A lot of water under the bridge<\/p>\n
Kiss, Andrea et al. \u201cCascading continental-scale floods across Europe in 1342\u20131343.\u201d Nature.<\/a><\/p>\n In the summer of 1342, central Europe was devastated by the Magdalena Flood, one of the worst natural disasters of the medieval period. This brutal deluge killed thousands of people, wiped out whole villages, and spread economic turmoil and disease. Its frightening depths are recorded by high watermarks on some buildings in Germany, which are often over 20 feet above ground, a sobering reminder of the horrible event.<\/p>\n Now, scientists have discovered that this catastrophe was part of a series of 16 major floods that swept over Europe from 1342 to 1343, many of which have been overlooked or forgotten. By poring over contemporary sources from the time such as chronicles, annals, administrative records, and correspondence, the team reconstructed the timing and intensity of this period.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is\u2026surprising that, out of the 16 events described here, only the Magdalena Flood survived in public memory,\u201d said researchers led by Andrea Kiss of the Vienna University of Technology.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis may be because it was the first time in the German areas when numerous flood marks and memorial plaques were mounted by local authorities and as a community effort and warning on the walls of iconic buildings whereas, for example, no flood marks were set for the Candlemas Flood in Prague,\u201d they continued. \u201cThe establishment of such material markers has been shown to play a crucial role in shaping long-term risk awareness and collective memory.\u201d<\/p>\n Extreme weather events, including floods, are becoming more frequent and intense due to climate change. Hopefully, these historic watermarks will not be surpassed by future floods, but the team warned that \u201csequences of very large floods, more extreme than those in recent decades, are possible and may occur again\u201d and that current flood management is \u201cnot necessarily prepared for such sequences.\u201d<\/p>\n As I\u2019ve noted before<\/a>, any study based on historical documents is likely to have a banger supplementary materials section, and this one is no exception<\/a>. The authors pulled together dozens of accounts from people who endured these challenging times with entries that bear witness to submerged castles and towns, and expose the search for meaning in the aftermath. Some blame the stars, or unbalanced elements, or \u201cthe sins\/ungratefulness of people\u201d (always a classic).<\/p>\n \u201cPeople barely escaped in the uppest parts of houses; but many people and animals died, as they could not \u2013 had no time \u2013 run to the hills,\u201d reads one eerie fragment, translated from Latin and written in Magdeburg in 1342.<\/p>\n At least the survivors had time to recover and rebuild, because we all know nothing else bad happened in Europe in the 1340s. Oh wait.<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n In other news\u2026<\/p>\n The Polyfroggic Spree<\/p>\n Hemingway, Claire T. et al. \u201cChoice overload constrains mate choice independent of energetic masking.\u201d iScience.<\/a><\/p>\n Thanks to the surge of interest in Homer\u2019s Odyssey, we all know what a problem it can be when too many suitors occupy too small a space. It turns out that this is also a real-world issue for female frogs, who can experience \u201cchoice overload\u201d when confronted with a cacophony of different male mating calls at once, according to a new study.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cDuring a breeding season, males gather in dense choruses, sometimes numbering in the hundreds and often including multiple species, where males call to attract females and deter rivals,\u201d said researchers led by Claire Hemingway of the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. \u00a0 \u201cThese advertising calls can be remarkably loud, reaching a peak sound pressure level (SPL) of up to 108 dB at 50 centimeters.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s quite an earful. How\u2019s a frogette supposed to find her prince in the noise? To answer that question, the researchers placed a series of female Cope’s gray treefrogs (Hyla chrysoscelis) in a small enclosure and serenaded them with recorded male calls from speakers in different locations. Females prefer longer calls, and hoped toward those sounds when fewer calls were played at once. But they became unable to identify the extended songs as more voices were added to the choir.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe found that as the number of calling males increased, receivers became less likely to choose the preferred target signal, took longer to decide, and became more likely to defer their decision,\u201d the team said. \u201cTogether, these findings provide support that choice overload exerted a strong influence on female decision-making.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Time to tap into the frog dating market. An app called Ribbit? I\u2019m spitballing here.<\/p>\n Total recall (mouse version)<\/p>\nThe high water mark at the “Packhof” in Hannoversch M\u00fcnden memorializing the St. Mary Magdalene’s flood in 1342. Image: Axel Hindemith\u00a0<\/p>\n
Cope\u2019s gray treefrogs mate in \u201camplexus\u201d position. Image: Jessie Tanner<\/p>\n