprenantes, je ne doute quasi plus que vostre Comté n'ait changé de Climat avec le Païs qui luy est Antipode, & j'apprehende que le cherchant dans la Carte, je ne rencontre à sa place, comme on trouve aux extremitez du Septentrion, (Cecy est une Terre où les Glaces empeschent d'aborder.)

2A It is of no use to me that your praises within them are made to fly about everywhere, they cannot meet you. And I even believe that if, by the whims of fortune or renown, which so often attends to that which is intended for you, one fell from heaven into your chimney, it would be capable of making your castle vanish. For my part, Madam, after such surprising adventures, I almost no longer doubt that your county has changed climate with the country that is antipodal to it, and I fear that in searching for it on the map, I do not come across its place, as is found at the farthest reaches of the Septentrion (this is a land where the ice prevents approach).

3F Ha! Madame, le Soleil à qui vous ressemblez, & à qui l'ordre de l'Univers ne permet point de repos, s'est bien fixé dans les Cieux pour éclairer une victoire, où il n'avoit presque pas d'interest. Arrestez vous pour éclairer la plus belle des vostres; car je proteste (pourveu que vous ne fassiez plus disparoistre ce Palais enchanté, où je vous parle tous les jours en esprit) que mon entretien muet & discret ne vous fera jamais entendre que des vœux, des hommages & des adorations.

3A Ah! Madam, the Sun that you resemble, and that the order of the universe permits no rest, is fixed in the heavens to illuminate a victory it has almost no interest in. Stop to illuminate the most beautiful of your own. For I protest (provided that you do not make your enchanted palace disappear, where I speak to you every day in spirit) that my mute and discreet interview will cause you to hear nothing but vows, tributes, and worship.

4F Vous sçavez que mes Lettres n'ont rien qui puisse estre suspect; Pourquoy donc apprehendez vous la conversation d'une chose qui n'a jamais parlé? Ha, Madame! s'il m'est permis d'expliquer mes soupçons, je pense que vous me refusez votre veuë, pour ne pas communiquer plus d'une fois, un miracle avec un prophane; Cependant vous sçavez que la conversion d'un incrédu(l)e comme moy, (c'est une qualité que vous m'avez jadis reprochée) demanderoit que je visse un tel miracle plus d'une fois. Soyez donc accessible aux témoignages de veneration que j'ay dessein de vous rendre.

4A You know that my letters have nothing that could be suspect. Why therefore do you apprehend the conversation of a thing that has never spoken? Ah, Madam! If I am permitted to explain my suspicions, I think that you refuse me your view so as not to share a miracle more than once with a non-believer. However, you know that the conversion of an unbeliever like me (it's a quality that you reproached me for long ago) would require that I see such a miracle more than once. Be therefore amenable to the testimonies of reverence that I intend to give you.

5F Vous sçavez que les Dieux reçoivent favorablement la fumée de l'encens que nous leur bruslons icy bas, & qu'il manqueroit quelque chose à leur gloire, s'ils n'estoient adorez: Ne refuſez donc pas de l'estre, car si tous attributs sont adorables, puis que vous possedez tres-éminemment les deux principaux, la Sagesse & la Beauté, vous me feriez faire un crime, m'empeschant d'adorer en vostre personne le divin caractere que les Dieux ont imprimé: Moy principalement, qui suis & seray, toute ma vie, MADAME, Vostre tres-humble Serviteur.

5A You know that the gods receive favourably the smoke of the incense that we burn for them down here, and that something of their glory would be lacking if they were not worshipped. Do not therefore refuse to be so, for if all attributes can be worshipped, since you most eminently possess the two principal ones, wisdom and beauty, you will make me commit a crime in preventing me from worshipping within your person the divine nature that the gods have impressed - me primarily, who am and will be all my life, MADAM, Your most humble servant.

[rjalker]

I understand why Don Quixote was written now

Now I will tell you, and listen well, who were these counts and kings. With a rich escort and one hundred extra mounts Count Brandes of Gloucester came. After him came Menagormon, who was Count of Clivelon. And he of the Haute Montagne came with a very rich following. The Count of Treverain came, too, with a hundred of his knights, and Count Godegrain with as many more. Along with those whom I have just mentioned came Maheloas, a great baron, lord of the Isle of Voirre. In this island no thunder is heard, no lightning strikes, nor tempests rage, nor do toads or serpents exist there, nor is it ever too hot or too cold. 121 Graislemier of Fine Posterne brought twenty companions, and had with him his brother Guigomar, lord of the Isle of Avalon. Of the latter we have heard it said that he was a friend of Morgan the Fay, and such he was in very truth. Davit of Tintagel came, who never suffered woe or grief. Guergesin, the Duke of Haut Bois, came with a very rich equipment. There was no lack of counts and dukes, but of kings there were still more. Garras of Cork, a doughty king, was there with five hundred knights clad in mantles, hose, and tunics of brocade and silk. Upon a Cappadocian steed came Aguisel, the Scottish king, and brought with him his two sons, Cadret and Coi—two much respected knights. Along with those whom I have named came King Ban of Gomeret, and he had in his company only young men, beardless as yet on chin and lip. A numerous and gay band he brought two hundred of them in his suite; and there was none, whoever he be, but had a falcon or tercel, a merlin or a sparrow-hawk, or some precious pigeon-hawk, golden or mewed. Kerrin, the old King of Riel, brought no youth, but rather three hundred companions of whom the youngest was seven score years old. Because of their great age, their heads were all as white as snow, and their beards reached down to their girdles. Arthur held them in great respect. The lord of the dwarfs came next, Bilis, the king of Antipodes. This king of whom I speak was a dwarf himself and own brother of Brien. Bilis, on the one hand, was the smallest of all the dwarfs, while his brother Brien was a half-foot or full palm taller than any other knight in the kingdom. To display his wealth and power, Bilis brought with him two kings who were also dwarfs and who were vassals of his, Grigoras and Glecidalan. Every one looked at them as marvels. When they had arrived at court, they were treated with great esteem. All three were honoured and served at the court like kings, for they were very perfect gentlemen. In brief, when King Arthur saw all his lords assembled, his heart was glad. Then, to heighten the joy, he ordered a hundred squires to be bathed whom he wished to dub knights. There was none of them but had a parti-coloured robe of rich brocade of Alexandria, each one choosing such as pleased his fancy. All had arms of a uniform pattern, and horses swift and full of mettle, of which the worst was worth a hundred livres.

[edinzphoto]

The Light Fantastic

Enjoying a rare sunset with Grey petrels on Antipodes island.

The end of a long day of census blocks, walking in lines over lumpy, orifice-infested vegetation. Wind riffling up the slopes of the southern end of Antipodes island, tossing golden tussocks with a chill sou-wester. Add to that a few thousand Kuia / Grey petrels returning from the sea, and low golden light in a rare patch of clarity, and you have something that is still fizzing in my blood…

[penguinies4]

The crested penguins of New Zealand. In Maori they are called “Tawaki”. Belonging to the genus Eudyptes, they are the Fiordland penguin (E. Pachyrhynchus), the Snares (E. Robustus) and the Erect-crested (E. sclateri).

Due to how closely related they are, it is debated whether they are a single species with three subspecies, or three distinct species. It’s difficult to tell them apart since they are so similar.

above: the fiordland penguin

Unlike the other two species, the fiordland penguin has small white stripes underneath its eyes, and has no bare skin around its beak. Like the snares penguin, its crest (the yellow eyebrows) does not stand up. This penguin is known for swimming very far for food. These chaps nest in forests.

above: snares penguin

the snares penguin looks almost exactly like the fiordland penguin, but it lacks the white stripes below its eyes, and has a bare area of skin around the beak. The fellows breed on the Snares Islands.

this is the erect-crested penguin. Like the snares penguin, it has a bare area of skin around its beak. Unlike the other two species, it has a crest that stands up, hence the name. These guys only breed on the Bounty and Antipode islands.

[eopederson]

Pinheiro da Ilha Norfolk (Araucaria heterophylla), Madeira, 2019.

A Norfolk Island pine growing at almost the antipode of its area of origin in the South Pacific

[sandgame]

Faking a spherical Age for the sake of KI coordinates

Heyo Tumblr, been a while!

Although I haven't used this blog lately, I have still been screwing around with this thing in the background of my life, because at this point I've basically accepted that semi-theorizing about how to make Better Uru is just my pastime.

Anyway. As a result of something else I was contemplating for this bizarre project of mine, I realized that because of how KI coordinates work, game worlds which allowed players to wander sufficiently far from the Age's Maintainer's Mark would need to implement some form of fakery in order to properly simulate the effect of walking around on a sphere while using a cylindrical coordinate system.

The "obvious" solution of just making the game world a sphere is… not really smart, though, so what's a game dev who is overcommitted to the concept of realism in this game to do?

Well, first let's finish defining the problem.

As you walk away from the Zero point of an Age, your elevation coordinate will decrease (generally; local surface geometry like mountains notwithstanding) until you reach the Zero’s exact antipode, because walking across the surface of the sphere will always send you "down" relative to the placement of the Maintainer's Mark. It should then increase back to 0 as you proceed back toward the Zero point across the other half of the planet.

But because game worlds are flat, this effect would have to be simulated for sufficiently large maps.

To do this, we have to know the following values:

The average radius of the planet

The distance traveled from the Zero point

The Zero point’s elevation relative to the planet’s average radius

The player’s local elevation relative to the planet’s radius

Using the equation for the length of a circular arc, we can reverse engineer the angular distance traveled:

L = θ * r

Or

θ = L / r

Where L is the length of the arc travelled (how far from the zero point the player is in a straight line), and r is the planet’s radius. 

NOTE: The math in the next part assumes you never travel more than 90 degrees around the planet, which I think is generally acceptable for the purposes of this hypothetical, but just be aware that what's presented here is not a completely comprehensive solution.

Solving for θ lets us construct a right triangle whose hypotenuse is the planet’s radius plus the player’s current elevation above that radius, and whose long leg is the planet’s radius minus the vertical distance the player has travelled away from the Zero point. We find the length of the leg with this function:

a = c × sin(θ)

Once we have a, we subtract it from the planet’s radius to get the elevation KI coordinate.

It may be necessary to make adjustments to certain values going into the equation solving for a in cases where the player has moved more than 90 degrees around the planet from the Zero point. 

The distance coordinate is calculated using the following formula to get the horizontal “opposite” leg of the right triangle formed by the radius of the planet and the angle the player is away from the Zero axis—which extends straight through the center of the planet, or:

b = c × cos(θ)

The value of b is our horizontal distance from the axis of the Zero point. (I should point out that we can't just use the XZ vector distance between the player and the Zero point for this measurement, as the player's travel is being treated as an arc for the purposes of simulating a sphere, and the arc's length would be greater than the actual absolute linear distance traveled if the map were actually spherical.)

The angle coordinate is the simplest to calculate, as it’s simply the player position’s angle from the vector of the Zero point (the “line” of the Zero), converted to torantee. 

In addition to faking the KI coordinates, a shader may also be used to post-process the geometry of the scene such that it falls over a false “horizon”, much like Animal Crossing New Horizons’ island terrain does (though the effect would be far less dramatic in this case). 

[dry-valleys]

Two male albatrosses mate in the Antipodes Islands, on Frozen Planet 2.

[sciencespies]

A South Pacific Penguin Dumps One of Its Potential Chicks

https://sciencespies.com/news/a-south-pacific-penguin-dumps-one-of-its-potential-chicks/

A South Pacific Penguin Dumps One of Its Potential Chicks

On the Antipodes Islands in the South Pacific, researchers observed a strange parenting move in erect-crested penguins — laying an egg that’s doomed to die.

In 1998, a team of researchers made the three-and-a-half day trek to the isolated Antipodes Islands in the South Pacific to study one of its few residents: the enigmatic and endangered erect-crested penguin.

“These are really the forgotten penguins,” said Lloyd Davis, a biologist and science communicator at the University of Otago in New Zealand, who led the team almost 25 years ago. “No one knows virtually anything about them.”

The modern plight of these birds inspired Dr. Davis, after decades of working in science communication, to revisit the data he and colleagues gathered in 1998. The results of their research were published on Wednesday in the journal PLOS ONE, chronicling the birds’ demographics and unique parenting style — including neglecting, and in some cases killing, potential chicks.

To describe the penguins’ native Antipodes Islands and nearby Bounty Islands as harsh would be an understatement almost as severe as the landscape itself. Known in the Māori language as Moutere Mahue (Abandoned Island) and Moutere Hauriri (Island of Angry Wind), they are technically part of New Zealand, though they sit hundreds of miles off its southern coast.

The islands have “a sort of bleak beauty,” said Dr. Davis. Aside from steep cliffs and severe winds, the only inhabitants of the islands are the penguins and other seabirds.

The research team arrived at the Antipodes Islands in September 1998 and stayed through the breeding season until November. They marked 270 penguins’ backs with yellow paint so the birds could be reliably tracked. The researchers counted the birds, observed their courtship, egg-laying and incubation behaviors, and gathered data on one of the most baffling features of crested penguin biology: they lay an egg that never hatches.

An erect-crested penguin colony on Antipodes Island, which has been observed by the research team since 1998.Tui De Roy/NPL/Minden Pictures

All species of crested penguin lay two eggs in a breeding season, a smaller first egg and a larger second egg, though this size difference is most extreme in erect-crested penguins. In other birds it’s usually the last egg that is smaller, only meant to be hatched and raised if the first eggs die — a sort of insurance policy. However, erect-crested penguins throw out their would-be insurance immediately, like a first attempt at a pancake not meant to be eaten. All of the smaller eggs that the team observed in 1998 died, mostly the day before or the day the larger egg was laid, suggesting the smaller egg did not evolve to be a backup plan.

That the first egg is smaller than the second egg has made crested penguins an enigma “for the last hundred years,” Dr. Davis said. “No one has come up with a good explanation for why this is.”

The smaller eggs often were not incubated by their parents, and most ended up rolling out of the nest or accidentally getting smashed. Occasionally, the penguins seemed to deliberately shove the tiny eggs out of their bare, rocky nests to their doom. The team in 1998 conducted an experiment: They built protective rock rings around some nests and compared the fates of those smaller eggs to those in unprotected nests. Even though the barrier saved some of them from rolling away, all were still neglected and died.

“You can see that from the penguin’s viewpoint, they want the bigger egg, and so they’re favoring the bigger egg,” said Dee Boersma, a conservation biologist at the University of Washington who was not involved with the study. While the ancestor to modern crested penguins raised two chicks, Dr. Davis suspected that food scarcity drove natural selection in today’s species to reduce their brood size to one.

This speculation will likely continue, as it is only getting harder to study erect-crested penguins. Dr. Davis says it is difficult to obtain permits to travel to these isolated islands. And while erect-crested penguin populations are at risk, they’re hardly alone. The related rockhopper penguin has seen a dramatic population crash, and globally, “penguins are in trouble,” says Dr. Boersma.

With the world warming at an alarming rate and continued exploitation of the oceans by humans, penguins face numerous threats. Dr. Davis said he hoped his paper would reintroduce the forgotten erect-crested penguin to the world and spark further research. “If you don’t know about them, you can’t care about them,” he said.

Until more research can be done, the reason crested penguins favor their second eggs remains a mystery. “So much is speculative because we just don’t know much about these birds,” Dr. Davis said.

#News