Linnet and geese on Goeree island

Wednesday, 29 July.

To Goeree-Overflakkee island.

At the ferry in Maassluis, black-headed gull and common tern.

On Voorne island, a goat drives away a grey heron. From a reed-bed, reed warbler sound.

Crossing the bridge to Goeree, common terns.

Then, the hide at Kwade Hoek nature reserve.

A marsh harrier flying. A kestrel sitting on a pole.

Many grey lag geese; three Canada geese; two barnacle geese.

A male linnet sitting on a leafless branch.

On the beach of Ouddorp: herring gulls, black -headed gulls, oystercatchers.

It is low tide now, which means many shallow pools on the sandy beach. Common terns skydive in those pools. Which means they must be good at putting on the brakes, or they might hit the bottom in those shallow pools. At least twice, a tern flies away with a small fish.

A swift. Probably one of the last of this summer.

East of Ouddorp, in the dunes, a rabbit and a male pheasant.

New bird species discovered in Laos

From BirdLife:

New ‘bald’ bird discovered

30-07-2009

An odd songbird with a bald head living in a rugged region in Laos has been discovered by scientists from the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and the University of Melbourne …

The species has been named Bare-faced Bulbul Pycnonotus hualon because of the lack of feathers on its face and part of its head, it is the only example of a bald songbird in mainland Asia. It is the first new species of bulbul – a family of about 130 species – described in Asia in over 100 years. A description of the new species has been published in the July issue of Forktail, the journal of the Oriental Bird Club.

See also here.

WWT’s work in Laos has been a resounding success, with the threat of building development around the sensitive and vulnerable That Luang Marsh averted, at least for the time being: here.

No or fewer blogging here for a few days

For a few days, there will be no or fewer blogging here.

Don’t worry, all will be back to normal soon.

Biggest leopard research project ever

From PRWeb:

Conserving Big Cats Works: Proof Published from South African Leopard Field Study

The Munyawana Leopard Research Project at Phinda Private Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal began in April 2002 and has been instrumental in the long-term conservation of local leopard populations.

Guided by Dr. Luke Hunter and Guy Balme from Panthera, the research is the most comprehensive study on leopards ever conducted, specifically in terms of the length of study, the number of leopards collared and the outputs generated from the research. Since inception, 64 leopards have been collared (the highest recorded in previous studies was 31), over 13000 locations logged and more than 1600 direct leopard observations made.

Mouse steals food from leopard: here. Probably, the rodent is a Northern red-backed vole.

Searching for leopards in the Drakensberg Mountains of South Africa: here.

First leopard spotted on newly created wildlife reserve in South Africa: here.

War and oil

This video is called Blood and Oil – Trailer – Featuring Michael Klare.

From bloodandoilmovie.com:

The notion that oil motivates America’s military engagements in the Middle East has long been dismissed as nonsense or mere conspiracy theory. Blood and Oil, a new documentary based on the critically-acclaimed work of Nation magazine defense correspondent Michael T. Klare, challenges this conventional wisdom to correct the historical record.

The film unearths declassified documents and highlights forgotten passages in prominent presidential doctrines to show how concerns about oil have been at the core of American foreign policy for more than 60 years – rendering our contemporary energy and military policies virtually indistinguishable. In the end, Blood and Oil calls for a radical re-thinking of US energy policy, warning that unless we change direction, we stand to be drawn into one oil war after another as the global hunt for diminishing world petroleum supplies accelerates.

Nine Iraqi women face imminent execution: here.

Fossil rodent discovered in Spain

From FECYT – Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology:

Extinct rodent species discovered

An international team of scientists has discovered an extinct rodent species, based on fossil tooth remains found in Alborache, Valencia. Eomyops noeliae, from the Eomyidae family, represents the oldest find within this genus in the world.

The small number of fossils found has prevented the scientists from the University of Valencia (UV), who have led this research study, from being able to gain a full picture of this “new” rodent. However, they have been able to prove – on the basis of just the teeth, the only fossil remains discovered – that Eomyops noeliae was morphologically and biometrically different from other rodents of the Eomyops genus. The new species provides valuable evolutionary, biostratigraphic and paleoenvironmental information related to this rodent, which was of average size within the group.

“Until now, the Eomyops genus was made up of a group of small species and one large one, but no intermediately-sized kinds such as Eomyops noeliae had been found”, Francisco Javier Ruiz-Sánchez, lead author of the study published in the French journal Comptes Rendus Palevol and a researcher in the UV’s Department of Geology, tells SINC.

The palaeontologists have also confirmed the age of the find. “The fossils found in the Morteral 20A deposit in Valencia show that this is the oldest species within the genus known in the world with absolute certainty”, points out Ruiz-Sánchez. According to this data, Eomyops noeliae would have lived during the Aragonese period “perhaps between the Lower and Middle Miocene (around 16 million years ago)”, underscores the researcher.

The rodent’s wet environment

The varied fauna of micro-mammals and the new species found in the Valencian deposit provide information about the environmental conditions in which these animals would have lived at the time. “The rodent taxa found show evidence that the environment was very wet”, says Ruiz-Sánchez, even though the full study on all the fossil rodent remains, begun with this new eomyid, has still not been completed.

According to the study, the environment was “relatively thickly wooded, and the climate was wet”, although other factors such as temperature have not yet been defined.

The biogeographical data also show that Eomyops noeliae lived throughout the east of the Iberian Peninsula during the Lower-Middle Miocene. This has been confirmed from the Eomyops species remains excavated from the “most recent” Morteral 22 deposit, which is very close to Morteral 20A.

Ruiz-Sánchez says the finds of this species’ teeth in deposit strata separated by just a few metres show that “how this species survived in the east of the peninsula over a specific time period that is currently hard to define, but which must have gone on for several tens of thousands of years”.

###

Reference: Ruiz-Sánchez, Francisco Javier; Lázaro Calatayud, Belén; Freudenthal, Matthijs. “Eomyops noeliae sp nov., a new Eomyidae (Mammalia, Rodentia) from the Aragonian of Spain” Comptes Rendus Palevol 8(4): 375-384 may-june 2009.

Baillon’s crake again

Like yesterday, to the Baillon’s crake nest area.

I saw the male and the female. Others had seen the three chicks.

Like yesterday: redshank, shelduck, great cormorants, lapwing, black-tailed godwit.

Unlike yesterday, a water rail.

This video from England says about itself:

Water Rail Chicks viewed from Waderscrape Hide, filmed by volunteer Dave Cole.

Later, in the meadow near the nature reserve, all four white storks are present.

Israeli Egyptology suffering

From Haaretz daily in Israel:

Israel currently has a great many professors of law and business administration, but very few professors of Egyptology. The few students who want to learn about hieroglyphics or the history of Pharaonic Egypt are often forced to make do with the single lecturer, at most, who specializes in this field at each university.

Because of the lack of students and faculty positions, Egyptology, Assyriology, classics and African studies are on the verge of disappearing from the world of academia here.

This week, the nation’s universities announced a new initiative aimed at enabling “unpopular” fields of study to continue to exist in an era of budget cuts: four joint programs in which students will take classes from lecturers at several different universities.

Thus an Egyptology student would spend one semester, or one day a week, at Tel Aviv university, and the next he would go to Haifa University or the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The four programs are in ancient Near East languages and culture, Africa studies, Latin in the Middle Ages, and Jewish culture in the ancient world.

Hieroglyphs, the writing system of ancient Egypt, were used only by an elite – it is estimated that only 0.4 % of the population could read and write during the Pharaonic period. But where and how, exactly, were they used? Here.

ScienceDaily (July 12, 2010) — A tiny clay fragment — dating from the 14th century B.C.E. — that was found in excavations outside Jerusalem’s Old City walls contains the oldest written document ever found in Jerusalem, say researchers at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The find, believed to be part of a tablet from a royal archives, further testifies to the importance of Jerusalem as a major city in the Late Bronze Age, long before its conquest by King David, they say: here.

How the British government ‘supports our troops’

This video from the USA is called Rethink Afghanistan (Part 3): Cost of War.

From British daily The Independent:

MoD challenges soldiers’ compensation

By Stephen Howard, Press Association

Tuesday, 28 July 2009

The Government launches an appeal today over two soldiers who won massive increases in compensation paid for injuries.

Light Dragoon Anthony Duncan, who now walks with crutches after being shot while on patrol in Iraq, was originally awarded £9,250 which was increased to £46,000 by an appeal tribunal.

Royal Marine Matthew McWilliams fractured his thigh in a military exercise and was awarded £8,250, increased to £28,750 on appeal.

The High Court upheld the higher awards, ruling that the Ministry of Defence argument that there should be a distinction between the original injury and later complications was “absurd”.

Now the MoD is taking the case to the Court of Appeal, where lawyers are expected to claim the pair should be compensated only for the initial injuries and not subsequent health problems.

It is being heard as the death toll in Afghanistan continues to rise, with a British soldier becoming the 20th to die this month.

Since the start of operations in 2001, 189 British service personnel have been killed.

See also here.

Bob Ainsworth, the defence secretary, has decided not to sack the parliamentary aide who described the government’s appeal against compensation awards for two injured servicemen as “politically bonkers”: here.

Britain: Anti-war campaigners have warned the government that they will mark the eighth anniversary of the invasion of Afghanistan with a massive demonstration in London later this year: here.

Scottish mountain dragonfly record

From the BBC:

Dragonfly discovery a ‘UK record’

A dragonfly found laying eggs in a mountain pond has set a UK record for the species, Highland Council’s biodiversity officer has said.

Jonathan Willet said the female common hawker was at 830m on Tom a’Choinich, north of Loch Affric – the greatest height it has been found in the UK.

The previous highest recorded breeding was at 650m.

Mr Willet said the species – one of 18 dragonfly and damselfly found in the Highlands – favoured warm temperatures.

He said: “This species does breed very high up in continental Europe, up to 2,700 metres in the Swiss Alps, but the summers are a lot warmer there.

“The pond is found in a sheltered location in a south facing corrie, so this must create a warm microclimate within the pond allowing the larva to develop, but it may spend five years as a larva before it is fully grown and ready to emerge as an adult, which may only live for three to four weeks.”

In May, Cairngorms National Park Authority asked the public for help surveying old curling ponds, lochs and bogs to gauge the numbers and varieties of dragonfly and damselfly in the park.

The area is believed to provide habitat for 13 types of the large insects.

A tiny creature no bigger than 1mm in length found in the Scottish hills has been confirmed as the first recorded member of its species found in the UK. The springtail Bourletiella viridescens was photographed in the Cairngorms by Tim Ransom: here.