Climate change brings new neighborhood birds

As winters have warmed, some species have moved north.

To get a good look at the impacts of global warming, you may need to look no farther than your own yard. Some unexpected species may perch in a local tree or stop by your bird feeder. These newcomers have been lured north by winter’s warmer temperatures, a new study finds. Birds such as cardinals and Carolina wrens are now wintering farther north than they did as little as 20 years ago.

Since 1970, the average winter low temperatures have risen by about 0.38 degree Celsius (0.68 degree Fahrenheit) in eastern North America. Global warming, also known as climate change, is the cause.

For several decades now, the planet has been slowly warming. The world’s animals and plants have responded. Many have begun to move north or south to keep pace with the conditions they’re used to. Such movement is considered one of the best fingerprints of climate change.

Since 1970, the average winter low temperatures have risen by about 0.38 degree Celsius (0.68 degree Fahrenheit) in eastern North America. Global warming, also known as climate change, is the cause.

Benjamin Zuckerberg and Karine Princé are wildlife biologists at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. They wanted to look for evidence that Earth’s warming had been affecting bird behaviors — such as where they settle for the winter. To do this, they analyzed two decades of data from a program called Project FeederWatch. This citizen-science project at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology in Ithaca, N.Y., collects reports of sightings at bird feeders from early November to late April.

There are currently more than 10,000 participating sites in the United States and Canada. Many of the studied feeders sit in people’s yards.

Why elephants never forget

It’s a common saying that elephants never forget. But the more we learn about elephants, the more it appears that their impressive memory is only one aspect of an incredible intelligence that makes them some of the most social, creative, and benevolent creatures on Earth. Alex Gendler takes us into the incredible, unforgettable mind of an elephant.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSXNqsOoURg

Spare the Rod, School the Child

In 1998, a young American biologist named Justin Brashares, now a professor at the University of California at Berkeley, went to Ghana to research antelope behavior. But, as he hiked the West African forests and savannahs, he didn’t see many antelope. He also didn’t see many hippos, leopards, duikers, or lions. What he did see were large, aggressive troops of olive baboons. They had recently begun to raid maize crops and steal chickens, causing such serious and persistent damage that many Ghanaians were keeping their young children out of school to help guard family farms.

How had baboons gained influence over the education of Ghanaian children? In search of an answer, Brashares dug into the fantastically detailed records of wildlife populations and hunting activity that Ghana has kept since its days as a British colony. He found that as populations of large mammal species had declined in the country’s national parks over the decades, baboon populations had expanded into the newly predator-free habitat. Hunting intensified by human population growth was one reason for the over-all declines, but the mammal numbers didn’t follow a straight line toward extinction: they rose, then fell, then rose again.

Brashares asked Ghanaian farmers about the pattern. “Oh, it’s the fish,” he remembers them saying dismissively. Poor fishing on the Atlantic coast, they told Brashares, drove more people into the forest to hunt for bushmeat. More hunting meant fewer large mammals, more olive baboons—and, eventually, more kids kept home from school. Brashares’ analysis of data collected by researchers from his lab and elsewhere showed that, in 2009, sixty-five per cent of school-age children in sixty-four baboon-affected villages were withdrawn from school for at least one month, and many for much longer than that.

African elephant numbers 'could fall by one-fifth' due to poaching

The scale of the elephant poaching epidemic could lead to local populations becoming extinct, an IUCN report says

African elephants in Amboseli national park, Kenya. Photograph: Zhang Weiyi/Xinhua Press/Corbis

Africa will lose one-fifth of its elephants in the next decade if the continent's poaching crisis is not stopped, data published on Monday shows.

There were about 10 million African elephants (Loxodonta africana) at the turn of the 20th century, but that number has fallen to half a million due to poaching and habitat loss, and the new figures show 22,000 were killed in 2012. While less than the record 25,000 deaths in 2011, the rate of killing compared to natural population growth means the largest animal on Earth could soon become extinct in local areas, conservationist warn.

New species of the Amazon rainforest - in pictures

At least 441 new species of animals and plants have been discovered over the past four years in the vast, underexplored rainforest of the Amazon. The discoveries made from 2010 to 2013, include a flame-patterned lizard, a vegetarian piranha, and a monkey that purrs like a cat

A 'purring' monkey (Callicebus caquetensis) – Colombian Amazon

The new species, named the Caqueta titi monkey or Callicebus caquetensis, is one of about 20 species of titi monkeys, which all live in the Amazon basin. The population size has been estimated at less than 250 individuals, and its habitat has been fragmented by clearing for agricultural land. It is classified as critically endangered by the IUCN. According to scientists, titi monkeys are among the few species of primates that are monogamous. 'All of the babies purr like cats too,' said Thomas Defler, who was part of the team that discovered the species. 'When they feel very content they purr towards each other, and the ones we raised would purr to us'

For more amazing photographs: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2013/oct/23/new-species-amazon-rainforest-in-pictures#/?picture=420633461&index=8