New Mozambique snake discovery

From the Mozambique News Agency:

Mozambique: New Venomous Snake Discovered in Cabo Delgado

15 January 2013

Maputo — A researcher at Lurio University, based in the northern Mozambican province of Nampula, has discovered a species of highly venomous snake not previously known in the country.

The species is Thelotornis usambaricus, which belongs to a group of snakes commonly known as twig snakes. Previously, this species was only known from Tanzania, but the researcher, Harith Farooq, discovered it when he was undertaking a survey of terrestrial wild life on Vamizi island, in the Quirimbas archipelago, off the coast of Cabo Delgado province.

Farooq caught two of the snakes, which he could not immediately identify.

He sent one of the animals to the Natural History Museum in Zimbabwe to ascertain its taxonomic classification. This work was done by the zoologist Donald G. Broadley, who discovered the species in Tanzania in 2001.

The second of the snakes is now in the reptile collection kept in the branch of Lurio University in the Cabo Delgado provincial capital, Pemba.

Thelotornis Usambaricus is a member of the Thelotornis genus of back-fanged snakes. Its venom is hemotoxic – which means that it destroys red blood cells. This type of venom can disrupt blood clotting, and cause generalized tissue damage.

It is much slower acting than the neurotoxic venom (poison that affects the nervous system) of snakes such as the black mamba. However, no anti-venom has yet been developed for Thelotornis poison, and although bites are rare, fatalities have been recorded in Tanzania.

This snake usually conceals itself in trees, from which it strikes at its favoured prey – lizards, frogs and sometimes birds.

With this discovery, the number of snake species known to exist in Mozambique has risen to 96.

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Africa’s largest coastal marine reserve in Mozambique

This video is about marine life in Mozambique.

From Wildlife Extra:

Mozambique creates Africa’s largest coastal marine reserve

Ten islands and surrounding coralcover more than 1 million hectares

November 2012. The Primeiras and Segundas have been approved as a marine protected area in Mozambique making this diverse ten-island archipelago Africa’s largest coastal marine reserve.

Comprising ten islands off the coast of northern Mozambique, the protected area will cover more than 1.040.926 hectares and contains abundant coral and turtle species. WWF has worked for eight years to secure this marine reserve, threatened by overfishing and unauthorised tourism.

Florêncio Marerua, WWF Mozambique´s Country Director, said “This is a great response to the appeal by local communities to help them protect their resources. This is a very important step in our effort to achieve the conservation and sustainable management of Mozambique’s marine and coastal resources, as this adds a globally significant area to the network of marine protected areas along the country’s coast. It is particularly exciting that both the government authorities and local communities recognise the benefits of conserving these resources.”

Located in the northern region of the country, between Nampula and Zambezia Provinces, the declaration of the Primeiras and Segundas environment protection area is the second major conservation area to be declared within the last two years.

Rich in coral and mangroves

The Archipelago includes the most robust and diverse coral community in Mozambique. It is rich in mangroves, marine life, deep underwater canyons and large seagrass beds. Due to cold nutrient-rich upwellings, the Archipelago is spared coral bleaching, a common problem in other coral-rich areas, making these some of the most globally productive and important reefs on the planet.

“This declaration by the Government shows they understand and care about the need for conservation of marine resources to support sustainable use by their communities, “said John Tanzer, Director of WWF’s Global Marine Program.

“Protecting the rich natural resources of this magnificent area will make a major contribution to the long term food security and livelihoods of the people of the region. It is also a significant contribution by Mozambique to safeguarding the future of the world’s marine environment more generally and deserves recognition and congratulations to all concerned who worked together to make it possible.”

The area is also of great economical importance. Artisanal, semi-industrial, and industrial fishermen have been carrying out their fishery activities in the same area. Thus, all fishing activity within the archipelago area shows signs of overexploitation, with some species on the brink of collapse.

Related articles

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• In Nevis, fishers are essential to the success of marine protected areas (greenantilles.com)
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• Mozambique: A hide away in the Quirimbas Archipelago (telegraph.co.uk)
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Tuna and shark fishing off Mozambique

This video, in the Afrikaans language, is about marine life and sea cucumber poaching in Mozambique.

From Wildlife Extra:

Greenpeace monitoring of tuna and shark fishing off Mozambique

Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior ends two weeks of joint fisheries surveillance with Mozambique government

September 2012. The Greenpeace flagship Rainbow Warrior has ended its two week cooperation with the Mozambican Ministry of Fisheries. The Rainbow Warrior had been patrolling Mozambique’s waters and facilitating inspections of foreign fishing vessels that mainly target high-value tuna and endangered sharks in Mozambique’s waters. Due to limited resources, vast areas of Mozambique’s waters are not closely monitored, creating an opportunity for illegal and unreported fishing.

“Currently fishing fleets are plundering the Indian Ocean of tuna, sharks and other ocean life. Vessels which repeatedly fail to comply with the rules must be stopped. Our oceans and the billions of people dependent on them for food and jobs need proper control and enforcement of fishing regulations,” said Paloma Colmenarejo, Greenpeace International campaigner on board the Rainbow Warrior.

Japanese and Spanish trawlers

During the joint surveillance, an area of 133,500 km2 was covered and four foreign vessels were inspected. Three were Japanese and one Spanish. One of the Japanese vessels, the Fukuseki Maru N° 27, owned by the Fukuseki Maru Co. Ltd., failed to cooperate and allow enforcement officials to weigh shark fins found onboard. This is an infringement of its licencing conditions and the Mozambique government is currently considering further legal proceedings.

Tuna and shark fins

Longliners in Mozambique waters mainly target albacore, bigeye, and yellowfin tuna as well as swordfish and sharks for the lucrative fin trade. Albacore tuna is being overexploited in the region and many shark species are endangered. Indian Ocean albacore is caught almost exclusively with drifting longlines. The lack of proper management and pirate fishing are contributing to the demise of these species.

“Illegal fishing is a massive problem in waters of coastal states with limited capacity to monitor these vessels’ activities. It is stealing fish from the Indian Ocean and deprives coastal states of much needed income,” added Colmenarejo.

João Noa Senete, Head of the Fisheries Surveillance Operations Department at the Mozambique Ministry of Fisheries, added: “Illegal fishing affects fishing communities and squanders resources at the expense of future generations. That is why we think this joint mission with Greenpeace International may contribute to minimising or eliminating illegal, unreported and unregulated fishing, maximising economic benefits from fishing and the sustainability of fisheries resources.”

Greenpeace is calling on key market players and tuna brands to ensure they have a traceable supply chain and only source tuna that is legal and comes from sustainable sources.

Greenpeace is continuing its mission in the Indian Ocean to highlight the problems associated with excessive tuna fishing, unsustainable fishing practices, and the need for countries to cooperate and ensure that communities will benefit from the wealth coming from the oceans in the future.

Canada: Banning shark fin is on the menu at this week’s Union of B.C. Municipalities’ meeting in Victoria but several Vancouver restaurants serving the dish are reluctant to discuss it: here.

Whale sharks, new research

This video is called Whale Sharks – Reef Life of the Andaman – Part 3.

From Wildlife Extra:

Whale shark ID identifies world hotspots

Donsol is Philippines Whale shark hotspot, reveals WWF, with at least 377 identified.

September 2012. High-tech satellite tags, waterproof cameras and hefty lungs are the tools of Dave David’s trade. As the head researcher of WWF’s Donsol-based whale shark photo-identification programme, Dave has spent the past six years holding his breath – literally – to swim with the world’s largest fish.

Weigh up to 10 tonnes

Strikingly-spotted whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) can grow longer than a passenger bus and weigh a whopping 10 tonnes. With unblinking golf ball-sized eyes, they wolf down wafting clouds of plankton and the occasional, unlucky small fish. Together with basking and megamouth sharks, they are one of just three planktivorous, or filter-feeding, sharks and have cruised the world’s seas for some 50 million years. Little is known of their habits, with fewer than 350 sightings recorded prior to the 1980s.

Through the support of WWF-Denmark, WWF-Philippines allied with Australia-based ECOCEAN, the Hubbs Sea World Research Institute (HSWRI) and Banco de Oro Unibank (BDO) to catalogue the country’s whale sharks. The partnership provides researchers with both population numbers and migratory data to guide conservation efforts not just for whale sharks – but for all migratory pelagic species.

Whale shark ID

Sporting waterproof digital cameras, trained WWF skin divers snap photos of a spot right above each shark’s pectoral fins, behind its gill slits. The photos are fed into a computer which uses a program to triangulate each shark’s unique spot configuration. Data is then uploaded to the web-based ECOCEAN library.

3822 whale sharks identified worldwide

Unless it is a new individual, the library shows researchers when and where the shark was last encountered. Since 2003, ECOCEAN has catalogued 3822 individual sharks from places as far as Mexico, Mozambique and the Galapagos Islands.

“Photo-identification is a non-invasive approach for identifying sharks,” explains David. “The library uses the whale shark’s distinct patterns, plus information on scars, sex and size to identify individuals.”

Philippines whale sharks

Since WWF-Philippines began implementing the programme in 2007, 458 individual whale sharks have been identified – 377 in Donsol, 54 in Cebu, 14 in Leyte and the rest in Bohol, Palawan, Albay and Batangas.

GPS tags

To complement the photo-identification drive, 29 whale sharks were affixed with detachable GPS satellite tags designed to pop to the surface after several months of data collation. Four sharks were tagged in May 2007, 10 more in May 2009 and 15 in April 2010.

Wide ranging, and deep

The results suggest that most tagged whale sharks keep to 200 kilometres of Donsol. Three however, swam east to the Philippine Sea, with one more swimming as far north as Taiwan. All spent most of their time below 50 metres, rarely rising to the surface to feed.

“The results suggest that whale sharks are highly-mobile, transient foragers which recognize no country or territorial boundary as their own. The distribution of whale sharks and other large filter-feeders also indicate the presence of plankton and the overall health of our oceans,” expounds David.

Whale shark hot spots – Ningaloo Reef, Mexico & Mozambique

For years, Donsol has been identified as a whale shark hotspot, hosting one of the largest aggregations of whale sharks on Earth. Other large aggregations include Ningaloo Reef in Australia with 808, Mexico with 812 and Mozambique with 624. Through continued research, Dave and other WWF volunteers hope to generate an accurate estimate of the country’s migratory and resident whale shark population.

“Long days at sea are worth it, considering the immense scientific, ecological and economic value that whale sharks bring people,” adds David. “Even after years of research, there’s still so much we have to discover – where they feed, mate and give birth. Our work continues, which is just as well because diving with these gentle giants is pure magic.”

After six years of swimming with the world’s largest fish, it seems that each shark encounter still leaves Dave breathless.

Whale sharks regulate their body temperature: here.

Whale sharks, a threatened species that can grow as big as a bus, have become so wildly popular with tourists that scientists, environmentalists and even eco-­tourism operators are calling for new limits on human contact: here.

Shark finning bans catching on! Way to go Vancouver! Here.

Today we moved closer to a complete ban on shark finning in the European Union: here.

Sharks are color blind, new research suggests, with the toothy predators likely forever seeing the world in black and white: here.

New bat species discovery in Africa

Those newly discovered bats may help solve the problem of the newly discovered malaria mosquito species … unless some zealot starts spraying DDT or similar poison all over the place, killing the bats, making people sick and making the mosquitoes resistant.

From Wildlife Extra:

4 new bat species recognised in Africa

A new multidisciplinary study on the enigmatic large Horseshoe bat – found widespread throughout South and East Africa – has revealed that instead of just one species as previously believed, the bat is in fact five different species, four of which have just been classified for the first time following their discovery.

September 2012. Latest research has discovered four new species of Horseshoe bat in Africa by piecing together clues such as DNA data and sonar frequency. This innovative approach could be used to tackle mysteries of other ‘cryptic’ species.

It was previously thought that there was only one type of large Horseshoe bat, Hildebrandt’s Horseshoe bat, although a series of discoveries beginning back in 1988 has led researchers to long suspect that the bat was in fact a complex group of different species – known as a ‘cryptic’ species. But hard evidence had eluded scientists for years. Now, modern technology, combined with a multidisciplinary approach, has allowed researchers to solve the riddle of these cryptic species for the first time.

How they separated them

The researchers compared key characteristics of the bats, including sonar calls, skull shape, genitalia and, critically, divergence in DNA sequences to diagnose and classify the four new species. It is believed that this combination of techniques, the consilience of evidence, could be used to unlock other cryptic species in the future – such as certain types of chameleon, frog and shark – suggesting that current predictions of global biodiversity might be too low.

The new species are:

Cohen’s Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus cohenae)
Smithers’ Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus smithersi)
The Mozambican Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus mossambicus)
The Mount Mabu Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus mabuensis).

Researchers discovered correlations between altitude and size in the bats, with gigantism occurring in high habitats and dwarfism at lower altitudes due to variations in climate temperature. To explain the evolution of these differences, they invoked the relationship between skull size and sonar frequency – the larger bats call at lower frequencies.

Mozambique

One of the four new species of bat was discovered by Dr Julian Bayliss from the Conservation Science Group at Cambridge’s Department of Zoology, and has been named after Mount Mabu – the largest rainforest in southern Africa.

The rainforest in northern Mozambique was first brought to the attention of the global scientific community by Bayliss in 2005, who came across it while scanning the digital satellite application Google Earth . A field visit was then organised by Bayliss and Claire Spottiswoode to ground truth the site, in preparation for a RBG Kew Darwin Initiative project to assess the biodiversity of the high altitude mountains in northern Mozambique. Since this discovery, Bayliss has worked extensively at Mount Mabu – home of the new bat species. The rainforest has proved to be a vast treasure trove of previously undiscovered wildlife, and conservationists are fighting to get the land protected.

Bayliss said “We chose this bat’s name to draw attention to the serious threat to the unique biodiversity isolated on the montane forest islands in northern Mozambique, notably Mount Mabu and Mount Inago. None of these landforms lie within formally protected areas, and are all undergoing major habitat degradation and destruction from human activities such as timber harvesting and agricultural practices. The more endemic species we can attribute to the area, the greater the justification to preserve.”

The DNA analysis critical to distinguishing the new species has shown that they are relatively old and evolved in the Pliocene Epoch over the past two to five million years.

Isolated by geographical features

“We suggest that because of climatic extremes and geomorphological changes across eastern Africa, the ancestors of these species were isolated on either mountain tops or along river valleys,” said Dr Woody Cotterill, from Stellenbosch University.

Two of the species have been named in honour of dedicated Southern African conservationists – Ms Lientjie Cohen, a scientist of the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency in South Africa, and the late founder of Zimbabwe‘s museums, Dr Reay Smithers, author of Southern Africa’s most comprehensive mammal anthology.

The discoveries were published yesterday in PLoS ONE, with the investigation led by bat experts and evolutionary geneticists from the University of Venda, Stellenbosch University, the University of Swaziland, the University of KwaZulu Natal, and the University of Cambridge.

The University of Cambridge about this: here.

Geoffroy’s bat discovered in UK for first time: here.

To the Bat Cave! Scientists Hope Bunker Can Halt Deadly Fungus: here.