Christ's Church Little River Valley

05/23/2026

The strawberry poison dart frog is one of the most astonishing examples of parental care in the animal world. Deep in the rainforests of Central America, this tiny amphibian performs a survival strategy so precise and coordinated that every step has to work together perfectly from the beginning.

Unlike most frogs that simply lay eggs in water and leave, the female strawberry poison dart frog lays her eggs on the damp rainforest floor. The father guards the eggs constantly, keeping them moist and protected. When the tadpoles hatch, they instinctively wriggle onto their mother’s back. She then carries each tiny tadpole individually through the rainforest, searching for rain-filled bromeliad plants high above the forest floor.

Inside these plants are tiny pools of water. The mother carefully places one tadpole into each separate pool so they will not compete or eat one another. Then comes perhaps the most incredible part: every few days she returns to each hidden location and feeds every tadpole with unfertilized eggs specially produced as food. She remembers multiple locations scattered throughout the forest and repeats this process for six to eight weeks until the tadpoles fully develop into frogs.

How could such a system evolve step by step? If the mother did not transport the tadpoles, they would die. If she did not feed them, they would starve. If the tadpoles lacked the instinct to climb onto her back, the cycle would fail immediately. Every behavior depends on the others already existing and functioning together.

This is not random chaos struggling toward order. It is coordinated design. The instincts, memory, timing, anatomy, and behavior all point to intentional creation. Even a tiny rainforest frog reflects astonishing wisdom and care from the Creator.

“Let every thing that hath breath praise the Lord.” Psalm 150:6

05/21/2026

05/20/2026

NOISY APES. At first glance, you might think they look like monkeys, but they are apes. One way to tell is that most monkeys have tails they use to swing through the trees, but apes don’t have tails. However, the lack of a tail does not prevent these animals from swinging through the trees with their long, slender arms. The siamang (Symphalangus syndactylus) is the largest gibbon species and inhabits the forests of Indonesia, Malaysia, and Thailand.

Siamangs weigh 22-26 pounds (10-12 kg). Their arms can be 2.6 times their body length, allowing them to move by acrobatic hand-over-hand swinging through the forest. They survive mainly on leaves and fruit and disperse seeds throughout their habitat. In doing so, these apes fulfill an ecosystem role.

Even though resting takes up over 50% of a siamang’s awake time, they are the most active gibbon species. Their activities include walking, resting, grooming, and socializing. They consider grooming an essential social action, and the adult male in a family usually performs it. Unlike most primates, siamangs are monogamous. They form lifelong pairs and live together in families consisting of a mother, father, and children. They emphasize loyalty to the group and will defend each other at all costs.

Siamangs are highly territorial animals. To defend their territories, males and females make deep tones that ring through the forest canopy. They use their enlarged throat sac, which they can inflate to the size of their head. The throat sac amplifies the siamangs' vocalizations, filling the forest. A pair of siamang mates will call together in a pattern known as “duetting.” If the calls and yells do not deter an intruder, siamangs revert to violent alternatives involving high-speed forest chases, slapping, and biting.
The loud calls, unique appearance, and agility are fascinating features of these animals. The endangered siamang species is another example of the evidence of design in living things pointing toward a Creator.

05/20/2026

Wednesday’s Word …

“Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen. For by it the men of old gained approval. By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible.” (Hebrews 11‬:‭1‬-‭3 NASB1995)

05/14/2026

TO THE MOON AND BACK. Bird migrations are amazing. One impressive example is the red knot (Calidris canutus), a shorebird or sandpiper that breeds in the far north of Canada, Europe, Greenland, and Russia.

There are six subspecies of red knots. One of particular concern is the red knot rufa. This bird makes an annual round-trip migration of almost 20,000 miles (32,000 km) from islands north of Hudson Bay in Canada to Tierra del Fuego, Argentina, at the southern tip of South America. One member of the rufa subspecies was banded in Tierra del Fuego in 1995, when it was about two years old. It has been recaptured for study at least three times since then. It was last seen in the Canadian Arctic in 2014, making it more than 20 years old. Its tag number was B95, but scientists have given it the nickname “Moonbird.” They called it that because its annual migrations surpassed the distance from Earth to the Moon.

If B95 is still alive today, it would have gone almost as far as to the Moon and back. We don’t know how long red knot rufas typically live, but this one is the oldest recorded. Despite that, the rufas are an endangered subspecies because their population has been declining since the 1990s.

On their spring trip back to the Northern Hemisphere, the red knot rufas stop in the Delaware Bay to feed on horseshoe crab eggs. The Delaware horseshoe crab population has declined because of harvesting by humans, which may be a factor reducing the rufa population. Moonbird B95 now has a statue in Delaware Bay. It’s a reminder that we need to take care of the magnificent creation that God has given us.

05/13/2026

Wednesday’s Word …

“Do not let kindness and truth leave you; Bind them around your neck, Write them on the tablet of your heart. So you will find favor and good repute In the sight of God and man.”(Proverbs 3‬:‭3‬-‭4 NASB1995)

05/06/2026

05/06/2026

Wednesday’s Word …

“Charm is deceitful and beauty is vain, But a woman who fears the Lord, she shall be praised.” (Proverbs 31‬:‭30 NASB1995)

05/05/2026

FOREST FISH. They are large freshwater fish with powerful teeth. Native to tropical South America, tambaqui (or giant pacu) (Colossoma macropomum) belongs to the same subfamily as the infamous piranha species.

Tambaqui grow up to 3.6 feet (1.1 m) long and weigh 97 pounds (44 kg). They are oval-shaped, with an olive-green back and a dark black ventral area. The white flesh of the tambaqui is a favorite food, and people say it tastes more like pork than fish.

Unlike the carnivorous piranhas, tambaqui live on a vegetarian diet. They prefer flooded forest habitats, where they eat various fruits, seeds, nuts, and grains such as wild rice. Although similar in shape to the sharp-toothed piranhas, tambaqui have molar-like teeth for chewing seeds and nuts.

When the Amazon and Orinoco river basins flood, fruit seeds fall into the water, where tambaqui eat them. Many of the seeds pass through their digestive system and are scattered over a wide area. Tambaqui depend on the forest trees for food, and the trees rely on the fish to disperse seeds that grow after the floodwaters recede. Tambaqui spawn and feast during the high-water season, thereby positively impacting the ecosystem. In the flood season, they use their keen sense of smell to locate their favorite fruits and seeds, and they live off fat stores and eat minimal food until the floods return.

Tambaqui are primarily solitary but migrate in large schools. Their life cycle follows the flow of the floods. They lay eggs in river channels, and high water carries the eggs into the floodplain, where they hatch when the water returns. During the low-water season, they eat microscopic plants to sustain themselves until the next term. Then, at 4 or 5 years old, they swim back to the river channels to continue the cycle of life for the future fish.

Tambaqui thrive in a continuously fluctuating habitat, with plants, animals, and weather working together. We believe that God designed this life system to fulfill a critical ecosystem role in the Amazon basin environment.