HMS Beagle Awarded "Coolest Business in K.C." for 2nd Year

We just received notification that H.M.S. Beagle was awarded the "Coo;est Business in Kansas City" for the 2^nd year in a row. The award is given out by KC Magazine. We will once again be tooting our own horn for the next year. Thank you KC Magazine, the editors and publisher.

Vertebrate Fossils in the U.S.

All:

I am a member of the Association of Applied Paleontological Sciences, and I am hoping to find support amoung the readers of this blog for help in defeating or removing a provision that was wedged into the recent Omnibus Land Management Act of 2009 in front of Congress. Please read on:

As you may have heard, the Omnibus Land Management Act 2009 was defeated in the House on Wednesday. This act is not part of the stimulus program, nor is it a spending bill. It will adversely affect those of us who hunt, collect, trade and sell vertebrate fossils outside of an academic setting. Just because the House of Representatives defeated it for now, our work is far from over. It will be presented again, as early as next week, and it is imperative that we contact those Representatives that voted Yes and inform them of the big problems with the Paleontological Resources Preservation Act (PRPA), a very small part of this 1000+ page bill. I'm pretty confident that most of the folks in Congress have not read this entire bill and are voting based on the small part of it they want to see passed. That's no excuse and we need to help them be responsible stewards of our country. Tracie Bennitt of Triebold Paleontology, Inc. was personally able to change the vote of her representative in Colorado, Doug Lamborn, by showing him the problems with this bill. Please take action NOW and contact your representative. Here are some talking points for your call, fax, email or letter.

S22 Subtitle D (page 495 of 1248) PRPA Highlights:
The bill requires a federal permit for fossil collecting on federal lands; there is NO exception for casual collectors and permit is still required, and without one a casual collector will be subject to the penalties outlined below:
It requires that ALL vertebrate fossils found on federal lands are the property of the U.S. Government.
Establishes civil and criminal penalties for some fossil activities that are quite commonplace. Local boy scouts and college students could be arrested.
The criminal penalties are felonies in some situations. Child abusers and rapists get off easier than this! And for picking up a fossil?
The federal government is given the powers of asset forfeiture for vehicles, equipment, and fossils collected in violations of these new restrictions.
The bill also contains a provision to condemn private land with funds seized under this act. Your personal property could be taken if the government thinks it's in their best interest! (See United States Code Chapter 44 Title 18) This is in the gray area and we all know how the government can operate in the gray.
Locality data will not be released. This is against all scientific principles of sharing knowledge.
There are still no provisions for the sale of fossils by commercial dealers. You can grind them up into gravel, but not collect and sell them. There has never been an opportunity for commercial collectors to come to the table to present reasonable alternatives for collecting, although the Secretary of the Interior instructed all interested parties, academic, amateur, professional and government to sit down and map this out.
The direct effect of PRPA will be to exclude the majority of those who are currently collecting fossils on federal lands from being able to do so. This will reduce the fossils available for museums and classrooms. The vast majority of amateurs are not operating for profit. Those of us that are will continue to be unable to collect on federal lands. You can get a permit for just about anything else, forest products, wildlife, gas and oil, timber harvest, mining etc. but not to collect fossils. One can even get a permit to go onto federal lands (= public lands) to dig up rocks and crush them into gravel for profit The academic community cannot collect them all and would rather see them turn to dust than show up in a private collection or pay fair market value for someone else collecting it.

So, I urge you to act today. We did make a difference on this vote, but next time round they only need half to pass. Please help.
Now is the time to write your local federal representatives, and let them know where you stand on the bill. Most congressmen have a toll free number listed in your phone book, and on their web sites.

If your not sure how to contact you representative, follow this link; http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102503382295&e=001HBcfHdc5woMJC96tz0phuMrwo1i697R4fr2gdWWL0Iv3oOoDx68_zOwjOfCp5FfCV0v_69WEhdQRNnnz4mhaKuc7vIxNvkv7t_LdVdGdFZ17NNLdp64C6OYGepj-uMPT
Senate votes - see Colorado
http://rs6.net/tn.jsp?et=1102503382295&e=001HBcfHdc5woPfNrjV_dHCvM_TFmyvYcNqohFBNeVwDV4s2Gl6TpsTsat3gTGcC301hxBByqVi49KBTSVdkNrApm4NBQ9qF11x_zDMuYHI9B3rZNMRWVHrbMOaU7sKzc67Dy7lA-Z2I8ym_ZbdBJ0k5bmOceoxYs4G
House Votes -- by member names: Lamborn, Coffman, Markey, Salazar, Polis, DeGette, Perlmutter
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2009/roll117.xml

Thanks to Tracie Bennitt of Triebold Paleontology, Inc. for preparring the bulk of this posting. I hope you will help in this endeavour and contact your representatives. If you do so by e-mail please c.c. (or b.c.) me at jfk@hms-beagle.com.

==JFK==

member AAPS

EuroTool lapidary & jewelry working tools

By the time you read this post we will be awaiting our first shipment of EuroTool tools and equipment for lapidarists, jewelers and hobbyists. This will be another line from a local, Kansas City area, company, and they join Garmin, Donnegan, Ken-a-Vision, and Midland Radio as the lines we carry that are made in our area.

Very soon now these new items wil be on our shelves and in our on-line catalog.

==JFK==

Correcting an error...

This past Saturday we had the last monthly session for our Science Club members in the 4th through 8th grade on Charles Darwin. During that session I misspoke and created an error that, I am sure. led to a misunderstanding of my point about relatedness among species. My point was intended to be about the well-known cichlid fishes (Family: Cichlidae) of Lake Victoria in East Africa. Prior to the 1980's there were known to be several hundred species of small, mostly in-shore cichlids in the lake. By that time, however, the introduction of the Nile perch (Lates niloticus) had started to take a noticeable toll on the endemic fishes and their total numbers as well as the number of species began to drastically disappear.

This kicked in high gear a world-wide effort to stop the species loss, and the Victorial Species Survival Plan (VSSP) was instituted whereby zoos and aquariums and private individuals were to hold in captivity, for the purposes of captive breeding, select species whose offspring would them be reintroduced into the lake.

Studies of the genetics of a group of fourteen, obviously distinct, species of these colorful fishes led to the discovery that there were fewer genetic differents among those fourteen species than there were (are) between any two individual humans, and all humans are of the same species!

My error came about when I substituted the word more for the word fewer.

==JFK==

No More Copernican Theory

I received official warning today from Cardinal Bellarmine that I am not to teach or defend the Copernican Theory whereby the Earth moves around the Sun.

--Galilei
26 Feb 1616

Yay! No Moon!

This is a great weekend for observing as the light of the moon won't be washing out all the deep sky objects.

Starting in the solar system, though, we can observe Venus in the southwest after sunset. It's the brighter-than-any-star star-like object. Just about any telescope will show you what phase Venus is in.

Around midnight Saturn is high in the sky. It's hanging around the back legs of Leo right now. It's a fairly bright star-like object, a little cream-colored. Just about any telescope will show you the rings around Saturn. But this year the rings are nearly edge-on, so look for a thin line or ring around the planet.

A little later than Saturn, this year's bright comet (so far), Comet Lulin, is still brightening. From a dark location, I've read, you can see the comet with the unaided-eye. Lulin will be brightest the night of 23-24. Will it be bright enough to see with the unaided-eye from Parkville?

This is the time of year for observing open clusters. On Taurus' back is the Seven Sisters, or the Plieades. To the unaided-eye it looks like a very tiny Little Dipper. In even the smallest of 'scopes it looks like a swarm of stars.

North of Orion in the constellations of Gemini and Auriga are four of my favorite star clusters, all of them Messier objects (so they're fairly bright). M35 in Gemini is a star cluster I call the Soccer Ball because it sits at the feet of Castor, one of the twins of Gemini. Three clusters lie right in a row northwest of M35. These are M36, 37, 38 all in southeastern Auriga. A small to modest-sized 'scope will bring all of these into view.

Clear skies and enjoy.

Our Telescope

About 10 months ago a rumor came to our ears that a spyglass had been made by a certain Dutchman by means of which visible objects, although far removed from the eye of the observer, were distinctly perceived as though nearby. About this truly wonderful effect some accounts were spread abroad, to which some gave credence while others denied them. The rumor was confirmed to me a few days later by a letter from Paris from the noble Frenchman Jacques Badovere. This finally caused me to apply myself totally to investigating the principles and figuring out the means by which I might arrive at the invention of a similar instrument, which I achieved shortly afterward on the basis of the science of refraction. And first I prepared a lead tube in whose ends I fitted two glasses, both plane on one side while the other side of one was spherically convex and of the other concave. Then, applying my eye to the concave glass, I saw objects satisfactorily large and close. Indeed, they appeared three thimes closer and nine times larger than when observed with natural vision only. Afterward I made another more perfect one for myself that showed objects more than sixty times larger. Finally, sparing no labor or expense, I progressed so far that I constructed for myself an instrument so excellent that things seen through it appear about a thousand times larger and more than thirty times closer than when observed with the natural faculty only. It would be entirely superfluous to enumerate how many and how great the advantages of this instrument are on land and at sea. But having dismissed earthly things, I applied myself to explorations of the heavens. And first I looked at the Moon from so close that it was scarcely two terrestrial diameters distant. Next, with incredible delight I frequently observed the stars, fixed as well as wandering, and as I saw their huge number I began to think of, and at last discovered, a method whereby I could measure the distances between them. In this matter, it behooves all those who wish to make such observations to be forewarned. For it is neccessary first that they prepare a most accurate glass that shows objects brightly, distincly, and not veiled by any obscurity, and second that it multiply them at least four hundred times and show them twenty times closer. For if it is not an instrument such as that, one will try in vain to see all the things observed in the heavens by us and enumerated in further "blogs." Indeed, in order that anyone may, with little trouble, make himself more certain about the magnificatoin of the instrument, let him draw two circles or two squares on paper, one of which is four hundred times larger than the other, which will be the case when the larger diameter is twenty times the length of the other diameter. He will then observe from afar both sheets fixed to the same wall, the smaller one with one eye applied to the glass and the larger one with the other, naked eye. This can easily be done with both eyes open at the same time. Both figures will then appear of the same size if the instrument multiplies objects according to the desired proportion. Now let us review the observations made by us during the past 2 months, inviting all lovers of true philosophy to the start of truly great contemplation....

-- Galilei

(Translated by Albert Van Helden, University of Chicago Press, 1989)