Source: AGU Advances

Urbanization, climate change, and fire suppression practices are contributing to increased wildfire risk at the densely populated wildland-urban interface. These factors make fires more unpredictable and harder to manage. In January 2025, this was made devastatingly clear in Los Angeles, when massive wildfires engulfed entire hillsides and canyons, destroying neighborhoods and damaging surrounding ecosystems.

The Mediterranean climate region of California, which stretches up most of the state’s coastline, is a naturally fire-prone landscape because its dry conditions support vegetation growth and also allow for fire to spread easily. As wildfires become more intense, better modeling and understanding of their drivers is crucial in efforts to predict risk.

Ward-Baranyay et al. looked at three of the January 2025 Los Angeles wildfires by analyzing preburn conditions, such as fuel characteristics, topography (including elevation and slope), and wind speed. Satellite observations gathered from the Ecosystem Spaceborne Thermal Radiometer Experiment on Space Station (ECOSTRESS) and the Earth Surface Mineral Dust Source Investigation (EMIT)—precursors to a recently announced NASA mission, the Explorer for Artemis Geology Lunar and Earth (EAGLE)—provided detailed information about the vegetation’s condition before the fires began. The researchers then built a random forest regression model to predict burn severity based on these conditions, ultimately demonstrating that prefire fuel conditions were a key driver of the destructive wildfires’ immediate effects on wildlands.

The model used in the study was able to accurately capture about 60% of the patterns in burn severity. It was most accurate for the Palisades and Hughes fires, but less accurate for the Eaton Fire. This discrepancy could be because the area burned by the Eaton Fire was more topographically variable, meaning its burn severity drivers may not have been fully captured by the model, the researchers suggest. Vegetation type was also a strong performance indicator: Terrain with shrub or scrub cover, the dominant vegetation type, offered the most accurate predictions for burn severity. The burn patterns of forests and other landscape types were less accurately captured.

Fuel conditions emerged as the dominant driver of burn severity, more so than topography or weather. In particular, how abundant, wet, dry, or stressed vegetation is can hint at how severe future fires may be. Tracking and monitoring these fuel conditions, researchers suggest, may be a way to monitor wildfire hazard in California and other fire-prone regions. (AGU Advances, https://doi.org/10.1029/2025AV002179, 2026)

—Rebecca Owen (@beccapox.bsky.social), Science Writer

Citation: Owen, R. (2026), Want to predict wildfire severity? Look to the state of vegetation, Eos, 107, https://doi.org/10.1029/2026EO260130. Published on 4 May 2026.

Text © 2026. AGU. CC BY-NC-ND 3.0
Except where otherwise noted, images are subject to copyright. Any reuse without express permission from the copyright owner is prohibited.

No tentacles here, folks! Only beautifully strange plants.

If you’ve spent any time online, the word “hentai” probably conjures up some very specific imagery that you may not feel comfortable talking about with your family. However, Osaka is playing host to an event called the Hentai Shokubutsu Club (or “Hentai Plant Club”), where you can say without shame, “Hey, Mom! Let’s go see some hentai plants.”

To be perfectly clear, this event will involve substantially less tentacle-like appendages than you might be imagining, as in botanical science, “hentai” translates to the process of metamorphosis, or structural transformation. It refers to the fascinating way certain flora abandon typical plant architecture, morphing their leaves, roots and stems into unorthodox shapes to survive, and this summer will see a showcase of unusual yet absolutely gorgeous exotic plants.

Taking place on July 4 to July 5 at the Osaka Nanko ATC Hall, a short walk from Trade Center Mae on the New Tram Line, the Hentai Shokubutsu Club brings a Japanese television show of the same name to life, curated by the celebrity plant explorer Keisuke Hase and Tokyo influencer Botanical Gorilla, and introduces 20 vendors who will be showing off some of nature’s eccentric plants.

▼ Actor and comedian Hyoroku (left) is the face of the Hentai Shokubutsu Club show.

A selection of the transformations you can hope to see, as well as buy, at the venue are:

● Platycerium: These plants feature leaf dimorphism, where they grow two completely different types of leaves, one for trapping food, and the other to catch the sun. The company Groote Plantage specialize in the sale of platycerium and are based in Saitama, often traveling to Thailand to carefully select and import high-quality plants in a wide range of varieties.

● Anthurium: With deceiving heart-shaped “flowers” that are actually leaves that have undergone metamorphosis to trick pollinators, whereas the actual flowers are microscopic bumps on the central spike. The anthurium is on show by Acu’s Forest, based in Osaka, who sell domestically bred variants with a focus on leaf color, texture, and shape. This time, they’ll focus on anthurium with a velvet texture and veins with unique physical characteristics.

● Dyckia: Bromeliads that reflected the rainforest lifestyle, transforming their leaves into water tanks to survive arid cliffs, lining them with vicious-looking thorns to keep thirsty animals away. Thorns and Leaves handle both terrestrial and tank bromeliads, focusing on original dyckia hybridized and grown by themselves.

Alongside the plants, you could even take home some quirky little collectibles, like the adorable Mandragora figures crafted by B-The-U.

However, the activities don’t just stop with the plants, as the Hentai Shokubutsu Club is actually a special exhibition within the larger Reptiles Fever 2026 event, the largest of western Japan’s reptile expos.

Discount advance tickets, priced at 1,200 yen (US$7.50), are available online via platforms like Rakuten Travel, and convenience stores (links below), but it’s also possible to purchase an entry ticket on the day for 1,400 yen.

With how the plants have adapted for survival, they make for great additions to lush, bioactive terrariums for many of the reptiles attending the festival.

▼ Like this little guy!

The venue will be packed with reptiles, amphibians, breeding gear, and a family-friendly petting corner, making it the perfect weekend plan for anyone looking to experience the reptile-keeping hobby.

▼ Cute though they may be, I can’t vouch for how “reptilian” hedgehogs are, but they still make an appearance in the petting zoo.

So, grab your tickets and get ready to be amazed by reptilian beauty and the bizarre world of botanical hentai this summer.

Exhibition information
Hentai Shokubutsu Club / 変態植物倶楽部
Address: Osaka-fu, Osaka-shi, Suminoe-ku, Nankokite 2-1-10
大阪府大阪市住之江区南港北2-1-10
Dates: July 4, 2026–July 5, 2026
Open 10:00 a.m.–5:00 p.m. (last entry 4:30 p.m.)
Website

Related: Hentai Shokubutsu Club YouTube, Rakuten Travel, Lawson Ticket (code: 54813), 7-Eleven Ticket (code: 115-554)
Source and images: PR Times (1, 2)
Top image: PR Times
Insert images: PR Times PR Times (1, 2)
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Six years in the making, Christina Mrozik’s new project tackles “the feelings of all things.” Fifty cards comprise the richly illustrated oracle deck, which delves into a vast emotional terrain through the artist’s distinctive visual metaphors of flora and fauna. Monochromatic in palette and surreal in subject matter, the individual works portray a variety of curious pairings from twin turtles with eyes nested into their shells to a bird speared by a spindly tree to a lily pad bursting from an open alligator jaw.

“Each drawing took between 20 to 40 hours of focused work,” Mrozik writes. “I built every image in layers—starting with rough sketches, researching forms, refining the composition, and slowly developing the final drawing in pencil until it felt complete.”

What results is an “emotional ecosystem designed to help you witness your feelings, understand their purpose, and build a relationship with your inner world. It is not a tool for fixing yourself, but a practice for meeting yourself,” they add.

As with much of Mrozik’s work, The Feelings of All Things melds beauty and pain, death and life. The deck is designed to be used on its own or alongside a preferred tarot set, either by selecting an illustration that feels most alluring or profound in the moment or simply choosing a card and reflecting on the imagery.

The Feelings of All Things has just under a week to go on Kickstarter, where it’s blown past its original goal, although there are still a few rewards available. Find more on Mrozik’s website and Instagram.

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David Morrison continues his hyperrealistic explorations of flowers, seeds, and plants, capturing the intricacies and alluring textures found throughout nature in lush colored pencil. Delicate, fine lines and smooth gradients prevail in the artist’s drawings, which present the organic subject matter as if it were bathed in light. Rendered in a soft haze, shadows of individual fronds and nodes add a deceptive sense of depth to the two-dimensional works.

The pieces shown here are some of Morrison’s latest, and you can find more on his Instagram and via Garvey | Simon, where he’s represented.

Do stories and artists like this matter to you? Become a Colossal Member today and support independent arts publishing for as little as $7 per month. The article David Morrison’s Alluring Drawings Spring from the Blank Page appeared first on Colossal.