The backyard drama last week wasn’t exactly cat-and-mouse.
Imitating his purring ancestors, the neighborhood’s resident black-and-white feline warily crept across wet grass to get a closer look at an odd creature of far more ancient lineage.
Bloodlines, to which many humans seem so attached, don’t mean anything to creatures in the here and now. The two animals fixated only on the morning’s staredown with the unfamiliar.
The cat, possessed of predatory shrewdness, needed its innate curiosity to be satisfied. The turtle, vessel for a primitive brain, clad in a hard, 12-inch shell and inheritor of a transparently passive but antisocial disposition, wanted to be left alone.
We’ve long known about sabertooth cats, but not the rest of their world.
BRYAN CHAN/LOS ANGELES TIMES VIA GETTY IMAGES
The earliest people who lived in North America shared the landscape with huge animals. On any day these hunter-gatherers might encounter a giant, snarling saber-toothed cat ready to pounce, or a group of elephantlike mammoths stripping tree branches. Maybe a herd of giant bison would stampede past.
Obviously, you can’t see any of these ice age megafauna now. They’ve all been extinct for about 12,800 years. Mammoths, mastodons, huge bison, horses, camels, very large ground sloths and giant short-faced bears all died out as the huge continental ice sheets disappeared at the end of the ice age. What happened to them?
Scientists have pointed to various potential causes for the extinctions. Some suggestenvironmental changes…
China expertGordon Changsounded the alarm on Chinese President and CCP leader Xi Jinping’s plan to, in his eyes, “reunify” his country and Taiwan – whether its people are ready to submit or not.
Chang, a Gatestone Institute senior fellow and author of the 2001 book “The Coming Collapse of China,” joined a panel of key analysts and China experts onFox Nation’s…
(The Center Square) – The Washington State Department of Fish & Wildlife has announced the adoption of new rules governing special use permits.
The measures amend and clarify existing rules and establish new regulations for accessibility permits, allowing increased access and opportunities for individuals with disabilities.
The new rules, filed with the state last month, were adopted earlier this week.
“We are excited to reduce barriers that may impede participation by people with disabilities by streamlining the administrative processes associated with these common requests,” said Diversity Equity and Inclusion Manager Larry Delgado in anews releaseaccompanying the announcement.
A team of researchers analyzing almost 400 coral reefs found significantly declining numbers of certain shark species, warning that they face a risk of extinction because of overfishing.
The researchersreleased a report in theacademic journal Science on Thursday after analyzing the presence of five common species of sharks that live by coral reefs. They surveyed 391 reefs across 67 countries and territories using almost 23,000 underwater video stations.
The report states that the researchers found global declines between 60 and 73 percent for the five species, and individual shark species were not detected in 34 to 47 percent of reefs.
The decline in shark species has also caused rays to increasingly dominate these reefs, having further implications for the ecosystem at large.
In a warming world, those problems are set to get worse, experts say.
“The climate is changing and it’s changing drastically,” said Todd Crowl, director of the Institute of Environment at Florida International University in Miami. “It is measurable and happening.”
No single ruined beach day should be directly attributed to a warming globe. But the rise in both atmospheric and ocean temperatures is rapidly altering the stretches of coastline where land and water meet.
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) — Bush pilot Jim Tweto, known for his starring role in the Discovery Channel’s “Flying Wild Alaska” series, was killed along with a hunting and fishing guide from Idaho when their small plane crashed shortly after takeoff, Alaska State Troopers said.
Tweto’s family-run rural aviation business in Unalakleet was featured in three seasons of the television series a decade ago. He and passenger Shane Reynolds of Orofino, Idaho, died Friday near the coastal village of Shaktoolik, roughly 125 miles (200 kilometers) east of Nome, the statement said.
The plane “was witnessed taking off but not climbing and then crashing,” their report said. Troopers were notified of an SOS activation around 11:48 a.m. Friday, followed by a report that a Cessna 180 had crashed 35 miles northeast of Shaktoolik.
A beluga whale sounds in the waters of Turnagain Arm along the Seward Highway on August 21, 2019. (Photo by Bob Hallinen)
The number of endangered beluga whales swimming in Alaska’s Cook Inlet increased slightly in the past four years, providing “a glimmer of hope” for a population that crashed in the 1990s and remained at a low number long after that, according to anew estimatereleased Thursday by federal biologists.
The latest population estimate for endangered Cook Inlet belugas is between 290 and 386, with amedian estimate of 311, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said. That compares to NOAA’s Alaska Fisheries Science Center 2018 median estimate of 279 and a range of 250 to 317 animals.
The new population estimate is based on aerial surveys conducted in the summers of 2021 and 2022.
We rented a stranger’s boat for 4 hours using the ‘Airbnb for boats.’ Our captain was great and we’d totally do it again for a special occasion.
My group of eight rented a boat and captain for four hours through Boatsetter for $1,652.
Our captain was knowledgeable and we brought our own food and drinks on board.
The experience was so fun but a little pricey so we’d only do it again for something special.
At the start of the new year, I set out to put myself and my well-being first.
Six months later, I’ve been doing just that by investing in weekly yoga and setting aside time and money for new, fun experiences. My most recent splurge was a boat rental with friends.
We set our automatic out-of-office messages, pooled our funds, and rented a captained boat for a day on the water with the online rental platform Boatsetter, which has been nicknamed the “Airbnb for boats.”See More
European sailors first reported a spike in orca encounters off the coasts of Spain and Portugal in 2020. The interactions have continued to grow ever since and are happening every day, now.
“They clearly find a lot of pleasure in these encounters,” Andrew Trites, director of the Marine Mammal Research Unit at the University of British Columbia in Canada, told Insider.
But Trites isn’t talking about malicious pleasure, though it may feel like that for the people whose boats are taking a beating. Sailor Werner Schaufelberger described his encounter with orcas in May as “brutal.”
“They’re probably socializing, yucking it up with each other about their adventures without realizing the terror they’re creating in their moments of joy,” Trites said.
Trites is one of several orca experts Insider spoke with who all agree the orcas are just having a good time and probably don’t have any ill will against the boats or humans on board.
However, none of the experts Insider spoke with were convinced this was the case.
“I certainly think orcas are capable of complex emotions,” Monika Wieland Shields, director of the Orca Behavior Institute told Insider. “But we just haven’t seen anything like that anywhere else in the world. And we have given orcas plenty of reason to want to seek revenge on us.”
Shields points to the long history of humans harming the orca population, from shooting them at fisheries to the years of live captures in the ’60s and ’70s in which humans separated orca offspring from their families to display them in aquariums.
And yet, these situations haven’t resulted in wild orcas attacking boats, Shields said. Orcas in captivity have attacked and killed humans, but there are no records of orcas killing humans in the wild.
Related video: Explainer: Why Orcas Are Attacking Boats (unbranded – Newsworthy)
According to Shields, orcas’ natural curiosity and playfulness are likely the cause for these encounters and not revenge.
Orcas are very social and curious animals that often engage with their environments, Shields said.
In the Salish Sea off the coast of Washington, for example, it’s not uncommon for orcas to play with crab traps, dragging them around for a few minutes or hours until they eventually lose interest, according to Shields.
“To me, that’s really similar to what’s going on in Spain,” Shields said. “It’s the same type of behavior, they might be thinking, ‘Hey, there’s this piece of equipment in my environment, I’m going to play with it for a while then move on.'”
In fact, Strager doesn’t classify these encounters as “attacks,” or attempts by the orcas to harm people and their property, but rather an example of orca exploration.
“I don’t doubt that it feels like an attack for the people on the boat,” Strager told Insider. “But from the orca’s perspective, I don’t think it’s aggressive. Just because it feels and looks very dramatic to us doesn’t mean it is dramatic for them.”
Orcas find boats stimulating
Experts agree orcas are definitely targeting sailboats, but probably because there is something stimulating and exciting about “playing” with boats that causes them to repeat the behavior and teach it to others in their pod.
According to Trites, orcas might simply enjoy the sensation of ramming into boats.
“Orcas are very tactile and sensitive to touch,” Trites told Insider. “In my research I’ve been struck by how often they touch each other and run into each other while swimming. It’s just like with humans. We need to be touched.”
Orcas might also be enticed by a boat speeding through the water and get a thrill out of chasing it, Trites said. In fact, the more people on a boat make a commotion or try to speed away, the more exciting the event is for the animal and the more likely they are to try to ram the boat again, Trites said.
“You can’t outrun a killer whale,” Trites said. “Just turn off your engine, let your rudder up, and become as boring as possible.”
Playful, or not, this behavior could put orca lives at risk
While orca experts have good reason to think the animals are just being playful, ultimately, it’s impossible to know what they’re thinking.
And this uncertainty has people feeling uneasy, especially as these encounters become more prevalent and potentially dangerous for both people and orcas.
“I think tensions are escalating,” Shields said. “And I think it’s just a matter of time before a whale gets hurt or gets killed.”
With better tracking of these incidents, hopefully, sailors can avoid high-risk areas and after enough “boring” encounters with boats, the orcas will eventually move on, Strager said.
Until then, Trites said it’s important to remember these are endangered creatures who likely aren’t out to hurt us.
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) — A federal appeals court has sided with commercial fishermen who say proposed restrictions aimed at saving a vanishing species of whale could put them out of business.
The fishermen harvest lobsters and crabs off New England and oppose tough new restrictions on the way they fish that are intended to protect the North Atlantic right whale. The whale numbers only about 340 in the world and it’s vulnerable to lethal entanglement in fishing gear.
The fishermen and the state of Maine appealed their case to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit after losing in a lower court. The appeals court said Friday it disagreed with the lower court’s ruling.
The appeals court ruling could mean that the federal government must take another stab at crafting new rules to protect the whales. The restrictions would limit where lobster fishers can fish and what kind of gear they can use to try to prevent the whales from becoming entangled in fishing ropes.
The changes would represent a potential worst-case scenario for the lobster fishing industry, wrote Douglas H. Ginsburg, the senior judge of the appeals court, in Friday’s ruling.
Related video: A dead minke whale has washed up on a beach in northeastern New Brunswick (cbc.ca)
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A dead minke whale has washed up on a beach in northeastern New BrunswickUnmute
“The result may be great physical and human capital destroyed, and thousands of jobs lost, with all the degradation that attends such dislocations,” Ginsburg wrote.
The fishers sued the National Marine Fisheries Service, an arm of the federal government. The service declined to comment on the lawsuit.
A district court judge ruled in September 2022 that the service used the best available data to create the new fishing restrictions. The rules are meant to reduce the likelihood that the whales will get caught in the vertical rope lines that run from the surface of the water to lobster and crab traps on the ocean floor.
Numerous conservationists have argued over the years that the trap lines pose too much of a risk to whales because even those that survive an entanglement can emerge less likely to thrive and reproduce.
“If they’ve been traumatized by ropes, and climate change, lack of food, they may wait for years to calve, maybe up to 12 years, and some never do,” said Michael Moore, director of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Marine Mammal Center in Massachusetts. “It’s not only about mortality, it’s also about keeping the animals that are still alive healthy and growing.”
The whales were once abundant off the East Coast, but they were decimated during the commercial whaling era. Their populations have declined in the last several years, and they also face other threats such as collisions with large ships.
Maine Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, and other Maine politicians have sided with the fishermen, who feel the new fishing restrictions are based on flawed data and are overly punitive. The U.S. lobster fishing industry, worth hundreds of millions of dollars per year, is based largely in the state.
“We’re facing rules that are just nonsensical,” said Dave Cousens, a lobster fishermen and past president of the Maine Lobstermen’s Association. “They don’t pass a straight-face test.”
FOX News
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Related video: Explainer: Why Orcas Are Attacking Boats (unbranded – Newsworthy)
unbranded – Newsworthy
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