Males Can Sniff Out A Well Fed Female July 8, 2011
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Brain Power, Insects, Think About It.Tags: black widow spider, cannibal, female, male
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If they’re a male black widow spider, that is. Simply by taking a little saunter across the female’s web, a male black widow can sense if a female is hungry or not. Why does it matter? Because female black widow spiders have a rather freaky habit of eating the male after mating. It’s how they earned their dangerous name.
Now that's one massive female black widow spider. You would almost think she's been doing some seriously heavy weights at the gym. But nope, females are normally much bigger than males. Those males best watch out!
The Smell Of Safety
Males have developed this very useful technique, which tells them whether or not a female has recently eaten. But if a female is hungry, she would be more likely to cannibalize the male spider. They take a sniff of those silk strands and then decide if they want to proceed or scurry away. A new study discovered this interesting skill and published the findings in the journal Animal Behaviour. So, how do researchers actually go about testing something like this?
Feeding Time For The Ladies
First things first. The researchers fed a bunch of hungry female back widow spiders. Using a cricket neatly held between forceps, they rested it on the web and waited for the female to come over, wrap the cricket in silk and chow down. The females got one cricket each week. Yet, by the time the fourth week came around, they weren’t so hungry anymore and didn’t really want to eat the crickets.
I bet this female black widow spider is thinking: "Ah, the satisfaction from a good meal of crickets. I think I'll accept the advances of the male spider perched nearby. Since I'm well fed, I probably won't eat him after we're done."
Another bunch of female black widow spiders were starved for a few weeks. It apparently didn’t put their lives at risk, but they did get a bit smaller. Now, let’s find out what happened when a male was placed on the web of a well fed or a starved spider.
One Step, Two Step, Three Step…Four
Since the male spiders can pick up scents with their feet, they were able to figure out the difference from one female to another just by walking on the web. Normally, a male black widow spider has a special dance he does to court the female.
In this experiment, the males danced far more actively on the webs of well fed females. Smart dudes! If anything, dancing and mating would leave them ready to eat – not be eaten! Typically, they dance around for an hour or two, which sure shows their dedication to the purpose. They wave their legs and pluck and tap at the web in a unique way, so that unlike prey they show the female they are interested to mate rather than become dinner.
If Only I Had Such Powers
Now I have a strong sense of smell but definitely nothing like these male black widow spiders. It’s too bad because I’m really scared of spiders even though I know most are harmless. If I had my way, I’d be able to simply smell any spider from several meters away. That would give my timid self enough time to run!
No Fair! December 21, 2010
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Easy As Pie.Tags: dogs, science blog, toilet
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Despite the exclamation above, I’m not throwing a temper tantrum. But I do get frustrated when I read news stories about science and think “Woah, this is really complicated.” It’s one reason I started this blog. To learn about a few more reasons, you can see an interview I did for the Charlotte Observer here.
Speaking of unfair things, if you read my last post and wondered if Tiko ever got off the toilet, well the picture on the right should answer your question.
His furry derriere is still planted firmly on the porcelain potty. He says it’s actually rather comfortable and he even had the audacity to ask me to serve him some liver treats and install a television on the wall.
I’ve already decided that if I ever start another blog, it will be called Weird Dogs.
Whale Poo Is Good For You September 12, 2010
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Brain Power, Environment, Ocean, Tough Stuff.Tags: CO2, feces, global warming, poo, whales
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In fact, it’s good for all living things. Australian researchers recently found that whale poo is battling one of the planet’s toughest battles ever – climate change. The poor whales previously had a horrid reputation. Since they breathe out a common greenhouse gas known as carbon dioxide (CO2), they were disliked for contributing to global warming. Estimates are that they breathe out 200,000 tonnes of CO2 a year. Eep! It isn’t surprising people had a bad opinion of them!
But there’s way more to the story than this one fact. Let’s start with the basics and see how something so gross can actually be good for us all. Major science geeks can read the full study results in the Fish and Fisheries journal.
Benefits Of Whale Poo
A young sperm whale gracefully swims in the Southern Ocean. A trip up to the surface might mean a poopy feeding for the hungry phytoplankton, helping to fight global warming. Image credit: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).
In the Southern Ocean, we’ve got an estimated 12,000 sperm whales. They hunt down fish and squid for food. Once digested, out comes all that poo. Why should we care about whale feces? Well, it contains loads of iron. All of those whales poop out approximately 50 tonnes of iron each year.
What’s so special about the iron? It’s a fabulously delicious food for phytoplankton, which are marine plants that exist up near the surface of the ocean. These helpful plants like to take in CO2 from the atmosphere through a process called photosynthesis.
Better still is that the whales pop out their poop (even I chuckled as I wrote that) in a liquid form that’s close to the surface of the ocean, making it easier for the phytoplankton to access. After, the whale dives down into the ocean, presumably feeling a little – or a lot – lighter!
Let’s Do The Math
First, we have to see how much CO2 gets sucked up by the plants, which is all thanks to the whale poo. It’s 400,000 tonnes. Now that’s twice as much as the 200,000 tonnes they breathe out through respiration each year. The 200,000 tonnes is equivalent to emissions from 40,000 cars!
I got in touch with Steve Nicol of the Australian Antarctic Division to find out how the study all started. He explained:
Our research was actually looking at baleen (krill eating) whales and the iron that they release. The research was stimulated by some ideas raised by Victor Smetacek and we had the samples and the expertise here in Hobart to do the measurements necessary to test these ideas.
When I asked Steve what we can do to help, his answer was a simple one. Simple but not necessarily easy to attain, especially given the attraction of whale hunting in many places around the world. According to Steve:
Many populations of great whales are recovering fairly fast – some at about the maximum rate possible. The best assistance we can give them is to avoid killing them – either accidentally or deliberately.
Don’t Judge Too Soon
I think an important lesson here is that we can’t judge too quickly and instead, should always look at the big picture. When we first hear about all the CO2 the whales are putting out there, it’s easy to think badly of these massive sea creatures. But with the Southern Ocean normally being a poor source of iron, the whales are making sure those phytoplankton are happily fed. This way, the phytoplankton can do their job of taking out the nasty CO2.
Now, if only human poo had such fantastic capabilities.
Bartholomew Says Hello June 22, 2010
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Brain Power, Deep Sea, Easy As Pie, Environment, Evolution, Ocean.Tags: blobfish, extinction, fish
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If this blobfish could talk, I think it would ask for us humans to give it some space. Maybe then it would have reason to smile. Credit: Greenpeace
Okay well, I made up the name Bartholomew and this interesting creature can’t really speak. But if it could, I imagine it might say something like “Please leave me alone!” So, just what is this odd, slimy thing and why would it want us to stay away?
Meet A Blobfish
With the formal name of Psychrolutes marcidus, the blobfish is definitely not the world’s prettiest fish. It is, however, on the verge of extinction according to researchers at the University of York in England. For blobfish, home is 800 meters into the ocean, just off the southeastern coast of Australia.
But unfortunately, excessive fishing with nets along the bottom of the ocean has jeopardized the well-being of the blobfish. It starts with overfishing at less deep and murky depths. After reducing populations up there, not much is left.
To compensate, we do something called bottom trawling, which takes us even deeper into the ocean. Here, we are fishing along the sea floor. It’s bad news for Bartholomew and all the other blobfish down there. No wonder poor Bartholomew looks so sad.
These blobfish may look like your grumpy Great Aunt Martha but they're probably unhappy for another reason. Overfishing is threatening their livelihood. Credit: NOAA Alaska Fisheries Science Center.
A Day In The Life Of Bartholomew
Just humour me here and let’s keep the name. So what’s life like for Bartholomew? You won’t see it for yourself because Bartholomew lives deep in the ocean, far away from our eyes.
That peculiar body serves a purpose, letting Bartholomew sort of float above the sea floor. Instead of using a bunch of energy to move, Bartholomew keeps movement easy and light.
How big is this body? A blobfish usually grows to approximately 12 inches (30 centimeters). In fact, I just picked up a comic book I will soon be reviewing here on the blog, and it’s about the same length as a blobfish.
A Floating Feeder
And boy oh boy, feeding is an interesting activity for the blobfish. While you or I take an active role in eating – we open our mouths and put food inside – the blobfish does it another way. When Bartholomew feeds, it means just drifting along, swallowing food particles that float in its mouth.
Ugliness Comes In Many Forms
Bartholomew is yet another example of the consequences from overfishing. Without adequate regulations around deep sea trawling, our ‘hello’ to Bartholomew may soon be a ‘goodbye’ instead. While his appearance may be ugly, some might say that the actions of humans are far uglier.
How To Be An Assassin February 21, 2010
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Brain Power, Insects, Think About It.Tags: assassin bug, prey, spiders
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Credit: Video generously provided by Anne Wignall of Macquarie University.
Imagine you’re a hungry insect. To get your next meal, you need to be a true assassin, using stealthy tactics to capture your prey. Well if you were an assassin bug, then your plan might read like this:
1. Slowly approach your prey
2. Tap the web before each step
3. Bounce around a bit
4. Grab some web strings
5. POUNCE
It might sound like a strange plan but it works! The assassin bug does all these bizarre movements to trick the spider into thinking it has an insect caught in its web. Once the spider is sure that it has its next meal, it scurries over to the assassin bug. But too bad for the spider, it will now become a tasty meal for this sneaky insect. To find out more about this peculiar bug, I chatted with Anne Wignall of Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, who had some of her recent work published in the Journal of Ethology. Anne already knew that some bugs would hunt down spiders but she wanted to find out just how they did it! Anne explained to me:
When I heard that there was a bug that seemed to lure spiders toward them, I was instantly fascinated because it seems like such a crazy thing to do, when spiders are such dangerous predators themselves.
In fact, there is actually one more step in the assassin bug’s plan, which could come in at number six. Once the assassin bug grabs the spider, it sometimes will tap the spider with its antennae. Researchers think this might be a way to hypnotize the spider, making it harder to escape.
A World Of Assassins
The assassin bug in the video above is a species known as Stenolemus bituberus. But if you thought it was the only one, think again! Anne describes just how busy our world really is when you get outside:
There’s also lots and lots of other assassin bug species and insects that use stalking, deception, luring and other cool tactics to hunt other invertebrates, and we’re finding more all the time.
So this means there are way more bugs out there with incredible, assassin-like tactics to capture their prey. For example, Todd Blackledge of the University of Akron in Ohio has been investigating how wasps hunt spiders. He found that adult female wasps will capture spiders and sting them. Ouch! But that isn’t all. The wasp then lays an egg on the spider, which allows the wasp larva to eat the spider, helping it grow into an adult.
Your Garden: A Battleground For Bugs
Now that you’ve checked out the video above, you might actually be able to find one of these creepy crawlies in your garden. Anne suggests that if you live along the east coast of Australia, you should explore the trees and webs in your garden, where you might find an assassin bug battling it out with a spider. Just be glad that while those hungry bugs fight it out, you don’t have to go through anything quite so dramatic when you want to have lunch. In fact, make yourself a nice sandwich, grab your camera, then see what you can find in your backyard!
The Return Of Bed Bugs – Smarter Ones January 13, 2010
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Evolution, Insects, Tough Stuff.Tags: bed bugs, bites, DDT, infestation, pests
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Your mattress may be home to more than your pillow or favorite stuffed animal. It could be the home of bed bugs!
The title reads like a horror movie but for those who have battled it out with bed bugs, it makes a lot of sense. Others might think that ‘don’t let the bed bugs bite’ was just some bedtime line their parents used as a cute joke.
In fact, let’s see now who knew that bed bugs really existed. Try out the poll below (be honest!).
Bed Bug Basics
Bed bugs are small, reddish brown insects that feed on human blood, which engorges them and makes them bigger. They are from the insect family Cimicidae and common bed bugs are formally called Cimex lectularius. They tend to be most active at night, coming out of the cracks in walls or bed frames and other hiding places to get their bloody grub. They can travel in suitcases, so hotels are a hot spot for bed bugs as well as other places that see plenty of people coming and going. Cornell University has an ace fact sheet to give you the lowdown on bed bugs. You can also have some fun playing around on Pest World for Kids, a website created by the National Pest Management Association (NPMA). But let’s get back to finding out why these wee pesky critters have returned and what makes them smarter today.
Gone But Not For Long
Here we have a bed bug hiding in a wood bed frame. The bed bug looks like it's having a Sunday snooze but I bet it's getting rest so it can hunt for fresh blood! Image credit: Thomas Oldani
Bed bugs were once nearly destroyed in our modern environment, where the use of chemicals such as dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane – otherwise more easily known as DDT – kept these beasties at bay. DDT is a pesticide that is either very useful or very toxic, depending on who you ask or what journal study you read. Ultimately though, it was banned.
The Good And Bad Of DDT
DDT was used to keep mosquitoes under control, mostly because they spread malaria. It was used to keep lice numbers down too. So what happened when it was banned? As somewhat of a side effect of its use, DDT had kept bed bug numbers down. After it was banned, a bunch of other chemicals were used to treat bed bug infestations. The bed bugs, however, got smart and developed resistance to some of these chemicals. That resulted in a big UH OH for society as bed bug infestations are now on a major rise! Scientists from the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Korea’s Seoul National University decided that it would be important to find out more about resistant strains of bed bugs in New York. The work was published in the Journal of Entomology. Let’s see what they discovered, shall we?
When researchers got busy observing bed bugs in New York, they found these pests had mutations in their nerve cells. What does this mean? It means they are resistant to the chemicals used to kill them. Where the chemicals would previously have paralyzed and killed the bed bugs, the mutations mean that bed bugs are now outsmarting their opponents – us!
Let The Bed Bug Collecting Begin!
To get the scoop on bed bug resistance, researchers took a sample of easily controllable ones from Florida and compared these to ones from New York that were harder to deal with. So just how resistant were these little bugs?
Look at this partially engorged bed bug. It probably looks similar to the bed bugs in Milan after they feasted on my blood. Oh, and a fun fact of the day: the Italian word for bed bugs is cimice dei letti.
Researchers found that the bed bugs in New York had up to 264 times the resistance to the modern chemical used to kill bed bugs – deltamethrin. If we picture a nerve cell, it has these little sodium channels on the outer membrane bit. This is where the flurry of nerve impulses come to life. In the New York bed bugs, this nervous system mutation means they can keep feeding long after those Florida ones have been exterminated.
Grossaroo
When I was in grade 3, I made up the word ‘grossaroo’ to describe anything yucky. This word is fitting in the case of what happened to me recently when I was working at an agency in Milan. After a few nights at what seemed to be a nice corporate flat, I began to get loads of itchy, inflamed red bites. I awoke one night to find a flattened-looking bug moving across my otherwise clean, crisp white sheets.
I yelped and quickly squished it with my slipper, only to see it turn into a smattering of blood, which it just took from its recent feeding of my body! Just after, I saw another one. By morning, my bed looked like a crime scene with all those splats of blood and bugs. Eeek! Fortunately, I got moved to a new place and had everything washed. Hopefully, those Milan bed bugs weren’t too hard for the building owners to get rid of, unless they’re resistant beasts like those New York ones.
Bed Bug Warrior To The Rescue
So now you know (if you didn’t already!) that bed bugs do exist. Not only that, but they’re continually evolving to get smarter, doing so in ways that make it harder to get rid of them. For now, you can be smart by being extra cautious when traveling. Always check for signs of bed bugs around the mattress and furniture. Since not everyone shows bites from these little pests, prevention will remain the best line of defense. And while it’s not necessarily smart, it sure is fun when checking for bed bugs to yell “YOU’RE GOING DOWN!” If your parents ask what you’re doing, you can explain that you’re the self-appointed family warrior here to protect everyone from bed bugs.
Image credits: Unless otherwise specified, images courtesy of the National Pest Management Association.
The Recipe For A Perfectly Sticky Web May 31, 2009
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Brain Power, Evolution, Insects, Tough Stuff.Tags: evolve, spider, web
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Have you ever tried to bake a cake, only to find out that when it came out of the oven, it was dry and hard? Maybe you realized that you’d put in too much sugar. Or, maybe you cooked it for too long. Would you believe that spiders have a similar challenge when it comes to spinning their webs? Too much of a good thing can actually leave a web that’s far from perfect.
For this web to catch its prey, it needs to have just the right amount of stickiness and strength. If all goes well for the spider, dinner will soon be served!
For a spider to catch its prey, the web needs to be sticky but still remain strong. If the balance isn’t right, the web won’t catch a bug and it’ll be one hungry and grumpy spider!
A Killer Web Evolves
If you’re a spider, you’ve got your work cut out for you! To catch your prey, you want a web sticky enough that the bug gets caught inside but strong enough that the web doesn’t break from its struggles. With such a fine balance needed, spiders have evolved to get it just right.
Let the Construction Work Begin
To build those impressive webs we see, spiders start by putting down lines of dry silk. Then, they weave spirals of sticky silk to nab their prey. But, spiders of yesteryear didn’t build their webs in quite the same way.
Millions of years ago, spiders would lay down a coating of dry adhesive on these spirals. Rather than stick to the web, a bug would be entangled by these dry spirals. As a cool fact you can throw out at your friends, there are still some spiders today that weave their webs with this dry adhesive – we call them deinopoid spiders.
Yet things began to change, with orb weaving spiders evolving to make webs that were more effective at catching prey. Rather than continue to use this dry adhesive, spiders started to go the sticky route by using wet drops of a glue-like substance. When you think of glue, it seems that the sticker the glue, the better. Not for spiders though!
Curious Scientists Start Investigating
Some scientists started to wonder about these sticky webs – is stickier always better? To find out, Ingi Agnarsson of the University of Puerto Rico in San Juan and Todd Blackledge of the University of Akron in Ohio went on a mission to check out a lot of different spiders. They observed 17 species of orb weaving spiders. You’d have to like spiders quite a bit to watch so many different kinds! The full study results are in the Journal of Zoology.
It’s All About Force
The researchers tested the strength of the strands and the stickiness of them too. How’d they do that? Well, they stuck a piece of sandpaper in the web and then measured how much force was required to remove it.
To break a strand on the web, a specific amount of force is needed. When the researchers put the web to the test, they found that by using anywhere from 20% to 70% of this force needed to break the web, the sandpaper was released.
So, a stickier web might hold the insect but as it continues to struggle, the force would ultimately break strands of the web, causing the insect to be released. Yet, with the glue being a bit less sticky, the insect could pull away from a single strand, but it would get caught by the next one. Since the strands don’t break, they can continue to stick to the bug, making its fight a much harder one.
Spiders Are Impressive
It’s actually really impressive and cool when you think about the work that goes into creating a web with just the right balance of stickiness and strength. As for me, I’ll leave the bug-catching to those smart spiders. I think I’ll just stick to making cakes instead. Pun fully intended! Now if only there was a recipe for making good jokes…
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Hairy Frogs Have An Unusual Defense June 2, 2008
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Tough Stuff.Tags: claws, defense, hairy frogs
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When I think about frogs, I usually picture the cute, little ones hopping around the lake near my house. Well, there are many types of frogs and one in particular is almost the stuff of nightmares! Not only is it a super duper hairy creature but it has a peculiar defense mechanism that has intrigued scientists.
Credit: Gustavocarra for Wikimedia Commons. Check out the claws on this bad boy! If the hairy frog feels threatened, he will bring forth his dangerous claws through the toe pads on his hind legs. Hmmm. I have a feeling that unlike dogs, throwing him a treat won’t make him like me!
Trichobatrachus robustus – as the frog is formally named – breaks its own bones to create special claws that force their way through the frog’s toe pads. It’s thought that this action is performed when the frog is threatened. While we already know that salamanders do something similar by pushing their ribs through the skin to create spiky barbs, the frog’s maneuver is unique! Not only that, but the closest action we’ve seen from other frogs involves bony spines that stick out from the wrist. The difference, however, is that the bones project out naturally, which is different from the hairy frog where the claws force their way out as a form of defense.
Beware The Claw
David Blackburn from Harvard University has studied these interesting frogs; the work is published in the journal Biology Letters. Blackburn found that when at rest, the frog’s claws are sheltered in a bunch of connective tissue. A piece of collagen joins the sharp bit of the claw and a bone found at the tip of the frog’s toe. At the other end of the claw is an attached muscle. Blackburn thinks that when the frog is threatened and under attack, it will contract the muscle, which causes the claw to be pulled downwards. Then, the sharp bit tears away from the bony end and pokes through the toe pad. The end result is a contraption that looks really intimidating. But wait, there’s more to the hairy frog than just these claws! They also have some other neat features. When they breed, male frogs produce long strands of skin and arteries that resemble hair. While researchers aren’t totally sure why the hair exists, they think it might be to bring in more oxygen through the frog’s skin.
Feeling Hungry
In some parts of the world, these hairy frogs are cooked and eaten. Yes, you did just read that correctly – food! The people who hunt the frogs have to be careful not to get hurt by the frog’s claws, so they use spears and similar weapons to capture the creatures. Now, I’m all one for trying new foods but in this case, I think I will pass, thank you very much!
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Secrets Of Climbing June 1, 2008
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Environment, Evolution, Think About It.Tags: energy, primates, treadmill, trees
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Ever had a favorite tree in your yard that you liked to climb once in a while? You probably scurried up the tree and maybe hung out for a bit before carefully making your way down to your abode on the ground. We all know that some creatures like to live up in the trees but what makes the trees such a cool place to inhabit? Scientists may have found some clues as to why early primates liked to make their home in the forest canopy. It’s all about size!
Apes and monkeys – ancestors of humans – might have ended up in the trees because of their small size. Researchers have been curious for a while now about why early primates happily lived up in the trees. Why so curious? It’s because they thought that climbing used up more energy than walking. When it comes to walking, for example, smaller animals use up more energy in comparison with larger animals. Generally, we would expect the animals to live in a way that conserves energy. So, it has been somewhat of a confusing question as to why primates would make a transition to the trees if it meant that their energy efficiency was compromised.
Using A Treadmill To Investigate
You’re probably reading the word ‘treadmill,’ and wondering to yourself what I’m talking about! Well, treadmills can be useful for many things – not just for us humans to use as exercise equipment. In this case, researchers from Duke University in North Carolina observed primates as they walked and climbed on a special treadmill that was designed for the study. The results were surprising!
The researchers found that there was no difference in how much energy was consumed for small primates whether they walked or climbed the treadmill. This means that climbing didn’t have a higher energy consumption. In this way, the small primates could make good use of the treetop environment without compromising their energy. These early primates would have been approximately the size of a very big rat. The results were published in the journal Science and the information gives us some clues about how the ancestors of these primates ended up in the trees approximately 65 million years ago.
Yummy Food
You might be wondering what was so great about the trees? Well for early primates, moving into this new environment provided them with an abundance of tasty insects and fruits. On top of that, evolutionary changes then occurred, which means that the primates developed characteristics to help them better adapt to this new environment. For these mammals, the changes included the development of nails instead of claws. Jandy Hanna, a Duke graduate student at the time of the study, created the treadmill apparatus and measured primate activity and energy consumption. She explained:
We assumed it would be more energetically expensive for all of them to climb than to walk, so this finding was unexpected. What we have shown is that they could have made this shift into a rich environment with insects and fruits without increased energetic cost.
Ultimately, the small size of the primates meant that they could make the transition into the trees to enjoy the goodies up there. From the perspective of energy consumption, heavier animals had less incentive to climb than walk, so it was the smaller primates who had the competitive edge. Still, even if it does take more energy for humans to climb – that sure never stopped me when I was a kid and I liked climbing the tree to my playhouse.
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Bye Bye Bats February 28, 2008
Posted by Mrs Weird Scientist in Animals, Think About It.Tags: bats, disease, illness
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You probably don’t give a lot of thought to bats, maybe because they don’t tend to be particularly visible creatures to most of us. Biologists in North America, however, are giving a lot of thought to bats right now. In fact, they are extremely perplexed and confused about bats. Why? A very mysterious illness is killing off bats in enormous numbers.
Bat Illness Strikes
In New York state last winter, the illness was identified in two caves, where it killed off almost all of the bats. What is particularly worrisome now is that it has spread to Vermont, where it has afflicted bats in New England’s biggest bat cave – Aeolus cave.
White-nose Syndrome
It’s called white-nose syndrome, which leaves a bat emaciated and with a white fungus on its nose. While the fungus isn’t the actual cause of their death, the combination of changes that occur do lead to the bat’s death. These changes include abnormal hibernation patterns and weight loss, leaving the bats unusually thin and suffering from related problems. Biologists still aren’t sure exactly sure how this illness gets transmitted. They also don’t know what causes it – if it’s the result of something happening in the bat’s environment or perhaps another cause entirely. For now though, officials are recommending that people avoid caves in the affected area for the next few months because by then, we will all hopefully know more about this mysterious illness.
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