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Can behavior be controlled by genes? The case of honeybee work assignments

Wed, 18 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

ScienceDaily - By Yehuda Ben-Shahar - Apr. 18 (Research) - The pattern of conservation across species suggests that micro-RNAs are important regulators of social behavior not just during the bee's lifetime but also over evolutionary time, according to this Washington University study.

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Wolf Torture and Execution Continues in the Northern Rockies

Sun, 01 Apr 2012 00:00:00 -0700

earthisland.org - Apr. 01 (News) - Wolf advocates hope that these pictures will go viral, shaming a nation into facing the torture people inflict on animals and the moral and political failures that promote and legitimize it.

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Horses could soon be slaughtered for meat in US

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Associated Press - By Justin Juozapavicius - Nov. 30 (News Report) - Horses could soon be butchered in the U.S. for human consumption after Congress quietly lifted a 5-year-old ban on funding horse meat inspections, and activists say slaughterhouses could be up and running in as little as a month.

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8.7 million species exist on Earth, study estimates

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Washington Post - Aug. 23 (News Report) - For centuries scientists have pondered a central question: How many species exist on Earth? Now, a group of researchers has offered an answer: 8.7 million. Although the number is still an estimate, it represents the most rigorous mathematical analysis ye

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A New Study Shows That Global Warming Is Leading to Extinctions

Tue, 12 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Time - By Tara Thean - Jul. 12 (Special Report) - With all the climate conversation currently littering the Internet, and the myriad ways that extreme weather is linked to global warming, it's hard not to get confused about climate change sometimes – and given the sheer volume of muddled information out there, you might even be forgiven for being unconvinced by the arguments thus far. But University of Exeter scientists have brought us some simple proof that climate change seems to be as bad for our planet as we've been led to believe. Their study shows that the loss of animal and plant species that have already happened match previous predictions in terms of the relative risk to different species around the world. And based on that information, the scientists have made a frightening forecast: one in 10 species will be extinct by 2100 if climate change continues affecting the world the way it is now.

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Bug’s Penis Makes Loudest Animal Sound

Fri, 01 Jul 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Wired - By Mark Brown - Jul. 01 (News Report) - This minuscule water boatman might be smaller than a drawing pin, but it’s also the loudest animal on the planet. Well, relative to its body size, at least. The male lesser water boatman, aka Micronecta scholtzi, can create mating calls as loud as 99.2 decibels, which is the equivalent of sitting in the front row of a loud, full-blown orchestra, or standing 15 meters away from a hurtling freight train. “Remarkably,” said Stratchclyde University’s James Windmill in a press release, “even though 99 percent of sound is lost when transferring from water to air, the song is so loud that a person walking along the bank can actually hear these tiny creatures singing from the bottom of the river.”

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Horse welfare declines after closing of U.S. slaughter plants

Sat, 25 Jun 2011 00:00:00 -0700

billingsgazette.com - By Jan Falstad - Jun. 25 (News Report) - The closure of the last U.S. horse slaughter plants in the fall of 2007 has failed to reduce the number of horses shipped to slaughter.

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Bubbling sea signals coral threat

Sun, 29 May 2011 00:00:00 -0700

BBC News - By Richard Black - May. 29 (News) - Findings from a "natural laboratory" in seas off Papua New Guinea suggest that acidifying oceans will severely hit coral reefs by the end of the century.

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Werner Herzog Enters 'The Cave Of Forgotten Dreams'

Mon, 25 Apr 2011 00:00:00 -0700

NPR - By Terri Gross, Werner Herzog - Apr. 25 (Interview) - In 1994, three French cave explorers discovered hundreds of prehistoric paintings and engravings on the walls of the Chauvet Cave in southern France. Carbon dating has since shown that the depictions of rhinoceroses, lions, cave bears, horses, bison, mammoths and other animals are between 30,000 and 32,000 years old. That doesn't mean the ancient drawings are any less sophisticated than what artists create today, says filmmaker Werner Herzog. "Art ... as it bursts on the scene 32,000 years ago, is fully accomplished. It doesn't start with 'primitive scribblings' and first attempts like children would make drawings," Herzog says. "It's absolutely and fully accomplished." The acclaimed German director, who has produced, written and directed more than 40 films, gained exclusive access to the Chauvet caves. He tells their story and the story of the world's oldest cave paintings in The Cave of Forgotten Dreams, a 3-D documentary film. "Since early adolescence, I have been fascinated by cave paintings," Herzog tells Fresh Air's Terry Gross. "It actually was my personal intellectual awakening ... and shook me to the core — seeing an image of a horse [from the] prehistoric Stone Age. I couldn't believe it." Part of Herzog's interest in the paintings, he says, is the knowledge that tens of thousands of years ago, humans had the instinct to make art in order to represent the world around them.

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Number of Dead Dolphins and Whales in Gulf At Least 50 Times Higher

Thu, 31 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Huffington Post - By Rocky Kistner - Mar. 31 (News Report) - This young dolphin was one of the most recent of at least 138 dolphins that have died in the Gulf this year, nearly half of them premature or newborn calves. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg, scientists say. Many more dolphins are dying in the Gulf than are officially counted. New research released today shows that the average number for most species may be 50 times higher than what’s reported now, a conservative figure according to the authors

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Beaked whales 'scared' by sonar

Tue, 15 Mar 2011 00:00:00 -0700

BBC News - By Ella Davies - Mar. 15 (News Report) - Beaked whales are disturbed by military sonar, according to real-time data collected by scientists.

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Bruce Friedrich: U.S. Citizens Forced to Abandon Their Dogs in Egypt

Sat, 05 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Huffington Post - By Bruce Friedrich - Feb. 05 (Opinion) - This leaves the terrified evacuees with an impossible choice: leave their beloved companions behind to face certain death, or risk their own lives by remaining in Egypt in order to stay with their animals.

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Dog-burning trial: Jury deliberating in dog-burning case sends note to judge

Fri, 04 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Baltimore Sun - Feb. 04 (News) - The jury deliberating in the animal cruelty trial of Travers and Tremayne Johnson sent a note to the judge Friday morning suggesting it is having trouble reaching a verdict.

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Amtrak train strikes eagle in rare encounter

Fri, 04 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Washington Post - By Darryl Fears - Feb. 04 (News) - A symbol of American rail collided with a symbol of American might Thursday on a lonely stretch of track between Wilmington and Baltimore. Sadly, the bald eagle was no match for the Amtrak passenger train.

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Jury begins deliberations in dog burning trial of twin brothers

Thu, 03 Feb 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Baltimore Sun - Feb. 03 (News) - In closing arguments, prosecutors highlight evidence, defense cites lack of itAfter four full days of testimony and a morning's worth of attorneys' arguments, the animal cruelty case against brothers Travers and Tremayne Johnson is now in the hands of a Baltimore jury, which began deliberations Thursday afternoon.

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Carnivorous Plants Eat Poop From Tiny Bats

Sun, 30 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Wired - By Mark Brown - Jan. 30 (News) - In a bizarre example of a symbiotic relationship, tiny bats in Borneo have been found using a carnivorous plant as a toilet, feeding the pitcher plant with their droppings, while they safely roost in the plant’s traps. Ulmar Grafe, an associate professor at the Universiti Brunei Darussalam, was researching the pitcher plant — a giant, carnivorous vine with deep, pitfall cups that are used to trap prey — for a study published in Biology Letters. Grafe wanted to find out how the pitcher managed to find the nitrogen needed to survive in the nutrient-poor peat swamps of Borneo in southeast Asia.

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Spiderman on Broadway? ‘Been There, Done That,’ Say Ants

Mon, 24 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Miller-McCune - By Michael Todd - Jan. 24 (Interview) - Insect biologist Rob Dunn has uncovered a hot spot of insect biodiversity.

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South Africa's dancing stallions keep a tradition alive

Mon, 10 Jan 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Los Angeles Times - By Robyn Dixon - Jan. 10 (News Report) - South Africa's dancing stallions keep a tradition alive. Yet the Lipizzaners' story in South Africa — and their struggle for financial survival in recent years — is also symbolic of the country's culturalhistory: "White" culture, post-apartheid, has often fallen on hard times and the Lipizzaners are kept afloat by the ardor of a tiny group of hardworking enthusiasts.

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Undercover investigation of Smithfield Foods reveals factory farm horrors

Sat, 18 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Yahoo! News - By Brett Michael Dykes - Dec. 18 (Special Report) - The Lookout - If you enjoy eating pork occasionally, you might not want to read any further. But you probably should -- especially as America waits to learn the fate of the almost universally hailed food safety bill suddenly facing hurdles in Congress. This week the Humane Society released the results of its undercover investigation of a Virginia pig farm that's owned by Smithfield Foods, the largest pork producer in the world. A Humane Society investigator spent a month inside the Waverly, Va., facility, armed with a hidden camera

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Obama signs law banning 'crush videos' depicting animal cruelty

Fri, 10 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

CNN - By Bill Mears - Dec. 10 (News Report) - President Barack Obama has signed a law that specifically bans so-called "crush videos" -- depictions of small animals being tortured to death by humans. The legislation came in response to a Supreme Court ruling this year striking down a broader congressional law dealing with animal cruelty.

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In Her Defense, I'm Sure the Moose Had It Coming

Wed, 08 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

Huffington Post - By Aaron Sorkin - Dec. 08 (Opinion) - "Unless you've never worn leather shoes, sat upon a leather chair or eaten meat, save your condemnation." You're right, Sarah, we'll all just go fuck ourselves now. The snotty quote was posted by Sarah Palin on (like all the great frontier women who've come before her) her Facebook page to respond to the criticism she knew and hoped would be coming after she hunted, killed and carved up a Caribou during a segment of her truly awful reality show, Sarah Palin's Alaska, broadcast on The-Now-Hilariously-Titled Learning Channel.

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Beekeepers Ask EPA to Remove Pesticide Linked to Colony Collapse Disorder, Citing Leaked Agency Memo

Wed, 08 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

panna.org - Dec. 08 (Special Report) - Beekeepers and environmentalists today called on EPA to remove a pesticide linked to Colony Collapse Disorder (CCD), citing a leaked EPA memo that discloses a critically flawed scientific support study. The November 2nd memo identifies a core study underpinning the registration of the insecticide clothianidin as unsound after EPA quietly re-evaluated the pesticide just as it was getting ready to allow a further expansion of its use. Clothianidin (product name “Poncho”) has been widely used as a seed treatment on many of the country’s major crops for eight growing seasons under a “conditional registration” granted while EPA waited for Bayer Crop Science, the pesticide’s maker, to conduct a field study assessing the insecticide’s threat to bee colony health.

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Video: Giant panda cub gets clean bill of health

Fri, 03 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0800

The Guardian - Dec. 03 - A newborn giant panda cub is examined by veterinarians during a health checkup at Atlanta zoo in the United States

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Cricket Earns Big Testicles Title

Thu, 11 Nov 2010 00:00:00 -0800

BBC News - Nov. 11 (News) - Researchers discover that bushcrickets have the largest testicles proportionally, and use them in a promiscuous mating strategy.

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Honeybee Killer Found by Army and Entomologists

Wed, 06 Oct 2010 00:00:00 -0700

New York Times - By Kirk Johnson - Oct. 06 (News Report) - Since 2006, 20-40 percent of the bee colonies in the United States have suffered “colony collapse.” Now, a unique partnership — of military scientists and entomologists — appears to have achieved a major breakthrough ... it may be the first time that the defense machinery of the post-Sept. 11 Homeland Security Department and academia have teamed up to address a problem that both sides say they might never have solved on their own.

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