The 35-foot (10.6-meter)- long creature was reported to be flapping its tail at the time of the incident
and tail like modern-day sperm cells do). The largest living branch of the mammalian family tree holds the placentals mammals that keep fetuses alive with placentas as opposed to marsupials such as kangaroos
In addition to a furry tail the researchers suggest the four-legged creature likely ate insects weighed from 6 grams (about the weight of some shrews) up to 245 grams less than half a pound
Another thing the people appear to have brought from their time outside Mesa verde was connections to a vast trade network. oethe presence of Chaco-style pottery vessels macaw-feather sashes
and then they created synthetic leaf traps or biomimetic plastic surfaces. Traditionally in Bulgaria Serbia and other southeast European countries households with infestations of bed bugs have thwarted the evasive little bloodsuckers by strewing kidney bean leaves on the floor at night.
and theatrical courtship displays peahens almost always gazed at the lower part of the peacock's train of feathers particularly below the neck.
Previously scientists suggested the colors of the feathers or the length of a male's train influenced a female's mating decisions.
Others thought peahens were drawn likely to the distinctive eyespots on a peacock's display of feathers.
since in India where peacocks are typically found thick vegetation could obscure everything except the top part of the males'display of feathers.
which are potent greenhouse gases that trap heat in the Earth's atmosphere and contribute to the destruction of the ozone layer.
#Puzzling Plumage: Fractals Reveal Birds'Health For birds fractals are a turn on. A new study found that the complexity of fractal patterns on a bird's chest communicates the animal's fitness to potential mates.
Scientists studied male and female red-legged partridges (Alectoris rufa) which both display complicated black-and-white patterns of plumage on their chests.
and apparently the plumage of red-legged partridges. 5 Seriously Mind-boggling Math Facts In a new study scientists found that the healthier a bird is the more fractal-like its plumage becomes.
We have shown that fractal geometry can reveal biologically meaningful information encoded in a complex plumage trait:
The scientists found that fractal dimension predicted immune responsiveness meaning that partridges with more complex fractals on their plumage tended to have stronger immune systems.
After losing weight the same birds would grow in plumage with a lower fractal dimension than they had before while the birds
This dominant female nicknamed Trike is believed to have lost a hand and lower arm in a snare accident before the creation of the protected forest in the southern highlands of Tanzania.
Endangered Chicks Emerge from Nest This could be the first and last high-definition video of a Spoon-billed sandpiper chick emerging from its nest.
-and-white chicks stumble out of the nest pecking for food. They feed themselves from day one Vyn said in the video.
Vyn filmed the only nest with eggs in 2011: The other 20 eggs were bred in captivity
This video shot during the first few days of a pair's seasonal courtship includes an attempted copulation and a nest scrape display.
Greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide trap heat helping warm the globe. The surge in carbon dioxide levels due to human activity since the Industrial revolution is now causing an overall warming of the planet that is having impacts around the globe.
and branches in chimpanzee nests which are viewed as a feasible comparison for what a primitive human home might have been like.
Dinosaurs Waggled Flashy Tails to Woo Mates Feathered dinosaurs might have used muscular tails to shake tail feathers
Oviraptor tails were short but were made of many tailbones with many points between these vertebrae where they could flex.
Stunning Illustrations of Dinosaurs Their tails were not only very very flexible but quite muscular Persons said.
They could not only move them sinuously to strike a pose but also hold it to do a muscular dance with the tail.
Unusually at the very end of the tail in some oviraptors the last few vertebrae were fused actually together to become one solid ridged bladelike structure Persons said.
which serves as an anchor point for a big fan of tail feathers. Modern-day birds use pygostyles to help them fly
but oviraptors were not flying animals they had feathers but they didn't have big broad wings Persons said.
Peacocks and turkeys use their tail feathers for courtship displays. Past research has suggested that dinosaurs may have evolved first feathers for show not flight.
Persons and his colleagues found that at least four known oviraptor species separated by 45 million years had pygostyles.
I think like peacocks oviraptors were strutting their stuff by shaking their tail feathers to show off Persons said.
Between the crested head and feathered-tail shaking oviraptors had a propensity for visual exhibitionism.
Although feathers on dinosaur forearms might have served as stabilizers that helped them steer that may not have been the case for any tail plumes.
Flightless birds such as ostriches and emus don't have big tail-feather fans and birds that do have big tail-feather fans such as peacocks
and turkeys don't try to use them to run at all but just keep them tucked in except
if such tails were typically found in one sex or the other. Maybe they were larger in males as we see in modern-day birds Persons said.
The problem there is that the tip of the tail is one of the rarest parts of a fossil skeleton to find
Examples of Southern-style foods included fried chicken fried fish fried potatoes bacon ham liver and gizzards and sugar-sweetened beverages such as sweet tea.
#Spider Traps Prey Using Amazing Ladder Webs Scientists have gotten a rare glimpse of the enigmatic odd-clawed spider
what ruffled people's feathers Carmen Small of neighboring Robbinston told the Associated press. Doing it at a cemetery is sacrilegious and disrespectful.
and monkeys often have tails that let them grab branches). O. bambolii had apelike arms odd teeth with ridges more like a monkey's
Observations of the system revealed a dust trap of millimeter-size grains on one side of the star with smaller micrometer-size particles spread evenly throughout the disc.
Enter the dust-trap theory: If there were a way to form an environment for the dust to grow perhaps it could solve the radial-drift problem.
and could potentially have created the massive planet that is partially responsible now for creating this other trap said Phil Armitage a theoretical astrophysicist at the University of Colorado in Boulder who wrote an analysis of the paper in the journal Science.
He said the dust-trap theory has been around for a while but few astronomers suspected it would be so obvious in an image.
From Antarctica's glacial lakes to acidic hot springs to unkempt home aquariums diatoms are everywhere.
The giant plume of ash from Toba stretched from the South china sea to the Arabian sea and in the past investigators proposed the resulting volcanic winter might have caused this die off.
#The Amazing Mating Dance of the Peacock Spider The animal dances and lifts up its tail-flap which once unfurled resembles an abstract Indian blanket of intense color.
Sexual selection involves the development of exaggerated features like the tail-feathers of a peacock
and is depicted wearing feathers and shells and holding an atlatl (spear-thrower) features associated with Teotihuacan writes researcher John Montgomery in his book Tikal:
An Illustrated History of the Mayan Capital (Hippocrene Books 2001. The numerous cities found throughout the Maya world each had their own individual wonders that made them unique.
Cuckoo moms lay their eggs in the nests of other birds which raise them unwittingly.
and kicks the other chicks out of the nest. The other chicks die and the cheeky cuckoo receives all of the adoptive mother's attention. 3. Bloodsucking ants Count Dracula isn't the only creature with a taste for bodily fluids:
Before leaving the nest some of the ravenous babies cannibalize each other. 7. Bonobo wing-moms Unlike human males bonobo males hang out with mom
When conservation biologist Firoz Ahmed installs camera traps in Kaziranga National park in northeastern India's Assam state he
Because the traps are installed in pairs to capture each side of a passing tiger Ahmed has photographic evidence.
Some camera traps are touched not and some are told every day Ahmed Ouramazingplanet. Even a heavy steel box weighing 30 pounds (12 kilograms) isn't elephant-proof
How have improved camera traps our knowledge of tiger populations? Firoz Ahmed: The stripes of a tiger can never lie.
because they have to show tigers from their own camera traps. Iconic Cats: All 9 Subspecies of Tiger OAP:
because they the camera traps. Initially what we used had a very bad focusing flash
. and the Aquarium of The americas in New orleans to come up with ways to allow the public to see pieces of the forest.
and Aquariums to develop a creative and informative use of the crushed ivory with a goal to educate the public about poaching.
#Whales Trap Dinner with Mouthful of Swirling Bristles Humpback and bowhead whales create their own food nets from specialized bristles in their mouths to more efficiently nab fishy morsels a new study of baleen whales suggests.
Both rely on baleen a system of hairy bristles that line their mouths and trap food.
The whales'tongues wear away the inner edges of the plates to create a fringe that traps krill and other tasty morsels.
Jerry Karnas the Center for Biological Diversity's population campaign director in Miami is all too familiar with these political pitfalls particularly in addressing the impact of population growth on climate change.
The continent was once home to a menagerie of giant creatures or megafauna such as marsupial versions of lions rhino-size wombats giant kangaroos and flightless birds but about 90 percent of that megafauna disappeared during this time.
In her explanation of reproduction to her young daughters she used images of blue eggs in the robin's nest wind blowing pollen dust from one plant to the other
Venus on the other hand has a very dense atmosphere that traps solar radiation; the average temperature on Venus is about 864 degrees F (462 degrees C). The exchange of incoming and outgoing radiation that warms the Earth is referred often to as the greenhouse effect because a greenhouse works in much the same way.
When you add up the votes in eight state legislatures that passed bans on shark-fin products it was 914 ayes and 87 nays.
The larger size of turkey eggs requires more room to nest which takes up too much space in a coop.
Each spring Red-faced Warblers along with two other related species the Orange-crowned Warbler and Virginia s Warbler build cupped nests of grass tucked into the ground at the base of trees.
and raise their young until they grow big enough to leave the nest. In the past the three warbler species did not choose the same kind of nest sites.
and are forced increasingly to nest in sites similar to those of the Red-faced Warbler. Â So why does this matter?
Well nest-site choices have consequences for nest survival and subsequent population numbers. When the birds divvied up their use of the different nest sites in the past predation on their eggs
and nestlings by squirrels and mice was lower. But now that the forest has changed and the birds are nesting in similar sites their nests are being detected more often by predators
which means fewer nests are fledging young. Fewer young can then lead to population declines.
It is not entirely clear why nest predation increases when nest sites become more similar over time.
The forest is changing but there is no indication that predator numbers are going up so that s an unlikely reason.
Focusing on finding just one type of nest might be easier than learning to recognize
and search for lots of different nest types in the same way that finding Waldo is easier
like poaching setting animal snares or harvesting of firewood. The project which began earlier this year will help rangers know where to go to best prevent these illicit activities he said during his presentation.'
but the hard part was finding the nest sites and the foraging sites to include in the study that part took years Slaght said.
One of the reasons it's so hard to find fish owl nest trees is that the birds are almost unbelievably shy.
That means it is very difficult to find nest trees or foraging sites because you almost never see the owls at those locations.
and tail-docking or the practice of removing the tail. To find out if these experiences affect the animals they split a group of 20 ewes into three groups.
One group had a typical tail-docking experience in which an elastic band is wrapped tightly around the tail cutting off blood supply until the tail falls off There is no anesthesia used during this procedure.
The second group had their tails left intact but were injected with a low dose of E coli bacteria to simulate a mild fever and immune response.
and tail-wagging which can also signal pain in farm animals. Generational effects? The scientists found that ewes with an early traumatic experience of tail-docking
or infection changed positions more often wagged their tails more and had more contractions than ewes left alone in their early days.
Plucking a few feathers from shorebird hatchlings reveals how much mercury was in their eggs before they hatched.
The biologists occasionally find eggs from other species such as terns in avocet nests Hartman said.
Wolverines also have a distinctive mask of dark fur around their eyes and forehead and a stripe of blond or ivory fur that runs from each shoulder to the base of the animal's tail.
Their tail adds another 7 to 10 inches (18 to 25 centimeters) to their length.
and its tail measures from 26.25 to 39.5 inches (67 to 100 centimeters) long. African lions typically weigh 265 to 420 lbs.
Their tails measure 23.62 to 35.43 inches (60 to 90 cm. Male lions are generally larger than females
Peacocks With their stunning plumage peacocks already have a knack for style. But researchers at the University of California Davis and Duke university wanted to know what parts of the flashy males'display catch a female's or peahen's eye.
It turns out the peacock gals were mostly looking at the lower part of their suitor's feathers
Tigers also have very long tails which can add 2. 3 to 3. 6 feet (0. 7 to 1. 1 m) to their overall length.
Tigers mark their territory by scratching marks into trees with their claws. Tiger babies or cubs are born helpless.
Its tail adds an additional 5 inches (13 cm) to the animal's length. An individual weighs about 3 lbs.
When platypuses are on land their webbing retracts making the claws more pronounced. The animals walk awkwardly on their knuckles to protect the webbing.
While they are in the water a lot they will also waddle onto the riverbanks to dig burrows with their claws.
Their waterproof thick fur keeps platypuses warm in chilly temperatures and their big tails store extra fat for energy.
or two eggs and place them between her rump and her tail to keep them warm.
This is due primarily to lack of worldwide research and data on the species. Platypuses swim with their front feet and steer with their tails and back feet.
Habits, Diet & Other Facts Rabbits are small mammals with fluffy short tails whiskers and distinctive long ears.
They have narrow elongated snouts lean bodies covered in thick fur yellow or amber eyes and long bushy tails.
Their tail adds another 16 inches (41 cm) to their length. Coyotes typically weigh about 20 to 50 lbs.
and traps but the populations are still growing according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
See Newly Hatched Osprey Chicks on Live'Critter Cam'For all you bird lovers out there you can watch a set of newly hatched osprey chicks ruffle their tiny feathers on a live webcam.
and Rachel by viewers returns to this nest every year to raise their young. Two chicks have hatched already
Steve gathered sticks and soft bark to line the nest while Rachel prepared the nest for her eggs according to representatives from explore. org.
When a pair of ospreys bonds they will attempt to mate more than 160 times over a period of weeks resulting in a clutch of two to four eggs.
and will practice flying from the nest. In early September they will launch on a solo journey along the Atlantic Flyway from Maine to South america via the Caribbean.
In addition as the name suggests their claws are powerful enough to open coconuts which are common on their home islands in the Indian and western Pacific oceans.
#Birds of a Feather: Whooping cranes Need Parents More Like Them Whooping cranes have made an astonishing comeback in North america thanks in part to some bizarre conservation methods.
and models (both spear and net fishing) and fish shows up in offering lists. There is also a lot of archeological evidence for fish consumption from sites such as Gaza
In the day they sleep upside down from trees or the roofs of caves holding on with their sharp claws.
and pluck insects from spider webs according to the BBC. An anticoagulant in vampire bat saliva has been adapted for use in increasing blood flow in patients with stroke or heart disease
In the new study researchers used high-resolution micro-computed tomography (CT) scanners to analyze two fossils of leafcutter-bee nests excavated from the pits.
By examining the nest cell architecture and the physical features of the bee pupae (stage of development where the bee transforms into an adult from a larva within the leafy nests
and cross-referencing their data with environmental niche models that predict the geographic distribution of species the scientists determined their Ice age specimens belonged to Megachile gentilis a bee species that still exists today.
To reproduce females build small cylindrical nest cells made of carefully chosen leaves and sometimes flower petals.
The nests look like mini cigars Holden told Live Science. The bees build these multilayered nest cells in secure locations near the ground such as under the bark of dead trees in stems
or in self-dug burrows or those dug by other insects. In 1970 when scientists first excavated the two nest cells analyzed in the new study the cells together known as LACMRLP 388e were connected with an additional layer of leaves.
LACMRLP 388e was thought initially to be buds and only later after the two cells were separated accidentally did people suspect they might be bees.
and one female She decided to try to identify the bees'species. I had read some of the big literature that said leafcutter bees aren't really identifiable by their nest cells Holden said.
'Holden paired up with leafcutter-bee expert Terry Griswold an entomologist with the U s. Department of agriculture to try to pinpoint characteristics that distinguish between the nest cells of different leafcutter bee species. Piecing the evidence together The researchers
and examined micro-CT scans of the bee nest cells and discovered there are some differences in the way different leafcutter bees make their cells.
However the nest cells of LACMRLP 388e contained the cap as well as an uncommon circular base
They found essentially that M. gentilis was far more likely than M. onobrychidis to have lived in the La Brea area 23000 to 40000 years ago (the approximate age of the excavated nest cells.
The nest cells of LACMRLP 388e were constructed underground (but near the surface) in an area adjacent to the fossil-rich Pit 91.
Leaf matter used to construct the nest cells likely came from trees not far from the nest site suggesting the La Brea Tar pits had a nearby forest possibly containing streams or a river.
but the fish traps to transport the fish upriver are antiquated small and. American Rivers is calling for upgrades to fix the dams
mutilating animals by cutting their tails horns and genitals off without pain relief; and locking egg-laying hens veal calves and mother pigs in tiny cages for their entire lives.
They are distinguishable from other rodents due to their short tails stubby legs and small ears.
Their vertebrae indicate they swam more like fish using their tails for propulsion with strong fin-shaped forelimbs and vestigial hind limbs.
They had long sinuous necks sharp teeth clawed hands and a long bony tail. Coelophysis fossils found in large numbers in New mexico indicate the animal hunted in packs.
and more time at their nests but were less attentive to their chicks while at their nests compared to untreated adult males the team reported in the Feb 4 online issue of the journal Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.
Each male had two chicks at the start of the experiment but by the end after the pellets had degraded completely many of the treated males had lost one of their two chicks to predators
Their bellies usually have a black-and-white checkerboard pattern occasionally with orange accents and two black stripes under the tail.
and invade rodents nests looking for prey. Nevertheless these snakes are generally quiet and shy.
ll actually dissolve their own bones to make baby-housing shells. That' s one way to lose baby weight!</
s nest. In doing so the cuckoo tricks the other bird often a different smaller species into taking on the expensive burden of raising the chick.
and grows faster forcing the other chicks out of the nest where they then die.
For several species of the<em>Stegodyphus</em>spiders motherly love goes even further than watching over the nest.
While hunting wild game did not involve much co-ordination beyond placing traps and positioning hunters agriculture presented an opportunity to massively increase the amount of food that could be produced.
Back in a lab the researchers looked for signs of claws hoofs and hair and other indigestible parts of unlucky prey in the scat.
WCS manages The bronx Zoo the New york Aquarium and other sites in addition to its conservation work. Calvelli contributed this article to Live Science's Expert Voices:
Even in the first few weeks of a forest villager getting his smartphone he reported this trap designed to capture a live primate we think either a baboon
or a chimp and this trap had never been recorded before in Tanzania Pintea said. In the future Pintea hopes to use imagery of the region gathered over the years to track changes in the forests over time.
The vertebrae suggest that L. laticauda had a very broad muscular tail which may have allowed it remarkable control
Unique discovery Diplodocids are famed for their long necks and long tails; the earliest discovered specimens came from the rich Jurassic fossil beds in Colorado.
so they contain more old trees would help trap more carbon (making the forest a carbon sink).
On this trip the dive team gathered about 200 juvenile emerald rock cod primarily using little green fishing nets the kind you d use in a child s aquarium.
#Back at Crary Aquarium in Mcmurdo Station the science team moved the juvenile fish to their new aquarium quarters
'Long Tail Feathers The largest four-winged dinosaur known has been found and this predator has the longest feathers yet outside of birds researchers say.
This new finding yields insights on how dinosaurs may have flown the scientists added. The 125-million-year-old feathered dinosaur named Changyuraptor yangi sported feathers over its body including its arms and legs
which made it look as if it had two pairs of wings. Its fossil was unearthed in 2012 in Liaoning province in northeastern China
The fossil revealed Changyuraptor had extraordinarily long tail feathers. The tail is really the crown jewel of the specimen Chiappe said.
At about 12 inches (0. 3 m) long Changyuraptor had the longest feathers seen outside of birds.
Until now the longest known microraptorine tail feathers were only about 7 inches (0. 18 m) long Chiappe said.
The long feathers seen on both the arms and legs of four-winged dinosaurs suggest they were capable of flying.
It's surprising to think of Changyuraptor flying because it's so large maybe the size of a peacock Chiappe said.
But the scientists'aerodynamic calculations suggest Changyuraptor's long tail feathers helped slow its fall assuring safe landings.
The tail tells us Changyuraptor could have generated a fair amount of lift to slow its flying
In one I thought I had captured a meteor intersecting the comet's tail I just could not tell in the field.
Here s another potential pitfall. Even if there is a net conservation benefit to the area where the offset project is carried out these gains could be wiped out
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