Animals
S


Nuke

Mass die offs of Sitka sea stars recorded, Alaska

Anne Brice
ktoo.org
Tue, 28 Oct 2014 19:19 UTC
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© Anne Brice/KCAWTaylor White pulls up a rock on Sage Beach to see three leptasterias, which are small, 6 legged sea stars that are common at this site. She points to the one with three legs and lesions, symptoms of sea star wasting disease.
A trip to the coast usually means you're going to see sea stars, but a mysterious disease is killing them along the West Coast. There had been a few reports of sick sea stars in Alaska, but recently in Sitka, the first mass die offs in the state were detected. Scientists in Sitka are tracking the progress.

Patty Dick lives on a boat in Thompson Harbor in Sitka. In the morning, when it's low tide and she has an extra moment, she goes out and checks on the sea stars living in the area.

"I just sit there in awe of the beauty of that animal," she said. "Everybody loves sea stars."

Dick teaches 6th grade biology at Blatchley Middle School. She often takes her students on field trips to learn about marine animals, and they usually find dozens of sea stars.

But one morning last month, Dick noticed something was wrong with the sea stars. "I just looked over and I just stopped. There were these big, huge, white spots all over them and they were just wasting away. My heart just sank."
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Health

Two-year-old girl and adult seriously injured in Kenya by elephant attack


The Standard (Kenya)
Tue, 28 Oct 2014 20:13 UTC
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Two people including a two-year-old girl are fighting for their life in hospital in Taita-Taveta County after they were attacked and seriously injured by marauding elephants.

Villagers of Jipe in Taveta district said the victims were attacked by stray jumbos while walking along the road.

The villagers who identified one of the victims as Julius Kibanga Nyerere, 50 suffered broken ribs while the toddler sustained multiple head injuries.

"The old man was carrying his grand child to see her mother when they were attacked by the jumbos. They escaped death by a whisker after villagers intervened," said Paul James, the victim's neighbor.

Speaking to The Standard at Taveta district hospital where the victims had been admitted in critical condition, James claimed elephants had virtually imposed a dawn-to-dusk curfew on residents.

Comment: See also: Elephant kills 70 year old woman in Kenya

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Attention

Beached long-finned pilot whale dies on Tain sands, Scotland


whalesandmarinefauna.wordpress.com
Mon, 27 Oct 2014 19:17 UTC
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The long-finned pilot whale was stranded on the mud flats at Tain
A long-finned pilot whale has died after becoming stranded on mud flats near an Easter Ross beach.

More than 100 locals gathered round the stricken mammal as it was pulled 55 yards inshore and lifted by a crane onto a truck at Tain Links.

The 14ft long young male cetacean is thought to have become stuck after becoming separated from its pod in deeper waters.

A local vet went to the scene on behalf of the British Divers Marine Life Rescue at about 2pm on Saturday after a member of public raised the alarm.

But as the tide went out, the whale was left in shallow water and died at about 4pm.
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Whistle

Update: Hunt for killer bear in Poland is cancelled after autopsy discovers its 'victim' had actually been murdered


Daily Mail, UK
Tue, 28 Oct 2014 18:45 UTC
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Stanislaw Puchala, 61, was found dead with marks of having been mauled by a bear in southern Poland
* Polish man found dead and mauled by a bear in the woods

* Autopsy finds man had been killed before bear attacked the body

* Police in south Poland believes Stanislaw Puchala, 61, was murdered

A bear has escaped by the skin of its teeth after it was found not to be responsible for the killing of a Polish man.

Stanislaw Puchala, 61, was found dead with marks of having been mauled by a bear near the village of Olszanica in the Bieszczady Mountains, southern Poland.

The village hunting party sent out to shoot the bear was called off when an autopsy revealed Mr Puchala had been murdered.
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Frog

Massachusetts conservationist discovers extremely rare blue leopard frog

Don Lyman
The Boston Globe
Tue, 28 Oct 2014 18:51 UTC
Blue leopard frog
Conservation scientist Jacob Kubel with the blue leopard frog, rare compared with green and beige specimens.
Late this summer, Jacob Kubel, a conservation scientist with the state Division of Fisheries and Wildlife's Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program, was slogging through a Sudbury wetland, searching for a new species of leopard frog, when something unusual caught his eye.

"The frogs were quick and blended in with their surroundings," Kubel said in an e-mail, "so we were basically chasing blurs and moving vegetation."

Leopard frogs, which are named for their dark spots, are usually green, beige, or some combination of those colors, but one of the blurs Kubel saw through the stems of sedge and grass appeared to be bright blue.

"I couldn't be sure of the exact color," said Kubel, "so I just thought to myself, 'Oh, I have a brightly colored one here - he should be easier to chase down.' "

Kubel said he didn't think much of it at first: Individual animals in many wildlife species, after all, vary greatly from one another. But when he captured the 2-inch frog and looked at it up close, he realized it was something he - in fact, most everyone - had never seen before: a blue-colored leopard frog.
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Light Sabers

North Carolina teenager saves toddler from pit bull

Khier Casino
Opposing Views
Tue, 28 Oct 2014 00:00 UTC
Colton Hartley
A North Carolina teen is being hailed as a hero for saving a toddler who was being attacked by a dog.

T.J. Blake, of Caldwell County, and her grandson Eli, 2, had seen the dog as they were making their way to a neighbor's house last Thursday.

As they were walking back home, Blake says the dog lunged through a screened window and latched on to the 2-year-old boy, MyFox8.com reports. Blake was also scratched on her arm.
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Attention

Deer crashes through window into furniture store in Cedar Falls, Iowa

Ben Hooper
upi.com
Mon, 27 Oct 2014 16:01 UTC
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The owner of an Iowa furniture store said security cameras recorded a deer running buck wild through the store before leaving through the back door.

Deb Emmert, owner of Simpsons Furniture in Cedar Falls, said the store had just opened Saturday when the buck crashed through a window and started running around the store.

Security camera footage shows the deer running among the furniture before using his antlers to push open the back door and make his exit.

"They go, 'Deer! Deer! Deer!' And they go, 'Get out of the way!' And I'm just like ... I didn't know which way to go to get out of the way of the deer," Emmert said. "We're just laughing. We're just laughing, especially when we saw him just nonchalantly opened the door and was like, 'OK, done with my shopping.'"

There were no injuries from the deer's shopping trip Saturday and the store remained open while a crew cleaned up the mess.

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Attention

Pack of wild boar attack woman in suburb of Stockholm, Sweden


rcinet.ca
Mon, 24 Mar 2014 14:28 UTC
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© N. A. Naseer/ Wikimedia Commons A wild boar group.
A young woman was left shaken after being chased by a pack of wild boar in a suburb of Stockholm, Sweden.

Stocholm county police write on their website that the woman was out walking in the evening when she met more than a dozen wild boars.

When the surprised woman turned tail and fled the boars gave chase. She luckily met a group of young people who were able to scare away the pack of pursuing porkers.
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Attention

At least six people attacked and injured by a group of wild boar in India


The Statesman (India)
Sun, 26 Oct 2014 14:10 UTC
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A group of 5 Wild Boar
In the latest incident of man-wildlife conflict in villages lying in close proximity of Bhitarkanika wildlife sanctuary, at least six persons including two women and an infant were injured today following attack by hordes of wild boars in Jamboo village under Mahakalpada police station jurisdiction.

As the news of animal attack spread, people rose in protest and demonstrated in front of the local forest office.

The agitating people were demanding the launch of foolproof measures to curb the intrusion of animals like wild boar, crocodiles and spotted deer into places of human habitation.

Three persons including a 15-year-old girl, a 55-year-old woman were injured while three others sustained injuries following the stampede that ensued as the wild boars chased the people. All of them, who were hospitalised, are out of danger.
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Health

Wolf Lake man attacked and injured by elk at campground in Muskegon, Michigan

Heather Lynn Peters
mlive.com
Tue, 07 Oct 2014 16:02 UTC
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A 59-year-old man was injured by an elk at the Wolf Lake Resort & Campground in a bizarre Monday, Oct. 6 incident.

An Egelston Township fire official confirmed the attack happened Monday evening between 6 p.m. and 7 p.m. at the resort located at 5451 Harding Ave. The elk is housed at an adjacent deer and elk farm owned by the same people who own the campground.

A woman who spoke with an MLive Muskegon Chronicle reporter by phone from the campground office refused to confirm the incident. She denied it ever happened.

But the fire official confirmed the fire department was sent there on a medical call and the man had been injured by the elk severely enough that he required hospital treatment.
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