Author: David

This nightmarish parasitic isopod lives in the mouth of fish, replacing their tongues and feasting on their blood. These isopods live in the mouths of fish rent free. Image source: MrMiracle27 While we at Earthly Mission have previously covered some truly creepy marine creatures, such as the Atlantic wolffish, or the sarcastic fringehead, the tongue-eating louse may top it all off when it comes to creepiness. The Cymothoa exigua, or the tongue-eating louse, is an isopod (a group of animals, which also includes crabs and shrimp) that spends most of its life inside the mouths of different fish. They are known to remove the tongue,…

Stretching from Arctic to the southeast coast of the island of Newfoundland, Iceberg Alley is the perfect spot for iceberg viewing – even from your kitchen window, while cooking the local staple ‘Jiggs dinner’. A 150 ft. Iceberg passing through Iceberg Alley near Twillingate, Newfoundland, Canada. Photo: Doreen Dalley If you live in Canada’s Iceberg Alley, you will never be short of icebergs to view. And in the spring, when the sea ice around them melts, they’ll look even more spectacular. The icebergs come from even further up north, mostly from Greenland, where chunks of glaciers tend to break off…

In the abandoned village of Houtouwan, China, visitors get a first-hand experience of how nature is taking back what is hers. This abandoned Chinese village has been abandoned for decades. Image credit: Nuno Luciano Shengsi Island is a tiny island in the Pacific Ocean, east of Shanghai, where you can find one of the most amazing ghost towns in the world, overgrown by blankets of green vegetation. On this island, which belongs to the chain of 400 islands next to the coastal province of Zhejiang, you can find the abandoned Houtouwan village. Even though it has become an eerie ghost town,…

While the SS Ayrfield was once a proud steam cargo ship, even used in World War II, its decaying shipwreck now stands as the famous Floating Forest of Homebush Bay. The Floating Forest is one of Homebush Bay’s signature landmarks. Image credit: Marc Dalmulder Homebush Bay is located on the south bank of the Parramatta River, in Sydney, Australia. The Bay and its surrounding became a huge industrial area in the 20th century, which resulted in massive land reclamation. As the industrial activities had scaled down, the Bay became a dumping ground for waste, broken-up ships, and toxic industrial waste. During…

GAIMON Although he tried to attack the Straw Hat Pirates at first, Gaimon ends up making friends with them after telling them about his past, and they tried to help him get the treasure chests he had been wishing for. However, with the chests empty, Luffy asked him to join his crew, but Gaimon declined the invitation to stay with the animals. TAMA Tama and Luffy had a heartfelt relationship early on in the Wano arc and bonded further through their mutual relationship with Ace. There were a lot of parallels between what Ace wanted to do for Tama (and…

10 – DONQUIXOTE DOFLAMINGO Donquixote Doflamingo is the captain of the Donquixote Pirates, a former Shichibukai, the most influential underworld broker under the codename “Joker”, and is a former World Noble of the Donquixote Family descent. He is 41 years old.Doflamingo ate the Ito Ito no Mi, a Paramecia-type Devil Fruit which grants him the ability to create and manipulate strings. He usually moves his fingers accordingly to bend them as he pleases for either manipulating people like puppets or bifurcating his targets. The strings are extremely thin and some may even be invisible, making it almost impossible to notice and avoid them.Using…

Kuma is a character that is key to the current events of One Piece. The Egghead Island arc is heavily centered around him and his importance to the overarching plot and, with each passing chapter, Oda has been revealing bits about him through either his daughter, Jewelry Bonney, or through him directly. While Kuma has been involved in a big chunk of the ongoing arc, his life still remains to be a big mystery to the fans. There is very little that Oda has made known about Kuma and whatever fans know is also very obscure at this point in time. That said,…

History is gearing up for the premiere of their new UFO reality show Unidentified: Inside America’s UFO Investigation. It airs this Friday, May 31 after Ancient Aliens. The show has already generated a ton of press, and the show cast members were key in influencing the Navy to take a closer look at UFO reports, as reported in Politico by Unidentified cast member Bryan Bender. Bender’s article, and a new article in the New York Times that includes witness testimony from Navy pilots, has hit the media by storm. Now, in the middle of the media fervor, History has released these clips of interviews with some of those…

In October 2017 a curious post appeared on the facebook page of ‘Art Bell’s Midnight In The Desert Feat Heather Wade’. It showed an apparent daylight scene of a ‘UFO’ in the desert with a helicopter hovering overhead. The text to accompany the photo read: “I’ve been holding on to these pictures for 10 years and it’s time I showed someone. I took pictures of this thing in July 2007 on out radar test range in the Mojave Desert. I’ve always been nervous to show anyone but here you go.” My curiosity peeked I dropped the post of this message…

The Baltic Sea Anomaly refers to interpretations of an indistinct sonar image taken in June 2011 by Peter Lindberg, Dennis Åsberg, and their Swedish treasure hunter group named “Ocean X.” It was discovered on the floor of the Northern Baltic Sea at the center of the Bothnian Sea. For its strange appearance, the Baltic Sea Anomaly has caused debates on what it could be. The Baltic Sea Anomaly is a still-unknown object deep in the Baltic Sea, which, some say, could be a pre-Ice Age artifact or Nazi anti-submarine device. Oddly, divers’ electrical equipment stops functioning within 650 feet of…

Extraterrestrials from another dimension began visiting a young boy in 1942. These visitors imparted wisdom and guidance to the boy to prepare him to become a great prophet. When he became a man, the extraterrestrials permitted him to snap photographs and record video of their spaceships. And they even whisked him away on time-traveling adventures. At least that is how Billy Meier tells the story of his life. The case of Eduard Albert “Billy” Meier is one of the most well-known and controversial cases in ufology. Meier claims to have personally interacted with multiple extraterrestrials during his life, taken more…

The unexpected find is way larger than any other known colony of fish nests found so far. The ice babies in the nests may soon get their own marine protected area. Image credit: Alfred Wegener Institute, PS124 OFOBS Team The fact that we know less about the ocean floor than we do about the surface of the Moon doesn’t make this incredible find any less surprising. Five hundred meters below the ice covering the south of Antarctica’s Weddell Sea, a research team recently discovered the world’s largest fish breeding site known to date. According to a new study published in Current…

The cassowary is regarded as one of the most dangerous birds on the planet. But what exactly makes this large flightless bird so deadly? The cassowary is the third largest bird on the planet. It is thought to be the most dangerous one, though. Image credit: Brian Gratwicke Cassowary is a type of flightless bird (ratite) that belongs to the order of Casuariiformes. These long-legged, large birds are cousins to the emus and have 3 subspecies, the most common being the southern cassowary (Casuarius casuarius). It’s much taller than the other two, the northern cassowary and the dwarf cassowary, and it’s…

The extremely well-camouflaged mata mata turtle dresses like a piece of bark with spiky ridged scales, and sucks in prey by creating a vacuum. And it appears to be always smiling. With its disproportionately large head and elongated thick neck, the mata mata looks a bit odd, but always smiles nevertheless. Image credit: Per Se One of the largest freshwater turtles (their shell can grow to nearly 45 centimeters or 1.5 feet, and weigh about 17 kilograms or 38 pounds), the mata mata is a rather strange-looking animal, at least by human standards. It has a disproportionately large head and elongated…

This giant living fossil is definitely not your average salamander. The length of the giant Chinese salamander can reach almost 2 meters (6 ft). Image credit: Petr Hamerník The Chinese giant salamander (Andrias davidianus) is one of the largest and most unique species of salamanders in the world. Native to central and eastern China, this species can grow up to 1.8 meters (almost 6 ft) in length and weigh almost 60 kg (130 lb), making it the largest extant amphibian on the planet. Historically, Chinese giant salamanders were believed to be a single species, but recent research differentiated three distinct species from southern,…

Yes, it exists. And it still exists, even though the volcano erupted a few years ago. The tiny little island of Vulcan Point in the Philippines is the world’s largest island within a lake (Crater Lake) that is situated on an island (Volcano Island, or Taal Island) located in a lake (Lake Taal) within an island (Luzon). It also happens to be one of the cones of the active Taal Volcano, so Vulcan Point is also the world’s largest volcano in a lake (Main Crater Lake) on a volcano (Taal Volcano). Crater Lake also happens to be the largest lake…

For the first time ever, we are able to observe the formation of an “ice finger of death” through some breathtaking footage. These days it’s rare to uncover a phenomenon completely new to science, one that expands our knowledge of the world in unique and wondrous ways. But just as it happened in the past few years with uncontacted tribes, unseen caves, and sea beasts, the forming of Antarctic brinicles – also known as “ice fingers of death” – was recently introduced to armchair adventurers in the form of some breathtaking footage. Brinicles are otherworldly, finger-like structures that reach down…

When flowers look like flowers, we mostly appreciate their presence, but sometimes they can trick us. Especially when they take on the form of other creatures of Nature, a white dove, a dancing girl, even a naked man… Here are some of weirdest-looking flowers on earth that resemble something (or somebody) else. Naked-man orchid (Orchzis Italica) Source Photo: Luis nunes alberto Naked Man Orchids, also known as Hanging Man Orchids, are native to the Mediterranean and resemble tiny little hanging naked men, right down to every last detail. They come in different sizes (as usual with naked men) and usually range in…

Also known as the Pub Tree, the massive baobab had a circumference of over 108 feet, with its tangle of branches soaring to almost 75 feet. Sunland Baobab Tree, Limpopo. Photo: South African Tourism The Sunland Big Baobab was naturally split into two separate trunk-like chunks that were nevertheless connected. Each had cavernous hollows inside that were connected by a passage. These huge hollows in baoabs begin to form after a tree reaches one thousand years of age. In the Big Baobab this has resulted in wonderful caverns and caves. The stunning baoab tree became a popular tourist attraction when back…

Devil Fruits are mystical fruits found throughout the world that, when consumed, provide the eater a special ability, depending on the type and variation of the Fruit itself. Devil Fruits are the origins of the powers of some of the strongest people in the current generation of One Piece World, including Rookie Pirate Crews, Marine Admirals, Shichibukai, and at least two Yonko(Marshall D. Teach and Charlotte Linlin). All Devil Fruit are categorized into three types/classes: Paramecia, Zoan and Logia. Certain Devil Fruits are noted to be “unique” or “special”, even for their respective classes. Let’s have a look at them: #Goro…

Before he becomes the world’s greatest swordsman, Zoro needs to have a real sword fight. By that, I mean a fight determined by the quickness and subtlety of the blade. I understand that Haki attacks that cut ships and cliffs are cool. But what I would love to see is a fight where every stroke of the blade can dismember limbs or necks, where Zoro barely dodges a thrust and responds with a slice that his opponent paries at just the right time. Throughout the series, Zoro’s fights have demonstrated his strength, resolve, and power. His swordsmanship, however has only…

One piece 1075 proved to be a chapter that no fan of the story would have been able to predict. This chapter saw Oda at his very best when it comes to setting up expectations for fans in a particular direction and completely misleading them. Previously, fans were led to believe that someone is actively working against Dr. Vegapunk and the Straw Hat Pirates on Egghead Island. This week’s chapter focused heavily on the identity of this traitor and thankfully, this mystery was finally solved towards the end. Along with that, fans also got to see an unlikely team-up, all of which made One…

Archaeologists have uncovered an ancient, forgotten city in Ethiopia once thought to be the home of giants. The discovery reveals important new information about the origins of international trade and Islam between the 10th and early 15th centuries. This is the first evidence that proves Eastern Ethiopia was well connected with the Gulf, Egypt, and India hundreds of years ago and highlights how skilled artisans traded with communities worldwide and lived alongside people from different areas around the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea. A dig in Harlan, Eastern Ethiopia, has revealed a 12th-century mosque, evidence of Islamic burials and…

Scientists have made a significant discovery in Ganzhou City in China’s southern Jiangxi Province. They’ve found the remains of a dinosaur sitting on its nest of fossilized eggs. The dinosaur, an oviraptorosaur (oviraptor), belongs to a group of bird-like theropod dinosaurs that peaked during the distant Cretaceous Period (145 to 66 million years ago). The adult oviraptor’s fossils and the embryos’ eggs have been dated to roughly 70 million years old. This is the first time researchers have found a non-avian dinosaur sitting on a nest of eggs that have been fossilized, so they still contain the babies inside! The…