Trap More Wolves (Op-Ed) Zack Strong is an NRDC wildlife advocate in Bozeman Mont.
Another amendment would allow landowners with a kill permit to use foothold traps to kill wolves that have attacked livestock.
Further foothold traps are non-selective and would be more likely to capture a non-threatening non-offending animal than a specific wolf.
Allowing the use of foothold traps could also result in the capture and killing of threatened and endangered species such as wolverines lynx and grizzly bears as well as black bears deer elk moose mountain lions eagles and yes landowners'own dogs and livestock the very animals
these traps would supposedly be protecting. The odds of incidental captures would be given particularly high that landowners would be allowed to leave these traps out a full month
and a half after the livestock attack had occurred. A third amendment would remove the requirement that FWP set quotas during the wolf hunting
This Op-Ed was adapted from New Rules Would Allow Montana Landowners to Shoot Trap More Wolves on the NRDC blog Switchboard.
and pebbles to help grind up their food inside their gizzard which is a small pouch where food is crushed
and flap their wings outward to display their plumage. When they are ready to mate the male's beak
Their feathers will turn a silvery color according to the American Ostrich Association. Ostrich eggs are 6 inches (15 cm) in diameter
Eggs are laid in a communal nest called a dump nest which can hold about 60 eggs at one time.
Ostrich feathers look shaggy because they hang loosely and don't hook together like feathers on other types of birds y
#Chimps Are Naturally Violent, Study Suggests For years anthropologists have watched wild chimpanzees go ape and attack each other in coordinated assaults.
Instead the primates build a new nest each evening from scratch. High up in the forest canopy the animals interlace strong stems
In 2011 one intrepid Cambridge researcher who slept in wild chimpanzee nests for six nights reported that the nests kept her warm and relatively free of bug bites;
Images of Primate Nests And now another group of researchers has looked at whether chimpanzees are picky about the type of wood they use for their nests.
Anthropologists David Samson of the University of Nevada Las vegas and Kevin Hunt of Indiana University in Bloomington examined 1844 chimpanzee nests in western Uganda's Toro-Semliki Wildlife Reserve.
They found that 73.6 percent of the nests were built with the plant species Cynometra alexandri
despite the fact that this tree was hardly the most common species in the area representing just 9. 6 percent of the local arboreal population.
Food Turns Feathers Pink Flamingos are large birds that are identifiable by their long necks sticklike legs and pink or reddish feathers.
The pink and reddish colors of a flamingo's feathers come from eating pigments found in algae and invertebrates.
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.
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.
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.
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.
The new fossils were not found with feathers Schachner said but the dinosaur's close relatives had them
One of the specimens was found with debris of shells and tiny vertebrae between its ribs and pelvis but the scientists aren't sure
The tail can add another 2 feet (60 cm) in length though their tails are quite short
Lions'tails by comparison can grow up to 3. 5 feet (105 cm. Males are heavier than females.
Jaguars will dip their tails into the water to lure fish much like a fishing line.
To keep other jaguars at bay they mark their territory with urine or by marking trees with their claws.
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
King cobras are the only species of snake to build nests for their young which they guard ferociously.
When scientists account for the world's carbon dioxide their totals suggest some of the greenhouse gas disappears into land-based carbon traps.
and fart methane an odorless gas that is about 25 times more powerful than carbon dioxide in its ability to trap radiant heat in the atmosphere.
They also like to sleep hanging by their claws from tree branches. For the most part a sloth's life revolves around sleeping
A sloth only has its claws for defense against predators. However its very low level of movement
They have large black eyes and bushy tails. They have four toes on each foot and the thin claws on each toe are surrounded by stiff bristles.
Chinchillas are typically 9 to 15 inches (23 to 38 centimeters) long but the tail can add another 3 to 6 inches (8 to 15 cm) to their length.
They generally weigh 1. 1 to 1. 8 lbs. 0. 5 to 0. 8 kilograms.
A gazelle will flick its tails or stomp its feet to warn others of a lurking predator.
When the water sinks it traps heat in the ocean depths. Ocean surface temperatures drive the current:
and pectoral fins were supported by several long thin bones powered by muscles largely within the trunk.
and pelvic fins articulating to the shoulder or pelvis by a single bone (humerus or femur)
which was powered by muscles within the fin itself. Some species were capable of breathing air through spiracles in the skull.
</p><p>When scientists account for the world's carbon dioxide their totals suggest some of the greenhouse gas disappears into land-based carbon traps.
#Zoos, Aquariums and Their Visitors Are Critical Advocates for Conservation (Op-Ed) John Calvelli is executive vice president for public affairs at the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and director of the 96 Elephants campaign.
or aquarium in recent years there's a good chance that you've noticed something new.
or aquarium about their primary mission they would underscore the education of guests regarding the conservation status of the animals they are observing
Zoos and aquariums are living museums where children and adults alike are witness to the wonders of the natural world.
I attended the Winter Meeting of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) recently. We attended to provide senior zoo representatives from across the nation with an update on the forest-elephant poaching
So far 115 different zoos and aquariums have signed on as 96 Elephants partners. All have the ability to spread the message of elephant conservation to their park-going audiences
and zoos and aquariums are making a difference. Each in their own way is helping to focus attention educate their visitors
And over the next month three Chicago institutions the Chicago Zoological Society's Brookfield Zoo the Lincoln Park Zoo and Shedd Aquarium will likewise be working with local and state lawmakers to raise awareness
and the important role of zoos and aquariums and their visitors when working together to achieve public-policy goals.
or aquarium you may want to listen a bit closer to zoo professionals or read the exhibit material a bit more carefully.
& Aquariums and Their Visitors Can Be Critical Advocates for Conservation Action that appeared on Huffington Post.
and using HEPA (high-efficiency particulate air filters to trap pollen. Mistake 3: Not taking steps to keep pollen away Your shoes clothes hair
With their colorful plumage and ability to mimic human speech parrots are very popular pets.
and moving their tail feathers. Some parrots like the kakapo are nocturnal. They sleep during the day and search for food at night.
and lay eggs in a nest. Some species though lay their eggs in tree holesground tunnels rock cavities and termite mounds.
A parrot chick is born with only a thin layer of thin wispy feathers called down.
At three weeks they start to grow their adult feathers. The chick will not be matured fully for one to four years depending on its species. According to the Integrated Taxonomic Information system (ITIS) the taxonomy of parrots is:
Cockatoos have a group of feathers on top of their heads that they can move. When on full display these feathers resemble a mohawk.
The cockatoo can also retract the feathers so they lay flat against their heads r
#Chasing Alligators, Dodging Parrots: A Zookeeper's Life (Op-Ed) Christopher Scoufaras is a zookeeper at the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS)' s Queens Zoo.
and New york Aquarium and knew from a young age that I was interested in working with animals.
Archaeologists found residues of fish scales bird feathers and starchy plants at a Neanderthal cave in the Rhone Valley in France.
</a p><p></p><p>The colorful mantis shrimp is known for powerful claws that can stun prey with 200 lbs.
We've been able to deploy nest cameras to watch the birds'chick-raising habits and their family life.
and chicks but they're nothing like great horned owls who will swoop into a nest decapitate the chicks
and leave often after whitewashing the nest with their feces. High-tech tools like satellite transmitters and nest videocams have given us a better understanding of eagle life
but the census flights remain a primary tool for keeping tabs on the population. The annual bald eagle assessment involves two rounds of flights.
and involves systematically flying over all tributaries to check nests that we've recorded from previous years.
This part of the survey also includes mapping new nests constructed since the last breeding season.
Now that we know exactly where the eagles are nesting we fly back to each nest counting the number of new chicks.
Byrd sits in the copilot seat keeping the log and marking each nest. I'm the spotter.
I sit in the back and call out the nests. Armed with a stack of topographic maps for plotting nests a stack of datasheets for recording survey information
and a supply of no. 2 pencils Byrd travels through eight hours of banks dives
Those lazy flying days of the'70s when nests were rare and a day's flying could be recorded on a single sheet are gone long.
when we set goals of checking on 100 nests before breaking for lunch. The census surveys have gotten pretty intense
For long stretches we see a nest every few seconds. Even with three experienced people doing the job we keep busy.
Eagles tend to nest in the same places often reusing a nest so out of the three of us we know
when a popular nest tree is coming up. Sometimes for reasons known only to the eagles a tree might go without a nest for a year or two.
We remember those trees too. After flying over all those nests we've gotten pretty good at quickly gauging the age of eagle chicks by evaluating size and plumage.
These flights involve more than just keeping track of the numbers of breeding eagles in our territory.
or nest-repair activities. We don't know why birds here breed so early or why the early birds seem to concentrate in this one short stretch of the James river.
Still fresh are the memories of undertaking long heartbreaking flights without finding a single nest.
The famous Venus flytrap shuts its jaws rapidly by essentially growing them shut Gilroy said.
Acid released at the flytrap's hinge softens cell walls and makes them expand quickly. Image Gallery:
I stood there staring at the amazing specter of Hyakutake's tail stretching across the entire darkening sky.
Observers stated that they had seen a strange sparking in and around the comet's tail.
I was to capture the sparking phenomenon in Lovejoy's tail. As time dragged on
And this small spark of a meteor was apparently close to comet Lovejoy's tail. A few hours later I fell sound asleep dreaming that perhaps I had done what
They grow to 15 to 20 inches (38.1 to 50.8 cm) in length with their tails adding an extra 6 to 9. 5 inches (15.24 to 24.13 cm) to their length.
or nests that are built into the crooks of branches To get from tree to tree
When the kits leave the nest they don't travel farther than 2 miles from home according to the Massachusetts Department of Wildlife and Fisheries.
One difference between the two categories is that Old world monkeys don't have prehensile tails; New world monkeys do.
They show affection by grooming each other intertwining their tails holding hands cuddling and lip smacking.
Facing extremes Young chicks between 9 and 23 days old were particularly vulnerable to hypothermia as they were too young to have fully grown their waterproof plumage
They have to have waterproof feathers to survive study co-author Dee Boersma told Livescience. If chicks don't have waterproof plumage they are going to die as soon as they end up in the water.
Extreme heat another component of climate change expected to worsen throughout the century also challenged chicks'temperature-regulation systems
To gather information on the abundance of brown hyaena I turned to camera traps. Wildlife surveys have been enhanced greatly by the development of camera traps.
A key factor is the capture confirmation and monitoring of rare and elusive species particularly when the species is located across large remote areas.
Camera traps are excellent tools that have grown in popularity with conservation ecologists. However every camera trap needs to be set up monitored
and protected areas to reach the designated camera trap sites come rain or shine. In the farmland acquiring permission to gain access to private land was critical.
and mark their territory through latrines at road junctions making these ideal sites for placing camera traps.
A total of 800 camera trap nights produced nearly 35000 images of which 10000 were made up of carnivores ranging from the large ones such as lion leopard spotted hyaena brown hyaena wild dog to the medium-sized such as honey badger jackal civet serval caracal
or slightly yellow coat round face long tail and erect ears. Adult males grow to 6 to 8 feet (1. 8 to 2. 4 meters) long
A puma's tail is almost as long as its head and body combined. Habitat & habits Pumas can adapt to a wide variety of climates and habitats.
The new volcano animation reveals the plume of ash and steam rising from Sarychev. The plume appears to be capped brown ash with a head of white steam a result of air rising quickly in a strong updraft before cooling and condensing.
The plume was so immense that it cast a large shadow on the island according to NASA Earth Observatory.
See the Sarychev Eruption Animation On the ground denser gray ash known as pyroclastic flows can be seen.
Wildlife Services agents also use a variety of traps and snares. These devices often capture non-target animals including rare and threatened species such as wolverines lynx and grizzly bears.
and killed more than 520 animals in leghold traps and more than 850 in neck snares including mountain lions river otters pronghorn antelope deer badgers beavers turtles turkeys ravens ducks geese great blue herons and even a golden eagle.
Frustratingly these non-selective methods continue to be used even though their indiscriminate nature has been known for decades.
Even though I was experienced an professional trapper my trap victims included non-target species such as bald eagles and golden eagles a variety of hawks and other birds rabbits sage grouse pet dogs deer
Because of trap injuries these non-target species had to be destroyed. And scientists continue to describethe indiscriminate nature of snares.
While studying the impacts of wolf snares on moose Alaska biologist Craig Gardner reported in the journal Alces:
Wolf snares can be even less selective than snares set for smaller furbearers because cable diameter and loop circumference are larger set height is higher
and the size and strength of a wolf require that minimum breaking forces must be high...
Based on my 15 years of experience releasing nearly 40 moose from snares and discussions with other Alaskan biologists
I concluded that most moose restrained in wolf snares die either at the capture site or from frozen limbs or nose subsequent to release.
That is why NRDC recently supported a ban on body-gripping traps and snares in the City of Los angeles. It's why we've opposed the trapping
and snaring of wolves in the northern Rockies. It's why we've pushed for federal legislation prohibiting the use of poisons to kill wildlife.
The author's most recent op-ed was Montana Landowners May Soon Shoot Trap More Wolves.
The practice of tying a noose around a criminal's neck and suspending them until dead has been around since the medieval era.
Sprouting like a tail from the bottom of an oddly-shaped fruit the cashew in its natural state is both very weird-looking and very poisonous.
Gorilla beds are called nests. Young gorillas often make their nests in trees and older gorillas make their nests on the ground.
Gorillas usually don't need to drink water from lakes or streams. They get all of the moisture they need from their food and morning dew
#Oranges: Health Benefits, Risks & Nutrition Facts Sweet juicy oranges make a delicious and healthy snack or addition to a meal.
It is 8 to 9 feet (2. 4 to 2. 7 meters) from head to rump with its tail adding an extra 2 to 3. 3 feet (60 to 100 centimeters.
Tanzania has a network of pheromone traps set up as monitoring devices to attract the moths
Nature Newsthe water plumes erupting from the south pole of Saturn's moon Enceladus could be caused by a liquid ocean lurking many kilometres underground rather than by geysers erupting from a salty ocean just beneath the moon
The absence of sodium in the plumes pouring out of vents at Enceladus's south pole rules out geysers from water just below the surface.
or molecular sodium both in the plumes and in one of Saturn's rings thought to be fed by these plumes, the E ring.
If geysers caused Enceladus's plumes, then they would throw up salt-rich jets giving out a strong sodium signal that could be spotted by ground-based telescopes.
These grains travel out into space in the plumes along with salt-poor ice grains that are formed like snowflakes from pure water vapour.
The absence of sodium in the plume does not contradict his theory because the small amounts of sodium he would expect to see would not be detectable using the Keck telescope.
But other models exist to explain Enceladus's plumes apart from oceans or geysers. One of these suggests that reservoirs of clathrates gassy molecules locked up in the lattice of another molecule exist below the surface.
which carry up ice particles with them to form the icy plumes. These ice particles could carry up salt as well
Kieffer also says that the other gases present in the plume including methane, carbon dioxide and nitrogen can only be accounted for with the clathrate model.
Francis Nimmo, a planetary scientist at the University of California, Santa cruz, had suggested that the plumes came directly from the solid ice shell,
such as the absence of sodium in the plumes. There really ought to be some there, he says.
The study also included experiments in a veritable menagerie of animals including mice, miniature pigs, ferrets and macaques.
One reason for the difference between the EPA and the California DPR reports is that the EPA effectively assumed that no one would get hit by a'plume'of pesticide created by stagnant air pockets
Such plumes of other fumigants, she says, typically send a couple of dozen people in the United states to the emergency room every few years.
A NASA probe sent crashing into the Cabeus crater near the Moon's north pole on 9 october ploughed up a plume containing water, hydrocarbons and, unexpectedly, mercury,
the last 2-3 months of the animals'lives, obtained by analysing the quickly regenerating tail tuft hairs,
'Levin says that her finding shows the pitfalls of relying on self-reporting. If you want to know
The former produced on average two fledging chicks per nest in 2009. In contrast, birds at the control sites achieved an average of three fledging chicks.
Nature Newsbaiting mosquito traps with cards soaked in honey, and then analysing VIRAL RNA in saliva left by mosquitoes that feed on them,
researchers often use traps baited with carbon dioxide or light to attract the insects, which are then ground up
and his colleagues have developed a method for collecting mosquito saliva by allowing the insects to feed on honey-drenched cards placed in a trap filled with carbon dioxide.
Their results showed that traps containing honey-soaked cards attracted more mosquitoes than those without cards,
with more than 75%of mosquitoes consuming honey while in the traps. Each week, the team collected cards and trapped mosquitoes and shipped them to a lab,
Five out of eight crows that had refused previously to visit the nest suddenly began feeding the chicks.
it too generated subsurface oil plumes. That oil made its way around the Gulf, and at one point some beaches in Texas took an unexpected oil hit after it mixed with surface waters close to shore.
president of the Forest Products Association of Canada in Ottawa, lauded former antagonists for working together on how to meet the needs of humanity without trashing the environment, our own nest.
Nature Newsthe sight of a feather in a peacock's tail, Charles darwin wrote in 1860,
The seemingly useless, even cumbersome, gaudy plumage did not fit with his theory of natural selection, in
and its plumage has become the poster child for his theory of sexual selection, in
Research in which peacocks'tails were plucked experimentally, published online this month in Animal Behaviour1, now suggests that the answer is yes but only sometimes.
They found that males with very few eyespots in their tail feathers a measure of the size of the tail were unattractive to females
Beginning in the 1980s, Marion Petrie, a behavioural ecologist at Newcastle University, UK, examined the role of the peacock's tail in mating rituals.
Plucking feathers from a male's train ruined his chances2. Later, French scientists found that males with lots of eyespots had stronger immune systems than less showy males
I think there's clear evidence that peahens use a peacock's tail in their mate choice,
Dakin repeated Petrie's experimental work by plucking the feathers of peacocks. She noticed a drop in their success with peahens.
and on average, those with the most eyespots didn't mate any more than males with less extravagant tails.
but that the trait could help to weed out particularly unfit males that are missing lots of feathers.
but is convinced not that the natural variation in the number of eyespots on a tail is so small.
She also says that males do shed not feathers at random, and peacocks that manage to hold onto their plumes are likely to be the healthiest and fittest.
Still Petrie admits that traits such as the number of eyespots are only rough measures of tail quality,
Gr ae'Â msv ae'Â tn spewed a plume of material some 20 kilometres into the sky,
finds that bird species with orange feathers living in the fallout zone seem to be more susceptible to radiation than their drabber gray and black fellows1.
Mousseau and M ¸ller found that birds whose feathers were coloured with bright yellow and red carotenoid-based pigments showed a decline in abundance as radiation levels increased,
what gives redheads their hair colour and Red Forest birds such as the hoopoe (Upupa epops) their distinctive palette of light browns and their orange crown feathers.
Pieter Tans and his team at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric administration s Earth System Research Laboratory in Boulder, Colorado, measure greenhouse-gas plumes from major facilities through a network
the peat forest contained trees that looked like feather dusters, with trunks twice the height of telephone poles;
Rather than setting out camera traps the idea is to collect and sequence DNA left in the environment, in everything from soil to leeches stomachs."
Their team failed to find the saola using camera traps and considered bringing in trained dogs to help the hunt, at an estimated cost of US$400,
The irish have used targeted snare-trapping to all but eliminate badgers from selected areas. That system would be more affordable
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