December 28, 2007

Beaches Of Dead Fish Anger Tourists
Local6.com - www.local6.com
27 Dec 2007
Area: Florida United States

More Than 3,000 Fish Wash Up In Brevard County

Thousands of fish lie rotting along Brevard County's beaches, the latest victims of a red tide outbreak that has lingered over the Space Coast for months, angering tourists and residents who hoped to spend part of the holiday break beachside. At least 3,000 fish, primarily mullet, have been reported dead since Saturday along Cocoa Beach, according the St. Petersburg-based Fish and Wildlife Research Institute. Although main tourist areas, such as the Cocoa Beach Pier, have been cleared of the ocean bile, the smelly remnants of mullets can be found just a few blocks south, Local 6 News partner Florida Today reported. The pungent odor forced the Calac family of St. Louis to move farther south and use the beaches near Patrick Air Force Base.

Initially, they headed out to the water near Ron Jon Surf Shop, but said they couldn't stomach the smell. "The smell of the fish was just nasty," said 14-year-old Matt Calac, who was bodyboarding on Wednesday. "The dead fish came up to the middle of the beach, and we couldn't take it." According to the latest round of ocean water tests, collected on Dec. 21, Karenia brevis, the Florida red tide organism, was detected from Volusia to St. Lucie counties. Red tide on Brevard beaches ranged from "not present" to "medium concentrations."





Group tries to head off special deer hunt
Associated Press (Posted by news.postbulletin.com)
26 Dec 2007
Area: Minnesota United States

Several northwestern Minnesota landowners want to stop a special deer hunt scheduled to start Saturday in a 450-square-mile area near Skime. The 16-day hunt authorized by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources in Permit Area 101 aims to stop the spread of bovine tuberculosis among wild deer. Three deer out of 1,100 killed by hunters this fall tested positive for the disease, which has also infected cattle in the area. The landowners' attorney, Grant Merritt, said Wednesday he hopes to meet with Natural Resources Commissioner Mark Holsten on Friday and persuade him to call off the hunt.

If that fails, Merritt said, his clients could ask a court to stop the hunt. Merritt said fencing deer out of cattle feeding stations would be a better approach than killing them. He said his clients hunt deer themselves on more than 4,000 acres of land they own north of Lower Red Lake, and want to protect the herd from a second hunting season. They also oppose a plan to have sharpshooters kill more deer later.





Pacific Salmon Invading Atlantic, Threatening Penguins
National Geographic News - news.nationalgeographic.com
28 Dec 2007
J Owen
Area: Argentina

Ocean-swapping Pacific salmon are moving into Atlantic waters, scientists say.

The fish, native to the North Pacific, have started colonizing and breeding in rivers in southern Argentina, a new study shows (see map). Although the sight of salmon leaping in Argentina's world-renowned trout rivers may be enticing to anglers, the silvery predators could become a nightmare for the region's marine life. The invaders threaten to deprive penguins and sea mammals of food—an ever-increasing risk given the number of invasive salmon currently escaping from fish farms in neighboring Chile, researchers say. The warning stems from the first study to show salmon swimming from the Pacific to the South Atlantic, where salmon don't naturally occur.

. . . But the impact of these sea-feeding fish on the marine environment may prove severe, according to the latest research carried out by Pascual and his colleagues. A new study, yet to be published, found that 96 percent of the chinook salmon's diet in Patagonian seas is made up of sprats, small herring-like fish that are key prey for Magellanic penguins, a species classified as "near threatened" by the World Conservation Union. While the number of chinook salmon in the region isn't yet known, models indicate that a "medium-size population" could match the food consumption of the entire penguin population of southern Patagonia, Pascual said.






OTHER WILDLIFE DISEASE RELATED NEWS


WILDLIFE DISEASE RELATED PUBLICATIONS

Conflict and Emerging Infectious Diseases [free full-text available]
Emerging Infectious Diseases. 2007 Nov; 13(11): [Epub ahead of print]
M Gayer et al.

Detection of a North American lineage H5 avian influenza virus in a South African wild duck [online abstract only]
Onderstepoort J Vet Res. 2007 Jun;74(2):177-80
C Abolnik

The American Journal of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene
Vol. 78, No. 1
Table of Contents

at Friday, December 28, 2007

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