Living the Scientific Life (The Archives)

Web Award News

2006-02-06T00:14:00.000-05:00

I wasn't going to post anything else here, but I just learned that Scientific Life was awarded the first runner up in the "Biggest Blog Whore" category for the 2005 Best of Blog (BoB) Awards!

Congratulations to everyone who was entered in the BoB Awards, it has been fun. If you wish to continue reading this blog, please be sure to link to my new site.

Migration

2006-01-31T20:18:00.000-05:00

Living the Scientific Life is keeping its original name but it has moved to its new home at ScienceBlogs, a project of Seed Media. This original site will remain here because I don't want to break any existing links, so it will serve as my "deep archives". You are welcome to link to both sites.

I am mirroring Birds in the News at this site until the end of January for two reasons; first, I want to break 100,000 visits (for purely egotistical purposes) and second, I want to give the Koufax Award visitors some new content to look at while they decide whether they want to investigate the new site -- where there is a LOT of new material -- while they decide whether they want vote for me.

Scroll down to see content that was added prior to 31 January.

100,000 Dead Mice

2006-01-29T01:38:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, Scientific Life surpassed 100,000 visitors. In fact, visitor number 100,000 popped into here shortly before 6pm. What brought this visitor here? Dead mice, that's what! This person googled the phrase, "how long does a dead mouse smell" and guess whose blog pops up?

Okay, for those of you who want to know about dead mice, I will tell you that they smell horrible for approximately 3-4 days. After that, they still smell but it's not as bad as it was -- perhaps because your sense of smell has been so severely compromised that you are no longer aware of it?

Also, I've noticed that dead mice smell differently, depending upon how they die. Mice that died after being stuck in sticky traps tend to smell like really dirty laundry, whereas mice that die after eating poison containing warfarin tend to smell like, well, dead mice, but there's a sweet smell mixed in with the stench. I hope this answers all your dead mouse questions. If not, feel free to ask and I will provide the answers because we all know that I am the internet expert of dead mice.

So, those of you who know that I was mirroring Birds in the News here are probably curious to know if attaining the magical 100,000 visits was personally satisfying to me, if all my problems are solved as a result. I'd like to say that yes, having more than 100,000 visitors who have looked at my site for information about dead mice (and other things) that polite people don't talk about is tremendously satisfying to me. I think my next step will be to use my new-found confidence to run for the presidency of this country so I can forevermore eradicate evil house mice and the landlords who love them.

Birds in the News #45

2006-01-27T00:39:00.000-05:00

Female Snowy Owl, Bubo scandiacus.
By Bill Ferensen, Seattle.
(click image for Bill's site)

People Hurting Birds

Deceived by all the bird flu sensationalism, an Egyptian farmer abandoned 10,000 newly hatched chicks to their fate on a desert road east of Cairo fearing they might be infected with the deadly bird flu virus, a police official said on Wednesday. Shocked motorists travelling on the road about 130 km (80 miles) east of Cairo contacted police after seeing the chicks running loose on the tarmac on Tuesday, the official added. Health officials gathered the chicks and confirmed after testing that they were not carrying the virus.

Birds .. proving once again that People Really Are Monkeys

There's nothing that stirs man's blood like the thrill of the hunt. The fact that the object of this hunt, a feral monk parrot, Myiopsitta monachus (pictured), was destined to become a pet to this particular man's girlfriend only added to this thrill. I don't want to spoil this story for you by elaborating further, except to say that it is an Honorable Mention on the Darwin Awards website. GrrlScientist observes: it's amazing what a little testosterone can do to a person.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker News

As scientists debate whether the ivory-billed woodpecker, Campephilus principalis (pictured), still exists in the Big Woods of Arkansas, environmentalists have enlisted the bird as a key soldier in their fight against a massive irrigation project. The irrigation project has been on the table since the mid-1980s, when studies showed that groundwater aquifers in the area, which lies in east-central Arkansas, were being depleted by rice growers. To solve that, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ Grand Prairie Area Demonstration Project is working with farmers to build reservoirs on their land and elsewhere that will be filled via a canal and pipeline network with water pumped from the White River. But Lisa Swann of the National Wildlife Federation and other groups have long fought the Grand Prairie project as a federal boondoggle that poses serious environmental threats and squanders tax dollars to deliver huge subsidies to farmers. This “mammoth sucking machine” would hurt wetlands, degrade water quality and threaten species in the region from ducks to mussels, the National Wildlife Federation says in one publication about Grand Prairie.

Avian Influenza News

Scientists who have made a big leap in unraveling the genetic code of bird flu viruses (pictured) found a new clue that may help explain why the notorious H5N1 strain is so deadly. St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee (USA), is home to a remarkable viral library, housing samples of about 11,000 influenza viruses that Dr. Robert Webster has gathered from around the world since 1976. These flu viruses have infected people, pigs and other animals, and includes approximately 7,000 bird flu viruses gathered from poultry, ducks, gulls and other species. Yesterday, St. Jude researchers reported in the top-tier journal Science that they have completed the first large genetic analysis of more than 300 of these bird flu viruses. They identified 2,196 bird flu genes and 160 complete viral genomes, doubling the amount of genetic information available to scientists studying how these viruses evolve and spread over time. Decoding all the influenza genes instead of select ones will help scientists learn how these constantly evolving viruses change and spread, and why some are so much more virulent than others.

Turkey accused its neighbours on Friday of hushing up outbreaks of bird flu, complicating the fight against a virus that has killed four Turkish children. "It is unofficially known that this illness exists in our neighbouring countries which are ruled by closed regimes, but these countries do not declare this because of their systems," Agriculture Minister Mehdi Eker told a news conference. He did not name the countries he had in mind, but Iran and Syria are two likely targets of the criticism. Turkey has culled more than 1.1 million wild birds and poultry since the outbreak began two weeks ago. The outbreak has hit the $3 billion poultry industry hard. The Turkish government unveiled a $40 million aid package on Friday for poultry firms hit by bird flu, including compensation for culled chickens and postponement of tax and debt payments. However, poultry industry representatives said the measures did not go far enough. GrrlScientist complains; this story does not describe what poultry industry officials wanted that was not granted by the government, so this makes it impossible for me to rant about the situation here.

Do the wild birds that fly through cold winter skies to warmer lands silently carry deadly bird flu around the world? Or are they simply potential victims? "Scientists are increasingly convinced that at least some migratory waterfowl are now carrying the H5N1 virus in its highly pathogenic form, sometimes over long distances, and introducing the virus to poultry flocks in areas that lie along their migratory routes," the World Health Organisation said in its latest bird flu fact sheet last week. It said scientists found that viruses from the most recently affected countries, all of which lie along migratory routes, were almost identical to viruses recovered from dead migratory birds at Qinghai Lake in China. The viruses from Turkey's first human cases were also virtually identical to the Qinghai Lake strain, it added. "I think that wild birds may introduce the virus but it is through man and man's marketing systems (the poultry trade) that the disease spreads. It is also possible that poultry can transmit the virus to wildlife when they share the same ecosystem," said Juan Lubroth, the senior officer for infectious diseases with the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). "The pattern of outbreaks between Asia and eastern Europe do not follow any known pathway for migrant birds, which tend to fly on northerly-southerly routes. They don't go east-west, Dr Richard Thomas of BirdLife International points out. Wild birds that were discovered to have the H5 virus, such as swans found in Croatia in October 2005, were already dead -- suggesting they were victims rather than vectors.

Streaming Birds

This week on BirdNote you can learn more about Western Scrub-Jays, Aphelocoma californica, on the Move; The Comeback of the Peregrine Falcon, Falco peregrinus (featuring Ruth Taylor's photograph of Bell, the resident female peregrine falcon, nesting on the Washington Mutual Bank (WAMU) tower in downtown Seattle); Nesting Great Horned Owls, Bubo virginianus (first of a series about the nesting season); How the Robin Got its Name; and on Friday (today), you can learn more about the upcoming Skagit Bald Eagle Festival (February 4-5). BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [rss mp3/podcast].

You might be interested to follow the birding adventures of David and his wife, Gayle, as presented on their audio magazine of birds and birding, On The Wing. They index a variety of their birding adventures in the UK and other places, including some of my old stomping grounds in the Pacific Northwest. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

The parents of Toga -- the penguin chick whose disappearance last month was followed around the world -- have a new egg (pictured), British zookeepers said this week, prompting dozens of well-wishers to send congratulatory e-mails. Toga, a 3-month-old jackass penguin, Sphenicus demersis, disappeared in December from Amazon World, on the Isle of Wight in southern England. Despite scores of reported sightings and an on-air confession from a man who called a television station to admit to stealing the bird, Toga has not been found and is presumed dead. Zoo officials have installed closed circuit television cameras and motion sensors to make sure that Toga's expected sibling remains safely with his parents, who are a rare species of penguin found on the southern coast of Africa.

While the cost of chasing birds to the far corners of the earth is high, virtually everyone afflicted with this obsession claims the rewards -- beauty, mystery, awe and longer lists -- are well worth it. ''A tiny warbler that weighs maybe 3 ounces and is not more than 3 inches long can fly from the edge of the taiga in Canada to Costa Rica and Puerto Rico. The more you see them, the more amazing they are to you. You can't ever get enough,'' says Financial reporter Christine Williamson, who lives in Chicago when she is not chasing birds across the globe. American birders spend over $32 billion annually on their hobby and about 18 million travel to see birds, according to a 2001 study by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The average birder that year was 49 with an above-average income and education level. ''In addition to seeing these incredibly beautiful and diverse birds, ranging from flightless penguins to little tiny hummingbirds, it takes you to places that are just stunning and show a diversity of life and the diversity of this planet,'' said Tom Snetsinger. Tom is the son of legendary birder, Phoebe Snetsinger who saw more birds -- 8,450 of the world's approximately 10,000 species -- than any other person who ever lived. Phoebe Snetsinger was already an avid birder when she was given less than a year to live after a diagnosis of malignant melanoma, so she hurled herself into birding trips more than ever. She ended up living another two decades before dying in a bus crash in Madagascar. ''Birding is a lens to look at the world. It guides me to places I'd otherwise never go,'' said Tom. GrrlScientist note: I absolutely agree with Tom. I have experienced more habitat types, learned more about ecology and geology, met more people, seen more animals and had more incredible experiences as a direct result of birding than most people I know -- except other birders with more money!

There is an epidemic of bird ticks this winter in the Carolina Piedmont, and it's right on schedule. For some super-close-up photos and intriguing information about these gloriously repulsive ectoparasites, please scroll down on the link provided to This Week at Hilton Pond. As always, they include a list of birds banded during the period, including several mugshots of a partial albino American Goldfinch, Carduelis tristis (pictured). Fortunately, they also include suggestions for dealing with a tick-infested bird.

The Fine Print: Thanks to my bird pals; Dawn, Joel, Bill, Larry, Ellen and Ron for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here.

I also appreciate long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! Voting will probably begin at the end of January. There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins.

Previous : : Birds in the News : : Next

tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Academic Job Applications: none sent this week, but I am preparing to send out several postdoc applications soon.

Survival Job Applications: none this week. The academic semester has begun, so I can plan on becoming quite lean over the next five months unless someone decides to hire me.

Survival Job Rejections: 1

Birds in the News #44

2006-01-20T01:56:00.000-05:00

Brown Pelican, Pelecanus occidentalis.
Photo by Arthur Morris, Birds as Art.

Birds in Science

Two University of Canterbury biologists are part of a team whose evolutionarily-informed approach to conservation is aiding the recovery of New Zealand’s critically endangered parrot, the kakapo, Strigops habroptilus (pictured). Bruce Robertson and Neil Gemmell, Associate Professor of Biological Sciences, are members of a research team that has just had a paper published in the Royal Society of London’s prestigious journal Biology Letters. The manuscript outlines how the team, led by Robertson, used sex allocation theory to remedy a conservation dilemma. A key prediction of sex allocation theory is that females in good condition should produce more sons. The kakapo, which today has a population of 86 located on a handful of small island sanctuaries, is the subject of much global conservation interest. They only breed every two to five years and about 58% of eggs do not hatch. Providing breeding females with extra food over the past decade has improved breeding frequency and chick survival, but at a recently-recognised cost: females in better condition were producing more sons. “Left unchecked, the recovery of this already male-biased species could be prolonged by more than 100 years, dramatically increasing the risk of losing this charismatic bird to extinction,” Dr Robertson said. Only females below a predicted breeding threshold weight were given ad libitum food in the months before commencement of mating in mid-January to bring them up to the desired optimum weight. Females above the predicted breeding weight threshold were put on a diet to avoid raising their body condition to that previously associated with male-bias sex allocation. “This is a world first, using evolutionary theory to inform conservation practises and the first time anyone has used sex allocation theory to manipulate sex ratios with a critically endangered species. Our work has not only remedied the immediate problem of an overproduction of sons, but also highlights the value of incorporating evolutionary theory into modern conservation practice."

People Helping Birds

Ridgway's Hawk, Buteo ridgwayi (pictured), is a forest raptor endemic to the New World island of Hispaniola. Once commonly distributed throughout the island, the hawk has been reduced in the last century to a single declining population of 80 to 120 pairs, confined to less than 208 km² of native rainforest in the Dominican Republic's Los Haitises National Park. In 2004, the Peregrine Fund, York University (Canada) and the Sociedad Ornitológica de la Hispaniola initiated a research project to examine the nesting ecology and conservation genetics of Ridgway's Hawk. This is the first time that nests have been monitored in detail since the species was listed as Critically Endangered. Researchers found that human disturbance was the number one cause for nest failure for these critically endangered birds. [BirdLife Caribbean Newsletter PDF 2.5 MB]

A team of international bird experts will begin surveying the Bangladeshi coast Tuesday in search of the endangered spoon-billed sandpiper, Eurynorhynchus pygmeus (pictured), whose population they believe has dwindled to just 350 pairs in the wild, organizers said Monday. The spoon-billed sandpiper, a small shore bird with a bill shaped like a teaspoon, lives and breeds in the Russian tundra. After a long, arduous journey of nearly 3,730 miles, these birds winter along the coastal areas of Bangladesh, India and Myanmar. The population of the species has been declining over the years for a combination of reasons, and a 2000-2005 survey found an estimated 300-350 breeding pairs in sparsely populated Siberia, said Christoph Zockler from Cambridge, England who will lead the Bangladesh survey. "We ringed some young birds, but none returned home to breed. So what's going on?" said Zockler, who has been following the birds for five years. "We hope to uncover the mystery along the fly path." Enam Ul Haque, a Bangladesh water fowl census coordinator said; "We hope our survey will yield results that will help save them."

The biggest ever British Birdwatching Fair has produced record funds for vital conservation work in the forests of south-east Asia. Over 18,000 bird-watchers and wildlife enthusiasts visited the British Birdwatching Fair in August 2005. The three-day annual event is held at Rutland Water and is jointly promoted by the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK) and the Leicestershire and Rutland Wildlife Trust. Martin Davies, the RSPB’s International Funding Unit manager and one of the organisers of the Bird Fair, expressed his delight at the contribution the event can make to international projects. "From the wetlands of Madagascar to the dry forests of Peru, conservation projects have been directly helped by funds raised at the Birdfair. British birdwatchers should be truly proud of what they have been able to help achieve," he said.

Stinky needs a free ride to Florida, and soon. An Onslow County wildlife center in North Carolina is looking for help in transporting a juvenile brown pelican, Pelecanus occidentalis (pictured at top), to a new home in Miami. "Stinky" was found starving and injured on the beach in Surf City in December, when he was just four months old. He now has an eight-foot wing-span and smells pungently of fish after recovering at Possumwood Acres in Hubert. The Pelican Harbor Seabird Station in Miami has agreed to take him. But transporting Stinky is the problem: Possumwood Acres can't afford the cost of moving the bird. Officials say a free flight would be the optimum solution to ensure that the bird is fed the way he needs to be during travel and to limit stress, while also providing great public relations for the airlines that decides to help out.

People Hurting Birds

In India, Pakistan and Nepal, vultures are teetering on the brink of extinction. Their rapid decline has been blamed on a veterinary drug, diclofenac, which the vultures ingest when feeding off treated cattle carcasses. New research shows the widely used anti-inflammatory drug is highly toxic to an entire family of vultures and may cause the birds' demise around the globe (pictured: Oriental white-backed vulture, Gyps bengalensis). The situation was "extremely urgent," said Debbie Pain, a research scientist at the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds in England. "Populations of three vulture species affected by diclofenac in South Asia have declined by more than 97 percent since the early 1990s," Pain said. Vultures play a critical role in human and environmental health. For example, when cows die in India and Pakistan, it is custom to leave the carcasses where they are. In India, this is partly due to religious Hindu reasons because the cow is considered sacred. The rotting carcasses also become breeding grounds for diseases such as anthrax. "If a carcass is unconsumed for a day, anthrax within the animal has a chance to form spores, and these spores are incredibly resistant," said Rick Watson of the Peregrine Fund in Boise, Idaho. "That's how the disease spreads. So you set yourself up for increased incidence of disease -- both animal and human."

Birds Annoying People

Terre Haute, Indiana, has become the Panama City of America’s crow population. But at least that Florida coastal town gets some economic jolt from the college students who flock there for spring break. While those kids might throw up on the Panama City sidewalks, they’re also spending money on hotels, food and party supplies. There are other cities on the crows’ list of vacation hotspots. For example, their roost in Auburn, NY, mushroomed to 63,000 birds in 2004 before that town took action. “They seem to like to come into the city,” Auburn Mayor Tim Lattimore said by telephone last week. “They’re very intelligent birds. Very social birds. On weekends, their cousins fly in to visit.” Their tactics included using pyrotechnics similar to those in Terre Haute, accompanied by recorded crow distress calls and handheld laser lights. Auburn paid the New York USDA division $13,000 for the work, but the federal agency spent $32,000 itself on the project. It worked. “It was a real positive experience,” Chipman said.

Avian Influenza News

Much has been written in recent months about the role of wild birds in spreading the Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) H5N1 virus. But there is a distinct lack of evidence to support these assertions. "No species migrates from Qinghai, China, west to Eastern Europe," says Dr Richard Thomas, BirdLife International's Communications Manager. "When plotted, the pattern of outbreaks follows major road and rail routes, not flyways. And the absence of outbreaks in Africa, South and South-East Asia and Australasia this autumn is hard to explain, if wild birds are the primary carriers." Movement of infected poultry and poultry products is a likely cause of spread. South Korea and Japan are two countries to have suffered outbreaks of H5N1 in poultry and wild birds following importation of infected duck meat. Both countries stamped the virus out by culling infected poultry around disease areas, and imposed strict controls on poultry and poultry meat imports. "Neither country has suffered a recurrence of the virus despite the influx each autumn of hundreds of thousands of wild migrant birds," Richard Thomas points out. GrrlScientist note: I have been saying this very thing for years, based on traditional migratory paths of wild birds compared to the dates and locations when influenza outbreaks are first identified. It's about time that this information becomes more widely known and accepted.

The World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday it expected more human cases of bird flu following the death of four people in Turkey, but said the risks to humans were steadily diminishing. The WHO confirmed laboratory test results in Ankara, which revealed that four people from two families in eastern Turkey died of bird flu this month and a further 16, mostly children, were infected with the H5N1 virus. "We do expect to see some (more) cases because it takes time before the virus in birds has completely disappeared," said Dr. Guenael Rodier, head of the WHO mission to Turkey and an expert in communicable diseases. Human victims had been confined to East Asia until this month, when three infected children from the same family died in eastern Turkey, showing the deadly H5N1 strain had reached the crossroads of Europe, Asia and the Middle East. "Now is the right time to look beyond outbreak control to look at medium- and long-term efforts, particularly on the animal side, and also keep a constant surveillance in Turkey and neighbouring countries," he said.

Would you estimate the percentage of movie fans in the world by polling at a cinema? Would you calculate the number of overweight Americans by taking a survey at Weight Watchers locations? Not if you were aiming for any sort of statistical accuracy; such methods would not give you samples at all representative of a larger population. Regrettably, just this sort of sampling bias may have lead to huge errors in avian flu mortality numbers. While stony-faced newscasters somberly report that more than 50% of people infected with avian flu ultimately die, the death rate may be much lower. A study published in the January 9th issue of Archives of Internal Medicine found that as many as 600 to 750 people in Vietnam may have come down with a mild variant of the avian flu—one that does not carry lethal consequences. This suggests that current mortality estimates, which are derived from only the most severely ill patients, are biased. We may be underestimating the virus' transmission rate while overestimating the deadliness of avian flu. "Our study suggests that this milder form may be more prevalent than the more deadly disease that we heard about earlier," said Anna Thorson, a researcher at the Sweden's Karolinska University Hospital and lead author of the study.

Thousands of chickens mysteriously dropped dead at several farms in Trinidad over the last four weeks but authorities ruled out the deadly bird flu virus as the cause. "What they are saying to me is that [avian influenza] is not to be worried about," Narine told a local radio station. Narine said health officials believed the chickens in Trinidad were dying because of a fungal disease of the respiratory tract caused by Aspergillus fumigatus, a kind of mold (pictured). GrrlScientist note: Aspergillosis infection is very common in birds kept in conditions with overcrowding, poor hygiene and with little or no ventillation. In two words; chicken farms.

Streaming Birds

The schedule for this week on BirdNote is .. Monday, the call of the loon; Tuesday, seabirds in decline; Wednesday, migratory owls; Thursday, Bohemian Waxwings, Bombycilla garrulus; and Friday, a swirl of Snow Geese Anser caerulescens. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [mp3/podcast].

Ivory-billed Woodpecker News

Jerome Jackson's long anticipated comments regarding the Ivory-billed Woodpecker have finally been published by the Auk (123:1-15, 2006), one of three top-tier ornithological journals in the world. This article is publically available as a free download courtesy of the American Ornithologists' Union. [PDF, 15 pp.] The cover, which features the art of Julie Zickefoose, for this issue of Auk will appear here as soon as it is released.

Parrots in the News

Parrots were big in the news this week. Our first story is about a pet parrot who attacked a man who broke into its owner's apartment, and the resulting bite and blood marks helped police identify the suspect. A blue and gold macaw hybrid named Sunshine attacked Michael L. Deeter, 44, after he broke into the apartment, police said. Sunshine had blood on its beak and Deeter had marks on his hand consistent with those made by a parrot. Deeter told police the bird bit him very hard after he entered James Erb's apartment and he still had the marks to prove it when he was arrested, authorities said. He allegedly got away with about $100 and a camcorder. As for the bird, Sunshine did not come away unscathed -- all but one of its large tail feathers had been pulled out.

Our second parrot story describes how a gossipy parrot split up a pair of lovebirds when a computer programmer discovered that his girlfriend was having an affair when his pet parrot kept repeating her lover's name. The African grey parrot, Psittacus erithacus (pictured), named Ziggy, kept repeating "I love you, Gary" as his owner, Chris Taylor, sat with girlfriend Suzy Collins on the sofa of their shared flat in Leeds, northern England. But when Taylor saw Collins's embarrassed reaction, he realized she had been having an affair -- meeting her lover in the flat whilst Ziggy looked on. Ziggy even mimicked Collins's voice each time she answered her telephone, calling out "Hiya Gary," according to newspaper reports. "I wasn't sorry to see the back of Suzy after what she did, but it really broke my heart to let Ziggy go," Taylor said. Taylor revealed that he had also parted from Ziggy because the bird continued to call out Gary's name in his ex-girlfriend's voice, media reports said. GrrlScientist note; this is actually an old news story that I've linked to in Birds in the News, issue 38. But this time, I received 8 or 9 reader recommendations to include this link in this issue, more than I've ever gotten for any news story since I've been putting these things together, so here is the story again, by popular demand.

Our third parrot story tells how the movie star parrots (pictured, photo by Eric Luse) from San Francisco's Telegraph Hill just might get a happily-ever-after ending to the real-life saga of their favorite trees. In a finale fit for a sequel to their big-screen debut, the birds' beloved Monterey cypresses appear close to being spared from the ax. "We want to save those trees," said Mark Bittner, who wrote the best-selling book about the colorful birds and co-starred with them in a popular documentary film. The parrots "are my friends, and if I didn't help them, it would be absurd." An agreement could be reached as early as this week in a highly publicized, long-running feud between a property owner who wants to chop down the cluster of trees he sees as a liability and parrot lovers so intent on saving them that they have thrown themselves in front of buzzing chain saws. "It's a very emotional issue," Foster said. "On one side you have a group that has a relationship with the birds, and on the other hand you have a property owner with a liability issue."

Miscellaneous Birds

US Geological Survey has a National Wildlife Health Center webpage listing a variety of free books about animal health issues for download as PDFs in English, Spanish and Italian. Included in this listing is the beautifully illustrated 30-page Avian Necropsy Manual for Biologists in Remote Refuges [PDF, 2.87 MB], as well as important online information such as Coping with Diseases at Bird Feeders.

Fewer migrating ducks, geese and wading birds are wintering in the UK because they are staying closer to their Arctic breeding grounds due to climate change. New studies by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) and the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust have revealed that ducks, geese and waders are attracted by the relatively warmer winter conditions in the Gulf Stream that protects the British Isles but, claims the BTO, global warming could be persuading migrating birds to stay in cooler northern and eastern waters. Signs are growing that all is not well for a range of geese, ducks and wading birds. Species such as the grey (black-bellied) plover, Pluvialis squatarola, and dark-bellied brent goose, Branta bernicla bernicla (pictured), whose populations peaked in the early 1990s, after long periods of increase, numbers are now declining steadily.

With more than 18,000 collectible owl memorabilia, Pam Barker half-kiddingly thought she might have a world's record. The Guinness Book of World Records has now certified that she was right. Barker, 47, sent her count, a video and photographs to Guinness last spring. A couple of weeks ago, she got a certificate verifying her claim. The collection - all 18,055 items - had been owned by Dianne Turner, a collector who had recently died. A family friend was cleaning out the house and put the owls up for sale for $7,000. Barker offered about half. Although Barker didn't know Turner, she's put the world record in Turner's name. "Her husband gave her three owls after they got married," Barker said. "That started it all." Barker is now selling off the collection, and has priced everything in the store. She'll sell it piece-by-piece if she has to, although she'd like to find a home for the entire collection. "My husband would like his store back," she said.

This week, the 300th installment of "This Week at Hilton Pond," the ongoing series of photo essays about natural history in the Carolina Piedmont -- and beyond. This week, the Piedmont naturalists describe a very unusual bird captured for banding at Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History near York, SC. They include a mini-quiz and photos of this mystery bird on their site, a tally of birds banded during the week, plus some miscellaneous nature observations.

The Fine Print: Thanks to my bird pals, Ian, Mary, Arpit, Christine, Mike, Bill, Caren, Sara, Ellen and Ron for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here. Thanks to Ian for fact-checking this document.

I also appreciate long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! Voting will probably begin at the end of January. There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins.

Previous : : Birds in the News : : Next

tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Survival Job Applications: none this week. After an unending stream of negativity and rejection, I decided to begin my first formal week of unemployment in 2006 by hiding in snowy Morris, Minnesota, thanks to help from a lot friends (I've actually been unemployed since 23 December 2005 but was too depressed to register with the unemployment office until last week).

Gaining on Second Place!!

2006-01-19T15:40:00.000-05:00

I am not sure how many more hours this poll is open, but today's results show that I am gaining on second place! Not bad for a scientist, huh? If you haven't voted yet, or if you are using a different computer or different IP address from the last time you voted, be sure to take this opportunity to vote for Scientific Life for "Biggest Blog Whore"! Or heck, just vote anyway. It only takes one second.

Tangled Bank Available .. I think!

2006-01-18T11:21:00.000-05:00

The latest edition of the Tangled Bank is online at Greythumb, however, I am having trouble accessing that site. Can anyone else see it? If so, what is the magical OS-browser combination that you are using?

Tangled Bank is looking for volunteers to host future editions once again. If you are interested in hosting, please send email to PZ. I know that I have my most favorite time slot lined up already, so it is time for you to also throw your hat into the ring and help spread the good news about science blogging!

Slipping in the Polls!

2006-01-18T07:52:00.000-05:00

Even though I try not to obsess about the polls, I do check them several times per day and I am sad to report that, after yesterday afternoon's peak support level of 16%, I have fallen to a mere 13% of the popular support in the "Biggest Blog Whore" poll. Out of 651 votes cast, I have received only 87 votes! HORRORS!

I hope you know this is practice for the REAL polls that will be initiated at the end of the month .. if I can't convince you to vote for Scientific Life in this poll, how can I convince you to vote for me (or for Birds in the News) in those other polls??

Who Are You, Dear Readers?

2006-01-17T08:46:00.000-05:00

Reader demographics for the previous 100 visitors to this site.

I love looking at my stat meter, mostly because I am intensely curious to know who reads my blog and what country you are from. I know that I have a fair number of regular readers, most of whom lurk, never commenting and never sending email to me. Since I will be leaving this blog at the end of the month and moving to a new, more professional, site, I want you to come with me to that new site, and of course, I want it to be a success. So I am curious, who are you, dear readers? Where are you from? Why do you read my humble blog? What topics do you like most, and what topics would you like to read more about? What else would you like to tell me that might help me improve my blog? You can, of course, send these comments to me in email, but I prefer that you comment here so other people can also read what you have to say, and therefore might be encouraged to add their comments, too.

I also want to remind you that comments are currently on email moderation as a precaution against William, the spam-meister, and his ilk, which means that there will be a delay between the time you post your comments and the time until they appear, but don't let that discourage you.

Big Apple Blog Festival Shows Outstanding Support in Polls

2006-01-16T13:11:00.000-05:00

Nominated (!!) to the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 24.

I am getting an unexpected show of support in the polls from this issue of the Big Apple Blog Festival! Many thanks to Shouting Thomas for nominating me!

Still Third

2006-01-15T10:44:00.000-05:00

Scientific Life is still in third place, my peeps, although it appears to be picking up a little momentum because now it has 14% of the popular vote.

Uh-oh!

2006-01-14T06:35:00.000-05:00

I am in third place! Out of 231 votes cast so far, Scientific Life has only received 27 votes for "Biggest Blog Whore"! Where did you go, dear readers? We've got to do better!

Blog Award Poll

2006-01-13T09:18:00.000-05:00

I am a finalist for a Best of Blogs (BoB) Award in the category of "Biggest Blog Whore". If you would like to vote for me, please go here and scroll down to this category. You can vote once every 24 hours.

Birds in the News #43

2006-01-13T09:04:00.000-05:00

Western Grebe, Aechmophorus occidentalis
copyright by Ted Steinke.

Birds in Science;

Researchers at Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, believe they have located a place in the brain where songbirds store the memories of their parents' songs. The discovery has implications for humans, because humans and songbirds are among the few animals that learn to vocalize by imitating their caregivers. In a paper published this week in the top scientific journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, David Vicario and Mimi Phan of Rutgers, and Carolyn Pytte of Wesleyan University, report that songbirds store the memory of caregivers' songs in a part of the brain involved in hearing. This suggests the auditory version of the caregiver's song is stored first, and that it may serve to guide the vocal learning process. "There is independent evidence, notably from work done by Patricia Kuhl of the University of Washington in Seattle, that something similar may underlie the acquisition of human speech by infants and, thus, be part of the mechanism that allows kids to learn any human language if they start early enough," Vicario says. "If the processes of learning in young birds and human babies have formal similarities, which it now seems they do, then studying the songbird brain can tell us how this imitation trick is actually performed by cells in the brain," Vicario says. "The bird's brain provides a laboratory for studying how memories that underlie vocal learning are stored in the brain and how the stored memories are used to guide the development of vocalization."

It has long been my opinion that feather picking in birds is a compulsive habit with an underlying genetic component that is triggered by stress, but I've had little evidence to support this assertion. But recently, Purdue researchers found that abnormal repetitive behaviors, such as feather picking, are influenced by a combination of stress and genetics. Abnormal repetitive behaviors in both humans and animals settle into two basic categories: stereotypies (the mechanical repetition of the same posture, movement or speech), and compulsive behaviors (such as plucking out feathers). According to the study, feather picking was affected by a number of factors, including genetics, gender (it was more severe in females), and location. The behavior was progressively worse in birds housed closer to the door when they had a direct line of sight to the door. Parrots with cages that didn't have a view of the door were less likely to feather pick. There was no evidence that the birds learned this behavior by observing plucking birds. "It reinforces this general message of how important physical and social enrichment for these birds really is. Well thought-out physical and social environments should be first thing we think of," said study author Joseph Garner, an assistant professor of animal sciences at Purdue University School of Agriculture. The findings, which appear in the January issue of the peer-reviewed journal, Applied Animal Behaviour Science, may provide new ways to study compulsive behavior in humans.

Birds Hurting People:

An 80 year old debate about who killed the single most important human ancestor has finally been laid to rest. The announcement that the Taung child (Australopithecus africanus, 2.5 million BP) was killed by an eagle was made on Thursday by Professor Lee Berger at an international conference held at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits) in Johannesburg. Since the Taung child's discovery in 1924, leopards or sabre-toothed cats have always been blamed for the child's death. But ten years ago, Berger and Dr Ron Clarke of Wits challenged the world's scientific community with the idea that the little Taung child had probably been killed by a large bird of prey. "While some colleagues accepted that the damage to the Taung fossil monkeys was probably made by a bird of prey, the majority felt that apemen, even baby apemen like the Taung child, were way too large, sophisticated and organised to be taken by an eagle," says Berger, who is now a reader in palaeoanthropology at Wits. "The one big problem was the lack of multiple areas of damage on the Taung child itself that could be linked to a bird of prey," says Berger. "We had one little flap of bone on the top of the skull that looked like some of the damage we see made by eagles, and nothing else. Most of my colleagues felt we had reached the end of the road in solving this problem. It was the ultimate two-million-year-old cold case!" But the McGraw paper went further than any previous research. "They also found one suite of characters I had never before seen described, characters that were unique to eagle-damaged skulls and were sure clues to raptor involvement," Berger explains. Both journal papers detailing the discoveries will appear shortly in the peer-reviewed American Journal of Physical Anthropology. [another story with a linked slideshow]

People Helping Birds:

Western Grebes, Aechmophorus occidentalis (pictured at top), elegant seabirds that were battered by high winds, pounding rain and rough surf from recent storms were recently found waterlogged and emaciated along the coast of Washington state, and a local animal support group is helping them recuperate. The weak birds were rescued and taken to PAWs where they were cleaned, dried and are currently being fed with feeding tubes. After they get stronger, they will be introduced to water and allowed to preen and condition their feathers properly. It is estimated that the birds will be healthy and their feathers in good enough condition so that they can be released back into the wild in a couple of weeks.

A rare bird of prey has been spotted in a garden in east London, England. Experts hope the sighting of a red kite, Milvus milvus, in Hackney is proof the species is making a comeback to an area it thrived in during medieval times. Living on discarded food, red kites were once considered pests and almost hunted to extinction in 1880. The species was reintroduced to the Chilterns in the mid-20th Century - experts think this bird was a juvenile from a successful breeding pair. An RSPB spokesman said: "We always hoped the Chiltern birds would spread and there is now strong evidence that they are venturing into London."

The Endangered Black-faced Spoonbill, Platalea minor (pictured), native to the Tainan area of Taiwan, has reached a historical high of 939 birds on 21 November 2005. In the winter of 1989-1990, the known global population of Black-faced Spoonbill was just 294 birds.

Two rice paddies with neighboring coastal areas are unusual candidates among the Important Bird Areas (IBAs) proposed for Cuba. IBAs are normally located in natural areas, and single-crop cultivation is not what typically comes to mind when one thinks of bird conservation. However, in Cuba, rice cultivation goes through a wet and dry cycle, and since rice is grown constantly over large expanses, there are always fields in varying stages of flooding and draining, leading to high levels of vertebrate and invertebrate biodiversity. The first of these proposed IBAs is the Costa Sur de Sancti Spiritus while the second IBA consists of a similar environment and is located in the south of Pinar del Río province. Financed by the Whitley Fund for Nature and implemented by the group Ecología de Aves from the Universidad de la Habana's Biology Department, a conservation project titled Rice Paddies and Natural Wetlands as Conservation Sites for Aquatic Birds is being developed for both areas.

In November 2005, BirdLife International Cambodia project staff counted up to 70 White-shouldered Ibis, Pseudibis davisoni, at wetlands in Western Siem Pang Important Bird Area (IBA). The White-shouldered Ibis is a large ibis that inhabits lakes, pools, marshes and slow-flowing watercourses in open lowland dipterocarp forests that are often subject to seasonal flooding. This bird also occurs in sparsely wooded, dry or wet grasslands and wide rivers with sand and gravel bars. Populations have declined as a result of anthropogenic disturbances (habitat loss, logging and drainage of wetlands, hunting, harassment, livestock grazing, grass harvesting, and so-called "development"). Previously, the highest counts of this species were 23 in January 2003 and 33 in November 2004. These new counts are highly significant as upper estimates of this Critically Endangered species' population are of just 250 mature individuals. 40 individuals were still present in December 2005.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker News

Nova's Science Now has a website devoted to the Ivory-billed Woodpecker that includes a 7 minute streaming broadcast, interviews with amateur birders, and an Ask the Experts segment.

Streaming Birds

This week on BirdNote, they talk about birds mobbing a Northern Pygmy-Owl, Glaucidium gnoma; next, a topic that is near and dear to my heart, urban parakeets and parrots; also, how feathers insulate; the "early bird" ... why it may not be the lucky bird; and today's show asks, What's your jinx bird? BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

The northwestern coast of the United States is experiencing an irruption of snowy owls, Bubo scandiacus. The birds visit Oregon every few years from their home range above the Arctic Circle, says Dan Gleason, who teaches ornithology each summer at the University of Oregon. "They go in cycles," Gleason said. "Every few years, big numbers of them start moving farther south. Some of the old literature says that as the lemming population increases up north, so do the snowy owls. Then as the lemming population crashes, they move south." Though they often travel here in winter, apparently looking for open areas that resemble their native tundra, the big white birds have never set up breeding territories in Oregon. "It used to be thought that the birds who got down here were starving," Gleason said. "That is probably not true. The birds down here are quite healthy and may, in fact, return to the Arctic for the breeding season."

Strictly speaking, this is not solely about birds, but it is an important announcement nonetheless: the entire retinue of AMNH publications is now available free and online, including American Museum Novitates (complete back to 2004, work is ongoing to digitize all of this publication), Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History (back to 1907), Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History (back to 1881!), and the Memoirs of the American Museum of Natural History (back to 1893).

The Fine Print: Thanks to my bird pals, Dawn, Caren, Mike, Mary, Sara, Ian, Ellen B. and Ron for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here, and special thanks to Tom for sending the best ribs in the whole USA to me. I am sharing them with PZ and family this coming week (ssshh! It's a secret: they don't know this yet!). Special thanks to long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for surprising me by nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins.

Previous : : Birds in the News : : Next

tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Survival Job Applications: four applications sent out for adjunct appointments. I later learned that one application was added to a tenure-track job search for a job that I might actually be qualified for.

The Rumors Are True

2006-01-12T12:30:00.000-05:00

To the best of my knowledge, I haved never been the subject of gossip before, probably because I am the most boring person whom you could ever know. However, an e-magazine, Element broke the news today that Scientific Life and several other science blogs will be moving to a new location. This has not exactly been a secret because I have hinted here several times in the previous months that I will be moving to a new server, and some friends and colleagues have been following the development of this project behind the scenes, but the details of this move are something that you, as readers, probably want to know, and should know, in my opinion.

Scientific Life is moving soon to a spiffy new server provided by Seed Media Group, which publishes Seed Magazine, among other things. Seed Media Group, the parent organization, is a science media and entertainment company that is dedicated to developing world-class science content across digital media channels. Indicative of their interest in science, they have some really interesting people on their board of directors, including Nobel Prize winner James Watson who, along with Francis Crick, Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin, co-discovered the structure of DNA. Because I am a molecular biologist, these people have attained near-legendary status in my world, along with Mullis, and Darwin and Wallace, and Avery, MacLeod and McCarty, along with a host of others who have made important scientific advances.

Seed's ScienceBlogs is a community of science bloggers from around the world who, it is hoped, will provide one location for cutting-edge, up-to-date and sometimes, behind the scenes, scientific information to the general public. To this end, they are designing the site to meet our needs, a process that is still ongoing, so you will see a variety of changes there in the next few months as new features are implimented. (I, for example, have a great idea for my masthead, which has not been designed yet. I also am trying to get a different wallpaper from the standard one they offer, and there are a few cute little features that I will be adding soon, too).

We will be paid to write our blogs after we move. The initial pay scale is based on the traffic to our current sites, and then will be based on the traffic to our new site after the move; more traffic means a bigger paycheck, of course. The sum that each of us is paid is small, but may possibly increase in the future (for example, I will earn just enough to pay for a wireless connection from my apartment).

There will be advertising on our blogs. I am not sure if any of you know my philosophy about ads, but I know you have noticed that I have never had any ads here. There is a reason for this; I hate 'em. But the reality is that supporting this project would not be possible without advertising, even if we weren't paid for writing -- and in fact, us bloggers are the "most affordable" aspect in this entire project. The equipment and the IT experts necessary to support this project are very expensive. But I have been assured that these ads will be "tastefully done" and further, if there is a particular ad that I don't want on my site, the IT folks at Seed will write a filter that prevents it from appearing there.

In my opinion, the most important aspect for you to know about this move is that, as scientist-bloggers in the Seed community, we will never be subject to any editorial oversight. So basically, we will write essays and commentary about the same topics that we always have written about, argue with IDiots, host blog carnivals (yippee!), answer memes, online quizzes and indulge in other silliness, and basically carry on as we always have done.

Currently, new commentaries/essays that I publish will be mirrored on my new site. I am still learning how to use the publishing platform, Movable Type, and I am experimenting with the template. I will be posting essays here until the end of January (my birthday!), when I will formalize my move by leaving this site as linkable archives, close down reader comments to avoid those annoying spamweasels (do you hear me, William?), and focus my blog writing energies on my new site.

As the author of a mere "baby blog", I am thrilled and honored beyond words to be invited into this little online scientific community. I am proud to say that I am friends with several of my "sibling bloggers" in this online community and I hope to become friends with all of them over time. I am so excited about this move and its promise for providing high-quality scientific information to the public, and I hope that you, dear readers, are too.

You are welcome to make suggestions, ask questions or voice any concerns that you have and I'll do my best to answer them.

Some of my "sibling bloggers" have made a formal announcement to their readers or have already made the move;

Cognitive Daily, a team blog by Greta Munger and her husband, Dave Munger

Evolgen, who used this opportunity to change the name of his blog to Clash, Culture and Science

Dr. FreeRide, who reveals her real name and face on her new site

Deltoid, by Tim Lambert

Pharyngula, by PZ Myers

tags: ScienceNews, SeedGroup, ScienceBlogs

The Truth About BoB and the Owl

2006-01-10T17:21:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, despite my illness, I managed to struggle to an upright position (someone has to feed the birds so they don't riot), checked my email, and then discovered that Scientific Life is listed as a finalist in the Second Annual Best of Blogs Awards. Gee, until just now, I had no idea that the BoBs existed and yet, out of more than 2,000 nominees, here I am, a finalist in one of their categories! But which category is Scientific Life in? Is it in "Best Science Blog"? No. Is it in "Best Bird Blog"? Nope. Is it in "Best Unclassifiable Blog"? NO! Put on your rubbers (I mean galoshes, of course), dear readers, because Scientific Life is a finalist in the "Biggest Blog Whore" category.

What exactly is a blog whore? Apparently, engaging in shameless self-promotion (i.e.; participating in blog carnivals), in addition to referring to all three of you as "dear readers", has qualified me as a finalist for this unique blog award category.

Even though I don't stand a ghost of a chance of winning against the likes of WebKittyn (who will win solely based on her name), I learned that winning this award is a Really Good Thing; besides impressing potential employers by mentioning this award on my CV, I also win ...

Prize Package - First Place:

So, when the polls open, throw a few votes in my direction, okay? Like everyone, I love free stuff, especially internet-related free stuff.

RedHot

2006-01-08T19:08:00.000-05:00

Wow, someone out there named Shawn Rawls likes me! And he sent me a cute little graphic to put on my sideboard to prove it (see it there? see? poke poke).

So who are these peeps who like me? How did they find me in this huge blogosphere? Do they have any idea how good this little tag makes me feel, especially today, since I am sicksicksick and miserable and just wanna stay in bed all day?

Executive Decision

2006-01-07T22:46:00.000-05:00

I really hate to do this because it reduces the spontaneity of a blog (and therefore, it diminishes at least some of the fun), but I am moderating blog comments for an undetermined length of time because pimply-faced spamweasels filled my blog comments sections with advertizing for a variety of fake drugs that will ~~enhance your physical prowess~~ compensate for one's inadequacies -- the same ads that you can also find in your email boxes. This makes me wonder if this is the result of all those "work at home and get PAID!" ads that collect in my own spambox, er, email box? (A cruel daily reminder that even though I am an excellent speller, I can't even get a job as a paid spammer, but that's a rant best left for another day). As a result, it will take a little while for comments to show up here because I have to approve them, first. Sorry for any inconvenience this causes my legitimate readers who actually have a brain in their heads and know how to use it for something besides theft and electronic vandalism.

Incidentally, in the midst of my crankiness, I googled "spam" and found a delightful blog, Spam Poetry: poetry written using only the subject line from hundreds of spam emails! It looks like it has recently stalled, though. Hrm, I'll bet we all have a few thousand spams to donate to kick-start this worthwhile project.

Coneheads

2006-01-07T19:51:00.000-05:00

Yesterday, I experienced an adrenaline surge of terror after opening my electricity bill from good ol' ConEd (a name that I always mistake as spelling out "Cone head" for reasons I didn't quite understand, until now).

It turns out that, despite the fact that I don't have a television, stereo, air conditioner, christmas tree, stove, toaster oven, aquarium, halogen "grow-lites", clock radio or electric heat or any other appliances with a healthy appetite for electricity (save for my microwave, laptop, cell phone, refrigerator and a couple lights), someone living in my apartment somehow managed to consume nearly $800 of electricity last month (I suspect the birds did it; they've been acting strange recently). Before this, my power bills have always been between $12-50 in NYC.

Of course, in keeping with Murphy's Laws, I opened this bill after business hours, so I have all weekend to think about it. Considering that I am unemployed yet again with no income-producing possibilities in sight, and this bill is nearly as much as I pay for renting my humble abode, it is probably easy to imagine that I am currently experiencing a sharp increase in stress hormones. I just hope I don't end up with brain damage before the weekend is over.

tags: NYCLife

Birds in the News #42 -- Welcome to the New Year

2006-01-06T00:24:00.000-05:00

Horned Puffin, Fratercula corniculata,
on St. Paul Island in the Pribilofs, Alaska.
Photo courtesy of Paul West © - all rights reserved.

Birds in Science

The effects of overfishing may have driven marbled murrelets, Brachyramphus marmoratus (pictured, left), an endangered seabird found along the Pacific coast of the United States, to increasingly rely upon less nutritious food sources, according to a new study by biologists at the University of California, Berkeley. The results, to be published online by early March 2006 in the peer-reviewed journal Conservation Biology, suggest that feeding further down the food web may have played a role in low levels of reproduction observed in contemporary murrelet populations, and has likely contributed to the seabirds' listing as an endangered species, the researchers said. "The dietary patterns of today's marbled murrelets might be artifacts of the profound changes that coastal marine ecosystems world-wide have undergone because of overfishing," said Steve Beissinger, professor of conservation biology in UC Berkeley's Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management and principal investigator of the study. "So little is known about the diet of the murrelet that a study like this is important in informing fishery management decisions." GrrlScientist note: the effects of overfishing on seabirds has been published by three different research groups within recent months and, even though they all used different methologies, they all came to the same conclusions. Don't you find this troubling?

Every summer for three decades, ornithologist George Divoky, a 59-year-old Seattle resident who works for the University of Alaska's Institute for Arctic Biology, has migrated to Cooper Island, a pile of pebbles in the Arctic Ocean 25 miles from Barrow. The grizzled scientist arrives each June, hauling three months' worth of supplies, to record the lives of birds called black guillemots, Cepphus grylle (pictured), elegant seabirds that nest on the ground under decaying wooden ordnance boxes. Guillemots don't begin nesting until the snow melts and the ground is exposed. The first eggs are laid roughly two weeks later. But one day, Divoky noticed a strange pattern: in the mid-1990s, the first egg was being laid 10 days earlier than in 1975. Basically, the Arctic summer was arriving earlier. "It happened so slowly, it took a long time to see," Divoky said. The guillemot colony once hovered at 200 pairs. But as the sea ice moved farther offshore each year, it drew away the cod that the guillemots eat. As temperatures increased, horned puffins, Fratercula corniculata (pictured at top), which formerly stayed in the warmer Bering Sea, began moving in and killing the guillemots to take over their nests. "Now you've got a sub-Arctic species [puffins] driving out an Arctic species [guillemots] in the middle of the Arctic," Divoky observed. He suspects warming will ultimately drive off all the guillemots, leaving Cooper Island for puffins. GrrlScientist says: in addition to the drama of the study itself, this is a fascinating and well-written story that describes some of the rigors that are a normal part of many scientists' professional lives.

Birds are breaking records by living longer and travelling further, according to a report from leading ornithologists. The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) said a worldwide study had added years to the known age of several species after metal bands, or rings, were fitted to their legs to help trace their movements. "Producing the ringing report is always exciting - but to break so many records in one year is tremendous. Unlike humans, birds don't spend a long time going through middle and old age. After maturing, they remain in good shape for most of the rest of their lives," said Jacquie Clark, who heads the BTO's ringing scheme. "Once they fall below par physically they tend not to last long. They might lose that essential bit of speed necessary to escape predators, face increasing difficulty completing long migrations or struggle to survive through winters." It was also noted that volunteers caught and ringed more birds in 2004 than in any other year since tagging started in Britain in 1909.

For birds, getting hauled out of a nest by a scientist and poked with a needle -- an increasingly common occurrence in this season of bird flu -- is very stressful. Some German ornithologists who study terns, gull-like seabirds, worried that such unpleasant encounters were biasing their research results. So taking a cue from nature, they put a tropical blood-sucking bug, Dipetalogaster maximus (pictured, right), on the job to do their work for them. "I had used the bugs to bleed captive bats," says Christian Voigt of the Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research in Berlin. He describes the technique in the online journal, the German Journal of Ornithology (E-pub, vol. 147, 2006). Basically, to adapt the method for wild terns, he and his colleagues put insect's larvae into hollow artificial eggs with an oval opening. Netting over the hole kept the insect from escaping. After temporarily replacing the real clutch with these artificial eggs containing blood-sucking larvae, the researchers were able to collect 78 blood samples from 59 individual birds (the real eggs were then returned, unharmed). Initial analyses of the blood, which have not been published yet, further validate the research, says Voigt: "Our findings indicate that the bugged birds have indeed reduced levels of stress hormone compared to birds that were caught and bled with traditional methods." GrrlScientist note: even though I rarely had trouble getting blood from much smaller bird species than terns, I do think this is a clever way to obtain blood samples for stress hormone assays without causing a stress-induced increase in their titres.

The Center for Biodiversity and Conservation (CBC) at the American Museum of Natural History invites you to attend its eleventh annual symposium, Conserving Birds in Human-Dominated Landscapes: Weaving a Common Future, in New York City this 27 and 28 of April. This symposium focuses on diverse avian responses to broad-scale human activities in urban centers, agricultural areas, coastal communities, and working forests -- the wide array of landscapes that we call home. Within these human-dominated systems, shifts have been documented in bird abundance, distribution, behavior, life histories and, ultimately, evolutionary potential. The CBC's 2006 conference will present unique challenges to, and key opportunities for, invigorating bird diversity in the areas most heavily impacted by human activities.

Christmas Bird Count News

Will "winter finches" or northern raptors spread across North America this December? Will snow and ice blanket this continent, or will mild conditions prevail until the New Year? Will observers along the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast be able to discover the effects of this summer's hurricanes on their local birds? More than 50,000 observers in hundreds of locations throughout the United States and Canada, the Caribbean, parts of South and Central America, Bermuda, the West Indies and even a few Pacific Islands will be outside counting birds to find out. The Christmas Bird Count, also known as the CBC, now under the supervision of the National Audubon Society, began 106 years ago when ornithologist Frank Chapman and 26 fellow bird enthusiasts replaced the traditional Christmas Day bird hunt with a day of bird observation. The annual Christmas Bird Count starts on 14 December and extends through 5 January in any given year. Each official CBC location consists of a 15 mile-diameter circle. Observers start out before dawn, listening for owl calls, then drive and walk through woods, fields, wetlands and along lakes and streams from dawn to dusk, noting not only how many different species they can find, but the numbers of each species. Participants are not paid for the count. In fact, they each contribute a $5 fee to cover the cost of printing official lists, preparing other materials and publishing the results. For more information, click each link to view; this year's CBC results and last year's (105th CBC) photo gallery. You can also start off the new year by joining the National Audubon Society (always a great gift idea for that person on your list who has everything).

Regional CBC news stories;

Maine (USA)

Augusta, Virginia (USA)

Newton, Massachusetts (USA)

Solano County, California (USA)

Mad Island, Matagorda County, Texas (USA)

Lakeland, Florida (USA)

all Florida State CBC data

Florida Ornithological Society

Cayuga, New York (USA)

Holland, Michigan (USA)

Other CBC News

new friends

damage to bird populations

Glaucidium brasilianum

Melanerpes uropygialis

People Helping Birds

No one knows what birds see when they look out at the world, says ornithologist Daniel Klem, but he's sure they don't see glass. He estimates that at least 1 billion birds are killed by flying into windows every year in the United States. "It's a very common phenomenon," said Klem. "Birds are deceived. They just don't see glass as a barrier and this is a problem for them." Many birds killed by windows get eaten by cats and other scavengers, says Julie Hagelin, an ornithologist at Swarthmore College. But even when there isn't a carcass, it's possible to tell when there's been a collision. Most birds leave a distinctive smudge mark on the window. The challenge was to find a kind of glass that birds could see and people could see through. Everbach and Klem recommended using so-called "fritted" glass. It's etched with closely spaced rows of small circles. When standing right in front of it, the glass is hard to see through, but Everbach says from a slight distance, the dots don't obscure vision that much. If nothing changes, Klem says it's certain that the problem of window hits will escalate. He notes that in the next few decades, millions of new homes and offices will be built in the United States alone. More information.

Citizen scientists are being enlisted by the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) to help search for one of Scotland's most elusive birds, the Scottish ptarmigan, Lagopus mutus (pictured in winter plumage). This small, plump bird is typically found in pairs or small groups on the tundra across northern Europe where it relies on cold, mountainous habitats for survival. The ptarmigan is unusual among birds because it changes its plumage pattern three times per year to camouflage it against the changing scenery. The BTO believes global warming has led to a reduction in its range. "Up until now, the wide-scale monitoring of birds in upland areas, particularly the remote mountains of Scotland, has been limited by the low availability of volunteers to carry out survey work," said Jacqui Kaye, of the BTO in Scotland. The first full survey will take place between April and August 2006 and, if enough hillwalkers become involved, the BTO hopes to expand the project to include other upland species.

Except for Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, Archilochus colubris, the 2005 bird banding season at Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History in South Carolina wasn't very spectacular. To view the annual summary, banding totals, and wonderful close-up photos of some birds they captured, please visit the this week's installment of This Week at Hilton Pond. Along with the photo essay and the final week of 2005's banding results, they also include a miscellaneous nature note (scroll down a little on this link).

Bird Flu News

The second child who tested positive for bird flu died early Thursday at Van 100th University Medical Faculty Hospital in eastern Turkey, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported. With the death of Fatma Kocyigit, 15, the number of people who died from bird flu in Turkey increased to two, said Ahmet Faik Oner, the doctor who was treating the siblings of Kocyigit family. The Kocyigit children helped to raise poultry on a small farm in Dogubayazit town of Agri province in eastern Turkey, and were in close contact with sick birds. The World Health Organization (WHO) on Thursday sent a team of experts to Turkey to help investigate the deaths, a senior official said. GrrlScientist note: I received word this morning that a third child in this family, an 11 year old girl, died recently (today?). It is suspected that all three children died from bird flu, although more tests are being conducted to confirm this.

U.S. chicken producers including Tyson Foods, Inc., and Pilgrim's Pride, Inc., will begin testing all their flocks to make sure they are free from hazardous forms of avian influenza (H5 and H7 viruses), after the disease decimated the industry in Asia. Samples will be taken on the farm before the birds are moved to processing plants under a program announced today by the National Chicken Council, a trade group. Tests will be conducted under procedures approved by the National Poultry Improvement Plan, an existing federal-state cooperative program, the Washington, D.C.-based chicken council said in a statement. Flocks found with the H5 or H7 form of bird flu will be humanely destroyed, the council said. The U.S., the world's largest producer and exporter of poultry, is preparing for the possibility that the lethal H5N1 strain of bird flu may reach domestic flocks, threatening an industry valued at $29 billion. The virus, which has never been found in the U.S., led to the destruction of millions of birds in Asia and parts of eastern Europe and resulted in at least 74 human deaths since 2003.

In a trend federal authorities say is "scary", the Internet suddenly is awash with bogus drugs to counter a possible bird-flu pandemic, including counterfeit Tamiflu. Hundreds of fake Tamiflu pills sold to U.S. consumers by Asian online entrepreneurs have been seized in South San Francisco over the past month, most recently on Wednesday. They are the first such counterfeits detected in this country. The week before, the Food & Drug Administration sent warning letters to nine Internet marketers it accused of peddling other phony remedies. Most were dietary supplements that, among other things, claimed to kill the bird-flu virus or provide "a natural virus shield." How much fraudulent Tamiflu is being sold isn't clear. Roche officials said they are aware of only one instance of counterfeit Tamiflu showing up outside the United States. Those pills, found in Holland, contained only Vitamin C and lactose, and were improperly labeled.

Webbed Birds

There is a new birding site, The Birding Site of Malaysia for you to try out. Even though it is still under construction, it has a lot of gorgeous pictures and a bird memory game that you might enjoy. As you work your way through this site, you are invited to email your comments and suggestions to the webmaster (contact information at the bottom of their main page). Be sure to bookmark this site so you can return often.

A new website, The Wiki Guide to Birds, is currently being developed. Anyone is invited to contribute species information, images, articles, or set up a birding guide to their favorite area. This site is non-commercial and is based on the same free license and wiki software used by Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia. This site consists of two main areas: regional guides to birding and individual species accounts. A regional birding guide might contain information for the area such as local hotspots, maps, recent sightings, lists of species with links to the species accounts, and just about anything else useful for birdwatching. For an example, see the guide for the Rio Grande Valley in Texas. A field guide for birds in your chosen region can be created by including the shared species information in your species accounts. Your regional species page can then add local information, such as regional distribution and places to find the species. When the general information, such as field marks or vocalizations, which is shared by all regional field guides, is updated then your species account will automatically be updated with that information. For an example see the Tamaulipas Crow, Corvus imparatus, for the Rio Grande Valley and the general Tamaulipas Crow page. An index is automatically maintained for each region by putting each page in a category. The site is very new so there is plenty of opportunity to contribute and help mold it so it will be useful to the birding community. Feel free to browse or make contributions by editing. The developer, Tim, be more than happy to help others to set up a regional guide for a state, county or other region. Questions, comments or suggestions should be emailed to Tim.

Streaming Birds

For the first week of 2006, BirdNote discusses piracy among raptors; the sounds of dawn around the world; comparing chickadee calls; birdbaths in winter; and today's story, Cuvier's Toucan, Ramphastos cuvieri, Toucan Sam - the Froot Loops bird. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [mp3/podcast].

If you don't already love National Public Radio, this series of bird stories should help you rethink your affections.

Licensed wildlife rehabilitator and National Public Radio commentator, Julie Zickefoose, raised three orphaned ruby-throated hummingbirds, Archilochus colubris, a couple of years ago, never expecting to see them again. This All Things Considered episode tells the touching story of their return. [3:54, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required] For those who are interested to learn more about these particular birds, this is an earlier story about them. [3:55, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required] GrrlScientist says: sigh! These stories remind me of how much I miss all my baby birds!

We've all been in stores and seen birds fluttering around and wondered, how did they get in there? Do they live there 24-7? Licensed wildlife rehabilitator and National Public Radio commentator, Julie Zickefoose, remembers Paul, a savannah sparrow, Passerculus sandwichensis, that she met in her local grocery store that became quite popular with the employees there. [3:07, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required]

For the past 19 years, ornithologists at Cornell University have solicited help from the general public to count birds from November until April. David Bonter, Project Feeder Watch coordinator, tells reporter Liane Hansen from National Public Radio's Weekend Edition how the program works. [2:56, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required]

Miscellaneous Birds

Every year, more people become involved in birdwatching. Fancy equipment, binoculars, expensive scopes, specially designed jackets, pants, hardbound guide books and covers, boots, hats and more line the shelves at the nearest nature stores. All these things are wonderful, but may seem overwhelming to the average person who just wants to learn about the birds around his or her home. These special gadgets and clothing are not necessary; in fact, all you really need is one bird feeder and one field guide to get started on this exciting hobby that will offer hours of entertainment and joy for the whole family. Additionally, there are numerous web sites featuring free and easily accessible information on birdwatching from your own easy chair. It's so easy to get started birdwatching and it's relatively inexpensive, too, so open up a new world for yourself. GrrlScientist note: this article also tells you how to get free bird magazines and how to get involved in bird related activities that you might enjoy.

If you are like me, then you enjoy hiking and birding at the same time. If so, then you will be pleased to know that the North Alabama Birding Trail is now complete. This hiking/birding trail, which stretches across north Alabama from the Mississippi to Georgia borders, passes through 12 sites around the Shoals, Alabama. "We're starting to see quite a few people coming through on the birding trail," said Debbie Wilson, director of Florence-Lauderdale Tourism. "We expect it will really pick up as awareness of the trail increases." It officially opened 30 September. Birders are important tourists: studies have shown bird watchers typically spend more than $150 each day per person for lodging, food, fuel and other purchases while visiting birding sites. Wilson said being able to attract bird watchers to the Shoals during the winter will be a boon for local motels and hotels in what is normally a slow time for travel.

Holiday Birds

A bird pal of mine sent a really cute holiday card to me and of course, this means I will share it with all of you, too!

The Fine Print: Thanks to my bird pals, Caren, Chris, Dawn, Tim, Victor, Bill, "a good blogging friend" who prefers to remain anonymous, Virasat, Ellen B. and Ron for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here and thanks to Tom Palmer, a reporter for The Ledger for taking the time to provide more information about the Florida CBCs. Thanks to Ian for catching my amusing mistakes in this issue, thereby preserving my readers' faith in my accuracy. I greatly appreciate James N. for his $upport (and his friendship). Special thanks to long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for surprising me by nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Nominated (!!) to the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 19.

The Tale of Lake Birdbegon Now Available

2006-01-05T19:46:00.000-05:00

The blog carnival that celebrates the best writing about wild birds, I and the Bird issue #14 is now available for your reading pleasure at Bird-brained Stories. Written as a spoof of Garrison Keillor's beloved imaginary hometown, Lake Wobegon, it is a tale that is full of wonderful essays and photographs, including some from first-time contributors (oh, and I also contributed a little something), so settle in with a hot cup of tea and some cookies for a pleasurable evening of reading about birds!

If you are inspired to contribute a blogged essay, poem or photograph of your own to the next edition of I and the Bird, send the URL to Mike by 17 January.

Visual Trickery

2006-01-04T19:57:00.000-05:00

Or, why you shouldn't necessarily believe everything you see.

If your eyes follow the movement of the rotating pink dot, you will only see one color, pink. But if you stare at the black + in the center, the moving dot becomes green. Now, concentrate longer on the black + in the center of the picture. After a short period of time, all the pink dots will slowly fade away and you will only see a rotating green dot. Don't see it? Well, keep staring! (But be careful; if you are like me, you will start to feel nauseous after a short time).

It's amazing how our brain interprets this animation because there really is no green dot, and the pink dots don't disappear. This nicely illustrates how we don't always see what we think we see.

Click image to go to source.

Thanks for sharing the animation, Cheri.

Nominated (!!) to the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 19.

Blog Carnivals, Writing Contests and Blog Awards

2006-01-04T18:27:00.000-05:00

The blog carnival that celebrates the best science, nature and medical writing, the Tangled Bank, issue #44 is available today at Afarensis: Anthropology, Evolution and Science. Besides linking to 38 contributions (one from me, too -- gee, can you guess which one?), the host's blog also is great reading, so be sure to poke through his archives.

The blog carnival that celebrates your best blogged essay from the previous week or two, the Carnival of the Vanities, was published within the hour, and includes a contribution from me. This particular blog carnival is not restricted to specific topics; instead, its rules are; one really good post per blog, written recently, substantially original and not merely a linkfest or quote, and not from a spam blog.

The Science Creative Quarterly (SCQ) is pleased to present another writing contest. This contest seeks "creative" entries inspired by the photographic images found in David Bookbinder's Flower Mandalas Project (January's flower is pictured, click image to see a larger version in its own window). These creative pieces can be composed on the whim of the author, in any form, including (but not limited to), poetry, fiction, and/or personal essay; and should preferably refer to a specific flower image found either at SCQ's site or at the main project website.

You, dear readers, are also invited to nominate my blog for one or for a bunch of 2006 Bloggie Awards. Allow me to suggest that Scientific Life might do well in these categories; best topical blog (science), best writing, and best-kept-secret. Be sure to think carefully about your Bloggie nominations in advance because you can only make one multi-category nomination, you can nominate no more than three blogs per category and you must nominate at least three different blogs in total. Nominations for the Bloggies are now open. Nominations close on 10 January, and categories will only list the top-ten nominees per category for voters to choose from.

For those who are curious, the Bloggies are a different series of blog awards from the 2006 Koufax Awards, for which Scientific Life received a number of nominations from you, dear readers (thanks!). Nominations for the "Sandies" are now closed, and I will post details regarding the first round of voting when I have them. With your help, it is my hope that Scientific Life will win a "Sandy"! And the benefit is that reading the nominees is a great way to find really good blogs out there, too.

Gifts From the Birds For the New Year

2006-01-01T23:15:00.000-05:00

Female Broad-billed hummingbird, Cynanthus latirostris.
Photo by Ralph W. Scott.
Click image to see more.

May the owl give you wisdom
May the crow bring teachings from the invisible realm
May the jay show you strategies
May the hummingbird keep you alert and energized
May the eagle give you the strength to soar to great heights and fulfill your goals
May the hawk give you courage
May the chickadee give you laughter
and
May the dove bring you peace.

-- Ellie Schuster

Thanks for sending these wishes, Dawn. Thanks to Ralph and Greg for their kind permission to use this lovely image here.

Friends, You Know Who You Are

2005-12-31T19:50:00.000-05:00

.. and I think I've finally figured out who you are, too.

Angelwing.
Ruth Bernhard, 1943.
Gelatin Silver Print.

Broken heart, broken
wings. Suspended, I don't fall.
Your hands, my refuge.

If a person's wealth and worth are measured by the quality of friends that she has, then I am rich beyond imagining and valuable beyond words.

tags: haiku

Birds In the News #41 -- End of the Year Edition

2005-12-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

Snowy Owl, Bubo scandiacus.
Currently, there is an irruption of snowy owls in Washington State, USA,
probably due to a disruption in their local food supply.
This individual was photographed in Discovery Park, Seattle.
(more details about this photograph below).

Birds in Science

Last week, scientists said they found a major cache of bones and likely complete skeletons of the long-extinct Dodo bird, Raphus cucullatus (pictured), which could help them learn more about the lost creature's physique and habits. The find is significant because no complete skeleton of a single Dodo bird has ever been retrieved from a controlled archaeological site in Mauritius. The last known stuffed bird was destroyed in a 1755 fire at a museum in Oxford, England, leaving only partial skeletons and drawings of the bird to go on. The bird was native to Mauritius when no humans lived there but its numbers rapidly dwindled after the arrival of Portuguese and Dutch sailors in the 1500s. The last recorded sighting of a live bird was in 1663. The international team of researchers found the bones on a sugar cane plantation on Mauritius, located in the Indian Ocean off the east coast of Madagascar. "We have found 700 bones including bones from 20 Dodo birds and chicks but we believe there are many more at the site," said Kenneth Rijsdijk, a Dutch geologist from the Netherlands Organization for Applied Scientific Research, who led the dig. They presented their findings last week at the National Museum of Natural History in the Dutch city of Leiden.

Christmas Bird Count News

Will "winter finches" or northern raptors spread across North America this December? Will snow and ice blanket this continent, or will mild conditions prevail until the New Year? Will observers along the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast be able to discover the effects of this summer's hurricanes on their local birds? More than 50,000 observers in hundreds of locations throughout the United States and Canada, the Caribbean, parts of South and Central America, Bermuda, the West Indies and even a few Pacific Islands will be outside counting birds to find out. The Christmas Bird Count, also known as the CBC, now under the supervision of the National Audubon Society, began 106 years ago when ornithologist Frank Chapman and 26 fellow bird enthusiasts replaced the traditional Christmas Day bird hunt with a day of bird observation. The annual Christmas Bird Count starts on 14 December and extends through 5 January in any given year. Each official CBC location consists of a 15 mile-diameter circle. Observers start out before dawn, listening for owl calls, then drive and walk through woods, fields, wetlands and along lakes and streams from dawn to dusk, noting not only how many different species they can find, but the numbers of each species. Participants are not paid for the count. In fact, they each contribute a $5 fee to cover the cost of printing official lists, preparing other materials and publishing the results. For more information, click each link to view; this year's CBC results and last year's (105th CBC) photo gallery. You can also start off the new year by joining the National Audubon Society (always a great gift idea for that person on your list who has everything).

Regional CBC news stories;

York-Rock Hill, South Carolina (USA)

Freeport, Texas (USA)

Shreveport, Louisiana (USA)

Oakland, California (USA)

California CBC data

Anchorage, Alaska (USA)

Danville, Kentucky (USA)

Crystal Springs Dam, California (USA)

Please email links to your CBC news stories and I will publish them in next week's issue.

Other CBC News

king eider

Somateria spectabilis

People Hurting Birds

Thousands of seabirds are being killed each year after a massive rise in plastics pollution in the North Sea, according to a new report. Studies on the bodies of 600 fulmars that washed up on beaches revealed that 95 per cent had plastic litter in their stomachs - with an average of 40 pieces of plastic per bird. One fulmar had 1,600 pieces of plastic in its guts, according to the Save the North Sea project, which was set up by volunteers and professional organisations in all countries with North Sea coastlines. Fulmars are gull-like tube-nosed seabirds that have a massive breeding colony on St Kilda. They are affected because they mistake discarded plastic floating on the sea's surface for their normal prey, jellyfish. "Plastics pollution is a chronic problem in the North Sea. Heaven knows where some of this plastic comes from. They've found everything from balloons to shotgun cartridges in the birds' stomachs. But the commonest is beads of raw plastic before it is formed," said Mark Grantham from the British Trust for Ornithology.

Police ran down leads and the Royal Navy was on alert Thursday in the search for Toga, an 18-inch-tall baby penguin stolen from an Isle of Wight zoo Saturday night, creating a national soap opera rivaling Elton John's gay union for media coverage. "We're all a bit ragged here, to say the least," said Kath Bright, manager of Amazon World Zoo Park, which has received nearly $13,000 in donations — including $600 from the United States — to offer as a reward for the safe return of the nine-pound South African jackass penguin, Sphenicus demersis (pictured). As of today, Toga is still missing, and Bright said zookeepers were beginning to worry he could starve to death. Bright said that before the theft, the 3-month-old was still being fed by his father, Oscar, and his mother, Kyala. Because the parents simply regurgitate food directly down the baby's throat, Bright said, Toga wouldn't know how to find his own food and wouldn't accept any from humans. "He hasn't got a clue," Bright said.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker News

This winter, 30 full-time research scientists and 112 volunteers — some of them looking from head to toe like balls of shredded camouflage cloth — are combing through thousands of acres of swampy Arkansas woods in search of a bird called Elvis. That is the affectionate local nickname given to the ivory-billed woodpecker, Campephilus principalis, a spectacularly shy but showy species that scientists thought had gone extinct around 1944. A dramatic announcement in April that at least one ivory-bill had been spotted here kicked off a massive effort to try to tally how many there are, research how they live and learn how best to protect them. The rediscovery also has turned into a resurrection of sorts for the rare habitat the woodpecker lives in, galvanizing public and private conservation agencies that for decades had been fighting lonely battles to save a few thousand acres of Arkansas’ swamp forests. But unfortunately, no convincing photographs of this bird exist. This winter, with more people looking, better high-tech search and recording gear, and more carefully laid plans, scientists are hopeful they will come up with “slam dunk’’ evidence of the ivory-bill, namely a clear, unambiguous photo or video (more information).

Avian Influenza News

According to a recent study, bird flu appears more likely to wing its away around the globe by plane than by migrating birds. Scientists have been unable to link the spread of the virus to migratory patterns, suggesting that the thousands of wild birds that have died, primarily waterfowl and shore birds, are not primary transmitters of bird flu. If that holds true, it would suggest that shipments of domestic chickens, ducks and other poultry represents a far greater threat than does the movement of wild birds on the wing. It also would underscore the need to pursue the virus in poultry farms and markets rather than in wild populations of birds if a possible pandemic is to be checked, U.S. and European experts said. ''There is more and more evidence building up that wild migratory birds do play some role in spreading the virus, but personally I believe - and others agree - that it's not a major role,'' said Ward Hagemeijer, a wild bird ecologist with Wetlands International, a conservation group in Wageningen, Netherlands. ''If we would assume based on this evidence that wild birds would be a major carrier of the disease we would expect a more dramatic outbreak of the disease all over the world.'' GrrlScientist note: I've been saying this very thing for more than one year (relying on incomplete data, unfortunately). I am pleased to see that the epidemiologists are starting to realize where the bird flu threat really is found; with domestic poultry raising and handling practices.

The Ornithological Council has published a peer-reviewed fact sheet on the implications of avian influenza for ornithologists, bird banders, rehabbers, and others who handle live birds. If anyone is willing to translate the fact sheet into Spanish, contact the Ornithological Council through their website and they will post the Spanish version, too.

A conservation group is astonished that Kapiti Island near New Zealand has been suggested as a possible quarantine station if a deadly flu virus hits the Wellington region. Kapiti Island Watching Interest president Hugh Barr said the island had been a bird sanctuary for more than a century – and should be the last place to isolate humans who could be carrying a mutated bird flu virus. "It is astounding that Wellington's health authorities should be considering quarantining bird flu sufferers in the same place as our endangered kiwi, kaka, takahe, kokako, stitchbirds, saddlebacks and weka," Dr Barr said. "These rare birds are likely to be susceptible to bird flu too." GrrlScientist note: This makes me realize that the United States isn't the only country in the world that has Really Stupid People in control of things. I am not sure if this is comforting or not.

Scientists are baffled over the case of two bird flu patients in Vietnam. Both patients died after developing resistance to Tamiflu, the drug that is being stockpiled in case of a flu pandemic. The girls received early and aggressive treatments with Tamiflu using the recommended doses, according to an Associated Press report. Doctors now think they may need to rethink dosages; lower amounts may promote resistance by allowing viruses or bacteria to mutate and make a resurgence, according to the press accounts.

Streaming Birds

For the last week of 2005, BirdNote discusses The Myth of the Wren on St. Stephen's Day; Morning in Oaxaca, visiting our summer birds south of the border; Winter on the Columbia River; A Year's Worth of Birds; and for the last show of 2005, Queen Bee in Winter. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [mp3/podcast].

The discovery of an ivory-billed woodpecker, which many had believed to be extinct, outside Brinkley, Arkansas, has brought profound changes to the town. With hundreds of birders and scientists passing through to catch a glimpse of the bird, locals are attempting to capitalize on the excitement. National Public Radio's Morning Edition story. [9:15, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required]

Miscellaneous Birds

BirdLife has published their year in review edition that highlights the non-event of avian influenza, the exciting rediscovery of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, a list of new avian species recognized this year as well as those species lost forever to extinction, island "super mice" that kill endangered albatross chicks, and the near-collapse of the vulture populations in Asia due to widespread use of a veterinary drug, just to mention a few stories that they cover.

Calm down, Oprah fans! It was ordinary wear and tear that almost took down Oprah's private plane, not a collision with a bird as originally reported.

Featured Bird Photograph Details

Marc Hoffman says; The photo was taken on a sunny day at 10:56 a.m. I was about 60 feet from the owl, which was resting on a woodpile in Discovery Park, a large park in urban Seattle. About 8 other birders were present. This owl had been sighted for a few weeks and has been well-watched. At the time the photo was shot, the owl was resting, opening its eyes and turning its head every 10 minutes or so. This is one of a number of snowy owls reported recently in Western Washington. Several others have been sighted in and around Seattle, including one that perched on the second floor of an office building in nearby downtown Bellevue. The camera I used is a Minolta DiMage A2 with a Raynox DCR 2020 Pro (2.2x) teleconverter attached, providing an effective zoom of 15.4x. More photographic details are available on request from Marc or from me.

The Fine Print: Thanks to my bird pals, Caren, Bill, Ellen P., Wise Crow, Ian, Mike, Ellen B. and Ron for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here. Thanks to Jamie and Ian for reminding me that the generic name for Snowy Owls was changed to Bubo scandiacus. Best regards to John B. his $upport. Special thanks to long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for surprising me by nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins. As an aside, it has come to my attention that Internet Explorer does not respect the formatting of this blog. I apologize because I am not sure how to rectify this situation except to say that this blog looks best when viewed with Firefox.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Survival Job rejections: 1 (I applied for a survival job as an adjunct at this one particular school, but they put my application in with the tenure-track medical school applicant pool for reasons I cannot comprehend. Today, I received their rejection letter!! I was rejected for a position that I never applied for! I hope this mix-up is not indicative of the quality of their medical training, although I do have my doubts.)

Androgynous

2005-12-28T07:16:00.000-05:00

Where do you rank on this scale? What do you think of the questions they used to determine your scores?

Androgynous
You scored 66 masculinity and 56 femininity!

You scored high on both masculinity and femininity. You have a strong personality exhibiting characteristics of both traditional sex roles.

My test tracked 2 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender:

You scored higher than 59% on masculinity
You scored higher than 40% on femininity

Link: The Bem Sex Role Inventory Test written by weirdscience on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Tsunami: One Year Later, Part I

2005-12-26T23:57:00.000-05:00

What We Know About The Event Itself

Worldwide patterns of wave propagation triggered by the 2004 Sumatra-Andaman earthquake. The massive tsunami triggered by an undersea earthquake in the Indian Ocean literally rippled around the world. NOAA scientist Vasily Titov, using seismic data, rendered an animation showing how the tsunami waves propagated around the Earth. Some of the waves reached the United States and many other nations outside the Indian Ocean. This cartoon depicts a period of 44 hours and 27 minutes of tsunami propagation. The tsunami reached the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of the United States about the same time, some 28 hours after the earthquake struck on Dec. 26, 2004, at 00.59 UTC or 7:59 p.m. EST. Titov's model also was used to interpret the data gathered by four satellites for determining the tsunami's wave height. [Image credit: NOAA].

One year ago today, the world was stunned to learn that a giant tidal wave, or tsunami, had smashed into the coastlines of twelve countries in southeast Asia, causing unimaginable devastation and killing what turned out to be hundreds of thousands of people and leaving millions homeless. This tsunami was triggered by the largest earthquake to occur on the planet in forty years; the third largest earthquake since these events were formally measured. Various official agencies measured this submarine earthquake to be between 9.0 and 9.3 on the moment magnitude scale (the higher estimate would make this the second largest earthquake to have ever been measured). Authoritative analyses of the data now estimate the magnitude at 9.15.

This earthquake, known in scientific circles as the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake, occurred on the sea floor of the Indian Ocean at a depth of 30 kilometers (18.6 miles) below average sea level. This was a very large earthquake, geographically speaking; occurring over 1200 kilometers of the fault line that lies roughly between the islands of Sumatra and Andaman. It resulted from a tectonic slip that occurred along the fault line where the India Plate dives beneath the Burma Plate. The epicenter was just north of Simeulue Island, which is located 160 kilometers (100 miles) off the western coast of northern Sumatra.

As a result of this earthquake, Simeulue Island, near the southern end of the fault line, gained at least 6 feet in elevation and the Nicobar Island group, at the northern end of the fault line, were similarly thrust upward while several of these islands were broken into two or even three pieces. The earthquake itself was felt as far away as Thailand, Singapore, Bangladesh, India, Malaysia and the Maldive Islands.

The Sumatra-Andaman earthquake was a megathrust earthquake that occurred over a large geographic area over a period of approximately five minutes, perhaps longer. Megathrust earthquakes are unusual, consisting of vertical movement where one tectonic plate slips beneath another, pushing it upward, in a process known as subduction. In addition to generating vertical movement, megathrust earthquakes may also be accompanied by sideways movements of the tectonic plates, as occurred in this case.

Satellite and GPS data are being used to determine the precise nature and extent of the many geological changes that occurred as a result of this earthquake. For example, it is estimated that the seabed along the fault line rose by several meters, and that some of the smaller islands located south of Sumatra moved southwest by as much as 20 meters (66 feet). Other calculations estimate that the northern tip of Sumatra itself may have moved as much as 36 meters (118 feet) to the southwest.

The earthquake's sudden vertical movement caused the seabed to rise by several meters, which displaced a tremendous amount of seawater. This displaced water rippled outward in a series of waves that traveled faster through deeper seas and slowing in shallower waters. These waves raced through the world's oceans at speeds between 500 to 1,000 kilometers/hour (310 to 620 mph), taking anywhere from fifteen minutes (Aceh) to seven hours (Somalia) to hit land. Unfortunately, until they slowed and mounded up in shallow coastal waters, these tsunamis were not easily detected: satellite data revealed that the largest of these waves, recorded in open ocean two hours after the event, was approximately 60 centimeters (2 feet) high.

Even though it was widely reported that there was only one tsunami, the Sumatra-Andaman earthquake actually triggered a succession of four large and very destructive tsunamis whose peaks arrived on land approximately 30 minutes apart. The third of these four waves was the most devastating, with a peak estimated to be as high as 30 meters (100 feet) in some locales in Aceh. In addition to these four major waves, many smaller tsunamis occurred throughout the region for the remainder of that day.

Because the fault line lies lengthwise in a north-south orientation, the strongest waves were triggered in an east-west direction and thus, the greatest damage from these tsunamis occurred along coastlines in the Indian Ocean that were also oriented east/west. As a result, Bangladesh, a low-lying country located north of the epicenter, suffered relatively few deaths and damages when compared to the much more distant Somalia, located directly west on the African continent.

These tsunamis had a global effect: they devastated portions of the shorelines of Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Southern India, Thailand and neighboring countries. Most of these areas are still ruined, being described by recent visitors as resembling “the aftermath of a bomb blast”. Additionally, tsunamis were recorded along coastlines around the world (see cartoon at top). For example, Struisbaai, South Africa, which is 8,500 kilometers (5,300 miles) away from the epicenter, recorded a 1.5 meter (5 foot) high wave approximately 16 hours after the earthquake. Remarkably, the tsunamis also traveled into the Pacific Ocean, hitting the shoreline at Manzanillo, Mexico, with a 2.6 meter (8.5 foot) wave. These tsunamis also caused deaths as far away as the east coast of Africa, where the most distant tsunami-caused death occurred at Port Elizabeth in South Africa -- 8,000 kilometers (5,000 miles) away from the epicenter!

Speaking of deaths and damages, Part II of this series will explore the human toll due to this event.

Sources

The Global Reach of the 26 December 2004 Sumatra Tsunami (2005) by Vasily Titov, Alexander B. Rabinovich, Harold O. Mofjeld, Richard E. Thomson, Frank I. González. Science, 309 (5743): 2045-2048. abstract (free) and PDF (not free, the weasels!).

2004 Indian Ocean earthquake [Wikipedia].

Tsunamis and Mangroves: The Shrimp Connection [Opinion piece that I wrote in the days after the tsunami]

Index of 11 streaming tsunami stories [National Public Radio].

Included with "The Best Science, Nature and Medical Blog Writing" by The Tangled Bank,
Issue #44.

Included with "The Best Recent Blogged Writing" by The Carnival of the Vanities, Mark II.

Included with "The best weblogging about Science and India" by The Scian Melt, issue #13.

tags: tsunami, earthquake, Indian Ocean, Southeast Asia, Sumatra, Indonesia

Happy Holidays

2005-12-25T00:17:00.000-05:00

Click image for a larger version in its own window.

This image is kindly provided by my Seattle bird pal, Dawn. This photograph was taken in a small valley south of Puyallup, Washington. You can see more of Dawn's beautiful photographs by going to her photobucket account.

The Seven Times Seven Meme

2005-12-24T01:56:00.000-05:00

Coturnix and Philaelaethes both nailed me with a meme. I think this is part of their grand distraction project.

Seven Things To Do Before I Die

Seven Things I Cannot Do

Nature

Science

Seven Things That Attract Me to Blogging

Seven Things I Say Most Often

what?

Zazu

Seven Books That I Love (How about authors I love, instead?)

Seven Movies That I (would if I could) Watch Over and Over Again

Seven People I Want To Join In Too

~~Philaelaethes~~

and he already tagged me with this same meme earlier!

~~but who will probably ignore this silliness anyway~~

~~Rexroth's Daughter, because I can't believe that you haven't been nailed two dozen times already with this meme~~

already tagged, too.

Dr. Charles

tags: meme, seven times seven meme

Birds in the News #40 -- Christmas Edition

2005-12-23T09:07:00.000-05:00

Tufted Titmouse, Baeolophus bicolor, copyright by Doris Dumrauf.
Winner of WildBird Magazine's 2005 amateur photography contest
(Click image for larger picture in its own window).
Photograph appears here with permission of Doris Dumrauf.

Birds in Science

It took years of study and involved weighing 10,000 sparrows, but Scottish scientists believe they have discovered a vital clue that could unravel the mystery surrounding the dramatic decline of one of Britain's best-known birds. Research results showed that house sparrows, Passer domesticus (pictured), fail to prepare effectively for the low food supplies and freezing temperatures during winter months. Instead of eating extra food before cold weather, sparrows retain their sleeker shape to allow them a better chance of fleeing predators -- despite the disadvantage of having a low body weight when the temperatures drop. The study, a collaboration between the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) and the universities of Glasgow, St Andrews and Oxford, also explained sparrows' susceptibility as resulting from habitat change: Cleaner towns and cities, as well as intensive farming (which reduces the amount of spilled grain and the seed-rich winter stubble favored by sparrows) have reduced the amount of food available to the birds in the winter.

Global warming has apparently lulled Europe's songbirds into canceling their winter stays in Africa. Instead, they'll warble in Britain, bird experts say. Eleven species of migratory warblers wintered in Britain last year and reports from more than a thousand British birdwatchers included sightings of approximately 1,500 blackcaps, Sylvia atricapilla, and almost 1,000 chiffchaffs, Phylloscopus collybita (pictured). "I am amazed by the numbers of warblers that were reported," says Greg Conway, a researcher with the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), who runs the survey. It's as if the birds are now saying, "Let's not bother to go all the way to Africa this winter." Increasingly mild winters mean the birds can now cope with Europe's coldest months, giving them a head start when choosing territories the following breeding season. "Because they have the best breeding sites, they have the best productivity. And because it's a genetic trait, they are pumping out more and more kids which come (to Britain in the winter)." As for food, the BTO says bird feeders and berry-laden shrubs in gardens are helping blackcaps get through the lean winter months. GrrlScientist notes; but see the report below (People Helping Birds) that discusses how many British birds are dying of starvation due to massive failure of seed crops, forcing them to fight over rapidly diminishing berry crops.

Christmas Bird Count News

Will "winter finches" or northern raptors spread across North America this December? Will snow and ice blanket this continent, or will mild conditions prevail until the New Year? Will observers along the storm-ravaged Gulf Coast be able to discover the effects of this summer's hurricanes on their local birds? More than 50,000 observers in hundreds of locations throughout the United States and Canada, the Caribbean, parts of South and Central America, Bermuda, the West Indies and even a few Pacific Islands will be outside counting birds to find out. The Christmas Bird Count, also known as the CBC, now under the supervision of the National Audubon Society, began 106 years ago when a couple dozen birdwatchers replaced the traditional Christmas Day bird hunt with a day of bird observation. The annual Christmas Bird Count starts on 14 December and extends through 5 January in any given year. Each official CBC location consists of a 15 mile-diameter circle. Observers start out before dawn, listening for owl calls, then drive and walk through woods, fields, wetlands and along lakes and streams from dawn to dusk, noting not only how many different species they can find, but the numbers of each species. Participants are not paid for the count. In fact, they each contribute a $5 fee to cover the cost of printing official lists, preparing other materials and publishing the results. For more information, click each link to view; this year's CBC results, and here to see last year's (105th CBC) photo gallery. You can join the National Audubon Society (always a great gift idea for that person on your list who has everything).

Regional CBC news stories;

Hamilton County, Indiana (USA)

Southern Illinois (USA)

Maine (USA)

Huntsville, Ontario (Canada)

GrrlScientist note: Please email links to your CBC news stories and I will publish them in next week's issue.

People Helping Birds

British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) is encouraging people to put out supplemental food for wild birds who are suffering from food shortages after the failure of several seed crops, with fears many could die of starvation before the end of the winter. Three major sources of food -- oak, beech and fir trees -- have failed to produce much fruit this year, leaving birds such as woodpigeons, Columba palumbus, coal tits, Periparus ater, and chaffinches, Fringilla coelebs (pictured), struggling. It is highly unusual for all three seed crops to fail in the same year, according to the BTO. As a result, these birds have now started feeding on berries much earlier than normal, putting them in competition with species such as the robin, Erithacus rubecula, and long-tailed tit, Aegithalos caudatus. Mike Toms, of the BTO, said: "What this means for our garden birds is that a food source which would normally last them through the winter months is already pretty much exhausted." A severe cold spell at the beginning of December has made conditions even worse, leading to trees being stripped earlier than they would have been. "The food that garden owners put out for birds could be the difference between life and death for many species," Toms said.

People Hurting Birds

How far would you travel to feed your baby? A female Christmas Island Frigatebird, Fregata andrewsi (pictured), named Lydia, recently made a 26-day journey of about 2,500 miles across Indonesian volcanoes and some of Asia's busiest shipping lanes, in search of food for her chick. The trip, tracked with a global positioning device by scientists at Christmas Island National Park, is by far the longest known nonstop journey by one of these critically endangered seabirds. Previously, the black-and-white scavengers with distinctive pink beaks and wingspans of up to 8 feet were known only to fly a few hundred miles from their nesting sites, staying away for just a few days at a time, officials said. "The thing that really surprised me is that it was a long, nonstop journey, and that she crossed overland over volcanoes," said David James, coordinator of biodiversity monitoring for Christmas Island National Park, the birds' only known breeding ground. "Normally, you would expect the seabirds to fly over the sea." Lydia's trip started October 18 from Christmas Island, an Australian territory in the Indian Ocean approximately 310 miles south of Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, and 1,600 miles northwest of Perth, in western Australia. "It is tragically ironic that while Lydia nests on one the world's most remote and pristine islands, she makes her living in some of the most degraded seas on the planet," James said. "Fishing pressure is huge and marine pollution is severe." GrrlScientist wonders; In view of Alexander Kitaysky's research on the diet of young kittiwakes, I wonder how good this chick's chances are of surviving into adulthood and reproducing?

Two domestic ducks have been rescued after two residents found them swimming among wild ducks in a corner of the library's mostly frozen duck pond. "I'd hate to come out here someday and see them frozen," said Diane Holmgren, at the duck pond before the rescue last week, where she walks nearly every day with her husband, Frank. Holmgren called animal control, the Humane Society and Recreation and Parks, afraid that the ducks wouldn't survive the winter. Unfortunately, these birds are not as unusual as one might think. In fact, they are part of a growing national problem known as unwanted pet syndrome. "I get about a half-dozen e-mails a day from all over the country asking for help because white Pekin ducks (pictured) are getting frostbite and frozen and being euthanized. It's horrifying," said Kim Link, co-president of Majestic Waterfowl Sanctuary in Lebanon, Connecticut, one of only a handful of shelters set up to accommodate domestic waterfowl that have been rescued. "Folks see ducks on ponds and decide to set their ducks 'free' to live happily ever after. What they don't realize is that domestic ducks do not fly. They are not free and they are not wild. They are trapped on the ponds they are abandoned to. They can't migrate. They lose their food supply. The pond freezes over, they get frostbit legs and bills, they freeze into the ice -- if only people knew what they were doing." Rescued waterfowl are in need of loving and safe, predator-proof homes. Click here if you would like to help.

Streaming Birds

On BirdNote, for the week of December 19, learn more about rete mirabile, the reason that birds' feet don't freeze. Also; swallows in winter?; solstice fires and the return of the sun; why woodpeckers don't get headaches; and today's show, The Twelve Days of Christmas -- the derivation. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed. [mp3/podcast].

An obscure area in New Mexico called Bosque Del Apache is where the world's largest concentration of sandhill cranes, Grus canadensis (pictured), migrate every fall. Every year, Bosque Del Apache hosts upwards of 20,000 cranes and these majestic and ancient birds form seas of blue along the Rio Grande. Writer Doug Fine watched some of this year's migration and reports about it for Morning Edition, heard on National Public Radio. [3:19, RealPlayer or Windoze Media Player required]

Miscellaneous Birds

Mark Brazil is the author of my constant companion, The Birds of Japan (pictured), when I visited Tokyo for six weeks a few years ago. In this article, he expounds upon the joys of birding in the nude in Japan. Need I say more?

Mistletoe, a plant that is distributed by birds, has been associated with Christmas for centuries. In fact, this plant's name is derived from old English, meaning "dung on a twig", because it frequently is propagated from bird poop found on twigs of trees. Now, just in time for Christmas, you can read a nicely written and photographed natural history about mistletoe that is featured at This Week at Hilton Pond (scroll down a little on that link). As always, the naturalists at Hilton Pond include a tally of birds banded there, as well as miscellaneous notes about local nature happenings. Hilton Pond Center for Piedmont Natural History is a non-profit research & education organization located in York, South Carolina, USA.

The fine print: Thanks to my bird pals, Bill, Caren, Ellen and Ron, for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here and thanks to Ian and Candy for correcting my errors. Best regards to Lawrence B. and to anonymous for their generous $upport. And special thanks to long-time readers, Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader, for surprising me by nominating Birds in the News for a 2005 Koufax Award for Best Series! There will be an announcement here, along with more details, when voting begins. As an aside, it has come to my attention that Internet Explorer does not respect the formatting of this blog. I apologize because I am not sure how to rectify this situation except to say that this blog looks best when viewed with Firefox.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter, Christmas Bird Count

Transit Strike Fallout

2005-12-20T21:08:00.000-05:00

As you know, dear readers, I live in NYC, so you might imagine that I, along with several million other New Yorkers, have been impacted by the public transit strike. But throughout the night, I was in denial that this strike would actually occur; after all, I could still hear the elevated trains roaring through the darkness as late as two in the morning. Early this morning, I awoke to an ominous silence, a stillness that was formally confirmed when the awful truth was announced on the radio; transit strike! I briefly thought about investing the day in restoring order to my neglected apartment while teaching my birds to say a few foul words. But, being the wanderer that I am, that thought was too much to bear. Instead, I decided that I had to get out, even if I did have to walk eight million miles each way in the freezing weather to get to my destination.

So I set out, realizing -- too late -- that I was underdressed for the cold. After surviving two bouts of pneumonia, you'd think I would have learned my lesson by now. My numb toes and fingers finally made me brave enough to poke one blue thumb out of my tightly clenched fist into the frigid air in the typical hitchhiker's pose. Surprisingly, within just a few minutes, a van stopped and I began a grand, serendipitous adventure after climbing into the back seat, warm air enveloping me.

And so it was that I met Rodney, the manager for a men's formal wear store in Chelsea. Rodney is Peruvian, but was born in NYC and lives in the Bronx. Due to Rodney's generosity (and also because he needed at least three people in his vehicle to pass the police check points to enter the business district), I also met a Russian immigrant, Ellie, and a Dominican beautician, Pat.

For more than an hour, we snailed through the tremendous crush of traffic, our progress and spirits buoyed as we shared stories and gifts along the way. We grumbled about huge delivery trucks clogging the streets, and complained about taxi drivers who refused to bring us to the business district or who were only too happy to charge us twice the set rate to do so. We laughed together when we noticed that the snowy-haired policeman sitting in his car at the westside highway entrance ramp was asleep. We swapped contact information so we could find each other tonight, and again tomorrow, for our return.

This one vehicle's cargo reflected the face of NYC and all that makes America great; each of us different, separate, yet the same; a black woman, a brown man, and two white women; almost all of us bilingual; two of us immigrants, one, a transplanted New Yorker and one, a native New Yorker, brought together by circumstance.

This one vehicle blended smoothly into the masses as it carried us all into the raucous, chaotic, glowing heart of the city.

tags: NYC Life, strike

Follow Up on An Issue of Birds in The News

2005-12-20T19:05:00.000-05:00

In a recent issue of Birds in the News, I linked to an obituary about a woman, Jane Olyphant, who had banded 84,000 birds in her lifetime. Either yesterday or today, her granddaugther, Melissa, found that the number two story that popped up on a google search of her grandmother's name was the 37th issue of Birds in the News. Melissa was kind enough to post a comment to that blog entry (I encourage you to read it) and her message included a link back to a blog where she has a really sweet picture of herself and her grandmother, holding a goldfinch.

How to Stuff a Lory During the Holidays

2005-12-19T07:59:00.000-05:00

Fijian (Solitary) Lory, Phigys solitarius. Known as the Kula Bird by the locals.
(Click image to see a larger version in its own window).
Photograph by Ryan Photographic, who kindly granted permission for it to appear here.

Some of you, dear readers, might know that I have lived with lories for most of my life. Lories are small- to medium-sized parrots that feed on nectar and they are endemic to the islands of the South Pacific Ocean. As companion pets, they also are very curious and active and can cause a lot of trouble in a short period of time if not closely supervised. This recipe for how to prepare a holiday meal while in the company of a lory has been circulating "out there" for awhile, so I thought I'd rewrite and revise it and then share it with you here, just in time for the holidays. The lories pictured below are some of the many species that I bred, hand-fed and lived with at some point in my life.

Ingredients:

Turkey
Dressing
Sweet Potatoes
Mashed Potatoes with Gravy
Green Beans
Cranberry Sauce
Hot rolls and Butter
Relish tray
Pumpkin Pie with Whipped Cream
Wine, both red and white, and lots of it
Hot Coffee

Instructions:

Get up early in the morning and have a cup of coffee. It's going to be a long day, so place your lory on a perch nearby to keep you company while you prepare the holiday meal.

Remove your lory from the kitchen counter and return him to his perch.

Prepare dressing, then remove your lory from the edge of the dressing bowl and return him to his perch.

Stuff the dressing into the turkey and place the turkey into the roasting pan. Remove your lory from the edge of the pan and return him to his perch. Have a glass of wine to steady your nerves.

Remove your lory's head from the turkey cavity and return him to his perch, and then restuff the turkey. Quickly place the turkey into the preheated oven to roast.

Prepare the relish tray, and remember to prepare twice as much as you need so there will be enough servings for your guests after your lory has eaten his fill. Remove your lory from the kitchen counter and return him to his perch. Have another glass of wine to steady your nerves (it is the holidays, afterall).

Prepare the cranberry sauce, discarding the berries that your lory threw to the floor.

Peel the potatoes, then remove your lory from the edge of potato bowl and return him to his perch. Whip potatoes.

Arrange the sweet potatoes in a pan and cover with them brown sugar and miniature marshmallows. Remove your lory from the edge of the pan and return him to his perch. [Note: caution should be used when carrying out this maneuver because lories are especially fond of sugary substances. They may viciously attack anyone who dares to separate them from such food items]. Replace missing marshmallows and hide the sweet potatoes in the oven. Have another glass of wine with your guests as they begin to arrive.

Brew another pot of coffee. While it is brewing, clean up the torn coffee filters. Pry the coffee bean from your lory's beak, then have a cup of coffee with your guests to counteract the effects of all that wine (oops!). Remove your lory from the kitchen counter and return him to his perch.

When serving the meal:

Place a stick of butter out on the counter to soften - think better of this idea and return it to the refrigerator.

Place the roasted turkey on a large platter and cover your lory's beak marks with strategically placed sprigs of parsley.

Put the mashed potatoes into a serving bowl and rewhip at last minute to conceal beak marks and claw prints.

Place the pan of sweet potatoes on the sideboard -- since you are out of marshmallows now, forget about "presentation" because there's no way to hide those marshmallow-free areas from your guests.

Put the warm rolls into a decorative basket, then remove your lory from the side of the basket and return him to his perch. Remove beaked rolls from basket and serve what's left.

Wipe down the kitchen counter to remove mashed potato claw tracks. Remove your lory from the kitchen counter, wipe the mashed potatoes from his feet and return him to his perch.

Serve dinner to your guests.

Cut the pumpkin pie into serving sized pieces. Wipe the whipped cream from your lory's beak and return him to his perch. Place large dollops of the remaining whipped cream onto each pie slice. Serve intact pie slices to your guests, reserving the beaked-out slices for the yourself.

Place your lory inside his cage and lock the door.

Have another glass of wine and sit down to a nice relaxing dinner with your guests - accompanied by shrill cries of "WANT DINNER!" or "FEED ME!" from the other room.

tags: birds, pets, holidays

Included in the

Christmas Eve Carnival of Recipes (71st edition).

Included in the first

Carnival of Christmas

What Would Hermione Say About This?

2005-12-18T18:33:00.000-05:00

GrrlScientist's Elf Name Is...

Trixie Mince Meat

What's Your Elf Name?

For the record, I hate mincemeat. But it's a relief to see that PZ's elf name is sillier than mine is!

Also for the record ..

Hermione Granger's Elf Name Is...

Grumpy Snowballer

More Koufax Nominations

2005-12-17T23:37:00.000-05:00

Wow, I do have a few dedicated fans out there, don't I?

The latest tally for the 2005 Koufax Award category nominations for Scientific Life are;

Best Blog -- 2 nominations (anonymous blog reader and anonymous, except the second anonymous forgot to leave a URL!)

Best Expert Blog -- 3 nominations (Coturnix, John and anonymous blog reader)

Best Single Issue Blog -- 3 nominations (Dr. FreeRide, John and anonymous blog reader)

Most Deserving of Wider Recognition -- 3 nominations (Jamie, Dr. FreeRide and anonymous blog reader)

Best Writing -- 2 nominations (Alon Levy and anonymous blog reader)

Best Series for Birds in the News -- 3 nominations (Jamie, Tony and anonymous blog reader)

Best Individual Post for Backtracking Birds Show Islands are not Evolutionary Dead Ends -- 2 nominations (Coturnix and anonymous blog reader)

Best Individual Post for Tsunamis and Mangroves: The Shrimp Connection -- 2 nominations (me, seconded by another blog pal, Tony)

Most Humorous Post for My Living Will -- 1 nomination (anonymous blog reader) Come on, doesn't anyone out there like this piece well enough to second the nomination? You all sure liked it when I first posted it! Fweh!

Remember, to be included on the ballot in any category, Scientific Life or its essays must have at least two nominations and you must include the URL or your nomination doesn't count. You do not have to write your own blog to nominate anyone; all you have to do is read and appreciate them.

Nominated for the 2005 Koufax Awards

2005-12-16T15:10:00.000-05:00

I am stunned. I had no idea that there were blog awards, but I just learned that Scientific Life was nominated twice for the Best Expert Blog category (by Coturnix, and by John. Wow, you both are so sweet to think of me!) and once for the Best Single Issue Blog category (by John) for the 2005 Koufax Awards. The Koufax Awards, named for lefty pitcher Sandy Koufax, are intended to recognize blogs and bloggers on the political left. Click here for the rules for the "Sandy" Awards.

It appears that multiple nominations for blogs and for individual blog essays are actively encouraged, and a blog must receive more than one nomination to appear in the semi-finals, so if you also feel motivated to nominate Scientific Life or an individual essay that appears here for one of the Koufax categories, then go for it!

Here are a few recent pieces that I think are worthwhile individual nominations for the "Best Post" category (you can also check out the pieces listed as "most popular" on the left sideboard);

Backtracking Birds Show Islands are not Evolutionary Dead Ends

Thoughts on the Value of Blogs to Science (this one generated a lot of discussion when I posted it)

The Wizarding Apprentices' Surprising Discovery (this one was suggested to me; I never would have picked it out of the collection)

and several other 2005 pieces that have been favorites;

Beauty is in the Details (this one was republished in the print media)

How I Hosted the Tangled Bank .. (this one still generates a lot of discussion and interest)

Tsunamis and Mangroves: The Shrimp Connection (this one is really good, and is my first essay posted in 2005, so I think it is eligible for this category)

My friend, PZ Myers, was nominated for the same blog categories, and my other friend, Chris Clarke, was nominated for Best Post category for his wonderful piece, Life and Death (and they both will certainly win) but hey, I am honored to be included in such wonderful company! Thanks, dear readers!

Birds in the News #39

2005-12-16T04:20:00.000-05:00

Steller's Jay, Cyanocitta stelleri

Birds in Science

A Canadian researcher says the title of most innovative birds goes to crows and jays, such as the Steller's Jay, Cyanocitta stelleri, (pictured above) -- a judgement based on observed novel feeding techniques. Corvids were followed by falcons, hawks, herons, and woodpeckers with regards to innovative feeding techniques. The avian innovation index is based on 2,000 reports of feeding "innovations" observed in the wild and published in ornithology journals over a period of 75 years. "We gathered as many examples as we could from the short notes of ornithology journals about the feeding behaviours that people had never seen or were unusual," said Dr Louis Lefebvre, of McGill University in Montreal, Canada. Dr Lefebvre, the test's creator, was surprised that parrots were not high in the pecking order - despite their relatively large brains. This work was presented to the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS). [original paper (PDF)]. GrrlScientist comment: you will notice that the news story claims this is an avian IQ, or intelligence, index, but it is not. Intelligence is more multifaceted than just innovative feeding behaviors. Additionally, since this index is based on observer reports of feeding behaviors, that means the birds had to be observable while feeding. Of course, that could explain why parrots ranked much lower than expected since they tend to feed in the canopy, where they are difficult to see. Also, tropical birds -- which include parrots -- are poorly known, particularly when compared to North American birds.

Scientists working with the 52 member organizations of the Alliance for Zero Extinction recently published a study that identifies 794 species threatened with imminent extinction, each of which is in need of urgent conservation action at a single remaining site on Earth. While extinction is a natural process, the authors note that current human-caused rates of species loss are 100-1,000 times greater than natural rates. In recent history, most species extinctions have occurred on isolated islands following the introduction of invasive predators such as cats and rats. This study shows that the extinction crisis has now expanded to become a full-blown assault on Earth’s major land masses, with the majority of at-risk sites and species now found on continental mountains and in lowland areas. Their recommendation is to protect 595 sites around the world to help stave off an imminent global extinction crisis. This research was published this week in the top-tier peer-reviewed journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. [abstract, and the full paper free via open access].

People Helping Birds

The Australian Government's Regional Natural Heritage Programme (RNHP) has awarded AU$193,000 to identify conservation priorities and build partnerships for managing Timor-Leste's first national park. (Timor-Leste was formerly known as East Timor and has been officially independent since 2002.) The project will focus on the area with the highest biodiversity value in East Timor, to build partnerships and collaboratively identify conservation priorities and objectives. It will establish a foundation for community-based conservation via a national protected areas network. The first area of focus on will be the Lore/Lake Iralalaro/Jaco Island region, including three Important Bird Areas (IBA) with populations of the Critically Endangered Sulfur-crested Cockatoo, Cacatua sulphurea (pictured), the Endangered Timor Green-pigeon, Treron psittaceus, and several Near Threatened and endemic species. "The creation of East Timor's first national park is an important step for conservation in the country. The Australian Government are to be congratulated on helping to protect the biodiversity of their close neighbors," said Richard Grimmett, Head of BirdLife's Asia Division. BirdLife will manage this project.

Birders Helping Birders

Would you like to help test drive a unique new web site for birders? Blake Maybank created Birding Sites of Novia Scotia in conjunction with his recently published book with the same name, and he is asking for your assistance by "test driving" it. The site is designed to augment and support the birding guide by helping prospective visitors plan and organise Nova Scotia birding trips. This site contains links to information that, for a variety of reasons, was impractical or impossible to place on the printed page, including trip-planning sources (tourism and orientation sites); daily weather, tide, and road information; species' lists for birding sites described in the book; maps for the inside covers of the book (inadvertently left out during the printing process); links to provincial cultural resources, parks, natural areas, trails, and lighthouses; map links and satellite imagery for the birding sites and routes described in the book and links to other provincially-relevant natural history information. Blake wants to know if the site provides the sort of information that a travelling birder would need to plan a trip? Blake's contact information is included on the site itself so you can send him feedback directly.

People Hurting Birds

This webpage documents two recent tower kills of migrating birds in Madison, Wisconsin. It includes lots of photographs of the towers and its feathery victims, a complete breakdown of species killed, a discussion of the event and links to other webbed towerkill reports. Particularly worrisome are the relatively large numbers of Golden-winged Warblers, Vermivora chrysoptera (pictured), found at the site. The five dead individuals reported represent almost 1% of the total GWWA picked up at communication towers in the eastern U.S. since monitoring has begun.

Bird Flu News

As the year draws to a close, millions of wild birds have flown to their wintering sites across, Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas without the widely predicted outbreaks of H5N1 bird flu associated with their migration routes. "The most obvious explanation is that migrating wild birds are not spreading the disease," said Dr Michael Rands, Director & Chief Executive of BirdLife International. "Migratory wild birds were blamed for spreading bird flu west from Asia, yet there’s been no spread back eastwards, nor to South Asia and Africa this autumn. The limited outbreaks in eastern Europe are on southerly migration routes but are more likely to be caused by other vectors such as the import of poultry or poultry products. The hypothesis that wild birds are to blame is simply far from proven," concluded Dr. Rands. "Wild birds occasionally come into contact with infected poultry and die: they are the victims not vectors of H5N1 bird flu."

Thanks to Mr. Bui Quang Anh, Director General of the Department of Animal Health at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, the Vietnamese Government has finally come to their collective senses. After receiving an official letter written by Mr. Bui, the Vietnamese Government ordered an immediate halt to the culls of wild birds in Ho Chi Minh City, and the cities of Da Nang and Hue. Mr. Bui sent his letter to the three cities, saying: "The killing of pigeons and wild birds is not a national policy. This practice is not only an inappropriate measure but is also likely to cause bad effects to the ecosystem. Some international organisations have already expressed their great concerns regarding this practice. The Department of Animal Health at the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development has therefore requested Provincial Departments of Animal Health to advise Provincial Departments of Agriculture and Rural Development, Provincial People's Committees to stop the killing of pigeons and wild birds." City authorities had embarked on the culls, using poison and guns, in an attempt to prevent the spread of avian flu from the countryside.

The sudden death of more than 1,000 ducks at a lake in Mexico was not caused by bird flu, the government said on Monday, but scientists are still trying to uncover the reason that the birds mysteriously died. An Agriculture Ministry spokesman said that the condition of the dead birds, found by a lake in central Aguascalientes state, showed they had been dying over a period of days or weeks. Scientists are trying to determine if the birds died of botulism, a rare but deadly illness caused by a toxic bacteria, or from pollution, the ministry said. Incidentally, also mentioned in this story is that some Mexican environmental activists say that H5N1 could enter the country via a thriving trade, both illegal and legal, in exotic birds such as parrots. GrrlScientist says; I am frustrated that these activists are so concerned about the parrot trade but no mention is ever made of a much more likely vector for avian influenza; cockfighting birds.

Streaming Birds

On BirdNote, for the week of December 12, they discuss the Christmas Bird Count; the sad tale of the Dodo, Raphus cucullatues; what birds do on a cold night; Who Was Townsend? and the majestic Gyrfalcon, Falco rusticolus. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

The January 2006 issue of the top-tier ornithological journal, AUK, will publish a 15 page commentary about the recent Ivory-billed Woodpecker rediscovery by Jerome Jackson, an expert on this species. It should be interesting to read, so keep your eyes open for it.

Although indirectly related to birds, this article describes the difficulties associated with reducing one's contribution to global warming while simultaneously reducing one's impact on environmental destruction. For example, some people are increasingly relying on bioenergy as an environmentally-safe alternative. Bioenergy is the energy generated from living plants and plant components (so-called "renewable biomass"). It has been hailed as one of the key weapons in the battle against global warming. However, without strong environmental safeguards in place, reduction in greenhouse gas emissions due to use of bioenergy will be negligible while impacts on the broader environment will be severe. "Travelling in a car fuelled by biodiesel seems like a great, environmentally-friendly thing to do. However, if the biodiesel has come from soya planted in the Brazilian Amazon or palm oil from Indonesia, the green consumer is likely to be unwittingly driving another nail into the coffin of the world's great ecosystems," observed Ariel Brunner, Agriculture Policy Officer at BirdLife International.

Thanks to my bird pals, Ian, Ellen and Ron, for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here. Thanks to Ian for catching my typographical errors.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Nominated (!!) to the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 20.

December Thanksgiving

2005-12-15T21:55:00.000-05:00

Aspens. Ansel Adams.

Speaking of falling down and going boom, Blogger and I have a lot in common these days because I also took a hard fall. Really hard. And damn, but it hurts, it hurts, it hurts. Fortunately, my pipetemen and laptop appear to be mostly unscathed (at least I hope so), and those are everything that I care about.

Well, nearly. To the good people at my local Starbucks who warm my frozen spirit with hot chai and quiet companionship, and especially to those of you, dear kind readers, who saw my nose dive and reacted as quickly and decisively as you did, I am so so grateful.

Blogger Fall Down and Go Boom -- AGAIN

2005-12-06T21:11:00.000-05:00

I have received several emails from you, dear readers, wondering where Scientific Life went. Well, it is still here, at least for awhile, but my server, Blogger ("blogspot"), is having a lot of problems these days. Well, these many months, actually. I have been considering leaving Blogger for several months now because these issues have been getting progressively worse, but I haven't found any reasonable (free) alternatives out there. Not only that, but moving means I would break all of my incoming links, which I am incredibly reluctant to do. Besides, who knows if the server that I move to would be any more stable than Blogger is?

Yesterday, Blogger was down for maintenance for many hours longer than it was supposed to be, during peak traffic hours, but unfortunately, this so-called maintenance did not appear to solve anything. Scientific Life still disappears from time to time (hitting reload often recalls it, though), and Blogger is still eating reader comments (which makes me sad), and it still is very inconsistent about publishing anything that I write. There were five days recently where I could not publish anything at all, in fact. Further, another reader informs me that my RSS feed is screwed up, for reasons I cannot begin to fathom, although I am willing to bet that this is also a Blogger-related issue, grr!

In addition to all those problems, my blog download speed has become .. well, downright slow. This is due to a combination of factors, beginning with Blogger, but made worse because I link to lots of graphics as well as a fair number of bells and whistles on my sideboard (look to the left and you shall see my collection). As one person told me recently, Scientific Life has outgrown Blogger. Well, I am not sure if that is true because it is still a baby blog (although I would like to believe it is growing up), but something has got to change, and soon.

I guess this is a prime example of how I get what I pay for -- and less.

Another Web-based Toy

2005-12-05T21:53:00.000-05:00

for you to scratch your head over ...

Okay, you guys, you gotta check out this wacky site. They rate blogs based on stupidass criteria;

Basically, Gematria is searching for different patterns through the text, such as the amount of words beginning with a vowel. If the amount of these matches is divisible by a certain number, such as 7 (which is said to be God's number), there is an incontestable argument that the Spirit of God is ever present in the text. Another important aspect in gematria are the numerical values of letters: A=1, B=2 ... I=9, J=10, K=20 and so on. The Gematriculator uses Finnish alphabet, in which Y is a vowel.

Please enlighten me, dear readers, but what is the problem with vowels?

Also, because this little exam is based on the Finnish alphabet and because I happen to be Finnish by ancestry (but my real-life name is Hebrew, go figure), why can't I get extra credit points to be assigned as I see fit? Certainly, I'd like to score higher in the "evil" category because being an evil female scientist would do wonders for increasing traffic to my humble blog!

And speaking of evilness, I am incredibly disappointed that I only earned a "48% evil" rating, especially after reading more about their rankings criteria. I am tempted to publish a fresh entry with a lot of swear words like, you know .. the seven unmentionables .. and words that begin with .. vowels .. but I don't want to demean my blog in that way, just because I can (I have standards to maintain).

Big Apple Blog Festival #18 Available

2005-12-05T07:37:00.000-05:00

The Big Apple Blog Festival, issue #18, is available for your reading pleasure. This carnival draws attention to blogs whose authors either live in NYC or who write about NYC. You know, like moi.

BestOfMeSymphony #106 Available

2005-12-05T00:34:00.000-05:00

The BestOfMeSymphony, issue#106, featuring TS Eliot, is available for your reading pleasure.

For those of you who don't know, the BestOfMeSymphony specializes in linking to essays that were published 2 months or longer ago on a blog. I contributed a piece of mine, describing the annual honey harvest in Hell's Kitchen. So stop by the Symphony and discover something that you might have missed the first time!

I am a Blog Expert

2005-12-04T20:17:00.000-05:00

I won't tell you how many times I had to answer this questionnaire before I qualified as an expert, though!

You Are a Blogging Expert

You got 8/8 correct!

You know so much about blogging, you should blog for a living.

How Much Do You Know About Blogging?

Snow Globe

2005-12-04T05:45:00.000-05:00

I saw my first snowflakes yesterday morning as I walked past christmas trees and wreaths, christmas decorations and lights, on my way to the subway, shivering, fingers blue. I was greeted by several inches of snow this morning, formerly white snow that is liberally punctuated with yellow and brown stains. I guess the holidays are here again.

You might enjoy playing with an online holiday snowglobe. I am especially amused by the snowman who eats the little girl who created him.

Birds in the News #38

2005-12-02T00:27:00.000-05:00

Toco Toucan, Ramphastos toco.
Copyright Paul Bratescu, 2003.

Birds in Science

What can bird beaks teach mechanical engineers? In this beautifully written news story, translated from a research paper published today in the research journal, Acta Materialia, engineers from the University of California San Diego reveal the secret for how toucan beaks can be light yet incredibly strong. Marc A. Meyers and his graduate students, Yasuaki Seki and Matthew S. Schneider, reported that the toucan beak's lightweight strength is the result of an unusual bio-composite. The interior of the beak is rigid "foam" made of bony fibers (pictured, right) and drum-like membranes sandwiched between outer layers of keratin, the same protein that makes up fingernails, hair, and horn. "Our computer modeling shows that the beak is optimized to an amazing degree for high strength and very little weight," said Meyers. “It’s almost as if the toucan has a deep knowledge of mechanical engineering.” They also noted a hollow region extending about half the length of the upper and lower beaks (pictured, left). "When we did the calculations, we discovered that there are only very insignificant mechanical stresses in the center of the beak at the position of the hollow areas," said Meyers. "This is why I jokingly tell my students that toucans have a deep knowledge of mechanics. They don't bother adding structural support in a part of the beak that doesn't really need it." Just as the hook-shaped barbs on cockleburs inspired the development of Velcro, Meyers said the avian bio-composite could inspire the design of ultra-light aircraft and vehicle components with synthetic foams made with metals and polymers. This link includes lots of beautiful pictures and a 4-minute streaming interview with Professor Meyers.

Adding further credence to the "birds are dinosaurs" hypothesis, it was reported recently in the top-tier research journal, Science, that the oldest known bird fossil has feet that are more like a dinosaur's than previously thought. The nine previously known fossils of Archaeopteryx suggested that birds probably evolved from small meat-eating dinosaurs that are closely related to Dromeosaurs. A newly revealed fossil strengthens this hypothesis. The specimen (pictured, right -- click to see larger image in its own window) comes from the private collection of a worker at the Solnhofen limestone quarries in Germany, where the first Archaeopteryx fossil was discovered. This fossil was unknown to science until its owner's death, when the new owner made it available to scientists at the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in the US. This fossil reveals that there are no unique traits shared by Archaeopteryx and the other bird-like fossils, Confuciusornis and a primitive bird called Rahonavis, that lived much later, that are not also shared by dinosaurs. Thus, Archaeopteryx either cannot be classified as belonging to the same evolutionary group as birds or this entire group of bird-like fossils must be redefined. More information; This document tells the story of this, the Thermopolis Archaeopteryx specimen and this links to a formal reconstruction of the specimen. GrrlScientist says; I wonder how many more rare fossils are hidden in private hands, preventing scientists from learning their secrets? I also wonder if rare fossils are safe from potential damages caused by religious wingnuts?

Birds and Those Who Watch Them

Wildlife biologists believe a whooping crane, Grus americana (pictured, left), that became separated from its parents while learning to migrate is spending a second winter lost and in the company of friendly sandhill cranes, Grus canadensis. A bird watcher last week spotted the whooper near Hargill, about 110 miles south of the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge where the world's only naturally migrating flock of whooping cranes winters each year. A U.S. Fish & Wildlife service biologist confirmed the find. With only about 200 of the endangered species in the flock -- up from about 15 in 1941 -- biologists try to keep tabs on each chick. During last year's fall migration, however, one juvenile was spotted in some offbeat places, including Colorado, Oklahoma, and finally Bay City, Texas, more than 100 miles from Aransas. ''This one particular whooping crane doesn't know where Aransas is. Its parents never showed it,'' said Tom Stehn, whooping crane coordinator for the Fish & Wildlife Service. Stehn said the bird has no problem getting to Canada and theorized that a future mate might lead it to Aransas.

People Helping Birds

Member countries of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) added eleven birds and other animals to their endangered species lists. These species needing extra protection include the Basra Reed Warbler, Acrocephalus griseldis (pictured, left), a small brown and white bird that breeds in the Mesopotamian marshlands of southern Iraq, thought to be the mythological Garden of Eden, and the Red Knot, Calidris canutus, a migratory shorebird that I focus on here. "The 11 species will join a listing of around 107 migratory animals which are considered endangered and thereby given special status by all member states," said Marco Barbieri, CMS scientific officer. The CMS, a treaty signed under the aegis of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), says migratory species are considered more vulnerable than others because of their patterns of regular movement across borders and countries. Other avian species added include Henderson's Petrel, Pterodroma atrata, a migratory sea bird, the Malagasy Pond Heron, Ardeola idea, the Balearic Shearwater, Puffinus mauretanicus, the Spotted Ground-Thrush, Zoothera guttata, as well as the Basking Shark, the second largest shark species in the world, and the Short-Beaked Common Dolphin.

People Hurting Birds

In the southwestern portion of Connecticut, United Illuminating (UI) Company's parrot-eradication program begins its third week. Under the cover of darkness, UI captures feral monk parakeets, Myiopsitta monachus (pictured, right), that nest on its power poles and sends them to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, who then kills them. The current death toll of monk parakeets "humanely euthanized under methods approved by the American Veterinary Medical Association" is approximately 120. Al Carbone, the utility's public relations spokesman, calls the UI/USDA death squads a "solution," into which the stupid and unimaginative officials from the utility were forced. Carbone said that the crews started in West Haven and will focus on one town at a time as UI works to pull down 103 nests along the Connecticut coast to Fairfield. GrrlScientist comment: It always amazes and saddens me to see how people react in such a primitive way when attempting to "solve" problems caused by animals.

Avian Influenza News

Vaccinating chickens against avian flu can prevent a major outbreak by preventing birds from passing on the virus, Dutch scientists said in a study published last Monday. Vaccination is one of the main weapons in the fight against bird flu. However, scientists did not know if vaccination protected only treated birds or had wider benefits. "Our conclusion is that vaccination of poultry can prevent a major outbreak of highly pathogenic avian flu viruses," scientist Jeanet Van der Goot told Reuters. However, they noted that it could take two weeks after vaccination before transmission to other birds was completely stopped. This study was published in the top-tier American journal, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. GrrlScientist comment: It's about freaking time that something like this was published. I fervently hope that the government officials worldwide read this report before they start/continue their massive bird extermination programs, particularly since the evidence is weak that links migratory wild birds and influenza spread. Further, people tend to solve problems by shooting first and thinking later -- often with tragic and unintended consequences.

Streaming Birds

On BirdNote, for the week of November 28, learn about the Raggiana Bird of Paradise, Paradisaea raggiana; Goldeneyes with whistling wings; Snow Geese, Anser caerulescens; Downy Woodpeckers, Picoides pubescens, far and wide; and the plight of the Western Grebe, Aechmophorus occidentalis. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

Have you noticed all the wonderful bird sounds in the Harry Potter films, and wondered if they are authentic? Wonder no more, because this interesting story reveals that Cornell's Macaulay Library at the Lab of Ornithology has established itself as more than just a vast scientific resource but also as a repository for creative but realistic background sounds for a wide variety of movie soundtracks. For example, the makers of the Harry Potter movies contacted the Macaulay Library for an appropriate call for the film's mythical hippogriff (pictured, left), a creature with an eagle's head, horse's body, large beating wings and ostrichlike feet. Greg Budney, curator of audio at the Macaulay Library, came up with the screech of a limpkin, Aramus guarauna (sound file link), a swamp-wading bird with long legs and long curving beak that lives mainly in Florida, the Caribbean islands and Central and South America. And so, in the Prisoner of Azkaban, the hippogriff swoops down and lets out the prehistoric-sounding screech of a limpkin. Once studios spent millions on the footage for a movie and just a few thousand dollars for sound effects. Now "studios are spending more [for audio] because the public is more discriminating and today's sound designers are committed to taking their craft to a higher level," Budney said.

A East Anglian blackbird, Turdus merula, that has amazed ornithologists by flying hundreds of miles between two gardens has arrived in Devon for its annual winter break. What is so unusual about this? The bird travels nearly 300 miles from Thetford, Norfolk, to the warmer climes of Newton Abbot, south Devon. The British Trust for Ornithology (BTO) research shows that only 3% of East Anglian blackbirds leave their tiny territories, and then they will stray by no more than 20 miles or so. "Its trips between Norfolk and Newton Abbot are becoming the stuff of local legend and it really does go to show that we still have a lot to learn about even our commonest birds," said a BTO spokesman.

This short story tells what can happen when you are not careful about what you say when your pet parrot is listening!

Thanks to my bird pals, Fred, Paul, Ian, Ellen and Ron, for some of the news story links that you are enjoying here.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

I Passed Eighth Grade Science

2005-11-27T20:25:00.000-05:00

If this is an example of the general quality of the average eighth grade science test, it's no wonder that our kids are failing. They can't decipher the tests because they are so poorly written.

For example, you will not get 8/8 unless you substitute neutron for neuron on this test. And that is just the beginning.

You Passed 8th Grade Science

Congratulations, you got 8/8 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Science?

It Isn't Easy Being Green

2005-11-27T20:00:00.000-05:00

According to this survey, my blog is the wrong color.

Your Blog Should Be Green

Your blog is smart and thoughtful - not a lot of fluff.
You enjoy a good discussion, especially if it involves picking apart ideas.
However, you tend to get easily annoyed by any thoughtless comments in your blog.

What Color Should Your Blog or Journal Be?

Holiday Gift Idea

2005-11-27T18:14:00.000-05:00

What does a disenfranchised chemist do for a living when she is unable to find a job doing anything at all?? Even though I am not a chemist, I have spent years wondering this myself in the context of my own tiny life and today discovered one possibility in my email box from a self-described "disenfranchised struggling moonlighting female scientist". She reports that some of her similarly disenfranchised and unemployable colleagues actually got together and started their own business, designing and selling t-shirts, mugs and other paraphernalia to their still-employed scientist-colleagues and their geeky friends and family members. So if you, dear readers, would like to support several more scientists who are currently struggling to survive and receive something special in return for your contribution, you should check out Yellow Ibis (no, I didn't name them).

I really love their logo (pictured at top), and ~~wish they had a t-shirt with that on it~~ they tell me that they can make one for me if I wish!

tags: holiday gift idea, science

Birds in the News #37

2005-11-25T23:10:00.000-05:00

Portrait of the endangered Whooping Crane, Grus americana

Birds in Science

Removing an egg from the endangered whooping crane's nest increases the species' chances of survival despite governmental concerns about tampering with nature, says a University of Alberta scientist. Dr. Mark Boyce, from the Faculty of Science, studied the policy of removing from Wood Buffalo National Park one of two whooping crane, Grus americana (pictured top), eggs laid and raising it in a "foster-parenting" program. Cranes usually rear a single chick and the other dies to siblicide or is killed by a predator, such as wolf or fox. The egg-removal program was initiated years ago by Ernie Kuyt, an Edmonton-based scientist who reasoned that one egg could be taken and used for artificial propagation programs. The idea was so successful, says Boyce, that the whooping crane's numbers have skyrocketed to over 200 birds in the original population and two new populations have been established elsewhere. But Parks Canada prefers that no future egg collections occur in Wood Buffalo National Park due to concerns that egg removals may reduce the productivity of the whooping crane population and that more generally, human intervention and disturbance should be minimized. Boyce's research found, however, that taking one egg away actually increases the probability of nest success. His paper, co-authored by Subhash Lele from the U of A's mathematical and statistical sciences department as well as Brian Johns from the Canadian Wildlife Service, is published in the December issue of the peer-reviewed journal, Biological Conservation.

European songbirds are canceling their annual winter breaks in Africa, preferring instead to fly to Great Britain, bird experts say. The surprising detour in European warbler migrations was revealed by data from an ongoing survey that involves bird-watchers across Britain. It's as if the birds are now saying, "Let's not bother to go all the way to Africa this winter," said Greg Conway, a researcher with the British Trust for Ornithology (BTO), who runs the survey.

People Helping Birds

A report commissioned by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) showed that more than half of the 60 species of migratory birds of prey found in Africa and Eurasia face extinction, either globally or within their regions. "Of all types of birds, birds of prey have always fascinated people," UK Biodiversity Minister Jim Knight said this week at the Eighth Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Migratory Species in Kenya. Fortunately, Britain has put forward a plan for international action to protect such rare birds of prey as eagles, vultures and owls from extinction. If the 93 signatories of the convention agree by the end of the conference on Friday to commit to the British proposal, the UK will organise an intergovernmental conference to work out further details, Knight said. So far Britain, backed by all its 24 European Union partners, has outlined priorities for the protection of the threatened species, said a DEFRA spokeswoman in Nairobi.

People Hurting Birds

The Kori Bustard, Ardeotis kori (pictured), is the world’s largest bustard and it occurs across sub-Saharan Africa. Although this species is still common in some protected areas, it is currently experiencing rapid population declines across much of its range. Botswana is a stronghold for the species, but it is threatened by habitat loss due to overgrazing and poaching. BirdLife Botswana has undertaken an investigation of Kori Bustard poaching and found the practice to be widespread, both for local consumption and for export to South Africa and beyond. "We found that many Kori Bustards are poached for local consumption, mainly by men over 30,” says BirdLife Botswana’s Kabelo Senyatso. “Snares are mostly used to kill birds in KGR, whilst guns are favored in KTP. In some areas only tribal elders are allowed to eat bustard meat. Sometimes a traditional doctor is brought in to 'treat' it before it is eaten, because of a belief that bustard meat can otherwise cause mental illness."

Ivory-billed Woodpecker News

Scientists and birders will resume their search this winter for the elusive ivory-billed woodpecker, Campephilus principalis, to prove, once and for all, that the bird really lives in the vast eastern Arkansas wetlands. "The birds are relatively silent," said Tim Gallagher of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and member of the search team. "The woods, they're like a jungle, just thick foliage, just incredibly hot, humid, buggy and snakes everywhere. Everything about it is just as bad as could be." A crew from Cornell and its partner agencies will train 100 volunteers for the six-month search of 500,000 acres, Gallagher said.

Avian Influenza News

Countries that ban the import of wild birds to stave off deadly avian flu may drive the trade underground and make it more difficult to detect the spread of the virus, a senior UN scientist warned on Sunday. A number of countries, including European Union members, have slapped a ban on the import of live birds and feathers in a desperate attempt to contain the spread of the virus. "As long as there is a demand, there will be a trade and you can't stamp out illegal trade by banning the legal trade," David Morgan, head of the Scientific Support Unit of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES).

A respected Japanese scientist, who works with the World Health Organization, says 300 people have died of H5N1 bird flu in China, including seven cases caused by human-to-human transmission. He says he was given the information in confidence by Chinese colleagues who have been threatened with arrest if they disclosed the extent of the problem. The allegations, which he revealed at a meeting in Germany, contrast sharply with China’s official position. GrrlScientist wonders Oh, right. And this is the same government that claims benzene poisoning is not occurring at this very moment.

Streaming Birds

Did any of you hear the story about Sandhill cranes on National Public Radio's Morning Edition this past Tuesday morning? I did and I liked it, and I think you will like it, too.

On BirdNote, for the week of November 21, we consider the LBBs and LBJs, the little brown birds and the little brown jobs so frustrating to new birders; a bit about feeding birds in winter; ducks in eclipse plumage; and on Thanksgiving day, what else? the Wild Turkey, Meleagris gallopavo (pictured); and "Which Jay Was That?" -- about the Blue Jay, Cyanocitta cristata, and another blue jay, the Steller's Jay, Cyanocitta stelleri. BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

I normally don't link to obituaries, but this one is rather interesting, especially for the bird banders out there. Jane Olyphant of Lake Elmo, New Jersey, was a licensed bird bander for 45 years. During her lifetime, she fastened tiny aluminum bands on 84,000 birds, most of them migratory songbirds. With a license granted by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, she banded her first bird, a white-breasted nuthatch, in her back yard on Oct. 1, 1959. "Young people stare spellbound when they see a small, vibrant, alert bird first in the net and then in my hand," she wrote of her nature-center teaching in the November-December 1977 edition of the Minnesota Volunteer, a newsletter of the Department of Natural Resources. The biggest challenge was "to help them become aware of life going on around them and to explain the vital role birds play in the world."

Thanks to my bird pals; Caren, Ellen and Ron for some of the links you are enjoying here. Please accept my apologies for the lateness of this issue of Birds in the News. I am having trouble locating a consistent internet connection and this is particularly apparent (and annoying) on holidays, when my internet options are seriously limited.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Included with the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 16.

I and the Bird #11 Now Available

2005-11-23T07:20:00.000-05:00

I was just notified that the eleventh issue of I and the Bird was published this morning. For those of you who are new to "this blog thang", I and the Bird is a relatively new blog carnival. Blog carnivals are link harvests of writing or photoessays or other materials published on blogs that meet certain criteria. In the case of I and the Bird, all contributions were published within the past couple months and are dedicated to celebrating some aspect of wild birds and their biology. The current host kindly contacted me a couple days ago, hoping I had something to contribute to this edition, so I sent her a link to one of my recent stories. You'll have to peek there to figure out which piece it was (especially yous twos, Rob and Chris; you might be pleased even though I still want to rework that piece), and while you are looking, you will also find many other fine stories about birds to entertain you over this holiday weekend.

And to the rest of you, dear readers, I promise that there isn't even one recipe for cooking any species of bird in the collection.

Galapagos Tortoises Visit NYC

2005-11-22T23:31:00.000-05:00

Galapagos giant tortoise, Geochelone elephantopus.

Early this morning, I visited the two Galapagos tortoises, Geochelone elephantopus, who currently reside on the third floor of the American Museum of Natural History. Even though the sign outside their large glass-enclosed area claims they are female, their handlers now suspect that they are both male. Apparently unperturbed by their mistaken gender, these teen-aged giants act as unofficial greeters to the crowds that are flocking to the newly opened Darwin exhibit at the museum.

"They're brothers. That's Frank and this is Charlie," Beth said, pointing to each tortoise in turn. The closest tortoise, Charlie, looked serenely through the glass at us, a piece of hay hanging out of his mouth.

Even though they are brothers, Beth explained, they are distinct and their caregivers can easily distinguish them by the shape of their scutes, the thick scales comprised of keratin that cover their bony shells. Keratin is a protein that is also found in hair, nails and hooves. But there are other physical differences between these brothers, too.

"For one, Frank is heavier, and Charlie is taller," Beth explained. I leaned down and squinted my eyes, trying to compare their respective shell heights from their level and found myself wishing for a tape measure.

Frank and Charlie's ancestors are terrestrial reptiles found only on the Galapagos Islands. The Galapagos lie in the Pacific Ocean, west of Ecuador (click map above for larger image in its own window). The Galapagos are really a group of more than 15 islands and islets, and each one has a different habitat and is occupied by a distinct combination of plants and animals, including giant tortoises. Historically, approximately 250,000 tortoises inhabited these islands, but unfortunately, their numbers plummeted because sailors ate them and routinely abandoned their domestic animals, such as dogs, pigs, goats, cats and rats, on these islands. Because these introduced species either ate tortoise eggs, preyed on young tortoises or competed with the adult tortoises for limited plant resources, only 10-15,000 individuals are alive today.

After a century of scientific study, it is not known for certain if each island's tortoise population can be classified as a true species, or if they might instead be subspecies or local variants of one species. However, recent DNA evidence suggests that at least a few of these island populations are legitimate species.

Giant tortoises have long been the focus of great scientific and historical significance because they were one of the many species that fascinated Charles Darwin on his voyages.

"I never dreamed that islands, about fifty or sixty miles apart, and most of them in sight of each other, formed of precisely the same rocks, placed under a quite similar climate, rising to a nearly equal height, would have been differently tenanted," Darwin wrote about these tortoises in his popular 1839 book, The Voyage of the Beagle.

After a conversation with the Vice-Governor of the islands, who claimed that each tortoise population was characterized by marked physical differences, Darwin discovered that he too, could identify a tortoise's home island, particularly by carefully noting the tortoise's overall size and the shape of its carapace (the bony shell). Just as selective breeding by humans caused the wolf to be modified into hundreds of distinct breeds of dogs, each breed with its own talents, these tortoises were likewise modified by the demands of their new environment. Over the millennia, this selective pressure shaped the original tortoises into distinct populations inhabiting each island. Because these changes are influenced by nature instead of humans, this essential process of evolution is known as natural selection. Consequently, because these animals illustrated the correlation between geographic isolation and morphological divergence, they became instrumental to the formation of Darwin's concept of evolution through natural selection.

In Darwin's day, there were 15 distinct populations of Galapagos tortoises. Representatives from 14 populations were formally described by the scientists of that time and 11 of these populations are still live today, although some are endangered.

These populations fall into two "morphotypes" based on the shape of their carapace, which is one of the tortoise's physical adaptations to the habitat found on their particular island home. It was noticed that generally, tortoises living on larger and wetter islands are very large, with domed carapaces and stubby, thick legs. These are the "dome-backed" group, of which Frank and Charlie are representatives.

The other morphotype, the so-called "saddleback" tortoises, are found on smaller and drier islands in the Galapagos archipelago. They are physically smaller than their dome-shelled cousins, with longer and thinner legs, and their carapaces flare out above their necks and legs. It is thought that these physical modifications provide the saddlebacked animals with greater mobility necessary to reach the succulent pads of the Opuntia cactus (interestingly, this cactus, which is a major source of water on the dry islands, evolved a tree-like form in response to the demands of hungry and thirsty tortoises). Because the saddle-backed tortoises reminded the early Spanish explorers of a type of riding saddle called the "galapago", this group inspired the name for these islands.

But who were the ancestors of all these tortoises and how did they get to the remote Galapagos islands? New DNA data reveal that the giant Galapagos tortoises are close relatives to the much smaller chaco tortoises, Geochelone chilensis, that are native to South America. It is thought that the Galapagos islands were colonized 2-3 million years ago by either a pregnant female tortoise or by several individuals that rafted from the mainland to the newly formed volcanic island of Espanola or San Cristobal. From this tenuous beginning, the resulting offspring of these tortoises then colonized the other islands in the Galapagos archipelago.

Unlike their mainland cousins, these island tortoises are huge animals. Male Galapagos tortoises from some island populations can attain a carapace length of 130 centimeters (approximately 4 feet) and can weigh up to 270 kilograms (600 pounds). Males are much larger than the females, who never exceed 300 pounds. Galapagos tortoises reach sexual maturity at approximately 40 years of age and can live to be 150 years old. So as these tortoises go, Frank and Charlie are mere whippersnappers: they are roughly the size of a footrest and weigh approximately 80 pounds each.

"They just celebrated their 13th birthday this past August," said Beth to a crowd of their admirers who were watching the two boulder-shaped animals move sedately around their enclosure. She noted that it's a good thing that these tortoises are relatively small because the larger and stronger adults tended to walk through closed doors when they so desired.

"If we had a full-grown male on display, he could crash through the wall of the display," Beth explained. I peered around the large reptile hall for a moment, imagining what it might be like to be greeted by a 600-pound giant tortoise out for an early morning stroll across the gleaming floors.

"Do they bite?" I asked after a moment, watching the piece of hay disappear into Charlie's mouth.

"No. Well, not really," Beth paused. "If they do bite, they just grab a little bit of fabric [of your clothes]."

As you might have already surmised, Galapagos tortoises are herbivores. Depending upon the island where they originated, they eat a diet consisting of those particular species of prickly pear cactus and fruits, bromeliads, water ferns, leaves, shrubs and grasses that are native to their island homes. Beth noted that they have good color vision, and show distinct preferences for food items that are red, green or yellow in color.

"This is probably because foods with these colors had the highest nutrition content on their islands," she said.

The tortoises also have tremendous water storage capacities, and have been known to survive as long as one year without water. This led to their popularity as a menu item from the 1700s onward for hungry sailors craving fresh meat and oil during their long voyages.

Because Galapagos tortoises are protected species, Frank and Charlie were domestically bred animals: they hatched in Oklahoma and then were purchased seven years ago by Reptileland in Pennsylvania where they usually live when not visiting museums in New York City. Beth was not certain which island was home to Frank and Charlie's ancestors because one parent's ancestry cannot be verified.

"They're probably mutts," she said.

Regardless of their ancestry, Frank and Charlie are fascinating animals with a remarkable story to tell about the origin of all life on earth.

Acknowledgements

GrrlScientist sincerely thanks Beth for answering her many questions.

More Information

AMNH tortoise cam. Image refreshed every 30 seconds.

The Endangered Galapagos Tortoise, Discover Galapagos. Provides information about each tortoise population.

Galapagos Tortoise, Honolulu Zoo (includes video of nesting tortoises).

Interactive Galapagos map.

tags: evolution, biogeography, Darwin, Galapagos, tortoise, NYCLife

Included in the Bonfire of the Vanities Blog Carnival, issue #127

Included with the Big Apple Blog Festival
Issue 16.

The Movie of My Life

2005-11-19T16:50:00.000-05:00

The Movie Of Your Life Is A Black Comedy

In your life, things are so twisted that you just have to laugh.
You may end up insane, but you'll have fun on the way to the asylum.

Your best movie matches: Being John Malkovich, The Royal Tenenbaums, American Psycho

If Your Life Was a Movie, What Genre Would It Be?

Of course, I've never seen any of these movies, so you'll have to tell me, dear readers -- are they are good? What are they about?

Blogging Rights

2005-11-19T15:06:00.000-05:00

Surely you have read stories of people who were fired for blogging, but did you know that Rick Santorum (R-PA) is trying to restrict the public's right to access taxpayer-funded information provided by the National Weather Service? Were you aware that Sony sold millions of music CDs that they intentionally ~~infected with computer viruses~~ programmed to damage the computer hard drives of unsuspecting customers? Do these issues affecting freedom of digital information and expression concern you? If so, and especially if you are a blogger, then this is the website for you (click image).

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is working to protect freedom of digital information and particularly freedom of expression for bloggers. To this end, they have created an online legal guide for bloggers that anyone can refer to. This legal guide provides information about bloggers' legal liability issues, bloggers as journalists, and other legal issues, such as students who blog, blogging about political campaigns, workplace blogging, and publishing adult material on one's blog. You can also join EFF and support their efforts by making a donation (I joined, and my t-shirt is pictured on the right). You can also check out EFF's action alert page to learn more about who is assaulting the public's right to free speech and what types of speech are are under attack.

Via Crooked Timber

Birds in the News #36

2005-11-18T00:02:00.000-05:00

Greenwing Macaw, Ara chloroptera.

Birds in Science:

In the Solomon Islands, east of New Guinea and northeast of Australia, lives the monarch flycatcher, a medium-size songbird, which is refining our understanding of evolution. Curious about how new species arrive on islands, Chris Filardi, a University of Montana visiting scholar, began gathering DNA samples from the flycatchers and reconstructing relationships between the birds on the islands and on the island’s nearest continents. What he and co-researcher Robert Moyle discovered was that islands are much like a petri dish that sprouts its own biodiversity. Contrary to conventional thinking, the scientists, both of whom work for the American Museum of Natural History’s Center for Biodiversity and Conservation, have found evidence that islands are not evolutionary dead ends, but can actually be sources of new species. “If we keep getting this kind of result, it will be relevant for the whole world,” Filardi said. “And because of that, we will have to think differently about islands everywhere and what we do with them.” This study was published last week in the top-tier research journal, Nature.

A change in the diet of seabirds may be making them less intelligent and lowering their chances of survival and breeding, a new study shows. Scientists used lab experiments to mimic changes observed in the diets of kittiwakes in the Bering Sea - changes probably caused by a warming ocean. Chicks given a diet low in lipid-rich fish were less able to find food. The 1980s saw the start of a decline in populations of red-legged kittiwakes, Rissa brevirostris (pictured), on the Pribilof Islands in the southeastern Bering Sea, off the coast of Alaska. The cause has been unclear, though scientists have documented a change in their diet that occurred around the same time. Around the coast of the UK, some sea bird populations are in catastrophic decline, also due largely to the removal of high-lipid prey such as sand eels. This appears also to be linked with climate change. The study is published in the Royal Society’s science journal Proceedings B.

A deep-voiced black-capped chickadee, Poecile atricapillus (pictured), may wonder why other birds ignore it, but there may be a good reason behind the snub, says a University of Alberta study that looked into how the bird responds to calls. Dr. Isabelle Charrier and Dr. Chris Sturdy modified the black-capped chickadee calls, played those sounds back to the bird and observed how they reacted. They found that the chickadee relies on several acoustic features including pitch, order of the notes and rhythm of the call. They also rejected the calls of the control bird, the gray-crowned rosy finch, in favor of their own species. The chickadees’ two most well-known vocalizations are the “chick-a-dee” call and the “fee-bee” song. Males produce their song to attract a mate and to defend their territory during the breeding season. The learned call is produced by both sexes throughout the year and is believed to serve a variety of functions such as raising mild alarm, maintaining contact between mates and co-ordinating flock activities. They even go through stages of learning this “song language,” which explains why juvenile birds can be heard frantically practicing to perfect this call. In this study, the researchers found that if they raise the pitch, the bird would still respond, but if they lowered it, the chickadee stopped answering. “We speculate that this happens because the pitch may be related to size, so the chickadee thinks, ‘wow, that bird sounds big,’ and they stay away from it,” says Sturdy, co-author of the study. “The first thing birds use to identify vocalizations is the frequency range. Different birds use different acoustic ranges as a filter, so if it is too high or too low, they ignore it.” This research is published in the current edition of the research journal, Behavioural Processes.

Birds in Education:

Professor David Hall, a handful of undergraduate research students and a volunteer taxidermist named Miles Stelios, have been working on a teaching collection of stuffed birds and skeletons for his undergraduate biology classes. Most of the birds in Hall’s collection died of natural causes, or were found dead after accidents such as flying into windows. These birds bodies are prepared and used for teaching and public outreach. “Outreach is what makes me feel all warm and fuzzy,” Hall said. “As a lecturer, I try to get more job satisfaction. I want to use it for teachers to improve science education in Texas, to get people interested in conservation and biology in general. It’s a huge benefit.” Most of Hall’s work for the collection has been on his own time, since, as he says, the University puts more funding toward research than materials for teaching. GrrlScientist says; this is a long but very interesting and worthwhile story, and the photographs are beautiful.

People Hurting Birds:

This story wins the award for the most unbelievably disgusting display of human stupidity and cruelty in 2005. This week, a sparrow flew into an exhibition hall in Amsterdam, became trapped and then panicked, knocking over 23,000 dominoes that had been set up for a new world record attempt. The terrified and defenseless bird was cornered and then shot dead by an exterminator packing an air rifle. The miscreant was a House Sparrow, Passer domesticus (pictured), an endangered species in the Netherlands. “Under Dutch law, you need a permit to kill this kind of bird, and a permit can only be granted when there’s a danger to public health or a crop,” said Dutch animal protection agency spokesman, Niels Dorland. The Endemol Production company, the dumbass TV firm that organized the event, attempted to defend their inexcusable revenge killing. “That bird was flying around and knocking over a lot of dominoes. More than 100 people from 12 countries had worked for more than a month setting them up,” said Endemol spokesman Jeroen van Waardenberg. BooHooHooHoo. So besting their own world record is more important than a life? How far would they stoop to protect their silly world record, a record they already hold? Fortunately, the Dutch animal protection agency plans to submit the case to prosecutors. A Dutch website, Dodemus.nl, is dedicated to collecting people's reactions to the death of this sparrow. So far, more than 4,000 have been posted.

Bird Flu News:

Why would anyone want to resurrect a long-dead flu virus? This is the question that the public commonly asks regarding research into the 1918 flu virus that killed millions of people worldwide. But the genetic sequence from the virus has the potential to help us develop vaccines that might help protect humans from another pandemic. However, recently reconstructed 1918 virus surprised researchers with its weird genetic sequence. Dr. Jeffery Taubenberger, a molecular pathologist at the Armed Forces Institute of Technology who led the research team that reconstructed the long-extinct virus, said that a few things seemed clear. First, the 1918 virus appears to be a bird flu virus. Second, if this virus originated in a bird, it is not a species that anyone has studied before. It is not like the H5N1 strain of bird influenzas in Asia, which sickened at least 116 people, and killed 60. Additionally, it is not like the influenza viruses that infect wild waterfowl in North America. Yet many researchers still believe that the 1918 virus, which caused the worst infectious disease epidemic in human history, is a bird flu virus. If so, it is the only “bird flu” virus that has ever been known to cause a human pandemic. That, Dr. Taubenberger said, gives rise to a question. Are scientists looking for the next pandemic flu virus in all the wrong places? Is there a bird species that no one ever thought about that harbors the next 1918-like flu? And if so, what bird is it, and where does it live? [pictured: electron micrograph of Influenza viruses]

Incidentally, the parrot that was thought to be the UK’s first victim of bird flu probably did not have the virus, it was finally reported earlier this week. A Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs report admitted that a mix-up in samples taken from a quarantine center where several birds died led to the South American parrot being suspected of bringing the killer virus into the country and of being its first fatality. It now appears that the only birds to be infected at the centre in Essex came from a consignment of finch-like mesias, Leiothrix argentauris, imported from Taiwan. Samples taken from a mesia that died and from the Amazon parrot from Surinam, who died in an adjoining cage at the Pegasus Birds center, became mixed up, leading the testing laboratory wrongly to conclude that the parrot was the source of the H5N1 bird flu strain. The report says that 53 of 101 mesias died in quarantine. It was also found that the virus was not passed on to other bird species being held at the center - a fact that Ben Bradshaw, the animal welfare minister, hailed as having “potentially huge implications” for international efforts to tackle avian flu. GrrlScientist note: Why is this story not even mentioned in any of the newspapers in the USA, and it was barely even mentioned in the UK, even though the original story received so much press coverage? And why did it take almost one month for this story to appear in the British papers? (The mix-up was first reported to have occurred on 26 October and this story was published on 16 November). Perhaps ‘pandemic fear’ becoming a little too convenient?

European Union veterinary experts on Wednesday extended a ban on imports of captive live birds from outside the EU for a further two months to guard against the spread of bird flu, the European Commission said. The ban, which covers captive live birds other than poultry imported for commercial purposes, was imposed in late October and was due to expire at the end of this month. It will now run until the end of January, when the EU vets will review it again.

As Bush outlines the nation's plans to respond to a possible avian influenza pandemic, The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) today called on the federal government to immediately take preventative measures to reduce the risk of a pandemic, with a specific focus on the animal-human disease pathways. “President Bush and the U.S. Congress should not overlook several steps that they could take now to minimize the chances of an avian influenza pandemic,” said Wayne Pacelle, HSUS president and CEO. “Cockfighting, the importation of live birds as pets, live poultry markets, and the unregulated transportation of birds all present unnecessary risks of spreading disease and should be halted.” GrrlScientist note: Mr. Pacelle is very cleverly using our “bird flu” fears to shove his own political agenda down our collective throats. Part of his agenda is to prevent Americans from enjoying the company of domestically-bred companion birds. Did you see how he managed his sleight-of-hand? Even though most of these guidelines are reasonable, there is one notable exception: There is no rational reason to ban importation of live pet birds. The USA only allows the importation of two pet birds per person, and "pet birds" are defined as birds that have been kept as pets by their owner for at least one year. Mr. Pacelle overlooks this, and he also conveniently forgets the fact that pet birds almost always live indoors with their owners where they are unlikely to be exposed to any influenzas, and further, he ignores the fact that all imported birds are subjected to a 30 day quarantine at a licensed quarantine station prior to being released to their owners. The evidence suggests that, in the vanishingly rare event that a pet bird might be infected with an influenza virus, they will either develop the illness or clear the virus from their systems during that 30 day period of quarantine. Additionally, it is useful to remember that there are many flu viruses out there that are not the deadly H5N1 that terrifies us, so in the incredibly unlikely event that an imported bird develops the flu, it is probably not H5N1.

Streaming Birds:

This week on BirdNote, we peer into the world of the Black Oystercatcher, Haematopus bachmani; learn about the eagle eye (the website includes an amazing photo of a Golden Eagle taken by my bird pal, Don Bacchus); soar along with Red-tailed Hawks, Buteo jamaicensis; celebrate the “snowbird,” the Dark-eyed Junco, Junco hyemalis; and also they discuss the return from the North of the Trumpeter swan, Cygnus buccinator, and Tundra Swan, Cygnus columbianus (a swan is pictured). BirdNote programs are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM in Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia on KPLU radio and now also in North Central Washington state on KOHO radio. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds:

Seattle is experiencing a bird problem. Nona Raybern thought she’d lucked out a couple of weeks ago when she found a parking spot on Fourth Avenue just a half block from the Starbucks at Westlake Center, where she works as a barista. But, like all good things that happen in a person’s life, this parking space came with a price. At precisely 5 pm, about 200 small black European Starlings, Sturnus vulgaris (pictured), that had been circling over Macy's, landed in the trees, filling the air with the sound of chirps and the pings of poop hitting windshields. Raybern later discovered her mistake. “I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. I just got inside [my car] in disbelief. On the drive home, everyone was staring and pointing. I had to run it through the car wash twice, so it ended up costing me $25,” Raybern complained. The starling problem has been worse in some cities in the Midwest and the East Coast, “where they've suffered an invasion numbering in the millions,” said Roy Francis, the city's manager of urban forestry. Some have poisoned the birds; others have played loud noises and hung colorful streamers in the trees to mimic predators. Nothing has worked. But other people are philosophical. For Brahim Mahdoubi, bird poop is the price to pay for living in a city intertwined with nature. He parked his black Mercedes under a tree with about 50 birds perched in it, knowing what he’d find when he came back. When questioned about this, he shrugged, looked up at the tree and said: “Look at all the birds. How lucky are we to see that beauty?” But there is a bright spot in all this. More people are taking the bus to work.

Isn’t it interesting how birds lose when corporate profits are threatened? For example, when a Washington state board gathered this week to pretend how to best protect endangered spotted owls, Strix occidentalis caurina (pictured), the man in charge was a Department of Natural Resources official who had privately met with timber industry executives and promised to soften proposed regulations. An internal timber industry memorandum obtained by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer outlines how Pat McElroy, chairman of the Forest Practices Board, agreed to eliminate a key DNR staff recommendation to be considered today. The memo also suggests that McElroy had planned to alter his agency’s recommendations without telling others involved in the talks, such as environmentalists and tribal leaders. “This just shows how stacked the deck is against a credible public process,” said Peter Goldman of the Washington Forest Law Center, which represents environmentalists in timber lawsuits. “We've been working for two years to convince them what they need to do to protect owls. This is what the DNR staff came up with, and it almost went into the trash.” GrrlScientist observes; In view of shenanigans like this, how can any sane and rational corporate droid not understand that the public is fully justified in their mistrust of corporations when environmental issues or endangered species are at stake?

Okay, this week has made me feel really cranky, so I had to cheer myself by ending this issue of Birds in the News with a humorous birds-in-clothing story. Incredibly, this story is true. According to this news story, a 35-year-old woman near Fort Myers was charged this month with stealing a Greenwing Macaw, Ara chloroptera (pictured at top), from a bird farm by hiding the bird in her bra. How on earth did she do this? “When you got a thousand birds, it’s hard to keep track of all of them,” said Hobbs Guenther, the owner of Baby Exotic Birds. The suspect, Jill Knispel, 35, of Englewood, Florida, was employed as a bird feeder at Guenther’s farm when she made off with the rare parrot, which can grow to a height of 4 feet. That seems like a lot of bird to stuff in a bra, even by today’s augmentation standards. “She didn't take it when it was full grown,” Guenther said. “It was just a baby. Only about two inches.” Apparently, Knispel’s mouth also runneth over, otherwise, Guenther might have never known. After Knispel stole the bird, raised it, and traded it for a Karmann Ghia car, she then, being a genius, blabbed about it to a woman who happened to be Guenther’s former girlfriend. Ooops.

Thanks to my bird pals; Jamie, Caren, Mary, Eddie, Pat, Debi, Fred, Ellen and Ron for some of the links you are enjoying here. Thanks also to Devery for financial support for Birds in the News.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Survival Job applications: 4 (shotgun method, again. I actually have no idea if any adjunct positions exist at any of these schools)

Carnival of the Vanities is available!

2005-11-16T10:50:00.000-05:00

I am having major problems with Blogger STILL, so hopefully this message will be published instead of disappearing somewhere in the big "out there" (Grrrrr!).

I just found out that the latest issue, #164, of the Carnival of the Vanities was posted today at Dr. Charles' Examining Room, and my island birds essay was included!

This is the first time I've ever contributed anything to the Carnival of the Vanities, although, as I understand it, this carnival is the "grand dame" of blog carnivals, the one that started the whole blog carnival scene. This particular blog carnival specializes in linking to the very best blog writing within the past week, so definitely stop by to read the hottest and newest blog essays!

Tangled Bank is available

2005-11-16T10:00:00.003-05:00

The Tangled Bank (TB) issue #41 was published today. I am not a contributor to this issue because I wanted to have an essay of mine nominated by someone else -- just once!! -- and I was hoping that someone would nominate my island birds essay. I was hoping this because PZ had admired it so openly on his blog, and had mentioned that it should be included in this issue of TB. So I apologize to my colleagues for letting my own silly wishes to supercede the importance of promoting their work. Certainly, I have been promoting this essay (their work) to every venue possible, but I wanted just this one venue -- the most obvious one of them all -- to be my first ever essay nomination. Alas, I will have to wait for that elusive nomination.

Anyway, I mention TB here not because I wanted to tell you that embarassing story (I merely offer it as an explanation for my bad behavior), but because I encouraged a blog pal to contribute his work to TB. This friend of mine is a freelance journalist who lives in London, and writes "behind the scenes" stories of his journalistic adventures and publishes them on his blog. This story, The Cup Runneth Over, is the one that I encouraged him to submit to this issue of TB, and they accepted it!

What Type of Humanist am I?

2005-11-15T16:42:00.000-05:00

Thanks to PZ, I found out that I am a ...

Hardhat

You are an atheist, a rationalist, a believer in the triumph of science and of reason over libido. You can’t stand mumbo jumbo, ritual, spiritual nonsense of any kind, and you refuse to allow for these longings in others.

Astrologers, Scientologists and new–age crystal ball creeps are no different in your view from priests, rabbis and imams. They’re all just weak–minded pilgrims on the road to easy answers. Nature as revealed by science is awesome enough for you, but it’s a nature that needs curbing and taming by us on our evolutionary journey to perfection.

Your heros are Einstein, Darwin, Marx and — these days — Gould, Blakemore, Watson, Crick and Rosalind Franklin. Could you be hiding a little behind those absolutist views, worried that, if you let in a few doubts and contradictory ideas, the whole edifice might crumble? Loosen up a bit and try to enjoy the amazing variety of human belief systems. Don’t worry — it’s unlikely you’ll end up chanting your days away in some distant mountain cult.

What kind of humanist are you? Click here to find out.

(another silly online quiz for you to amuse yourself with)

More Me, Take Two

2005-11-14T14:15:00.000-05:00

The BestOfMeSymphony #103 was published today and once again, I have contributed one of my older essays to the line-up. For those of you who don't know, the BestOfMeSymphony specializes in linking to essays that were published 2 months or longer ago. Because "Bird Flu" is such a huge news story, and also because it is one of the top search phrases that brings people to my blog, I thought I'd share this story again, Influenza: How Its Biology Affects Vaccine Production. [Some of you, dear readers, know that I also have a strong background in virology, both educational and practical, and that I particularly enjoy thinking and writing about avian influenza. I plan write more about this topic -- I have two essays in progress on my computer, in fact, and one of these days, I'll finish both of them.] So stop by the Symphony and discover something that you might have missed the first time!

Wonders

2005-11-12T17:41:00.000-05:00

This image was made by my blog pal, Tabor, who saw the earlier message I'd published here where I lamented the lack of birds in this nearly perfect streaming commercial. I think she made this image to amuse me.

She succeeded. She also made me wonder.

Where does Tabor find the time to invest in creating an image for a person she's never met? Tabor is a busy person with a real life; she has a loving husband, two kids, a grandbaby, and a fulltime job in addition to building her retirement home and drinking fine wine! And she has a blog full of funny essays about her life. And she still manages to do little things for strangers like me.

Bird Flu Symptoms

2005-11-11T15:56:00.000-05:00

The Center for Disease Control has released a list of symptoms of bird flu. If you experience any of the following, please seek medical treatment immediately:

1. High fever
2. Congestion
3. Nausea
4. Fatigue
5. Aching in the joints
6. An irresistible urge to shit on someone's windshield.

Thanks to my Seattle Bird pal, Dawn, for forwarding this to me.

tags: bird flu, humor

Birds in the News #35

2005-11-11T00:07:00.000-05:00

Pied Monarch, in hand.
Photo Credit: Christopher E. Filardi, American Museum of Natural History.

Birds in Science

Oceanic islands were always thought to be evolutionary dead ends, but new information show this is not always the case. Far from species hopping steadily down an island chain from a continent and coming to a dead stop, the research using new DNA techniques shows the process can actually go into reverse and spread back to the continents. "People have always assumed that the source for biodiversity has been continents," said lead author Christopher Filardi from the American Museum of Natural History, and a colleague of mine. The paper was published this week in the top-tier research journal, Nature. (One of the bird species featured in the study is pictured above).

The global decline in seabird populations is of growing concern to ecologists, and now researchers have discovered a new cause – some may be becoming too stupid to survive. Climate change may be the root of the trouble. New environmental conditions lead fish to migrate, leaving the birds that feed on them malnourished. The new research shows that lack of a specific nutrient in red-legged kittiwakes, Rissa brevirostris (pictured), damages their cognitive abilities and could leave them too daft to find food. Red-legged kittiwake populations have plummeted by half since the 1980s in the Pribilof Islands in the southeastern Bering Sea. So another colleague of mine, Alexander Kitayski and colleagues at the Institute of Arctic Biology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks in Irving, US, devised an experiment to try to find out why. The sharp drop in the seabird numbers coincided with a climate shift that resulted in a reduced abundance of lipid-rich fish in the area, though other fish species remained available as food. The researchers theorised that chicks born at or after this time lacked the lipid-rich foods they needed for proper cognitive development, leaving them less likely to have the skills needed to survive as independent adults. “This is really fascinating research, and demonstrates a very complex mechanism driving a reduction in population,” says Mark Grantham, from the British Trust for Ornithology. “Climate change has had a noticeable effect on both the timing and success of breeding of many of our bird species, but this new study just shows how unpredictable such consequences can be.”

People Helping Birds

Good News! New Jersey and Delaware officials finally came to their collective senses when they agreed this week to cut the harvest of horseshoe crabs in half, a move intended to stop the decline of both the helmet-shaped creatures as well as the migrant shorebirds that feed on their eggs. The agreement, which still must be ratified by fisheries councils in each state, also would prohibit harvesting during the horseshoe crabs' prime spawning season, May 1 through June 7. Public access to some Delaware Bay beaches also would be limited to reduce shorebird disturbance. Environmental groups welcomed the move as a step toward a total ban on horseshoe crab harvests. A decline in their spawning numbers has roused the concern of environmentalists and international researchers who believe migrating shorebirds, particularly the endangered red knot, Calidris canutus (pictured), a long-distance migrant who are not finding enough crab eggs to eat when they arrive on Delaware Bay beaches to refuel each spring. "The Delaware Bay is a shared resource and drastic measures are called for on both sides of the waterway to address the alarming decline of the horseshoe crab population and wildlife that depends on horseshoe crab eggs as a primary food source," Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bradley M. Campbell said. GrrlScientist says: I am keeping my fingers crossed that this was enacted in time to save the red knot, whose Delaware Bay numbers declined dramatically from more than 150,000 to approximately 17,000 in less than 10 years.

Each year on November 7th, one of the world’s richest bird areas is celebrated. "November 7th is a reminder each year that the forests of the Tumbesian region represent one of the richest and most threatened sites for biodiversity on the planet," said Amiro Perez-Leroux, BirdLife Americas Partner Development Officer. The Tumbesian region, which stretches from northern coastal Ecuador south to just north of Lima in Peru, holds exceptional levels of endemic bird species – species found nowhere else on the planet. However, heavy deforestation has resulted in many of its inhabitants becoming threatened, converting the region into a major conservation priority for BirdLife and other conservation organisations.

BirdLife's new Global Office in Cambridge, UK, was officially opened recently by Her Imperial Highness Princess Hisako Takamado of Japan, BirdLife's Honorary President. After a lifetime of strong interest in birds combined with many years of activism on their behalf, HIH Princess Takamado was named to be BirdLife International's Honorary President in 2004.

Buzzards are again breeding successfully across Scotland after years of decline, a leading conservation body has found. Research by RSPB Scotland indicated the birds of prey, dubbed miniature eagles, have again started to breed and live in some of Scotland's most densely populated and built-up areas. Until recently the birds were largely confined to the west of Scotland but have now become more evenly distributed throughout eastern farmland areas. In the past, many were shot and many also died due to ill effects of agricultural pesticides. Their spread and overall increase is also attributed to a reduction in poisoning and trapping, particularly in the lowlands.

People Hurting Birds

The stately Southern Ground Hornbill, Bucorvus leadbeateri (pictured at left), or "Lehututu" as it's locally called, may not be around for much longer. These huge black birds with their distinctive beaks and bright red wattles are part of the hornbill family that occur naturally only in Africa and Asia. But hornbill numbers are declining due to habitat destruction. "Many species will not survive without human intervention," said chief executive officer of the Limpopo Tourism and Parks Board, Benny Boshielo.

The flock of conures known as the Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, that took up residence on a hill overlooking the San Francisco bay, becoming the subject of a documentary and best-selling book, are searching for a new home after one of their perches was cut down and two others face a similar fate. Mark Bittner, who brought attention to the birds that have delighted tourists and residents for years, halted a crew this week before they cut down three cypresses whose owner wants them removed because they pose a hazard. "I would be a horrible human being if I wasn't helping my friends out, and they are my friends," Bittner, 53, said as he stood outside his cabin near the lone cypress stump and the surviving pair of trees.

Bird Flu News

Revealing once again that governments are often willfully stupid, the Vietnamese government recently issued a warning that kissing pet parrots can help spread bird flu. GrrlScientist rant: When will this dumbassery stop? Pet birds cannot spread avian influenza unless they have FIRST been exposed to birds that were already ill with the virus. This erroneous information is already causing problems for perfectly healthy companion parrots. And while I am ranting, I might as well add that I am appalled that wild birds are being blamed for spreading the bird flu across Asia when the evidence shows that this was not the case until very recently -- within the past few months. In fact, there is more evidence to suggest that during the five years previous to this, bird flu was spread by people who sell their sick poultry at market, and by people moving their cockfighting birds all over creation. By moving sick birds freely, and also by not keeping their sick domestic poultry separate from wild migratory birds, it appears that people infected wild birds with avian influenza, and now people are erroneously blaming wild birds as being the primary source of this virus. This allegation is ridiculous and is not reality based.

Are you afraid of catching bird flu from your bird feeder? Well, don't be. Naturalists say fears of an international bird flu pandemic should not stop anyone from enjoying birds at their backyard feeders. "Birds carry a variety of strains of avian flu," said David Bonter, of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, during a telephone interview with The Tribune. "But most strains of flu don't affect birds (we would see) at feeders." GrrlScientist says; Base your bird feeding decisions on facts, not fears. Birders and bird feeders should continue to enjoy their activities. But use common sense. Cleanliness and sanitation should be maintained at all times, whether you’re a feeder or outdoor sportsman. And don't forget that the simplest behavior, hand-washing, will tremendously reduce your rate of infection with any disease organism, including influenza viruses.

Streaming Birds

This week on BirdNote, we talk about the disappearance of scaup; mixed-species flocks; the Northern Shrike, Lanius excubitor (pictured); a bit about common sayings that have birds as subjects; and the episode I am most interested in, the relationship of birds to dinosaurs. BirdNote shows are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM on the radio throughout Western Washington and Southwest British Columbia and is also available as RSS/Podcast feeds from BirdNote. Congratulations as BirdNote expands its listernership: this is the first week when BirdNote are broadcast on the radio in North Central Washington state (they also stream BirdNote live). All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

If you enjoy marine birds, then you will also be interested to read the research journal, Marine Ornithology, that is dedicated to them. This journal is also published online and provides free PDFs of all papers published in volumes 16 to the present.

How are your bird identification skills? You can test them by going to Bird Quizzes and find out. The tests are designed to challenge novice, intermediate and advanced birders and the answers to the quiz are posted to the website at the end of the month. This website also has a comments section (similar to what you find on blogs) that you might find interesting.

There is a new bird website out there, eBird, that focuses on birds in and around Ontario. Their most recent article, winter finch predictions discusses nine winter finch species and three erruptive passerines to expect in the Ontario area. The article features a beautiful picture of one of my favorite bird species, the Bohemian Waxwing, Bombycilla garrulus.

Thanks to my bird pals; Frank, Cheri, John, Dawn, Michael, Ellen and Ron for some of the links you are enjoying here. Special thanks to MJE for financial support for Birds in the News.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

Backtracking Birds Show Islands are not Evolutionary Dead Ends

2005-11-10T17:59:00.000-05:00

Kolo Sunset.
Photo credit: Christopher E. Filardi,
American Museum of Natural History
(Click on image for a larger picture).

Finally, dear readers, I can tell you the news that I have hinted at on my blog several times during the past few months! Two of my ornithologist colleagues, Chris Filardi and Rob Moyle, published a paper yesterday in the top-tier research journal, Nature. This paper is especially exciting because it shows that oceanic islands are not necessarily the evolutionary "dead ends" that they have traditionally been portrayed to be. In fact, Chris and Rob's data show that a group of birds have actually accomplished what scientists had never previously been able to document; some island species doubled back and successfully re-colonized the continents from where they originated.

Historically, scientists thought that continental species colonize island chains by hopping from one nearby island to the next in a stepping-stone fashion as they progressively moved away from the mainland. This "stepping stone hypothesis" was based on traditional methods for categorizing measurements of certain physical characteristics, such as beak shape, collected from different bird species. These morphological data were analyzed to build family trees based on the numbers and relative similarities of shared physical characters between bird species found on different islands. Using these data, taxonomists thought that those island bird species that most resembled each other also tended to be located within the same island chain, while remote islands hosted birds that were more distantly related. Thus, traditional hypotheses about speciation were built upon the assumption that geographically isolated species were also most likely to be evolutionarily distant.

However, many of these physical characters, especially beak shape, were later discovered to be particularly malleable and will quickly change in response to environmental demands. Because birds located on neighboring islands often live under comparable environmental demands, those particular morphological characters tend to be similar, even when the birds are not closely related. As a result, traditional taxonomic methodologies can provide data such that distant relatives are erroneously classified as close cousins.

The model system supporting the stepping stone hypothesis are the Monarch Flycatchers (Monarchidae), an Australasian family that comprises approximately 60 species of birds. These small- to medium-sized passerines are also widespread throughout the islands and archipelagos of the Pacific Ocean as the result of historic colonization events. Island Biogeographer Ernst Mayr, who first proposed the stepping stone hypothesis, completed most of the studies of this group using traditional taxonomic methods. These taxonomic data suggested that species colonize island chains by moving in only one direction -- away from continents. Because the biological traffic appeared to be one way, this implies that islands are evolutionary dead ends, which is one of the predictions of the stepping stone hypothesis. But the DNA data from the Monarchs conflict with the taxonomic data, and reveal that this is not necessarily always true.

"The original source [for these birds] was continental, but if you look at island lineages and analyze all the unique forms at once, as we have, you find that the Pacific is an engine of diversity ... that can contribute to continental diversity," explained Chris Filardi, lead author of the paper, in a late-night telephone conversation.

These data were exposed using powerful DNA technologies that quickly reveal important details that were previously undetectable by traditional taxonomic methodologies. These DNA data were statistically analyzed to build a family tree, known as a phylogeny, for these birds (Figure 1, below).

Figure 1:

The tree is rooted with Machaerirhynchus and Rhipidura (not shown). Daggers indicate taxa for which DNA was extracted from museum study skins and are represented by mitochondrial DNA only. Asterisks indicate nodes receiving more than 0.95 posterior probability and/or more than 70% maximum-likelihood bootstrap support. General geographic distributions are indicated to the right of taxon names. Ancestral area assignments for nodes are based on maximum-likelihood-based reconstructions (see Supplementary Information for details). Node age ranges were estimated with rates of 0.01 and 0.0276 substitutions per site per lineage per million years (see Supplementary Information). NG, New Guinea; AU, Australia. [Click image to see larger version in its own window].

The resulting phylogeny suggests that speciation patterns of the Pacific Monarch Flycatchers are more subtle and complex than previously thought. For example, these birds diversified from a single continental colonist which then expanded outward from its island home (Figure 2, below) – instead of speciating after a recurring series of colonizing island "hops" away from Australasia, as implied by the older taxonomic data.

Figure 2:

Bird drawings are roughly to scale and illustrate some of the marked morphological differentiation between island endemics that has complicated the evolutionary interpretation of the group. Coloured circles indicate three classes of node age by using point estimates from ND2-specific rate calibration. Branch lengths are not to scale. The image representing the continental monarchs (Monarcha verticalis) is typical of taxa within clade B (Fig. 1). Large hatching outlines the distribution of Clytorhynchus and small hatching outlines the range of M. cinerascens. [Click image to see larger version in its own window].

According to Rob Moyle, co-author of the paper, the DNA data also revealed that the oldest monarch lineages inhabit the most remote Pacific islands while younger species groups are closer to the continental source area, New Guinea. This finding is contrary to "stepping stone" predictions. Additionally, the DNA data show that species that were previously classified into six different groups, or genera, are actually embedded within another genus, Monarcha (Figure 1). This shows that the birds are actually more closely related than suggested by their physical characteristics alone.

These data will refine our understanding of the role of oceanic islands as potential sources of global biodiversity.

"People have always assumed that the source for biodiversity has been continents," said Chris Filardi. This is because the proposed barrier that prevents island species from successful re-colonization of continents is the complexity of their floral and faunal communities, which islands lack.

This research will undoubtedly have important ramifications for identifying conservation priorities for oceanic islands.

"Islands aren't just little landforms worth saving as icons of evolutionary quirkiness ... They are important in a broader sense and may contribute significantly to future diversity of life on earth," Chris Filardi concluded.

Female White-capped Monarch, Monarcha richardsii, in hand.
This species is endemic to the Solomon Islands.

All photographs appear here with permission from Christopher E. Filardi, American Museum of Natural History.

Sources

Single origin of a pan-Pacific bird group and upstream colonization of Australasia (2005). C Filardi and R Moyle. Nature. (You can request a PDF of the original article from Chris by going to First Paragraph and writing to his email address shown there).

Island birds show evolution is no one-way street (Reuters).

Special thanks to my colleagues, Chris and Rob, for trusting an excitable itchy-fingered scientist-blogger with their manuscript for so many months, and to Chris for sharing some of his wonderful photos here. Also thanks to PZ Myers for telling me the secret scanner-free method for grabbing images from Nature papers so I can share them all here with you.

Included with "The Best Science, Nature and Medical Blog Writing" by The Tangled Bank,
Issue #42.

tags: evolution, biogeography, ornithology, birds, avian

I and the Bird #10

2005-11-10T06:17:00.000-05:00

The 10th Edition of I and the Bird, the bi-weekly blog carnival of the best in bird blogging, is now up at Thomasburg Walks. This edition includes 28 contributions from four continents describing bird identification, migration events, unlikely birding, lucky (and unlucky) birding, endangered birds, birds in recovery, and more.

Enjoy! I will be back here this afternoon with my own little essay, I am just waiting on the pictures and a few more materials.

The History of Life in 50 Seconds Flat

2005-11-09T17:27:00.000-05:00

Okay, I need some serious cheering up. Maybe you do, too. Ian, one of my Seattle pals, emailed this link to me. It combines nearly everything I enjoy (in this case; evolution, beer, animals and humor, but alas, no birds, though) into one cute video.

A Stolen Moment

2005-11-08T14:55:00.000-05:00

I know some of you, dear readers, have wondered where I went (I have been wondering this very same thing) and what I am doing. Basically, I have been innundated by a tremendous amount of teaching commitments as well as trying to deal with some needless political gamesmanship at the little college on the hill. These issues have exhausted and depressed me and also made me wonder many things that I probably should not be thinking about at this time.

However, in the midst of the madness and unpleasantness that are my life right now, I have focused on one lovely glimmering science story where birds are our teachers, one wonderful story that I can hardly wait to share with you, dear readers. I am working on it especially for you during those moments that I have stolen away from my other obligations. I am not allowed to tell you more about this story yet because it is still under embargo by Nature magazine, but I will publish it here Thursday afternoon, complete with breathtaking photos -- and this story, dear readers, is definitely worth the wait!

Birds in the News #34

2005-11-04T00:21:00.000-05:00

Male Western Bluebird, Sialia mexicana.
Photo by Nan Moore.

Birds in Science

What is the connection between wine and bluebirds? According to a recently published study, Western Bluebirds, Sialia mexicana (pictured at top), are increasingly falling on hard times along the Central Coast in California, in part, at least, because these are good times for grape growers. If bluebird families don't have enough mistletoe berries to eat during the winter, their sons are apt to up and leave, the study showed. But mistletoe grows in oak trees, and oak trees are disappearing all too rapidly as land is cleared for agriculture -- especially vineyards. The intersting study, which is presented in this linked news story, was co-written by Andrew McGowan of the United Kingdom and published online in The Proceedings of the Royal Society B last month and will come out in print later this year. The study was conducted at the Hastings Reserve in upper Carmel Valley while Dickinson was an associate research zoologist there. She is now an associate professor at Cornell University and the director of citizen science at the Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology.

People Hurting Birds

Bizarre and wildly fluctuating weather patterns have confused - and could yet kill - plants and animals across the country. Botanists, twitchers and wildlife-watchers in Scotland say last week's record-breaking heatwave fooled numerous species into believing winter had already passed. They now fear animals and plants will perish in their tens of thousands if, as predicted by some experts, the UK suffers its coldest winter for years with temperatures as low as minus 27°C. GrrlScientist note: I have never had the priviledge of visiting Scotland, but this scenario sounds rather melodramatic.

The avian influenza panic has caused uninformed or stupid people to release their pet exotic birds outdoors rather than take them to the vet to be tested for the virus. GrrlScientist comment: Even though this story reports what is currently happening in Rochdale, UK, this is happening elsewhere and will also happen in the USA after influenza arrives here. My hope is that the public will spend even as much as three minutes talking to their vet or reading accurate reality-based information on the internet, because pet birds cannot possibly be a source of the influenza virus. The only way a pet bird can infect humans with avian influenza is if the birds were housed outdoors with domestic poultry that died from avian influenza, or if they were in close physical contact with wild migratory birds, especially waterfowl, that were shedding this virus. Don't forget that bird flu is not easily passed from an infected bird to a human, either. It requires very close contact, or that the person drinks the bird's blood, raw. How many pet owners are going to do that?

Those of you who believe that abandoned and unwanted or neglected pet cats that roam freely in a city or elsewhere are not a menace should think again. This excellent story describes the many problems created by free-roaming cats. Pet owner negligence is the Number one contributor to the feral cat population, experts say. "People need to know how to take care of their pets," said Marc Hammond, a member of the Animal Welfare Alliance of Southern Arizona, and co-owner of Animal Experts Wildlife Rescue and Trapping Services. "If you own a cat in the US, it's not a right; it's a privilege." Nationwide, an estimated 70 million feral cats are roaming, more or less the same number as house cats.

People Helping Birds

With almost all of the world's remaining Short-tailed Albatrosses, Phoebastria albatrus (pictured), breeding on a steep slope of a Japanese volcanic island that is subject to eruptions, mudslides and erosion, an international team of scientists has a proposal to help the endangered birds by luring them to a safer island. The relocation idea, part of a draft recovery plan released on Thursday by the US Fish and Wildlife Service, involves the use of decoys and recorded bird calls to make some other site seem as enticing as Torishima Island. The approximately 2,000 short-tailed albatrosses left in the world spend their winters on the remote Japanese island but spend their summers spread out over Alaska's southern coastline. "You're not going to get adults to change. If there's a bunch of lava coming down and they're incubating an egg, they're just going to sit right there and let the lava roll right over them," said Greg Balogh, a Fish and Wildlife Service biologist who is coordinating the recovery plan. Instead, the plan focuses on chicks, which might form attachments to new places if moved at the correct time, he said. A new island has not yet been chosen for the birds.

A guide is available for distinguishing endangered Whooping Cranes, Grus americana (pictured), from other birds that appear similar in flight, such as White Pelicans, Pelecanus erythrorhynchos, and Sandhill Cranes, Grus canadensis, is available online. Includes a link to the streaming news report comparing these cranes to other birds.

Bird Flu News

The man who runs the quarantine center in the UK where two Amazon parrots died from bird flu has a history of evading quarantine procedures. The Government was recently facing questions over why Brett Hammond, who runs the Pegasus Birds Centre in Essex, was given a licence to quarantine birds when he has a self-confessed history of ignoring quarantine rules. Customs officers claim that Hammond made up to £4m through his alleged bird-smuggling operation. At his appeal hearing in June 1997, at which his 18-month jail sentence was reduced to a year, it was disclosed that the reason for his tax evasion scheme was to avoid having to put birds through a month-long quarantine, a process that cost him time and money. As if that is not bad enough, it has also emerged that Howard Savage, who helps to run the quarantine center, also works at a local hospital, fuelling fears of a spread of the influenza strain. Hammond kept the (now dead) parrot in a cage in "quarantine" in his back yard. GrrlScientist comment: this story is so astonishing that it almost deserves its own category; Unbelievably Stupid People and the Greed-Driven Things They do to Innocent Birds.

For your reference, here is a basic primer on How Bird Flu is Transmitted. Please add it to your list of bookmarks.

The Australian Medical Association (AMA) also issued a recent warning against overreacting to avian influenza. "[We must] reassure the public that they are in no immediate danger so that they don't get too concerned about rushing off, getting immunisations that don't exist, and rushing off getting tablets and sprays against influenza that may not work," said Dr Mukesh Haikerwal of the AMA.

Governmental overreaction to the bird flu can be conveniently used as a political and economic weapon, as we currently see in several South American countries. GrrlScientist wonders; Hrm, what next?

Where is the next logical place for bird flu to pop up? Researchers think the next stop for the bird flu, which threatens a global pandemic, will be Africa, where it could have a major impact. The H5N1 virus is expected to be carried by migratory birds into the Middle East and east Africa within weeks, according to the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). In a special report, the top-tier research journal Nature said the health and economic consequences could be worse than in south-east Asia where the virus is already widespread. The pattern of the virus's spread to date points strongly to wildfowl travelling southwest from northern Russia to the African continent.

The US Agriculture Department said on Wednesday it would step up testing of migratory fowl for bird flu as part of federal precautions against the deadly disease. The US government said it is planning more extensive testing in 2006 in the flyways where wild birds, believed to be the primary carrier of the disease, enter the United States. Officials did not say how many birds would be tested or where, but wild birds are expected to carry avian influenza into the USA by way of Alaska along the western flyway. The United States is the world's largest producer and exporter of poultry meat, with chicken, turkey and duck production valued at about $23 billion annually, and exporting approximately 5.4 billion pounds of chicken meat in 2005 alone.

But the US Agriculture Department and other official agencies throughout the world would be well-advised to remember that there’s no record of avian flu in wild birds or cases of humans being infected with the disease by wild or migratory birds. Bird Life International, British Trust for Ornithology and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, in a statement, said that while there are numerous strains — at least 144 — of avian influenza, most of these viruses within wild bird populations are benign. “Highly pathogenic-avian influenza viruses (including H5N1) can cause great mortality in domestic poultry flocks, but are very rare in wild birds,” the statement said. “H5N1 is highly pathogenic but was never recorded in wild birds before the recent outbreaks in Southeast Asia, Russia and countries around the Black Sea. It is likely that it originated in domestic poultry through mutation of low pathogenic sub-types and was subsequently passed from poultry to wild birds.” The statement noted that there is a possibility that migrating water birds may be involved in the spread of the virus.

The parrot, named Koki, who belonged to the former Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito has been placed in quarantine as a precautionary measure following the bird flu cases reported in Croatia. The Croatian media reported that Koki has been quarantined along with other birds in the northern Adriatic archipelago Brijuni, a former summer residence of Tito, who passed away back in 1980. Koki, who is a talking parrot, is a tourism attraction for all guests at Brijuni. Earlier in the week the strain of the bird flu virus lethal to humans was found in Croatia. GrrlScientist comment: this sounds like a bit of an overreaction unless this parrot was exposed to birds that are known to have died from avian influenza. On the other hand, at least the bird was not "culled" -- a definite overreaction!

Streaming Birds

This week, BirdNote celebrates Hallowe'en with Spooky Shearwaters; Freeway Hawks; Beaks and Bills; The Douglas Squirrel, Tamiasciurus douglasii; and Birds in the Winter Garden. BirdNote shows are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard live, Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM on the radio throughout Western Washington and Southwest British Columbia and is also available as RSS/Podcast feeds. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. Incidentally, BirdNote can be heard in North Central Washington beginning the week of November 7 [mp3/podcast].

Miscellaneous Birds

Who says there aren't feral parrots in NYC?? If you look around, you'll find that one of the light poles next to Brooklyn College's athletic field is crowned with a large nest made of sticks. This shelter is a sturdy home to an extended family of small green parrots known as Myiopsitta monachus (pictured) - Monk (Quaker) Parakeets to you - who have thrived in Brooklyn for the better part of 30 years, well outside their native habitat in South America. The small birds have fist-size bodies and long tails, they are covered in mossy green feathers with notes of blue peeking out beneath. When about a dozen converged on some human-provided seed, a few of them began to squawk angrily at one another. "They're having an argument there," said birder, Steve Baldwin, who works in marketing for a small publishing house. "But this is Brooklyn, so that's to be expected." Mr. Baldwin has been a devoted fan of these birds; he even started a free blog about these birds in March, BrooklynParrots.com.

A Black-tailed Gull, Larus crassirostris (pictured), normally found around the seas of Japan or along China's northeast coast, has turned up on the shores of Lake Champlain, Vermont. "This bird has never been seen in Vermont, and it's extraordinarily rare in the US," naturalist Bryan Pfeiffer said. Pfeiffer speculated the bird was thrown off course by a storm, migrated in the wrong direction or could have gotten a ride on a ship.

Speaking of lost birds that are giving birders a cheap thrill .. Hurricane Wilma has given bird watchers a treat after dozens of rare feathered visitors appeared on the island as the monster storm passed to our west.
The extraordinary influx of birds included Frigate birds, Sandwich terns, Sterna sandvicensis, Royal Terns, Sterna maxima, and Yellow-billed Cuckoos, Coccyzus americanus. Andrew Dobson, president of the Bermuda Audubon Society, said Wilma had brought unprecedented numbers of seabirds. He noted that seabirds have a good chance of survival when being blown off course by severe weather, but thousands of landbirds will not have been so fortunate. "Many thousands of migrant birds will have perished at sea, judging by the large number of landbirds that have arrived," he said. National Public Radio's Weekend Edition broadcast a story recently about these hurricane-misplaced birds that you will enjoy listening to.

This is a love story that might warm your feathery heart; Princess Sayako (also known by her nickname, Princess Nori), the daughter of the Emperor of Japan, will marry. Her match is Yoshiki Kuroda, a 39-year-old urban planner who still lives with his mother. Princess Nori, who is an avid bird watcher, part-time researcher at the Yamashina Institute for Ornithology and co-author of a book about her hero, John Gould (the British ornithologist), were members of the same nature-lovers club when they met. Unfortunately, single women in Japan, referred to as loser dogs, will be deprived of their most famous icon when Princess Nori marries.

Thanks to my bird pals; Ian, Cheri, Leslie, Ellen and Ron for some of the links you are enjoying here.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter

What Brings You Here?

2005-11-03T15:52:00.000-05:00

Some of my roommates.

As I was poking around on my site hit meter, I realized that the most popular search phrase that brings people to my site this week is not what you might expect, but instead it is died mice smell and similar such phrases. Oh, joy.

Keywords: Evolution, Writing, Science, Creative

2005-11-02T11:00:00.000-05:00

My pal, Dave, announced that the e-zine he edits, Science Creative Quarterly, is sponsoring a writing contest that you might enjoy. As you might know, SCQ's primary goal is to bridge that artificial chasm that exists between the scientific and creative communities. As part of that effort, SCQ is seeking your creative pieces about evolution. But they need more entries by the deadline on 28 November. The prize? Stephen Jay Gould's magnificent tome, The Structure of Evolutionary Theory. Just imagine this book on your shelf, this evolution book is thicker than the bible, and it contains more facts, too! I realize that most of you, dear readers, already own a copy or two of this book, but I don't, although I have specifically targeted this book to add to my personal library by the end of this year. Needless to say, I hope I can find the time to collect my thoughts and write something worthy of winning this contest because I want to buy toys for my parrots with the money I save!

What Advanced Degree Should You Pursue?

2005-11-01T06:54:00.000-05:00

You Should Get a PhD in Liberal Arts (like political science, literature, or philosophy)

You're a great thinker and a true philosopher.
You'd make a talented professor or writer.

What Advanced Degree Should You Get?

This test is not very accurate, in my opinion.

Happy Hallowe'en

2005-10-31T20:57:00.000-05:00

Since tonight is Hallowe'en, I thought I'd share my story about last year's Hallowe'en adventure in lovely NYC! I was tempted to repeat this adventure tonight because it was so fun last year and the music was so spectacular, but alas, I am trapped here at the little school on the hill and cannot make it to the cathedral in time for tonight's performance.

I also would like to tell you that an essay that I wrote was linked by the 101st issue of the BestOfMeSymphony (BOMS), a blog carnival that keeps good older blogged pieces in circulation by linking to them. As such, all submissions for this blog carnival must be at least two months old. My particular submission, Dead Birds Do Tell Tales, is more than one year old and was originally published as a "little vignette" in email to my Seattle pals, but it was then published in the print media, and then later, after I started this blog, it was published here. As I read some of the articles in this week's BOMS, I noticed this one, Bloggers: The New Pamphleteers, which might give you some food for thought regarding the role of blogging in society. BOMS was published this morning, so be sure to stop to read the linked essays there.

Harry Potter News

2005-10-31T15:40:00.000-05:00

As some of you might know, the latest Harry Potter film is being released on 18 November. Even though the idiots out there can and do happily claim that any adult who enjoys HP is a nascent pedophile, I will go out on a limb anyway and tell you that I have been eagerly awaiting this film, feeling a secret thrill of happiness every time I see the film posters (such as the one posted here) that decorate the subway platforms, although I have kept rather quiet about this on my blog.

Of all the Harry Potter films, I have been most looking forward to this one (and of course, HP5) because the nature of the topics they deal with are more serious than in the earlier three books .. Harry and his pals are growing up and the problems they encounter become less black-and-white as well. (And there is less Quiddich -- yawn -- in the later books/movies, too).

Considering the outrageous price of films these days, unless my pals at Scholastic Books or my actor pal come through for me with free tickets for a sneak preview or an opening night extravaganza, I'll have to attend a public showing by forking over "cat cash"; money I've earned by scooping cat shit. This is fine with me! But one thing that cat cash apparently cannot buy is the company of a birdwatching pal to go watch this film with me, as I enjoyed for the previous films (I enjoy having a second pair of eyes to rely on for the inevitable after-film debriefing of bird species). Perhaps one of my Seattle Bird pals would like to visit NYC in the near future, and see the latest HP film with me?

Incidentally, does anyone keep a bird list for all the birds seen in Harry Potter films? Or a "film bird list" for all birds seen and heard in any film they've watched?

But I digress. For those of you, like me, who are spellbound by the upcoming release of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, this link to a trailer of the new film, called "The Maze", is for you! (Those of you who have read HP4 will know exactly what "The Maze" refers to). This next link is full of all sorts of very amazing teasers that you'll like (the winged horses flying past the classroom window and the Tall Ship popping up out of the lake are especially wonderful). Also linked from this page are other clips that you'll love!

Links courtesy of my ever-watchful pal, Ian, who keeps me in touch with those things that really matter when stupid issues threaten to sweep all pleasure from my life.

Bored to Death

2005-10-31T14:01:00.001-05:00

A real neutrophil with a nucleus shaped like a question mark. A neutrophil is a type of granulocytic white blood cell and is an integral part of our immune system. Perhaps this oddly shaped nucleus is evidence of Intelligent Design? Naaaaw!

For the first time since I've started teaching at the little college on the hill, I gave a lecture to my students that made me happy. I gave them an overview of blood (erythrocytes, leukocytes and platelets) and the lymphatic system, as required. But because I thought this lab was severely lacking in any interesting activities, I then used this required information as the background for a brief introduction to the wonders of the immune system and how it functions, the similarities and differences between immune response to bacterial infections versus viral infections, and then I discussed some cutting-edge research about the immune response to cancer and the relationship between immune cells, depression and cancer. Talking openly about these very interesting subjects cut through my own despondency and made me want to design a graduate-level course (or write a book) that addresses these topics.

I am not sure if any of my students learned anything from my lecture, although I'd like to believe they did, but at this point, I don't care. For the first time this semester, I was satisfied and that is all that counts right now. The oddest thing about this? I relied on only a few notes to remind me of the basic facts because I am going to examine them over those, so I wanted to make sure I didn’t accidentally misstate this information to them. But I did not write out my lecture in meticulous detail and in advance as I always do. I just talked to my students about what I think is so very interesting about these related topics. My thoughts and words came so easily, as if I was describing a series of events as they occurred in front of me, and my students' questions wonderfully anticipated the next topic that I was going to talk about .. how did they do that? I almost felt like a tour guide leading them on a great adventure; a great adventure of the mind.

Unfortunately, for the next few weeks, I am back to delivering "canned" lectures, although I think this will be fine since my students will be learning about the circulatory, respiratory and digestive systems. As a result, they will have some interesting dissections to keep them engaged so an interesting lecture is probably not necessary. Incidentally, last week, the lab technician told me that I am the only professor in this class that delivers a lab lecture at all, the others just spend ten minutes or so telling the students what they are supposed to be doing that week in lab, but provide no other background or contextual information. Yet, despite my devotion to detail, I am the only professor who is spot-on target with the course syllabus; all of the other classes have fallen behind, some of them are three weeks behind where they are supposed to be. Gah! It's no wonder that more than half of the students in the class are failing! The professors' apathy is killing them: They're bored out of their skulls!

I decided that my students can anticipate one more "fun" lecture from me, at the end of the semester (if I feel equal to it). Our lab covers the endocrine system on the last week of the semester, and a quick glance ahead in the book reveals that the lab manual succeeds once more in transforming another intriguing living phenomenon (endocrinology) into a boring exercise in rote memorization. However, I am just the person to remedy that situation: Because I researched the relationship between hormones and behavior in birds for my dissertation, I told my students today that I will give them a lecture about the mechanisms of how hormones cause changes in behavior and physiology. Like today's lecture, my upcoming presentation about hormones will be another lecture that requires my students to have mastered previous material covered in the class. If they have mastered it, I think this lecture will help them to better understand those previously memorized facts because they will have a context for them and context provides relevance. And relevance is what this entire course lacks. In fact, it's downright embarassing to be part of this particular course.

After all my subversive lectures have been delivered, I am sure the little college on the hill will fire me (I am too different from what they seek in an adjunct, they say). Or (because I agree with them), maybe I will quit and pursue homelessness as a viable life option? That seems to be the only option remaining since I can't find a satisfying job that pays a living wage. Of course, at this point, I am too disillusioned to care.

tags: academics, teaching, science, biology

Birds in the News #33

2005-10-28T08:42:00.000-04:00

Orange-winged Amazon Parrot, Amazona amazonica.
This is the species of parrot that died from avian infliuenza, H5N1,
in the UK this past week (stories below).
Photograph by Pascal Dubois.

Birds in Science

We can put a man on the moon, transplant human hearts, split atoms, create the Internet, cell phones and digital-recording devices, yet we can't fully grasp the intricacies of bird migration nor avian evolution. However, this i9s changing. A population of songbirds that share summer breeding grounds may be dividing into two populations based on where they spend their winters, according to a report in this week's top-tier research journal, Science. European Blackcaps, Sylvia atricapilla (pictured), that follow a new migratory path tend to mate with each other and reproduce more successfully than birds that stick to the traditional route. This split into two breeding groups could increase the likelihood of the birds forming separate species, the authors note. This is the first time biologists have directly observed a mechanism -- selective mate choice -- that is separating a species into two populations, said Pete Marra, a senior scientist at the Migratory Bird Center of the National Zoo in Washington, DC. "To actually have this demonstrated is nice," noted Marra, who was not involved in the study. (If you wish to read more about avian migration generally, this nice little article provides more information about the questions that scientists ask about bird migration.

Birders Helping People

BirdLife is appealing for donations for the earthquake survivors in the Palas Valley in Pakistan, which is near the epicentre of the earthquake that struck on 8th October. In this valley alone, an estimated 80 people were killed and over 100 badly injured, and 30,000 people face the Himalayan winter without shelter. Most houses collapsed and approximately 3000 people are now living in the open. With the onset of the Himalayan winter, there is tremendous risk of further death and disease among the earthquake survivors. Most displaced households have lost all their belongings, including warm clothes and essentials such as cooking utensils. Food is in short supply. Many of the injured are in upper Palas, which has been always difficult to reach because there are no roads beyond the mouth of the valley (pictured).

People Helping Birds

Some birds under threat of dying out across Britain appear to be making a comeback, according to an important annual survey. According to the government's indicator of 111 wild bird populations for 2004, published last week, total bird numbers across the UK are now almost 10% higher than ten years ago. Bird populations are considered to be a good indicator of the broad state of wildlife and the countryside because they occupy a wide range of habitats and tend to be near or at the top of the food chain. Mark Avery, RSPB director of conservation, said the wild bird indicator was showing its value. "It will become increasingly important as we measure progress towards the Government's target of halting the loss of biodiversity by 2010," he said.

Parrot News

An enigmatic species of Australian parrot - last seen mummified on a Queensland roadside in 1990 - has surfaced at the center of a dispute in the Pilbara region of Western Australia. Ecologists report "very convincing" sightings of three of these critically endangered Night Parrots, Pezoporus occidentalis (pictured left), in marshes at Mulga Downs. Normally, this would be good news, so why the uproar? These ecologists work for Andrew Forrest and they claim the sightings occurred on the pastoral station owned by Australia's richest woman - and Forrest's mining competitor - Gina Rinehart.

Some of you may remember that I provided many links to stories about New Zealand's mysterious Kakapo, Strigops habroptilus (pictured, below right), in my earlier editions of Birds in the News. A reader sent me a link to this story that reminds us that the Kakapo resumed breeding in February of this year. This is wonderful news: the Kakapo is revered in New Zealand as a unique treasure. However, this species consists of only 83 known individuals world wide, so this bird is included on the international list of critically endangered species. The Kakapo has a combination of biological features not shared with any other parrot species; it is a large, flightless, nocturnal and eccentric parrot that can live for decades. In addition to their nocturnal habits and their tendency to freeze when imperiled, they have other owl-like features such as soft plumage and almost fur-like discs around their eyes. Kakapos' main defence is their camouflage of mossy green and yellow feathers. Kakapos are the heaviest parrot in the world, with males weighing up to 4 kg. They also are the only parrot in the world to have a ‘lek’ mating system: males compete for specially dug out bowls in ‘calling pits’ and ‘call’ each night for up to four months for a female. The male’s low frequency mating boom travels up to 5 km.

Bird Flu News

Sadly, parrot news and avian influenza news seem to be merging. I am sure that all of you have heard that H5N1 was confirmed in a parrot that died in a UK quarantine station after importation from South America. The parrot imported from Surinam was apparently kept in quarantine with a second parrot imported from Taiwan that was ill with avian influenza. Because of this, and also because of the way in which the influenza tests were performed, there is confusion as to which parrot was truly ill. It is known that the flu strain that killed the parrot(s) is different from the strains from Romania and Turkey and it is not a strain that the Veterinary Laboratory Agency has seen before. In fact, the closest match to the flu that killed this Orange-winged Amazon parrot, Amazona amazonica (pictured), is a strain identified in ducks from China earlier this year. "Our working hypothesis is that any infection in the birds from Surinam is likely to have arisen in the quarantine system, most likely in the facility in Essex where the Surinam birds shared airspace with the birds from Taiwan," said Chief Veterinarian Debby Reynolds. "There are more tests underway on the birds from Taiwan because we have established that some of them died before October 16." But, as expected, Taiwanese officials deny that the parrot was infected by exposure to the Taiwanese poultry. Because the parrot died in quarantine, the UK's "disease free" status remains intact -- news that should help mitigate the widespread panic that has ensued in the UK.

EU veterinary experts will soon discuss plans to ban imports of live captive and pet birds, another measure to prevent the spread of bird flu within the European Union, the EU's health chief said recently. "It will be a general ban, not just on one specific country, on imports of captive birds. And we also have to regulate pet birds ... there has to be control of imports of these birds as they can also transmit disease," EU Health and Consumer Protection Commissioner Markos Kyprianou said at a news conference. The EU imports 1.76 million birds destined to be pets each year, German animal charity Pro Wildlife said. London called for the ban on Sunday after an imported South American parrot died in quarantine in Britain of the virulent H5N1 strain of bird flu that has killed over 60 people in Asia. (Interestingly, not everyone agrees with this ban on importing exotic birds, especially when situations like this one in China, and this one and this one in the UK occur).

After a huge uproar resulted in the wake of Abu Dhabi's announcement that ALL pet cage birds were to be killed in a misguided attempt to prevent the spread of avian influenza, officials in that country finally came to their senses and announced that caged pet birds that do not come in contact with outdoor birds do not have to be destroyed. "Currently our concern is over loose birds in neighborhoods that may potentially have contact with migrating birds. Pet birds kept in enclosed cages at home are of no concern to us," said Mohammad Al Bowardi, Managing Director of the Abu Dhabi Environment Agency. Veterinarians say pet birds kept in private homes are highly unlikely to catch and spread the deadly bird flu virus because they are isolated from wild birds. GrrlScientist notes: One of the most effective ways to ensure rapid spread of avian influenza is to kill pet birds. Because people will go to great lengths to preserve and protect their pets, this overreaction is nothing less than punitive. Pursuing this senseless course of action will only result in reduced public cooperation and will serve to increase people's mistrust of the authorities involved. Further, some agencies are questioning the effectiveness of government-initiated killing of wild birds and draining of wetlands to contain the spread of influenza (these actions certainly have not proven to be particularly effective so far).

Those of you who accept all the media coverage of Bird Flu as being completely accurate will want to read this article which explores this 'accuracy in reporting' issue regarding avian influenza in more rational detail.

I was surprised to learn this week that most people are unaware that there is a vaccine against avian influenza for use in birds. As you will learn from this linked story, the poultry vaccine against H5N1 is already in wide use in China and Vietnam. GrrlScientist notes: Because of variations between even different isolates of H5N1, vaccinated birds can still become ill with influenza because vaccines are limited to providing protection against only a few strains. Additionally, because influenza viruses evolve so rapidly, vaccines are rapidly outdated, providing protection for older versions of the virus that are no longer in wide circulation.

For the American dog owners who rely on the internet for their news, please be warned that the dangers of a newly discovered dog influenza that mutated from an equine flu virus are being blown out of proportion by pet owners, fueled partly by rumors spread online, veterinarians and researchers say. "It's all over the Internet. The rumors are rampant," says Gail Golab of the American Veterinary Medical Association in Schaumburg, Illinois. The disease was identified in racing greyhounds in 2004 and spread to other canine populations. It moved into the national spotlight when a September 29 paper in the top-tier research journal Science identified it as a mutation of a form of the disease found in horses. If you read this and related blogs very often, dear readers, then you know that influenza has been found in species such as horses, pigs, cats and birds for years, but this is the first canine flu. But even with a high infection rate, dog mortality is low, Cynda Crawford, the veterinary immunologist from the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine in Gainesville who first identified the virus, said at a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention briefing. "Despite the rumors that are out on the Internet and other such sources, this disease is not as deadly as people want to make it." Incidentally, there are no reports of either dog or horse influenza ever being transmitted to humans.

Ivory-billed Woodpecker

This long but very interesting opinion piece by Keith Sutton notes that before the rediscovery of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker, Campephilus principalis, most people who visited the Big Woods were hunters and fishermen. And most people knew that those hunters and fishermen were the ones primarily responsible for conserving the last large remaining tracts of the Big Woods in Arkansas. Sutton's point? Conservationists and birders owe a huge debt of gratitude to hunters, fishermen and the agencies that their dollars fund because they purchased the majority of the lands now part of the Big Woods. Without this intervention, it is likely the Big Woods would not exist … and neither would the Ivory-billed Woodpecker.

Streaming Birds

Featured this week on BirdNote are answers to those Burning Bird Questions (BBQs) that keep you awake at night; who was the Anna for whom the Anna's Hummingbird, Calypte anna, was named; the rugged life of the Harlequin Duck, Histrionicus histrionicus (pictured, right); step two of feeding wild birds -- keeping your feeders clean; another Native American legend, Why Crow Is Black; and the folklore of owls. BirdNote shows are two-minute vignettes that incorporate the rich sounds of birds provided by Cornell University and by other sound recordists, with photographs and written stories that illustrate the interesting -- and in some cases, truly amazing -- abilities of birds. Some of the shows are Pacific Northwest-oriented, but many are of general interest. BirdNote can be heard Monday through Friday, 8:58-9:00AM, throughout Western Washington and Southwest British Columbia and is also available as RSS/Podcast feeds. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs. [mp3/podcast].

Holiday Gift Ideas for Your BirdPals

The holidays are coming, so I am including a few links for gift ideas for your bird-loving friends. Because bird flu is such a huge news item this week (even my students were asking me about the infected parrot!), I included a link to the BirdFlu Shop as a potential gift source for your terrified friends. The BirdFlu Shop has some interesting designs, such as the one you see pictured here (right), that the bird lovers on your shopping list might find amusing.

Speaking of (apparently legal) gifts for the bird lover in your life, perhaps this mounted specimen of the extinct Passenger Pigeon, Ectopistes migratorius (pictured, left), might tickle someone's fancy -- and your wallet!

For the computer-geek-birder, there is some birder-written software out there designed for identifying birds, called EnjoyBirds. I especially like the sample scroll-over feature shown on this linked page that shows where particular bird species may be found within their habitat. This is PC-only software, so I cannot personally tell you more about the user interface, but the webbed samples certainly looks interesting, and might be a great gift for your birdwatching friends.

Miscellaneous Birds

There has been a lot of chatter on several email lists about the validity of these photos of a preying mantis that has captured and killed a hummingbird. One of the reasons mentioned regarding authenticity of this photograph (courtesy of Pablo and Al), are that that the Mantis has its foreleg claws open. However, other people claim that the photographs are real because there are not any blurry edges around the hummingbird, as one would expect if the photographer had enhanced his work with photoshop. What do you think, dear readers? [As part of this discussion, several papers regarding this phenomenon were cited; Miller and Gass (1985). Survivorship in hummingbirds: Is predation important? Auk 102: 175-178; Johnson (1976). Concerning the feeding habits of the praying mantis Tenodera aridifolia sinensis Saussure. Journal of the Kansas Entomological Society 49: 164; Nickle & Harper (1981). Predation on a mouse by the Chinese mantid Tenodera aridifolia sinensis Saussure (Dictyoptera: Mantoidea). Proceedings of the Entomological Society of Washington 83: 801-802; Holling (1964). The analysis of complex population processes. Canadian Entomology 96:335-347; and a 2001 paper on Belotomatids in Rev. Society of Entomology Argentina. 60:139-146.]

For the fans of San Francisco's Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill, Mark Bittner, author of the book and star of the film with the same name has a webpage about them that you might enjoy. Includes links to informative pages about these birds and a wav file of the parrots talking to each other.

A singing parrot in the Pennsylvania legislature irked the nerves of a key state senator after the bird was invited to sing by the lieutenant governor. State Senator Robert Jubelirer, the top senator in the legislature, approved the animals' visit but publicly took issue with Lieutenant Governor Catherine Baker Knoll when she allowed the bird to sing.

This long but interesting story from the UCLA student newspaper describes how, in a city of mostly concrete and actresses, there are people who look in mirrors and there are people who look in bushes. UCLA alumnus Jason Finley, a graduate in cognitive science, finds his excitement peering into the latter because Finley is one of UCLA's campus "birders." "I've become fascinated with watching the birds on campus because it has really added a new level of perception to my experience of the world around me," Finley said, moments after spotting a Yellow-rumped Warbler. "It turns out that we're surrounded by birds most of the time and it's something you would probably never even notice unless you started paying attention."

Thanks to my bird pals; Ellen, Pablo and Al, Leslie, Jamie, Phil, Mike, Scott, Rex, Ian, Genny, Jeremy, Marty, Anonymous and Ron for some of the links you are enjoying here.

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tags: Birds in the News, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter