Bluebird

Snow Fleas in the UP

March 12, 2012, 7:38 PM

When Snow Fleas Surface, Winter Study Comes to a Close

By JOHN VUCETICH

John VucetichWolves in the Chippewa Harbor Pack.

John Vucetich, a wildlife ecologist from Michigan Technological University, leads the wolf-moose Winter Study at Isle Royale National Park.

Saturday, March 3

Snow fleas by the hundreds have congregated on the surface of the snow. They belong to a group of creatures collectively known as collembola. They look like insects, but recent research suggests they may be as closely related to insects as mammals are to reptiles. They live in the soil, sustaining themselves on decomposing vegetation. Of the earth’s animals large enough to see with the unaided eye — and collembola barely qualify — these are reputed to be the most abundant. Usually they escape our attention almost entirely.

Then on certain warm days in late winter, some adventurous snow fleas crawl to the surface of the snow, where you can’t help but notice them. I wonder what the life of a snow flea is like. Is it itchy to molt your exoskeleton? Do their “springtails” feel stiffer on cold days, when their bodies are soaked in glycine-rich proteins that work like antifreeze? Why do they come to the surface of the snow?

What we do know is that when the snow fleas congregate, the end of winter is not far off. Soon the snow will begin receding and exposing stumps, and south-facing exposures will see the sun again as the snow recedes. The chickadees will switch to their spring song. And the ice will begin to break up.

Our plan, should the weather cooperate, is to fly home three days from now. If today’s snow and wind continue as forecast, then the last research flight of Winter Study 2012 was yesterday. It’s as sad as the last day of summer.

 

John VucetichThe skull of a wolf-killed moose.  The inset shows a tooth impacted with rotting vegetation.

JOHN VUCETICH

Posts From Isle Royale

• Preparing to Live With Wolves
• In Winter Weather, Flying to Find Wolves
• Wolves, Snow and the Red Dragon
• A Wolf-Moose Standoff at Isle Royale
• One Moose, Two Moose
• Following the Wolf Pack
• Much to Learn From What Remains
• A Luscious Meal for Moose
• An Eruption of Ravens
• A Pack of Hungry Wolves
• As Wolf Diminish, Moose Flourish
• Keeping an Eye on Two Intimate Wolves
• For Moose, an Easy Winter Turns Hard
• A Band of Boy Wolves

Sunday, March 5

In preparation for our departure, I decommission the bone boiling pot. The bones are cleaned, tagged, inventoried. Later we’ll move them to a permanent storage facility, where they’ll join the ranks of skeletal remains of some 4,500 other moose, souvenirs of 54 years of effort and the subject of many scientific papers on topics ranging from the causes of arthritis to long-term trends in atmospheric deposition of mercury and lead.

For now, the bones we collected this winter will wait here in the bone shed. Two of the specimens catch my attention. One is what remained of a skull that belonged to an old cow moose. Wolves consumed most of the skull, leaving only the palate — the roof of a mammal’s mouth — and two rows of teeth. It is rare for wolves to consume so much of an adult moose’s skull. It’s an indication of how tough a time they had capturing food this winter.

The skull of another old cow moose shows severe periodontal disease. Rotting, fermenting twigs and needles are packed in a space between the roots of her teeth. I don’t imagine that a human could endure such a severe infection. Of all the moose we’ve ever collected, more than half have significant debilitation, like severe periodontal disease or arthritis.

The next two days will be a blur, and tonight is the last time until next year for the three of us to relax together. We stay up late to watch the “Mollie B Polka Party.”

Monday, March 5

Tomorrow’s forecast is dicey. If we can fly off the island, there will only be a small window of opportunity in the morning. We’ll break down base camp today – all manner of gear and equipment; boxes of canned goods to the root cellar; dry goods, dishes, pots and pans to the shed; seven weeks’ worth of long underwear and winter socks in boxes; decommission the sauna, the water hole and the red dragon.

The Winter Study generates quite a few statistics about the wolves and moose. One of the most important is the kill rate — how frequently wolves kill moose. Right now the Chippewa Harbor Pack’s kill rate stands at five moose killed, divided by the six wolves in that pack, divided by the 42 days that we’ve been able observing them. If we fly today, we might find another kill, but at least we can add a couple more days to the denominator.

No kill in the past few days. As soon as we land, with the sun setting, we strip the Flagship of her telemetry gear and survival equipment and decommission the pump used to refuel her.

George DesortFrom left, Don Glaser, pilot of the Flagship; Rolf Peterson; and John Vucetich, leaders of the wolf-moose project, on Isle Royale National Park’s Washington Harbor.

Tuesday, March 6

At 10:30 a.m., we take off from the ice on Isle Royale’s Washington Harbor for the last time this winter. A warm, moist south wind blurs the boundary between Lake Superior and the sky. Before long, the island has faded into the haze.

This winter we observed the wolves of Isle Royale National Park experience one of their toughest years ever — high mortality rates and low recruiting left relatively few wolves. The Middle Pack is gone. The Chippewa Harbor Pack may not have any females. The future of this population may well rest with the West-End Duo. They mated last week. If all goes well, within a day or two of April 26, the female will be nursing half a dozen pups, each a little larger than your fist.

Despite recent snowstorms, the moose haven’t experienced times this good in more than a decade. That is partly a result of declining wolf predation. Climate warming is adversely affecting many populations of moose living at the southern limit of their range. Isle Royale moose are one of the few moose populations that have been doing well in recent years. It’s important to observe the moose respond positively to reduced wolf predation. With climate warming, that response cannot be taken for granted.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll prepare an annual report summarizing and contextualizing what we learned this past year. Throughout the year, Rolf and I will write papers and visit universities, high schools, local communities and government agencies to share what the wolves and moose have taught us and what our observations mean.

John VucetichThe Chippewa Harbor Pack heads into the forest.

The first lesson draws our attention away from “What does it all mean?” The more important question is, “From where does the meaning come?” The meaning comes from caring, and caring can be ignited by the simple act of paying attention. Pay attention to another creature from one day to the next, but understanding those observations may well require the context of observing from one year to the next, one generation to the next. Scientists can do this in a special way — enlivened with theories and equations.

But the essential lesson of Isle Royale wolves and moose is for all of us. Meaning comes from paying attention to the life that surrounds us, life in all its varied forms.

We land in Duluth at noon, and drive for the rest of the afternoon around the western end of Lake Superior to Houghton, Mich. There we reunite with our sweeties. Every year it ends just the same. We leave in a hurry, and our lives change tremendously. Indoor plumbing and complete disregard for the weather are two of the biggest changes. But we’ll return to Isle Royale in just a couple of months to begin the summer field season, and then again next January for the 55th annual Winter Study. Don, our pilot, captures the spirit entirely with an old English proverb: “It’s a long road that has no turning.”

“Fortunate Wilderness” is a documentary illustrating wolf and moose behavior in Isle Royale National Park over a four-year span. It was filmed by George Desort and had its premiere in the summer of 2008.

 

Unprecedented number of sea otter deaths along California coast

After being brought back from the brink of extinction, the mammal is again in peril. The U.S. Geological Survey reported that 335 dead, sick or injured otters were found in 2011, a record high.

A sea otter basks in the sun in Moss Landing Harbor in Monterey Bay. The U.S. Geological Survey reported that 335 dead, sick or injured otters were found along the California coast in 2011, a record high. (Vern Fisher, Monterey County Herald / February 3, 2009)

By Dalina Castellanos, Los Angeles Times

February 26, 2012, 9:28 p.m.

After being brought back from the brink of extinction, sea otters are again in peril, with an unprecedented number of deaths along the California coast in the last year.

The U.S. Geological Survey reported that 335 dead, sick or injured otters were found in 2011, a record high.

"We're starting to see a perplexing trend suggesting increased shark attacks on sea otters," said Tim Tinker of the USGS' Western Ecological Research Center.

Shark bites accounted for 15% of otter deaths in the late 1990s, but that percentage nearly doubled in 2010 and 2011, Tinker said.

Sharks have long received some of the blame for the otter's mortality rate, but the population has also been thinned by infectious diseases, boat strikes and gunshot wounds, among other factors.

"If these stressors remain high and shark mortality remains high, then there is no chance" for the population to regenerate, Tinker said.

Sharks seem to favor breeding-age female otters, he said, which could deliver more of a blow to the sea mammals' numbers.

The last official population reported for the sea otter was 2,711, only 379 short of the threshold that would begin consideration for it being removed from the federal endangered species list.

 

February 23, 2012, 7:59 AM

A Luscious Meal for Moose

By JOHN VUCETICH

John VucetichLush growth of a balsam fir tree, untouched by moose teeth.

John Vucetich, a wildlife ecologist from Michigan Technological University, leads the wolf-moose Winter Study at Isle Royale National Park.

Thursday, Feb. 9

We check the wind hourly: 31 miles per hour at 8 a.m., 36 m.p.h. at 9 a.m., 33 m.p.h. at 10 a.m., 32, 33, 34, 37, 38 m.p.h. throughout the afternoon. As we wait, we manufacture meteorological explanations for why we should expect the wind to let up. It seems like it is shifting directions, we say; the barometer seems to be stabilizing, we say. We stare at the treetops and lie to ourselves about how the wind seems to be letting up. The wind continues at 31 m.p.h. as the sun sets. No flying today.

Friday, Feb. 10

Wind gusts exceed 30 m.p.h. each daylight hour.

Saturday, Feb. 11

The wind whips at 30 m.p.h. at 8 a.m. and builds throughout the day. At 10:24 p.m., the anemometer on Ojibway Tower records a 59-mile-an-hour gust. We fall asleep with the wind pounding in a fury against the cabin walls.

Sunday, Feb. 12

On Day 5 five of the windstorm, we have been given a task on the ground. We find the tracks of two wolves on the harbor near the cabin — the same pair of wolves we’d first seen scent-marking on the beach of Siskiwit Bay. They made the tracks while leaving the moose they killed a week ago at a site about a mile north of the harbor. We can hike in, perform a necropsy on the moose carcass and collect scats for the first time from these wolves.

 

John VucetichWolves making tracks through the winter landscape.

JOHN VUCETICH

Posts From Isle Royale

• Preparing to Live With Wolves
• In Winter Weather, Flying to Find Wolves
• Wolves, Snow and the Red Dragon
• A Wolf-Moose Standoff at Isle Royale
• One Moose, Two Moose
• Following the Wolf Pack
• Much to Learn From What Remains

On our hike in, Rolf Peterson and I marvel at the balsam fir trees. Many have grown 12 to 18 inches in the past few years. The apical meristems (the root and shoot tips where vertical growth occurs) of some now reach four feet or so above the forest floor.

Moose arrived on Isle Royale about 100 years ago. And fir trees that were just seedlings at that time here on the west end of Isle Royale (the story on the east side is completely different) were the last to grow tall into the canopy. Since that time, not a single fir tree has escaped the teeth of moose. Moose are paragons of patience, when you think of the thousands of bites they take each day of their lives, and the hundreds of hours a week they spend chewing their food.

But then you think of a fir tree. Every year of their lives, they spend all summer mustering all the energy and material they can from the air and soil to produce a little twig reaching a few inches higher toward the sky. And each winter, in a moment that is absolutely insignificant to a moose, that entire summer’s effort is ripped, chewed and digested, along with thousands of other twigs. Fir trees endure, year after year. They witness the entire lifetime of a moose, and her son and his daughter. A fir tree can endure the browsing of three or four generations of moose and never grow more than a yard. But they don’t die, either. They just keep producing those twigs, waiting and hoping — hoping not in the way that you and I understand, but hoping in the only way that a fir tree can — that it can escape being browsed not for a single year, but for the 10 to 15 years it might take to come out of its stupor and grow into the forest canopy, out of reach of the teeth of moose.

John VucetichTo check for arthritis, Rolf extracts the pelvis from frozen carcass of a moose.

And that is what we saw today on our hike in to perform a necropsy: something that hasn’t happened in a century. The fir trees are rising from their moose-induced stupor. And wolves get most of the credit — they have played a dominant role in bringing moose to levels low enough for long enough.

The carcass is an old cow moose. The bone marrow was full of white, flaky fat, a little like vegetable shortening. She had been well nourished. But her worn teeth betrayed her old age, and her hips showed signs of arthritis.

We search for wolf scats with the enthusiasm of children on an Easter egg hunt. We find 11. I pick one up and wonder if its DNA has a Y chromosome, which only males carry, or the two X chromosomes that all females carry.

I think the wind storm will end tonight.

 

Groundhog Cacciatore

Recipes

Happy Groundhog Day! Here's All You Need to Know About Cooking the Critter (With a Recipe!)

By Lauren Shockey Thu., Feb. 2 2012 at 8:00 AM

Categories: Recipes, Shockey

 

La Belle Province / Flickr

Hello, spring? More like hello, dinner.

​Happy Groundhog Day! Not only is today the day that inspired Bill Murray's second greatest film ever, it's the day we get to find out whether we're going to have six more weeks of winter or if it'll be an early spring. But the little furry groundhog is more than just a glorified weatherman. He makes for a mighty fine dinner! "The meat takes very well to a braise and is similar to rabbit, but it's dark meat instead of light meat," explains Ian Knauer, a former food editor at Gourmet and author of the forthcoming cookbook, The Farm: Rustic Recipes for a Year of Incredible Food.

 

"It is not at all gamey, but is distinct. It has subtle flavors of onion and grass. I treat it just like rabbit -- brown, then braise. I've made pulled groundhog sliders, hasenpfeffer, cacciatore, cider-braised -- and anyone who is brave enough to try it, is always pleasantly surprised," he says.

Knauer notes that it is very important to remove the greyish-colored glands that are under the front legs as they impart a super-strong flavor that affects the entire dish. He also suggests saving the liver, which makes for a tasty pate. "When I was at Gourmet, I brought in a groundhog liver pate and everyone was amazed, including Ruth [Reichl], who wrote about it in the forward to my cookbook."

Here's Ian's go-to recipe, featured in The Farm, for cooking groundhogs. For more tasty recipes of country living, though, you'll have to wait until the book comes out on April 17.

Groundhog Cacciatore

You can never really understand bloodlust until you start growing your own vegetables. You carefully select your seeds and watch them pop up out of the earth, reaching for the sky. You pull weeds, a lot of weeds, with the idea to give your plants a fighting chance. You hope and plan and dream about dinners to come. And then, one day, you walk to the garden and there's nothing there. All the lettuce...is...gone. So are the cauliflower and all the soybeans. Gone. This could only be the work of one evil varmint: a groundhog! If you're me, this is the point when you load the rifle and carefully peer in the direction of the garden with the hopes of finding him red handed in the sweet pea patch. But after the groundhogs are dead, I always feel a little bad. As it turns out, there's no need to, because groundhogs (like their rabbit cousins) are delicious! I naturally put their meaty little carcasses to use in my take on cacciatore, the tomato-based Italian hunters' stew. But if you're squeamish, this recipe works just as well with chicken or rabbit.

Serves 6

1 groundhog, quartered
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 cup dry white wine
2 lb tomatoes, chopped, or 1 (28 oz) can whole tomatoes in juice
3 tablespoons chopped brined capers
2 strips fresh orange zest
2 anchovy filets
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
Kosher salt and black pepper

Remove the glands from the front legs. Pat the groundhog dry and season with 1 teaspoon kosher salt and ¾ teaspoon pepper. Heat the oil in a large heavy pot over medium high heat until it shimmers. Brown the meat well on both sides, in batches if necessary. This will take about 6 minutes per batch. Transfer it to a plate.

Add the onion, carrots, and garlic to the pot and cook until the vegetables are browned, this will take 8 to 10 minutes. Add the wine and boil until the liquid is reduced by half.

Stir in the tomatoes, capers, zest, anchovies, and bay leaf, then nestle the meat into the sauce. Simmer, covered, until the meat is tender. This will take 1½ to 2 hours.

When meat is tender, remove it from the pot, leaving sauce in the pot. Simmer the sauce until it is slightly thickened. This will take about 10 minutes. Stir in the butter. Season the sauce with salt and pepper to taste, then return the meat to the pot.

 

Life writ large in the vastness

January 24, 2012, 6:11 PM

In Winter Weather, Flying to Find Wolves

By JOHN VUCETICH

John VucetichApproaching Isle Royale in winter snow and fog.

John Vucetich, a wildlife ecologist from Michigan Technological University, leads the wolf-moose Winter Study at Isle Royale National Park.

Friday, Jan. 20

“Dispatch, Beaver 1, departing Shagawa Lake, eastbound for Washington Harbor, Isle Royale, two aboard, four hours fuel,” said Pat Lowe, a United States Forest Service pilot. We were supposed to fly to Isle Royale on Jan. 17, but for three days, low clouds, snow and then high winds kept us waiting impatiently on the shore in Ely, Minn. It was clear, calm and cold (minus 18 degrees Fahrenheit) this morning as Pat and I lifted off from Shagawa. Rolf Peterson, a co-researcher, and Don Glazer, our Winter Study pilot, were 30 minutes ahead in the Flagship, our tiny research plane. In an hour we landed on Lake Superior ice.

The island was loosely veiled by low gray clouds — a collaboration of the west wind and moist lake air. Waves lapped on ice-covered rocks that separate Lake Superior from the forest. That forest has insights to share, if we pay attention.

 

JOHN VUCETICH

Posts From Isle Royale

• Preparing to Live With Wolves

The Forest Service plane dropped our gear on the ice and took off. It’s been six months since I was last here, and it is good to be back. It is comfortable and familiar — the feeling of being alive that only minus 5 degrees Fahrenheit can bring, the feeling of openness that comes from standing on several square miles of frozen ice, and the feeling of content from being among so many spruce and cedar trees. Wilderness is not just part of the world in which we live — it is a part of us.

There is a great deal to do. Knock holes in the ice for water. Secure the Flagship to the ice. Bring a snowmobile and several generators to life. Fire up the communications systems. Make sure the refueling system is working. Start a fire in the cabin. Haul gear from the harbor up to the cabin. The chores will keep us busy all night and into the morning. We can’t begin to make observations until we’ve prepared at least some of the essential gear.

John VucetichUnloading supplies on the ice of Washington Harbor at Isle Royale.

Saturday, Jan. 21

We worked diligently because the weather was deteriorating, and we wanted to get a flight in before the snow clouds we could see building began to unload their contents. By noon we were ready to fly.

Where do you begin when you don’t know what you may find, when you know you won’t have much time and when you need to keep an eye on the weather? We began with the south shore, where wolves spend a great deal of time looking for moose. In the flat light filtering through thick clouds, we strained to spot wolf tracks. Finally we saw the tracks of a lone wolf at Long Point. Several miles to the northeast, they hooked up with tracks of what seemed to be three wolves that had spent the night on a rocky crag near Atwood beach. They didn’t look particularly fresh, so we left seeking better prospects. At Senter point we found more tracks, most likely from the same group of wolves.

We flew northeast, listening through headsets for telemetry signals from the radio-collared wolves and staring out the cockpit window for wolf tracks that might cut across any creek, drainage or inland lake. An hour passed without another clue. Plenty of time to wonder: Are three wolves all that remain here in what had been Middle Pack (MP) territory? If they are MP wolves, none of them is collared. It could take days to find them.

Then comes a beep, and another and another. Within a few minutes we were circling over the alpha male of Chippewa Harbor Pack (CHP). He is traveling southwest through a swamp near Lane Cove with four other wolves.

John VucetichWolves of Chippewa Harbor Pack following their alpha male.

Last year CHP had nine wolves. One of them, Romeo, was not among them today. He’d tried to disperse from his natal pack during the winter of 2010, but returned home without success and spend the winter of 2011 with CHP. Had he now taken control of territory that once belonged to Middle Pack? Or was he just temporarily away from CHP? Even though Romeo wears a radio collar, we were unable to find him before having to land as falling snow began to blanket the forests.

Sunday, Jan. 23

Big, wet, heavy snowflakes let us sleep in. We won’t be able to fly again until the snow clears.

 

How I like to be wooed myself

OBSERVATORY

Design and Illusion, to Impress the Ladies

By SINDYA N. BHANOO

Published: January 23, 2012

Great bowerbirds, which live in Australia, get their name from the elaborate grass structures, or bowers, that the males build to woo prospective mates.

The bowers are impressive, featuring a long avenue of bones and stones — called a gesso — for females to inspect. But now scientists are reporting an even more impressive feature: The gesso includes a sort of optical illusion to make it appealing to females.

The males place smaller objects closer, and the larger ones farther away, creating the illusion that all the objects are similar in size, and that the gesso is smaller than it actually is. The better the illusion, the greater the male’s reproductive success.

“It’s the female’s view” that is most important, said John Endler, an evolutionary ecologist at Deakin and James Cook Universities in Australia, who was involved in the research. He and a Deakin colleague, Laura Kelley, report their findings in the current issue of the journal Science.

In a previous study, in which the scientists inverted the display, the birds restored it within three days, a sign of that the small-to-large configuration is critical. Females enter the grass structure and observe the gesso, while the male presents the female with various colored objects, usually fruits. She is able to see only the male’s head, and makes her decision based on presentation.

If she sticks around long enough, the male takes it as a positive sign and goes out to mate with her. A female might visit several males before deciding.

In a way, Dr. Endler said, the gesso display could be called artistry.

The illusion “is evidence that bowerbirds are actually creating art,” Dr. Endler said. “It can be regarded in an aesthetic sense because judgments are made.”

 

January 1, 2012, 10:01 AM

A Boom Year for Illicit Elephant Ivory

By BETTINA WASSENER

If you think you had a bad year, spare a thought for Africa’s elephants. They are being killed in ever greater numbers for their ivory, which is smuggled these days mostly to Asia. Rising wealth has led to a boom in demand there in recent years.

ReutersKenyan officers inspecting tusks seized at a warehouse in Mombasa in late December.

The 13 largest hauls of ivory intercepted by customs officials around the world in 2011 weighed in at a combined 23 tons, probably taken from more than 2,500 slain elephants, according to Traffic, an international organization that monitors wildlife trade.

2011 “has truly been a horrible year for elephants,” Tom Milliken, Traffic’s elephant expert, said in a press release detailing the organization’s preliminary findings for the year.

Once the records of hundreds of smaller ivory seizures are included, 2011 could well prove to be the worst year for elephants in a database of ivory seizures going back 23 years, Traffic said.

As I report at greater length here, much the same can be said in regard to some other rare and endangered animal and plant species.

Despite efforts by enforcement agencies and campaigners, that overall demand shows no sign of abating. Smuggling rare creatures for use as pets, food, decoration or their (often disputed) medicinal benefits is a profitable business.

Mr. Milliken said that most of the illegal shipments of African elephant ivory end up in China or Thailand.

The rise in the ivory trade reflects the growing sophistication of the gangs behind the trafficking, he said. Given that most large-scale ivory seizures fail to result in any arrests, he added, “I fear the criminals are winning.”

 

Mummies in Antartica

December 19, 2011, 12:12 pm Awakening Streams and Mummified Seals

By ALIA KHAN

Alia KhanA mummified seal on a hike between Lake Bonney and Lake Hoare in the Taylor Valley.

Alia Khan, a graduate student at the University of Colorado, Boulder, writes from the McMurdo Dry Valleys in Antarctica, where she is studying ephemeral glacier fed streams.

Thursday, Dec. 15

Early in the season, the streams are fickle. We arrived in the field on Oct. 22 and were greeted by cold temperatures and no flow the first five weeks we were in the field. While there was still plenty of prep work, like retrofitting stream controls and switching out data-logging systems from the end of last season, we eagerly awaited the arrival of flowing water.

Chris DeanThree Stream Team members, Chris Jaros, Tyler Kohler, and Alia Khan, in a stream gauge box at the lower Onyx River. The boxes also double as an emergency shelter in severe weather.

The hydrological cycle in the McMurdo Dry Valleys is a unique system. The streambeds are covered with a layer of permafrost, there is less than 4 inches of water equivalent precipitation per year, and there are no groundwater contributions. Like most hydrological cycles, climate is a large driver; however, unlike many other locations, surface energy budgets play a larger role than precipitation. The source waters for the streams in this polar desert almost entirely come from glacial melt. Runoff from the glaciers is largely based on glacial elevation, solar radiation exposure, air temperature and winds. High winds, like katabatic events, can blow increased sediment loads onto the glaciers, which absorb more radiation because of their dark color, decreasing surface albedo and increasing rates of meltwater generation.

As the midnight sun came out, the 24 hours of daylight increased radiation on the glacier surfaces and raised average daily temperatures above freezing, two important factors in meltwater generation and the start of seasonal streamflow. The first sight of sparkling flowing water on Canada Stream, glistening under the sun on Nov. 29, filled me with excitement as I knew the flow season had begun. Canada is the first stream to flow each season because of the aspect of the glacier which enables it to receive more solar radiation compared with others in the valley. It is also at a lower elevation and has a short stream length. Since then, we had one week of warmer temperatures in which about 10 other streams started flowing. However, on any given day, just a few hours of below-freezing temperatures or cloudy skies can be enough to cause the streams freeze up and cease flowing.

Alia KhanThe F6 Hut, named after the stream gauge next to it. It is the 6th of 10 stream gauges in the Fryxell basin.

Alia Khan

Posts From Antarctica

• Extreme Ecology in a Polar Desert
• Camp Life in the Dry Valleys

A typical field day consists of visiting three to five streams. After having breakfast and morning coffee, we prepare our gear for the day. This includes items like a pygmy meter for measuring stream discharge, waders, water sample bottles, snacks and a field note kit. We split the heavy gear among team members as we often hike up to 5 miles to stream sites. After hiking, driving by all-terrain vehicle or flying to the sites, we measure the discharge and take water samples for chemical analysis. The water samples are filtered at the hut after returning to camp that day, stored in a refrigerator and then sent to McMurdo for analysis.

Alia KhanEmily Bernzott takes water chemistry samples on Bowles stream, a stream with abundant algal mats.

Lee StanishA light microscope image of live Antarctic algae. Despite the harsh conditions, stream microbial mats harbor a diversity of organisms.

Biological analyses of algal mats are also a focus of the streams. Diatoms, cyanobacteria and green algae are the abundant microbes. Diatoms are unicellular algae that can be found all over the world in a variety of environments. Existence of microbial life in the Dry Valleys is especially interesting because of the oligotrophic (low nutrient) and harsh environment. Despite extreme conditions, diverse communities exist in this polar desert.

The peak flow time for the streams here is late December to early January. There is still no telling if it will be a high or low flow season, but both can have significant impacts on the connectivity of the ecological systems in the Dry Valleys. High flows can scour algal mats, decreasing microbial activity, whereas under low-flow conditions, some streams may not flow at all, prohibiting nutrient transport to algal mats along the streambed. Since the streams are also the primary transport mechanisms of nutrients to the lakes, high- and low-flow seasons can also have significant impacts on their biogeochemistry.

One of my favorite gauge sites is on the Onyx River, the longest river in Antarctica. It is in the Wright Valley, one valley north of Taylor Valley, where we spend a majority of our season. Since we can’t see this river from our home base, our eyes and ears are often the helicopter pilots who frequently fly over the streams and inform us if they have begun flowing. A task this year is also to implement telemetric systems that will allow us to monitor flow remotely.

Alia KhanA helicopter sling carrying empty barrels for urine and graywater.

Alia KhanMummified seal on Lake Fryxell.

There are no polar bears in Antarctica, but penguins and seals are plentiful on and near the sea ice. In the Dry Valleys, it is extremely rare to encounter a live animal, but there are a surprising large number of mummified penguins and seals. Miles away from the ocean, it is hard to think what could inspire a marine mammal to journey into the Dry Valleys. The jagged rocks, rough sediments and lack of running water and prey are an unfortunate and sure death for the animals. My adviser, Diane McKnight, has an interesting story about a live seal she came across in the Dry Valleys. This was the first documented live encounter with a seal here; it was relocated to the sea ice and a stream in the Fryxell basin is now called “Lost Seal.”

Rats

Observatory

Rats to the Rescue

By SINDYA N. BHANOO

Published: December 9, 2011

In the Chinese zodiac, rats are considered witty, imaginative and curious. Now scientists have discovered another attribute.

A new study in the journal Science has found that rats can be helpful — the first instance that such behavior has been documented in rodents.

The researchers placed a free-roaming rat in an arena with a caged rat. Over the course of several days, the free rats realized they could nudge open a door and release the caged rat.

After figuring this out, they did so repeatedly, day after day.

“They then did what we refer to as a celebration,” said an author of the study, Peggy Mason, a neuroscientist at the University of Chicago. “The trapped rat runs around the arena, and the free rat appears excited and runs after the trapped rat.”

That behavior alone is not enough to show that rats are empathetic, she said. The rats could be releasing their caged cohorts simply for companionship.

So the researchers changed the setup: when the free rat released the caged rat, the caged rat went into a second arena, and the two were unable to interact.

Still, the free rats released the caged rats, day after day.

Then the researchers placed a free rat in an arena with a caged rat and locked-away chocolate.

The free rats were just as likely to free the caged rat as they were to liberate the chocolate and eat it. Moreover, when they got the chocolate they almost always shared it; on average, they would leave about one and a half out of five pieces for the caged rats, Dr. Mason said.

There was also a difference in the behavior of male rats and female rats.

“The females, once they open the door, they open the door every day, and within a few minutes,” Dr. Mason said. “But the male rats would occasionally take off a day.”

Tragedy of Horns and Ivory

November 21, 2011, 6:27 pm

After Rhino Horn Seizure, Conservationists Seek Enforcement

By RACHEL NUWER

Hong Kong Customs and ExciseSeized rhino horns and ivory products in Hong Kong.

Authorities at the Hong Kong International Airport made a record seizure of illegal rhino horns last week, estimated to be worth about $2.2 million, officials said.

Customs agents confiscated 33 rhino horns, 758 ivory chopsticks, and 127 ivory bracelets concealed inside a shipping container from Cape Town, South Africa. The concealed animal parts were labeled as “scrap plastic,” an increasingly common trick for smuggling horns and ivory out of Africa and into Asia.

Tom Milliken, a program coordinator at Traffic, a wildlife trade monitoring network, said the rhino horns were likely bound for Guangzhou, China, where the largest waste processing industry in the world is located. “Unfortunately, Guangzhou also has a very large ivory carving industry,” he said.

In this case, airport scanners revealed the presence of hidden rhino horn and elephant ivory, but conservationists have no way of telling how many illegal goods slip under the radar. “We don’t really understand exactly how much ivory goes undetected,” Mr. Milliken said, but added that new seizures in Africa and Asia are made every week.

Since July, customs officials in Malaysia made three major seizures, uncovering thousands of elephant tusks.

According to Traffic, rhino and elephant poaching has reached epidemic levels in Africa: 366 South African rhinos were poached in 2011, compared to 13 in 2007. “There’s been an uninterrupted upsurge in illicit trade in ivory and rhino horns,” Mr. Milliken said.

In October, Vietnam’s Javan rhino was declared extinct in the country, and in November, East Africa’s Western Black Rhino was declared extinct in the wild.

Elephant ivory is often sought for Chinese sculptures, name seals and jewelry. For rhinos, killings have escalated because of rising demand in Vietnam, where the horns are used by practitioners of traditional medicine, despite no evidence of any health benefits. Conservationists at Traffic are concerned that last week’s seized shipment was destined for China, and not Vietnam, indicating that the Chinese market for rhino horn may also be on the rise.

“Before, we’d been looking at Vietnam as the epicenter of rhino horn consumption,” Mr. Milliken said, “but this is a surefire indication that Chinese consumer dynamics are kicking in as well.”

Scientists at the University of Pretoria in South Africa hope to compare DNA samples from the rhino horns to records in their African rhino database to identify the poached rhinos. This would help to pinpoint the location of the crimes and could help to narrow an investigation into the poachers’ identity.

Mr. Milliken says arrests and convictions for illegal wildlife trade crimes don’t occur frequently because of a number of challenges, including misinformed or corrupt officials and a lack of collaboration between supply countries, like South Africa and Tanzania, and demand countries, like China and Vietnam.

Conservationists at Traffic say they view the seizure as a way to enforce more smuggling crimes and protect rhinos from the ongoing poaching crisis.

“This is not an unlimited supply,” Mr. Milliken said. “These are finite resources that, in many cases like with rhinos now, are down to the brink of extinction