BHL - Information for everyone

BHL
Biodiversity Heritage Library

 - a great web-site with free access to endless information.

Inspiring discovery through free access to biodiversity knowledge.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library works collaboratively to make biodiversity literature openly
available to the world as part of a global biodiversity community.

BHL also serves as the foundational literature component of the Encyclopedia of Life


Maybe you know it already for it was launched in 2005, but it has developed through time. It is really a good website. Books and material from all over the world and from various periods in time. Fantastic information. 

Have a good time !
Grethe B. 

Møns Klint and the Geocenter Møn

July 2013
On our way to Møns Klint we saw two cranes flying north. We have been searching for the cranes in North Jutland in the nature reserve in Thy last year, but saw no one. But here they were, high up in the air. Some very special birds.

Stege

Entrance to shop and café

citygate, Stege

in the coffeehouse

We came through the main town of the Møn-island, named Stege. The town has maintained its city gate from the Middle Ages.






 We had coffeee in a Coffeehouse established in the old pharmacy. The entrance was a gift shop with exotic things from Asia. The café, called Kaffehuset Møn, is furnished after Viennese model with the traditional darkbrown bentwood Viennese chairs and other Viennese furniture and Art Nouveau lamps. The waitresses were dressed in starched pure-white shirts and long skirts and long aprons. They even had an oldfashioned hairstyle. Nice and friendly service.

We discovered that this place was actually a micro roastery where they imported and roasted their coffee from all over the world. There was a very elegant coffee menu  with all those various coffees. "What coffee would  you prefer?" they asked.  The coffee was fantastic. The pastry was like being back in Vienna.



Møns Klint

Freuchens Pynt, seen from new boardwalk.

Freuchens Pynt

New Boardwalk, 2013

 Møns Klint

After this lovely and surprising experience we went on towards Møns Klint. A new boardwalk was built here and had just been opened by queen Margrethe. The boardwalk lead the public to a cliff called Freuchens Pynt which had not been accessible before. It was a quite new design which gave access for wheelchair users. Some have critisized it for damaging the nature, but IMO it is silly, for we have also built steps down to the beach and stairs up to the high section of the cliff several years ago. Where's the difference? The nature is there for us to see and explore. We have learned invaluable things about the "Birth of Denmark" through the examination of this amazing place around Møns Klint, and we can get all the information we wish for in the communication center Geocenter Møn, which opened on Store Klint in Klinteskoven in May 2007.


Geocenter Møns Klint

The plankton in the warm tropic ocean.

Ice cave.

The exhibition is constructed as a timetravel of 70 million years, where you are brought from the bottom of the chalky ocean and forward to the unique nature at Møns Klint today -  this happens via hightechnological exhibition-techniques, free interpretations of artists and rare fossiles. The exhibition is made up as a prehistoric and a contemporary section, a workshop, a climbing cave, a little cinema under the glacier and a 3D-cinema. The workshop is a working place, where children and adults can have exciting activities together with the nature supervisor. It is the most modern science-center in northern Europe.

dinosaur

A new special exhibition about the dinosaurs.
This new exhibition is based on the finds from a Danish expedition to Jameson Land in Greenland July 2012 and the finds from eight earlier expeditions to the same area made by Harvard University twenty years ago. When the Danes went on the expedition in 2012 it was the result of a good cooperation between Geocenter Møns Klint, Københavns Universitet, Geomuseum Faxe and Harvard University. Some extremely exciting fossiles were found, among other things a phytosaur, a crocodile-like beast, which had not been found in Greenland before. In the new special exhibition at Geocenter both the bones from the Harvard-expedition and the Danish expedition in 2012 have their world's premiere. And the dinosaurs are brought to life in the newest technology.

children's corner

playground

Beside the Geocenter is by the Danish Naturstyrelse (management) built a fine campsite with 4 shelters, tables and benches, fireplaces, toilet sheds etc. There is room for 30 people and it is free of charge to stay there. Downside the restaurant is also a children's playground with wooden models of some of the large fossiles. 

map of Møns Klint from 1900./wikipedia

Møns Klint in 2007/ stig b.nielsen,naturplan.dk

Møns Klint is a beautiful landmark along the eastern coast of the Danish island of Møn in the Baltic Sea.The cliffs and adjacent park are now protected as a nature reserve. The dramatic steep cliff is an experience, but also the forest and the open areas offer an exciting nature, the place is especially known for the many fine orchids. Møns Klint is the highest cliff in Denmark and is at the same time a unique biotope - or rather a collection of biotopes.





The look of the klint is still changing caused by degradation. It is usually possible to walk along the cliff in all its extension, although occassional slippage creates natural hindrance. It is at your own risk to walk there. Several signposted circuits provide opportunities for walkers, riders and cyclists to discover the surroundings.


Møns Klint consists of the high chalk deposits from the end of the Cretaceous period about 75 million years ago. The chalk (in Danish called "skrivekridt" because of its usability) consists of the shells from plankton from the wam tropic oceans of the Cretaceous period. Glacials have pushed these chalk-layers up from the sea during the Ice Ages, creating the high cliffs at Møn, but also Stevns Klint at the eastern part of Zealand. In the chalk-layer are incredible lots of remains from prehistoric lesser marine animals. On the beach it is possible to find the fossiled back shield of octopus and spikes from sea urchins. It is easy to find fossiles of mussles, oysters and other shellfish

.

model of a slippage

There have been many large cliffslides through the years. In 1994 was a large slide at "Dronningestolen"  and a French tourist was killed. Erosion caused one of the highest points on the cliffs, the "Sommerspiret", to fall into the sea in 1998, and in January 2007, there was an even larger landslide around the Store Taler, in the northern part of the cliffs, creating a 300-m long peninsula of chalk and fallen trees stretching out into the sea below

the Peregrine Falcon

In recent years, the Peregrine Falcon, the fastest of all birds as it swoops down to its prey at 350 km/h, has been breeding on Møns Klint.

( Report 2013: 6 pairs, of which 5 pairs with chicks).  And the extremely rare Large Blue butterfly (Maculinea arion) can also be found in the area.

Large Blue butterfly, foto: g.bachmann 2013

photo 2007/2013: grethe bachmann

photo 2007: stig bachmann nielsen, naturplan.dk

2013: wikipedia

A Little Nonsense now and then...........

 .............is cherished by the wisest men.
Roald Dahl.



Funny Car Insurance Claims.

1. Three women were talking to each other and when two stepped back and one stepped forward I had to have an accident.

2. A bull was standing near and a fly must have tickled him because he gored my car.

3.  One wheel went into a ditch. My foot jumped from brake to accelerator pedal, leapt across the road to the other side and jumped into the trunk of a tree.

4. The water in my radiator accidentally froze at 12 midnight.

5. I was taking a friend home and keeping two yards from each lamp post which were in a straight line. Unfortunately, there was a bend in the road bringing the right-hand lamp post in line with the other and of course I landed in a ditch.

6. Coming home I drove into the wrong house and collided with a tree I haven't got.

7. I can't give details of the accident as I was somewhat concussed at the time.

8. I blew my horn but it would not work as it was stolen.

9. I left my car unattended for a minute, and whether by accident or design it ran away..

10. I was proceeding along the road at moderate speed when another car rushed out of a side turning and turned upside down in a ditch. It was his fault as he said.

11  I started to slow down but the traffic was more stationary than I thought.

12. A car drove away at speed catching our client who went up in the air and his head went through the windscreen and then rolled off at the traffic lights a good few feet away. The car then sped off and miraculously our client remained conscious and managed to cross the road.

13. I started to turn and it was at this point I noticed a camel and an elephant tethered at the verge. This distraction caused me to lose concentration and hit a bollard.


14. Three men approached me from the minibus. I thought they were coming to apologise. Two of the men grabbed hold of me by the arms, and the first slapped me several times across the face. I knee' d the man in the groin, but didn't connect properly, so I kicked him in the shin.

15. I was going at about 70 or 80 mph when my girlfriend on the pillion reached over and grabbed my testicles so I lost control..


16. Mr. X is in hospital and says I can use his car and take his wife while he is there. What shall I do about it?

17. I knew the dog was possessive about the car but I would not have asked her to drive it if I had thought there was any risk.'

18. Q: Do you engage in motorcycling, hunting or any other pastimes of a hazardous nature?
A: I watch the Lottery Show and listen to Terry Wogan.

19. First car stopped suddenly, second car hit first car and a haggis ran into the rear of second car.

20..'Windscreen broken. Cause unknown. Probably Voodoo.

21. The car in front hit the pedestrian but he got up so I hit him again.

22. We had completed the turn and had just straightened the car when Miss X put her foot down hard and headed for the ladies' loo.

23. I had been driving for 40 years when I fell asleep at the wheel and had an accident.

24. I pulled away from the side of the road, glanced at my mother-in-law and headed over the embankment.

Painkilling Food

Autumn in the Forest.

Now we are once again on our way to autumn and a lovely colour palette - a sunny day in October with the cool fresh air is healing and medicine for the soul. It's getting colder in the night hours and the house feels chilly, we begin to heat up our home - first a little and then a litte more. If we've got some physical weaknesses, they might tease our poor delicate bodies before winter comes. I've heard that we'll get a tough winter this year. They don't know for real, do they?
 
Here are a few natural "remedies", which might help you to ease your pain and strengthen your body, if you've got....


..... sore joints: try ginger and rosehip. Both are known for easing the osteoarthritis and other problems of the joints. There are substances in ginger which imitate aspirin, used in painkilling tablets. Rosehip is antibacterial and is fx used against rheumatoid arthritis.

..... migraine: try oily fish. The Omega-3 fatty acids in the fish help heart and blood vessels, so that the circulation functions in the best possible way. Oily fish also works anti-inflammatory = it diminishes inflammation, and according to research it eases pain in neck and shoulders.

 .....muscular pain:  try cherries. They contain substances which can block the muscular pain in the same way as some medicines. Studies of long distance runners show that they get less pain in the muscles, if they drink cherry juice before running.

.....stomach pain: try bananas (green are best) and cranberries. The bananas contain pectin, which forms a protective film around the stomach mucosa. The cranberry juice has shown that it is able to eradicate a part of the bacteria causing gastric ulcer.

.....headache: try coffee. Caffeine has an adstringent effect on the blood vessels, which have expanded,when our head hurts. But don't drink too much coffee, this might have the opposite effect!

 ..... bloated stomach : try yoghurt with live bacterial culture. The yoghurt keeps a balance in the intestinal bacterias and ease both stomach ache and the bloated feeling.




And now we can all go out enjoying the fresh October air..... 

 

Source September 2013: Ugebladet Søndag, News about your Health, Vivi Ahlström/ Marianne Arnvig, scientist professor Charlotte Erlanson-Albertsson. 


photo Moesgård forest: grethe bachmann