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A team of biologists has made the first observations on one of the world's least known species of whale: the Omura's whale. For a long time, these whales were commonly mistaken for the Bryde's whale, for both are small, tropical, baleen whales. The Omura's, however, are smaller than the Bryde's whales, and have distinguishing markings. The Omura's whale was finally distinguished as its own species in 2003 when analysis was conducted on genetic data from beached whales. Prior to now, there had been no confirmed sightings of Omura's whales in the wild. Omura's whale tend to dwell in remote regions and are usually between 33-38 feet. Scientists know so little about the whale that they are not able to of how many of the species there actually is. The whales were observed off of the coast of Madagascar. Researchers are studying the vocalization patterns of the whales as well as the whales' habitat preferences. The team hopes to produce the first estimate for the size of a population of Omura's whale. This issue is of particular importance because it is important to know about the different species of organisms that are found in the world. Knowing the intricacies of each species will allow us to better understand the role of each species in the grand scheme of their particular ecosystem. Such a species may play a crucial part of a food web. For these whales, their ability to remain hidden for so long simply calls for curiosity. Figuring out more about Omura's whales may help us to calculate our impact on them, which was already made apparent by the fact that some of them have been caught during whaling expeditions. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151022141744.htm
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Sea turtles lay their eggs in burrows along the coast, and the burrows are left unattended and without parental care. The incubation time varies with environmental conditions. Drought, heavy rainfalls, and climate changes are influencing the incubation and sex ratios of loggerhead sea turtles. Sea turtles do not have an X or Y chromosome, so what determines the sex of the hatchlings is the temperature during incubation. Warmer incubation environments produce females, while cooler incubation periods produce males. Loggerhead turtles already have trouble reproducing and repopulating, as only 1 in about 2,500 to 7,000 turtles reaches adulthood. With climate change increasing the ratio of males to females in a species in where the females already outnumber the males, it is going to become increasingly difficult for sea turtles to reproduce. This issue is particularly important because it can lead to the demise of the sea turtle. With warmer temperatures, the sea turtles will not have enough males to repopulate their species. And with only a select few of males actually surviving, there will be a lack of genetic diversity in the sea turtle offspring. The loss of genetic diversity within the loggerhead turtle population will mean that they are especially susceptible to factors that may reduce their population size. The extinction of the loggerhead sea turtle would only contribute to the mass extinction that is currently underway. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151015111047.htm http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151006085230.htm There are predators in the world, such as killer whales, that can move from their main food source to another when the particularly favorite food is in short supply. Though this may help these predators in the long run, moving to other foods can be detrimental to ecosystems. For example, the killer whale's main source of food was newborn whale calves, but when the supply was running low, the killer whales moved on to hunting seals instead. After when the seal supply in turn began to decrease, the killer whales turned to sea otters as a new food source. Through the hunting of sea otters, whales were able to indirectly increase the amount of sea urchins, since they are the main food source of sea otters; with less sea otters comes more sea urchins. The sea urchins have now eaten the kelp beds that once were thriving with many different species. The new conclusion that the changing of food sources can lead to a cascade of extinction contradicts what was once thought before: that an extinction cascade would be avoided if the predator could find a new prey. This issue is of particular importance because now we are able to see the effects that we are having on the ecosystems that we are currently over-fishing. Some fisherman have resulted in harvesting in nature reserves when fish supply is low, which leads to the extinction of the species that were once in that specific nature reserve. Increases awareness is important in our role in altering ecosystems because then we may take action in trying to reduce our effect on ecosystems that are delicately arranged in food webs. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151006085230.htm
After five years of studying and research, scientists have found that glaciers in warmer Patagonia move faster than those in Antarctica. Patagonia is a region in at the southern end of South America that contains the Andes mountains and the deserts and grasslands to the east of the Andes. The glaciers in Patagonia cause more erosion because they move faster, a process that is only made possible by the melting ice helping to lubricate the glaciers. Glaciers erode 100 to 1,000 times faster in Patagonia than in Antarctica. The depositing of sediments due to this erosion may impact fisheries, dams, and freshwater in mountain areas. Depositing more sediments around the polar regions will decrease the biodiversity there as organisms there are not accustomed to the high level of minerals that would be brought about. These findings have helped to confirm that glaciers do more erosive damage during the end of each cycle of glaciation rather than when ice cover is greatest.
This topic is of particular importance because melting glaciers can permanently alter the shape of the planet, and in doing so, can decrease the biodiversity of polar regions. Sediments being deposited by the moving glaciers have the potential to impact fisheries, an industry that is already facing major crises. This recent finding should encourage us to reduce our impact on global warming even more so, since melting glaciers are not only warming the ocean and causing more extreme weather, but are also changing the shape of the earth as we know it.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/10/151001142222.htm
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AuthorI'm Angel Archives
April 2016
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