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California, US: Three Beaches Closed After Deadly Shark Attack


The Associated Press
Sat, 23 Oct 2010 23:28 UTC
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© Spencer Weiner/AP PhotoAirmen 1st class Daniel Clark, left, and Staff Sgt. Keri Embry, post a sign warning surfers of a recent shark attack Friday, Oct. 22, 2010, at Vandenburg Air Force Base, Calif.
A string of beaches on California's Central Coast were shut down Saturday and there was no word on when they would reopen after a deadly attack on a bodyboarder from what some scientists said was probably a great white shark, authorities said.

The three beaches north of Santa Barbara - including Surf Beach where the attack took place - would be closed at least through the weekend and officials on Monday would decide when to reopen them, said Jeremy Eggers, spokesman for Vandenberg Air Force Base, which owns the beach property.

Eggers said he expected base officials would reopen the beaches Monday, but there was too much uncertainty and confusion surrounding the attack to say for sure.

"There's a lot of fog and friction in these kinds of situations," said Eggers. He said his bosses determined the shutdown "was the right thing to do as a safety precaution."
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Fish

New species of fish discovered in ocean's deepest depths

Hilary Duncanson
The Independent
Fri, 15 Oct 2010 15:04 UTC
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© PAThe snailfish was found living at a depth of 7,000m in a trench in the South East Pacific Ocean, which was previously thought to be free of fish
A new species has been discovered in a part of the ocean previously thought to be entirely free of fish, scientists said yesterday.

The new type of snailfish was found living at a depth of 7,000m in the Peru-Chile trench of the South East Pacific Ocean.

Mass groupings of cusk-eels and large crustacean scavengers were also discovered living at these depths for the first time, scientists said. The findings, in one of the deepest places on the planet, were made by a team of marine biologists from the University of Aberdeen and experts from Japan and New Zealand.

The team took part in a three-week expedition, during which they used deep-sea imaging technology to take 6,000 pictures at depths between 4,500m and 8,000m within the trench.

The mission was the seventh to take place as part of HADEEP, a collaborative research project between the University of Aberdeen's Oceanlab and the University of Tokyo's Ocean Research Institute, supported by New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric research (NIWA).
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Question

A Whale of a Journey, Captured in Photos

Sindya Bhanoo
New York Times
Wed, 13 Oct 2010 21:23 UTC
Brazilian Whale Journey
© F. Johansen, via Associated PressThe image above, taken in 2001, was used to identify a female humpback whale who traveled more than 6,000 miles from Brazil to Madagascar.

If you cruise the Web you can find long-lost friends, high school sweethearts and ... far-traveling humpback whales.

With the help of Flickr, a photo-sharing site, Peter Stevick, a biologist at the College of the Atlantic, in Bar Harbor, Me., and colleagues have identified a whale that made an unprecedented journey, an epic 6,000 miles from Brazil to Madagascar, about 10 years ago. The whale's adventure is described in Biology Letters.

Carole Carlson, an author of the paper and a researcher at the College of the Atlantic, often checks Flickr for whale photos because humpbacks can be identified by their tails, which are as individual as fingerprints. An amateur photographer had taken a photo on a film camera in 2001 and only recently posted it. That photo matched one taken by researchers of a whale off the coast of Brazil in 1999.
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Sherlock

New meat-eater emerges in Madagascar

Cian O'Luanaigh
New Scientist
Mon, 11 Oct 2010 11:13 UTC
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© Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust
This feisty cat-sized creature from Madagascar is the first new species of carnivorous mammal to be discovered in 24 years.

Durrell's vontsira (Salanoia durrelli) was found in the threatened Lac Alaotra wetlands in central eastern Madagascar in 2004. Zoologists took photos of it at the time, and have now confirmed it is a new species after comparing it to specimens of the closely related brown-tailed vontsira (Salanoia concolor).

Named in honour of the late conservationist Gerald Durrell, the new vontsira weighs just over half a kilogram and belongs to a family of carnivores - Eupleridae - only known in Madagascar. It is likely to be one of the most threatened carnivores as their Lac Alaotra wetland habitat becomes threatened by agricultural expansion, burning and invasive plants and fish.
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Binoculars

Malaysia: Monkey Steals Baby from Living Room


The Telegraph, UK
Thu, 07 Oct 2010 00:00 UTC
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© Rex FeaturesMalaysian authorities have battled a booming macaque population in cities.
A newborn baby girl has died after being snatched from her family's living room by a monkey.

The four-day-old infant has been left alone for just a few minutes when she disappeared.

Her body was found shortly later outside the home in central Negri Sembilan state, Malaysia's Star and the New Straits Times newspaper reported.

The baby, who was found by her mother and grandmother, had bite marks on her neck and face.

Her father was quoted as saying a macaque monkey had been seen roaming near the house in recent weeks.

The baby's grandmother said that she was in the kitchen when the infant, who had not yet been named by her parents, was snatched.
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Bulb

Dolphin species attempt 'common language'

Matt Walker
Earth News
Thu, 30 Sep 2010 20:50 UTC
dolphin
© L.May-ColladoA Guyana dolphin leaps to escape the attention of a bottlenose dolphin

When two dolphin species come together, they attempt to find a common language, preliminary research suggests.

Bottlenose and Guyana dolphins, two distantly related species, often come together to socialise in waters off the coast of Costa Rica.

Both species make unique sounds, but when they gather, they change the way they communicate, and begin using an intermediate language.

That raises the possibility the two species are communicating in some way.
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Arrow Down

China Experts Say Panda Suffocated to Death in Japan


Agence France-Presse
Sat, 02 Oct 2010 09:00 UTC
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© Agence France-PresseMale giant panda Kou Kou
Chinese experts sent to Japan to investigate the death of a giant panda on loan to a zoo have determined that the animal died of asphyxiation, state media reported Saturday.

Kou Kou died last month at the Oji zoo in the western port city of Kobe after it had received an anaesthetic so that veterinarians could extract semen from the 14-year-old male panda to impregnate his partner, Tan Tan.

Experts found that Kou Kou had suffocated when "objects in its stomach went into its lungs, leading to asphyxiation," the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Earlier, reports suggested the experts believed that the death could have been caused by an overdose of sedatives and were questioning why Japanese veterinarians were extracting semen outside the animal's mating period.

A breeding agreement between Beijing and Tokyo includes the stipulation that Japan pay 500,000 dollars in compensation if a panda dies due to human error, state media reported previously.
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Attention

US: Rocky Mountain Bighorn Sheep Ravaged by Disease

Laura Zuckerman
Reuters
Sat, 02 Oct 2010 17:29 UTC
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© Ryan Hagerty/U.S. Fish and Wildlife ServiceBighorn sheep are pictured in Montana in this photograph taken on February 27, 2006 and obtained on October 2, 2010.
Across the northern Rocky Mountains, bighorn sheep are dying by the hundreds from pneumonia and alarmed wildlife officials are hunting and killing the majestic animals to halt the spread of the disease.

Since winter, nine disease outbreaks across five states in the West have claimed nearly 1,000 bighorns, prized as a game animal for the prominent curled horns of the adult males, or rams.

Scientists recently confirmed what they long suspected -- the cause of the plague is contact between the wild bighorns and domestic sheep flocks.

Putting the blame on domestic sheep has heightened a furious debate between advocates of the wild bighorns and sheep ranchers -- one skirmish in a bigger war between proponents of economic interests and those seeking protection of remaining wild areas and species in America's West.
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Binoculars

US: Bull Sharks Making Homes in Waters of South Alabama

Ben Raines
Alabama Live
Fri, 01 Oct 2010 04:00 UTC
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© Wikipedia Commons/Albert kokBull sharks born in waters around south Alabama are staying in the area and using the rivers as they get larger.
Bull sharks are common in Dog River, Fowl River and the rivers of the Mobile-Tensaw Delta, according to a tracking effort conducted by the Dauphin Island Sea Lab.

During the last two years, 34 newborn sharks have been fitted with radio tags that transmit signals to receivers set up in the rivers around Mobile Bay.

While last year's data suggested that the babies were making use of the coastal rivers, it has now become apparent that sharks coming into their second year are staying in the area and using the rivers as they get larger.

The researchers said they also routinely catch adult bull sharks in Mobile Bay and Mississippi Sound, some longer than 6 feet.
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Binoculars

East Africa: Rare Pink Hippo Spotted


The Telegraph, UK
Thu, 30 Sep 2010 00:45 UTC
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© Burrard-Lucas/BarcroftThe rare pink hippopotamus stands next to a river in the Masai Mara National Reserve, Kenya
Rare pictures of a pink hippopotamus have been captured by British photographers.

Will and Matt Burrard-Lucas, were visiting the Masai Mara in Kenya, hunting the wildebeest migration, only to find a pink hippo.

"Our guide had mentioned that he had heard rumours of this rare hippo from a fellow guide, however, he was not told where it lived and he had never come across it before," said Will, 26.

"After a rather uneventful morning, we stopped on the banks of the Mara River for a picnic breakfast.

"After a while, to our great surprise, we spotted the pink hippo emerge onto the far bank of the river."
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