Image right: Based on the new sequence, scientists found that different species copy each other’s wing patterns by exchanging genes, a process thought to be very rare, especially in animals. (Photo by Mathieu Joron)

The genome of the Postman butterfly, Panama’s Heliconius melpomene, helps scientists understand how the stunning diversity of wing color patterns in tropical butterflies evolved. Heliconius species are highly distasteful. Their vivid wing patterns warn predators not to eat them. How have different butterfly species evolved similar wing patterns?

Based on the new sequence, scientists found that different species copy each other’s wing patterns by exchanging genes, a process thought to be very rare, especially in animals. Although many different species interbreed in the wild, their hybrid offspring often cannot reproduce successfully. But sometimes hybrids gain useful genes that help them adapt to changing conditions. Heliconius hybrids gain wing patterns that help them survive.

Kanchon Dasmahapatra, the a lead author of the study and a former Smithsonian fellow who worked with Jim Mallet at University College London notes: “What we discovered is that one butterfly species can gain its protective colour pattern genes ready-made from a different species by hybridizing with it–a much faster process than having to evolve one’s colour patterns from scratch.”

Some of the other genes in the sequence also surprised researchers. These butterflies, typically regarded as primarily visual insects, apparently have a rich array of genes for smelling and sensing chemicals in their environment, raising new questions about the links between perception and the origins of new species. Indeed, analysis carried out at the University of California by co-author Adriana Briscoe showed that butterflies have an even greater array of genes involved in chemical communication than moths, which depend on chemical signals for finding mates and host plants.

The study heralds a new era in genome biology and an important step in the Smithsonian’s goal to understand and sustain a biodiverse planet. Low-cost genetic sequencing opens doors to small research groups and individuals to sequence entire genomes, a technique formerly accessible only to labs with major government funding.

“Assembling a genome from scratch is still hard work: think Humpy-Dumpty,” said Owen McMillan, geneticist and Academic Dean at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, “but it is getting easy, inexpensive, and is transforming how we do science. At the core, having a reference genome opens up new research possibilities and reveals previously unimagined connections.

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Recently, after examining hundreds of photos taken by camera traps set-up to monitor clouded leopards in the park, three Smithsonian researchers say Khao Yai also is quite popular with a different kind of visitor: poachers.

Next to the Eurasian wild pig, humans were the most common creature to show-up in the camera-trap photos, namely villagers, park staff, tourists and poachers, write Kate Jenks, JoGayle Howard and Peter Leimgruber of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute in a recent issue of the journal Biotropica. Humans appeared in photos from 43 of the 217 different sites in the park where the camera traps were set, even though 78 percent of the park is zoned as a strict nature reserve/primitive area.

Images: Right, a clouded leopard in a camera trap photo. Above and below: poachers. (Photos courtesy of Kate Jenks)

Attached to trees in the forest, the camera traps use an infrared beam that can detect motion or a change in temperature to trip the camera’s shutter. The researchers considered humans in the snapshots to be “poachers” only if they were carrying a gun, a carcass or animal parts, a bag to carry forest products and animals; or if they were accompanied by a dog, Jenks explains.

Surprisingly, close analysis of the project’s some 650 photos revealed the presence of poachers very close to Khao Yai’s 21 ranger stations. Few carnivores, such as clouded leopards, were photographed near the stations.

“We expected to find higher carnivore biodiversity near the ranger outposts because those areas should be really well protected,” Leimgruber says. They are not.

In fact, Jenks says, “the ranger stations seem to be having the opposite of their intended effect. Building and staffing the outposts required the construction of roads into the park, which has provided easier access for everyone into the forest.”

This video depicts camera traps being set up in Thailand’s Pang Sida National Park, which is located adjacent to Khao Yai National Park.

In Southeast Asia poaching is fueled by demand from the traditional Chinese medicine trade, trade in wild bush meat for human consumption and forest products the researchers say. In addition, Jenks says, there are villages right up on the boundary of the park with no transition and no buffer zone. It is very easy for villagers to wander into the park.

Jenks, Howard and Leimgruber recommend increased foot patrols by park staff through the forest and continued monitoring of the impact of these foot patrols using the camera traps. Unless the human presence in and impact on the park is reduced, wildlife populations “will only shrink progressively into smaller and smaller core areas of the park” the researchers write.

(JoGayle Howard, a prominent researcher at the National Zoo who had dedicated her life to the study and conservation of endangered species, passed away last year.  She had been instrumental in developing this wildlife conservation project.) –John Barrat

Article link: “Do Ranger Stations Deter Poaching Activity in National Parks in Thailand?” by Kate Jenks, JoGayle Howard and Peter Leimgruber appeared in the scientific journal Biotropica.

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This means just a few towering white fir, sugar pine and incense cedars per acre at the Yosemite site are disproportionately responsible for photosynthesis, converting carbon dioxide into plant tissue and sequestering that carbon in the forest, sometimes for centuries, according to James Lutz, a University of Washington research scientist in environmental and forest sciences. Lutz is lead author of a paper on the largest quantitative study yet of the importance of big trees in temperate forests being published online May 2 on PLoS ONE. The research was funded by the Smithsonian Center for Tropical Forest Science.

Image right: A handful of large-diameter trees per acre, such as these incense cedars, together with remains of big trees like the three-foot-wide white fir snag and downed debris account for half the forest biomass at a Yosemite National park study site. (Image by James Lutz)

“In a forest comprised of younger trees that are generally the same age, if you lose one percent of the trees, you lose one percent of the biomass,” he says. “In a forest with large trees like the one we studied, if you lose one percent of the trees, you could lose half the biomass.”

In 2009, scientists including Lutz reported that the density of large-diameter trees declined nearly 25 percent between the 1930s and 1990s in Yosemite National Park, even though the area was never logged. Scientists have found notable numbers of large trees dying in similar areas across the West.

The new 63-acre study site is one of the largest, fully-mapped plots in the world and the largest old-growth plot in North America. The tally of what’s there, including the counting and tagging of 34,500 live trees, was done by citizen scientists. The site is part of the network of the Smithsonian Center for Tropical Forest Science, a global network of 42 tropical and temperate forest plots including the one in Yosemite.

Image left: Washington State University’s Mark Swanson pulls a tape tight around a 4-foot-wide sugar pine, one of the 34,500 live trees counted and tagged for long-term study in a Yosemite National Park study plot. (Washington State University)

One implication of the research is that land managers may want to pay more attention to existing big trees, the co-authors said. In some younger forests that lack big trees, citizens and land managers might want to consider fostering the growth of a few big-trunked trees, Lutz added.–Source: University of Washington.

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CTFS-SIGEO is a global network of forest research plots committed to the study of tropical and temperate forest function and diversity. The multi-institutional network includes plots across the Americas, Africa, Asia, and Europe, with a strong focus on tropical regions. Ecologists at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute established the first forest dynamics plot on Barro Colorado Island in the Panama Canal in 1980.

Image left: Daniel Johnson, a biology graduate student at Indiana University, measures the diameter of a white ash tree in the University’s Lilly-Dickey Woods. The 550-acre woods were recently added to CTFS-SIGEO’s global network of forest research plots. (Photo by F. Collin Hobbs)

Stuart J. Davies, CTFS-SIGEO director and senior staff scientist at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, will make the move along with David Kenfack, CTFS-SIGEO Africa Program coordinator. Davies sees the need for increased presence at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. as the network continues to build partnerships within different Smithsonian units.

The scale and intensity of the CTFS-SIGEO research program remains unprecedented in forest science. Scientists monitor the growth and survival of about 4.5 million trees of approximately 8,500 species in 21 different countries. The work aims to increase the scientific understanding of forest ecosystems, guide sustainable forest management and natural-resource policy, monitor the impacts of climate change, and build capacity in forest science. Most recently CTFS-SIGEO added the Lilly-Dickey Woods–a 550-acre forest in Brown County Indiana that is a research and teaching preserve for Indiana University–to its network of forest research plots.

Because of its extensive biological monitoring, unique databases, and the expertise of its partners, CTFS-SIGEO enhances society’s ability to evaluate and respond to the impacts of global climate change. Monitoring so many forest plots at once is providing a comprehensive, yet locally detailed perspective on how the world’s forests are being transformed by global change.  Research on tropical forest dynamics continues, but is joined by new initiatives studying carbon fluxes, temperate forests, ecosystem services, and biodiversity. CTFS-SIGEO and its many institutional partners are leveraging huge intellectual horsepower to transform our understanding of forest-ecosystem structure and function. The network has been so successful that the Smithsonian is now planning to extend its system of earth observatories to the near shore marine realm. –Source: The Plant Press, newsletter of the Department of Botany, National Museum of Natural History.

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Jonathan Thompson is Research Ecologist at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute, Research Associate at the Harvard Forest, and lead author on the paper which appeared in the journal Ecological Applications in late 2011. “The rebounding forests of New England provide a tremendous public benefit by storing carbon that would otherwise contribute to climate change,” said Thompson. To put these findings into context he adds, “In Massachusetts, forests capture approximately 2.3 million metric tons of carbon each year. That’s equal to the amount of carbon dioxide emitted from the energy used by one million American homes annually.” He and his coauthors were able to estimate the extent to which development may chip away at that carbon sink, using an uncommon collection of long-term data and a distinct form of research known as scenario science.

Image right: From this 71-foot eddy-flux tower in a 200-year-old hemlock forest, Harvard Forest scientists have measured carbon dynamics and other ecosystem processes for more than 20 years as part of the Long-Term Ecological Research program. Located in a 35-hectare Smithsonian Global Earth Observatory plot and part of the core measurements for the National Ecological Observatory Network, this tower is a focal point for studies of the eastern hemlock tree and its impending demise from the invasive hemlock wolly adelgid, as well as phenology studies of succeeding hardwoods.
(Photos by David Foster)

For more than 30 years, scientists at the Harvard Forest have scaled towers into the forest canopy and measured the trunks of trees to track how much carbon is stored or lost from the woods each year. This treasure trove of data is part of the national Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) Network, which is celebrating more than three decades of research this month. This important milestone is marked by six new papers released today in a special issue of the journal BioScience. The forest carbon research is one example of participatory scenario science — a growing trend in ecology featured in a paper by Thompson, David Foster, Director of the Harvard Forest, and their colleagues in the BioScience issue.

Image left: Summer Research Program students monitor soil respiration of decaying wood in a large study comparing carbon, water, and energy fluxes between harvested and unharvested sites.

Harvard Forest is one of four LTER sites in the northeastern U.S. and was awarded a grant by the National Science Foundation to join the Network in 1988. David Foster coauthored the Ecological Applications paper of 2011 and co-edited the new BioScience special issue. He notes, “With three decades of data meticulously collected as part of the LTER Network, we have reached a crucial transition where we are now able to tackle major environmental challenges, such as the fate of forest carbon, across large landscapes.”

Foster adds, “Over the last two centuries, forests have stored more carbon with each passing year in many parts of New England, but the turning point may be in sight for Massachusetts and other urbanizing landscapes if recent development trends continue.” But that’s not the end of the story for Foster: “The good news is that forests are resilient and history is not necessarily destiny. Our research makes a compelling case for expanding support for forestland protection and for the efforts of private landowners to keep their land forested. It reminds us that forests provide important infrastructure that we should invest in, just as we do major civil works projects.”

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Reptiles & Amphibians: Conservation and Natural History.

Image right: Burmese pythons (Python molurus bivittatus), native to southern Asia, have taken up a comfortable residence in the state of Florida, especially in the Everglades. In addition to out-competing native wildlife for resources and habitat, the pythons are eating the native wildlife. (Photo by Sarah L. Stewart)

Burmese pythons, native to southern Asia, have taken up a comfortable residence in the state of Florida, especially in the Everglades. In addition to out-competing native wildlife for resources and habitat, the pythons are eating the native wildlife. Burmese pythons (Python molurus bivittatus) were first recorded in the Everglades in 1979—thought to be escaped or discarded pets. Their numbers have since grown, with an estimated breeding population in Florida in the tens of thousands.

Image left: Five of ten entire Guineafowl eggs regurgitated by a Burmese python. (Photo: R.W. Snow, Everglades National Park)

In an ongoing study to better understand the impact of this snake in the Everglades, scientists from the Smithsonian Institution, the National Park Service and others have been examining the contents of the digestive tracts of pythons in the area. They have shown that Burmese pythons consume at least 25 different species of birds in the Everglades, but until now no records documented this species eating bird eggs.

“This finding is significant because it suggests that the Burmese python is not simply a sit-and-wait predator, but rather is opportunistic enough to find the nests of birds,” said Carla Dove, ornithologist at the Smithsonian’s Feather Identification Lab in the National Museum of Natural History and lead author of the study. “Although the sample size is small, these findings suggest that the snakes have the potential to negatively affect the breeding success of native birds.”

Image right: Two Limpkin (Aramus guarauna) crushed but intact eggs (top) recovered from a Burmese python digestive tract and com­pared to a reference Limpkin specimen from the Smithsonian’s collection (below) for size and color patterns. The arrow shows fragments of eggshells from the python sample placed on the Smithsonian specimen for color comparison. (Photo by Don Hurlbert)

Scientists collected a 14-pound male python that was 8 1/2 feet long near a property with free-ranging guineafowl. The snake regurgitated 10 whole guineafowl eggs soon after it was captured. The team discovered the remains of two bird eggs in another python collected for the study―a 30-pound female more than 10 feet long. Scientists used DNA tests on the membrane of the crushed eggs and comparisons of the shell fragments with egg specimens in the Smithsonian’s collection to determine what the female snake had eaten. Their research revealed the species to be the limpkin (Aramus guarauna), a large wading bird found in marshes and listed as a “species of special concern” by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

There are several species of snake known to eat bird eggs. Those species are equipped with pointed or blade-like extensions on the vertebrae in their esophagus that punctures the eggshell, making it easy for the snake to crush the egg and digest its contents. Burmese pythons do not have these adaptations. However, the pythons studied were so large in relation to the eggs they ingested that the scientists believe these specialized vertebrae may not have been needed.

“Our observations confirm that invasive Burmese pythons consume not only adult birds but also eggs, revealing a previously unrecognized risk from this introduced predator to nesting birds,” said Dove. “How frequently they are predating on bird eggs is hard to know.”

In an earlier stage of the study, the scientists collected more than 300 Burmese pythons in Everglades National Park and found that birds, from the 5-inch-long house wren to the 4-foot-long great blue heron, accounted for 25 percent of the python’s diet in the Everglades.

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In other words, less than half of the giant panda’s already decreased habitat will be suitable to sustain them in 70 years. The research team used two different global climate models to make this prediction, taking into account remaining habitat, lost habitat, potential new habitat and current protected areas for giant pandas.

The study also found that habitat fragmentation will likely increase, leading to smaller areas that can support fewer pandas farther away from each other, increasing the risks of inbreeding and population collapse.

“Our research predicts that climate change will substantially decrease the amount of suitable giant panda habitat within the species’ current distribution,” said Melissa Songer, lead author of the paper and an SCBI wildlife ecologist. “But also we may see new areas becoming suitable for giant pandas,” Songer adds. “The question remains as to whether giant pandas will have the capacity and opportunity to shift to new areas.”

In addition to calling for the development of more protected areas that are aligned with climate predictions, the paper emphasizes the importance of creating corridors to reduce fragmentation. The study also has land-use implications, as agricultural land and land near human settlements are unsuitable for pandas.

Photos: Giant pandas at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo.

In addition to Songer, the authors of the panda ecology study from SCBI are Melanie Delion and Alex Biggs. The partnering author is Qiongyu Huang in the geography department at the University of Maryland. Friends of the National Zoo helped fund this research.

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Image left: Jumping Silverstoneia flotator (Photo by Brian Gratwicke)

• Not all frogs can leap, or even hop. The desert rain frog (Breviceps macrops) has legs that are too short to hop. Instead, it walks.

• Male frogs of the genus Pipa are known to defend their territory by jumping at and then wrestling other males.

• The New Guinea bush frog (Asterophrys turpicola) takes jump attacks one step further: before it jumps at a strange frog, it inflates itself and shows off its blue tongue.

• Stumpffia tridactyla are normally slow-moving critters, but when they’re startled they can abruptly jump up to 8 inches. That doesn’t sound very far, but these little guys are less than half-an-inch long!

• The Fuji tree frog (Platymantis vitiensis) may be the leaping stuntman of the frog world. Each time it leaps, it twists in the air—sometimes even 180 degrees—to throw predators off its trail.

• The Larut torrent frog (Amolops larutensis) gets its name from a nifty leaping trick: it can jump into a fast-moving stream and back to its usual perch, the underside of a rock, without being affected by the current.

• The record for longest jump by an American bullfrog (Rana catesbeiana) recorded in a scientific paper is a little over 4 feet. But scientists who went to the Calaveras County Fair, which Mark Twain’s short story made famous for frog jumping, found that more than half the competitors bested that record—and one jumped more than 7 feet in one leap!

• The Guinness Book of World Records doesn’t include any frogs for their leaping ability. But it does track human performance in frog jumping (jumping while holding one’s toes).

In honor of leap day celebrations being coordinated globally by Amphibian Ark, the Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project made this video for a frog song written by Alex Culbreth.

–by Meghan Bartels, Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project/Smithsonian’s National Zoo

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Image left: A desert tortoise, Gopherus agassizii.  (Image by Mike Jones, courtesy Encyclopedia of Life)

“Roads are barriers to dispersal for lots of species and usually it takes many generations to show up in the genetic structure of an animal,” says one of the paper’s co-authors Emily Latch, a postdoctoral researcher at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute’s Center for Conservation and Evolutionary Genetics, and now an assistant professor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. “Because tortoises have such a long life span, we didn’t think the roads would influence their genetic structure so quickly, but they did.”

The study shows for the first time that recent landscape features such as roads “can have rapid effects on the genetic structure of a localized population and are detectible almost immediately,” in as little as one generation, the scientists report. As a result, the scientists conclude, “Roads may become increasingly important in shaping the evolutionary trajectory of desert tortoise populations.”

For the study, DNA samples were taken from 859 tortoises living in an area of 23,969 acres. “A huge number of samples,” for such a small area, Latch says. Data also was taken on each animal’s sex, location, and location elevation and slope.

Image right: A tortoise in the Mojave Desert. (Image courtesy Wikipedia)

The tortoises were sampled as part of a tortoise relocation effort at Fort Irwin Army Training Center and the animals were located by having people walk map transects in the desert. They picked-up, labeled and took data and DNA samples for every tortoise encountered.

“The adult individuals were initially genotyped to develop a baseline genetic database of translocated and resident tortoises so that family groups hatched after the translocations could be identified to particular parents, and the reproductive success of translocated and resident tortoises compared,” says Smithsonian geneticist Rob Fleischer, head of the Center for Conservation and Evolutionary Genetics and senior author on the paper. “This is important to determine if translocation is really an effective mitigation step. It was serendipity that led to our finding a surprising level of genetic structure.”

Roads may inhibit gene flow in desert tortoises by the reptiles being hit by cars, picked up by travelers, and predation and disease associated with pets released by the roadside. Eroded banks and increased vegetation along desert roads also may provide places for the tortoises to burrow and forage for food, causing them to move along a road rather than to cross it.

The article “Fine-Scale Analysis Reveals Cryptic Landscape Genetic Structure in Desert Tortoises,” by Emily K. Latch, William I. Boarman, Andrew Walde, and Robert C. Fleischer appeared recently in the journal PLoS ONE.

-John Barrat

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