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Beauty in everything

Category Archive: Nature

The Jewel Box Star cluster

The Jewel Box Star cluster

The Jewel Box Star cluster

The Jewel Box Star cluster. The Jewel Box (NGC 4755 at 7,500 light years) in the Southern Hemisphere is one of the youngest known open clusters, about 20 light years across with 198 stars. The stars from Earth are exceptionally beautiful with colors varying from red and yellow, to the more common blue-white with a number of luminous B-type giant stars and a red super giant star. It is also situated near the dark nebula called the Coal Sack. A planet orbiting one of the member stars would have a night sky blazing in brightness with hundreds of stars brighter than Venus or Jupiter at their most brilliant. Several stars may even exceed the brightness of the full moon if we were close enough. These would appear as a dazzling red and several blue stars. The Jewel Box is one of the finest objects in the southern sky.
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Beautiful Scarlet Red Animals

Scarlet ibis. Beautiful Scarlet Red Animals

Scarlet ibis. Beautiful Scarlet Red Animals

Beautiful Scarlet Red Animals

A typical habitat of Scarlet Ibis is marshy areas and rainy tropical forests of South America, as well as the Caribbean islands. Red or scarlet ibis is a medium-sized bird, most known for its bright color of plumage. Also, it is one of the 2 national birds of the Republic of Trinidad and Tabago.
Traditionally, Red color symbolizes much from love and blood to boldness and sacrifice. Also, red color plays an important role in nature. In particular, such color among animals and plants usually warns others about the danger and calls for the outsiders to stay at a distance. However, people on the contrary most often find plants and animals of red color extremely attractive and try to decorate their homes with it. By the way, red, or “krasny” in Slavic cultures means beautiful.
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Keukenhof the world’s largest flower garden

Keukenhof the world's largest flower garden

Resembling a paradise, Keukenhof the world’s largest flower garden

Keukenhof the world’s largest flower garden. Keukenhof, known as the Garden of Europe, is situated near small town of Lisse, the Netherlands. Approximately seven million flower bulbs are planted annually in the park, which covers an area of 32 hectares. Keukenhof is open annually from the last week in March to mid-May. The best time to view the tulips is around mid-April, depending on the weather. The garden was established in 1949 by the mayor of Lisse. The idea was to present a flower exhibit where growers from all over the Netherlands and Europe could show off their hybrids – and help the Dutch export industry (the Netherlands is the world’s largest exporter of flowers). Keukenhof has been the world’s largest flower garden for over fifty years.
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Realistic flowers knitted by Tatyana Yanishevsky

Tiger Lily, 2011. Realistic flowers knitted by Tatyana Yanishevsky

Tiger Lily, 2011. Realistic flowers knitted by Tatyana Yanishevsky

Realistic flowers knitted by Tatyana Yanishevsky, talented self-taught American artist, born in the Soviet Union. Biologist by education (Brown University), Tatyana Yanishevsky reproduces anatomically correct botanical forms created out of yarn, in her studio in Providence, Rhode Island. Her featured artwork “The Knit Garden” includes hand-knitted flowers and plants, created in a variety of fibers, colors, and stitches. The reality of knitted plants is seen in various organs of the plant, and the knitting process, stitch by stitch, conceptually mimics plant growth. And, her sculptures vary – in scale and range, in form and style, and from realistic to abstract. As a matter of fact, these beautiful realistic knitted flowers is a result of the deep knowledge of the subject. Besides, the artist taught herself how to knit, dissected flowers and studied their anatomy in textbooks and greenhouses. As Tatyana Yanishevsky says, “It was a knitting challenge to create those forms, to have them be three-dimensional and puffed out where they needed to be”.
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Bear Soldier Wojtek

Bear Soldier Wojtek

A cub, future Bear Soldier Wojtek

Bear Soldier Wojtek
Every year, World War II, one of the most difficult trials that humanity faced in the twentieth century, becomes the thing of the past. It seems, we know almost everything about its battles, remember its heroes. At the Great War everything happened – joy and pain, happiness and tears. There were heavy losses and unexpected returns, unique military operations and unusual soldiers. One of them was Bear Soldier Wojtek, about whom this post is.
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Snowflake photographer Alexey Kljatov

Snowflake photographer Alexey Kljatov

Snowflake photographer Alexey Kljatov

Snowflake photographer Alexey Kljatov.
First of all, almost all snowflakes are unique. Moscow based photographer Alexey Kljatov uses homemade tools for fixing stunning closeups of snowflakes. Of course, the definition ‘homemade tools’ is slightly exaggerated, but still, the idea is created by Alexey. Alexey Kljatov takes pictures of snowflakes right on his balcony. As components of the installation, he uses his camera Canon A650, lens Helios 44M -5 from the old brand of Soviet camera ‘Zenith’, a little scotch, a piece of glass and wooden bar. Snowflakes turn out to look really beautiful, with ideal geometrical shapes. It’s amazing, but there are no two identical snowflakes.
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Konigssee the cleanest lake in Germany

Konigssee the cleanest lake in Germany

(In fact, the first picture in this post published in 2013 mistakenly features Armensee, the lake in Switzerland). Konigssee the cleanest lake in Germany

Konigssee the cleanest lake in Germany
Undoubtedly, beautiful natural lake Konigssee is the cleanest lake in Germany. Located in the southeast Berchtesgadener Land district, Bavaria, Konigssee is near the border with Austria. Most of the lake is within the Berchtesgaden National Park. Surrounded by rock walls, high mountains, such as Watzmann massif in the west, the lake creates an unusual clear echo. In particular, as if a trumpeter plays along with the returning sounds, so it sounds like as many as 7 multiple players. Of course, the effect attracts tourists, who come here on boats. Besides, it has become a tradition to play a flugelhorn or trumpet to demonstrate the echo. To save the cleanness of the lake, only electric-motor-powered ships, pedal boats, and rowing have been permitted since 1909.
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Seven-colored bird Paradise Tanager

Seven-colored bird Paradise Tanager

Natural wonder – Seven-colored bird Paradise Tanager

Beautiful seven-colored bird Paradise Tanager
At home, in tropical rain forests to the east and north of the Amazon basin, Paradise Tanager (Latin: Tangara Chilensis) is more commonly known as the “seven-colored bird”. And this perfectly matches its bright plumage shimmering with different shades. Nature, painting feathers of a paradise Tanagra was generous for colors. A head decorated with light green, almost neon feathers, belly – dark, turning into turquoise, tail and wings draw attention with fantastic yellow. Lower back of paradise Tanagra has bright-red color, and the upper part of the wings and tail – black.
Externally, males and females of paradise Tanagra do not differ from each other and to determine which of them is male or female is possible by observing their behavior – males are more melodious and, of course, do not lay eggs.
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Water is the driving force of all nature

Water is the driving force of all nature. GIF by Dutch photographer Marinus

Water is the driving force of all nature. GIF by Dutch photographer Marinus

According to Leonardo da Vinci, Water is the driving force of all nature.
28-year-old Dutch photographer Marinus posts amazing animated images of beautiful landscapes in his blog titled “Head like an orange”. The water in his photos is not frozen, it flows, clouds float, car rides, and the stars are falling. Because of this it seems that the images are not in front of you, but a real cut-out piece of nature. The concept of “live” photos have become a part of our lives, becoming ever more popular. At first, only a small part of the animated GIF-image, but the technology is improving, and photographers working in engineering of cinemagraphy improve the quality of it.
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