Whale Falls

 It's no small feat for life to exist anywhere in the universe, yet in the most extreme of conditions we find thriving flora and fauna everywhere we look. In this instance, the abysmal depths of the seafloor holds a special -- albeit morbid -- place in my heart. 

Let's take a look at it. The ocean is divided into several layers of varying depth. Here's a diagram:

Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming...

Light only penetrates the first 800 or so meters, beyond that, the amount that filters through is insignificant in terms of supporting life. This diagram is a good diagram, but it doesn't show a few variations present in real life. For example, seafloor altitude is not constant worldwide, but rather can start as far up as the bathypelagic zone, although typically extends to the abyssopelagic zone. The hadalpelagic zone is where trenches in the seafloor are. 

While light goes down to almost 1000 meters down in some cases, the strength of the light is extremely weak. Light that can support photosynthesis only penetrates a meager 200 meters. 

Now, most animals and plants on the surface of the world are supported by photosynthesis, creating energy from sunlight. A cow will graze grass that lives off of their photosynthetic processes. All life stems from light, yet in the places in the world that have virtually no light -- such as the still support a litany of life-forms.

Down in the abyssopelagic zone, commonly referred to as the abyssal zone, creatures on the seafloor have special adaptations to live. One particular adaptation to life is living off of something called marine snow. 

A vampire squid swims amongst a flurry of marine snow, fragments of once-alive organisms.
Nature's way of saying, "memento mori"

Marine snow is a euphemism for a macabre form of sustenance deep-sea creatures thrive off of. Essentially, marine snow is the remnants of dead animals and plants, alongside other various materials like feces. Very pleasant. 

But marine snow is often composed of small pellets and flakes of organic material, derived from small organisms in the upper regions of the water column. What happens when something much larger, say, a whale, dies?

Oh, boy. Here we go.

Thar she blows!

When a whale dies, its body floats around the surface of the sea for a few hours up to a few days. Eventually, a whale's body will begin to sink to the bottom of the ocean. This is known as a whale fall.

The carcass of a whale will remain on the seafloor, and gradually get eaten by organisms and scavengers. Larger organisms such as crabs, giant isopods, and sharks will consume the flesh of the whale for up to two years! After all the meat has been stripped away, organisms will begin to break down the nutrients in the bones and whatever leftover meat is present, breaking down the lipids and forming bacterial mats, which in turn sustain and nourish other organisms like clams.
This entire process takes many years, building up a localized ecosystem around the dead whale.

Circle of life.

Fort Pumpkin

 I think I've found a suitable large-scale project to ensure the cycle of tedious accumulating resources isn't repeated: an island fortress.

By taking any medium-sized island, I could convert it into a walled-in fortress, I could have courtyards for trees, gardens for crops, regular pens for animals, and the occasional empty space or quarry for blocks. And of course, it being a fortress, a hill should serve as a base of operations, and have underground areas to retreat to in the event of an attack. In other words, if I decide ever to let any friends in, I'll have a safe space to stay while they inevitably raze the aboveground sections. 

After twelve or so worlds, I finally created one that spawned me on an island that wasn't too small or too close to mainland. I started off slow, because the large majority of the island is a prairie area, full of animals but not much wood and exposed minerals. Of course, it being an island, all the mobs decided to manifest aboveground, leading to several deaths and last stands in the water.

It's a good thing that endermen are hurt by water.

But this did have an upside, and as pictured above, I was able to get a hefty amount of carrots, potatoes, and bones for bonemeal to start off a rudimentary farm for food. I didn't want to slaughter what precious animal herds I have on the island, so using crops seemed like a good idea. The temporary farms are just behind the hill in the picture.

I set up shop in the aforementioned hill, and carved out a section to begin the bunker. 

Unpleasant proportions.

I think that the plan would be to have an underground section of storage, backup farms, and tunnels, a small inner courtyard for any pets I may acquire. The island did come with a herd of horses, after all. Alongside this, I'd wall in a good section of the island -- if not all of it, and make the island a home.

I've decided to christen the entire base Fort Pumpkin, as my spawn point was on a pumpkin patch. Speaking of it, pumpkins really are nice as a building block and a fun thing to use for pumpkin pies. I'll cap off this post with a screenshot of an enderman infiltrating the storage area -- sans storage.

Needless to say, he overstayed his welcome.

We'll see how far this world goes.

Tea and Biscuits

 Imagine this: a ship made of ice and wood shavings, able to regenerate itself by freezing sea water, one so grand that only the British could envision it. Welcome to Project Habakkuk. 

I bet if they added flags and dirt and claimed it as British soil and land, and they traveled around the world, the sun would really never truly set on the British Empire.

During the Second World War, Geoffrey Pyke devised a solution to fighting German U-boats in the Atlantic ocean, where Allied troops had little to no air cover. Pyke thought that an iceberg station in the Atlantic to help store aircraft and fight the German U-boats. Instead of ice, however, he invented a material called pykrete. Pykrete is made of around 14% sawdust and 86% ice, a 6:1 ratio. Pykrete is something like a biological concrete, and it was proposed for the Habakkuk because it can be maintained using seawater.

Wood shavings and water.

The Habakkuk would have giant coolers to maintain the pykrete hull of the ship, and since it would be fighting in seawater, the Habakkuk would have a virtually unlimited source of armor, as long as the Habakkuk didn't run out of power. 

The Habakkuk would not have main cannons, just machine guns. Its primary weapon would be its aircraft, since it was going to be an aircraft carrier. Sadly, the British Royal Navy never carried out their weird but wonderful idea due to a "lack of paper" and "paper needed in other industries", which sounds like an excuse to not build the most overpowered ship in the history of ships.

I wonder if they would have stores of tea and biscuits on board.

The Beginning?

 I am geared up for the fight against the Wither in my most advanced world. I chose a nice, flat area in a savanna relatively far from my house, and I started constructing a wither. I left my final set of tools (aside from my bow because I have another one with Flame and Infinity) in my ender chest and brought a diamond pickaxe (Efficiency IV, Fortune III, Unbreaking III), my older sword (Sharpness IV, Fire Aspect II, Unbreaking III, Knockback II), and my final bow with Power V, Unbreaking III, Flame, and Infinity. I repaired my armor a little (the helmet was wearing out) and gathered my materials:

Ender chest
4 pieces of soul sand
3 Wither skeleton skulls
Water bucket
5 golden apples
2 potions of Strength II
5 potions of Speed II
2 potions of Regeneration II
3 splash potions of Instant Health II
Diamond Pickaxe with Efficiency IV, Fortune III and Unbreaking III
The Feral Timekeeper (Sharpness IV, Fire Aspect II, Unbreaking III, Knockback II.)
Full set of diamond armor, all at around half durability
Stack of dirt
Stack of cobblestone
19 pieces of steak
Bow with Power V, Infinity, Flame and Unbreaking III
16 arrows
2 stacks of torches (not sure why I brought them, maybe to light up the whole place if it gets dark)



During the heat of the battle, I forgot to take any screenshots. But nothing too important was missed.

I died the first two times very easily, my aiming was horrible and the boss just hovered above me and struck projectile after projectile into my face, all the while making sounds that were reminiscent of dying whales. 

I lost my full set of diamond armor, my bow, and all the stuff I had with me. I spent some days making and enchanting a full new set of armor and a new sword and some more potions. I didn't have any more apples, so I left that section alone. This time, I was lucky enough to have a Smite IV enchantment on the sword. I made another Infinity, Power V, Flame and Unbreaking III bow but left that for later. I grabbed another bow, with Power IV, took 4 stacks of arrows and headed to where I last saw the Wither.

I sniped it down to half health from an extreme hills biome when it was in a roofed forest biome. Then I drank a potion of speed II and ran towards it, striking it with my sword. Luckily, it stayed directly in front of me and I was able to kill it using the sword. 

I probably would've died if it weren't for the Blast Protection IV diamond chestplate I was wearing.

Here is a screenshot of the Nether Star, hanging above my bed in my main base.

Quite a fight, that was.

New Territory

 I got bored of survival single player, so I went to the realms option and found that Hank's realm was expired. Okay. I'll be going on singleplayer more often now.

If Hank's stays expired, this may be the main Minecraft-related source of information for this blog. On the off hand, heres an update on the most advanced world:
I went mining for diamonds and returned with 58, allowing me to craft and then enchant a full set of diamond gear. 

I've finished my final set of tools, but I haven't gotten my final set of armor ready. Unbreaking III is a pain to get. To get rid of useless or low-level enchantments on the enchantment table, instead of crafting books to hold them, I just used stone or wooden tools. It's cheaper and works the same. Plus, I might even use them if I need to grind some dirt.

I was grinding experience for my final bow, and then I got two enchanted bows. I moved over to the cactus trash can, and I was about to throw the second one out when I saw that it had Infinity. It was nearly broken, so I used an anvil to meld that bow with my other bow. So now I have this:

Finally, I'll need to get one last wither skeleton skull from the nether so I can construct a wither and fight it. I hope it gives a lot of experience. I have a looting III sword, so that last part should be fine and done in about 20 minutes, maybe 30. I'll have to brew splash health potions and some golden apples. 

Encephalartos woodii

 

There has been a considerable hiatus since my last post. Heres a post about trees to keep you occupied.

E. Woodii has become one of my favorite plants. Being one of the rarest cycads on Earth (actually, the rarest), the population of E Woodii was once prosperous. In the times of Pangea, E. Woodii was more than 20% of the flora at the time! 

"...and I speak for the trees!"

The cycad can grow up to 6 meters in height, and the top layer of leaves make it look pretty damn awesome and prehistoric looking. Which is to say, a dumb observation since E. woodii has been around since the time of the dinosaurs. Also, the trunk looks similar to what one would expect a dinosaur's skin to look like: Scaly and rough, tough and dry. The story of the E. woodii goes:

It is 1895, and John Medley Wood (I would trade my name in a heartbeat for his) is wandering through dense bush. He parts some branches and sees a lone tree growing in a flat area, and approaches it. He likes it immensely, and when his ship arrives, he take a small portion of the tree to grow back at London in the Kew Gardens. Little does he know he just mutilated the last wild member of Encephalartos woodii. However, in the decades to come, Wood (oh my god, I love his name) sparked quite a good bit of conservation efforts. But despite multiple failed attempts to find a female E. woodii, people failed. E. woodii is dioecious, meaning it needs a male and a female in order to make a new tree. Sure, there are clones of the E. woodii, but they are all male. Sure, there are more cycads that resemble E. woodii, but they can't really mate. 

It's the loneliest tree on Earth. I hope not.

The only other members of the woodii family are a different species of cycad found in Africa. There are only two wild ones:

Poor things.

What a sad story of a plant. Lemme go water my bush.

Realms Gameplay

 Realms update: I went with Hank to the upper bedrock region of the nether to kill a Wither for a star so he could make a beacon. I stupidly decided to bring only 19 arrows, (And a Power I bow) no potions, not much food of good saturation (Bread) and nothing to heal me quickly like a golden apple.

 

Needless to say, I died and lost all my stuff. But the Wither kept on targeting me, even when Hank was dealing almost twice as much damage as me, the three-headed monstrosity kept with me like white on rice. Worst still, the boneheaded freak's skulls blew up the contents of my inventory. Damn. It's not like I had some really good stuff in there, but I will have to enchant my armor and tools again. Not much stuff was lost. 

In other news, a blaze farm has been set up in the nether! I spent some time farming levels and rods there before heading back up to the bedrock region of the nether, which I'll be calling, "The Icelands," because water freezes there.

The blaze farm

Hidey-hole for going AFK

I'm planning on building a house on the Icelands complete with a tree farm, wheat farm, and maybe some other farms. It'll be a pain to grow without water but it should be fine and pretty cool too.