The Wildclickers Trivia thread (# 70)

ul, that sounds like wonderful fun. But, I can imagine the pressure with deadlines and such. Keep us posted and if you have a problem - we have suggested solutions............ grin

all clicked........ :wink:

clicked for devriesj and me (anyone seen dev lately?)

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aktbird57 - You and your 294 friends have supported 2,361,827.6 square feet!

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2361827.6 square feet is equal to 54.22 acres

Click

Hi all,

Have been AWOL for a bit, and am now catching up.

Ul,
Keep on truckin'. I had wondered when the Mozart project was (would be) showcased. Avatar change?

Danon,
Idea for consultation. It seems to me that an awful lot of money, research, good minds, etc., has gone into the field of sports medicine/sports injury rehabilitation issues. Any such expertise within commuting distance for a consult/another opinion about 'what now' questions?

Just ran across:

Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

Thanks for the offer, Danon.
I really could use your craftmanship.

Susan- not really warm here- but you are right, I should try to find a new one.

all clicked - - -

Hoping a great Thursday for everyone.

clicked for dev and me

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aktbird57 - You and your 294 friends have supported 2,363,209.0 square feet!

Marine Wetlands habitat supported: 110,174.1 square feet.
You have supported: (0.0)
Your 294 friends have supported: (110,174.1)

American Prairie habitat supported: 51,639.5 square feet.
You have supported: (12,454.2)
Your 294 friends have supported: (39,185.3)

Rainforest habitat supported: 2,201,395.3 square feet.
You have supported: (170,346.2)
Your 294 friends have supported: (2,031,049.1)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2363209.0 square feet is equal to 54.25 acres

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who's on for the next enviro-test question?

Marnin awl, the granddaughter's visitin and having just turned 21 she buys the beer. Grin

all clicked.........

I'll look for one. Meanwhile:

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-05/uoea-mmh050406.php

"Man may have caused pre-historic extinctions

New research shows that pre-historic horses in Alaska may have been hunted into extinction by man, rather than by climate change as previously thought.
The discovery by Andrew Solow of Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, US, David Roberts of the Royal Botanic Garden, Kew and Karen Robbirt of the University of East Anglia (UEA) is published this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

The accepted view had previously been that the wild horses became extinct long before the extinction of mammoths and the arrival of humans from Asia - ruling out the possibility that they were over-hunted by man. One theory had been that a period of climate cooling wiped them out.

However, the researchers have discovered that uncertainties in dating fossil remains and the incompleteness of fossil records mean that the survival of the horse beyond the arrival of humans cannot be ruled out.

The PNAS paper develops a new statistical method to help resolve the inherent problems associated with dating fossils from the Pleistocene period. The aim is to provide a far more accurate timetable for the extinction of caballoid horses and mammoths and, ultimately, the cause.

"This research is exciting because it throws open the debate as to whether climate change or over-hunting may have led to the extinction of pre-historic horses in North America," said UEA's Karen Robbirt.

The Pleistocene period refers to the first epoch of the Quarternary period between 1.64 million and 10,000 years ago. It was characterised by extensive glaciation of the northern hemisphere and the evolution of modern man around 100,000 years ago.

It is known that the end of the Pleistocene period was a time of large-scale extinctions of animals and plants in North America and elsewhere but the factors responsible have remained open to question, with climate change and over-hunting by humans the prime suspects."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/05/04/AR2006050401016_pf.html

Bird Flu Expert Says H5N1 Worst He's Seen

By MARGIE MASON
The Associated Press
Thursday, May 4, 2006; 7:55 PM



SINGAPORE -- A leading expert said Thursday the H5N1 virus is the worst flu virus he's ever encountered, and far too many gaps in planning and knowledge persist for the world to handle it in the event of a pandemic.

The virus is a vicious killer in poultry, moving into the brain and destroying the respiratory tract, said Robert G. Webster, a virologist at the St. Jude Children's Research Hospital in Memphis, Tenn.

"I've worked with flu all my life, and this is the worst influenza virus that I have ever seen," said Webster, who has studied avian flu for decades. "If that happens in humans, God help us."

So far, most human cases have been linked to contact with infected birds, but experts fear the virus will mutate into a form that easily spreads from person to person, potentially sparking a global pandemic.

Webster predicted it would take at least 10 more mutations before the H5N1 virus could potentially begin spreading from human to human, but said there's no way to know when _ or if _ that will ever happen.

"All of those mutations are out there, but ... the virus hasn't succeeded in bringing it together," he said at the end of a two-day bird flu conference in Singapore organized by The Lancet medical journal.

Webster also called for more vaccine to be stockpiled, calling current efforts "miserable."

He said research in ferrets suggests that vaccination with a bird flu virus that circulated earlier in Hong Kong protected the animals from dying when they were later infected with the H5N1 virus now spreading in Vietnam. Such vaccination could potentially be used as a primer to prepare humans for a pandemic flu strain, he said.

Webster said much more research is needed to understand the virus' behavior and how it is spread. Research is being hindered, he said, by cultural issues preventing autopsies of victims. In many Asian countries, where most of the human deaths have occurred, many people do not believe in disturbing the body after death.

He said autopsies have been done on only six of the 113 people killed by bird flu since the virus began ravaging Asian poultry stocks in late 2003.

"The cultural ban in this region on autopsies has to be worked out somehow," Webster said. "Tissues have to be taken from cadavers to understand the biology of these viruses."

Dr. Frederick G. Hayden, a University of Virginia virus expert, said more research also is needed for antiviral drugs.

Hayden is collaborating on the first controlled clinical study looking at the effectiveness of Tamiflu in people infected with the H5N1 virus. It will examine how adults and children in Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia respond to standard doses of Tamiflu currently recommended for annual seasonal flu versus higher doses.

Health experts have touted the antiviral Tamiflu as the most effective medicine available to fight bird flu, and countries worldwide have been racing to stockpile it in case the virus mutates into a pandemic strain. But little is known about drug resistance and how much Tamiflu should be given to a person infected with the H5N1 bird flu virus. Dosage recommendations are currently not even available for children under 1 year of age.

Hayden said the World Health Organization is expected to announce revised dosing recommendations for Tamiflu soon.

The Queen Elizabeth Islands are part of which Canadian territory?

A The northernmost cluster of Canadian arctic islands - Nunavut and the Northwest Territories of Canada.




Queen Elizabeth Islands, northern Canada.



Bright Yellow - Nunavut

Pink - Northwest Territories

Green - Quebec

Light Green - Greenland

aktbird57 - You and your 294 friends have supported 2,364,941.6 square feet!

Marine Wetlands habitat supported: 110,314.6 square feet.
You have supported: (0.0)
Your 294 friends have supported: (110,314.6)

American Prairie habitat supported: 51,709.7 square feet.
You have supported: (12,477.7)
Your 294 friends have supported: (39,232.1)

Rainforest habitat supported: 2,202,917.2 square feet.
You have supported: (170,393.0)
Your 294 friends have supported: (2,032,524.2)

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2364941.6 square feet is equal to 54.29 acres

Good morning all,

all clicked - - -

sumac,
The Bird Flu possibility is approaching scarrrry............ I am sometimes reminded of what I heard a scientist say many years ago while speaking about hurricanes - "It is Earth's way of cleansing itself of a scourge."

Meaning we humans of course.

Seems to be a cold place.

Happy weekend!

Click

clicked for me and devriesj. I hope she has a great time at the Chicago get-together.

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aktbird57 - You and your 294 friends have supported 2,366,276.1 square feet!

Marine Wetlands habitat supported: 110,478.5 square feet.
You have supported: (0.0)
Your 294 friends have supported: (110,478.5)

American Prairie habitat supported: 51,733.2 square feet.
You have supported: (12,501.1)
Your 294 friends have supported: (39,232.1)

Rainforest habitat supported: 2,204,064.5 square feet.
You have supported: (170,439.8)
Your 294 friends have supported: (2,033,624.6)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

2366276.1 square feet is equal to 54.32 acres

http://www.livescience.com/environment/060505_fish_invasion.html

Non-Native Fish Invade Western Streams

By Robert Roy Britt
LiveScience Managing Editor
posted: 05 May 2006
01:05 pm ET



A quarter of all fish in streams of 12 western states are non-native, according to the U.S. Geological Survey.

The aquatic invasion is widespread. Half of all streams in the West are home to non-native fish. Few habitat types are immune, and humans are largely to blame.

One of the most surprising conclusions in the new study: In streams that are among the most pristine, there are generally more non-native fish than native.

All habitats

"Non-native fishes were found across the landscape in all habitat types, though streams in forested areas were less likely to contain non-native fish," said Scott Bonar, a USGS researcher at the University of Arizona. "Our data suggest that no matter how pristine the habitat type, there exists a non-native species that can colonize it."

Other findings:

In about 11 percent of streams, all fish were non-native.
Non-native fish were most common in streams of the interior states of Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, and Montana.
In Colorado, two of every three fish are non-native (in North Dakota, only 1 in 12 is non-native).
The survey covered 400,000 miles of streams in Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Oregon, South Dakota, Utah, Washington and Wyoming.

Why it matters

Scientists with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service say about 40 percent of all freshwater fish species in the country are at risk of extinction. Non-native fish can take over spawning grounds and crowd the natives out.

The invaders might not sound so foreign, however.

The most common non-native species include brook, brown, cutthroat and rainbow trout, as well as smallmouth and largemouth bass that were introduced here and there for sport. Other fish were added to streams on purpose to combat mosquitoes or to be food for larger fish.

The study, announced this week and published in the North American Journal of Fisheries Management in November, raises an unexpected possibility.

"Without deemphasizing the importance of landscape disturbance by humans, we concluded that non-native fishes pose an equivalent, if not greater, threat to native fishes than habitat degradation in western U.S. streams," Bonar said. "Consequently, attention to both habitat degradation and the non-native species problem is important to effectively restore streams of the American West."

Last week, federal officials announced that Fish and Wildlife, USGS, NOAA, state agencies, sport-fishing and conservation groups have partnered to work on fish habitat restoration plans. The idea is to protect healthy habitats and improve 90 percent of others by 2020.