Animals
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Attention

Millions of dead fish wash ashore on West Kerry beach, Ireland

Majella O'Sullivan
The Independent, (Ireland)
Sat, 03 Oct 2015 18:25 UTC
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© Domnick Walsh / Eye Focus LTDKevin Flannery Marine life specialist based in Dingle arrived to the area on the Maherees on Tralee Bay as millons of small fish were found dead on the beach
The discovery was made by local people two days ago on Sandy Bay in the Maherees, an island near Castlegregory on the Dingle Peninsula.

The phenomenon has never been seen in the area before, at least not in such huge numbers, but experts believe it is a natural occurrence that may be related to the fine weather over the past few weeks.

The fish are mainly sprat but there are also mackerel among the decaying bodies on the shore that will now have to be disposed of by Kerry County Council.
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Fish

Fish kill in Coral Bay, U.S. Virgin Islands


St.Croix Source
Sun, 04 Oct 2015 15:28 UTC
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© Robert Charleston photoFish and eel in the water by the Coral Bay dinghy dock

Fish started dying Thursday in Coral Bay, and it's raising a lot of questions. So far, no one has any answers.

"Is it tied to the sargassum?" Alan Mohler, who owns Coral Bay Marine, questioned Friday as he pointed out dead fish lying on the harbor floor, in the mangroves and in the sargassum weed along the shore.

At 1:30 p.m. Friday, the tide had cleared away many of the fish that Mohler said were piled up in the morning, but there were still plenty to see.

"This place was covered with eels," he said.

In addition to the dead fish, which haven't started to smell yet, the sargassum is inches deep along the shore. The stench is strong, and could be smelled for most of the week at least a mile away at Ajax Peak.

Comment: See also comments about seismic activity in the area: Thousands of dead fish wash up on British Virgin Islands

4.8. Magnitude earthquake rattles St Lucia

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Info

The mystery of 'crow funerals' solved: Scientists say birds are trying to learn about potential dangers to their own lives

Mark Prigg
Daily Mail, UK
Sat, 03 Oct 2015 19:00 UTC
Image
Previous research has found crows have an excellent memory for human faces.
Crows mourn their dead to try and learn about potential dangers to their own lives, researchers have found.

They found the birds can even remember an animal or person seen with a dead crow.

The birds were also able to easily distinguish between people or hawks carrying dead crows and other birds.

'The funeral behaviour of crows is so widely observed, and people often asked about it - but we haven't known what was happening,' Kaeli Swift at the University of Washington, who led the research, told Dailymail.com.

The study recorded the crow's behaviour when stuffed crows which appeared dead were introduced to areas where they are feeding.

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Fish

Thousands of dead fish wash up on British Virgin Islands

Todd Vansickle and Freeman Rogers
BVI Beacon
Fri, 02 Oct 2015 15:54 UTC
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Dead fish
On Friday morning, thousands of dead fish lay in the sun along Handsome Bay, Virgin Gorda, as frigate birds circled overhead and pelicans and seagulls perched on nearby rocks.

Other dead sea creatures on the shoreline included eels, a six-foot-long shark, lobsters, parrot fish and blowfish, to name a few.

Environmental officials believe the culprit was sargassum seaweed, which covered much of the bay on Friday and which has also been blamed for VG's water shut-off this week.

In recent months, Handsome Bay has been among the areas hardest hit by the seaweed, and residents have held several cleanups there in part to battle the sulfur smell emitted by the decaying vegetation.

On Friday, the dead fish were in larger numbers along the southwest side of the bay near the Taddy Bay Airport. On the other side, near the Handsome Bay Desalination Plant, the sulfur smell wasn't as strong, but a 14-foot-wide barrier of sargassum lined the beach.

Several bloated sea creatures with bulging eyes were entangled in the thick mat of seaweed.

Comment: A day before this event the region was hit by an earthquake. See also: 4.8. Magnitude earthquake rattles St Lucia

Perhaps outgassing from the sea bed caused by this seismic activity had more to do with these deaths than the seaweed that had been lying about on the shore for some time prior to the mass fish kill event?

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Question

Dozens of migrating birds found dead near transmission tower in Nashville

Andy Cordan
wkrn.com
Thu, 01 Oct 2015 19:20 UTC
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© WKRNDozens of dead birds were discovered at a west Nashville church Thursday.
Dozens of dead birds were discovered all over a west Nashville church ground's property Thursday morning.

The birds scattered Highland Park Church's parking lot, sidewalks and roof.

Church members, animal lovers and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services were all called to the property after the discovery was made.

"We pulled into the parking lot and all over the place there were little green things coming. The birds were on their way down from Canada. It was a sea of green on the ground and asphalt with green spots on it," church member Greg Levenduski said.


Comment: A similar incident happened close to the above location in March this year: Dozens of disoriented birds fall out of the sky in Spring Hill, Tennessee

See also: Mobile phone towers in Hyderabad, India are driving migratory birds crazy:
Increasing radiation from thousands of mobile phone towers in Hyderabad is playing havoc with the natural flight paths of migratory birds, experts said on Monday. Rare species of birds are unable to find their way back home after winter, they added.

While migratory birds use the geomagnetic field as a compass to track their route from Europe to the Indian sub-continent every year, radiation emitted from these mobile phone towers (6,000 of which came up in just two years) is damaging their brain cells and sense of direction, several environmentalist groups said.


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Cow

Welsh government begins investigation after mad cow disease identified in dead animal

David Deans
Wales Online
Thu, 01 Oct 2015 17:07 UTC
mad cow wales
© GettyThe dead cow is not reported to be a risk to public health
The Welsh Government says it has identified the body of a cow with mad cow disease

An investigation has been launched after a case of 'mad cow disease' was found in a cow in Wales. It did not enter the food chain and there is no risk to human health, the Welsh Government said in a statement.It is appears to be the first BSE case for the whole of the UK in 2015.

A wave of panic started in 1995, when 19-year-old Stephen Churchill died of a fatal brain condition linked to mad cow disease. By 2000, the leading group monitoring the outbreak was warning that the worst-case scenario could see 500,000 people die a similarly horrifying death. But there has been just one death from variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease (vCJD) - the condition which killed Stephen - in the last three years.

The location of the farm where the latest case was found hasn't been identified and it's not known what measures were put in place on the farm as a result.

Comment: More reasons to avoid factory-farmed (CAFO) foods.

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Attention

Man receives 30 stitches following shark attack in Vilano Beach, Florida: 5th attack in 2 weeks


actionnewsjax.com
Fri, 02 Oct 2015 16:27 UTC
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Shark bite in Vilano Beach
A 22-year-old is recovering Wednesday night from an apparent shark bite while surfing at Vilano Beach Tuesday.

David Morrison, 22, says it all happened in a matter of seconds.

"My foot was completely covered in blood," Morrison said.

He said the shark bit his ankle Tuesday while he was lying on his surfboard.

This is the fifth shark attack on our local beaches in the last two weeks.

Two occurred at Vilano Beach and one each at Fernandina Beach, Big Talbot Island and Jacksonville Beach.

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Fish

Thousands of dead fish found on Red Sea shore, Saudi Arabia


GDN Online
Wed, 30 Sep 2015 11:33 UTC
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Thousands of dead fish on the Red Sea coast
It was fish tsunami as thousands of dead fish washed ashore on the Red Sea coast in Saudi Arabia. They were dead despite still being in water.

A video of the incident was published by the Saudi Daily 'Okaz'.

Saudi officials say they are investigating the incident and trying to find out why the fish died.

"Officials said they have collected samples of the fish, the water and sand to have them tested at the laboratory to identify reasons for their death," the paper said.

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Telescope

NASA's new images of Pluto's largest moon, Charon show surprisingly complex and violent history

Tricia Talbert
Phys.org
Thu, 01 Oct 2015 00:00 UTC
charon, pluto moon
© NASA/JHUAPL/SwRICharon in Enhanced Color NASA's New Horizons captured this high-resolution enhanced color view of Charon just before closest approach on July 14, 2015.
NASA's New Horizons spacecraft has returned the best color and the highest resolution images yet of Pluto's largest moon, Charon - and these pictures show a surprisingly complex and violent history.

At half the diameter of Pluto, Charon is the largest satellite relative to its planet in the solar system. Many New Horizons scientists expected Charon to be a monotonous, crater-battered world; instead, they're finding a landscape covered with mountains, canyons, landslides, surface-color variations and more.

"We thought the probability of seeing such interesting features on this satellite of a world at the far edge of our solar system was low," said Ross Beyer, an affiliate of the New Horizons Geology, Geophysics and Imaging (GGI) team from the SETI Institute and NASA Ames Research Center in Mountain View, California, "but I couldn't be more delighted with what we see."
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Attention

People warned stay away from dead sperm whale on Oreti Beach, New Zealand

Dave Nicoll
stuff.co.nz
Wed, 30 Sep 2015 18:06 UTC
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© NICOLE JOHNSTONEA dead sperm whale on Oreti Beach on Wednesday.
Local iwi have issued a rahui or ban on people going near a dead whale that has washed up on Oreti Beach in Southland.

The 15-metre sperm whale washed up at the southern end of Oreti Beach last week after floating at sea for some time.

Ngai Tahu kaumatua Michael Skerrett said local iwi had been advised to stay away from the whale as it was decomposing and people should avoid touching the carcass, or the water pooling around it, as this could cause infection or sickness.

DOC was first notified about the dead whale floating in Foveaux Strait close to Oreti Beach about two weeks ago.

The whale had decomposed considerably and was missing its jawbone.
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