Cool

Via WTF Is It Now? Some great photos at here.

Golden Rays

Lakeshore Nightmare

I'm just happy I was born in the middle of the 20th century. Otherwise, I might be living with a few less fingers. This frog would have been the culprit.

Having It Both Ways

Is not a good thing in this case.

Some species of male fish are acquiring female sexual characteristics at unusually high frequencies in the Potomac River and its tributaries, prompting concerns about pollutants that might be causing the problem. In some Potomac tributaries, including the Shenandoah River in Virginia, nearly all of the male smallmouth bass caught in a survey last year by the United States Geological Surveys were so-called intersex fish, producing immature eggs in their testes. In the Potomac itself, 7 of 13 largemouth bass exhibited female characteristics, including 3 that were producing eggs. Intersex fish were discovered in the Potomac rivershed in 2003 and have also been found in other parts of the country. But the frequency found by the surveys is much higher than what had been found elsewhere, said Vicki Blazer, a fish pathologist. Female fish caught in the survey did not develop any unusual sex traits, though fish of both sexes exhibited lesions and other problems related to pollution, said Ms. Blazer, who coordinated the survey. Smallmouth bass appear to be more susceptible to intersex development than largemouth bass, she said.

Smallmouth bass are great fighting fish. We have a great fishery, some say world class, but stuff like that puts me off. But it's great fun. Now, if I only had a boat.

Amur Tiger Time

Not Cool

With his own President. It's a start, however. A good start.

California made a bold move to curb global warming by passing on Thursday the United States' first bill to cap man-made greenhouse gas emissions which state leaders hope will be emulated across the country.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, frustrated by lack of action by fellow Republican President George W. Bush on reducing heat-trapping gases, teamed up with the state's Democratic majority on the landmark bill and will sign it next month.

The bill cleared its last legislative hurdle in the State Assembly in a 46-31 vote, with opposition from Schwarzenegger's own Republican Party.

The Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 puts California at the forefront of the fight against climate change along with the European Union, and increases pressure on Washington to place mandatory caps rather than the voluntary ones favored by Bush.

California aims to reduce its emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, a cut of around 25 percent. The biggest sources of heat-trapping gases, like power plants and cement makers, will be required to report their emissions.

German Wolves

*

Good news for Europeans. See, I'm not an isolationist.

A century after they were wiped out by hunters and a burgeoning population, wolves have returned to parts of eastern Germany as factories close down, businesses fail and people move out.

A few dozen wolves have formed a beachhead in Germany's Brandenburg state just west of the border with Poland and enjoy special protection from authorities delighted by the return of the shy animals so deeply entrenched in German folklore.

It's a surprising comeback in one of the world's leading industrial nations where 82 million people are squeezed into a country the size of the U.S. state of Montana.

*These wolves are living in the Bavarian forest.

NRDC Blocks Drilling in Redrock Wilderness

Via Mrs. coldH2O & NRDC.

In a major victory for Utah's spectacular Redrock canyonlands, a federal court has ruled that the Bureau of Land Management broke the law by rushing to sell oil and gas leases on 16 parcels of wilderness-quality lands. NRDC and our partner, the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, filed a lawsuit to block the sale after the agency failed to consider the potentially devastating environmental impacts of putting oil and gas rigs in parts of Desolation Canyon, the Book Cliffs and the Flat Tops wilderness areas, among other fragile wildlands. Our court victory underscores more than ever the need to permanently protect the Redrock Wilderness, which provides important habitat for cougars, bighorn sheep, bald eagles and other wildlife. BioGems Defenders are urging Congress to pass "America's Redrock Wilderness Act," which would safeguard millions of acres of southern Utah's most spectacular mountains, canyons and rivers.

Kid+2 Update

Things have slowed way down. Tests have shown that the babies' lungs haven't matured sufficiently, so they're in some sort of staging area for birthing. They will probably be there for a couple of weeks. Ah, the long hospital stay, anyone jealous? Please report. Later.

The Chimp-In-Chief

...could maybe, possibly, no I guess not, learn from these guys.

The noise came from the trees: crack, crack, crack.

As the researchers and their village guides crept closer, they saw something that was not supposed to be happening in the Ebo forest in the central African nation of Cameroon: chimpanzees using rocks as hammers to break open tough-shelled nuts.

Previous research had found that kind of tool use only in chimps 1,000 miles away, across the wide N'Zo-Sassandra River in Ivory Coast. Researchers thought the behavior was either a genetic trait or maybe a learned skill passed from one generation to another.

The discovery of tool use among chimps in Cameroon, separated from their cousins in Ivory Coast by the "information barrier" of the river, suggests that the skill was invented independently in each place, according to a study published Tuesday in the journal Current Biology.

Just Stupid

& mean. How petty can Bu$hCo be, this petty:

Evolutionary biology has vanished from the list of acceptable fields of study for recipients of a federal education grant for low-income college students.
....
That the omission occurred at all is worrying scientists concerned about threats to the teaching of evolution.
....
“I am not at all certain that the omission of this particular major is unintentional,” he added. “But I have to take them at their word.”

I wouldn't trust them with an empty coffee cup.

Really Fast

Holy crap, I'm glad they aren't they aren't the size of pine squirrels.

Pine, OK, Red Squirrel

The trap-jaw ant's scientific name may be ponderous, Odontomachus bauri, but this hunter can clamp its mandibles shut at between 78 mph and 145 mph, according to a report in Monday's online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Trap-Jaw Ant