Scientists from the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center have found that fledgling catbirds living in the suburbs are extremely vulnerable. Almost 80 percent are killed by predators before they reach adulthood. Nearly half of the deaths are connected to domestic cats. The team studied catbird nests in 3 suburban neighborhoods in Maryland: Spring Park, Opal Daniels Park, and Bethesda. Learn more about this 2011 study by clicking here. (Catbird photo by Gerhard Hofmann)

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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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1

Rabbits are not rodents, but lagomorphs (lag-uh-mawrf), a scientific term which means “hare-shaped.” Hares and pikas also are lagomorphs.

Image: A domestic rabbit, breed: Silver Fox (Photo by Mehgan Murphy)

2

Scientists studying the bones of an extinct giant rabbit found on the Mediterranean island of Minorca estimate this prehistoric animal weighed as much as 31 pounds! The largest rabbits alive today– domestic breeds such as the Flemish giant–weigh 22 pounds at most.

Image: A reconstruction of a giant Minorcan rabbit is shown next to a modern European rabbit. (Image by Meike Köhler)

3

Thanks to human introductions the European rabbit (Oryctolagus cuniculus) is found throughout Western Europe, Australia, parts of South America, North Africa and on more than 800 islands around the world. Today in Iberia, Spain, the European rabbit’s sole home for many thousands of years, it is threatened.

Image: A European rabbit. (Image courtesy Encyclopedia of Life)

4

Archaeologists have evidence of people hunting rabbits in the south of France some 120,000 years ago. Scientists suspect even Neanderthals lived on diets made up largely of rabbits.

Painting: “Der November” by Joachim von Sandrat (1606-1688)

5

A “never fail” Kansas folk remedy for reducing fever recommends making a strong tea from the dung of the wild jackrabbit and drinking it every half-hour.

Image: Black-tailed jackrabbit (Photo by Susan E. Adams)

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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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Spring is in full swing at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo, and the Small Mammal House—which celebrated the birth of a black howler monkey (Alouatta caraya) March 22—is no exception. Since then, keepers have been monitoring the family at a distance, allowing first-time parents Chula (mother) and Pele (father) to bond with their baby.

The pair has exhibited strong parental skills and the young primate seems bright, alert, and increases its activity and independence day by day. This is the first surviving howler monkey in the Zoo’s history of exhibiting the animal. Its sex has not yet been determined. Zoo visitors can see the howler family on exhibit in the Small Mammal House.

Their thick necks house a unique voice box, including an enlarged hyoid bone, that enables male howler monkeys to penetrate three miles of dense forest with a single rumbling growl. These booming territorial calls have earned the primates, which are native to Central and South America, the title of loudest animal in the New World (North, Central and South America). The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists the black howler monkey as least concern.

Photos by Clyde Nishimura (top) and Janice Sveda, Smithsonian’s National Zoo

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Image right: Kwame in 2007 (Mehgan Murphy photo). Image below: Kojo in 2005 (Photo by Ann Batdorf); Image bottom: Kwame in 2007 (Mehgan Murphy photo)

On Feb. 2, Zoo veterinarians inserted an Implantable Loop Recorder beneath Kojo’s skin and between his shoulder blades. Kwame’s procedure took place on March 14. About the size of a USB drive, the ILR records electrocardiogram waves and allows animal care staff to analyze trends in the gorillas’ heart rates, rhythms, strengths and timing of electrical pulses.

“The Great Ape Heart Project is at the forefront of combating heart disease in gorillas, and we are honored to be one of the first institutions participating in this innovative research,” said National Zoo Director Dennis Kelly. “We hope that the information we learn will benefit this species and many others as well.”

Image left: Gorilla keeper Becky Malinksy trains Kwame to present different parts of his body, specifically his back, so that she can download data from the Implantable Loop Recorder.

Kwame and Kojo are ideal candidates for this study; they are clinically healthy yet the odds that they will develop heart disease later in life are high because of how common the disease is in gorillas. The Great Ape Heart Project chose them for another reason, as well: the Zoo’s training program allows animal care staff to monitor an animal’s health, administer medical procedures and provide preventive care without the use of anesthesia or restraints. Kwame and Kojo willingly present their backs to keepers Amanda Bania and Becky Malinsky on cue as part of everyday training. This ensures veterinarians will be able to scan the ILR, collect data and monitor trends in the gorillas’ health. The data will be shared among institutions and facilities that care for these primates. In addition, keepers will continue behavioral research projects and look for physical changes in Kwame and Kojo’s health.

“Even minute changes in their EKG waves could signal the onset of heart disease,” said Suzan Murray, chief veterinarian and head of the Zoo’s Department of Animal Health. “Detection is a major step in combating the disease.”

The notion of using ILRs in gorillas was first introduced by Dr. Ilana Kutinsky, co-director of the Great Ape Heart Project. As a cardiac electrophysiologist whose expertise lies in human medicine, she has seen ILRs save human lives.

“To ensure that these fascinating animals are around for generations to come, we must do everything possible to give them the best quality of life,” Kutinsky said. “Ultimately, this device will help improve great ape longevity in zoos.”

Kutinsky attended Kojo’s surgery and assisted Zoo veterinary staff. Murray and Kutinsky are two of the four scientists who have been at the forefront of gorilla heart disease for over a decade. The other doctors are Hayley Murphy and Pam Dennis.

In human care, western lowland gorillas can live to be upwards of 50 years old. In its native tropical forests of Western and Central Africa, however, a gorilla’s lifespan is about 35 years. Increased hunting, outbreaks of the Ebola virus and poorly regulated development projects threaten these great apes as well as their habitats. The International Union for Conservation of Nature lists the western lowland gorilla as critically endangered.

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In about six weeks, keepers will separate the chicks from their parents, and Zoo veterinarians will perform a routine medical exam and take feather samples to determine their sexes.

(Guam rail photos by Jim Jenkins, FONZ Photo Club)

To date, 82 chicks have hatched at the Zoo and SCBI, and each provides scientists with the opportunity to learn about the growth, reproduction, health and behavior of the species. The Zoo sent 29 Guam rails to the government of Guam for release and breeding, and an additional 25 birds have gone to other institutions to breed.

Guam rails flourished in Guam’s limestone forests and coconut plantations until the arrival of the brown tree snake (Boiga irregularis), an invasive species that stowed away in military equipment shipped from New Guinea after World War II. Because these reptiles had no natural predators on Guam, their numbers grew and they spread across the island quickly. Within three decades, they hunted Guam rails and eight other bird species to the brink of extinction.

In 1986, Guam’s Department of Aquatic and Wildlife Resources captured the country’s remaining 21 Guam rails and sent them to zoological institutions around the globe—including the National Zoo—as a hedge against extinction. The Association of Zoos and Aquariums created a Species Survival Plan for the birds. The SSP pairs males and females in order to maintain a genetically diverse and self-sustaining population.

Today, 118 Guam rails are thriving on two islands near the mainland: Rota and Cocos. The availability of release sites continues to shrink, however, due to deforestation and human expansion. Controlling the brown snake population remains a significant challenge as well, though researchers have made progress in developing a variety of barriers, traps and toxicants. Forty-four birds reside in zoos and other facilities in North America. Visitors to the Smithsonian’s National Zoo can see these birds on exhibit in the Bird House. In stark contrast to their brown-and-white-plumaged parents, Guam rail chicks sport black downy feathers.

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A new survey conducted in Minnesota’s Chippewa National Forest and Wisconsin’s Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest by a research team led by Scott Loss of the University of Minnesota and the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center has revealed a direct link between the presence of invasive European earthworms (Lumbricus spp.) and reduced numbers of Ovenbirds in mixed sugar maple and basswood forests. The results are detailed in a paper published on-line in the scientific journal “Landscape Ecology.”

Image right: An ovenbird. (Photo by Simon Pierre Barrette)

European earthworms are invading previously earthworm-free hardwood forests in North America the scientists say, and consuming the rich layer of leaf litter on the forest floor. In turn, herbaceous plants that thrive in thick leaf litter and provide cover for ground-nesting birds are thinning out, replaced by grasses and sedges. As a result, Ovenbird nests are more visible and vulnerable to predators and Ovenbirds searching for nesting sites reject these low-cover areas outright. Areas of reduced leaf litter also contain fewer bugs for the Ovenbirds to eat, requiring them to establish larger territories, resulting in fewer birds over a given area.

Image left:  A forest without earthworms has a rich understory of herbaceous plants, tree seedlings, and shrubs, and a thick, spongy leaf litter layer. (Photo by Scott Loss)

The worms invading northern Midwestern forests (as well as forests in the  northeastern U.S. and Canada) have been in the United States since soon after the first European settlers arrived, Scott Loss explains, brought over inadvertently in the ballast of ships, in the root balls of agricultural plants or on purpose for use in gardening. Only now is the leading edge of their continued invasion, caused mainly by logging activities and fishermen dumping their bait, reaching interior wilderness areas such as parts of the study site in the remote forests of Wisconsin and Minnesota. “Night crawlers [Lumbricus terrestris] and the slightly smaller red worms [also called leaf worms or beaver tails, Lumbricus rubellus], have the most damaging impacts to the soil, litter layer, and plants in forests that were historically earthworm-free,” Loss says.

Image right: A forest experiencing heavy earthworm invasion often has few remaining herbaceous plants and seedlings, no intact litter layer, and extensive patches of bare soil. (Photo by Scott Loss)

“Everyone has probably heard at one time or another that earthworms have really positive effects in breaking down soil and making it more porous,” Loss explains. “This is true in agricultural and garden settings but not in forests in the Midwest which have developed decomposition systems without earth worms.” Because the forested areas of the Midwest United States were once covered in glaciers, there are no native earthworm species present in the soil, Loss explains. “These earthworm-free forests developed a slow fungus-based decomposition process characterized by a deep organic litter layer on the forest floor.”

Image left: An Ovenbird incubating eggs on a nest. (Photo by Scott Loss)

Earthworms feed on this layer of leaf litter and make it decompose much faster, Loss says. “As a result, we see the loss of sensitive forest-floor species such as trillium, Solomons seal, sarsaparilla and sugar maple seedlings and a shift in dominance to disturbance-adapted species like Pennsylvania sedge.

One result is reduced nest concealment for the Ovenbird and increased predation by squirrel and bird predators.

The researchers found no decline in three other species of ground-nesting birds included in their survey—the Hermit Thrush (Catharus guttatus), Black-and-White Warbler (Mniotilta varia) and Veery (Catharus fuscescens)—nor did they find a correlation between Ovenbird decline and invasive worms in other forest types, such as red oak, paper birch and aspen.

Image right: Scott Loss uses a liquid-mustard mixture to sample earthworms.  The mustard contains a skin irritant that causes earthworms to come to the surface. (Photo by Sara Schmelzer Loss)

“Our results suggest that Ovenbird density may decline by as much as 25 percent in maple-basswood forests heavily invaded by invasive earthworms,” the researchers conclude. “Maple-basswood forests are among the preferred ovenbird habitats in the region, comprise a considerable portion of the region’s woodlands…and are experiencing Lumbricus invasions across most of the northern Midwest.” Previous studies have demonstrated that invasive earthworms also are harmful to other native North American species, such as salamanders.

Image left: Ovenbird nests in earthworm-free forests (left, arrow pointing to nest opening) are well-concealed.  In areas with invasive earthworms (right), nests are less concealed and therefore more vulnerable to predators. (Photos by Scott Loss)

There is reason for concern that the overall population of Ovenbirds could decline, Loss points out. “Ovenbirds migrate to Central America and the Caribbean and back every year, a trip during which they can fly into buildings and towers or get nabbed by a cat as they rest on the ground, and they also face loss of habitat on their breeding and wintering grounds. Now, here is yet another potential threat to their survival.”

The Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center is dedicated to fostering greater understanding, appreciation, and protection of the grand phenomenon of bird migration. Founded in 1991, we are located at the Smithsonian National Zoological Park in Washington, D.C.--John Barrat

“Invasions of non-native earthworms related to population declines of ground-nesting songbirds across a regional extent in northern hardwood forests of North America,” was co-authored by Scott R. Loss, Gerald J. Niemi and Robert B. Blair of the University of Minnesota.

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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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