Living the Scientific Life

Now on ScienceBlogs: Check out Ask Dr. Isis: Getting into Grad School on On Becoming a Domestic and Laboratory Goddess during the day. This not only makes them more vulnerable to attack but, because the birds need to be awake in daylight hours to feed, creates stress and exhaustion.

Worthy Causes to $upport Birds may not be as "bird•brained" as we thought. Zebra finches show many features of sleep, which had previously been assumed to be the sole preserve of mammals. The finding raises new questions about the complexity of the bird brain and about the evolution of sleep as we know it. Even though birds lack a neocortex, the researchers found that the birds display all of the characteristics of mammalian sleep. "The neocortex is at best sufficient, but not necessary for the production of these mammalian patterns," observes Philip Low at the Salk Institute for Biological Sciences in La Jolla, California, US.

The problem of keeping track of thousands of near•identical African penguins may have been solved. Researchers have developed surveillance technology that can identify individual birds and then monitor them over long periods of time. The team says the system will boost our understanding of the animals; it could even help ecologists solve the mystery of how long penguins live. The researchers say it could also track other species, from cheetahs to sharks. The technology is on display at the Royal Society's Summer Exhibition.

People Hurting Birds

Bugs Bunny was hunted by Elmer Fudd. The birds at Boston's Logan International Bookmarking/Networking Airport are stalked by truck 129. That's the story line of an avian drama posted on YouTube and set to the famous cartoon music "Kill the Wabbit," which is a twist on the "Ride of the Valkyries" from Richard Wagner's opera "The Valkyrie." "That was shocking," said the amateur videographer, who picked up a camera after seeing an airport employee take out several birds with lethal force last summer from her porch deck.

International presented the European Parliament with alarming data about the extent of seabird bycatch globally and in Europe. At the same time, BirdLife 1. Marking classes interactive: better learning welcomed the long awaited first steps of the European Commission to tackle the or just more fun? DISCOVERING BIOLOGY IN problem by developing a Community Plan of Action on seabirds with the intention Recent Posts A DIGITAL WORLD of completing it next year. "With 300,000 seabirds, including about 100,000 2. Quality assessment of Today's Mystery Bird for you diagnostic accuracy to Identify albatrosses, dying annually as bycatch in longline and trawl fisheries •• which HEALTHSKILLS: SKILLS FOR Christopher Street/Sheridan include many vessels operating under EU flags •• the European Community (EC) HEALTHY LIVING Square Subway Art 3, Panel 3. Oestradiol makes women 1 has the responsibility to put in place effective measures to tackle this readily hot and hard to keep Today's Mystery Bird for you solvable problem" said Dr Euan Dunn, Head of the Marine Policy at the RSPB OBSERVATIONS OF A NERD to Identify 4. Phase Alignment of Wild Ocean at AMNH (BirdLife in the UK), in a presentation at the Fisheries Committee of the European Neocortical Gamma Nature Blogging 101 Parliament. Oscillations by Christopher Street/Sheridan Hippocampal Theta Waves Square Subway Art 3 PHYSIOLOGY PHYSICS WOVEN FINE What Happened to Tangled The government of Kenya, through the National Environment Management Bank? Authority (NEMA), has approved a proposal to turn 20,000 hectares of the pristine 5. Don’t Waste Your Time on Today's Mystery Bird for you Social Media to Identify Tana Delta into irrigated sugarcane plantations. Conservationists and villagers SCIENCETEXT The Difference Between living in the Delta, which provides refuge for 350 species of bird, lions, elephants, Women and Men Christopher Street/Sheridan rare sharks and reptiles including the Tana writhing skink, believe the decision is Square Subway Art 2, Panel 3 illegal and are determined to block the development. "This decision is a national

disaster and will devastate the Delta. The Tana's ecology will be destroyed yet the Powered by SMG Technology

Recent Comments economic gains will be pitiful," said Paul Matiku, Executive Director of Nature

Rick Wright on Today's Kenya (BirdLife in Kenya). "It will seriously damage our priceless national assets Mystery Bird for you to and will put the livelihoods of the people living in the Delta in jeopardy." Identify PZ Myers on What Happened to Tangled Bank? 1. Test Subjects Who Call the Scientist Mom or Dad Kyle on Why Do We Yawn? People Helping Birds 2. Q & A: Avoiding Malnutrition When Mike on Nature Blogging Produce Was Scarce 101 3. Observatory: Monkeys Pick Right Stone JPS on Wild Ocean at AMNH for a Tough Nut Every couple of hundred yards, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation 4. Study Warns of Threat to Coasts From David Rankin on Today's Rising Sea Levels 5. Wind Farm Off Cape Cod Clears Hurdle Mystery Bird for you to Commission biologist stopped to listen for the short, shrill "sripp, sripp" of the Get more from NYTimes.com Identify aedis on Today's Mystery red•cockaded woodpecker, a species of special concern in Florida and an Bird for you to Identify endangered species on the federal list. For an hour, he heard nuthatches, pine Rick Wright on Today's Mystery Bird for you to warblers and red•winged blackbirds, but no red•cockaded woodpeckers •• often Identify referred to as RCWs. "I think I hear one," Mike Baranski finally said. "I hope." Then Russell on Today's Mystery he saw them •• two adults and a female fledgling he'd banded recently •• and Bird for you to Identify reflibman on Meme: Five documented the sighting. Books I Wish I'd Never Read Anton Oliver, the New Zealand rugby star and former All Blacks captain, is now Blog Bling tackling problems of a different kind •• seabird conservation! Anton is embarking on a new career this July when he starts a Masters course at Oxford University on 'Biodiversity, Conservation and Management'. In preparation for the course, Anton is now working with BirdLife International in Fiji's outlying Ringgold Islands where he is studying the link between biodiversity and economic security.

In an unprecedented move against rogue cattle ranchers in the Amazon, the Brazilian government has seized livestock grazing there illegally, the new environment minister announced. Officials carted off 3,100 head of cattle that they said were being raised on an ecological reserve in the state of Para, in an operation intended to serve as a warning to other ranchers grazing an estimated 60,000 head on illegally deforested land in Amazonia, the environment minister, Carlos Minc, said. "No more being soft," Mr. Minc told reporters in the capital, Brasilia. "Those that don't respect environmental legislation, your cattle are going to become barbecue for Fome Zero," he said, referring to the government's food program for the poor. GrrlScientist comment: Wow! Amazing, and wonderful! I wish we had a few people like this in the United States, especially in the Fish and Wildlife Service.

Munster, France is a village with a dual population: Humans live in charming medieval houses; white storks and their half•ton nests rule the rooftops. Gerard Wey, known in these parts as Papa Stork, is the emissary between man and bird. If an anxious villager reports a stork in danger, Wey and his crews rush to the scene. If the birds stage too large a takeover, he's there to remove some nests.

Bird Mysteries

Seaford's cherished black•legged kittiwake colony has dropped by 50 per cent in the last year according to experts. The colony is one of only a few in the south coast and can be found on the cliffs just outside the town. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) said in this area the numbers had dropped from 800 pairs in 2007 to around 400 pairs this year. "Last year around 800 pairs and their chicks left Seaford to spend the winter over the Atlantic but only 400 odd have returned. Something has gone wrong somewhere, but exactly what is a mystery. Countless things could have happened out at sea •• they could have hit stormy weather, or not found enough food, or it could be something else entirely. There's still a lot we don't know about sealife, which is why protecting it is so very important."

Rare Birds News

Archives A pair of elderly bald eagles at the Assiniboine Park Zoo in Canada has hatched and January 2009 is raising two chicks, astounding staff and wildlife experts. The pair, believed to be December 2008 November 2008 into their 40's is breaking species breeding records. The zoo says it's rare for an October 2008 eagle to live to 30 years old, let alone live to 40 and still be breeding. A 40•year•old September 2008 August 2008 eagle is the equivalent of a 110 year•old human. "This is probably a world record. July 2008 That's a guess, but I would bet on it," said David Curtis, who takes care of native June 2008 animals at the zoo. May 2008 April 2008 Conservationists are overjoyed that the corncrake, which has been on the March 2008 endangered list for more than 80 years, has returned to the Nene Washes, in February 2008 January 2008 Coates, near Whittelsey, in England following a re•introduction project. Twelve December 2007 male corncrakes have so far been recorded this summer at the specially created site November 2007 •• making this probably the greatest single concentration of the bird in the southern October 2007 September 2007 half of England. August 2007 July 2007 One of the rarest species of birds in Britain has nested at the RSPB reserve on the June 2007 May 2007 Somerset Levels, for the first time in 40 years. A pair of great bitterns, a bird closely April 2007 related to the heron, have nested at the Ham Wall RSPB nature reserve. Tony March 2007 Whitehead of the RSPB said: "We've got birds coming over from Europe in the February 2007 January 2007 wintertime chancing across places like this. They find it to their liking and because December 2006 it is managed with birds like bitterns in mind, they stick around. I could really see a November 2006 population building up." October 2006 September 2006 August 2006 A workshop to develop an International Single Species Action Plan for Endangered July 2006 White•winged Flufftail, Sarothrura ayresi, has been held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. June 2006 Although the flufftail has been recorded at nine wetland sites in South Africa May 2006 April 2006 between November and March, the only evidence of breeding comes from three March 2006 wetland sites in the central highlands of Ethiopia between July and September. It is February 2006 not known whether a single population migrates between Ethiopia and South January 2006 Africa, or each country hosts its own sub•population. Studies have suggested that

Deep archives the birds which breed in Ethiopia remain well into the dry season, and may wander within the country, rather than migrating. More than 330 articles on topics ranging from avian influenza to evolution of A once critically endangered species of parrot now under threat from a highly birds contagious virus may be offered a renewed chance of survival by a conservationist at the University of Kent. Dr Jim Groombridge, Lecturer in Biodiversity Rotating Drinking Pals Conservation at the University's Durrell Institute of Conservation and Ecology The Quantum Pontiff (DICE), has been awarded GBP215,594 from the Leverhulme Trust to lead a McBlawg Discovering Biology in a three•year project that aims to determine what factors drive the Mauritius Digital World parakeet's susceptibility to infection, and in particular the spread of the highly Pharyngula Good Math, Bad Math contagious (and often lethal) parrot•specific virus Psittacine Beak and Feather Aetiology Disease (PBFD) that has recently infected this endangered parrot. Nautilus Stranger Fruit The Omni Mouth Neurotopia v 2.0 Avian Zoonotics News OlduvaiGeorge Second Sight Uncertain Principles A biologist and undergraduate student have discovered that what's good for an Denialism Blog A Blog Around The Clock area's bird population is also good for people living nearby. The research, by John P. Swaddle and Stavros E. Calos, published June 25 in the online peer•reviewed Rotating Mutual Links journal PLoS ONE, indicates that areas which have a more diverse bird population

Rhinocrisy (biodiversity) show much lower incidences of West Nile virus infection in the human Junie Moon population. West Nile develops rapidly in bird populations, and then can be passed Women in Science to humans or other animals through a vector mechanism, often a mosquito. "We Life, Birds, and Everything don't yet know the precise mechanism that drives this pattern, but it's likely to be The Digital Cuttlefish due to diverse areas having relatively few of the bird species that are particularly DC Birding Trousers to Grow Into competent hosts and reservoirs for the virus," Swaddle said. The Reaction academia and me Some cases of human bird flu in Indonesia have been variously misdiagnosed as Peregrine's Bird Blog dengue fever and typhoid, resulting in the late administration of drugs, a leading Mateusz Weblog Everything and more doctor in the country said. Indonesia has had the highest number of human H5N1 The Lippard Blog cases in the world and while mortality rates are around 60 percent in other places, Guadalupe Storm‐Petrel the figure is highest, or at 81 percent, in Indonesia. "It (H5N1) is misdiagnosed Day By Day initially as dengue, bacterial pneumonia, typhoid and upper respiratory tract infection because of similar clinical features (symptoms)," said Sardikin Giriputro, Reading/Viewing director of the Sulianti Saroso Infectious Disease Hospital in Indonesia.

H5N1 Avian Influenza has been identified in domestic birds in Pakistan. Streaming Birds

On BirdNote, for the week of 30 June 2008. BirdNotes is really taking off! As of this week, BirdNotes can be heard seven mornings per week at 8:58•9:00am throughout Western Washington state and Southern British Columbia, Canada, on KPLU radio in Seattle, KOHO radio in Wenatchee, WA, WNPR radio in Connecticut, KWMR radio in West Marin, California, KTOO radio in Juneau, Alaska, and KMBH radio in Harlingen, Texas. All episodes are available in the BirdNote archives, both in written transcript and mp3 formats, along with photographs, so you can listen to them anytime, anywhere. Listener ideas and comments are welcomed.[Podcast and rss].

Do you have bird videos that you'd like to share with the public? Do you want to watch other people's bird videos? If so, Bird Cinema is for you!

Bird Book News I've Contributed To

This week's issue of the Birdbooker Report lists ecology, evolution, natural history and bird books that are (or will soon be) available for purchase.

Would you like an avian anatomy book •• free? If so, you can download one, two or all three books as PDFs by going to this entry, where you can read about the books that are available and choose your free copies. Note that each book must be uploaded to someone's computer at least once every 90 days, or the file will be automatically deleted by RapidShare, so please share this link with your friends.

Miscellaneous Bird News

Each June in the Carolinas, aquatic turtle females lumber onto land to make their nests in dry places. The naturalists at Hilton Pond often encounter egg•bound females along their trails, but "This Week at Hilton Pond" they got a rare up•close look at a male Painted Turtle. For a photo essay of this wandering shelled reptile out of his element, please visit their current installment for 15•21 June 2008. As always they include a tally of all birds banded or recaptured during the period, plus a follow•up note on the effects of last week's furnace•busting lightning strike.

Ornithologists are ecstatic as some of the winter avian guests from the northern hemisphere have made India's Bhitarkanika wetland spots their permanent home, a unique phenomenon. Though the migrant birds never prefer prolonging their stay once winter months pass by, for a change some of these species were spotted in the area during the gruelling summer and even two weeks back, park officials say. Stuck by the unusual development, wildlife personnel are now keeping close tab on the birds' movements.

Linked here is an amazing series of images of a female mallard trying to protect one

Web Library of her ducklings from being eaten by a heron. These amazing pictures show, frame by frame, how the heron swooped on the duck and her family as they swam near Science/Nature The Alex Foundation Bray Harbour in County Wicklow. Avicultural Society of America Ask Dr. Science Avicultural Society Burung Indonesia Previous : : Birds in the News : : Next Darwin Awards Darwin OnLine The Graduate Junction Indonesian Parrot Project Integrity in Science LabLit LivingBird Minnesota Public Radio The Fine Print: Thanks to Caren, Diane, Ellen, Jeremy and Ron for sending story National Association of Biology Teachers links. Thanks in advance to Ian Paulsen for catching my typos; as you probably National Center for know by now, I put a few typographical errors in these documents just so Ian can Science Education National Postdoctoral find them! Association Natural History Find more posts in: Life Science ShareThis New Scientist Oriental Bird Club Pacific Islands Books Comments Papua Bird Club "Kill the Wabbit," Public Library of Science #1 ScienceBlogs (English) The cartoon is called What's Opera, Doc? ScienceBlogs (Deutsch) I know all the important stuff. Science Daily Science News Posted by: Bob O'H | June 30, 2008 12:51 PM Science Now Scientific American The Scientist SEED Union of Concerned Scientists USFWS Forensics Lab World Parrot Trust World Science Higher Education Adjunct Nation

Miscellaneous

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