Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

Everyday we eat foods laden with harmful chemicals, pesticides, bacteria, antibiotics, steroids and other cancer-causing agents.

Today’’s photographs and entry are courtesy of Douglas Justice, the garden’’s Curator of Collections. – Daniel

This pine is a favourite of mine, being both exuberant in growth and delicate in overall effect. Himalayan pine produces long, relatively soft needles in fascicles of five on long, shoots that retain their smooth silvery sheen for many years. See the Wikipedia entry and the page at conifers.org for more information. The blue-green of its needles, the shape of its cones and the regular, whorled branching is somewhat typical of white-pines (compare with Pinus strobus, Pinus monticola and Pinus flexilis), but its crown is broad, at least in the cultivated material I”ve seen. According to Keith Rushforth (Conifers, Christopher Helm, London, 1987), nearly all of the soft pines (Section Strobus) “do not like exposure.” In the David C. Lam Asian Garden, the Pinus wallichiana pictured is sheltered on a southeast-facing hillside with a variety of other exotics under mature Abies grandis (grand fir).

VanDusen Botanical Garden (Vancouver’’s other botanical garden) also has a collection of Pinus wallichiana in its Sino-Himalayan Garden, and like ours, the trees are of unknown provenance. Sometime in 1981, I was working at Massot Nurseries, a large wholesaler in Richmond, BC (just south of Vancouver). One of my duties as a shipper was alternate truck driver, and one day I had occasion to deliver a load of these Himalayan pines (now in #5 pots) to the still developing VanDusen Garden. The plants had originally been grown at Hybrid Nurseries, a forest seedling grower, whose owner at the time, Bruce Morton, was interested in disseminating exotic conifers around the Vancouver area. At VanDusen, I met a kindred spirit in Gerald Gibbens, the gardener for the Sino-Himalayan Garden at VanDusen. Gerry had recently returned from an internship at Windsor Great Park and was still high on the experience, which he explained in some detail as we unloaded the pines. Ten years later, Gerry made it possible for me to intern at Windsor-a seminal experience for me. Windsor was not only a way to ease myself out of the nursery industry, but it was my starting point on the road to a career in public horticulture. What a great tree!

By:  Daniel Mosquin                        Source

Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

The Department of Energy has seeded the nanoscale sciences and technologies. This visualization depicts the growth of its collaborations over time.

Looks Like video gamers are on their way to being the dominant market for high-end audio and video components according to a report conducted by Nielsen Research Group (NRG), in partnership with THX. CEPro reports that gamers have more multi-channel audio and HDTV hardware than consumer electronic manufacturers realize. This makes them a key marketing and growth area for future audio and video hardware development.

The study was conducted with several hundred X-Box 360, Playstation 3 and Wii owners from the top 20 markets across the United States. Way to show the influence of the $40 billion dollar gaming industry on HDTV and audio components.

By:  Tripple                        Source

Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

New windows 7 OS. Expected to be launched by the end of 2009.

Online reviews of services are becoming more important even for off line purchases.

That was the findings of a study that was posted by the My Venture Pad Blog. Even for off line purchases, more and more people are looking to reviews on line before making their purchasing decision.

What does this mean for you? Make sure that your customers are happy and when you get a customer compliment tell them you would appreciate them putting in a good word for you.

The better you take care of customers while you are dealing with them one on one, the more likely you will have good reviews at the various sites. If you see a bad review I would email the person (if it’s available) and see what you can do to make it up to them and maybe they will change it.

Some people will be impossible to please and will put up negative things just to spite you, but if you treat all your customers to the best of your abilities you will have positive reviews and the one or two negatives will be taken in context.

It all comes down to treating your customers to the best of your abilities.

By:  John Dornoff                        Source

Chinese Mitten Crab

Help.

The Crippen household is under attack.

I called the council, but they laughed.

First, some details. At the back of the house there is a river. Not a big one, but big enough to canoe upon. The river is currently higher than I have ever seen it but we are not in danger of being flooded. I really believe that. Honest.

We are nowhere near the coast.

At the front of the house there is a main road and, across from that, a park. The garage is at the front of the house. In front of the garage there is a drain which, when the river is high, gets back flow.

The back door of the kitchen opens into the garage.

There is a Chinese restaurant half a mile away down the road. That may be relevant.

Over the last three days, when we open the door between the kitchen and the garage, we have found crabs on the garage floor. About half a dozen so far. They are about six inches in diameter. They seem to be attracted to the light under the door for they are always close but, as soon as the door is opened, they scurry away, usually under the washing machine.

I am, for an adult, absurdly nervous about what my mother would call “creepy crawlies”. I do not scream because I am a man - but the temptation is there. The children are much amused. They rescue the crabs and put them in the river. But still they keep coming. Not from the river side of the house, but from the garage/park/main road side of the house. Maybe from the drain.

Odd.

Naturally, I have consulted Google. I think they are Chinese Mitten Crabs
In the right conditions, the mitten crab multiplies and spreads at an astonishing rate. The crab can even leave the water, cross dry land and enter a new river system. Its phenomenal ability to disperse is of concern to scientists in the UK because the crab could infiltrate many of the country’’s rivers.Oh dear.

But then I see that:
The crab is a famous delicacy in Shanghai cuisine and is prized for the female crab’’s ovaries. (source)
I could not contemplate cooking and eating these crabs. It would be aesthetically impossible. And yet I have three lobsters in the freezer that I caught last week in Anglesey. When it comes to cuisine, there are no absolutes.

Maybe I should get the children to take the crabs down to the Chinese restaurant where they might be appreciated.

But I still do not understand why they have taken residence in my garage.Labels: crabs

By:  Dr John Crippen                        Source

Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

A fantastic new gadget, an electronic puzzle, wich will never bore you!

Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

Samsung and LG have signed on with Verizon’s Vcast service to bring live television to your cell phone. No details yet on price or when it will be available.

Direktlink zum Video auf Youtube

In this segment, Dr. Isaac Eliaz exposes the growing dangers of plastic packaging. Each year in the United States, nearly 90 million plastic bottles are purchased, burdening both the environment and your health. Certain chemicals contained in these plastic containers—including bisphenol-A (BPA) and polyvinyl chloride (PVC)—act as xenoestrogens, or substances that mimic estrogen in the body. They seep into your beverages during normal use, and are especially potent at high temperatures. These substances can disrupt crucial antioxidant and DNA activity, as well as interrupt the normal functioning of the endocrine system. This influence has dangerous consequences, ultimately heightening the risk of cancer in adults, and contributing to developmental problems in infants and young children. To minimize damage to both the planet and your health, you should switch to glass or stainless steel bottles and containers, which can be safely re-used by everyone in the family.