Animals Once Thought Lost, Found Again

I can’t think of a happier note for a Christmas Day post than the re-discovery of not one, but two species of animals once thought extinct.

In Australia, there’s the crest-tailed mulgara, a small carnivorous marsupial long thought extinct. It has recently been re-discovered in Sturt National Park, which is located near the center of Australia. Next year, the park had already been planning on starting to eradicate imported predators like rabbits and cats; this program now benefits from the new discovery’s extra energy jolt.

Meanwhile, almost 5,000 miles away, the Oriental blue clearwing, a blue-and-white clearwing moth that pretends to be a bee has been re-discovered in the Taman Negara National Park in Malaysia.

“You think about moths and you envision a grey, hairy insect that is attracted to light,” said Marta Skowron Volponi, a Ph.D. student at the University of Gdansk, co-founder of the ClearWing Foundation for Biodiversity and lead author of the paper. “But this  is dramatically different—it is beautiful, shiny blue in sunlight and it comes out during the day; and it is a master of disguise, mimicking bees on multiple levels and even hanging out with them.”

Among other things, these amazing re-discoveries show beyond a shadow of a doubt the importance of national parks. How many wonders might there be in these parks, hiding and waiting for the right time to emerge?

 

Racoons Having Hotter Saturday Night Than I Am

I have a huge backlog of things I want to post (sorry about the silence), but I thought I couldn’t do better than this little bit of urban wildlife from the Washington, D.C. blog, Popville: “Two very horny raccoons on our front porch who spent the better part of two hours making out and then forming a mini fight club with a third raccoon.”

There’s some debate in the article comments about whether, in fact, these are horny raccoons or just a playful family unit of raccoons, and whether they’re cute or terrifying, but whatever they are, they’re entertaining, at least.

Good News for Seahorses

It’s a pleasure to report some upbeat news: two species of seahorses have recently been confirmed as making their homes in the Thames in the UK. Starting in 2008, one or two seahorses a year would be found in the Thames, but it was unclear if they were outlier adventurers or signs of a new population. Now, however, the verdict is in: scientists have found six or seven this year, and since seahorses don’t travel very far in a year, it’s clear that they’re part of a resident population. Seahorses are very sensitive to pollution, so the news is also a welcome marker of a cleaner Thames.

Read more…

Just a quick note to say that this upcoming conference, Wildspeak, put on by the International League of Conservation Photographers from November 14-15 in Washington, D.C. looks amazing.

I love the combination of photography/mapping/science/indigenous peoples and public lands discussions!

There are so many threads that lead people to taking an interest in wildlife and nature, and I’m glad to see a conference bringing many of those threads together. If you’re in the area and can stop by, please do leave a note to say how it was; I’d love to hear.

Life on the Edge

Recent research led by Newcastle University and Imperial College London shows that half the world’s forest habitat is now within 500m of a ‘forest edge’ due to the expansion of road networks, logging, agriculture and other human activity. Combining two of my favorite fields of study — spatial analysis and conservation — the researchers looked more deeply at those forest edges and discovered that 85% of species’ abundances are affected, either positively or negatively, by forest edges.

Read more…

Happy All Saints’ Day?

Clearly, I meant to post this yesterday, but All Saints’ Day will do as well. Thanks to Zeb Hallock for letting me post this crazy video! An even bigger thanks to him for helping the stranded starfish get back into the water.

Society Cats

It’s been a really hectic week at work, and so much has happened in the world of animals! I just haven’t had a moment to write about it.

One really interesting study I happened across examines the social lives of cougars — specifically, the fact that they have a social life. Scientists had long thought of cougars as “solitary, robotic killing machines,” only to recently discover that female cougars, at any rate, have quite strong social bonds. They will spend a few days in each others’ company, and will even give each other access to their kill sites, sharing meals.

I had the amazing opportunity to stay at Dulini, a safari camp in South Africa a few years ago, and a video they posted recently reminded me of this study.

 

In this case, it’s a courting leopard couple sharing a meal — something that is, supposedly, never done.

Video and new technologies may be forcing us to re-evaluate this behavior that non-social cats theoretically never indulge in. Is it possible that many of the large cats enjoy social bonds, and all the independence of cats has largely been a figment of our own imaginations?

Sloth Day Celebrated Slothfully

I couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate sloth day than to do it a day late.

That, and by posting an alarmingly charming video of David Attenborough discussing the bathroom habits of sloths. How *does* he make absolutely everything sound so lovely?

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