November 22, 2010

TOP STORIES

Monitoring the Health of Endangered, Wild Chimpanzees

Siv Aina Jensen Leendertz has studied wild chimpanzees living in the tropical rain forest in Ivory Coast at close quarters for a year, and her doctoral thesis describes the health monitoring of this endangered species.

Her thesis focuses on the risk of retroviral infection in these chimpanzees due to their hunting of monkeys.

Infectious diseases represent a growing threat to wild chimpanzees and other endangered species of apes. There is therefore a great need to monitor the health of these animals and to map sources of infection in their habitat.

Science Daily - www.sciencedaily.com
18 Nov 2010
Photo credit: S Metzger/Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology



Avian influenza (52): world update, FAO

. . . The Ministry of Environment announced that an H5N1 AI virus was found through the surveillance of wild duck dropping conducted by the Hokkaido University.

The virus was isolated from 2 of the 183 samples taken on 14 Oct 2010 at Lake Onuma, Wakkanai City (E141.7593, N45.3788, the centre of the lake not the sampling site).

Hokkaido Prefecture checked farm within 10 km/6.2 mi (1 farm) and no abnormality found. There is no death of wild birds found in the Onuma area.

ProMED - www.promedmail.org
18 Nov 2010
Location: Lake Onuma, Wakkanai City, Japan - Map It



Reported Wildlife Mortality Events to the USGS National Wildlife Health Center Updated

USGS and a network of partners across the country work on documenting wildlife mortality events in order to provide timely and accurate information on locations, species and causes of death. This information was updated on November 19, 2010 on the USGS National Wildlife Health Center web page, New and Ongoing Wildlife Mortality Events Nationwide. Quarterly Mortality Reports are also available from this page. These reports go back to 1995.

USGS National Wildlife Health Center
19 Nov 2010
Area: United States




Beached Dolphins Are Often Deaf

In a fascinating study published on November 3 in the journal PLoS One, researchers looking into the cause of dolphin strandings found that in some species, many of these stranded creatures are nearly deaf.

That finding, which scientists gained from a study of the brain activity of the dolphins, could explain why such intelligent animals do something that appears pretty stupid: land themselves on a beach.

Unable to use sound to find food or family members, these dolphins are often weak and disorientated.

Care2 - www.care2.com
J Molland
16 Nov 2010
Photo courtesy of Care2


Journal Article Cited


OTHER WILDLIFE HEALTH RELATED NEWS
Rabies
Tiger News
Huh, That's Interesting!
Photo credit: M Nyfeler/Barcroft Media