Great Barrier Reef spared 'in danger' listing - for now

The Great Barrier Reef should not go on a World Heritage danger list, according to a United Nations draft report.

May 29, 2015

Green Photo Agency - by Fabio Iaconianni

However, it says Australia must carry out commitments to protect the reef, including restoring water quality and restricting new port developments.

The final decision on its status will be made at the World Heritage Committee meeting in Germany next month.

Conservationists have warned that the outlook for the reef is "poor".

A report published in 2014 concluded that the condition "is expected to further deteriorate in the future". Climate change, extreme weather, and pollution from industry were listed a key concerns.

However, in 2015 Australia submitted a plan to the UN heritage body, Unesco, outlining how it would address these threats.

This included a proposed objective of reducing pollution by 80% before 2025, as well as reversing a decision to allow dredged material to be dumped near the reef.

Precious place

The Unesco draft report says that Australia must implement this 35-year action plan, and Unesco will continue to check on its progress.

The matter - along with the future of other World Heritage sites - will be debated at a Unesco meeting taking place in Bonn from 28 June to 8 July.

* The Great Barrier Reef includes 3,000 coral reefs and 600 islands

* It is the world's largest marine park, covering 348,000 sq km

* It contains 400 types of coral, 1,500 species of fish and 4,000 kinds of mollusc

* It receives about two million tourists each year.

* The region contributes A$6bn ($4.6bn; £3bn) a year to the Australian economy.

The Great Barrier Reef was given World Heritage status in 1981.

It is a vast collection of thousands of smaller coral reefs spans, stretching from the northern tip of Queensland to the state's southern city of Bundaberg.

The UN says this is the "most biodiverse" of its World Heritage sites, and that is of "enormous scientific and intrinsic importance".

Setting targets

Greenpeace issued a statement saying the draft report was "not a reprieve - it is a big, red flag from Unesco". The group's reef campaigner Shani Tager highlighted the fact that the Australian government had been asked to prepare a report within 18 months.

"Unesco now joins a long line of scientists, banks, organisations and individuals who are deeply worried about the reef's health," Ms Tager said.

Prof Callum Roberts, a marine conservation biologist at the University of York in the UK, said he thought Unesco had made the right decision, based on "major progress" that has recently been made in the Australian authorities' approach to the reef.

But he noted that the announcement was more of a postponement than a final judgement.

"They're setting targets and they're obviously going to watch this very closely," Prof Roberts told BBC News.

"I think Unesco is right to put on hold its decision, in view of this long-term sustainability plan. But it's also very right to set some target dates for Australia to produce evidence that it's actually sticking to the plan - that it's investing enough money to make that plan happen."

Prof Roberts also pointed to efforts by the Queensland state government.

"The situation a couple of years ago was that the Queensland government was fast-tracking major industrial developments along the Great Barrier Reef coast - particularly a number of very large port developments which would service coal exports.

"That has all been scaled back significantly. [The government] has also responded to the major.

"The outlook for the reef is a lot better today than it was two years ago."

(source: BBC)

In Honor of International Polar Bear Day, Spectacular Pictures of a Threatened Species

A Disappearing Habitat

February 27, 2015  

Photograph by Tom Murphy, National Geographic

A polar bear watches her cubs on the Hudson Bay in Manitoba, Canada. The bay is famous for polar bears, but their population is in decline.

According to Steven C. Amstrup, chief scientist for Polar Bears International(PBI), rising temperatures have extended the duration of summer, melting ice in the Hudson Bay and forcing polar bears to live on shore for longer stretches of time.

"They live on the sea ice, and they catch their food from the surface of the sea ice," he said. "When they're on the shore, they lose about two pounds of body weight a day. They've adapted to being food-deprived for quite a while, but there are limits as to how far they can go."

As their habitat melts, polar bears are forced to forage elsewhere for food. In Svalbard, Norway, 

where melting sea ice is retreating from the archipelago's shore, hungry polar bears have gotten into trouble by wandering inland.

"Because there are more bears who are going longer without having anything to eat, often bears that are hungry and interact with humans end up getting shot," he said.

Amstrup says that the solution is to stop the rise in global temperatures.

"The threat to polar bears from global warming turns conservation as we've known it on its head," he said. "In the past, when a species is threatened, we could build a fence around it. But you can't build a fence to protect the sea ice. The only thing that will really make a difference is to stop the rise of global temperature."

(Source: NG)

Stop a spettacoli circo con animali a Milano

Ok mozione M5s impegna sindaco, governo faccia divieto in Italia

27 febbraio 2015

Green Photo Archive - Credit M. Grano

Stop al circo con animali a Milano. Questo il contenuto di una mozione approvata all'unanimità dal consiglio comunale, e proposta dal pentastellato Mattia Calise.

In sostanza, viene chiesto al sindaco Giuliano Pisapia che non siano più fatti spettacoli circensi in cui si usano gli animali sul territorio comunale di Milano.

Il documento, pur riconoscendo che l'arte circense è "un'arte antica che merita di essere difesa e tramandata", impegna sindaco e giunta a "non rilasciare autorizzazioni sul loro territorio per spettacoli circensi in cui si usano e si sfruttano, contro natura, gli animali".

Inoltre, la mozione chiede di "sollecitare il governo a vietare, con legge statale, l'uso di animali negli spettacoli circensi in Italia" e a "concedere i contributi statali per i circhi solo nel caso essi non usino animali". Infine chiede di promuovere l'informazione ai cittadini affinché sia "sensibilizzata" l'opinione pubblica per "disertare spettacoli che fruttano gli animali".  

(source: ANSA)

Great white shark swimming close to shore, residents told, after seal found severed in two

Judging by the spacing of the tooth marks on a harbor seal found last Thursday at Ocean Shores beach, it was attacked by a great white shark about 18 feet long, said Washington Fish and Wildlife Authority spokesman Craig Bartlett

 February 26, 2015

OCEAN SHORES, Wash. — State authorities are warning Pacific Coast residents that an estimated 18-foot-long great white shark is swimming off the Washington coast and feeding on harbour seals.

The warning comes after the Department of Fish and Wildlife retrieved the body of a seal last Thursday on a beach near Ocean Shores — neatly bitten in half.

A necropsy determined on Tuesday that the likely predator was a great white shark and judging by the spacing of the teeth marks it is about 18 feet long, said spokesman Craig Bartlett.

Related

The seal was a female that weighed more than 200 pounds and whose hindquarters were missing. “It was a clean bite right below the rib cage,” Bartlett said.

Its stomach was filled with smelt, indicating the seal had been attacked close to shore where smelt swim.

“That would be kind of terrifying,” Edith Laurent said. “It would be terrifying out there to have a shark come in.”

Only two shark attacks on humans have been documented in Washington state — one in the 1830s and one in 1989. The attacks weren’t fatal, Bartlett said.

As a precaution the department has notified other agencies of the presence of the great white shark, including the Coast Guard, state parks, and local governments and tribes on the coast.

The necropsy was performed by the department in consultation with a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration shark expert in California.

(source: NP)

Killer frog disease: Chytrid fungus hits Madagascar

A devastating disease that has wiped out amphibians around the world has been discovered in Madagascar, scientists report.

26 February 2015

Green Photo Archive - Credit F. Iaconianni

A survey has found that the chytrid fungus is present in numerous sites, although it is not clear whether it is infecting frogs yet.

The island is home to 500 frog species, and researchers fear they could be at significant risk.

The findings are published in the journal Scientific Reports.

One of the authors, Goncalo Rosa, from the Zoological Society of London, said he was worried about the impact that the fungus could have.

"It is heartbreaking, especially when you have an idea of what is happening elsewhere in other tropical areas - you see the frogs are gone," he told BBC News.

"The same could happen to Madagascar as well."

The chytrid fungus (Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis) was first identified in the 1990s and has swept across the world.

It infects the animals through their skin, and has killed off vast numbers of amphibians.

Madagascar was thought to be one of the last places free from the disease, but now the fungus has been confirmed in several sites across the island.

Scientists are trying to establish whether the fungus has always been present, but just not detected, or whether it has spread from elsewhere,

Mr Rosa said: "If these findings represent endemic chytrid, it means it has been there forever, coexisting with these frogs.

"But if we are talking about a recent introduction, this is really worrying because we've seen what has happened in other places. And if frogs in Madagascar have never coexisted with the fungus, it could be catastrophic - this could cause huge biodiversity loss."

Conservationists are particularly worried because Madagascar is an amphibian haven. Many of its 500 species of frog are not found anywhere else in the world.

"This is what makes Madagascar this special and unique place," said Mr Rosa.

If the disease is a new arrival, scientists will try to work out how it got to the island.

It can be carried on people's clothes or by invasive species, such as the recently introduced Asian common toad.

Researchers are now trying to establish where the disease has spread.

But with no cure, it may be difficult to limit the impact it has on Madagascar's unique amphibians.

(source: BBC)

Lav, stop ministero a pellicce tossiche per bimbi

Bloccata vendita in attesa esito accertamenti

26 febbraio 2015

Green Photo Archive - Credit F. Iaconianni

ROMA, 26 FEB - Stop del ministero della Salute alla vendita di alcuni capi d'abbigliamento per bambini di note marche per il periodo necessario ad accertamenti sulla eventuale presenza di sostanze "chimiche, potenzialmente tossiche e cancerogene nelle componenti di pellicce animale". Lo rende noto la Lega antivivisezione (Lav) che ha segnalato la presenza di queste sostanze, riscontrate nell'indagine 'Toxic fur 2'.

La Lav sottolinea che la "salute dei bambini è a rischio a causa di sostanze chimiche in alcuni capi di abbigliamento baby (24-36 mesi) delle note marche D&G, Blumarine Baby e Woolrich", avendo "pochi mesi fa sottoposto alcuni campioni di queste marche a rigorosi e indipendenti test di laboratorio, per i prodotti segnalati". Si tratta di una coperta di pelliccia di agnello di produzione tedesca destinata ai neonati, un cappotto e una giacca con inserti di pelliccia di coniglio e un parka per bimbo con inserto di pelliccia di caneprocione.

Oggi, afferma la Lav, "lo stesso ministero ha notificato alle aziende sopraindicate il blocco della vendita dei baby capi con pelliccia animale oggetto dell'investigazione della Lav disponendo 'per tutto il tempo necessario allo svolgimento delle verifiche degli accertamenti sulla sicurezza del prodotto, il divieto per gli importatori/distributori di fornire, proporre la fornitura o di esporre nella rete di vendita gli articoli coinvolti'".   

(source: ANSA)

World wildlife populations halved in 40 years - report

The global loss of species is even worse than previously thought, the London Zoological Society (ZSL) says in its new Living Planet Index.

30 September 2014

Green Photo Archive - Credit F. Iaconianni

The report suggests populations have halved in 40 years, as new methodology gives more alarming results than in a report two years ago.

The report says populations of mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians and fish have declined by an average of 52%.

Populations of freshwater species have suffered an even worse fall of 76%.

Severe impact

Compiling a global average of species decline involves tricky statistics, often comparing disparate data sets - and some critics say the exercise is not statistically valid.

The team at the zoological society say they've improved their methodology since their last report two years ago - but the results are even more alarming.

Then they estimated that wildlife was down "only" around 30%. Whatever the numbers, it seems clear that wildlife is continuing to be driven out by human activity.

The society's report, in conjunction with the pressure group WWF, says humans are cutting down trees more quickly than they can re-grow, harvesting more fish than the oceans can re-stock, pumping water from rivers and aquifers faster than rainfall can replenish them, and emitting more carbon than oceans and forests can absorb.

It catalogues areas of severe impact - in Ghana, the lion population in one reserve is down 90% in 40 years.

In West Africa, forest felling has restricted forest elephants to 6-7% of their historic range.

Globally, habitat loss and hunting have reduced tigers from 100,000 a century ago to just 3,000.

In the UK, the government promised to halt wildlife decline - but bird numbers continue to fall.

The index tracks more than 10,000 vertebrate species populations from 1970 to 2010. It reveals a continued decline in these populations. The global trend is not slowing down.

'New method'

The report shows that the biggest recorded threat to biodiversity comes from the combined impacts of habitat loss and degradation, driven by what WWF calls unsustainable human consumption.

The report notes that the impacts of climate change are becoming of increasing concern - although the effect of climate change on species until now is disputed.

WWF is keen to avoid despair. It points to conservation efforts to save species like:

• A Gorilla Conservation Programme in Rwanda, promoting gorilla tourism
• A scheme to incentivise small-scale farmers to move away from slash and burn agriculture in Acre, Brazil
• A project to cut the amount of water withdrawn from the wildlife-rich River Itchen in the UK.

Previously, the Living Planet Index was calculated using the average decline in all of the species populations measured. The new weighted methodology analyses the data to provide what ZSL says is a much more accurate calculation of the collective status of populations in all species and regions.

A ZSL spokesman explained to BBC News: "For example, if most measurements in a particular region are of bird populations, but the greatest actual number of vertebrates in the region are fish, 

then it is necessary to give a greater weighting to measurements of fish populations if we are to have an accurate picture of the rate of population decline for species in that region.

"Different weightings are applied between regions, and between marine, terrestrial and freshwater environments. We are simply being more sophisticated with the way we use the data."

"Applying the new method to the 2008 dataset we find that things were considerably worse than what we thought at the time. It is clear that we are seeing a significant long-term trend in declining species populations."

(source: BBC)

In calo gli abbandoni estivi di cani,maglia nera alla Puglia

Tra le province male Napoli, al Nord brilla il Piemonte

22 settembre 2014

In calo gli abbandoni di cani durante la stagione estiva. Dall'11 luglio al 18 settembre al servizio 'Io lo segnalo' attivato dall'Associazione italiana difesa animali e ambiente (Aidaa) sono arrivate complessivamente 4.858 segnalazioni, il 15,7% in meno rispetto allo scorso anno quando furono 5.767. E nei primi giorni di agosto si è registrata una punta del 30% in meno. Delle segnalazioni di cani abbandonati nelle città e nei paesi italiani quest'estate 1.705 hanno riguardato il solo mese di luglio (900 a luglio 2013 e 4.167 ad agosto, sempre del 2013).

Si tratta comunque di un dato positivo - nota l'Aidaa - che fa da contraltare all'aumento degli abbandoni direttamente nei canili, anche se il saldo complessivo è comunque positivo a due cifre. La maglia nera tra le regioni anche per questo 2014 spetta alla Puglia con ben 574 segnalazioni di cani vaganti, seguita dalla Sicilia con 459 segnalazioni, Campania 358, Lazio 297, Toscana 271 e Calabria con 253.

Tra le regioni del nord brillano il Piemonte con 92 segnalazioni e la Lombardia con 96. Tra le province la maglia nera spetta a Napoli con 109 segnalazioni, seguita da Roma (91), Bari (87), Grosseto e Frosinone con rispettivamente 79 e 74 segnalazioni e a sorpresa Ancona con 56. Tra le regioni del centro ottimi risultati in Umbria, mentre a Ravenna con 44 casi spetta il record dei cani fuggiti e ricatturati in pochi giorni "grazie ad un servizio esemplare di recupero".   

(source: ANSA)

Orsa Daniza: cuccioli avvistati dai forestali di Trento

Registrato i loro movimenti attraverso i versanti della Val Rendena

19 settembre 2014

Continua il monitoraggio sui due cuccioli dell'orsa Daniza da parte dei forestali della Provincia autonoma di Trento i quali hanno registrato i loro movimenti attraverso i versanti della Val Rendena. Il personale forestale li sta seguendo a debita distanza - informa la Provincia - in modo da non interferire con i loro spostamenti e comportamenti. Sono stati tuttavia avvistati in un paio di occasioni e questo ha consentito di acquisire ulteriori elementi sul loro stato di salute, che sono stati trasmessi alla Procura di Trento che conduce le indagini sulla morte di Daniza.

Accanto al monitoraggio - sottolinea la Provincia - sono state messe in atto diverse attività, tutte rivolte a favorire la sopravvivenza dei cuccioli. Sono state già definite apposite linee guida per la gestione di cuccioli orfani, basate sulla bibliografia specialistica esistente in materia. Queste linee guida - prosegue la Provincia - sono ora oggetto di confronto con le istituzioni nazionali competenti e con i maggiori esperti a livello europeo "per produrre un documento tecnico che si proporrà come punto di riferimento non solo per il caso in questione e per il territorio trentino, ma anche per contesti e situazioni diverse che dovessero verificarsi in futuro".

Sono stati inoltre collocati segnali stradali luminosi in corrispondenza dei tratti stradali ad alta percorrenza dove si ritiene più probabile che gli orsetti possano attraversare. Questo anche in relazione a quelli che sono stati gli spostamenti dell'orsa Daniza, già protagonista di due investimenti in passato, ricorda la Provincia. E' poi intenzione della Provincia autonoma di Trento convocare nel capoluogo trentino - entro il mese di ottobre - un tavolo tecnico ristretto, con i migliori esperti europei, "per un confronto che da un lato costituisca occasione di riflessione ed analisi sulle attività messe in campo ad oggi per la migliore gestione dei cuccioli, dall'altro consenta di poter stabilire i presupposti per poter contare su solide consulenze anche per il prossimo futuro". 

(source: ANSA)

Rinasce il grifone in Abruzzo, simbolo salute montagna

Progetto Cfs compie 20 anni, avvoltoio ripopola Appennino

18 settembre 2014

Green Photo Archive - Credit: F. Iaconianni

C'è una nuovo simbolo in Abruzzo: era estinto da secoli, ma ora è tornato, sta bene, vola alto ed è forte.

Il Progetto Grifone in Abruzzo compie 20 anni e saluta il successo del ripopolamento di un gigante del cielo che vede ormai almeno 180 esemplari nidificare e riprodursi in una vasta area che raccoglie la Marsica, il Parco Nazionale e il Gran Sasso, ma che ha una area di azione che va dal Matese ai Sibillini, cioè centinaia di chilometri di spazio aereo e 4 regioni interessate.

La notizia arriva dopo giorni di cattive notizie con le morti dei capodogli a Vasto e l'orso avvelenato nel sulmonese, e prova a riportare il bel sole sul fronte della tutela degli animali.

Nei giorni scorsi la Guardia Forestale ha rimesso in libertà 4 meravigliosi ed imponenti esemplari adulti dell'avvoltoio europeo (oltre 2,5 mt di apertura alare) che sono stati inanellati e radiocollegati per il monitoraggio continuo. Dal Riserva Naturale Monte Velino di Magliano dei Marsi hanno spiccato di nuovo il volo per raggiungere i nidi sparsi nelle montagne abruzzesi, e che oggi vedono almeno 30 coppie fisse e fertili in circa 5 colonie osservate.

Importati dalla Spagna nel 1994 i grifoni, che in Italia resistevano solo in Sardegna, possono quindi ormai essere considerati come di nuovo autoctoni, in attesa che dall'Abruzzo possano allargarsi verso altre zone dell'Appennino: l'impianto abruzzese dimostra che nonostante le difficoltà che in altre zone si verificano per altri animali, c'è spazio per una biodiversità che vince la scommessa di ripopolazione e consolidazione delle specie animali.

La Regione Verde d'Italia da un lato combatte ancora la battaglia per la salvaguardia di specie delicate come orso e lupo, ma dall'altro con grifoni, camosci e cervi ottiene il riconoscimento dentro e fuori dai parchi regionali.

(source: ANSA)

Maltrattamento animale legato a devianza sociale

Intesa Cfs e Link-Italia per definire il profilo criminale

18 settembre 2014

Il legame tra la violenza e la crudeltà sugli animali e fenomeni di violenza interpersonale, devianza, crimine e stalking è al centro del protocollo di intesa tra il Corpo forestale dello Stato e l'associazione Link-Italia, specializzata nell'analisi di questa correlazione.

Siglato oggi a Roma, l'accordo punta a definire, attraverso la raccolta e la condivisione dei dati, il profilo criminale del maltrattatore di animali, usando il database del Nucleo investigativo per i reati in danno agli animali (Nirda) del Cfs e quello in possesso di Link-Italia.

Dagli studi effettuati finora emerge un parziale profilo del maltrattatore che nel 95% dei casi corrisponderebbe a uomini, di cui il 19% bambini o adolescenti. La crudeltà sugli animali praticata da bambini (nei quali si può manifestare intorno ai sei anni e mezzo di età) o adolescenti ''è riconosciuta scientificamente non solo come segnale di una potenziale patologia, ma anche come indicatore di possibili coinvolgimenti in comportamenti antisociali e criminali'', spiegano i due enti.

In ambito domestico, poi, la violenza su animali da parte di adulti è riconosciuta come ''indicatore di potenziale violenza su donne e minori''. Uno studio Usa, inoltre, ha riscontrato che il serial killer e lo spree killer (l'omicida d'impulso) hanno precedenti di crimini sugli animali.

Campo d'investigazione rilevante è il web, dal traffico di cuccioli alla produzione e fruizione di filmati come i 'crush video', in cui sono ripresi cuccioli uccisi con ferocia da persone pagate proprio per questo, oppure siti a tema sul sesso con animali. I fenomeni più frequenti sono la zooerastia, cioè le pratiche sessuali tra uomini e animali, e la bestialità, che consiste nel filmarsi mentre si infliggono torture agli animali per poi condividere il video sui social network. 

source: ANSA)

Orsa Daniza, Cortina si offre di accogliere i cuccioli

Vicesindaco disponibile a valutare richiesta Ppe

18 settembre 2014

L'amministrazione comunale di Cortina d'Ampezzo è disponibile ad accogliere nel suo territorio i due cuccioli di orso, orfani di Daniza, uccisa in Trentino. Il vicesindaco Enrico Pompanin ha risposto affermativamente alla richiesta formulata dal Partito ambientalista europeo. Nei giorni scorsi il sindaco sospeso Andrea Franceschi aveva postato in Facebook un messaggio invitando i turisti a scegliere la località ampezzana perchè non vi vengono uccisi gli orsi.

"Abbiamo inviato una nota alcuni giorni fa e il comune ci ha risposto dandoci la massima disponibilità ad accogliere gli animali e a inserirsi nel suo territorio - spiega Enrico Rizzi, segretario nazionale del Pae - ora dobbiamo capire se l'operazione è fattibile. Il comune ci ha chiesto delucidazioni, perché una operazione del genere non è mai stata fatta prima".

"L'amministrazione garantirà un luogo circoscritto e protetto con videosorveglianza - precisa Stefano Fuccelli, presidente Pae - e si farà carico di tutte le spese di sostentamento, sia alimentare, sia sanitario, per tutto il periodo necessario allo svezzamento". Il Partito ambientalista europeo si opporrà all'affidamento dei due cuccioli al Corpo forestale dello Stato, deciso dalla magistratura. "E' stata disposta l'autopsia di Daniza - conferma Rizzi - da eseguire in una struttura esterna al Trentino, a Grosseto. Noi impugneremo l'affidamento agli agenti della Forestale, perché non sono attrezzati. Per noi è importante toglierli da lì e portarli in una zona sicura, seguiti da esperti: per questo sono in contatto con il presidente del Parco nazionale d'Abruzzo, per acquisire le professionalità necessarie".  

(source: ANSA)

Murder 'comes naturally' to chimpanzees

A major study suggests that killing among chimpanzees results from normal competition, not human interference.

18 September 2014

Groups of male chimpanzees patrol the borders of their territory in single file  

Apart from humans, chimpanzees are the only primates known to gang up on their neighbours with lethal results - but primatologists have long disagreed about the underlying reasons.

One proposal was that human activity, including destroying habitats and providing food, increased aggression.

But the new findings, published in Nature, suggest this is not the case.

Instead, murder rates in different chimp communities simply reflect the numerical make-up of the local population.

The international study was co-written by more than 30 scientists and gathers data from some 426 combined years of observation, across 18 different chimp communities.

A total of 152 killings were reported. This includes 58 that were directly observed by researchers; the rest were counted based on detective work - tell-tale injuries or other circumstances surrounding an animal's death or disappearance.

Violence most often occurs between male chimps, 

at the fringes of established community territories  

Interestingly, the team also compiled the figures for bonobos, with strikingly different results: just a single suspected killing from 92 combined years of observation at four different sites. This is consistent with the established view of bonobos as a less violent species of ape.

Killing the competition

The researchers' global compilation of chimp violent crime statistics allowed them to consider what conditions in a community produce a higher murder rate.

Chimpanzees live in well-defined colonies, and groups of males patrol the borders of each colony's territory. This is where violent conflicts are known to arise, particularly if a patrol encounters a single chimp from a neighbouring community - but never before has this much data on the lethality of those interactions been combined in a single study.

When the scientists compared the figures across chimpanzee research sites, they found that the level of human interference (e.g. whether the chimps had been fed, or their habitat restricted) had little effect on the number of killings.

Instead, it was basic characteristics of each community that made the biggest difference: the number of males within it, and the overall population density of the area.

Chimpanzees and bonobos are our closest living evolutionary relatives  

These parameters link the violence to natural selection: killing competitors improves a male chimp's access to resources like food and territory - and crucially, it will happen more frequently when there is greater competition from neighbouring groups, and when the males can patrol in large numbers, with less risk to their own survival.

"It's a natural behaviour - it's not something that we've induced by disturbance or intervention," explained Dr Susanne Shultz, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Manchester.

Dr Shultz was not involved in the study, but told BBC News the scale of the collected data was impressive.

"There's a real effort to look across a really wide range of populations, and the results are very compelling and very thorough," she said.

Violent debate

In an accompanying commentary for the journal Nature, Prof Joan Silk from Arizona State University said the results "should finally put an end to the idea" that violence in wild chimpanzees was a product of human interference.

She suggested that our perceptions of our evolutionary cousins can sometimes be distorted, because we want to believe that it is the nice behaviours, not the nasty ones, which have deep evolutionary roots.

There is no need to cling to such ideas, Prof Silk argues: "Humans are not destined to be warlike because chimpanzees sometimes kill their neighbours."

Prof John Mitani, a behavioural ecologist at the University of Michigan and one of the study's authors, agrees. "There is considerable variation in rates of killing by chimpanzees living in different populations, so even in chimpanzees killing is not inevitable," he said.

"And, of course, we are humans and not chimpanzees. We have the ability to shape and alter our behaviour in ways that they can't."

Prof Frans de Waal, an animal behaviour expert from Emory University in the US, said the new study was an important contribution.

"I'm very glad they're publishing this," he told BBC News. It answers a "long, long history of resistance", Prof de Waal explained, to the idea of natural, inter-community violence in chimpanzees.

"It has always been contentious - we've had meetings where people screamed at each other.

"What this paper does is, instead of getting into the ideology and the history of these arguments... they have just taken the data and analysed it, and said: Where do the chips fall?"

The chips, in this case, appear to fall in favour of a natural history of violence.

But rather than having deep implications for human nature, the authors of the new study suggest that chimpanzee homicide - which previous research has estimated to occur at a similar rate to that seen in hunter-gatherer human societies - goes up and down as a simple consequence of competition for resources.

(source: BBC)

Europeans drawn from three ancient 'tribes'

The modern European gene pool was formed when three ancient populations mixed within the last 7,000 years, Nature journal reports.

17 September 2014

Blue-eyed, swarthy hunters mingled with brown-eyed, pale skinned farmers as the latter swept into Europe from the Near East.

But another, mysterious population with Siberian affinities also contributed to the genetic landscape of the continent.

The findings are based on analysis of genomes from nine ancient Europeans.

Agriculture originated in the Near East - in modern Syria, Iraq and Israel - before expanding into Europe around 7,500 years ago.

Multiple lines of evidence suggested this new way of life was spread not just via the exchange of ideas, but by a wave of migrants, who interbred with the indigenous European hunter-gatherers they encountered on the way.

But assumptions about European origins were based largely on the genetic patterns of living people. The science of analysing genomic DNA from ancient bones has put some of the prevailing theories to the test, throwing up a few surprises.

Genomic DNA contains the biochemical instructions for building a human, and resides within the nuclei of our cells.

In the new paper, Prof David Reich from the Harvard Medical School and colleagues studied the genomes of seven hunter-gatherers from Scandinavia, one hunter whose remains were found in a cave in Luxembourg and an early farmer from Stuttgart, Germany.

The hunters arrived in Europe thousands of years before the advent of agriculture, hunkered down in southern refuges during the Ice Age and then expanded during a period called the Mesolithic, after the ice sheets had retreated from central and northern Europe.

They were closely related to each other and their genetic profile is not a good match for any modern group of people, suggesting they were caught up in the farming wave of advance. However, their genes live on in modern Europeans, to a greater extent in the north-east than in the south.

The early farmer genome showed a completely different pattern, however. Her genetic profile was a good match for modern people in Sardinia, and was rather different from the indigenous hunters.

The Sardinians could represent a population of early farmers that became isolated on the Mediterranean island, and were little affected by later migrations that shaped the rest of Europe.

But, puzzlingly, while the early farmers share genetic similarities with Near Eastern people at a global level, they are significantly different in other ways. Prof Reich suggests that more recent migrations in the farmers' "homeland" may have diluted their genetic signal in that region today.

Prof Reich explained: "The only way we'll be able to prove this is by getting ancient DNA samples along the potential trail from the Near East to Europe... and seeing if they genetically match these predictions or if they're different.

"Maybe they're different - that would be extremely interesting."

These regions will be the most challenging to get ancient samples from, however, because DNA breaks down more readily in warmer climates.

Pigmentation genes carried by the hunters and farmers showed that, while the dark hair, brown eyes and pale skin of the early farmer would look familiar to us, the hunter-gatherers would stand out if we saw them on a street today.

"It really does look like the indigenous West European hunter gatherers had this striking combination of dark skin and blue eyes that doesn't exist any more," Prof Reich told BBC News.

Dr Carles Lalueza-Fox, from the Institute of Evolutionary Biology (CSIC - UPF) in Barcelona, Spain, who was not involved with the research, told BBC News: "If you look at all the reconstructions of Mesolithic people on the internet, they are always depicted as fair skinned. And the farmers are sometimes depicted as dark-skinned newcomers to Europe. This shows the opposite."

Last year, Dr Lalueza-Fox published genetic details of a 7,000-year-old hunter from Spain who was similarly dark and blue-eyed, suggesting these looks were not a one-off.

So where did fair pigmentation in present-day Europeans, including their rich diversity of hair colour, come from? The farmer seems to be on her way there, carrying a gene variant for light skin that's still around today.

"There's an evolutionary argument about this - that light skin in Europe is biologically advantageous for people who farm, because you need to make vitamin D," said David Reich.

"Hunters and gatherers get vitamin D through their food - because animals have a lot of it. But once you're farming, you don't get a lot of it, and once you switch to agriculture, there's strong natural selection to lighten your skin so that when it's hit by sunlight you can synthesise vitamin D."

This reconstruction shows the dark skin and blue eyes 

of a 7,000-year-old hunter from northern Spain  

When the researchers looked at DNA from 2,345 present day people, they found that a third 

population was needed to capture the genetic complexity of modern Europeans.

This additional "tribe" is the most enigmatic and, surprisingly, is related to Native Americans.

Hints of this group surfaced in an analysis of European genomes two years ago. Dubbed Ancient North Eurasians, this group remained a "ghost population" until 2013, when scientists published the genome of a 24,000-year-old boy buried near Lake Baikal in Siberia.

This individual had genetic similarities with both Europeans and indigenous Americans, but lacked the East Asian ancestry present in Siberia and the Americas today. The ghost had been sighted.

The 8,000-year-old Scandinavian hunters already show some signs of mixture with this population, but the ancient hunter from Luxembourg and the farmer from Germany do not, implying that this third ancestor was added to the continental mix after farming was already established in Europe.

Dr Lalueza-Fox commented: "The interesting point is the idea that we can dissect these components in any modern European and explain diversity in modern Europeans as different proportions of these three populations."

The study also revealed that the early farmers and their European descendents can trace a large part of their ancestry to a previously unknown, even older lineage called Basal Eurasians. This group represents the earliest known population divergence among the humans who left Africa 60,000 years ago.

(source: BBC)

Saving Siberian Tigers: Documentary Derailed

A recent "observe and report" documentary about the incredibly rare Siberian tiger quickly became an all-out rescue mission after a team of conservationists and their camera crew stumbled upon three orphaned cubs.

Sep 16, 2014

Green Photo Archive

Now that incredible story is finally going to be shown to the public, revealing the mysterious and dangerous world of these dwindling cats.

"Last Tiger Standing" is set to air Sept. 27 through the Discovery Channel and BBC Natural History. According to a brief summary provided by documentarian Jeanine Butler, who wrote and produced the show, Butler Films and a team of conservationists headed by Liz Bonnin initially set out to simply film Siberian tigers - also called Amur tigers - in the frozen forest of Russia.

This alone would have been an impressive feat, as according to The Hollywood Reporter, this was the first time in BBC Natural History's 50-year existence that they managed to get the giant cat on film.

However, not only did the team find what they were looking for, but they also stumbled upon three Amur cubs that had just been orphaned.

Many may doubt this, but most scientists and even documentarians stand by a strict "observation-only" and "let nature take its course" mind-frame when it comes to this kind of work. But according to the World Wildlife Fund, there are only up to about 450 of these majestic, but endangered cats left in the world. Worse, the Amur tiger's habitat is now restricted to two provinces in the Russian Far East and small plots along the border areas of China, and possibly North Korea. And while the animal is a protected one, illegal logging and poaching are thinning their habitats and numbers by a little more every year.

To have left these freshly orphaned cubs to die in the cold would not have only seemed cruel, but it would have been a waste of an already dwindling animal.

It hasn't been revealed how well the ensuing rescue efforts (which occurred back in 2013) went, but you can just watch the film and find out for yourself.

(source: NWN)

Hedgehogs' inky paw prints point to sparse distribution

Hedgehogs are more thinly spread in the UK than previously believed, a study using ink pads to record their paw prints has revealed.

17 September 2014

Green Photo Archive

The nocturnal mammals were found at only 39% of sites surveyed.

Experts and volunteers set up tunnels baited with tinned sausages. Hedgehogs had to walk over ink pads to reach the food, leaving their prints on paper.

The method allowed researchers to identify hedgehog presence with almost complete accuracy for the first time.

The research, which was carried out by scientists from Nottingham Trent University, the University of Reading and The Mammal Society, is published in the journal Mammal Review.

Hedgehog populations in the UK are believed to be in rapid decline.

The new study builds a picture about how they are distributed in urban and rural areas. The finding that hedgehogs were only present in 39% of locations visited was "lower than anticipated", said research team member Dr Richard Yarnell, from Nottingham Trent University's School of Animal,

Rural and Environmental Sciences.

"Historically we thought that hedgehogs were pretty well distributed across the country," he told BBC Nature.

He added: "What's certainly clear now and after using this methodology is that the populations... seem to be quite local but not widely distributed across the countryside as we once suspected.

"And in the wider rural landscape they do generally seem to be absent."

The research also supported previous findings that hedgehogs are more likely to be present in areas where there were no badgers. But the reasons for this are unclear.

Spiky subjects

In the past, monitoring the secretive creatures accurately has proved difficult.

The team wanted to test the effectiveness of footprint tunnels as a way of monitoring hedgehogs on a large scale.

The study is the first to assess "actual hedgehog numbers on the ground", said Dr Yarnell. Ten tunnels complete with ink pads and paper were positioned at 111 rural and urban sites and inspected for paw prints every morning.

The method can identify the presence of hedgehogs in an area with 95% accuracy, according to the team.

"This is the first method that we've been able to actually get a true feeling for what their habitat preferences may be, and how they're occupying our wider countryside," said Dr Yarnell.

The researchers are now using the ink pad technique to carry out the first national hedgehog survey in England and Wales with the British Hedgehog Preservation Society and the People's Trust for Endangered Species to build a picture of the state of the species.

Volunteers have already been setting up and monitoring the tunnels over the summer, and the project is due to continue from May to September in 2015.

Dr Yarnell said of the footprint tunnels: "In terms of the methodology, it's easy to deploy, can be used by amateurs and hopefully it will be the cornerstone of hedgehog monitoring going into the future."

It is hoped studying hedgehogs in this way could reveal more about their decline, and lead to more effective conservation of the animals, which are classified as a "species of principal importance" in England under the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act (NERC).

(source: BBC)

Bosnia: Sarajevo creates unit 'to catch stray dogs'

Authorities in the Bosnian capital Sarajevo are setting up a special dog-catching service to clear the city's streets of dangerous strays - but animal welfare activists warn the plans are insufficient.

16 September 2014

Aggressive street dogs are a big problem for Bosnia-Hercegovina - it's thought there are around 12,000 homeless dogs roaming the streets of the capital, the Independent Balkans News Agency reports. Around 1,000 people were attacked by stray dogs in Sarajevo last year, regional news website Balkan Insight adds. "We have to react and we are starting a crew to catch the dangerous dogs," says Zlatko Petrovic, Sarajevo Canton environment minister.

But it's not clear what will happen to the dogs once they are caught. In 2009, it became illegal to euthanise stray dogs and the city's only dog shelter is reportedly already full. Meanwhile, Bosnian social media is full of reports of canines being rounded up and killed as frustrated residents take the law into their own hands.

UK charity Dogs Trust, which runs a programme in Bosnia to vaccinate and castrate stray dogs, says the main problem is that existing laws are not enforced properly - and what the city really needs is more animal shelters and medical centres.

(source: BBC)

Niente schiusa per uova tartarughe Caretta Caretta in Puglia

Era l'unico nido in zona, pioggia ha fatto morire embrioni

17 settembre 2014

Green Photo Archive - Caretta caretta

Probabilmente è stata l'abbondante pioggia caduta nei giorni scorsi a bloccare lo sviluppo degli embrioni delle 22 uova di tartarughe Caretta Caretta custodite in un nido sotterraneo, sulla spiaggia di Campomarino di Maruggio (Taranto). Il nido era sorvegliato da un gruppo di volontari sin dal giorno del ritrovamento, il 25 luglio.

I ricercatori del WWF di Policoro hanno provveduto al 'Digging' del nido con apertura della camera di deposizione e prelievo delle uova, tutte con guscio integro, che sono state sperate ed esaminate utilizzando un ecografo eco-doppler. A seguito degli esami effettuati è stata riscontrata l'assenza di vitalità degli embrioni, che sono stati pertanto dichiarati deceduti. Inizialmente erano ottanta le uova, ma ne erano rimaste intatte solo 22. Si tratta del secondo ritrovamento nella zona dopo quello dell'agosto 2011. Quello di Campomarino, sulla spiaggia dei 'Sette colori', era l'unico nido di queste tartarughe in tutta la Puglia.  

(source: ANSA)

Nuove norme internazionali mettono squali "più al sicuro"

Da scorso weekend rientrano nel Trattato Cites 5 specie squali

17 settembre 2014

Dal fine settimana appena passato gli squali possono stare "più tranquilli": sono entrate in vigore le nuove norme internazionali per rafforzare la protezione per cinque specie di squali che sono minacciate dalla pesca eccessiva.

Come descritto nell'Appendice II del Trattato Cites - che regola il commercio di animali e di piante che possono diventare a rischio di estinzione se sono raccolte in modo non sostenibile - , da domenica 14 settembre saranno necessari permessi speciali per esportare esemplari vivi o carne e pinne di tutte le specie esistenti di Manta Ray e di cinque specie di squalo: squalo longimanus, (Carcharhinus longimanus), squalo martello smerlato (Sphyrna lewini), grande squalo martello (Sphyrna mokarran), squalo martello liscio (Sphyrna Zygaena) e squalo smeriglio (Lamna nasus). Come riportato da numerosi studi, gli squali vengono pescati per la loro carne, cartilagine e pinne. A differenza di altri pesci, la specie tuttavia cresce e si riproduce a ritmi relativamente lenti; per questo motivo gli ambientalisti hanno avvertito che la pesca eccessiva potrebbe causare un rapido e tragico declino di questi grandi predatori.  

(source: ANSA)

Red card on environment for 'greenest government ever'

The government is failing to reduce air pollution, protect biodiversity and prevent flooding, a cross-party body of MPs has said.

16 September 2014

Archive Green Photo Agency

The Environmental Audit Committee dished out a "red card" on these three concerns after examining efforts made since 2010.

The MPs said on a further seven green issues ministers deserved a "yellow card" denoting unsatisfactory progress.

The government said it strongly disagreed with the findings.

After coming to power in 2010, Prime Minister David Cameron stated he was committed to leading the "greenest government ever".

A year later, a natural environment White Paper had the ambition of being "the first generation to leave the natural environment of England in a better state than it inherited".

Dirty air

To put these ideas to the test, MPs decided to look at 10 key measures of environmental protection.

On air quality, The Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) said the government deserved a red card.

The MPs found that emissions of airborne pollutants rose in 2013 after being steady for a number of years before. Under the terms of an EU directive on dirty air, the UK failed to meet the standards required in 34 of the country's 43 zones.

This led to the European Commission taking legal action to force a more rapid clean up.

However an assessment carried out by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said that London and two other regions would not meet the legal limits until 2030.

"A whole generation of young people in our cities will potentially have their health impaired by pollution before the government meets air quality safety standards," said committee chairman Joan Walley.

"That is not acceptable. We need to see much more urgent action in this area and we will be looking at this area in more detail when we publish the results of our inquiry later this year."

On biodiversity, the government also scored red.

The latest sustainable development indicators showed a decline in the counts of three of the four bird populations that are seen as key indicators for the state of the UK's wildlife. The MPs found that invasive species were also on the rise and becoming more prevalent.

The third red card meted out by the EAC was for flooding and coastal protection.

The committee pointed out that 2.4 million properties are still at risk from flooding from rivers or the sea, while three million are at risk from surface water.

The government's attempts to deliver natural flood alleviation measures were rated as "consistently poor" by Wildlife and Countryside Link in 2013. Nine of the 24 water areas in England and Wales were said to be experiencing serious water stress.

'Deeply committed'

In a statement, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) vigorously disagreed with the MPs' assessment.

"We are deeply committed to improving our natural environment. That is why we will be spending more than £3.2bn - compared to £2.7bn in the last parliament - on protecting the country from floods.

"We are also working to improve air and water quality; and to protect wildlife habitats both on land and at sea."

The MPs argued that there should be an overarching environmental strategy that would set out a strategic principle that would guide protection over the next five, 10 and 25 years.

To make this work they have proposed a new Office for Environmental Responsibility to advise on appropriate targets and monitor and publish performance against the strategy and its targets.

"I want the parties to use our report as both a wake-up call and a template for the measures that need to be put forward," said Ms Walley.

"Consistent action by successive governments will help ensure that the benefits of nature are available to future generations as much as they are to ours."

(source: BBC)