grrlscientist | February 23, 2007Researchers have documented 22 cases of wild chimpanzees fashioning wooden spears to poke at smaller primates sheltering in cavities of hollow branches or tree trunks. Chimpanzees have not been previously observed hunting other animals with tools.
"There were hints that this behaviour might occur, but it was one time at a different site," said Jill Pruetz, assistant professor of anthropology at Iowa State University, US and the study's lead author. Pruetz and her colleague, Paco Bertolani, made the discovery at their research site in Fongoli, Senegal, between March 2005 and July 2006.
"While…
grrlscientist | February 23, 2007This quiz might be more accurate than the previous one for diagnosing your linguistic profile.
Your Linguistic Profile:
45% General American English
25% Yankee
15% Dixie
10% Upper Midwestern
0% Midwestern
What Kind of American English Do You Speak?
grrlscientist | February 23, 2007She seemed like any other ordinary three-month-old kitten but she wasn't. Finally, her human family noticed there was something different about her. A closer examination of the frisky feline's paws revealed that this kitten had 26 toes -- so they named her "extra".
"We counted and then recounted but we had it right the first time," said Kaelene Gerrard, who lives with her partner Eli Eliu and daughters Mercy, six, and 12-year-old Shardae in New Zealand.
Extra has seven toes on each front paw and six toes on each back paw - instead of the normal five on the front feet and four on the back.…
grrlscientist | February 23, 2007Howard Norman's new book, Devotion (NYC: Houghton-Mifflin, 2007) begins on 19 August 1985, with a fist fight between David Kozol and his new father-in-law, William Field. This fight -- which occurred for reasons that remain mysterious until nearly the end of the book -- ends up in the street where William is hit by a taxi, injuring his pelvis and larynx.
From this dramatic beginning, the author then carefully fleshes out the story by moving forward and backward from this pivotal event to provide a glimpse into the lives and motivations of his protagonists.
From the moment that David first…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007Tolkein is a six-year-old howler monkey who lives at the Port Lympne Wild Animal Park near Hythe in the UK. When she was just a juvenile, she developed cataracts in both eyes and became totally blind, so she was completely dependant on her keepers for her needs. There was little hope that she would ever see her own hand -- let alone her own baby.
However, eighteen months ago, the staff decided to try a cateract operation in an effort to restore her sight. The procedure was a success and after a period of recuperation she was introduced to Clyde, a male who had recently arrived from Singapore…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007Did you know that North America had its own species of zebra? Or that there was a wolf-like carnivorous mammal -- with hooves? And there once was a horned rodent whose corkscrew-shaped burrows are still visible today? If this sort of thing interests you then you will enjoy Donald Prothero's book, After the Dinosaurs: The Age of Mammals (Bloomington, IN: University of Indiana Press, 2006).
With the exception of birds, dinosaurs became extinct 65 million years ago when a giant bolide crashed into the earth just off the Yucatan peninsula. This extinction left thousands of niches open for other…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007
Tree overlooking Craters of the Moon National Park.
Image: James Neeley.
As long as you send images to me (and I hope it will be for forever), I shall continue to share them with my readership. My purpose for posting these images is to remind all of us of the grandeur of the natural world and that there is a world out there that is populated by millions of unique species. We are a part of this world whether we like it or not: we have a choice to either preserve these species or to destroy them in search of short-term monetary gains. But if we decide to destroy these other life forms, the…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007
Swarms of giant hornets are getting ready to invade Britain. The 1.8 inch long insects feed their young with the larvae of bees and they can destroy a nest of 30,000 honeybees in several hours. Already, they have devastated bee populations in large areas of France.
The Asian hornets, with a three-inch wingspan, can also attack humans with their stings. Their string has been compared to a hot nail entering the body.
"There's no doubt that these hornets are heading north and will probably find their way to Britain," said Stuart Hine, of the Natural History Museum in London. "However, they…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007Scottish ministers have announced funding for what has been described as the world's biggest wave energy farm. The Pelamis device has been tested at the European Marine Energy Centre (Emec) on Orkney by Leith-based company Ocean Power Delivery. Scottish Power wants to commission four more at the same site.
The large, tubular segments were taken to a site off the northern coast of Portugal last year for a project which aimed to generate enough power for 1,500 households. Now Scottish Power is planning a venture which it believes could create enough power for 2,000 homes.
The biggest single…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007The immigration debate blows up when the Pilgrims protest limitations to their rights in America. See the streaming video below the fold.
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tags: streaming video, humor, immigration debate
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007tags: Tasmanian Devil, cancer, Devil Facial Tumor Disease, endangered species
A healthy Tasmanian devil, Sarcophilus harrisii, is shown in this photo from Tasmania's Department of Primary Industries. Researchers estimate the wild population has fallen from 140,000 in the 1990s to 80,000 due to Devil Facial Tumor Disease (DFTD), an illness that creates grotesque tumors on the animals' snouts that lead to starvation within a year.
A cancer that causes facial tumors on Australia's Tasmanian devil has brought the carnivorous marsupial to the brink of extinction, a leading researcher has said…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2007The 43rd edition of I and the Bird is now available for your reading pleasure. This blog carnival focuses on wild birds.
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007Rogelio Zacaula plucks an ear of corn from his field with the pride of a prospector unearthing the gold that legend says is buried in the slopes surrounding the nearby Orizaba volcano.
International corn prices driven by the burgeoning U.S. ethanol industry have soared to their highest in a decade, making farmers like Zacaula feel like they just won the jackpot.
''I have never seen prices like this,'' said Zacaula, 66, who has been growing corn since he was 10. "We suffered for so many years, years in which no one even wanted to buy our crop -- until now.''
Corn had languished around $2 a…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007Malaria is one of the top three deadliest diseases in the developing world. It is resurging worldwide because of resistance to drugs and the lack of an effective vaccine. But now, Northwestern University researchers have discovered how malaria parasites persuade red blood cells to engulf them -- and how to block the invading parasites. The malaria marauders hack into the red cell's signaling system and steal the molecular equivalent of its password to spring open the door to the cell. But researchers have found that a common blood pressure medication -- propranolol -- jams the signal to…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007
Siberian, or Amur, tiger, Panthera tigris altaica.
The photographer writes; Zeff, a 13 year-old female Amur tiger kept at Tiger Mountain [at the Bronx Zoo]. She may look like she's snarling, but this was actually the end of a yawn.
Image: Brian Switek.
As long as you send images to me (and I hope it will be for forever), I shall continue to share them with my readership. My purpose for posting these images is to remind all of us of the grandeur of the natural world and that there is a world out there that is populated by millions of unique species. We are a part of this world whether we…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007Today, I read a story in the latest issue of New Scientist that discussed how human activities are driving evolution of animals in dramatic and often unexpected ways. In effect, we have turned earth into a large uncontrolled evolutionary laboratory.
Biologists are struggling to understand what is happening although there is no shortage of species that are evolving in response to human interference. For example, chinook salmon in the Snake River are growing smaller and smaller, possibly as the result of dam construction. Additionally, the fish are apparently putting off migration out to sea so…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007Can one be religious while simultaneously claiming to be an ardent atheist? This is what Sam Harris manages to accomplish in his rant, The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason by Sam Harris (New York: WW Norton & Co., 2004, 2005).
Throughout much of this simplistic argument, Harris uses blunt, hard-hitting prose to make his case for why abrahamic religions, particularly Islam, are the most dangerous element of modern life. According to the author, religious faith is flawed because it requires its adherents to cling irrationally to mythic stories of heaven and hell. He…
grrlscientist | February 21, 2007I think I've posted this before, but thought that some of you might not have seen it yet. This video shows how 6 feet of DNA is packaged into the microscopic nucleus of a cell and also how DNA is replicated.
grrlscientist | February 20, 2007What is it about email that causes an otherwise civilized person to write and send an offensive, rude or downright mean message to someone else? That is the question that John Suler, a psychologist at Rider University in Lawrenceville, N.J., addressed in his 2004 paper published in CyberPsychology & Behavior.
Suler found that several psychological factors lead to disinhibition online: the anonymity of a Web pseudonym; invisibility to others; the time lag between sending an e-mail message and getting feedback; the exaggerated sense of self from being alone; and the lack of any online…
grrlscientist | February 20, 2007
Snow leopard, Panthera uncia.
The photographer writes; [This is] one [of] two young female snow leopards (twins) born a few months ago at the [Bronx] zoo. At the moment they're still being kept with their mother.
Image: Brian Switek.
As long as you send images to me (and I hope it will be for forever), I shall continue to share them with my readership. My purpose for posting these images is to remind all of us of the grandeur of the natural world and that there is a world out there that is populated by millions of unique species. We are a part of this world whether we like it or not: we…