I want to look at this clonal desert organism and this coral and these bacteria. That's the benefit of coming at something from a different angle.
#Poachers Killed More than 100,000 Elephants in 3 Years This story was updated at 10:32 am ET on Aug 19.
The insatiable demand for ivory is causing a dramatic decline in the number of African elephants.
Poachers are hunting the animal faster than it can reproduce with deaths affecting more than half of elephant families in the Samburu National Reserve in Kenya a new study finds.
In 2011 the worst African elephant poaching year on record since 1998 poachers killed an estimated 40000 elephants or about 8 percent of the elephant population in Africa.
In the absence of poaching African elephant populations grow about 4. 2 percent each year the researchers found based on detailed records from Samburu.
African elephants are an intelligent species; individuals cooperate with one another and console one another in times of distress
but people unfortunately like their ivory tusks said the study's lead researcher George Wittemyer an assistant professor of fish wildlife and conservation biology at Colorado State university.
Wittemyer has studied African elephants in Kenya for the past 17 years monitoring their complex social lives.
In 2009 a drought led to the deaths of about 12 percent of elephants in Kenya.
The animals'numbers dropped further when a wave of poaching which has been ongoing since that year upset the population.
Elephant Images: The Biggest Beasts On land Sadly in 2009 we had a terrible drought and we started seeing a lot of illegal killing of elephants as well as natural deaths Wittemyer told Live Science.
We've been struggling to respond. We've been trying to find solutions to dampen the illegal killing.
His team used data on natural deaths versus poaching deaths in the Samburu National Reserve in Kenya and then applied these numbers to a continent-wide database called MIKE or Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants.
Started in 2002 MIKE is maintained by communities across Africa that report when where and how elephants die.
and a second that examined all 306 sites even those with less information about elephant deaths.
which is home to about 2 percent of the African elephant population because data there are sparse Wittemyer said.
In the past 10 years elephant numbers at the 12 sites have decreased by 7 percent which takes into account that elephant numbers were mostly increasing until 2009.
Elephants in Central africa decreased by more than 60 percent in the past 10 years according to an analysis of three locations in the 12-site model.
Poaching is so widespread that 75 percent of elephant populations across the continent have been declining
since 2009 with only 25 percent showing stable or increasing numbers Wittemyer said. Alarming increases in illegal killing for ivory are driving African elephants rapidly into extinction said Peter Leimgruber a conservation biologist at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute who was involved not in the study.
Poaching rates for ivory are exceed unsustainable and the natural growth rate of wild elephants Leimgruber said.
This means that elephant populations currently decline by nearly 60 to 70 percent every 10 years making it likely for the species to go extinct in the near future
if poaching and the illegal ivory trade are stopped not he said. Much of the ivory demand comes from China and Southeast asia.
Poachers killed an average of 33630 elephants every year from 2010 to 2012 resulting in more than 100000 deaths across the continent the study found.
As more elephants are poached the number of governmental seizures of illegal ivory increase and the black market price of ivory goes up.
but at unsustainably high levels John E. Scanlon secretary general of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna
This article has been updated to correct the number of elephants that have decreased. Follow Laura Geggel on Twitter@Laurageggel and Google+.
and cat bites to slippery banana peels and ugly paintings. Here's a look at the Ig Nobel winners of 2014.
In one of their studies the team found that cat bites are associated with depression in humans particularly women.
As for why the researchers speculated on various reasons including the idea that depressed individuals may take in a cat for companionship.
Fluffy may also impart a nasty parasite called Toxoplasma gondii to its pet-loving owner causing changes to its owner's brain the reseachers write in 2013 in the online journal PLOS ONE.
Dogs are known to practice some odd behaviors like sniffing each other's butts but a discovery out this year takes the prize for bizarre-yet-amazing doggie behaviors:
When pooping dogs prefer to align their bodies along the north-south axis of Earth's magnetic field.
The finding detailed in the journal Frontiers in Zoology earned a team of international scientists the Ig Nobel in Biology.
Bear masks: Humans dressed as polar bears played roles in garnering the Ig Nobel's Arctic Science Prize.
Due to interactions between Svalbard reindeer (Rangifer tarandus platyrhynchus) and polar bears (Ursus maritimus) during field work on Edgeã¸ya Svalbard we measured response distances for reindeer from a stalking polar bear and improvised five
approaches from a person disguised as a polar bear for comparison with human encounters the team wrote in 2012 in their study published in the journal Arctic Antarctica and Alpine Research.
Result? The flight response and escape suggests a predator-prey relationship between the two beasts the researchers said.
Pooperoni: Baby poop landed scientists from Spain the Nutrition Prize. The team was looking for priobiotic bacteria that could be fermented with sausage
and other marine animals that nourish themselves in these nutrient-rich waters according to a new study.
These nutrients fuel phytoplankton growth in the sunlit surface waters. Since 1950 California has experienced more winters with weak coastal upwelling than in the last five centuries.
and lower reproduction rates for seabirds the researchers said. In Photos: The Wonders of the Deep Sea But the weather pattern that causes the coastal upwelling also blocks storms from coming ashore.
Phytoplankton at the surface rely on this seasonal influx of nutrients. These organisms are the backbone of the marine ecosystem and support huge populations of fish and seabirds.
Some variation in coastal upwelling from year to year is normal but most direct data records don't go back more than 70 years.
To determine how upwelling influenced marine life the researchers used data on yearly fish population growth since the 1940s along with data on seabird egg laying and the survival of baby seabirds since the 1970s.
and seabird statistics the researchers found that years with weak upwelling and lots of tree growth correlated with years
when fish and seabird populations suffered. Based on tree ring measurements taken by David Stahle a tree ring expert
which bird and fish populations don't fare well it's not necessarily indicative of a long-term decline Black said
since the bird and fish populations usually bounce back within a couple years after a bad season.
#Flamingo Facts: Food Turns Feathers Pink Flamingos are large birds that are identifiable by their long necks sticklike legs and pink or reddish feathers.
Flamingos embody the saying you are what you eat. The pink and reddish colors of a flamingo's feathers come from eating pigments found in algae and invertebrates.
There are six species of flamingo according to the Integrated Taxonomic Information system (ITIS: greater flamingo lesser flamingo Chilean flamingo Andean flamingo James'(or puna) flamingo and American (or Caribbean) flamingo.
The greater flamingo is the tallest species. It stands 3. 9 to 4. 7 feet (1. 2 to 1. 45 meters)
and weighs up to 7. 7 lbs. 3. 5 kilograms) according to Sea world. The shortest species is the lesser flamingo
which stands 2. 6 feet (80 cm) and weighs 5. 5 lbs. 2. 5 kg.
The wingspan of flamingos ranges from 37 inches (95 cm) to 59 inches (150 cm.
American flamingos live in the West indies Yucatã¡n in the northern part of South america and along the Galapagos islands.
Chilean Andean and James'flamingos live in South america and the greater and lesser flamingos live in Africa.
Greater flamingos can also be found in the middle East and India. Flamingos are water birds so they live in and around lagoons or lakes.
These bodies of water tend to be saline or alkaline. Flamingos are generally nonmigratory but changes in climate or water levels in their breeding areas will cause them to relocate according to Sea world. Flamingos eat larva small insects blue-green
and red algae mollusks crustaceans and small fish according to Sea world. Their tendency to eat both vegetation
and meat makes them omnivores. Flamingos are pink because the algae they consume are loaded with beta carotene an organic chemical that contains a reddish-orange pigment.
Beta carotene is also present in many plants but especially in tomatoes spinach pumpkins sweet potato and of course carrots.
The mollusks and crustaceans flamingos snack on contain similar pigment-packing carotenoids. Carotenoid levels in their food vary in different parts of the world
which is why American flamingos are usually bright red and orange while lesser flamingos of the drought-plagued Lake Nakuru in central Kenya tend to be a paler pink.
If a flamingo were to stop eating food containing carotenoids its new feathers would begin growing in with a much paler shade
and its reddish feathers would eventually molt away. Molted feathers lose their pinkish hue. What a flamingo eats depends on
what type of beak it has. Lesser James'and Andean flamingos have what is called a deep-keeled bill.
They eat mostly algae. Greater Chilean and American flamingos have keeled shallow bills which allow them to eat insects invertebrates and small fish.
To eat flamingos will stir up the bottom of the lake with their feet and duck their beaks down into the mud and water to catch their meal.
Groups of flamingos are called colonies or flocks. The colony works together to protect each other from predators
and to take care of the young. It is believed that flamingos are monogamous according to Sea world. Once they mate they tend to stay with that mate.
A group of flamingos will all mate at the same time so that all of the chicks will hatch at the same time.
Pairs will make nests out of mounds of mud and the female will lay one egg at a time according to the Smithsonian National Zoo.
Each egg is a little bigger than a large chicken egg at 3 to 3. 5 inches (78 to 90 millimeters) long and 4 to 4. 9 ounces (115
to 140 grams. The egg will take 27 to 31 days to hatch and the emerging chick will only be 2. 5 to 3. 2 ounces (73 to 90 g). Young reach maturity at 3 to 5 years old.
Baby flamingos are gray or white. They will turn pink within the first couple years of life.
Flamingos live 20 to 30 years in the wild or up to 50 years in a zoo.
The taxonomy of flamingos according to ITIS is: Kingdom: Animaliaphylum: Chordata Class: Avesorder: Phoenicopteriformes Family: Phoenicopteridaegenera:
Phoeniconaias Phoenicoparrus Phoenicopterusspecies: According to International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List of Threatened Species no flamingo species is considered currently endangered.
The lesser Chilean and James'flamingos are considered near threatened because their numbers are small or decreasing according to the IUCN.
Fossil evidence indicates that the group from which flamingos evolved is very old and existed about 30 million years ago before many other avian orders had evolved according to Sea world. It isn't really known why flamingos tend to stand on one foot
but it has been hypothesized that keeping one of their feet out of the cold water helps them to conserve body heat.
It also seems to be a comfortable resting position for them. Though it is believed that flamingos are tropical birds they can also live
and thrive in cold environments as long as they have access to plenty of water and food.
In East Africa more than 1 million flamingos have been known to gather together forming the largest flock known according to the Philadelphia Zoo o
#Wildfire Prevention Costs Far Less than Fires (Op-Ed) Jeff Peterson is a research associate of the Arizona Rural Policy Institute at Northern Arizona University (NAU) where he specializes in economic impacts
and data analysis. Peterson contributed this article to Live Science's Expert Voices: Op-Ed & Insights.
The economics of wildfires are complex and grow more so as environmental conditions evolve. The average wildfire season has stretched from five months in the 1970s to seven months today according to the report Playing With Fire from the Union of Concerned Scientists.
But effective planning has kept not pace. Fire suppression this year has cost the U s. Forest Service
and U s. Department of the interior $200 million more than the agencies budgeted. According to the FLAME Act Report a congressionally mandated assessment of those expenditures putting out forest fires will cost the federal government $1. 6 billion before year-end.
While some states such as Arizona and New mexico avoided mega-fires this season others have struggled. In California more than 4500 wildfires have burned 85000 acres (344 square kilometers.
A typical wildfire season there sees 3500 wildfires impacting 74000 acres (300 square km. Farther north the Carlton Complex the largest fire in Washington state's history is still smoldering behind containment lines.
Our undercover investigator documented calves being forced to rise to their feet by men who wrapped the calves'tails around their hands lifting the entire weight of the calf by this appendage.
The Humane Methods of Slaughter Act (HMSA) for which The HSUS works to secure substantial funding each fiscal year requires that animals be unconscious before they are shackled
Unfortunately the HMSA doesn't specify how soon ritually-slaughtered animals should reach an unconscious state.
and Serve Including the Animals. This article was adapted from HSUS Undercover Investigation Shutters NJ Slaughter Plant
and probably wore feathers. Anzu wylieli lived at the same time as Tyrannosaurus rex but was more lithe and graceful said study researcher Emma Schachner.
It's a fairly delicate animal compared to the large predators that were living at the time Schachner a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Utah told Live Science.
Avian Ancestors: Dinosaurs That Learned To fly Finding a new species Anzu wylieli's story starts about a decade ago with paleontologist Tyler Lyson now at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural history.
A private collector had found two nearly complete skeletons of the same animal in South dakota
The new fossils were not found with feathers Schachner said but the dinosaur's close relatives had them
It was likely omnivorous eating plants eggs and perhaps small animals. One of the specimens was found with debris of shells
and tiny vertebrae between its ribs and pelvis but the scientists aren't sure whether these fossils represent gut contents
which are closely related to birds. The dinosaur is also part of an oviraptorosaur subgroup called the caenagnathids
Specifically the pest is attacking arabica coffee trees (Coffea arabica) that produce the high-end superior brews favored by cappuccino drinkers worldwide.
when the oil is drizzled on other foods new research in mice suggests. Olive oil's unsaturated fat reacts with certain compounds in vegetables to form a third compound that can reduce blood pressure the researchers found.
which have been shown to keep blood pressure in check in animals according to the researchers. 7 Foods Your Heart Will Hate The scientists used mice to investigate how nitro fatty acids may lead to reduced blood pressure looking specifically at
The animals in the study had high blood pressure and were given olive oil omega-6 fatty acids along with sodium nitrite to mimic components of a Mediterranean diet for five days.
The results showed that the diet increased the level of nitro fatty acids in mice and lowered their blood pressure.
The evidence was strengthened by the fact that a subgroup of mice that were modified genetically and were resistant to the inhibitory effects on the enzyme were found to maintain their high blood pressure
and urine of people and animals and have been shown to relax blood vessels and reduce inflammation the researchers said.
#Jaguar Facts: Biggest Cat in Americas Jaguars are large cats that can be found in North Central and South america.
They are identified by their yellow or orange coats dark spots and short legs. The dark spots on their coats are unlike any other cat spots.
Each spot looks like a rose and are called rosettes. Jaguars are the biggest cats in The americas and the third largest cats in the world.
From head to flank these cats range in length from 4 to 6 feet (1. 2 to 1. 95 meters.
The tail can add another 2 feet (60 cm) in length though their tails are quite short
when compared to other large cats. Lions'tails by comparison can grow up to 3. 5 feet (105 cm.
Males are heavier than females. Males can weigh from 126 to 250 pounds (57-113 kilograms)
while females weigh 100 to 200 pounds (45-90 kg) according to the Denver Zoo. In August and September jaguars mate.
After mating the female will carry her young for around 100 days and will give birth to one to four young.
Baby jaguars are called cubs. They are born with their eyelids sealed shut. After about two weeks the cubs are able to see for the first time.
After six months the cubs'mother will teach them how to hunt and after their second birthday the cub will leave their mother to live on their own.
Jaguars are carnivores which means they eat only meat. In the wild jaguars will use their speed
and stealth to take down deer peccary monkeys birds frogs fish alligators and small rodents. If wild food is scarce these large cats will also hunt domestic livestock.
Their jaws are stronger than any other species of cat. With these strong jaws jaguars will crunch down on bones
and eat them. In fact in the zoo bones are part of a jaguars'regular diet. Jaguars typically live in forests
or woods but they are also found in desert areas such as Arizona. They tend to stay close to water
and they like to fish. Jaguars will dip their tails into the water to lure fish much like a fishing line.
Jaguars are loners that only spend time with others of their kind when they are mating or taking care of cubs.
To keep other jaguars at bay they mark their territory with urine or by marking trees with their claws.
Their territories can be up to 50 miles wide according to the University of Michigan Museum of Zoology.
They also don't like to share their food. Jaguars will only eat their prey after dragging into the trees
even if the trees are quite a distance away. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural resources'Red List the jaguar is threatened near due to poaching and the destruction of the rainforest.
Theworld Wildlife Federation states that there are only 15000 jaguars left in the wild. Their name comes from the Native American word yajuar.
Yajuar means he who kills with one leap. During a hunt jaguars take advantage of their strong jaws and sharp teeth.
They catch their prey by the head and chop down to make the kill. Other cats go for the neck when killing prey.
Melanistic or all black jaguars occur due to a genetic mutation. This mutation causes the skin
and fur to contain larger amounts of a dark pigment. These types of jaguars are found in rainforests
because it is easier for them to blend into the dark shadows of the trees.
Jaguars can see six times better than humans at night or during darker conditions due to a layer of tissue in the back of the eye that reflects light The jaguar is a top-level predator.
It doesn't have any natural predators other than humans who hunt them for their fur or sport.
Other resources p
#Ancient Parasite Uncovered in Mesopotamian Tomb Some of the earliest evidence of a human parasite infection has been unearthed in an ancient burial site in Syria.
The egg of a parasite that still infects people today was found in the burial plot of a child who lived 6200 years ago in an ancient farming community.
The oldest Schistosoma egg found previously in Egyptian mummies was dated to 5200 years ago. The parasite egg hails from the Fertile Crescent a region around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers in the middle East where some of the first irrigation techniques were invented about 7500 years ago.
That suggests that advances in farming technologies caused the rise of human infections with the waterborne worm Mitchell told Live Science. 7 Stunning Archaeological Sites in Syria Bloody worms Schistosoma parasites live in freshwater snails
and eventually bladder cancer while in Africa the flatworm typically infects the bowels where it causes bleeding and anemia as well.
if the flatworm has evolved since it began infecting humans Mitchell said. The findings were published today (June 19) in the journal Lancet Infectious diseases.
Why Snakes Don't Slip When Climbing Trees Some snakes seem to be little scaredy-cats as new research finds
when climbing trees they hold on for dear life. The study researchers found snakes use a much greater force to grip tree trunks
and other surfaces they're climbing than is necessary. The finding suggests the reptiles prefer to play it safe rather than conserve energy researchers say.
Compared with moving horizontally on flat land climbing up a vertical or inclined surface is difficult for animals.
The key to this motion is finding a way to prevent the body from slipping as gravity pulls down and different animals have solved this problem in different ways.
For example numerous mammals use their claws to cling to trees while some lizards and tree frogs simply adhere to surfaces using specialized toe pads
which contain tiny hairs that produce a short-range electrostatic force (called a Van der waals force) with a surface's molecules.
But humans and other animals lack these adaptations and can only hold on via friction generated by muscle forces.
Snakes also use friction to climb steep surfaces; more specifically they alternate between contracting and extending their bodies in a motion called concertina locomotion.
Basically part of the body will have a static hold on whatever they are gripping and the other part of the body will extend forward said Greg Byrnes an integrative biologist at Siena College in New york. It's like an accordion that's opening and closing.
Until now nobody knew just how much muscular force snakes use while climbing a surface with concertina locomotion Byrnes told Live Science.
Next they measured the forces that 10 snakes from five species boa constrictors brown tree snakes carpet pythons green tree pythons
and a smaller python used as they climbed the cylinder 10 times each. Watch a Carpet Python Climb a Tree
While Gripping Tightly This calculation involved placing the snakes on a flat board covered with the textured tape
and then raising the board until the snakes started slipping. The angle of inclination allowed them to figure out the coefficient of friction between the snakes
and the surface which is related to how much force the snakes must produce to support their body weight Byrnes said.
Their calculations also accounted for the equal and opposite downward force that's produced by the snakes'upward motion while climbing.
The researchers thought the snakes might take the economical approach and use as little force as possible to hold on to the cylinder.
After all climbing is energetically costly and some snakes can control their muscular forces at least while constricting prey.
But this isn't what they found. Sometimes the snakes'safety factor was close to 1 meaning the reptiles were using nearly the minimum force required to grip the cylinder and not slip.
Other times the snakes'safety factor was almost 20 which is about the same amount of force seen during prey constriction
and 20 times the force needed to avoid slipping. In Photos: How Snakes Climb up Trees The vast majority of time the safety factor was between 2. 5 and 5 Byrnes said.
They are using a force that's not at their maximum but not at their minimum either.
A common choice It's a bit unclear why the snakes on average use up to five times the force they actually need to climb.
It may be that arboreal (tree-living) snakes move so infrequently that their energy expenditure while climbing has little overall impact on their lives the researchers suggest.
Or perhaps the benefits of playing it safe simply outweigh the energy costs. Though the topic hasn't been explored much choosing safety over economy may be more common in the animal kingdom than thought Byrnes said.
Research shows that the large adhesive forces geckos and anoles use to climb is about 10 times greater than
what's necessary to support each animal's body weight. And though the gripping forces people use while climbing ropes or rock walls hasn't been studied research suggests people use two to four times the necessary force to hold on to objects Byrnes said.
Byrnes is interested now in conclusively determining why the snakes have such high safety factors and plans to study snakes'gripping patterns
and muscular activity as they climb. He's also interested in other types of behavioral safety factors.
For instance does a gazellerun at its maximum speed when it's being chased? And how far does an animal choose to jump
when it has to cross a gap? There are lots of different systems where those safety factors lie Byrnes said.
It's a really understudied field of research. Byrnes and Jayne detailed their work today (Aug 19) in the journal Biology Letters.
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