“While vision did play an important role in the understanding of both the macaroni as a phenomenon and the pleasure garden as a space, to focus on vision, to the exclusion of other senses and embodiment, is to miss an important means of understanding both macaronis and pleasure gardens. We must understand the pleasure gardens […]
Tag: odor
The smell of macaroni [part 2]
Q. How do Macaroni penguins smell? A. Pretty bad. For example, Lindeboom [1984] estimated that 220 kg NH3-N was volatilized daily from a rookery on Subantarctic Marion Island occupied by 350000 macaroni penguins, and reported that the odor was apparent up to 10 km from the source. More details can be found here. Previous article: […]
The smell of macaroni [part 1: snakes]
Q. Are garter snakes attracted to the smell of macaroni? A. Probably not, in general – though things can change dramatically if it’s coated in frog skin mucus. The picture shows a checkered garter snake (Thamnophis marcianus) enthusiastically attacking a macarono which has a light coating of frog skin mucus sauce. See:Identification and Characterization of […]
Like sound-cancelling headphones, kinda sorta, for odors
If you know how noise-cancelling headphones work, you may have wondered whether the same kind of technical trick — producing your own vibrations that exactly cancel out the “noise” vibrations — might somehow work with smells. Twin-brother scientists Kush and Lav Varshney spent some time noodling on that notion. (Thanks to Martin Gardiner for telling me about the […]