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Tag: Animals

  • Sumatran rhino birth offers glimmer of hope for species almost hunted to extinction | CNN

    Sumatran rhino birth offers glimmer of hope for species almost hunted to extinction | CNN

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    CNN
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    A critically endangered Sumatran rhinoceros calf has been born in a national park in Indonesia, the third successful pairing between a local female rhino named Ratu and Andalas, a former resident of Ohio’s Cincinnati Zoo.

    The unnamed female was born on Saturday at the Way Kambas National Park on southern Sumatra island, Indonesia’s Ministry of Environment and Forestry said on X, formerly Twitter.

    Environment and forestry minister Siti Nurbaya Bakar said it was “happy news not just for Indonesia but the rest of the world.”

    Sumatran rhinos were once found in great numbers across Southeast Asia but fewer than 80 remain in fragmented areas across Indonesia, according to the International Rhino Foundation (IRF).

    The calf’s birth represents hope for a species threatened with extinction due to illegal poaching and habitat loss.

    Photos shared by the forestry ministry showed the newborn calf, weighing about 27 kilograms (60 pounds), covered in black hair and looking bright-eyed next to her mother.

    In one picture, Ratu was seen giving her baby a gentle nudge.

    Within 45 minutes of her natural birth, the calf was able to stand and began feeding from her mother within four hours, the ministry said.

    Sumatran rhinos are the world’s smallest rhinos, standing at roughly 4 to 5 feet tall (about 1.5 meters), with an average body length of around 8.2 feet (2.5 meters).

    They are more closely related to extinct woolly rhinos than other rhino species and are covered in long hair.

    Sumatran rhinos typically live in dense tropical forest, both lowland and highland, on Sumatra and are generally solitary in nature, according to IRF. Females give birth to one calf every three to four years and gestation periods can last between 15 to 16 months.

    Habitat loss has driven them to occupy smaller areas of the Indonesian jungle and conservationists are concerned about the survival of the species.

    “As this reclusive species seems to disappear further into dense jungles, direct sightings have become rare and indirect signs like footprints are getting harder to find,” the IRF said.

    “The beacon of hope for the species is the breeding program at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary… that has produced three calves and continues its breeding efforts to create an insurance population of rhinos.”

    The species was declared locally extinct in neighboring Malaysia in 2019.

    A 25-year-old female named Iman died of cancer on November 24, 2019 at the Borneo Rhino Sanctuary. Her death came months after Tam – the last surviving male rhino – succumbed to organ failure, officials said.

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  • More than 100 dolphins found dead in Brazilian Amazon as water temperatures soar

    More than 100 dolphins found dead in Brazilian Amazon as water temperatures soar

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    SAO PAULO — More than 100 dolphins have died in the Brazilian Amazon rainforest in the past week as the region grapples with a severe drought, and many more could die soon if water temperatures remain high, experts say.

    The Mamiraua Institute, a research group of Brazil’s Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation, said two more dead dolphins were found Monday in the region around Tefe Lake, which is key for mammals and fish in the area. Video provided by the institute showed vultures picking at the dolphin carcasses beached on the lakeside. Thousands of fish have also died, local media reported.

    Experts believe high water temperatures are the most likely cause of the deaths in the lakes in the region. Temperatures since last week have exceeded 39 degrees Celsius (102 degrees Fahrenheit) in the Tefe Lake region.

    The Brazilian government’s Chico Mendes Institute for Biodiversity Conservation, which manages conservation areas, said last week it had sent teams of veterinarians and aquatic mammal experts to investigate the deaths.

    There had been some 1,400 river dolphins in Tefe Lake, said Miriam Marmontel, a researcher from the Mamiraua Institute.

    “In one week we have already lost around 120 animals between the two of them, which could represent 5% to 10% of the population,” said Marmontel.

    Workers have recovered carcasses of dolphins since last week in a region where dry rivers have impacted impoverished riverside communities and stuck their boats in the sand. Amazonas Gov. Wilson Lima on Friday declared a state of emergency due to the drought.

    Nicson Marreira, mayor of Tefe, a city of 60,000 residents. said his government was unable to deliver food directly to some isolated communities because the rivers are dry.

    Ayan Fleischmann, the Geospatial coordinator at the Mamirauá Institute, said the drought has had a major impact on the riverside communities in the Amazon region.

    “Many communities are becoming isolated, without access to good quality water, without access to the river, which is their main means of transportation,” he said.

    Fleischmann said water temperatures rose from 32 C (89 F) on Friday to almost 38 C (100 F) on Sunday.

    He said they are still determining the cause of the dolphin deaths but that the high temperature remains the main candidate.

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  • Environmental groups demand emergency rules to protect rare whales from ship collisions

    Environmental groups demand emergency rules to protect rare whales from ship collisions

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    A coalition of environmental groups is calling on the federal government to enact emergency rules to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with large ships

    ByPATRICK WHITTLE Associated Press

    October 2, 2023, 12:48 PM

    FILE – A North Atlantic right whale feeds on the surface of Cape Cod bay off the coast of Plymouth, Mass., March 28, 2018. A coalition of environmental groups is calling on the federal government to enact emergency rules to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with large ships. The groups filed their petition with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Sept. 28 in an effort to protect the North Atlantic right whale. (AP Photo/Michael Dwyer, File)

    The Associated Press

    PORTLAND, Maine — A coalition of environmental groups is calling on the federal government to enact emergency rules to protect a vanishing species of whale from lethal collisions with large ships.

    The groups filed their petition with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration on Sept. 28 in an effort to protect the North Atlantic right whale. The whale, which can weigh more than five school buses, numbers less than 340 and has been in steep decline in recent years.

    Ship collisions are among the most dire threats to the survival of the whale, according to NOAA. The groups cited a proposed rule from the agency designed to prevent such ship strikes by making more vessels slow down for whales. NOAA has yet to release a final updated speed rule despite proposing new rules more than a year ago, the environmental groups said.

    The groups argue it’s critically important to get new rules on the books before the upcoming calving season, during which the whales migrate hundreds of miles from waters off New England and Canada to their calving grounds off Florida and Georgia.

    “Even one ship strike would bring these whales closer to extinction, but speed limits can help prevent that. Federal officials can’t sit back and do nothing while right whales are in danger,” said Kristen Monsell, oceans legal director at the Center for Biological Diversity, one of the groups that filed the petition.

    NOAA anticipates announcing its final action on the proposed rule this year, said Katie Wagner, a spokesperson for the agency. That could land in the middle of calving season, and include a later date for the regulations to actually go into effect.

    The agency is aware of the petition but does not comment on matters related to litigation, Wagner said. The agency is considering expanding “slow zones” off the East Coast, and requiring more vessels to comply with those rules.

    NOAA denied a request from environmentalists last year to immediately apply new rules. The agency said at the time via public documents that it was focused on “long-term, substantive vessel strike risk reduction measures.” NOAA received more than 90,000 comments on the proposed rule and is using them to inform its final action, Wagner said.

    The right whales were once abundant off the East Coast, but they were decimated during the commercial whaling era. They have been protected under the Endangered Species Act for several decades. The whales are also vulnerable to accidental entanglement in commercial fishing gear, and proposed new restrictions to prevent such entanglements have been the subject of a lengthy court battle between the federal government and fishermen.

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  • ‘No one is safe’: France vows action as bedbugs sweep Paris | CNN

    ‘No one is safe’: France vows action as bedbugs sweep Paris | CNN

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    Paris
    CNN
     — 

    The French government has vowed action to “reassure and protect” the public as its capital Paris reports a “widespread” rise in bedbugs.

    French Transport Minister Clement Beaune said Friday he would “bring together transport operators next week” to “undertake further action” to “reassure and protect” the public from the reported surge in the numbers of the blood-sucking insect.

    The announcement comes as calls for government action from Paris officials and trade unions mount after several videos of bedbugs spotted in public transport and other locations such as cinemas have surfaced on social media.

    Speaking to French TV station LCI on Friday, deputy mayor of Paris Emmanuel Gregoire called the phenomenon “widespread.”

    “You have to understand that in reality no one is safe, obviously there are risk factors but in reality, you can catch bedbugs anywhere and bring them home,” he said.

    Three years ago, the French government launched an anti-bedbug campaign, which includes a dedicated website and an information hotline, as numbers of the insect surged.

    But Gregoire said that despite that plan, “there are 3.6 million people who come into Paris every day, and bedbugs do not stop on the outskirts of the city.”

    An expert from France’s national health and sanitary body, Anses, said the problem was “an emerging phenomenon in France and almost everywhere in the world.”

    “It’s mainly due to the movement of people, populations traveling, the fact that people stay in short-term accommodation and bring back bedbugs in their suitcases or luggage,” Johanna Fite from the Anses department of risk assessment told CNN.

    She added there was an “escalation” in numbers because bedbugs were increasingly resistant to insecticides.

    “We are observing more and more bedbug populations which are resistant, so there is no miracle treatment to get rid of them,” Fite said.

    However, the Paris deputy mayor warned against “hysteria” over the issue, noting there had been an “increase in Parisians who are referring to the town hall’s information services for information on bedbugs”.

    “Professional companies which intervene in residential areas are telling us that currently the proportion of interventions for bedbugs is atypical compared to normal and is increasing rapidly,” he said.

    The news comes as Paris gets ready to host the 2024 Olympics Games, but officials say they are not worried.

    “There is no threat to the Olympic Games,” Gregoire said.

    “Bedbugs existed before and they will exist afterward,” he added, saying the games were an “opportunity” for everybody to work together on the issue.

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  • Endangered red wolf can’t make it in the wild without ‘significant’ help, study says

    Endangered red wolf can’t make it in the wild without ‘significant’ help, study says

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    WAKE FOREST, N.C. — The endangered red wolf can survive in the wild, but only with “significant additional management intervention,” according to a long-awaited population viability analysis released Friday.

    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service also released an updated recovery plan Friday for “Canis rufus” — the only wolf species unique to the United States. It calls for spending nearly $328 million over the next 50 years to get the red wolf off the endangered species list.

    “This final revised recovery plan will help the conservation and survival of the Red Wolf, ensuring these endangered canids endure in the wild for future generations,” Interior Department Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks Shannon Estenoz said in a news release.

    But the announcement comes with a lot of caveats. The viability analysis says it will take drastic reductions in gunshot and vehicle deaths, stepped-up efforts to prevent wolf-coyote mixing, and creative methods to increase reproduction in the wild and captive wolf populations.

    As of August, Fish and Wildlife said the known and collared wild population was 13, with a total estimated wild population of 23 to 22 — all on and around two federal reserves on the North Carolina coast.

    “Despite active current management of this very small population, declines in abundance will likely continue in the face of persistent threats including high anthropogenic (human-caused) mortality and continued hybridization with coyotes,” the study said.

    If releases from the captive breeding program were to cease, extinction of the North Carolina population will likely take place in two to three decades.

    The red wolf once roamed from central Texas to southern Iowa and as far east as Long Island, New York. But generations of persecution, encroachment and habitat loss reduced them to just a remnant along the Texas-Louisiana border.

    Starting in 1973, the year Congress passed the Endangered Species Act, the last wolves were pulled from the wild and placed in a captive-breeding program. In 1980, they were declared extinct in the wild.

    But in 1987, the agency placed four breeding pairs in the 158,000-acre Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge. Another “non-essential experimental population” was later planted in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, but was declared a failure in 1998.

    The Alligator River population thrived, growing to as many as an estimated 130 wolves by 2012. But gunshot deaths and a 2014 decision to cease releases from the captive population, among other factors, caused the numbers to plummet to as low as seven wild wolves in recent years.

    According to the recovery plan, the first update in around three decades, additional wild populations “are necessary for redundancy and, therefore, Red Wolf viability.” But that will need to include federal, state, municipal and private land.

    “We have not yet identified locations for establishing new Red Wolf populations,” the report said.

    In early August, Fish and Wildlife settled a federal lawsuit by a coalition of conservation groups, promising regular releases of the wolves from the captive population — which currently stands at around 270 — over the next eight years.

    But the viability study cautioned that such releases be done very carefully, so as not to reduce the genetic diversity within the captive-bred population. If the program could be expanded to 300 to 400 animals and the reproductive success can be increased by 15%, the authors said, “gene diversity loss in this valuable source population can be reduced.”

    Two of the biggest hurdles to wolf recovery are gunshot deaths and interbreeding with coyotes.

    The viability study authors suggest a target of reducing gunshot and vehicle deaths by half, if possible, and an annual sterilization rate of 10% of the “intact coyote population each year for up to 25 years.” Fish and Wildlife has fitted the wild wolves with orange reflective collars to help distinguish them from coyotes, and has been working with locals to capture and sterilize coyotes.

    They also recommend splitting up unsuccessful breeding pairs and breeding the wolves younger.

    “The analytical results presented here suggest that recovery of red wolves in the wild can be achieved – and can perhaps be realized in 40 to 50 years if conditions are right,” the population study said. “However, success will likely require substantial management efforts beyond many of those currently implemented …”

    Ramona McGee, a lawyer with the Southern Environmental Law Center, said the recovery plan “remains very high level and lacks detail about specific short-term actions. “ But, she added, “we are encouraged the Service took to heart our concerns about better identifying recovery criteria.“

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  • US’ only bison roundup rustles up hundreds to maintain health of the species

    US’ only bison roundup rustles up hundreds to maintain health of the species

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    South Dakota cowboys and cowgirls are rounding up a herd of more than 1,500 bison as part of an annual effort to maintain the health of the species, which has rebounded from near-extinction

    BySUMMER BALLENTINE Associated Press

    September 29, 2023, 4:53 PM

    South Dakota cowboys and cowgirls rounded up a herd of more than 1,500 bison Friday as part of an annual effort to maintain the health of the species, which has rebounded from near-extinction.

    Visitors from across the world cheered from behind wire fencing as whooping horseback riders chased the thundering, wooly giants across hills and grasslands in Custer State Park. Bison and their calves stopped occassionally to graze on blond grass and roll on the ground, their sharp hooves stirring up dust clouds.

    “How many times can you get this close to a buffalo herd?” said South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Secretary Kevin Robling, who was among 50 riders herding the animals. “You hear the grunts and the moans and (see) the calves coming and running alongside mamas.”

    Custer State Park holds the nation’s only Buffalo Roundup once a year to check the health of the bison and vaccinate calves, park Superintendent Matt Snyder said.

    As many as 60 million bison, sometimes called buffalo in the U.S., once roamed North America, moving in vast herds that were central to the culture and survival of numerous Native American groups.

    They were driven to the brink of extinction more than a century ago when hunters, U.S. troops and tourists shot them by the thousands to feed a growing commercial market that used bison parts in machinery, fertilizer and clothing. By 1889, only a few hundred remained.

    “Now, after more than a century of conservation efforts, there are more than 500,000 bison in the United States,” said South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, a horseback rider who took part in the roundup. “The Custer State Park bison herd has contributed greatly to those efforts.”

    The park’s herd began with 36 animals bought in 1914. A state ecologist estimated the park can currently sustain about 1,000 bison based on how snow and rain conditions affected the grasslands this past year, according to Snyder.

    The other 500 or so will be auctioned off, and over the next week, officials will decide which bison will remain and which will go. About 400 calves are born in the park each year.

    “Each year we sell some of these bison to intersperse their genetics with those of other herds to improve the health of the species’ population across the nation,” Noem said.

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  • Missing toddler found sleeping in woods using her dog as a pillow after walking 3 miles barefoot | CNN

    Missing toddler found sleeping in woods using her dog as a pillow after walking 3 miles barefoot | CNN

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    CNN
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    A 2-year-old girl who walked barefoot more than three miles with her family’s two dogs was found sleeping off a wooded Michigan trail using the smaller dog as a pillow, authorities said.

    Troopers were called to a house in rural Faithorn, Michigan, around 8 p.m. on Wednesday after the toddler, Thea Chase, had wandered away from the home, Michigan State Police Lt. Mark Giannunzio told CNN on Friday.

    Faithorn is a small town about a mile east of Wisconsin’s border in northern Michigan.

    Brooke Chase, Thea’s mother, said she had an instinct to check on her daughter who had been playing in the yard, and learned the toddler’s uncle told Thea to go inside because she had no shoes on.

    When Chase and her brother-in-law realized Thea wasn’t in the house, she said she began to yell. They searched for about 20 minutes before calling Chase’s husband and police.

    “When we get a call like that, everything else stops,” Giannunzio said.

    Michigan State Police put out requests for drones, search-and-rescue and canine teams, while members of the close-knit community formed their own search party to help locate the child, who was assumed to be somewhere in the heavily wooded area near the home, Giannunzio said.

    Around midnight, four hours after police were first notified, a family friend searching for Thea on an all-terrain vehicle came across the Chase family’s rottweiler, Buddy, who started barking as he approached, according to Chase.

    The 2-year-old was discovered a short way off the trail, sleeping on the ground with her head atop Hartley, the family’s English Springer. When the ATV driver tried to get near the toddler to wake her up, the smaller dog growled, Chase said.

    “She has those dogs wrapped around her finger,” the mother said.

    Chase added she was “in a fog” for the roughly four hours that search teams looked for her daughter. While she stayed in the home with Thea’s younger brother, troopers searched the house multiple times and tried to comfort the mother.

    When Thea was returned home on the back of the ATV, the child was giggling and saying, “Hi, Mommy,” Chase said.

    The outdoor temperature was about 60 degrees when the toddler was found. Thea was determined to be fine after a medical evaluation, according to Giannunzio.

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  • Dozens Gather To Watch Endangered Tortoise Release On New Mexico Ranch

    Dozens Gather To Watch Endangered Tortoise Release On New Mexico Ranch

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    ENGLE, N.M. (AP) — While the average lifespan of North America’s largest and most rare tortoise species is unknown, biologists have said it could span upward of a century.

    So saving the endangered species is a long game — one that got another nudge forward Friday as U.S. wildlife officials finalized an agreement with Ted Turner’s Endangered Species Fund that clears the way for the release of more Bolson tortoises on the media mogul’s ranch in central New Mexico.

    Gertie, an endangered Bolson tortoise, is shown to a group of state and federal wildlife officials during a trip to Ted Turner’s Armendaris Ranch in Engle, New Mexico, on Friday, Sept. 22, 2023.

    AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan

    The “safe harbor agreement” will facilitate the release of captive tortoises on the Armendaris Ranch to establish a free-ranging population. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Director Martha Williams said the agreement, which offers private landowners protections from regulations, can serve as a model as officials look for more innovative ways to work within the Endangered Species Act.

    Dozens of people gathered for the release Friday of 20 more adult tortoises on the property, which is already home to 23 of them as well as dozens of juvenile ones. With the sun high in the sky and temperatures nearing 90 degrees (32 degrees Celsius), the release was held off until the evening to ensure their well-being.

    The tortoises usually spend about 85% of the time in their earthen burrows, which in some cases can be about 21 yards (20 meters) long.

    Shawn Sartorius, a field supervisor with the Fish and Wildlife Service, said the results of the breeding and restoration efforts for the slow-reproducing and long-lived animals will not be known in his lifetime.

    “What we’re doing here is establishing a population here that can be handed off to the next generation,” Sartorius said.

    Young Bolson tortoises are held in a plastic container before being released.
    Young Bolson tortoises are held in a plastic container before being released.

    AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan

    It’s a step toward one day releasing the tortoise more broadly in the Southwest as conservationists push the federal government to consider crafting a recovery plan for the species. The tortoise is just the latest example of a growing effort to find new homes for endangered species as climate change and other threats push them from their historic habitats.

    Now found only in the grasslands of north-central Mexico, the tortoise once had a much larger range that included the southwestern United States. Fossil records also show it was once present it the southern Great Plains, including parts of Texas and Oklahoma.

    The wild population in Mexico is thought to consist of fewer than 2,500 tortoises, and experts say threats to the animals are mounting as they are hunted for food and collected as pets. Their habitat also is shrinking as more desert grasslands are converted to farmland.

    While it’s been eons since the tortoises roamed wild in what is now New Mexico, Mike Phillips, director of the Turner Endangered Species Fund, said it’s time for biologists to reconsider what ecological reference points should matter most when talking about the recovery of an imperiled species.

    An endangered Bolson tortoise checks out a burrow after being released.
    An endangered Bolson tortoise checks out a burrow after being released.

    AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan

    Climate change is reshuffling the ecological deck and changing the importance of historical conditions in the recovery equation, Phillips said. He pointed to the case of the tortoise, noting that suitable habitat is moving north again as conditions in the Southwestern U.S. become drier and warmer.

    Absent a willingness by wildlife managers to think more broadly, he said, species like the Bolson tortoise could have a bleak future.

    “It would seem in a recovery context, historical range should be considered. Prehistoric range sometimes matters too,” he said in an interview. “But most importantly, future range — because recovery is all about righting a wrong, it’s about improving conditions. The future is what is of great relevance to recovery.”

    Sartorius, of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, agreed, saying managers can’t look narrowly at historic range and still keep animals like the tortoise on the planet.

    The question that biologists have been trying to answer is whether the Armendaris Ranch makes for a good home.

    So far the ranch, spanning more than 560 square miles (1,450 square kilometers) is proving to be an ideal spot. The landscape is similar to that where the tortoises are found in Mexico, and work done on the ranch and at the Living Desert Zoo and Gardens in Carlsbad has resulted in more than 400 tortoises being hatched since 2006.

    In all, the Turner Endangered Species Fund and its partners have been able to grow the population from 30 tortoises to about 800, said Chris Wiese, who leads the project at the Armendaris Ranch.

    “The releases are the essential step to getting them back on the ground and letting them be wild tortoises,” she said. “To us, this is the pinnacle of what we do.”

    The tortoises released Friday will be able to roam freely in the 16.5-acre (6.6-hectare) pen like they would in the wild. They are outfitted with transponders so they can be tracked, and wildlife managers will check in on them once a year.

    Depending on weather conditions and forage availability, it can take a few years or more for a hatchling to reach just over 4 inches (110 millimeters) long. They can eventually grow to about 14.5 inches (370 millimeters).

    The species was unknown to science until the late 1950s and has never been extensively studied.

    “Each and every day we’re learning more and more about the Bolson tortoise’s natural history,” Phillips said.

    A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employee holds Gertie, an endangered Bolson tortoise that has been a key part of the captive breeding program.
    A U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employee holds Gertie, an endangered Bolson tortoise that has been a key part of the captive breeding program.

    AP Photo/Susan Montoya Bryan

    The goal is to build a robust captive population that can be used as a source for future releases into the wild — both in the U.S. and Mexico. That work will include getting state and federal permits to release tortoises outside of the enclosures on Turner lands.

    Those released Friday hit the ground crawling, wandering through clumps of grass and around desert scrub as the Fra Cristobal mountain range loomed in the distance.

    It made for a perfect scene as one of the tortoises headed off toward the western edge of the pen, its shadow trailing behind. It was a moment that Wiese and her team have been working toward for years.

    “We are not in the business of making pets,” she said. “We’re in the business of making wild animals and that means you have to let them go.”

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  • Historians race to find Great Lakes shipwrecks before quagga mussels destroy the sites

    Historians race to find Great Lakes shipwrecks before quagga mussels destroy the sites

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    MADISON, Wis. — The Great Lakes’ frigid fresh water used to keep shipwrecks so well preserved that divers could see dishes in the cupboards. Downed planes that spent decades underwater were left so pristine they could practically fly again when archaeologists finally discovered them.

    Now, an invasive mussel is destroying shipwrecks deep in the depths of the lakes, forcing archeologists and amateur historians into a race against time to find as many sites as they can before the region touching eight U.S. states and the Canadian province of Ontario loses any physical trace of its centuries-long maritime history.

    “What you need to understand is every shipwreck is covered with quagga mussels in the lower Great Lakes,” Wisconsin state maritime archaeologist Tamara Thomsen said. “Everything. If you drain the lakes, you’ll get a bowl of quagga mussels.”

    Quagga mussels, finger-sized mollusks with voracious appetites, have become the dominant invasive species in the lower Great Lakes over the past 30 years, according to biologists.

    The creatures have covered virtually every shipwreck and downed plane in all of the lakes except Lake Superior, archaeologists say. The mussels burrow into wooden vessels, building upon themselves in layers so thick they will eventually crush walls and decks. They also produce acid that can corrode steel and iron ships. No one has found a viable way to stop them.

    Wayne Lusardi, Michigan’s state maritime archaeologist, is pushing to raise more pieces of a World War II plane flown by a Tuskegee airman that crashed in Lake Huron in 1944.

    “Divers started discovering (planes) in the 1960s and 1970s,” he said. “Some were so preserved they could fly again. (Now) when they’re removed the planes look like Swiss cheese. (Quaggas are) literally burning holes in them.”

    Quagga mussels, native to Russia and Ukraine, were discovered in the Great Lakes in 1989, around the same time as their infamous cousin species, zebra mussels. Scientists believe the creatures arrived via ballast dumps from transoceanic freighters making their way to Great Lakes ports.

    Unlike zebra mussels, quaggas are hungrier, hardier and more tolerant of colder temperatures. They devour plankton and other suspended nutrients, eliminating the base level of food chains. They consume so many nutrients at such high rates they can render portions of the murky Great Lakes as clear as tropical seas. And while zebra mussels prefer hard surfaces, quaggas can attach to soft surfaces at greater depths, enabling them to colonize even the lakes’ sandy bottoms.

    After 30 years of colonization, quaggas have displaced zebra mussels as the dominant mussel in the Great Lakes. Zebras made up more than 98% of mussels in Lake Michigan in 2000, according to the University of California, Riverside’s Center for Invasive Species Research. Five years later, quaggas represented 97.7%.

    For wooden and metal ships, the quaggas’ success has translated into overwhelming destruction.

    The mussels can burrow into sunken wooden ships, stacking upon themselves until details such as name plates and carvings are completely obscured. Divers who try to brush them off inevitably peel away some wood. Quaggas also can create clouds of carbon dioxide, as well as feces that corrode iron and steel, accelerating metal shipwrecks’ decay.

    Quaggas have yet to establish a foothold in Lake Superior. Biologists believe the water there contains less calcium, which quaggas need to make their shells, said Dr. Harvey Bootsma, a professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee’s School of Freshwater Sciences.

    That means the remains of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a freighter that went down in that lake during a storm in 1975 and was immortalized in the Gordon Lightfoot song, “The Ballad of the Edmund Fitzgerald,” are safe, at least for now.

    Lusardi, Michigan’s state maritime archaeologist, ticked off a long list of shipwreck sites in the lower Great Lakes consumed by quaggas.

    His list included the Daniel J. Morrel, a freighter that sank during a storm on Lake Huron in 1966, killing all but one of the 29 crew members, and the Cedarville, a freighter that sank in the Straits of Mackinac in 1965, killing eight crew members. He also listed the Carl D. Bradley, another freighter that went down during a storm in northern Lake Michigan in 1958, killing 33 sailors.

    The plane Lusardi is trying to recover is a Bell P-39 that went down in Lake Huron during a training exercise in 1944, killing Frank H. Moody, a Tuskegee airman. The Tuskegee Airmen were a group of Black military pilots who received training at Tuskegee Army Air Field in Alabama during World War II.

    Brendon Baillod, a Great Lakes historian based in Madison, has spent the last five years searching for the Trinidad, a grain schooner that went down in Lake Michigan in 1881. He and fellow historian Bob Jaeck finally found the wreck in July off Algoma, Wisconsin.

    The first photos of the site, taken by a robot vehicle, showed the ship was in unusually good shape, with intact rigging and dishes still in cabins. But the site was “fully carpeted” with quagga mussels, Baillod said.

    “It has been completely colonized,” he said. “Twenty years ago, even 15 years ago, that site would have been clean. Now you can’t even recognize the bell. You can’t see the nameboard. If you brush those mussels off, it tears the wood off with it.”

    Quagga management options could include treating them with toxic chemicals; covering them with tarps that restrict water flow and starve them of oxygen and food; introducing predator species; or suffocating them by adding carbon dioxide to the water.

    So far nothing looks promising on a large scale, UW-Milwaukee’s Bootsma said.

    “The only way they will disappear from a lake as large as Lake Michigan is through some disease, or possibly an introduced predator,” he said.

    That leaves archaeologists and historians like Baillod scrambling to locate as many wrecks as possible to map and document before they disintegrate under the quaggas’ assaults.

    At stake are the physical remnants of a maritime industry that helped settle the Great Lakes region and establish port cities such as Milwaukee, Detroit, Chicago and Toledo, Ohio.

    “When we lose those tangible, preserved time capsules of our history, we lose our tangible connection to the past,” Baillod said. “Once they’re gone, it’s all just a memory. It’s all just stuff in books.”

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  • Pine Ridge becoming known for its growing equestrian community

    Pine Ridge becoming known for its growing equestrian community

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    BEVERLY HILLS, Fla. — For many who call the Sunshine State home, it’s also known by another name.

    What You Need To Know

    • Pine Ridge Equestrian Community has been around for years only now its starting to earn the nickname ‘Little Ocala’

    • The Citrus County community has attracted those passionate in equestrian and is beginning to see more people call the area home

    • With 28 miles of trails to ride, the community is offering plenty of space for both horse and rider to enjoy

    The state didn’t obtain its other nickhame of “Horse Country” without a reason. But perhaps less known is the Citrus County community behind that reputation.

    The community of Pine Ridge has always been an equestrian paradise. Only now, as more people begin to discover its secret, it’s earning another name— “Little Ocala.”

    “If you look at her from behind, she has angel wings,” Gail Thomas said.

    On her 6-acre property, Thomas takes one of her two horses, Annie, out for a stroll.

    “It’s the best kept secret in Florida, I believe,” she said.

    That secret Thomas is talking about is the Pine Ridge Estates Equestrian Community. An areas Thomas has been calling home for the last 15 years.

    “It was the trails, the amenities, the equestrian center where you can board your horses for a couple of years while you’re building your own place,” said Thomas, who is also president of the Pine Ridge Equestrian Association.

    Just a short distance away from Thomas’ property sits the Pine Ridge Equestrian Center. A vast open space for members and their horses. 

    “I think Pine Ridge is truly becoming like the new Ocala,” said Judy McCoy, a realtor with Century 21 J.W. Morton.

    McCoy knows the area all too well. As a realtor, she understands the type of attraction Pine Ridge possesses.

    “We have space, we have the Suncoast Parkway coming directly up from Tampa so it’s very easy to get to either Tampa International Airport or Orlando International Airport,” McCoy said. “You can have the advantage of being kind of a small town and yet the advantage of being close to big cities, if you need that.”

    It’s for this reason that attracted Thomas. Not to mention the extensive trails that run just behind her home.

    “We have 28 miles of trails and then, if you want to ride it backwards, you can double that. Add the excess trails, it’s about 60 miles of trails.”

    Offering plenty of space for both horse and rider to enjoy.

    “I just hope to see people when they move into Pine Ridge to enjoy the wonderful amenities we have,” Thomas said. “And to learn about their horses and just enjoy their life with their horses here, in a safe manner.”

    An inviting prospect to residents and newcomers alike.

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    Calvin Lewis

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  • Private Louisiana zoo claims federal seizure of ailing giraffe wasn’t justified

    Private Louisiana zoo claims federal seizure of ailing giraffe wasn’t justified

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    A private Louisiana zoo says that federal regulators overreached last week when they took away an ailing giraffe

    ByThe Associated Press

    September 17, 2023, 4:11 PM

    ETHEL, La. — A private Louisiana zoo says that federal regulators overreached last week when they took away an ailing giraffe.

    Local news outlets report that Barn Hill Preserve, which markets close-up encounters with exotic animals, is challenging the decision by the U.S. Department of Agriculture to seize a giraffe named Brazos on Tuesday.

    Leaders of the zoo, which also operates a location in Frankford, Delaware, told local news outlets that the department had “no warrant, no ruling, no judgment, and no oversight” when inspectors took the giraffe. Barn Hill’s Louisiana location is in Ethel, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) north of Baton Rouge.

    The USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service says inspectors documented “continued failure” to provide adequate veterinary care, “resulting in a state of unrelieved suffering for the identified animal.”

    Barn Hill said it’s being unfairly retaliated against for notifying the USDA that the giraffe was in poor health. The company said in a statement Wednesday that a veterinarian who has cared for Brazos for the past two years committed “committed medical malpractice by not treating the giraffe properly or possessing the necessary skills to treat him in the first place.” Barn Hill said the veterinarian has since been fired.

    “If they can take our animals, they can take your cows, your horses, and we believe we have just been completely disrespected and that our civil rights are not being honored,” said Gabriel Ligon. CEO of Barn Hills Preserve. “The fact that our vet admitted via email that she misdiagnosed our animal and basically didn’t know what she was doing, I don’t know how we should be penalized. I think that the USDA should’ve given us more guidance and the resources.”

    The company said it hired a giraffe specialist when it learned the USDA planned to seize Brazos, and that the specialist recommended the giraffe not be moved.

    Barn Hill says it tried to appeal the decision but that inspectors showed up too soon.

    USDA records show problems at the nature preserve since 2018, WBRZ-TV reports, including a 2021 complaint that veterinary staff failed to properly diagnose or address the health concerns of some animals.

    The USDA said the giraffe was sent to another zoo licensed under the Animal Welfare Act.

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  • After attacks, British prime minister says American XL Bully dogs are dangerous and will be banned

    After attacks, British prime minister says American XL Bully dogs are dangerous and will be banned

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    British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has described American XL Bully dogs as a “danger to our communities” and announced plans to ban them following a public outcry after a series of recent attacks

    ByDANICA KIRKA Associated Press

    September 15, 2023, 8:15 AM

    FILE – Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak leaves 10 Downing Street to go to the House of Commons for his weekly Prime Minister’s Questions in London, Wednesday, Sept. 6, 2023. Sunak has described American XL Bully dogs as a “danger to our communities” and announced plans to ban them following a public outcry after a series of recent attacks. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung, File)

    The Associated Press

    LONDON — British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Friday described American XL Bully dogs as a “danger to our communities” and announced plans to ban the breed following a public outcry after a series of recent attacks.

    Sunak said he has asked government ministers to bring together police and canine experts to legally define the characteristics of the American XL Bully, which is not recognized as a breed by groups such as the Kennel Club in Britain or the American Kennel Club in the United States.

    “It is not currently a breed defined in law, so this vital first step must happen fast,’’ Sunak said in a video statement posted to X, formerly known as Twitter. “We will then ban the breed under the Dangerous Dogs Act and new laws will be in place by the end of the year.’’

    The government has been under pressure to take action after an 11-year-old girl was attacked and seriously injured by an American XL Bully on Saturday in Birmingham, England. Those concerns deepened on Thursday after a man was killed in an attack that may have involved this type of dog.

    “The American XL Bully dog is a danger to our communities, particularly our children,’’ Sunak said. “I share the nation’s horror at the recent videos we’ve all seen.’’

    Four breeds of dogs are currently banned in the United Kingdom: the pitbull terrier, the Japanese tosa, the dogo Argentino and the fila Brasileiro.

    Some campaigners have called for the American XL Bully, which was originally bred from the American pit bull terrier, to be added to the list because they believe dangerous characteristics have been bred into the animals.

    The XL Bully is not recognized as a breed by the U.K.’s Kennel Club, which has argued that no breed of dog is inherently dangerous. The organization says breed-specific bans do not address the most important factors contributing to attacks, primarily irresponsible dog owners who train their dogs to be aggressive.

    The bully breeds get their name because they were originally used in blood sports, such as bull baiting. The dogs have a muscular build and a heavier bone structure than pit bulls.

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  • Offshore wind energy plans advance in New Jersey amid opposition

    Offshore wind energy plans advance in New Jersey amid opposition

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    ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Two major offshore wind power projects are taking steps forward in New Jersey as the owners of one project agreed to bring the federal government in on their environmental monitoring plans at an earlier stage than has ever been done, and federal regulators said plans for another project are not expected to kill or seriously injure marine life.

    They come as New Jersey continues to grow as a hub of opposition to offshore wind projects from residents’ groups and their political allies, mostly Republicans. The state’s Democratic governor and Democratic-controlled Legislature want to make the state the East Coast leader in offshore wind energy.

    Community Offshore Wind, a joint venture between Essen, Germany-based RWE and New York-based National Grid Ventures, on Thursday announced a five-year partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to promote the exchange of data and expertise on environmental monitoring for offshore wind projects.

    The agreement will bring the federal agency into the company’s planning process at a much earlier stage than is currently done in the offshore wind industry, an arrangement that could become the new industry standard, according to company president Doug Perkins.

    “Instead of us coming up with this on our own and getting some feedback from the agencies, we will work together to make sure that it’s efficient in the data they collect,” he said. “It creates the opportunity, the avenue for us to engage with them, and for them to engage with us, to make sure that our plans, how we’re sampling, where we’re sampling, when we’re sampling, fits with what they do and with what will be required of the industry.”

    Jon Hare, director of NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, praised the proposed collaboration.

    “With help from a number of collaborators and the fishing industry, our agency maintains some of the world’s most comprehensive data sets on large marine ecosystems,” he said. “Our goal is to bring offshore wind energy monitoring activities into this partnership. This agreement is our first chance to make these partnerships a reality and show by example that effective scientific monitoring benefits everyone.”

    Community has leased a 125,000 acre site 60 miles (97 kilometers) off Long Island, New York, and 37 miles (60 kilometers) off Little Egg Harbor in New Jersey. Its project has yet to be designed but is likely to include at least 100 wind turbines. It could be active by 2030 or 2031, Perkins said.

    On Wednesday, NOAA released a letter of authorization for Denmark-based Orsted’s Ocean Wind I project in southern New Jersey.

    It involved approval of plans for unintentional harassment or injury of marine mammals during construction of the project, which would build 98 turbines about 15 miles (24 kilometers) off the coast of Ocean City and Atlantic City. The impact is referred to by the agency as “take,” which refers to harassment or injury of animals.

    “Ocean Wind did not request and (the National Marine Fisheries Service) neither expects nor authorizes incidental take by serious injury or mortality,” the agency wrote.

    Opponents of offshore wind blame the deaths of 70 whales along the East Coast since December on offshore wind site preparation work. But three federal scientific agencies say there is no evidence that such work is responsible for the deaths, about half of which have been attributed to vessel strikes.

    NOAA is requiring Orsted to take a number of steps designed to avoid harm to whales, including a moratorium on the detonation of undersea explosives from Nov. 1 through April 30; visual and acoustic monitoring of the waters near such explosions before, during and after them; shutting down pile driving “if feasible” if an endangered North American right whale or other marine mammal enters certain prescribed zones; and noise mitigation steps including using the least amount of hammer force possible for foundation installations.

    David Shanker, a spokesman for the Save the Right Whales Coalition, called the decision “appalling.” The group recently sent NOAA the results of a study by an independent acoustics company asserting that offshore wind survey vessels have been exceeding approved decibel levels and appear to be using other-than-approved devices.

    “There has been a complete breakdown in the system designed to protect marine wildlife and protect the North Atlantic right whale from extinction,” Shanker said.

    NOAA declined comment.

    Earlier this week, Republicans in the state Senate called for a moratorium on all offshore wind projects. They asked for a special session of the Legislature to consider measures to prohibit further tax breaks for offshore wind companies beyond one already given to Orsted. Senate Democrats declined comment.

    On Wednesday, six protesters were arrested after they refused to leave a roadway in Ocean City where Orsted began onshore testing for its first wind farm project.

    ___

    Follow Wayne Parry on X, formerly known as Twitter, at www.twitter.com/WayneParryAC

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  • A 4-year-old police dog named Yoda detained fugitive Danilo Cavalcante, bringing an end to the exhaustive, nearly 2 week-long manhunt | CNN

    A 4-year-old police dog named Yoda detained fugitive Danilo Cavalcante, bringing an end to the exhaustive, nearly 2 week-long manhunt | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Moments after law enforcement officials spotted convicted murderer Danilo Cavalcante’s head peeking through the underbrush, they released a police dog who bit and subdued Cavalcante, leading to his apprehension nearly two weeks after he escaped prison, officials said.

    The dog, a 4-year-old Belgian Malinois male named Yoda, was from one of two tactical teams that moved in on Cavalcante at around 8 a.m. in a wooded Pennsylvania area, ending an intensive manhunt that drew hundreds of law enforcement officials to the area without any shots fired during the arrest.

    Yoda was a significant force in the takedown, preventing Cavalcante from using a stolen rifle in his possession that lay within arms-reach, said Lt. Colonel George Bivens of the Pennsylvania State Police during a news conference Wednesday.

    “He was just essential as far as the tracking and searching, as were numerous other K-9s that were here,” Robert Clark, supervisory deputy US Marshal for Pennsylvania’s eastern district, told CNN on Wednesday. “All these K-9 resources were utilized from different tactical teams from the area, and they were just incredible resources.”

    US Marshal describes manhunt that led to escaped inmate’s capture

    Cavalcante escaped from Chester County Prison on August 31, leaving the surrounding community gripped with fear as he evaded capture despite being spotted numerous times.

    The 34-year-old was convicted last month in the 2021 killing of his former girlfriend, Deborah Brandão. He is also wanted in a 2017 homicide case in Brazil, a US Marshals Service official said.

    Cavalcante was captured in Chester County, swarmed by at least 20 law enforcement officers, Bivens said. Yoda joined the search from the US Border Patrol Tactical Unit stationed out of Michigan, Clark told CNN.

    Authorities say it took about five minutes from when authorities began moving in to apprehend Cavalcante, with Yoda’s help.

    Danilo Cavalcante is seen lying in the woods surrounded by officers and Yoda, a US Border Patrol BORTAC K9, on Wednesday.

    The fugitive was sleeping when police finally located him, lying on top of a rifle he had stolen from a nearby resident late Monday night. Officers took Cavalcante by surprise, and he tried to flee by crawling through the thick underbrush with the stolen rifle in hand, Bivens said.

    The tactical teams made the decision to deploy Yoda – knowing Cavalcante was armed – before upgrading to deadly force, according to Clark. Only the crown of Cavalcante’s head was visible when Yoda moved in on him, Clark said.

    Yoda is a “bite and hold” police dog, Clark said, trained to hold down an individual until commanded to release the hold. The dog bit Cavalcante on his scalp and then bit him again in the “lower extremity area” to keep him down, Clark said.

    “When the dog got to him, he then went flat with the dog on him – the dog was able to detain him there,” Bivens said. “I was told the rifle was within arm’s length.”

    Cavalcante then “continued to resist” and was “forcibly taken into custody” by the officers, Bivens said.

    Police dogs play “a very important role” in tracking down and safely capturing an individual, Bivens said during the news conference.

    “Far better that we’re able to release a patrol dog like this and have them subdue the individual than have to use lethal force,” Bivens said.

    Escaped inmate Danilo Cavalcante is shown after being captured on September 13, 2023.

    It’s standard practice for K-9s to move first, going quickly and directly to a suspect on command, Bivens told CNN.

    The dogs are trained to take a person “off guard” to prevent them from escaping or using any weapons in their vicinity. Their training grants officers a few extra seconds to approach the suspect and apprehend them without lethal force, Bivens added.

    “They don’t just keep biting and releasing or trying to cause additional injury,” Bivens said, referring to how K-9 dogs are trained.

    “They simply grab onto and try and hold that person in place until officers can get there,” he added, noting police dogs are not meant to be released at a distance or without supervision. “There are officers close by who can then move in, the handler can Immediately pull the dog back off… and then officers take over from there.”

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  • No identifiable relationship between deaths of 12 horses at Kentucky racetrack, investigation says | CNN

    No identifiable relationship between deaths of 12 horses at Kentucky racetrack, investigation says | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    An investigation into 12 horse fatalities at the famed horse racing track Churchill Downs found no causal relationship between the horse deaths and the track, but the report cited concerns about increased risk for some horses due to the frequency and cadence of their exercise schedules.

    The Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority (HISA) launched the investigation in the spring of 2023 to find the causes of the breakdowns, prevent further injury, and determine whether conditions at the famed track in Louisville, Kentucky, contributed to the death of the 12 horses, the report said.

    HISA describes the deaths at Churchill Downs, famous as the site of the Kentucky Derby, as “a sober reminder of the complexity and difficulty of the mission, and ultimately a moment of reckoning for the sport and HISA’s role within it.”

    After the 12 deaths in the spring, HISA advised moving the remaining spring races to Ellis Park in Evansville, Indiana, so additional investigation could be conducted at Churchill Downs before competition resumed. At the time, the authority said it was “deeply concerned by the unusually high number” of horse deaths and called for an “emergency veterinary summit.”

    HISA hired racetrack expert Dennis Moore to determine the conditions of the track. He examined the main dirt racetrack for several days and analyzed factors including the cushion depth, moisture content, surface grades, and material composition.

    Moore found the relevant metrics remained consistent with prior years.

    “The metrics did not indicate a correlation between the track surface and the equine catastrophic injuries sustained during the race meet,” according to Moore’s findings.

    The report also reviewed the location of the injuries on the racetrack to discover any patterns, but the study did not yield “any insightful information,” and no discernible pattern.

    Dr. Alina Vale also examined the results of the necropsies, a term often used for autopsies of animals, and determined there was no identifiable pattern in the reports that pointed toward a single causal factor of the fatalities. No prohibited substances were found in any of the 12 horses, Vale said in the report.

    Another veterinary expert, Susan Stover of the University of California at Davis, found that all 12 horses had run more races in their career than the average racehorse.

    Although the investigation found no causal relationship between the racetrack surface and the fatalities, “analysis of training histories did indicate an increased risk profile for some of the horses due to the frequency and cadence of their exercise and racing schedules.”

    The investigation listed the causes of the death for the 12 horses. Four horses suffered fractures sustained in racing on the dirt track, two fractures sustained in racing on the turf track, two soft tissue injuries sustained in racing on the dirt track, two cases of exercise-associated sudden death, one traumatic paddock injury, and one fracture sustained in training on the dirt track.

    The findings of this report were shared with Churchill Downs before the resumption of the racetrack this month, according to the investigation.

    “HISA has shared recommendations on track surface testing and maintenance with Churchill Downs and offers additional procedural improvements for the tracking and reporting of injuries to better inform the development of additional rules.”

    In a statement provided to CNN, Churchill Downs said they’ve implemented several of the recommendations from the HISA report.

    “We appreciate the diligent investigation and analysis from the team at HISA,” Darren Rogers, senior director of communications at Churchill Downs, said. “We have already implemented several of the recommendations listed in the report as well as additional internal key safety enhancements in time for the opening of our September Meet. Churchill Downs will continue to explore and invest in initiatives that support equine safety as our highest priority,”

    The track plans to resume racing on September 14.

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  • A rhino at an Austrian zoo kills a zookeeper and seriously injures her husband

    A rhino at an Austrian zoo kills a zookeeper and seriously injures her husband

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    Authorities say a rhino at a zoo in Austria attacked a married couple working as zookeepers, killing the woman and seriously injuring the man, authorities said

    ByThe Associated Press

    September 12, 2023, 5:13 AM

    Rescue helpers of the Red Cross enter the Hellbrunn Zoo in Salzburg, Austria, Tuesday, Sept. 12, 2023. Police say a rhino at a zoo in Austria has attacked and killed a zookeeper and seriously injured another. The fatal attack happened early Tuesday morning at the Hellbrunn zoo in the western Austrian city of Salzburg. Police said in a statement that during routine work in the rhino enclosure, a 33-year-old animal keeper was attacked by the animal ‘for reasons that are still unknown’. (AP Photo)

    The Associated Press

    BERLIN — A rhino at a zoo in Austria attacked a married couple working as zookeepers Tuesday, killing the woman and seriously injuring the man, authorities said.

    The fatal attack happened at the Hellbrunn zoo in the western Austrian city of Salzburg.

    Zoo director, Sabine Grebner, told reporters later on Tuesday that the 33-year-old woman, a German citizen from Bavaria, was assigned that day to put an insect deterrent on the rhino.

    It was then that 30-year-old female rhino, Jeti, attacked the keeper though it was not clear why, Austria’s APA news agency cited Grebner as saying.

    Salzburg police said that “the woman succumbed to her injuries at the scene of the accident.”

    The other zoo keeper, a 34-year-old Austrian citizen, was also attacked and injured when he tried to chase the rhino away from his wife.

    The woman suffered severe chest trauma because of the attack and died in the enclosure while her her husband had a fractured leg and was taken to the hospital, APA reported.

    The names of the two zoo keepers were not given in line with Austrian privacy rules.

    The zoo director said the fatally injured keeper was known to be “very careful and thoughtful with the animals, and she had an extremely good sense” when dealing with them.

    Grebner said the exact circumstances of how the accident occurred had yet to be determined.

    “We don’t know what exactly happened,” she said. “We are deeply upset and shocked.”

    All safety regulations would get re-evaluated, she said, adding that there had been no previous incidents at the rhino enclosure which was set up nearly 30 years ago.

    The zoo will remain closed on Tuesday.

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  • Wisconsin wolf hunters face tighter regulations under new permanent rules

    Wisconsin wolf hunters face tighter regulations under new permanent rules

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    Wolf hunters in Wisconsin would have to register kills faster and have less time to train their dogs under new regulations being finalized by state wildlife officials

    ByThe Associated Press

    September 11, 2023, 3:44 PM

    FILE – This photo provided by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife shows a gray wolf, April 18, 2008. Wolf hunters in Wisconsin would have to register their kills faster, face a limited window for training their dogs and couldn’t disturb dens under new regulations state wildlife officials are finalizing. The state Department of Natural Resources plans to hold a public hearing on the new regulations Tuesday afternoon, Sept. 12, 2023, via Zoom. (Gary Kramer/U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service via AP, File)

    The Associated Press

    MADISON, Wis. — Wolf hunters in Wisconsin would have to register their kills faster, face a limited window for training their dogs and couldn’t disturb dens under new regulations being finalized by state wildlife officials.

    The state Department of Natural Resources plans to hold a public hearing on the new regulations Tuesday afternoon via Zoom. The agency plans to bring the regulations to the agency’s board for approval in October.

    The DNR has been relying on emergency rules crafted after then-Gov. Scott Walker signed legislation in 2012 creating a wolf season.

    The new regulations would be permanent. They largely duplicate the emergency provisions but make some changes to reflect goals in the agency’s new wolf management plan. That plan doesn’t set a specific population goal, instead recommending the agency work with advisory committees to determine whether local packs should be maintained, grown or reduced.

    The major changes in the new rules include shrinking the current 24-hour period for registering kills to eight hours. DNR officials have said the 24-hour grace period prevented them from getting an accurate kill count quickly during the 2021 season, leading to hunters exceeding their statewide quota by almost 100 animals.

    Hunters would be allowed to train dogs to track wolves only during the wolf season and would be barred from destroying dens. The new rules keep existing prohibitions on hunting wolves with dogs at night and a six-dog limit per hunter.

    For every verified or probable wolf depredation, farmers would be able to receive compensation for up to five additional calves. According to a DNR summary of the rules, the additional compensation is meant to acknowledge that it’s difficult to prove a wolf attacked a calf.

    Wisconsin held a wolf season in the fall of 2012, in 2013 and 2014 before a federal judge placed gray wolves back on the endangered species list.

    The Trump administration removed them from the list in 2020 and the state held a hunt in February 2021 before a Dane County judge halted wolf hunting indefinitely later that year. A federal judge last year placed wolves back on the endangered species list.

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  • As US East Coast ramps up offshore wind power projects, much remains unknown

    As US East Coast ramps up offshore wind power projects, much remains unknown

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    POINT PLEASANT BEACH, N.J. — As the U.S. races to build offshore wind power projects, transforming coastlines from Maine to South Carolina, much remains unknown about how the facilities could affect the environment.

    And that worries some people, particularly those who depend on the sea for their livelihoods.

    “We don’t have the science to know what the impact will be,” said Jim Hutchinson, managing editor of The Fisherman magazine in New Jersey. “The attitude has been, ‘Build it and we’ll figure it out.’”

    The wind power industry disputes such claims, citing years of studies.

    So far, four offshore wind projects have been approved by the federal government for the U.S. East Coast, according to the American Clean Power Association. Vineyard Wind will place 62 turbines about 15 miles (24 kilometers) off Martha’s Vineyard, generating enough electricity to power 400,000 homes.

    South Fork Wind will place 12 turbines in the waters off Long Island, New York, about 35 miles (56 kilometers) east of Montauk Point, to power 70,000 homes. And Ocean Wind I, the first of two Orsted projects in New Jersey, will place 98 turbines about 15 miles off Atlantic City and Ocean City, generating power for 500,000 homes. The company is a Danish wind power business that will build two of the three offshore projects approved for New Jersey.

    Those projects are in addition to the planned Revolution Wind development, about 15 miles southeast of Point Judith, Rhode Island, with 65 turbines powering nearly 250,000 homes. Numerous others have been proposed, and the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management plans to review at least 16 offshore wind projects by 2025.

    “All this is happening so fast,” said Greg Cudnik, a recreational fisherman, bait and tackle shop owner and party boat captain from Ship Bottom, New Jersey. “Science takes time.”

    A joint study in March by two federal scientific agencies and the commercial fishing industry documents numerous impacts that offshore wind power projects could have on fish and marine mammals, including noise, vibration, electromagnetic fields and heat transfer that could alter the environment.

    Like numerous existing studies, the report pointed out the complexities of how the structures and cables might interact with marine life. For instance, turbines can attract some fish and repel others.

    The March study said large underwater platforms are rapidly colonized by smaller, bottom-dwelling marine life, including shellfish and crabs, which in turn attract larger predators like black sea bass. At the same time, cloudy water from turbine operations, noise, vibrations and electromagnetic fields could also make species leave an area.

    In most instances, report authors agreed that more studies are needed. Andy Lipsky, who oversees the wind energy team at NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center, is a co-author. He said the work helps agencies define monitoring required for long-term studies and that more work is required to determine how offshore wind energy changes marine habitats.

    Research in other countries also is also nuanced. Some European studies have shown that crabs and lobster are attracted to harder sea bottoms that support wind turbines. Others, including flatfish and whiting, were shown to leave those areas.

    And in May, the Biden Administration offered an $850,000 grant to collect more information on the hearing abilities of critically endangered North American right whales, citing “knowledge gaps” in how the animals behave. The request was made “in support of the rapid development of offshore wind,” according to a notice on the Grants.gov website.

    Substantial research already exists. The U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has posted a half-dozen or more studies on its web site every year since 2016; in several instances the studies called for further investigation and analysis.

    Phil Sgro, a spokesman for the American Clean Power Association, said the industry believes sufficient scientific studies exist to establish that offshore wind development can be done “in a manner that is both economical and environmentally responsible.”

    Opponents blame ocean floor preparation for causing or contributing to the deaths of 70 whales on the U.S. East Coast since December. But three federal agencies say there is no evidence the two are related.

    The U.S. fishing industry — both commercial and recreational — has numerous concerns about offshore wind impacting operations in places long available for fishing with minimal interference.

    Interviews with commercial and recreational fishermen and women show they share common anxieties about the offshore wind turbines chasing away species they have long relied on.

    They fear electromagnetic fields emitted from underwater power cables could deter or harm some marine life. They worry about being able to safely navigate around the turbines, and about being prohibited from productive fishing grounds on which they have relied for generations.

    They also worry that unforeseen consequences could reduce catches and trigger government limits on how much can be caught if fish stocks diminish.

    And while some companies have voluntarily agreed to compensate fishermen for any economic damage, there is no mandate requiring it.

    “Offshore wind is the single greatest existential threat to commercial fishing in the United States of America right now,” Meghan Lapp, fisheries liaison for Seafreeze, a seafood company based in North Kingstown, Rhode Island, told New Jersey lawmakers at a recent hearing.

    Cudnik, the New Jersey boat captain, worries about prime species being driven away by changes to the ocean floor.

    “Clams, scallops, flounder, and sand eels are associated with soft sand bottoms,” he said. “Striped bass, sea bass, mahis — everything eats these eels. When they are in abundance, it’s awesome fishing. All these offshore wind areas are in that prime habitat.”

    And Keith Craffey, president of the Baymen’s Protective Association on New Jersey’s Raritan Bay, worries that power cables from a New York project coming ashore in New Jersey will be placed across productive clam beds his members use, potentially rendering the areas off-limits.

    “If we have to lay off 50 guys because of it, are the offshore wind companies going to pick those 50 guys up?” he asked.

    On Monday, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management released an environmental impact statement for the proposed Empire Wind project in New York, designed to power 700,000 homes. It determined that the project could have “moderate to major” impacts on commercial fisheries, and “minor to moderate” impacts for recreational fishing, although minor beneficial effects could also occur from the creation of an artificial reef that will attract some fish.

    New Jersey’s commercial fishing industry had nearly $690 million in sales in 2020, not including imports, according to the U.S. Commerce Department. The recreational sector generated $724 million in sales that year.

    Sgro said the wind power industry has worked closely with the government and the fishing industry to address concerns, including agreeing to avoid placing turbines in the areas most heavily used by anglers. He said a study in the waters off southern New England determined that heat and electromagnetic fields from buried cables will not negatively affect important fish species in the area.

    Orsted, the developer behind two of New Jersey’s approved projects, said it has worked hard to “avoid, minimize and mitigate” negative impacts on fishing.

    The company said a 7-year study of its wind farm in Block Island, Rhode Island, found the catch of most species was unaffected and that there was a greater abundance of black sea bass and cod after construction.

    The study was paid for by Orsted, designed in cooperation with local commercial fishermen and carried out by INSPIRE Environmental, which does ocean floor studies for companies and governments.

    Orsted says it will compensate boat crews for damage to or loss of gear; pay direct compensation to recreational and commercial vessels adversely impacted, and create a navigational safety fund. It also plans to coordinate with state and federal authorities on seasonal operating restrictions to protect flounder and herring.

    The federal government has endorsed — but not required — compensation to the fishing industry for negative effects from offshore wind. Eleven states are considering setting up a regional fund to administer such payments.

    U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone Jr., a New Jersey Democrat, supports the compensation “if the industry experiences economic losses as a result of the transition to offshore wind power.”

    ___

    Follow Wayne Parry on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, at twitter.com/WayneParryAC

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  • Bangladesh’s worst ever dengue outbreak a ‘canary in the coal mine’ for climate crisis, WHO expert warns | CNN

    Bangladesh’s worst ever dengue outbreak a ‘canary in the coal mine’ for climate crisis, WHO expert warns | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Bangladesh is battling its worst dengue outbreak on record, with more than 600 people killed and 135,000 cases reported since April, the World Health Organization said Wednesday, as one of its experts blamed the climate crisis and El Nino weather pattern for driving the surge.

    The country’s health care system is straining under the influx of sick people, and local media have reported hospitals are facing a shortage of beds and staff to care for patients. There were almost 10,000 hospitalizations on August 12 alone, according to WHO.

    WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a news briefing Wednesday that of the 650 people who have died since the outbreak began in April, 300 were reported in August.

    While dengue fever is endemic in Bangladesh, with infections typically peaking during the monsoon season, this year the uptick in cases started much earlier – toward the end of April.

    Tedros said WHO is supporting the Bangladeshi government and authorities “to strengthen surveillance, lab capacity, clinical management, vector control, risk communication and community engagement,” during the outbreak.

    “We have trained doctors and deployed experts on the ground. We have also provided supplies to test for dengue and support care for patients,” he said.

    A viral infection, dengue causes flu-like symptoms, including piercing headaches, muscle and joint pains, fever and full body rashes. It is transmitted to humans through the bite of an infected Aedes mosquito and there is no specific treatment for the disease.

    Dengue is endemic in more than 100 countries and every year, 100 million to 400 million people become infected, according to WHO.

    All 64 districts across Bangladesh have been affected by the outbreak but the capital Dhaka – home to more than 20 million people – has been the worst-hit city, according to WHO. Though cases there are starting to stabilize.

    “Cases are starting to decline in the capital Dhaka but are increasing in other parts of the country,” Tedros said.

    Dhaka is one of the most densely populated cities in the world and rapid unplanned urbanization has exacerbated outbreaks.

    “There is a water supply problem in Dhaka, so people keep water in buckets and plastic containers in their bathrooms or elsewhere in the home. Mosquitoes can live there all year round,” Kabirul Bashar, professor at Jahangirnagar University’s Zoology department, wrote in the Lancet journal last month.

    “Our waste management system is not well planned. Garbage piles up on the street; you see a lot of little plastic containers with pools of water in them. We also have multi-story buildings with car parks in the basements. People wash their vehicles down there, which is ideal for the mosquitoes.”

    To cope with the onslaught of infections, Bangladesh has repurposed six Covid-19 hospitals to care for dengue patients and requested help from WHO to help detect and manage cases earlier, WHO said.

    Climate crisis spreading and amplifying outbreaks

    The record number of dengue cases and deaths in Bangladesh comes as the country has seen an “unusual episodic amount of rainfall, combined with high temperatures and high humidity, which have resulted in an increased mosquito population throughout Bangladesh,” WHO said in August.

    Those warm, wet conditions make the perfect breeding ground for disease-carrying mosquitoes and as the planet continues to rapidly heat due to the burning of fossil fuels, outbreaks will become more common in new regions of the world.

    The global number of dengue cases has already increased eight-fold in the past two decades, according to WHO.

    “In 2000, we had about half a million cases and … in 2022 we recorded over 4.2 million,” said Raman Velayudhan, WHO’s head of the global program on control of neglected tropical diseases in July.

    As the climate crisis worsens, mosquito-borne diseases like dengue, Zika, chikungunya and yellow fever will likely continue to spread and have an ever greater impact on human health.

    “We are seeing more and more countries experiencing the heavy burden of these diseases,” said Abdi Mahamud, WHO’s alert and response director in the health emergencies program.

    Mahamud said the climate crisis and this year’s El Nino weather pattern – which brings warmer, wetter weather to parts of the world – are worsening the problem.

    This year, dengue has hit South America severely with Peru grappling with its worst outbreak on record. Cases in Florida prompted authorities to put several counties on alert. In Asia, a spike in cases has hit Sri Lanka, Thailand and Malaysia, among other nations. And countries in sub-Sarahan Africa, like Chad, have also reported outbreaks.

    Calling these outbreaks a “canary in the coalmine of the climate crisis,” Mahamud said “global solidarity” and support is needed to deal with the worsening epidemic.

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  • Biden administration cancels years-long attempt to drill in Alaska National Wildlife Refuge | CNN Politics

    Biden administration cancels years-long attempt to drill in Alaska National Wildlife Refuge | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The Biden administration announced Wednesday it will cancel seven Trump-era oil and gas leases in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and protect more than 13 million acres in the federal National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska, stymieing a years-long attempt to drill in the protected region.

    The cancellation will affect Alaska’s state-owned oil development agency, the Alaska Industrial Development and Export Authority, which bought the leases covering about 365,000 acres on ANWR’s Coastal Plain during the Trump administration.

    “With today’s action, no one will have rights to drill for oil in one of the most sensitive landscapes on Earth,” Interior Secretary Deb Haaland told reporters on a press call. “Public lands belong to all Americans, and there are some places where oil and gas drilling and industrial development simply do not belong.”

    President Joe Biden echoed Haaland’s comments in a statement and said that his administration will “continue to take bold action” on climate change.

    Wednesday’s actions, Biden said, “will help preserve our Arctic lands and wildlife, while honoring the culture, history, and enduring wisdom of Alaska Natives who have lived on these lands since time immemorial.”

    The 2017 GOP tax bill opened a small part of the pristine wildlife refuge for drilling, a measure championed by Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski, a Republican. But it was never developed or drilled – or came close to doing so. Haaland suspended the leases in June 2021, and some major oil companies, including Chevron, canceled their leases in the area the following year.

    However, the 2017 tax law mandates leasing in ANWR, meaning the Biden administration will have to launch a new leasing process and hold another lease sale by the end of 2024, albeit likely with tighter environmental provisions.

    “We intend to comply with the law,” a senior Biden administration official said, adding they didn’t have a timeline for an additional lease sale apart from the law’s deadline of holding one by December 2024.

    The Interior Department is also proposing federal protections for 13 million acres of land in the NPR-A, limiting future oil and gas development and taking steps to implement conservation protections it announced in March, alongside the controversial Willow oil drilling project. The proposed rule would expressly prohibit new oil and gas leasing in 10.6 million acres, or over 40% of the NPR-A, according to an Interior Department press release.

    The protected area would span areas including Teshekpuk Lake, Utukok Uplands, Colville River, Kasegaluk Lagoon and Peard Bay Special Areas – home to migrating caribou, polar and grizzly bears and migratory birds.

    The new regulations would also reverse a Trump-era rule expanding oil and gas development in the area and shrinking protections for habitat and animals, while also protecting subsistence hunting and gathering from Alaska Native communities who live in the area.

    Haaland and White House senior adviser John Podesta pointed to the impacts of climate change quickening warming in the area.

    “Alaska is ground zero for climate change,” Podesta told reporters. “The Arctic is warming more than twice as fast as the rest of the planet. Today’s actions help protect their future, America’s future and they build on President Biden’s historic climate and conservation record.”

    The administration’s initial suspension of the leases was challenged in court by Alaska’s state-owned oil developer, but AEIDA lost their lawsuit in early August.

    AEIDA did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.

    The Biden administration’s move on Wednesday was cheered by environmental groups and some Democrats in Congress.

    “It’s a significant step to permanent protection of the Arctic refuge, but it’s not mission accomplished,” Rep. Jared Huffman, a Democrat from California, told CNN. “That terrible law requires them to do a leasing process, but not on a deeply flawed environmental review and not without considering more protective alternatives and the best available science.”

    Although Alaska Natives are split on Arctic drilling, some groups commended the Biden administration and urged Congress to undo the 2017 law mandating drilling in ANWR.

    “We urge the administration and our leaders in Congress to repeal the oil and gas program and permanently protect the Arctic Refuge,” Bernadette Dementieff, executive director of the Gwich’in Steering Committee, said in a statement.

    This story has been updated with additional information.

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