10,000 Birds

JULY 4, 2023

Jennifer Ackerman points out in the introduction to What the Owl Knows: The New Science of the World’s Most Enigmatic Birds , that we don’t know much, but that very soon we may know a lot more. What the Owl Knows: The New Science of the World’s Most Enigmatic Birds is a joyous, fascinating read.

Owls 203

Owls Science Barn Owls Penguins 203

10,000 Birds

APRIL 2, 2024

49-50) She is also adept at writing about conservation’s larger context in terms of its history, public policy struggles, and the science behind species re-introduction. Well-researched and footnoted, these sections never feel disconnected from the more personal sections.

California Condor 171

California Condor Falcons California Birds 171

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 13, 2023

The species is classified as Near Threatened for all the usual depressing reasons – pollution, drainage, hunting, and the collection of eggs and nestlings ( source ). They are also quite catholic (sorry, I really like this word) in their prey selection, feeding on 17 different species of fish and prawn in the study cited above.

Sri Lanka 205

Sri Lanka Birds Taiwan Cats 205

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 29, 2022

The Sacred Ibis was seen as the incarnation of the god Thoth, who (with gods apparently better at multitasking than humans) was (or maybe still is, who knows?) was responsible for maintaining the universe, judging the dead, and for writing and science ( source ). Possibly also for doing the dishes. Two ways of life folded at once.

Birds 147

Birds Australia Sheep Zebras 147

Critter News

NOVEMBER 16, 2010

The author is Nick Cooney and he's the Director of The Humane League, an animal advocacy non-profit with offices in Philadelphia, Boston, and Washington DC. Change Of Heart provides science-based answers to many questions that are hotly debated among animal activists. In the author's words.

Advocacy 100

Advocacy Factory Farm Factory Farming Companion Animal 100

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 20, 2013

Other hardy souls signed up for an early morning “Ostrich Run” 5k, with the prizes beinging–you guessed it–actual ostrich eggs. Emptied of their contents, of course.). A few days later, I was the assistant (a glorified gofer , if you will) for a morning-long session on migration.

San Diego 173

San Diego Ostriches Chicago Colorado 173

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 3, 2021

Bird communication is a complex and evolving science. The six chapters that follow explore bird communication in mating; defending territory; rearing children; responding to predators; interacting with neighbors and functioning in large groups; and communicating successfully in a noisy human world. There is so much here!

North America 278

North America Research Birds Groups 278

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 15, 2011

They have special adaptations to stay warm and to keep their eggs and chicks warm. However, we now know that human ancestors became upright first, and were bipedal for millions of years before they started to use tools extensively, and then another million years went by before their brains started to evolve a significantly larger size.

Penguins 189

Penguins Seals Peru Science 189

10,000 Birds

JULY 3, 2012

As a Northeast birder I am familiar with the alarming decrease in the number of Red Knots along Atlantic shores and have signed petitions and written e-mails calling for legislation and rules that will limit the overharvesting of the horseshoe crab, whose eggs Red Knots depend on. million in the late 1990’s. Should the gulls be controlled?

Delaware 177

Delaware New Jersey Research Eggs 177

Animal Person

MARCH 17, 2009

Animal science” – distinct from zoology, the science of Earth’s millions of animal species – is what LGUs call meat-industry courses, including slaughtering animals, making ice cream, the full range of meat-linked endeavor. RPA launched its 10,000 Years Is Enough campaign to get our universities out of the meat industry in 2003.

Meat Industry 100

Meat Industry Industry Meat Responsible Policies 100

Animal Ethics

FEBRUARY 27, 2012

That system may treat sentient animals like car parts, ruin antibiotics we need for human medicine, and destroy rural communities by polluting our air and water, but at least it’s “efficient” (a word Mr. Hurst hammers three times). The idea that eggs from free-range chickens are somehow morally superior to other eggs is, frankly, weird.

New York Times 40

New York Times New York Gestation Crates Gestation 40

10,000 Birds

MARCH 31, 2014

Erika is a first year graduate student studying Ecosystem Science and Conservation at Duke. As we looked closer, we saw the Sooty Terns nesting right on the ground itself, calling back and forth to each other as they sat on their speckled eggs. Sooty Terns are incredibly birds. Trips bird banding dry tortugas Florida'

Birds 175

Birds Florida Groups Breeding 175

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 6, 2024

It’s all about the improbable intersection of human beings and Emperor Penguins, and if I can’t make it to an Emperor Penguin colony (highly unlikely), reading this book has been the next best thing. It’s part memoir, part travelogue, part scientific narrative, part prologue to making an argument for Antarctic conservation.

Penguins 152

Penguins Seals Leopards Research 152

Animal Ethics

DECEMBER 28, 2010

This last implies of course an improvement in ethics, as opposed to morality, as I have defined it, unless we already understand 'Do as you would be done by' as applicable to whales, cattle, chickens, and so on, as it is to human beings. I eat eggs though they may come from battery hens.

Morals 40

Morals Whales Whaling Chickens 40

10,000 Birds

FEBRUARY 20, 2023

If you have always wondered what the minimum anesthetic concentration for isoflurane and sevoflurane for the Crested Serpent-eagle is, science has an answer. Apparently, some bird photographers think that any human artifacts shown on a bird photo immediately spoil the whole photo. Glad I did not have to watch these.

China 220

China Birds Pythons Eagles 220

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 10, 2022

Of course, it is hard to resist looking at a paper titled “Host personality predicts cuckoo egg rejection in Daurian redstarts” Basically, the personality of a female redstart (bold or shy) predicts the responses to parasitic eggs – bold hosts are more likely to reject parasitic eggs.

Birds 192

Birds China Eggs Owls 192

10,000 Birds

APRIL 15, 2014

The local Bald Eagles are getting busy, I suspect there is an egg in the nest. There is a bit of science news. The Izu scincid lizards (Plestiodon latiscutatus) that inhabit the four Japanese Izu Islands with only bird predators are drab brown, mature later, lay small clutches of large eggs, and hatch large neonates.

Birds 176

Birds Bald Eagle Zoos Philippines 176

10,000 Birds

OCTOBER 14, 2015

If you want to know why most scientists support collecting this piece in Science explains it better than I can. I can understand why some people are conflicted, but the value to science of the collections is immense. Box after box of egg. This collection isn’t some ghastly memorial or symbol of human stupidity.

Collecting 216

Collecting Solomon Islands New Zealand Fiji 216

10,000 Birds

JUNE 26, 2018

The Zoo episode focuses on two Pink Pigeon couples: The Stud and Serendipity, a male and female that the zoo people hope will mate and produce a viable egg, and Thelma and Louise, a same-sex pair-bonded couple who the zoo people hope will incubate the egg and nurture the chick. Because, Ms. On the WCS web page, Ms.

Mauritius 101

Mauritius Stud Zoos Eggs 101

10,000 Birds

JUNE 24, 2021

One Oriental Pratincole of them was courageously raising its wings when I unknowingly drove towards its eggs – I reversed, but I am not so sure about the next person using that road … Being yelled at by the chick of an Oriental Pratincole. I guess looking elegant during sex is difficult for most humans, too.

Birds 207

Birds Uganda Breeding Rats 207

10,000 Birds

JULY 25, 2022

Gisela Kaplan has written a book about the species, and how they seem unperturbed by humans: “It’s one of their most successful defense strategies. When these birds breed, this can lead to highly cringeworthy announcements, for example from Adelaide Zoo : “We have egg-citing news!”

Birds 220

Birds Australia Ducks Mountain Goats 220

10,000 Birds

SEPTEMBER 9, 2014

We immediately get a sense of the pigeons’ abundance, beauty, and danger to human activity. She portrays humans merged with Passenger Pigeons; the images are then framed to look like 19th century calling cards. This bit of science is a nice final counterpoint to an account that has emphasized art, history, and literature.

2014 159

2014 Killing Michigan Kentucky 159

10,000 Birds

MAY 15, 2023

I visited Tengchong in late 2020 and wrote about it – but I also went there earlier, in 2017, and this post shows some photos I took during that trip, along with the usual comments that seem to be much more about ridiculing my fellow humans (especially ornithologists and the like) than providing useful information on birds.

China 177

China 2017 Birds Indonesia 177

10,000 Birds

JULY 10, 2012

More than 150 bird species are known to have become extinct over the past 500 years, and many more are estimated to have been driven to extinction before they became known to science. This plain used to be little affected by humans, being grazed by just a few cattle, goats and camels.

Endangered Species 185

Endangered Species Species Morocco South Africa 185

10,000 Birds

AUGUST 7, 2023

Indeed, most cuckoo eggs are accepted by the babax ( source ), although a small proportion of hosts reject cuckoo eggs and often boast about this capability when having a few too many drinks. Meaning: we did real science, Martens did not. ” Meaning: we did real science, Martens did not.

Hamburgers 201

Hamburgers Birds Science China 201

10,000 Birds

NOVEMBER 17, 2011

Alternatively, imagine I set the dial to produce simple heat, like the kind that comes out of your stove to cook your scrambled eggs. The kind of energy produced by a cell phone signal is way more like the heat that cooks your eggs than like the scary radiation that comes form an H-bomb or X-ray machine or whatever.

Mammals 227

Mammals Birds Fish Cooking 227

10,000 Birds

JANUARY 29, 2024

Of course, the same applies to pizza services for humans. Which sounds like a species name taken from a science fiction novel for children. The bees pursue the bird until it settles down somewhere, try to sting it, and get eaten ( source ). Why move toward the food when you can have the food move to you? Reluctantly back to birds.

Squirrels 136

Squirrels Birds China Bears 136

10,000 Birds

APRIL 13, 2011

Earlier attempts to spread the risk around had failed, so Don and his team applied science to the problem, spending several months studying the birds in the wild in order to work out how to care for them and to decide what type of habitat to release them into. It worked, and the translocated birds were soon breeding.

Species 220

Species New Zealand Rats Endangered Species 220

10,000 Birds

DECEMBER 8, 2022

Fortunately for the buntings, they seem to detect most cuckoo eggs smuggled in (75% in one study). A study found that for Plain Prinia , egg characteristics in a mainland China location with many cuckoos make it much easier to spot cuckoo eggs than in a Taiwan location with few cuckoos ( source ). Better safe than sorry.

Birds 200

Birds Eggs Bangladesh China 200