A rare sea creature which is only usually seen at the depths of the ocean was found washed up on a Dorset beach.

Biomedical scientist Paul Harris was walking along West Bexington Beach when he stumbled upon a Sea Mouse, which can usually be found buried up to 6,600ft beneath the waves.

The rare creature, which feasts on dead animals and is covered in colourful hair, is a type of marine worm.

Dorset's coast has been battered by severe storms in recent weeks and tonnes of rubbish, dead seabirds and unusual finds have been washed up on the county's shores.

The cold weather is responsible for more problems than just potholes, it's causing massive losses for beekeepers. 13abc's Lissa Guyton spent the day in Hancock County at the Keller Bison and Bee Farm to learn more about the serious problem that could affect us all.

The farm normally has about 1,800 hives at dozens of different sites around the Arcadia area but the owner thinks that more than half of them have been lost this winter. Lyle Keller has been a beekeeper for more than three decades. He says this is setting up to be one of his toughest years, "When you start losing 50-60% of your total number it is not easy to recover from that quickly." Bees provide more than honey, they also pollinate fruit and vegetable crops.

We were with Keller on Tuesday as he checked on some of his hives, "The bees need to get out and fly every 4-6 weeks to cleanse themselves and they haven't been able to do the cleansing flights this winter. It's rough on them. They are under heavy snow and in the extreme cold."

In addition to the extreme cold, Keller says pesticides and the lack of quality food sources are two main reasons for the population decrease, "About 25 years ago losing 10% of your hives during the winter was a big deal, this year I'll be happy if I only lose 50%."Keller plans to rebuild hundreds of his hives this spring," I will always have bees. I truly enjoy them. I may just have to scale down a bit because it takes a lot of work and I am not getting any younger."

Honey prices have gone up dramatically in the last few years. Keller expects the increase to continue this year. His bees produce some honey but their main job is the pollination of local fruit and vegetable crops. He takes them to farms around the region to do their work. Each hive costs more than $100 to maintain throughout the year.

A dwarf sperm whale was washed ashore at Nainarkuppam near Uthandi on Monday.

Volunteers of the TREE Foundation who noticed the dead carcass established the identity of the species with the help of Zoological Survey of India authorities.

Supraja Dharini of the Foundation said the whale's carcass was highly decomposed and the lower body of the whale had been severely damaged. It was badly injured with the rib cage and stomach exposed.

It also had an injury on its head near the blowhole region which could be one of reasons for the whale's death, she said.

The whale was 6.69 feet long and weighed nearly 300 kgs. The flipper was 27 cm with a width of 18cm.

Dwarf Sperm Whale is one of the smallest marine mammals to be called a whale. There are totally three species of sperm whales - Sperm Whale, Dwarf Sperm Whale and Pygmy Sperm Whale. As they are small in size, slow and lead a solitary life, it becomes difficult for researchers to observe them in the wild. Because of this, not much information was available, say the Zoological Survey of India authorities.

The carcass was buried by the Foundation members, she added.

A 10-meter sperm whale was found dead and floating nearby Pamilacan island off this town, Wednesday morning.

Mayor Alvin Uy confirmed this incident to The Freeman, saying he had decided to have the dead whale buried after its decomposing body caused stench wafting around the area.

Uy, in an interview over station DyRD, said the body of the 5-ton whale will be excavated someday and have its bones restored to its original form. "The whale's bones can be mounted as a special tourist attraction," Uy said.

Jun Gultia of the Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources said the agency was no longer interested to conduct an autopsy because it was established that the whale died of accidental bumping into a ship's rudder, as evidenced by a long and deep wound on the animal's belly.

Another source said a fisherman, identified as Alan Tapon, was the one who found the dead whale floating.

BFAR said that, aside from sperm whale, among the commonly-sighted marine animals found between the seas off Pamilacan Island and mainland Bohol are bottlenose dolphin, Bryde's whale, Risso's dolphin, melon-headed whale, pygmy killer whale, short-finned pilot whale, spotted whale, Fraser's dolphin, and manta ray.

This town, where the oldest stone church is located but destroyed by the Oct. 15 earthquake, hosts the whale-watching in industry tourism during this season and summer months off the island.

Fishermen on the island used to catch whale shark using harpoon years back but they are now into whale watching since ban on catching marine mammals took effect in the late 1990s

It's been almost four years since a goat head was last found in Prospect Park (that we're aware of), so we were certainly about due for another, assuming Goat Head Scattering is a quadrennial event like a total solar eclipse or the World Cup.

Today's head was found by the park's Lincoln Road entrance this morning, adorned with ear tags suggesting that it - along with a body, presumably? - came from a live animal market or slaughterhouse, and is not an escaped house pet or someone's ironic lawnmower.

Five common dolphins - four adults and a calf - were found stranded this morning on Provincetown low-tide flats in the East End of town.

As of 9:50 a.m., one dolphin is dead but the rest are still live, said RuthAnne Cowing, Provincetown animal control officer.

The tails of three of the dolphins could be seen moving, according to a Times reporter on the scene, where the wind is blowing and it is very cold.

The dolphins stranded off the intersection of Snail Road and Route 6A near the Harbor Hotel.

Rescuers with the Yarmouthport-based International Fund for Animal Welfare arrived at the stranding scene at about 10 a.m.

No further information is available at this time.

Thousands of seabirds have been wiped out in the winter storms which have also claimed the lives of dolphins and seals found washed up on west country beaches

The winter storms have caused an "unprecedented" wildlife disaster, wiping out thousands of rare seabirds, experts said yesterday.

An estimated 1,600 dead birds have washed up on beaches in Devon, Dorset, Cornwall and West Wales since early last month, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds reported.

The bodies of a further 1,000 seabirds have been recovered from beaches in the Channel Islands, with more than 20 species, including guillemots, razorbills, puffins and kittiwakes, among the dead.

The RSPB said that a "double whammy" of climate change and winter storms was making it harder for birds to find enough fish to survive. The deaths will have a serious impact on breeding colonies.

At least 28,000 birds have perished across the north eastern Atlantic region, with nearly 22,000 washed up along the French coast, the conservationists said.

Grand Portage - For moose, this year's winter-long deep freeze across the Upper Midwest is truly ideal weather. The large, gangly creatures are adapted to deep snow: Their hollow fur insulates them like fiberglass does in a house. And the prolonged cold helps eradicate pests that prey on moose, like ticks and meningeal worm, or brain worm. Yet moose in Minnesota are dying at an alarming rate, and biologists are perplexed as to why.

In the 1980s, moose numbered about 4,000 in the northwest part of the state; today, there are about 100. In Northeast Minnesota, the population has dropped by half since 2006, to 4,300 from more than 8,800. In 2012, the decline was steep enough - 35 percent - that the state and local Chippewa tribes, which rely on moose meat for subsistence, called off the moose hunt. The mortality rate rebounded slightly this year, but moose continue to die at twice the normal rate to sustain a population. Researchers elsewhere, along the southern edge of moose territory in New Hampshire and Montana, are also beginning to notice declines in the animals' numbers.

Hundreds of ducks are being found dead along Lake Erie and Lake Ontario, and the state Department of Environmental Conversation says extensive ice coverage is to blame.

The ducks have been found along the Lake Ontario shoreline, the Niagara River, in the open waters of Lake Erie, and Dunkirk Harbor. Conservationists say the fish eating birds found dead are emaciated and lack water-proofing, which is often a side effect of starvation.

Biologists believe the extensive ice coverage on the lakes has forced wintering waterfowl to concentrate in the limited remaining open water. That, in turn, reduces the food for all and, along with severe cold, is killing off the undernourished birds.

Though the mortality rate is difficult to estimate, the DEC categorized it as "extensive."

A snake took on a crocodile and won following a dramatic five-hour long battle.

The snake - thought to be python measuring around 10ft - constricted the crocodile to death, before dragging it to shore and eating it whole in fifteen minutes in front of a shocked crowd of onlookers.

The incident was captured on camera by author Tiffany Corlis at Lake Moondarra in Queensland, Australia.

Ms Corlis, from nearby Mount Isa, was enjoying breakfast at the idyllic spot when a group of canoeists alerted her to the fierce fight.

She said: "When we reached the water's edge the snake had wrapped itself around the croc and was tightening.