Britain: marsh harriers saved from brink of extinction

The British Broadcasting Corporation reports:

A bird of prey is thriving throughout the UK, 35 years after it was on the brink of extinction.

A crackdown on toxic pesticides and persecution has helped boost numbers of marsh harriers to a 200-year high.

In 1971, just one pair remained at the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds’ Minsmere reserve in Suffolk.

By 2005, 360 breeding females were recorded in parts of eastern England, the Cambridgeshire Fens, Kent, Yorkshire, Lancashire and Scotland.

The birds are known for their spectacular aerial courtship display.

See and hear marsh harrier sound and video.

Tiger cubs born: see video. Other young animals

This video says about itself:

It’s a special day for three very rare white tiger cubs in Chile. They’re making their public debut at Santiago Zoo.

Recently, in Ouwehand’s zoo in The Netherlands, three tiger cubs were born.

An older entry, from my ModBlog cache, 6 May 2006:

Many young animals were born this spring in Blijdorp zoo in Rotterdam in The Netherlands.

They include four swift foxes from North America.

Also the white-naped cranes have two chicks.

And two young Mhorr gazelle.

And one young addax.

Also one young Southern crowned pigeon.

Flamingo from zoo in USA: here.

USA: punk band Ducky Boys on war in Iraq and at home

This is a video of The Ducky Boys – “Kids”.

From punkmusic.about.com:

Streetcore Punk For The Working Class

Boston’s Ducky Boys have always been a band that speaks to the blue-collar worker in all of us.

Their songs deal with simple themes about love and life.

On The War Back Home, they are continuing these themes, but their music has gotten simpler and at the same time their message has gotten more complex.

Dark Times

The War Back Home is stripped down, simple three-chord rock with complex messages that are heavily geared toward the working class.

Beginning with “Celebrate”, the first track, the band is dealing with both the war in the Middle East and the split between the haves and have-nots, addressing the idea that things are dark and getting darker.

This blue vs. white collar theme is predominant on the album.

On “Bombs Away”, vocalist Mark Lind sings, “Looks like it’s happening again.

They’ve brought back the Reagan Years and the Young Republicans.

Still, I’ve got no money to my name. Ain’t it funny how the rich get richer while the poor just stay the same?”

On Tony Blair’s London, where one can get arrested as a ‘terrorist’ just for playing songs by punk band The Clash: see here.

Colombia: painted frog, thought extinct, still alive

From Biology News Net:

Researchers exploring a Colombian mountain range found surviving members of a species of Harlequin frog believed extinct due to a killer fungus wiping out amphibian populations in Central and South America.

The discovery of what could be the last population of the painted frog (Atelopus ebenoides marinkellei) indicates the species has survived the fungus, providing hope that other species also might avoid elimination from the epidemic caused by a pathogenic fungus of unknown origin.

Also on this from LiveScience:

The painted frog was last seen in 1995.

“The scientific importance of the finding must motivate us to adopt urgent measures toward saving the last of these amphibians, both in the wild and through captive breeding programs,” said Fabio Arjona, executive director of Conservation International in Colombia.

“That will require a lot of support from the local and international communities.”

USA: junk science sacrificing mouse to developers unmasked

Associated Press reports:

New Study: Tiny Mouse Deserves Protection

May 17th

By ROBERT WELLER
Associated Press Writer

DENVER – A new study reinforces a tiny rodent’s reputation as the mouse that roared, and that could block millions of dollars in development in Wyoming and Colorado if it hangs on to its endangered status.

For the second time, a study has found the Preble’s meadow jumping mouse is distinct from other types of mice and deserves federal protection.

The 3-inch-long mouse has been at the center of a huge controversy in the West because its habitat includes prime undeveloped real estate, and protected status would put limits on what the owners could do with their land.

Eighteen months ago the Interior Department announced it was withdrawing the Preble’s endangered status based on a study that concluded it was actually a more common subspecies of jumping mouse.

Developers cheered the decision, but after a chorus of complaints by other scientists and environmental groups, the decision was delayed and a new study was ordered.

That study, by Tim King of the U.S. Geological Survey, found that the original study, by Rob Roy Ramey of the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, was flawed.

Ramey no longer works at the museum and his home number was not known.

The Interior Department, which hired him after he did the Preble study, was unable to provide a contact number for him Wednesday.

The latest report was published May 10 in Animal Conservation, the same magazine that had published Ramey’s conclusion that the Preble’s meadow mouse is the same subspecies as the Bear Lodge meadow mouse, which is not threatened.

For the latest report, eight scientists reviewed Ramey’s study.

They found that instead of showing that the two mice are the same subspecies, the research “offers further support for the classification of Zapus hudsonius preblei (Preble) as a unique subspecies and a distinct evolutionary unit worthy of the protection it is currently afforded.”

“Our examination of the Ramey et al. study both demonstrates its limitations and reveals that their own results support the conclusion that the Preble’s meadow jumping mouse is distinct and should remain protected under the Endangered Species Act, said Sacha Vignieri, a biologist who specializes in mammalian population genetics for the Centre for the Study of Evolution at the University of Sussex in Great Britain.

See also here.

Compare the Bush administration’s war on science, like George W’s little brother Jeb, Governor of Florida, using junk science against protection for the Florida panther.

Male mice sing songs of love: here.

Read more, and hear the mice sing: here.

USA: Former Nazi Removed From Space Hall of Fame

Associated Press reports:

Former Nazi Removed From Space Hall of Fame

May 18th

ALAMOGORDO, N.M. – A former Nazi scientist who was linked to experiments on prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp in Germany has been ousted from the International Space Hall of Fame.

Hubertus Strughold, who had been honored in 1978 for work in developing the spacesuit and space capsule and for his contributions to space medicine, was removed last week by unanimous vote of the New Mexico Museum of Space History’s commission.

The German-born scientist was brought to this country by the U.S. military after World War II to work on aerospace projects. He died in 1987.

The removal process began last fall after a museum visitor noticed Strughold’s name in its hall of fame and notified the New Mexico Anti-Defamation League, said Susan Seligman, the league’s regional director.

The league uncovered records of Strughold’s past and presented them to the commission.

Strughold was linked to experiments on concentration camp prisoners in the 1940s as the Nazi director of medical research for aviation, Seligman said, though she said she did not know of him personally conducting experiments.

Strughold’s name was removed from Brooks Air Force Base’s aero-medical library in 1995 and his picture was removed from the mural “The World History of Medicine” at Ohio State University in 1993, the Anti-Defamation League said.

Newly unearthed documents challenge whether Wernher von Braun, Nazi physicist and crucial figure in the US space programme, was really the inventor of Hitler’s infamous V-2 rocket: here.

United Nations: Bush, close down Guantanamo Bay and other torture centers. US censorship of film poster

The United Nations Committee against Torture has called on the United States Bush administration to close down Guantanamo Bay camp and other torture centers.

From Cinematical (USA; with different hyperlinks there):

MPAA Censors Guantanamo Poster

Posted May 18th 2006 12:31PM by Martha Fischer

Just a day after we reported on censorship in other parts of the world (assuming, perhaps, that films in the US escape such restrictions) comes the news that American authorities are getting into the act, as well. Fan-freaking-tastic.

According to press reports, the MPAA has objected to the poster that Roadside Attractions was planning to use to promote their American release of [movie] The Road to Guantanamo.

The original poster depicts a prisoner hanging from chained wrists, with a burlap bag over his head — nothing more, said Roadside president Howard Cohen, than a reflection of “what it is we are doing to people in Guantanamo.”

More posters of that film: here.

See also here.

And here.

Not only The Road to Guantanamo, but also the film Baghdad ER faces censorship; from the Pentagon of Donald Rumsfeld. See here.