Disease Opened Door To Invading Species In California

Plant and animal diseases can play a major and poorly appreciated role in allowing the invasion of exotic species, which in turn often threatens biodiversity, ecological function and the world economy, researchers say in a new report. In particular, a plant pathogen appears to have opened the gate for the successful invasion of non-native grasses into much of California, one of the world's largest documented cases of invading species and one that dramatically changed the history and ecology of a vast grassland ecosystem. The study, published today in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, a professional journal, should improve the understanding of invasive species and possibly suggest new tools to combat them, said researchers at Oregon State University.

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PennFuture Files Endangered Species Act Petition Against Bush ...

Citizens for Pennsylvania's Future (PennFuture) today joined environmental, sporting groups, and scientific organizations from all regions of the country in legal action to further press President Bush on global warming and the growing potential of significant wildlife extinctions this century. The diverse conservation groups - led by the Center for Biological Diversity, including California Trout, Center for Native Ecosystems (Colorado), Conservation Northwest (Washington), Friends of the Clearwater (Idaho), Restore the North Woods (Maine), Save the Manatee Club (Florida), and Arkansas Fly Fishers, as well as PennFuture - filed a petition under the Administrative Procedure Act to better protect endangered species from many current dangerous threats, particularly global warming, by fully implementing science-based recovery plans and actions.

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Wild about animals, three women work together

Wiscasset veterinarian Dr. Tammy Doughty has mended the broken wings of geese, pinned the broken hind leg of a fox and treated a baby raccoon for a respiratory infection. Sure, her degree in veterinary medicine from Colorado State University in 1999 prepared her for such tasks, but when she opened her office in Wiscasset in 2005, she thought she would be doing the more typical dog and cat routine. That was before she became friends with two other animal lovers - Bridget Green of Wiscasset, and Kathy Williams, who live in Edgecomb. In the last two years the three have worked closely together to take care of the animal community - both wild and domestic. Two weeks ago, the three women were at Kathy's farm in Edgecomb where Tammy had come to take care of a horse.

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NOTICED: ENDANGERED SPECIES

If we didn't know better, it would be tempting to suspect Al Gore and his climate-change pals of somehow fixing the weather. This winter's wacky extremes read like a page from Al's textbook on global warming. Not only does this now officially entitle the negative Nellies in the Green Party to stick out their pierced pink tongues at us and say, "I told you so," it will no doubt mark the tipping point where the fringe notion of environmental sustainability goes mass. As far as I'm concerned, this is a good thing. I'm all for protecting the habitat of an obscure owl, hitting our Kyoto targets and reducing, reusing and recycling (even though, if you actually cook every day for a family, you would need a full-time garbage wrangler). In all this talk about the environment, however, are we missing another crisis? It seems to me that culture -- or, to speak the language of the environmentalists, a certain valuable species -- is in danger of extinction.

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Alaska's Cook Inlet beluga whales under 'considerable' risk of ...

ANCHORAGE, Alaska (AP) - Beluga whales swimming off Alaska's largest city are at considerable risk of going extinct unless something is done to help them, a federal study says. The study by the National Marine Mammal Laboratory in Seattle says if the Cook Inlet belugas go extinct, another group of the white whales probably won't come in to swim the silty waters off Anchorage. "The population is discrete and unique with respect to the species, and if it should fail to survive, it is highly unlikely that Cook Inlet would be repopulated with belugas," the study says. The study found there is a 26 per cent chance the Cook Inlet belugas will be extinct in 100 years and a 68 per cent chance they'll be gone in 300 years. To make matters worse, it finds that the whales are becoming increasingly vulnerable to a catastrophic event because they are tending to gather in a restricted area in the upper Cook Inlet.

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Tiny snail that spawned endangered species battle still dwindling

After clambering down a canyon wall, ducking poison ivy vines along a switchback trail and wading chest-deep across a lukewarm stream, Cary Myler squats down near a riverbank, spies some flecks that look like pepper sprinkled on a wet rock and announces, "Found some." The pinhead-sized dots are Bruneau hot springsnails. The tiny mollusks that thrive in water as warm as 100 degrees are found nowhere else in the world but here, in the bottom of this southwestern Idaho desert canyon riddled with hot springs. A decade ago, the snails were at the center of a national battle over federal laws designed to protect endangered species. Today, years after the lawsuits were decided and most of the rhetoric retired, they are closer to extinction than ever before. That's because the level of the underground geothermal aquifer that feeds the seeps and springs of hot water where the snails live keeps dropping.

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Wild animals on show

THERE is a new attraction featuring various animals at Genting Skyway Complex in Gohtong Jaya and it is called the Amazing Ten Animal Kingdom. The mini-zoo launched on Dec 17 has over 300 species of marine and freshwater fish, 50 corals, 120 reptile varieties, 30 species of mammals including sloths and 10 species of birds. .

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