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How do butterflies and moths travel great distances? According to an article from the BBC researchers have discovered that on those warm summer nights,there are thousands of butterflies and moths traveling in winds up to 60 mph above us. They may look fragile, but these beautiful creatures have a navigation system that makes for the right directional choice and the means to find a way to get there—fast. Now those breezy summer nights seem to take on a whole new meaning.
Archive for the ‘Animal Behavior’ Category
On the Wind and a Prayer
Saturday, February 6th, 2010Ancient Desert Crocodiles
Thursday, November 19th, 2009
Ok, so maybe 100 million years ago, the Sahara Desert was a little more wet than it is now, and so we shouldn’t be too surprised to see that there were giant crocodiles that lived there when it was known as Gondwana. Nowadays we get excited when we see a crocodile that is over 20 feet long, but according to National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence Paul Sereno, based on the skeletons he found, these crocodiles were monsters and strange ones at that. The SuperCroc was 40 feet long and weighed 8 tons. Big, but not strange like some of the others which were smaller but appeared to have unusual characteristics for a modern crocodile like eating grubs or walking upright. (So much for bipedality as a trait that separates humans from other animals.) Sereno believes the amphibious abilities of these crocs who could gallop on land and then were equally at home in the water was the basis of their success. The entire article can be found in Science Daily.
Photo Credit: Mike Hettwer, courtesy National Geographic
Tiny Bird With a Big Story
Wednesday, November 4th, 2009Hummingbirds have many challenges – they are tiny and yet need to be some of the toughest birds out there. They live in conditions where eeking out a living can be a challenge – especially when you have to feed at frequent intervals just to keep going. In the cloud forests of Peru, there is a hummingbird – the male of which has a tail that defies all probabilities of flight. The Spatuletail Hummingbird’s tail 
appears to give no benefit to flight which is key to how we think about hummingbird aerodynamics. The BBC filmed the mating displays of this amazing little bird struggling to impress a female. Sometimes the truth is even more interesting than anything you could ever make up.
Photo Credit: BBC
When Once Just Isn’t Enough
Thursday, October 29th, 2009Songbirds who migrate at night have long been thought to migrate north to breed then south again to molt and overwinter. That makes sense, 
right? But, the times they are a changing. Now researchers from the University of Washington have discovered that there are some birds who make a stop in Mexico on the way down south, not to rest and molt, but to start a second family for the season. Known as “migratory double breeding”, this is the first instance of it in the new World, and the first time it has been documented anywhere in a southerly migration. The species researchers discovered taking part in this were Yellow-billed cuckoos, Orchard orioles, Hooded orioles, Yellow-breasted chats and Cassin’s vireos.
The entire article can be found in Science Daily, and if you want to learn more about some of these birds, you can check out the Peterson Field Guide to Backyard Birds.
Peterson Guide content copyright © 2009 by The Marital Trust B u/w Roger Tory Peterson
Best Friends
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009
One of the few things remaining that some people are convinced make humans different than other animals is the ability to have preferences or feelings. But, this is becoming more and more difficult to defend as there are numerous first-hand stories that refute this claim. This video from CBS News about an elephant in an elephant sanctuary and her best friend is not only delightful and heartwarming, it defies a variety of beliefs that have been previously held which make humans special. At The Elephant Sanctuary in Tennessee, not only does Carol Buckley rescue elephants who have been abused or need a home after their retirement, she also provides a most generous and thoughtful place for them to live out their lives…including the ability to have options with whom to live. Stories like this one make it easy and even a little bit satisfying to know that there are creatures who openly express a grace and compassion for others that we are capable of expressing as well. Sometimes we just need a good example.
Photo credit CBS
Sounds of Nature
Sunday, October 18th, 2009
Nature configures itself in interesting ways that have meaning and speak to us where we are. So it was for Jarbas Agnelli, a Brazilian musician, who saw music in the pattern of birds on wires. Letting the visual pattern the birds made on the wires be the notes, the outcome of this one photo frame of resting birds is a flight of music to anyone’s ears. Listen to the music he transcribed and think about the ethereal compositions that are visually all around us and not yet heard. There is art and music everywhere in nature. Sometimes we just have to look at things with a different eye to unlock it.
The Anxious Garden
Wednesday, September 9th, 2009There’s a lot of stress in my garden. This is not a good sign for a garden, but it’s the birds who are causing it. It took me awhile to figure out what was happening, but after listening to a day’s worth of anxious chirping by a female cardinal, I looked to see if there was a cat someone had let out 
or a pesky squirrel. No predators in sight. Soon I started hearing another sound. It was unfamiliar to me but definitely a bird – probably a baby of some kind. It seemed a little late to have baby birds in the garden, but I was willing to go along with it. After further investigation I discovered that the female Cardinal seemed very territorial and she did indeed have a baby – one who was just getting his red feathers in and looking pretty blotchy at that.
For our Cardinal the issue seems to be that there is a Mockingbird family in the garden as well, and she is not very happy about this. The male Cardinal does not seem to be terribly concerned, but the female is beside herself most of the day and exhausts most everyone who listens to her.
The Mockingbird parents are looking a little bedraggled themselves right now as they have a youngster who is food begging constantly and wearing them pretty thin – and who accounts for the other peeping sound.
The anxiety continues, although it seems rather one-sided as the Mockingbird seems to care very little about the Cardinal who is pretty upset about their proximity. Mother Cardinal seems to want a little more space for her and her baby to be together and that is not going to happen this late in the season with two young birds around. The Mockingbird, who showed his true colors as protector of the garden (you can check him out in fighting form a few blogs back as he attacked a Kestrel in Raptors on the Roof) seems unfazed by the Cardinal’s angst and spends his days feeding his voracious baby.
And the baby Cardinal…well…despite it all, he’s just a happy little thing!
Get Cardinal and Mockingbird ringtones for your phone or iPhone at Wildtones.com. And, make bird identification simple with the Peterson Field Guide to Backyard Birds for the iPhone.
Just Getting Going at 90
Sunday, August 2nd, 2009It is true that some species have a different life time frame than humans. Most are much shorter – some, like macaws and elephants – pretty much mirror ours at around 80 years. But many tortoise and turtles along with horseshoe crabs and a variety of other animals make us look like mortal pikers. George, 
the well-known endangered Galapagos tortoise, after years of sexual indifference, appears to be coming into his sexual prime at 90. Conservationists are delighted he has mated and they have found eggs in his pen, as with only 20,000 left of his species, George is under pressure to continue the line. Well done, George – you are an inspiration to all of us. Let’s hope your legacy keeps going!
Photo from Reuters
Raptors on the Roof
Monday, June 29th, 2009I was having breakfast on our roofdeck this morning with my husband and we were enjoying a gorgeous summer day. Directly across from us on the next building there was a lot of commotion. A mockingbird was doing aerobatics flying at another bird on the roof. We got our binoculars to see what it was and the bird being attacked definitely was a raptor. Just to confirm, we grabbed our iPhone and looked at my Peterson Field Guide to Birds of Prey app to make the ID. Happy to note this was a simple one to confirm – it was very clearly a juvenile American kestrel! The Mockingbird was extremely agitated at this intruder and spent well over 10 minutes dive bombing him until the Kestrel, feeling rather put upon, flew away.
He Otter Make Some Music
Wednesday, June 24th, 2009
I logged into my Facebook account tonight to discover that there was a post from my friend, Shirley McGreal who runs the International Primate Protection League in South Carolina. During the days when Shirley lived in Thailand (which is where she started helping primates over 30 years ago), she developed a love for Asian short-clawed otters. Here in the US, the IPPL has become a spot where not only gibbons but also these beautiful otters who need a home can live out their lives peacefully. Shirley told me that two Asian short-clawed otters from the Monterey Bay Aquarium just arrived at the IPPL. Everyone has been anxiously awaiting their arrival as after many years of attrition at the IPPL otter population, there remained just one lone female. These two guys (Dua and Satu) will keep her company, and so everyone is excited about them being there. It also appears that Dua has acquired a creative talent in California that may prove both useful and attractive. He has learned to play the piano.
Many zoos these days are paying attention to the quality of life of the animals who live there, and keepers are challenged to find ways to replicate some of the usually intense stimulation of life in the wild in a more sterile captive environment. Especially for animals we just don’t know very much about, it can pose all sorts of questions and difficulties. It does appear, however, that the keepers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium noticed that these otters have pretty dexterous “fingers’ on their feet, and decided tickling the ivories might be an interesting option. Now, I don’t know if this kind of musical talent will continue to be encouraged at the IPPL. However if it is, I guarantee you that the otters have a built in primate chorus with the gibbon population there. Every morning, there is a beautiful dawn chorus of song from these gibbons and I suspect that a little musical accompaniment might be a nice addition.
Video of Dua playing the piano
Photos by Mike Turco
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