Tabla de contenidos para February 2023 en National Geographic Magazine

IN WESTERN SLOVENIA, two hours from Ljubljana, the Soča River cuts through the hills around a cluster of storybook villages, in a region where the Julian Alps meet the Italian border. But on this late winter morning, a parade of monsters is gathering on the outskirts of the town of Ukanje (pictured above). It’s part of Pust (pronounced Poost), Slovenia’s version of Carnival, with roots in pre-Christian ritual. This traditional pre-Lenten celebration has evolved and adapted through the centuries, at times in response to church leaders and, in later years, a socialist regime. But it has always retained its spirit of seasonal rebirth. Today Pust is one of Slovenia’s biggest cultural events. Festivalgoers dress up in elaborate, handmade costumes and masks, some wearing belts of cowbells that clatter as they…

A CACOPHONY OF barking alerts me to the cardboard box delivered to my front door. Packed inside is a single sheet of white corrugated plastic folded into what looks like a large suitcase. My canine companions take a curious sniff as I unfurl the rigid form, which spans nearly the width of my living room. Pushing outward on the creases of one side, I hear a shockingly loud pop. The dogs sprint for cover, scrambling across wood floors, while I frantically look for damage, heart pounding. But nothing’s broken. Instead, the plastic suitcase has transformed, and suddenly a full-size kayak is sitting in my living room. The boat, created by the company Oru Kayak, is part of a scientific and technological revolution inspired by the centuries-old art of origami. What…

On an overcast Saturday morning in Iwase, a sleepy port district on the lip of Toyama Bay on Japan’s largest island, the streets are deserted until the appointed hour approaches. An elderly woman pokes her head out of her doorway and peers down the main thoroughfare lined with traditional low-slung wooden buildings. Another advances gingerly along a narrow side lane. A few minutes later, two tiny trucks trundle up and roll to a stop. The area suddenly springs to life. Five orange-vested workers emerge and bustle about, setting up traffic cones, handing out shopping baskets, and apologizing profusely for shifting the Tokushimaru mobile grocery a few feet from its usual spot. They ferry groceries from the first truck to the second, which efficiently morphs into a miniaturized shop with fold-out…

FERNANDO G. BAPTISTA, CHRISTINE FELLENZ, AND EVE CONANT, NGM STAFF. MESA SCHUMACHER SOURCES: JAMES BODKIN, BIOLOGIST EMERITUS, U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY, ALASKA SCIENCE CENTER; RANDALL DAVIS, TEXAS A&M UNIVERSITY SURFACE SLEEPING In kelp forests, sea otters cling to seaweed as an anchor to avoid drifting while they sleep. COAT CARE It takes regular grooming to maintain an insulating and buoyant layer of air in dense otter fur. STAYING ON TOP Sea otters conserve energy because they float; river otters must swim to remain at the surface. TOOL TRICKS Sea otters use rocks to dislodge prey, then swim to the surface to smash shells and eat their catch. OCEAN NEWCOMERS Whales and seals developed blubber for warmth over tens of millions of years. Sea otters evolved only within the past three million…

WHO A former biologist who focuses on natural history and wildlife conservation WHERE Outside of Tena, Ecuador WHAT Sony Alpha 7R III with a 50mm lens and two external flashes When Aznar traveled to the Ecuadorian Amazon, he expected to find abundant and diverse wildlife. “A lot of species were new to me,” he recalls. But this “unreal” animal was a special surprise. During a night hike, Aznar came across many frogs and bugs—and then the spiny devil katydid, which stopped him in his tracks. Using his macro lens and flashes that eliminated the background, he captured this portrait of the creature, a ferocious predator of other insects but a seemingly willing subject. National Geographic is the most popular brand on Instagram, with more than 324 million followers. This page…

BEYOND THE BEACH From a perch above Favela Santa Marta, photographer Wayne Lawrence captured this image of Rio de Janeiro, which stretches along the Atlantic Ocean and Guanabara Bay. While Brazil’s second largest city is famed for its lively beaches—Ipanema, Copacabana—it also has more than a thousand rock-climbing routes, making it an excellent urban destination for the sport. RIO ROCKS Across this sprawling city of nearly seven million people, mountains punctuate the landscape; towering cliffs overlook cerulean waters and sleek edifices. The rock around Rio, primarily granite and gneiss, draws adventurers of all experience levels for adrenaline-fueled ascents year-round. CLASSIC CLIMB Among the many peaks, Sugarloaf, at right, sticks out like a soaring thumb. To reach its summit, most visitors opt for an easy cable car ride, but others dare…

SPACE EXPLORATION Space missions need structures that are lightweight and versatile, compact during transport, and large once deployed. Origami-inspired space tools have grown to include antennas, photovoltaic arrays, sun shields, and solar sails. Starshade exoplanet exploration A starshade would fly between a telescope and a distant star, blocking the star’s light so that orbiting exoplanets could be seen and studied for signs of life. The starshade, folded to fit within a 16-foot-wide launch vehicle, would grow to about the size of half a football field once fully extended. The inner disk when deployed is much like a bicycle wheel: An outer truss is supported by spokes tensioned against a center hub. A motor unfurls a folded optical shield 65 feet in diameter. Flying in tandem with a space telescope, the…

CATCHING UP FAST Other countries are also aging quickly, particularly high-income ones in Europe and East Asia. South Korea is growing older at an accelerated pace; the proportion of its population that’s elderly could surpass Japan’s by 2046. HOW JAPAN GOT SO OLD Leading in longevity Healthy habits, along with advanced health care, help extend Japan’s average life span nearly 12 years past the world’s. Life expectancy at birth Years Births below the benchmark Since 1974, Japan’s fertility rate has been less than 2.1 children per woman, the level needed to sustain a country’s population. Fertility rate Children per woman Limited immigration Experts say xenophobia and strict requirements lower Japan’s admission rate for immigrants compared with other high-income countries. Net migration rate Migrations per 1,000 population* PAST ITS PEAK A…

ON A MID-MAY MORNING IN THE VILLAGE OF KOUMI, BURKINA FASO, SANON MOUSA HAS NEARLY FINISHED ANNUAL MAINTENANCE ON HIS THREE-ROOM HOUSE. He replaced termite-ridden roof supports with freshly cut beams and reinforced the heat-defying mud walls, some of which are a yard thick and more than a hundred years old. After replenishing the roof thatch and sacrificing a goat to the memory of his ancestors, all that remains is applying layers of rainproofing to the exterior. “The mud will keep us cool. The motor oil, clay, and cow dung will keep us dry,” Mousa says as we tour his living space, which is a good 25 degrees cooler than outside. “We’ve perfected this.” Mousa, a 50-something retired school librarian with a somber demeanor, is proud of his house. That…

A CHICKEN “IS NOT JUST an animal that gives us eggs,” says Alex ten Napel, who’s been roaming his home country of the Netherlands in search of farm fowl since 2014. Taking inspiration from Melchior d’Hondecoeter, a 17th-century Dutch artist known for his work with birds, ten Napel uses lighting, backdrops, and an elevated, catwalk-like stage to bring chickens out of the coop and into an entirely new context. “What I hope you see in the photos is that chickens can be proud beings or funny beings,” he says. “They can be like gymnasts or ballerinas. Not what most people think of when you talk about chickens.” While each animal has different characteristics, ten Napel has noticed the emergence of some patterns throughout his travels. Roosters, or male chickens, tend…

Special jawbones on sarcastic fringeheads (Neoclinus blanchardi) let the fish open their maws and flare their giant jaws in a wide gape, to show their mouths’ psychedelic colors. It hadn’t been clear why the species developed such wild yaps: “They might have evolved to have some special function,” says Watcharapong Hongjamrassilp, a biologist at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok and a National Geographic Explorer. Because males sport bigger, more colorful mouths than females, Hongjamrassilp’s team wondered if males gape to dazzle females, or perhaps to compete or communicate with other males. So the team staged fish showdowns, as reported in the journal Ecology. When two males were placed in a tank where only one could occupy a shell as shelter, the shell dweller went full-on gape at the other fish’s approach…

ONE OF THE most critical steps in the evolution of vertebrate life—even bigger than our aquatic forebears’ first waddles onto land—was the evolution of the jaw. From biting food to vocalizing, the jaw is essential to the survival of 99.8 percent of living vertebrates, including us humans. Of the jawless fish that once abounded in Earth’s ancient seas, only lampreys and hagfish remain today. The rich story chronicling the rise of gnathostomes, also known as jawed vertebrates, has long been missing the first few pages. But now rocks in China have yielded the oldest known complete skeletons and teeth of gnathostomes ever found. In four studies recently published in the journal Nature, scientists led by Chinese paleontologist Min Zhu described fossil menageries from two rock formations—436 million and 439 million…

THE SCRUNCHED FACE OF OTTER 820 PRESSED AGAINST THE GRILLE OF HER CARRYING BOX, AND SHE WAS SQUEALING, the way sea otters do when they’re panicked or indignant or calling for their kin. (Think of a gull’s cry, but sharper.) She had dark eyes, deep brown fur, and a radio transmitter implanted in her belly. She was 16 months old, a sea otter adolescent, and unsettling events had so far marked the whole course of her life. Abandoned as a newborn, lifted into a truck by rescuers, bottle-fed by black-cloaked humans, and raised by a sea otter foster mother in an outdoor aquarium pool, 820 was one small part of a long ecological experiment—an atonement, of sorts, for the massacre of her species more than a century ago. So she was…

1 PLANNING THE HOUSE Rooms are typically three to four steps wide; floor plans are etched on the ground. Height is measured in brick layers or mud balls. Construction is a community effort. 2 BUILDING BLOCKS Locally mined, clay-rich earth is mixed with water, then molded into bricks or balls. Grass, cow dung, and other materials can be added to strengthen the mixture. 3 MULTIUSE ROOF Wood beams support an earthen slab that insulates the structure. A finished roof is also used for drying food, for storage, and for outdoor sleeping on warm nights. 4 WATERPROOFING Walls are coated with resins and fats extracted from fruit or shea trees. This protects them from water during rainy seasons but must be reapplied annually. 5 DECORATION Wall designs are painted using natural…