Loose Feathers #424

Razorbill photographed by Bill Thompson/USFWS

Birds and birding

• More and more land is being taken out of the Conservation Reserve Program in the U.S. due to budget cuts and high grain prices, with bad results for birds and insects.
• A mystery illness is killing Bald Eagles in Utah. Samples are being analyzed for toxins and pathogens, but no cause is known so far.
• Prior to the breeding season, Bridled Terns eat a diverse diet, but once the eggs are laid, they restrict their foraging to waters close to their breeding colony and eat mainly crustaceans and black-spotted goatfish.
• At Cape Denison in Antarctica, the arrival of an iceberg has made it more difficult for the breeding Adélie Penguins to forage.

Science and nature blogging

• Backyard and Beyond: Xmas with the Owls
• Outside My Window: I Am Not Starving
• Cicada Mania: Photos of Cicadas from Australia
• Bird Ecology Study Group: Sex and the Birds: 10. Dunnock’s mixed bag of breeding systems
• ABA Blog: The 2013 Snowy Owl Invasion: It’s getting crazier by the minute
• 10,000 Birds: It Ain’t Over ’til the Fat Thrush Sings
• LepScience: Grasshoppers of Florida
• Not Exactly Rocket Science: Bird Cheaters Target Teams, But Teamwork Beats Cheats

Environment and biodiversity

• A key problem with reducing greenhouse gases is how to assign responsibility for emissions attributable to consumerism, particularly when goods are traded across international borders.
• Venezuelan scientists are trying to save the Orinoco crocodile; this reptile's population plunged over the course of the 20th century.
• Restoring grassland habitat and increasing milkweed availability will be key to rebuilding the Monarch population.
• Most of the dolphin deaths on the east coast this year are attributable to morbillivirus, but two dolphin die-offs in the Gulf of Mexico may be related to the Deepwater Horizon disaster, in addition to other environmental factors.
• The New York Times has a video of ants that can flow like a liquid or float as a mass on top of water.
• The hemlock wooly adelgid has now been discovered in a third Pennsylvania forest.
• The Franciscan manzanita recently received its critical habitat designation.
• The Delaware & Raritan Canal Commission rejected the DEP's plan to clearcut trees on Bull's Island in New Jersey.