Animals
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Wolf

Man dies after being attacked at home in Preston, England by his own dog while having an epileptic fit


Irish Independent
Fri, 01 Jan 2016 19:27 UTC
Police at the scene of dog attack in Preston
© Lauren Brown/PA WirePolice at the scene in Dundonald Street in Preston, Lancashire
The family of a man who died after he was attacked by his dog whilst suffering an epileptic fit have paid tribute to a "happy lad who was always smiling".

Liam Hewitson, 22, of Preston in England, was mauled by his dog Trigger after suffering a fit when he was at home alone, police said.

He sustained significant injuries to his face and neck and died at the scene.

In a tribute his family said: "Liam was a happy lad who was always smiling and had lots of friends. He had a beautiful personality and he will be missed by his dad Phil, girlfriend Jess and sisters Melissa and Aleisha and brother Cordell."

Police have confirmed there will not be a criminal investigation and they are treating the incident as "a tragic accident".

The dog, which was a male pit bull cross and not a banned breed, is thought to have been around five or six years old and had belonged to Liam since its birth.

Comment: Some other cases of fatal dog attacks during the past two weeks include:

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Attention

Thousands of carcasses of Olive Ridley turtles wash ashore in Andhra Pradesh, India

V Kamalakara Rao
Times of India
Mon, 28 Dec 2015 16:34 UTC
Dead Olive Ridley turtles
© The Hindu/ Lingaraj PandaDead Olive Ridley turtles
Thousands of carcasses of Olive Ridley turtles washed ashore from Ranasthalam to Ichapuram in Srikakulam district.Fishermen said they have seen innumerable carcasses in seashore villages of Gunupalli, Akkupalli, Dokulapadu, Manchineellapeta and Devunaltada in Vajrapu Kothuru mandal in the district in the last two days.

Srikakulam district fisheries joint director MA Yukub Basha said the turtles had died after they were accidentally trapped by trawlers. "This is the breeding season and the turtles come to the shore to lay eggs. Many of them get trapped in the nets of mechanised boats," he said.

Fishermen said that the dead turtles weighed up to 50 kg each. The length of the carapace is between 60 cm and 70 cm. Palasa, Baruva and Vajrapu Kotturu in Srikakulam district and RK Beach, Bheemili and Sagarnagar in Visakhapatnam district are the nesting spots of the turtles in north coastal Andhra. One can find about 1,000 nesting spots between January and March in the region.
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Snowflake Cold

Snow Blizzard kills more than 30,000 dairy cows in Texas, New Mexico (number could climb higher)

Betsy Blaney
Winnipeg Free Press
Thu, 31 Dec 2015 03:09 UTC
1966 South Dakota Blizzard
© NOAAA snow-covered steer in South Dakota after a blizzard in 1966.
Dairy producers in West Texas and eastern New Mexico are continuing to assess how many animals died in the winter storm last weekend, but the number will probably climb to more than 30,000, an official with a dairy group said Thursday.

Texas Association of Dairymen executive director Darren Turley said an estimated 15,000 mature dairy cows died in the storm's primary impact area — from Lubbock west to Muleshoe and north to Friona which is home to half of the state's top-10 milk producing counties and produces 40 per cent of the state's milk.
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Fish

Thousands of dead fish wash ashore in Hancock County, Mississippi

Justin Mitchell
Sun Herald
Sun, 27 Dec 2015 19:08 UTC
dead fish
© Jennifer Lenain/Sun HeraldLand servicing crews picked up thousands of dead fish that washed ashore along the beach in Bay St. Louis and Waveland on Sunday, Dec. 27, 2015.
Thousands of dead fish were picked up by land servicing crews in Hancock County on Sunday, and officials say it may be associated with the red tide algae that spread through South Mississippi waters earlier this month.

A dump truck driver told the Sun Herald that he began loading dead fish on the beach near Washington Street early Sunday morning. By 1 p.m., he had made his way to the shoreline in Waveland near Buccaneer State park. He said crews picked up about 15,000 fish.

Hancock County Chief Deputy Don Bass said most of the fish washing ashore have been black drum. Bass said Hancock County Emergency Management received calls about the fish early on Sunday, and the agency has been working with the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality to remove the fish.
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Attention

Dead orca calf found near Tofino, Canada

Laura Kane
The Vancouver Sun
Thu, 31 Dec 2015 18:53 UTC
A dead orca calf is pictured on Dec. 24, 2015.
© Fisheries and Oceans CanadaA dead orca calf is pictured on Dec. 24, 2015.
A female orca calf has been found dead on the west coast of Vancouver Island.

Paul Cottrell of Fisheries and Oceans Canada said a surfer spotted the dead whale washed up on Mussel Beach near Ucluelet on Dec. 23 and called the department's marine mammal incident hotline.

He said the 400-pound carcass was transferred to Abbotsford, where a necropsy was conducted on Christmas Day. Scientists are still awaiting results of tissue-sample testing and a cause of death is not yet known.

"It was just a tremendous effort by everyone involved, at a time when normally you're with your family," said Cottrell. "Everybody came together and made sure we got this animal looked at as quickly as possible."
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Fish

New species: Glow-in-the-dark stealthy ninja lanternshark

Laura Fraser
CBC
Mon, 28 Dec 2015 05:47 UTC
ninja lanternshark
The recently discovered ninja lanternshark can cloak itself by giving off a bluish light that effectively renders it invisible. (D. Ross Robertson/Douglas J. Long)
Forget Jaws — it's the ninja lanternshark that's making waves on social media and in the scientific community.

The inky-black fish already has the camouflage of darkness in the deepsea levels. But it's also covered in photophores — tiny dots that can emit light, cloaking the fish in a bluish glow and making it invisible to prey or predators below, the California scientist who identified the shark says.

"As they're swimming they can be backlit by the light and stand out, even though they're all black," Vicky Vásquez said. "So ... lanternsharks glow just enough to hide that shadow or that silhouette that they're creating."

The 30-50 centimetre shark — named by Vásquez's four young cousins "because it's good at being stealthy" — got introduced to the world last week thanks to a paper written by the Pacific Shark Research Centre graduate student and two other scientists.
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Wolf

Stray dogs kill another child in Bareilly, India; seventh so far in the past year

Priyangi Agarwal
Times of India
Mon, 28 Dec 2015 19:32 UTC
Stray dogs
Stray dogs
In unending attacks by stray dogs in Baheri tehsil of Bareilly district, a 10-year-old was mauled to death, the seventh kid to have died in the past year, with more than 30 children being attacked in the same period.

The boy, identified as Amit Kumar, a student of class II, became the seventh victim of dog attacks. Amit, along with his friend, had on Sunday evening gone to the outskirts of their native Siyatheri village to pluck wild berries when they were surrounded by a pack of dogs. While his friend managed to escape from the scene, dogs attacked Amit and mauled his head, neck and stomach.

When the villagers reached the spot, the child had sustained severe injuries. He was rushed to hospital where doctors declared him brought dead.

According to the district administration and forest department stray dogs have become feral in the region after scavenging on animal residue like flesh, blood and bones, which are mostly discarded from slaughterhouses.

Sub-divisional magistrate of Baheri, Paras Nath Maurya, said, "We conducted a meeting with the forest department and Nagar Palika on Monday. Forest department has been asked to identify the areas where pack of ferocious dogs are present and ways to deal with them. Nagar Palika has been directed to create awareness among locals that they should not dump animal residue in the open and should instead bury it."
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Binoculars

Crazy winter weather brings rare red-rumped swallow from the Mediterranean to Norfolk, UK

Stuart Winter
Daily Express, UK
Sat, 26 Dec 2015 16:09 UTC
Red-rumped swallow
© GETTYRed-rumped swallow
The balmy winter weather with its bees, butterflies and flowering bulbs has produced another phenomenal sighting of a swallow on the wing. And not just any swallow.

A rare red-rumped swallow from the Mediterranean is spending its Christmas on the North Norfolk coast - further evidence that December 2015 is likely to go down on record as the warmest since records began.

The red-rumped swallow that has brought a dash of seasonal, russet colour to our shores is finding enough small insects to maintain its energy levels as it patrols the skies over Norfolk's network of famous nature reserves.

By rights, the red-rumped swallow should be enjoying sunshine south of the Sahara or even as far away as India rather than the skies over Wells-next-the-Sea.

Temperatures as high as 16 degrees in recent days are also helping other fair weather species to survive. A hoopoe has been showing off its powder pink plumage at Hinksford in Staffordshire.
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Attention

Giant squid filmed in marina in Japan


Strange Sounds
Mon, 28 Dec 2015 12:53 UTC
Giant squid
Giant squid
A fisherman found a 3.7-meter (12.1 feet) giant squid swimming beneath fishing boats docked at the Mizuhashi Fisherina in Toyama prefecture on the morning of Dec. 24.

The rare giant squid was captured on video on the cost of the Sea of Japan.

This is the first time a giant squid was seen live at the Mizuhashi Fisherina, as the water depth is only about 2.5 to 3 meters.

The squid stayed inside the marina for several hours, at times swimming alongside divers and was led toward the open ocean later in the day.


Comment: See also: Giant squid caught alive in Japan

Increase in giant squid discoveries off Japan's coast is 'some kind of omen,' says fisherman

Another giant squid caught in fishing net in Japan

Giant squid found in fishing net off Japan

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Cloud Precipitation

Dozens of birds killed by large hailstones in Jonesboro, Arkansas

Ellen Thalls
5News KFSM
Thu, 24 Dec 2015 19:12 UTC
Hunters
Hail Storm causes dozens of birds to fall from sky
Extreme weather battered the Jonesboro area Wednesday (Dec. 23), and that weather is likely to blame for the untimely deaths of dozens of waterfowl.

Comment: See also these similar reports for this year:

Hundreds of birds killed by hailstorm in Ballari, India

Hailstorm kills and injures over 200 birds across Ahmedabad, India

Hailstorm kills 300 birds in Ivaiporã, Brazil

and a similar occurrence from Arkansas almost exactly 5 years ago:

Radar Dopppler images confirm overhead 'turbulence' cause of 2011 mass bird death case in Beebe, Arkansas

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