Up At The Ranch And Beyond

[Bluegreen]

South Celestial Tree by Kiko Fairbairn



https://apod.nasa.gov

If you live in the Northern Hemisphere, you may have learned how to locate the North Star, Polaris, in the night sky. It can be used to find north, and it approximately marks the northern celestial pole. If you live in the Southern Hemisphere, there is no bright star marking the southern celestial pole, but the Southern Cross can be used to find south.

The featured image was taken in Padre Bernardo (GO), Brazil. It shows the apparent motion of the stars around the apparently empty southern celestial pole over 2 hours, on August 20, 2018. Each star takes about 24 hours to make a complete turn around the pole in the sky.

Padre Bernardo is located in the Cerrado region, a tropical savanna that occupies most of central Brazil and supports rich biodiversity. The barren branch that apparently supports this sky wheel of rotating stars is a common sight in the dry season during winter.

[Bluegreen]

Breaking Down 8 Viral Hoaxes | The Proof Is Out There



Experts investigate shocking footage and claims to determine whether they reveal real phenomena or elaborate hoaxes designed to mislead.

Published 16th April 2026 (40:41)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=yzKHzxtGXtI

[Bluegreen]

Idioms & Their Origins





Steal someone’s thunder



In the early 1700s, English dramatist John Dennis invented a device that imitated the sound of thunder for a play he was working on. The play flopped. Soon after, Dennis noted that another play in the same theater was using his sound-effects device. He angrily exclaimed, “That is my thunder, by God; the villains will play my thunder, but not my play.” The story got around London, and the idiom was born.


White elephant



Legend has it, kings of Siam (now Thailand) used to give actual white elephants to people they wanted to punish. Yes, the elephants were valuable and respected, but that also meant they were expensive to take care of, so the kings hoped the present would drive the recipient into financial ruin. Now, of course, a white elephant exchange is meant for useless (though probably cheaper) gifts.


By and large



Sailors were the first to refer to things “by and large.” The first part of the phrase refers to the nautical term “full and by,” meaning a boat was traveling into the wind. On the other hand, “large” means the wind is coming from behind. “By and large,” then, would mean the wind is coming from any direction—giving rise to the current meaning of “in general”.


Close but no cigar



Carnival games nowadays give out stuffed animals as prizes, but in the late 19th century, the games were targeted to adults, not kids. Instead of getting a giant teddy bear, winners might get a cigar. If they almost won but didn’t earn that prize, they’d be “close, but no cigar.” By the 1930s, the phrase extended beyond fairgrounds to everyday close shots.


Give the cold shoulder



Surprisingly, this doesn’t just refer to coldly turning your back on someone. Etymologists think the phrase originated from medieval etiquette. After a feast, hosts in England would subtly signal that the meal was over (and it was time for guests to leave) by serving a cold slice of pork, mutton, or beef shoulder.


Let the cat out of the bag



Who would even put a cat in a bag? The answer may lie in medieval markets, where people used to sell piglets tied in bags for farmers to carry home. A shady dealer might swap the piglet in the sack with a less expensive animal, such as a cat. So when you let the cat out of the bag, you were exposing the con to everyone.


Gadzooks!



“Zounds!” “Egad!” “Cripes!” These silly exclamations, called minced oaths, were originally Bible-friendly alternatives to swearing. The idea was that if you shouted “Gadzooks!” instead of “God’s hooks!”—a reference to the nails from the Crucifixion—you could stub your toe without running afoul of the third commandment. Other minced oaths: gosh (“God”) jeez and jeepers (“Jesus”). “Gadzooks” dates back to at least the 1690s.


Till the cows come home



Clearly, this has to do with cattle 
curfews, right? It sort of does. Cows were often milked in their barns at night, making that task one of the 
last on a farmer’s to-do list (but let’s hope he wouldn’t wait forever 
to do the job, the way the phrase implies now). The expression has been around since at least the late 1500s and is likely to continue until … well, you know.

Published 5th April 2023 by Marissa Laliberte, Alison Caporimo and Jacopo Delia Quercia – Reader's Digest
https://www.rd.com/list/idiom-origins/

[Bluegreen]

LindemannFilmFotoDrohne



Bright Meteor April 8, 2026 11:46 p.m. Lower Saxony / Germany

(0:50)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=_3Wh-xLymVE

It took me a year and eight months to create this Hyperlapse

For this hyperlapse, I visited the Pestruper Gräberfeld near Wildeshausen three times a week. I took three photos per visit, taking three steps between each shot. By the time I finally returned to my starting point, exactly one year, eight months, and seven days had passed.

Published 12th April 2026 (1:28)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=vEe3xkQ_lxs

[Bluegreen]

Lighter Side

Aliens Gave Me Winning Lottery Numbers 3 Times!



This is kind of funny. The guy is totally sincere. And, who knows? Video consists primarily of a CBS News Pennsylvania report, with commentary from the hosts.

Published 18th April 2026 (16:13)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=VkCUWUTMXH8

[Bluegreen]

Lighter Side (cont'd)

The Best of "Spaceballs"



(9:53)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=AcY090XV284

The Best of Barbarella



(4:17)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=mivmJ-JyN9w

[Bluegreen]

300 Secret Historical Photos You Were Never Supposed to See



(1:02:33)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=KaOMnQzUhMg

[Bluegreen]

What This Photo Doesn't Show



This photograph, Three Young Farmers On Their Way To A Dance, was taken in Germany in 1914 by August Sander. Except, they weren't farmers ...

(9:39)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=3AVNhTi9pzM

[Bluegreen]

The Buddhist Story That May Change How You Spend the Next 60 Seconds



The Last Strawberry

A man was being chased by a tiger. He grabbed a vine over a cliff — and found a second tiger waiting below. This is the Buddhist story that reveals the only sane way to live when everything is falling apart.

(5:57)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=r5BhNzNAUuA

[Bluegreen]

Anton Petrov

Experiment Makes Something Move at 104% of Speed of Light!

The Darkness Inside

I'd be lying if I said I understood all of this, but the end result is certainly newsworthy.

Hello and welcome! My name is Anton and in this video, we will talk about an experiment that makes something move faster than light - the dark holes inside the light waves!

0:00 Challenging the fundamental rule about the speed of light 1:00 Why FTL should be impossible 2:50 New research - optical vortices (dark holes) 4:40 Breakthrough experiment and what was achieved 5:55 Main discoveries 6:30 No physics are broken 7:18 Why this matters 8:30 Physical applications? 9:30 Conclusions 10:00 What's next?

Published 23rd April 2026 (12:48)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=E1RVRB9X3H0

[Bluegreen]

The Trifid Nebula Highlights Hubble’s 36 Anniversary

April 24 marks the 36th anniversary of the Hubble Space Telescope’s launch





For the occasion, Hubble captured this shimmering region of star-formation – a close-up of the Trifid Nebula about 5,000 light-years from Earth – in intricate detail. The colors in this visible light image are reminiscent of an underwater scene filled with fine-grained sediments fluttering through the ocean’s depths.

Space Spark Episode 26: Image Highlights From Hubble's 36th Year



This Space Sparks episode highlights a variety of images that have been featured throughout Hubble's 36th year of operations.

Published 20th April 2026 (1:39)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=kipVdLhIZpc

[Bluegreen]

Constellation Leo




Leo the Lion and its easy to see backward question mark

Leo the Lion is one of the easiest of the 12 (13 with Ophiuchus) constellations of the zodiac to see.

First, you can start by finding the bright star Regulus. And then trace out a distinctive pattern of stars shaped like a backward question mark, known as the Sickle.

From a Northern Hemisphere perspective, the Lion is a fair-weather friend, springing into the early evening sky around the March equinox. While from the Southern Hemisphere, it’s a familiar constellation in the fall.

In fact, April and May are superb months for identifying Leo the Lion. That’s because this constellation becomes visible as soon as darkness falls and stays out until the wee hours of the morning. Remember, you are looking for a backward question mark pattern. Note that Leo’s brightest star, Regulus, is a sparkling blue-white beauty of a star, located at the bottom of the backward question mark. So, Regulus depicts The Lion’s Heart.




Even though the Sickle is the most obvious pattern in Leo, there’s another distinctive shape in Leo. That’s the triangle of stars in eastern Leo representing the Lion’s hindquarters and tail. The name of the brightest star of that triangle is Denebola, which stems from an Arabic term meaning the Lion’s Tail.

By around May 1, Leo reaches its high point for the night around 8 p.m. your local time (9 p.m. local daylight saving time). Also, in early May, the mighty Lion begins to set in the west around 2 a.m. local time (3 a.m. daylight saving time). By June, you’ll find Leo descending in the west in the evening.

Published 24th April 24 2026 by Bruce McClure – EarthSky.org
https://earthsky.org/constellations/...constellation/

[Bluegreen]

Teen Inventors Build Robot To Replant Burned Forests

Like many countries, Portugal has been experiencing increasingly hotter, drier weather. This has led to numerous massive wildfires. Since 2000, the country has lost about half of its forest cover to these blazes. More than 60 percent of these areas are on steep, dangerous slopes, making replanting difficult. Now, two teenagers have come up with an innovative solution — a tree-planting robot called Trovador.





Marta Bernardino and Sebastião Mendonça, both 19, grew up near Portugal’s capital, Lisbon.

They spent much of their childhood exploring the nearby woods. Dismayed to see them repeatedly scarred by fire, they decided to act.

In 2023, while still in high school, the two began building Trovador. The first prototype, made from recycled parts, cost just $17. Yet, it could plant saplings about 28 percent faster than humans. Even better, 9 out of 10 saplings planted by the robot survived.





The students' work quickly drew international recognition. In 2024, they were named finalists in National Geographic's Slingshot Challenge. They received $10,000 to continue improving their prototype. The following year, they became the youngest recipients of a European robotics award for sustainability.

Trovador is now a four‑legged, dog-shaped machine. It is being built with lightweight materials to avoid damaging the soil weakened by fires. The robot will be equipped with a number of cameras and sensors. This will enable it to navigate safely over steep, hard-to-reach slopes.

To improve the chances of tree growth, the robot will use artificial intelligence to check soil conditions before planting. A GPS system will allow the team to track the robot's location and progress in real time. Trovador will be able to work up to three hours on a single battery charge and plant up to 200 saplings per hour.

Published 2nd April 2026 by Hajar L. – Dogo News
https://www.dogonews.com/2026/4/2/te...burned-forests

[Bluegreen]

Africa is Splitting Apart

A Vast Rift Shaped by Moving Tectonic Plates





Eastern Africa's Turkana Rift is known both for its rich record of early human fossils and for intense volcanic activity driven by shifting tectonic plates. Now, scientists report that the crust beneath this region has thinned far more than previously understood, pointing to the long term breakup of the African continent and offering a fresh explanation for why so many ancient human remains were preserved there.

The findings were published in Nature Communications.

The Turkana Rift stretches roughly 500 kilometers across Kenya and Ethiopia and forms part of the larger East African Rift System. This massive system extends from the Afar Depression in northeastern Ethiopia all the way to Mozambique, separating the African tectonic plate from the Arabian and Somali plates. In the Turkana region, the African and Somali plates are slowly moving apart at about 4.7 millimeters per year.

As this separation occurs, a process called rifting stretches the crust sideways. The strain causes the surface to buckle and crack, allowing magma from deep within Earth to rise upward.

Not all rifts go on to split continents completely. In this case, however, the Turkana Rift appears to be on that path.

"We found that rifting in this zone is more advanced, and the crust is thinner, than anyone had recognized," says study lead author Christian Rowan, a Ph.D. student at Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, which is part of the Columbia Climate School. "Eastern Africa has progressed further in the rifting process than previously thought."

Published 25th April 25, 2026 by Columbia Climate School – Science Daily
https://www.sciencedaily.com/release...0424233204.htm

Kenya and the Giant Crack

From 2018.

(1:36)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Axjru6OPUc8

[Bluegreen]

'American Gothic' Models and Portrait

[Johnnycomelately]

Posted by Bluegreen (here)
Teen Inventors Build Robot To Replant Burned Forests

Like many countries, Portugal has been experiencing increasingly hotter, drier weather. This has led to numerous massive wildfires. Since 2000, the country has lost about half of its forest cover to these blazes. More than 60 percent of these areas are on steep, dangerous slopes, making replanting difficult. Now, two teenagers have come up with an innovative solution — a tree-planting robot called Trovador.





Marta Bernardino and Sebastião Mendonça, both 19, grew up near Portugal’s capital, Lisbon.

They spent much of their childhood exploring the nearby woods. Dismayed to see them repeatedly scarred by fire, they decided to act.

In 2023, while still in high school, the two began building Trovador. The first prototype, made from recycled parts, cost just $17. Yet, it could plant saplings about 28 percent faster than humans. Even better, 9 out of 10 saplings planted by the robot survived.





The students' work quickly drew international recognition. In 2024, they were named finalists in National Geographic's Slingshot Challenge. They received $10,000 to continue improving their prototype. The following year, they became the youngest recipients of a European robotics award for sustainability.

Trovador is now a four‑legged, dog-shaped machine. It is being built with lightweight materials to avoid damaging the soil weakened by fires. The robot will be equipped with a number of cameras and sensors. This will enable it to navigate safely over steep, hard-to-reach slopes.

To improve the chances of tree growth, the robot will use artificial intelligence to check soil conditions before planting. A GPS system will allow the team to track the robot's location and progress in real time. Trovador will be able to work up to three hours on a single battery charge and plant up to 200 saplings per hour.

Published 2nd April 2026 by Hajar L. – Dogo News
https://www.dogonews.com/2026/4/2/te...burned-forests

Robots might well be the treeplanters of the future, but imo they would be humanoids operating in the way that humans do it. Especially on steep, rough, obstructed terrains like those in Portugal.

I planted in the reforestation area “interior B.C.” (British Columbia Canada) for 8 years. Seasonal work, say 2 months “Spring Plant” at lower elevations, then a shorter “Summer” season at the higher cutblocks. Ground needs to be thawed, at our latitudes, and higher ground thaws out slower.

Difficult job, mentally and physically. Planters work for a reforestation contractor which is given all the parameters: spacing (min allowable between each), density (count of your seedlings within any circle of a defined radius), quality of each planting effort (root “plug” or “bare root” properly buried), specified micro-environment (light soil as opposed to clay, but has to not be dry surface stuff). All of these are formally checked (by “checkers’ from outside my employer), and if my “piece” of land fails, I have to “replant” it for free.

Anyways, here is a short vid (L=2:33) that says some basics about it. When I worked for one of my 4 or 5 planting companies, there was a fellow like this, older and more experienced, who was given his own blocks and worked alone. He had his big trailer, no tenting for him; word was, he had killed a Grizzly bear with a knife, which had killed one of his 2 dogs. That company was Nechako Reforestration, based in Prince George BC.

For anyone interested in treeplanting, or the history of that, the book “To Plant or Not to Plant” is an interesting read.


The Veteran Tree Planter - Tree Planting in B.C.

naturally:wood
4.12K subscribers

Jun 2, 2011

British Columbia, Canada is an international leader in sustainable forest management. In B.C., 200 million seedlings are planted per year. To date, B.C. has planted over 6 billion seedlings.

Guy Lacelle, a tree planter with more than two decades of experience in the trade, shares his personal story of why tree planting in B.C. was an important part of his life - he has since passed away.

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=o_hQnXNfns4

[ThePythonicCow]

Posted by Johnnycomelately (here)
word was, he had killed a Grizzly bear with a knife, which had killed one of his 2 dogs.

Don't mess with that guy ... nor his dogs ...

[Kryztian]

Images from a lost illustrated medieval book, even weirder than the Voynich Manuscript ?????












Alas, no, these are recent creations of A.I. I was asking it to create images of UFOs in the sky in the style of Dutch painter Hieronymus Bosch (1450 - 1516) and this is, to my great surprise, what I got.

Right clicking on the image should enlarge them.

[Bluegreen]

Big Flares with Eruption Eye Candy & A PanSTARRS Photobomb | Space Weather Spotlight

Space Weather Woman Tamitha Skov brings your space weather news.

Published 26th April 2026 (15:56)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=lNcaoB7be-k

As mentioned by Dr Skov:

COMET PANSTARRS, THE UNICORN: Over the weekend, Comet PanSTARRS (C/2025 R3) passed almost directly between Earth and the sun. We couldn't see it from Earth, but SOHO's C3 coronagraph had an excellent view. Here is the complete passage. Pay special attention to what happens near the end.





Just before the comet exits the field of view, it sprouts a second tail sticking out of its head. We slowed the animation to make it easier to catch.

The bright thick tail visible throughout the comet's transit is its dust tail. Comet dust is relatively heavy, so it is not easily blown away from the sun by radiation and solar wind. Thus, the dust tail tends to trace the comet's orbit.

The narrow plume emerging from the comet's head is not made of dust. It is the gaseous ion tail.

[Bluegreen]

Schoolyard Witnesses in Mass UFO Sighting Demand Answers | Australian Story

ABC News In-depth

On April 6, 1966, a Melbourne school was thrown into chaos when strange objects appeared in the sky. It remains the largest mass UFO sighting in Australian history, witnessed by more than a hundred students in broad daylight. Sixty years later, through the eyes of the now-adult witnesses, Australian Story examines the enduring impact of that day and the efforts to make sense of it that followed. The episode features new first-hand accounts and investigates several theories about what might have been behind the sightings.

Published 7th April 2026 (30:03)

Source: https://youtube.com/watch?v=IhKyQkhOfoM