Animals
S


Question

Numerous fish throw themselves out of the ocean in Northland, New Zealand


New Zealand Herald
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 13:52 UTC
Numerous fish leap out of the water on Karikari Peninsula.
© Ursula HutchinsonNumerous fish leap out of the water on Karikari Peninsula.
When walking on the beach you might expect to see a seal basking in the sun or some rubbish, but not hundreds of live fish jumping out of the water on to land.

That's just what Ursula Hutchinson saw when she was on a walk with her father and her daughter on the Karikari Peninsula in Northland.

"Never in my life have I seen anything like it."

She caught the action on her smartphone on Tuesday which showed the fish, about the length of her size 8 shoe, flopping on the sand.
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Attention

Atypical animal aggression: Otters attack, kill dog in backyard of property in St. Petersburg, Florida


wafb.com
Wed, 04 Apr 2018 13:10 UTC
otter
The peace and serenity of the lapping waters drew Marilyn and Jack Frieman to their Florida home 40 years ago.

But all that came to a crashing halt.

"My grandson came screaming. I mean, it affected him so terribly," Marilyn Frieman explained. "He was just crying and screaming and he was yelling about Bucky."

Otters had crept up into their backyard and attacked Bucky, the couple's 13-year-old Papillon.

The Friemans ran to catch a glimpse of the offending creatures.


Comment: See also this report about the other attack mentioned above: Kayaker attacked by otter in Bradenton, Florida

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Wolf

Mother and son found dead at home in Hanover, Germany after mauling by dog


The Local (Germany)
Wed, 04 Apr 2018 13:00 UTC
A Staffordshire terrier.
© DPAA Staffordshire terrier.
A 52-year-old woman and her 27-year-old son have been found dead at their home in northern Germany after apparently being mauled by their Staffordshire terrier, police said Wednesday.

The pair were discovered at their flat in Hanover, capital of Lower Saxony, on Tuesday evening, after a relative saw the bloodied body of one of the victims through a window and rang the emergency services.

Firefighters were called in to capture the dog who was still inside the residence, Hanover police said in a statement.

Fire personnel broke down the door and caught the dog by using a sling.
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Attention

Bear mauls 3 men to death in Orissa, India

Sanjay Pandey
Mirror (UK)
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 20:31 UTC
The brutal attack took place in India
© Newslions / SWNS.comThe brutal attack took place in India
Distressing footage shows the moment a villager who was out collecting flowers was mauled to death by a bear .

Nabakishore Nayak was killed while picking a special flower used to make liquor.

But when two other men tried to come to his rescue they were also killed by the creature.

The 54-year-old's distraught sons - who witnessed the attack - said the bear pounced from behind.

They said their father was not carrying a weapon to defend himself in the attack.

Upsetting footage shows him attempting to fight off the animal, in Khadiadhia in the Keonjhar district in Orissa in India.

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Attention

Elephant tramples man to death in Kerala, India

Jessica Green
Daily Mail
Tue, 03 Apr 2018 20:22 UTC
Suddenly the creature stomps forward and crushes the man's body under his giant feet
Suddenly the creature stomps forward and crushes the man's body under his giant feet
This is the horrifying moment a man is trampled to death by a raging elephant as terrified onlookers run for their lives.

Graphic footage captured the animal's deadly rampage in Kerala, a southern state of India.

At the start of the video the group of men that surround the elephant, in what appears to be a temple of some sort, can be heard shouting towards it.

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Magnify

Scientist finds bird couples use their songs as a complex form of communicating with each other

Tarpley Hitt
Miami Herald
Thu, 29 Mar 2018 16:57 UTC
Canebrake wren
© Karla Rivera-CaceresCanebrake wrens are known for their highly coordinated, operatic duets. This adult male wren was photographed mid-song
On a dewy summer morning, Karla Rivera-Cáceres, an ornithology researcher at the University of Miami, crouched in her usual workspace -- the tall grasses of Costa Rica's woodland -- and heard something unusual.

Rivera-Cáceres studies bird song, and that day she was listening to the canebrake wren, a brown bird whose bland appearance (it was once named the "plain wren") belies an unusual and extremely complex call.

Canebrake wrens are songbirds, the subset of species whose calls develop beyond the standard tweet or chirp into full-fledged ballads -- and within that group they are part of a somewhat exclusive club: duetting birds.

When two of these wrens communicate, they weave their songs into an elaborate, Sonny and Cher-style duet. They warble back and forth, literally finishing each other's phrases, with such high coordination that, to an outsider, they sound like a single voice.

But as Rivera-Cáceres sat listening that morning in 2011, she noticed something odd about this pair's effort: their duet was really bad.
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Attention

Baby boy snatched by monkey found dead in Odisha, India

Binita Jaiswal
The Times of India
Sun, 01 Apr 2018 12:55 UTC
The baby’s father, Ramakrushna Nayak lies prostrate before God, praying for safety of his child in Talabasta village of Odisha’s Cuttack district.
© SambadThe baby’s father, Ramakrushna Nayak lies prostrate before God, praying for safety of his child in Talabasta village of Odisha’s Cuttack district.
The body of a 16-day-old boy, who snatched by a monkey from his home in Odisha's Cuttack district, was recovered from a well in the backyard of the house on Sunday morning.

The incident occured in Talabasta village in Banki on Saturday at the residence of Rama Krushna Nayak, boy's father.

The body was sent to Banki Hospital for postmortem to know the exact cause of the death. Police said a woman had gone to the well to fetch water when she spotted baby's body floating in it. She immediately informed other family members after which the body was fished out from the well.
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Bug

Locusts swarm in the Pilbara and Kimberley regions, Western Australia

Michelle Stanley
abc.net.au
Sun, 01 Apr 2018 12:12 UTC
Locusts swarming through Western Australia's Pilbara and Kimberley regions
© cms.ausgeo.bauer-media.net.au.Locusts swarming through Western Australia's Pilbara and Kimberley regions
Locusts swarming through Western Australia's Pilbara and Kimberley regions are costing pastoralists thousands of dollars in lost pasture and control efforts.

The warm and wet summer in the north provided a perfect breeding ground for the yellow-winged locust.

Pastoralists believed locust numbers had not been so high for decades.

Bettini Beef Pastoral Group general manager Mark Bettini said in his 30 years in the Pilbara, the worst locust plague he had seen was in 1998 at De Grey Station, 100 kilometres east of Port Hedland.

"You could not see the tin on the roof for grasshoppers," Mr Bettini said.
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Attention

Dead dolphin found in Harrison County, Mississippi - 28th in the state for 2018 so far

Joyce Philippe
wlox.com
Sun, 01 Apr 2018 12:29 UTC
Twenty-eight dolphins have been found on the beach this year in South Mississippi.
© WLOXTwenty-eight dolphins have been found on the beach this year in South Mississippi.
An adult female dolphin was found dead on the Long Beach and Pass Christian line Sunday afternoon.

This marks the 28th dead dolphin found in South Mississippi in 2018. It's a higher number than usual, according to Eric Pulis from The Institute for Marine Mammal Studies.

He expects to see more appear in the upcoming weeks. "This is dolphin stranding season, it lasts last throughout spring,"said Pulis.

The dolphin sighting was reportedly called in by the public. It later was brought to IMMS for a necropsy.
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Wolf

Video of pit bull terrier attacking residents in Delhi, India

Aadil Ikram Zaki Iqbal
India
Mon, 02 Apr 2018 12:10 UTC
pit bull attack
A pit bull terrier dog attacked residents of Uttam Nagar, leaving three people injured. The attack by a Pit Bull Terrier dog took place on March 28 and was recorded in a CCTV camera. The video of the incident shows a furious dog attacking kids and other people in a lane of Uttam Nagar area.

In the video, the Pit Bull Terrier dog is seen grabbing a kid ferociously. People had to beat the dog for rescuing the kid from its hold. The animal then went after other people and left three people injured including a minor kid. It is not clear whether the dog was a pet.

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