Not everyone thinks bugs are cute… but what about their babies?! Just like their vertebrate counterparts, baby bugs will often elicit an “awwwwwww!” Many of the residents of the Cockrell Butterfly Center’s insect zoo were bred and raised in-house (especially Orthoptera and Phasmida). Eggs are collected and incubated until tiny little babies hatch out. Their […]
Editor’s Note: Look to the skies as HMNS Astronomer James Wooten explains the sky happenings for the month of September, including the highly anticipated postponement of the Artemis I launch. Jupiter is up literally all night long this month. Look for it low in the east at nightfall. Opposition (when Sun, Earth, and Jupiter are […]
Most reading this are familiar with the life cycle of a butterfly. An egg is laid on its host plant, the egg hatches into a caterpillar, the caterpillar eats the plant, the caterpillar forms a chrysalis, and then an adult butterfly emerges to continue the cycle. It’s easy to think of the plants in this […]
Editor’s Note: Look to the skies as HMNS Astronomer James Wooten explains the sky happenings for the month of August, including the Perseid Meteor Shower. Saturn is up literally all night long this month. Look for it low in the southeast at nightfall. Venus remains in the morning sky this month. Venus outshines everything […]
The plant cart in the museum is a great place to find some interesting plants and Greenhouse Manager Soni Holladay has curated a list of what you may want to grab on your next trip to the HMNS Museum Store. We regularly stock the cart with blooming annuals and perennials that feed pollinators like native […]
Editor’s Note: HMNS Astronomer James Wooten shines a light on the July 2022 sky happenings. Venus remains in the morning sky this month. Venus outshines everything except the Sun and the Moon, so you can try to find it low in the east at dawn. Venus remains a ‘morning star’ for most of 2022. Mars […]
It’s fitting that as director Paul Phelan speaks to us from the windswept, idyllic west coast of Ireland, decompressing with his family between film projects, one of his children will soon leave the nest. “Sea Lions: Life by a Whisker,” his newest nature film showing inside the Houston Museum of Natural Science’s Wortham Giant Screen […]
At least once a week, David Temple receives a breathless message about an oddly-shaped rock or stony object some individual came across in their backyard or while on a nature hike. Almost everyone thinks they have found a priceless paleontological artifact that will change their lives forever. Sorry, but it’s not a dinosaur egg. As […]
Editor’s Note: Each month, the astronomers of the Burke Baker Planetarium shed starlight on the night’s sky happenings. Take note of what’s out there for June 2022. Venus remains in the morning sky this month. Venus outshines everything except the Sun and the Moon, so you can try to find it low in the east […]
What do you get when you combine the talents of executive producer Jon Favreau, naturalist Sir David Attenborough, composer Hans Zimmer, and the power of prehistoric life in ultra-high-definition? Why, Apple TV’s newest series, “Prehistoric Planet”, which has unfolded this week on the streaming service in five parts. One early review from CNN applauded the […]
