grrlscientist | November 19, 2007tags: Birds in the News, BirdNews, ornithology, birds, avian, newsletter
Black-necked weaver, Ploceus nigricollis.
Image: Basia Kruszewska, author of India Ink. [Wallpaper size]
Birds in Research
A native Hawaiian bird has surprised researchers with its ability to survive malaria, apparently thanks to a number of resistant populations that have spread throughout the Hawaiian forest. The discovery hints that genes for natural resistance to the avian disease may lurk inside the genomes of many of Hawaii's endangered birds. Two years ago, researchers reported that one species, the amakihi,…
grrlscientist | November 19, 2007tags: cats, kizzy, cat does dog tricks, streaming video
This is a video showing the amazing Kizzy, an eight-year-old bengal cat that does tricks as well as any dog does [2:03]
grrlscientist | November 18, 2007Those of you who have been unemployed realize that businesses are always trying to figure out another way to punish you for committing the crime of being unemployed while not being wealthy, but hey, this has got to be the worst: one of our elected congresscritters is working on another way to further disenfranchise you. According to a news story that was published today, Senator Tom Coburn (a rethuglican from the proud goat-roping state of Oklahoma) is actively seeking to prevent people from protecting themselves from genetic discrimination. HUH??
Okay, let's just pretend that you have lost…
grrlscientist | November 18, 2007tags: house sparrow, Passer domesticus, birds, Image of the Day
House sparrow, Passer domesticus, which I usually refer to as an English Sparrow, in honor of where it originally came from. This is a young male that lives in Central Park, NYC.
Image: Bob Levy, author of Club George. [larger view].
More below the fold;
The photographer writes: I enjoyed the series of sparrow photos very much but I did not recall seeing the House Sparrow, [which is] often taken for granted. These birds intrigue me for a number of reasons not the least of which is the history of how they came to be here.…
grrlscientist | November 18, 2007This story reminds me of those days not so long ago when I was teaching molecular biology to a small group of motivated and talented high school sophomores and juniors. Basically, a group of high school biotechnology seniors from Abraham Lincoln High School in San Francisco, California, were invited to participate in the international Genetically Engineered Machine competition (iGEM), hosted at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. iGEM focuses on the hot new field of synthetic biology: this field genetically manipulates proteins and other molecules that are constructed by living cells…
grrlscientist | November 17, 2007
Image: orphaned.
It seems that I am really having some strange but memorable Thanksgiving holidays in NYC. For example, since I arrived in NYC, I spent my first three Thanksgivings at a local natural history museum (whose name I am not allowed to mention on my blog) where I was employed as a postdoc, wandering among the ornithiscians and sauriscians while the last of the giant Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons were inflated outside the windows, floating on the breezes in a vaguely threatening way. Honestly, those three were the best Thanksgiving celebrations I've ever had.
My next…
grrlscientist | November 17, 2007One of my readers, who shall remain anonymous, recently purchased the 2006 book, Chosen by a Horse, by Susan Richards, for me. I loved that book so much that I reviewed it on my blog (I usually only review new books, and almost all of the books that I review are sent to me by either the publisher's publicity agent or by the author, free of charge). Well, if you peek at the comments for that review, you will find that the author found my review and wrote a comment on it.
I used that opportunity to write back to her, and she responded. I learned that she has a new book coming out in June 2008…
grrlscientist | November 17, 2007tags: white-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys, birds, Image of the Day
White-crowned sparrow, Zonotrichia leucophrys, in the central valley of California.
Image: Madhu [larger view].
grrlscientist | November 16, 2007tags: song sparrow, Melospiza melodia, birds, Image of the Day
A friend who is a professor of Biology at KSU sent me a bunch of lovely images of sparrows that he took recently while birding. The song sparrow is one of the species that I studied for my dissertation work, although most of my dissertation focused on the white-crowned sparrow. These images are scheduled to appear daily at 3 pm from 6 November through 16 November.
Song sparrow, Melospiza melodia.
Image: Dave Rintoul, KSU. [larger size].
grrlscientist | November 16, 2007tags: hawk-headed parrot, red-fan parrot, Deroptyus accipitrinus, clicker training, streaming video
As some of you know, I recently added a four-month-old hawk-headed (red-fan) parrot, Deroptyus a. accipitrinus, to my household. I plan to learn how to clicker-train this bird (I already have the necessary tools and books). Below the fold is an example of another young Hawk-headed parrot, named Scooter (owned by Jeannie), who was approximately seven months old in this video. This training session focuses on teaching the bird how to place a small ball into a bowl. [4:14]
grrlscientist | November 15, 2007
Even when life is overwhelming and I find myself hiding from everyone and everything, as I have been for awhile now, I still find pleasure in feeding my birds. I know that many of you understand and share in this pleasure, so I thought I'd tell you what's on my parrots' menu for this week;
frozen thawed mixed vegetables (corn, peas, whole green beans, lima beans, asparagus pieces, red Bell pepper pieces, carrot chunks)
fresh corn on the cob, cut into 1-inch chunks
fresh cranberries
fresh globe grapes with seeds, cut in half
fresh mango, cut into 0.5-inch chunks
fresh kiwi fruit, with…
grrlscientist | November 15, 2007Do you use gmail as your primary (or only) email server? Well, you'd better be careful because several dozen gmail users per month have been experiencing problems recently -- problems such as mysteriously losing some, most or all their email messages.
What does Google have to say about this?
According to a Google spokesman, as far as Google is concerned, "most issues like this are a result of phishing attacks or compromised passwords -- or sometimes simply messages mistakenly deleted or marked as spam -- not a data corruption issue."
But unfortunately, the missing email problems at Google…
grrlscientist | November 15, 2007tags: swamp sparrow, Melospiza georgiana, birds, Image of the Day
A friend who is a professor of Biology at KSU sent me a bunch of lovely images of sparrows that he took recently while birding. These images are scheduled to appear daily at 3 pm from 6 November through 16 November.
Swamp sparrow, Melospiza georgiana.
Image: Dave Rintoul, KSU. [larger size].
grrlscientist | November 15, 2007tags: book review, Susan Richards, Chosen By a Horse
This wonderful book is the poignant memoir of a woman who rescues a maltreated horse, and discovers that this amazing horse ends up rescuing her. Chosen By a Horse: How a Broken Horse Fixed a Broken Heart by Susan Richards (NYC: Harvest; 2006) is the amusing and touching true story about the author's decision to take in a starved and abused standardbred broodmare that was part of a group of 42 racehorses rescued by the local SPCA. At first, Richards chose a horse from a list based on her name but then, when she and the animal control…
grrlscientist | November 15, 2007tags: slow motion popcorn, streaming video
Okay, this is a short video, but it is nonetheless interesting. Have you ever wondered what popping popcorn looks like in slow motion? Well, thanks to a special camera that captures 5,400 frames per second, you can now see exactly what happens to popcorn [0:17]
grrlscientist | November 14, 2007tags: Lincoln's sparrow, Melospiza lincolnii, birds, Image of the Day
A friend who is a professor of Biology at KSU sent me a bunch of lovely images of sparrows that he took recently while birding. These images are scheduled to appear daily at 3 pm from 6 November through 16 November.
Lincoln's sparrow, Melospiza lincolnii.
Image: Dave Rintoul, KSU. [larger size].
grrlscientist | November 14, 2007tags: the world's most deadly animal, streaming video
Do you know what the world's most deadly animal (for humans) is? The grizzly bear? Or wolves? Or maybe the humble hippopotamus? There is a streaming video below the fold that answers this question. [1:58]
The females of most mosquito species suck blood (hematophagy) from warm-blooded animals. This has made mosquitoes one of the most deadly vectors known to man, killing millions of people over thousands of years and continuing to kill millions per year through the spread of diseases.
grrlscientist | November 13, 2007tags: Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Regulus calendula, birds, Image of the Day
A friend who is a professor of Biology at KSU sent me a bunch of lovely images of sparrows along with this non-sparrow, that he took recently while birding. These images are scheduled to appear daily at 3 pm from 6 November through 16 November.
Ruby-crowned Kinglet, Regulus calendula.
Image: Dave Rintoul, KSU. [larger size].
grrlscientist | November 13, 2007
Carry a cool wand;
The unconfirmed rumor is that his boss told him: "You can keep your job if you wear that outfit for the remainder of 2007."
grrlscientist | November 13, 2007tags: wifi detector shirt, geek wear, gift ideas, holiday gifts
What is this? It is a shirt that detects the presence of wifi signals where ever you happen to be, and shows the strength of those signals on an animated emblem on the front of it, as you see here. Not only can you see whether wifi is available where ever you might be located, but everyone else who is nearby can also see it. The only sad thing about this is that it doesn't show whether the wifi signals are secured or free, but otherwise, this is the ultimate geek shirt!