Animals
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Attention

Rare Arctic bowhead whale seen for the first time in UK waters

John Ingham
Daily Express, UK
Sat, 28 Feb 2015 21:22 UTC
Image
© SeawatchThe bowhead was spotted with a mobile phone camera
The bowhead whale was photographed on a mobile phone off Par Beach on the remote island of St Martin's by diver Anna Cawthray who immediately suspected it was special.

But it took an international exchange of e-mails between experts in Britain and the United States to identify it as a young bowhead who was 2,000 miles from home.

Anna feared the whale - which was about 25ft long - could have been stranded but she said: "After about 15 minutes it swam away.

"Seeing it was a once in a lifetime experience."

Bowhead whales normally live in the high Arctic near the ice edge and their closest population is off Spitzbergen far to the north of Norway.

They can reach up to 70ft in length, weigh up to 90 tonnes and live for up to 200 years which makes them possibly the longest lived marine mammal in the world.

They live off small crustaceans and use their large heads to smash through pack ice.

Comment: See also: King crab from Arctic waters found on Redcar beach, UK

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Attention

Wild boar attacks and injures five in Mizoram village, India

Adam Halliday
The New Indian Express
Wed, 25 Feb 2015 20:30 UTC
Image
© David J SlaterWild boar
A male wild boar entered a village in eastern Mizoram on Wednesday morning and injured five people, three of them grievously, before villagers shot it dead.

Village leader C Lalnunpuia said the wild boar entered Saichal, within Champhai district, from the nearby woods around 9.45 am, chasing a woman who was coming from the same direction.

As it reached a house on the outskirts, it attacked a group of women sitting on the porch.

One of the women, identified as Lalruatliani, sustained wounds on her hands and arms, with several fingers broken.
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Attention

Dead whale found washed ashore at Cuddalore, India


The Hindu
Sat, 28 Feb 2015 19:54 UTC
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The carcass of the beached whale at Pettodai near Periyakuppam in Cuddalore on Thursday.
The carcass of a 30-foot-long whale washed ashore at Pettodai near Periyakuppam on Thursday evening.

A group of fishermen spotted the carcass near the shore at around 6 p.m. and alerted the Forest Department.

News about the dead whale spread like wildfire and people gathered in large numbers to get a view of the mammal.

"The whale had a length of 9 metres and weighed nearly five tonnes. A post-mortem examination alone can reveal reasons behind the death and how it was swept to the shore. The whale might have been hit by a barge or a ship passing through the coast," Sundaramurthy, Cuddalore Range Forest officer said.
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Attention

Jellyfish bloom reported for the first time off coast of Visakhapatnam, India

S.N.V. Sudhir
Deccan Chronicle
Fri, 27 Feb 2015 17:27 UTC
Image
Representational image
A bloom of jellyfish has been reported off the Visakhapatnam coast for the first time. MFV Matsya Shikari, a survey vessel attached to the Vizag base of the Fishery Survey of India (FSI), has reported a bloom of jellyfish around 60 nautical miles off Visakhapatnam.

The vessel was carrying out a demersal (near the seabed) fishery resource survey in the area and researchers were surprised that 500 kg of jellyfish was caught in a single haul from a single-patch area at a depth of 40m. They say this is an indication of their abundance in the area.

The jellyfish found off was identified as Crambionella stuhlmanni, which causes skin rashes if touched. There are many species of jellyfish, which are venomous and its sting considered dangerous. World over, jellyfish blooms have caused power plant outages, destroyed the fishing-industry and damaged the beaches of holiday destinations.
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Info

A molecular compass for bird navigation


phys.org
Fri, 27 Feb 2015 21:17 UTC
Image
© Brian E. SmallArctic Tern
Each year, the Arctic Tern travels over 40,000 miles, migrating nearly from pole to pole and back again. Other birds make similar (though shorter) journeys in search of warmer climes. How do these birds manage to traverse such great distances when we need a map just to make our way to the next town over?

Researchers have established that birds can sense the earth's magnetic field and use it to orient themselves. How this internal compass works, though, remains poorly understood.

Physicists at the University of Oxford are exploring one possible explanation: a magnetically sensitive protein called cryptochrome that mediates circadian rhythms in plants and animals. Blue or green light triggers electrons in the protein to produce pairs of radicals whose electron spins respond to magnetic fields. "As we vary the strength of the magnetic field, we can alter the progress of these photochemical reactions inside the protein," said lead researcher Peter Hore, who will present his work during a talk at the American Physical Society's March Meeting on Wednesday, March 4 in San Antonio, Texas.
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Info

Angry Norwegian lemmings: The bravest rodent and the myth of suicide

Hannah Osborne
International Business Times
Fri, 06 Feb 2015 20:21 UTC
Image
Angry Norwegian lemming
The angry Norwegian lemming is one of the bravest rodents in the world because it has evolved aposematic traits to ward off predators, a study has suggested.

Norwegian lemmings have an interesting reputation, with people often mistakenly believing they are "crazed creatures" that commit suicide by throwing themselves off cliffs, or exploding because they are so angry.

They have bold colouring - with a red-brown back, yellow flanks, a white chest, chin and cheeks, and a big black patch on its head - and so stand out from their less vibrant relatives.

While most other small rodents flee when they sense a threat and only very rarely aggressively protect themselves from predators, the Norwegian lemming laughs in the face of danger.

When predators approach, they make loud, severe barks, and fight back against attacks with lunges, bites and screams. In a BBC report about their behaviour last year, one group of researchers even reported a face off with a farm tractor, "leaving a trail of infuriated lemmings behind".

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Wolf

Weimeraner survives cougar attack in Sierra National Forest, California


examiner.com
Fri, 27 Feb 2015 14:00 UTC
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© yourcentralvalley.comWeimeraner survives cougar attack
A weekday rendezvous with Mother Nature gave a group of California hikers much more than they expected. What started out as a pleasant mountain jaunt for a four-year-old weimeraner and her owner in Oakhurst, California went south very quickly when they came face-to-face with a mountain lion. On Feb. 19, Candace Gregory was hiking with friends in the Sierra National Forest with her dog Sally. As Gregory tells it, she and her friends were about 30 feet behind her dog when she saw "a flash of something tannish".

Before it could even register, the big cat had Sally's head in it's jaws and it's paws wrapped around the pooch's body. Fellow hiker Rick Lawin said he heard a "blood curdling screaming sound of an animal in its death throes." He ran up and started hitting the mountain lion with his hiking stick, to help out Sally and protect his fellow hikers. That worked, because the hungry animal dropped the dog and jumped into the trees. They estimate that the big cat must have weighed at least 120 pounds.
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Wolf

Two coyotes attack dog in Cleveland, Ohio cemetery

Donna J. Miller
Cleveland.com
Thu, 19 Feb 2015 13:41 UTC
Image
© Beverly SinghMaitri, a 70-pound greyhound-mix, was attacked by two coyotes soon after this photo was taken.
A Cleveland Heights dog is recovering from being attacked Sunday by two cold and hungry coyotes at Lake View Cemetery.

Yes, a cemetery island of grass and trees amid the busy streets at the intersection of Cleveland, Cleveland Heights and East Cleveland was the scene of a coyote encounter and more proof that Ohio's coyote population is rebounding.

Maitri, a 70-pound greyhound-mix, was lucky she had speed on her side. She escaped with a gaping flesh wound to a hind leg that required six stitches.
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Eye 2

Snake makes a rare winter appearance in Stephenville, Maryland

Angela Price
The Star Democrat
Wed, 25 Feb 2015 22:58 UTC
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© Jake ClaypooleA Snake in Winter
Jake Claypoole of Stevenville spotted something unusual when he took his son sledding near the park and ride across from Kent Landing Shopping Center, commonly called Kmart hill, about noon Wednesday, Feb. 18. He noticed a 3-foot snake on top of the ice on the storm water management pond.

Claypoole said he thought the snake was dead at first, but then he noticed its tongue moving and it began slithering toward the snow.
He said he watched and took pictures for about 20 minutes as the snake made its way off the ice, across the snow and into some nearby brush.

He said he had never seen a snake out in the winter on snow or ice before.

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Ice Cube

King crab from Arctic waters found on Redcar beach, UK

Dave Robson
The Gazette
Tue, 24 Feb 2015 22:24 UTC
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King Crab on Redcar beach

Red king crab could be first on our shores, crustacean is usually found in icy waters like the Arctic

He's spent his working life beneath the sea but even oceanographer David McCreadie was baffled by a rare visitor to Redcar.

For the formidable-looking red crustacean found by David's fiancee Diane Weinoski looks for all the world like a king crab - and they hardly ever stray from considerably icier waters.

Members of the lithododid family, king crabs are large, tasty and usually found in seas MUCH colder than Redcar's.

And despite having worked and played in oceans across the world since the mid-1960s, David has never heard of one being found this far south.
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