Liz Langley

The "ballooning" or "parachuting" spiders known as Gossamer spiders fly on threads of silk, reaching heights of up to 2.5 miles up in the mountains. Find out how they use static electricity to get where they're going in How Do Spiders Fly? Mystery Solved on National Geographic. My favorite thing about writing this story was that the study author included long quotes of Charles Darwin's accounts of his encounters with the spiders and his theories about how they worked. It was so exciting to read about how scientists today investigate theories of scientists past, especially the most famous naturalist of all. These spinnerets that put out spider silk have a charge, part of how ballooning spiders fly

Listen for me at 4:32 pm on 90.7 FM WMFE Orlando for CF events this weekend. It's a museum weekend with a science museum, an art museum and an arts & sciences museum as a bridge between the two bringing the event highlights of the weekend. First is Science Night Live tomorrow at the  Orlando Science Center  featuring "Penguins 3-D" and a discussion of "The Archeology of Sex,", then Swingin' With the Smithsonian Jr. at the Museum of Arts & Sciences in Daytona , the New Smyrna Beach Jazz Festival (not at a museum, I kno, but a big event!) and the Foosaner Museum in Melbourne's "Art of Conservation(ism)" featuring the works of environmental artists Clyde Butcher and Earl H. Reed. Enjoy!

I deft you not to fall in love with that face. That's a red uakari monkey - looks kind of like an embarrassed costume character who came to work without his head piece one day, right? He's one of the remarkable creatures in Nature's Bald-Headed and Hairless Animals , my latest post on National Geographic.  I always learn a lot from writing these pieces and one of my favorite parts of this one was getting to spend time studying and watching videos this fantastic little monkeys (and they are quite small) and their (and our) kin, the chimpanzees: the ones in this piece have alopecia, a type of hair loss that effects humans but is decidedly more noticeable in chimps, in whom we don't usually expect that kind of thing. Enjoy the story and  when you're done there another must-click " Toad Eats Bat ," by NatGeo's Christine Dell'Amore, certainly a candidate for Weirdest & Wildest pic of the month!

Some animals are just as awesome as humans at masquerading as or adopting traits of the opposite gender and like us some of them switch it altogether, though with considerably less fanfare. And though they never do it to music , some, like this spectacular parrot fish, do wear it beautifully. Here's my latest on National Geographic, five Gender Bending animals, good enough to fool their public.

Sometimes the best defense is a good offense, a strategy well known to these  5 Animals With Stinky Defenses , my latest story on National Geographic. Nope, the people who think crystals make good deodorant (they do not) are not on the list.

Teach your dog new tricks! That's some of the very real advice from the experts in my latest NatGeo piece Do Animals Get Dementia? How to Help Your Aging Pet about cognitive dysfunction, not only in dogs and cats but some observation on animals in the wild as well.

On Friday the 13th Superstition IS the way! I was born on a Friday the 13th (whether this turns out to be lucky for me or anyone else is still a matter of conjecture) so I have a special fondness for the date and got to write about some  animal superstitions you might not have known about (or might have forgotten about for National Geographic . You won't find any black cats here (well, maybe just one little one....) (And yes, Iit's the 14th now....I'm only a day late....you have no idea how many dollars short I am....) AND if you really have triskadekaphilia  check out why other people don't in Why Does Friday the13th Scare Us So Much ?  also on NG.

Wave Hi to Lola the six-clawed lobster currently residing in the Maine State Aquarium. Lola was on display briefly and I felt lucky not only to get to do a story on her unique appendage but to talk to the Maine State Aquarium manager just as she was getting pulled off  display. Read the story and find out why - How Did Odd Lobster Get Six Claws? - and go check out all the other great stories on NatGeo!

We rely on science for just about every aspect of our daily lives, from our phones to our cars to the machine you're reading this on, but a lot of us don't take the time to understand it. It's often presented to us so dryly it's a wonder our devices don't crack like desert pavement. Thankfully when I was a kid we had things like National Geographic specials and later Carl Sagan's Cosmos to teach us the wonders of the world and worlds beyond in a way that made us feel like we might actually be part of it. Today one of our great science communicators is Dr. Michio Kaku , whose simple eloquence can make complex stuff like string theory   not only relatable but interesting enough that you might actually want to know more. Dr. Kaku will be at Rollins College Thursday September 12,  at 7:30 pm, a presentation of the Winter Park Institute and I hope lots of people will come out and see him in person. Please check out the WP institute for information on other gue

Certainly humans have body parts with multiple uses. We use our hands to touch, to signal, even to literally speak. We use our tongues to taste, talk and mostly importantly, become really good kissers. Here are some other amazing animals and insects who have found more than one use for their body parts - Singing Penis, hearing feet, among nature's repurposed body parts - on National Geographic. I have to add that when I did the story 7 Demonic Creatures - about animals that looked like they came straight from hell - I actually found the creatures quite beautiful though my photo editor said some of them would give her nightmares. On this round, though, that star-nosed mole....EEEEEEEEEEKKK! I'm sure it's a wonderful mole, good to its mother and a pillar of its community but there's something about that nose that makes me want to leave it at the door of the SyFy network, ring the bell and run. They could make it a star.

Things I love about blogging for NatGeo #49394: that it's my job to find things like this, the monkey-face orchid. There were numerous websites that said it was a fake, but I spoke to Ron McHatton at the American Orchid Society who give me the scoop and helped out a great deal getting this story " Two-Faced Animals: Masters of Deception" up on the blog. Click to see the rest of these amazing animals and all the other brilliant stuff on NatGeo this weekend!

Well, it happens to the best of us sometimes. Typically I post every Friday what's going to be on WMFE's  ' What's Hot in Central Florida  - I've done it every weekend for almost two years now - and this week I forgot to 'publish,' so the post sat in 'draft' all weekend. Damn! Hopefully though, you caught ton-air segment and since two of the events are on-going I hope you'll check them out! First up at the  Anita Wooten Gallery at Valencia Community College  the show 'Graphic Guts," featuring the power-packed poster art of Luba Lukova will run through September 27.  Pinupalooza  was a one-dayer (mark your calendar for next year?) and don't miss Neil Simon's The  Gingerbread Lady  at WP's Breakthrough Theatre.  If you're a movie person you know that play as Only When I Laugh . I mention this in case my friend Steven - last sighted somewhere in the area of New England several years ago- reads this. :) I love you, S

I'm kind of in love with this peanut-headed bug....and all the other creatures I had the pleasure of spending time with online while researching Masters of Deception: Two-Faced Animals for National Geographic's "Weird & Wild" blog. Click the link for the fish that makes you confused as to whether it's coming or going, a smiling spider and an orchid that looks like a monkey. And of course little peanut-head here! A face only a mother could love (or a science blogger...)

As of 9/3/13 I'm officially a contributor to National Geographic's  Weird & Wild  section! Here's a screen shot....see there, to the right of the lemur, just above the savannah monitor? I'm on the list! You know how sometimes you think what's the best thing that could happen to you and then something better happens? This was the day. Can't wait to get to work! Update: Here's my latest post: Masters of Deception: 5 'Two-Faced' Species  Go check out these amazing animals (like that happy face spider, left)!