Kenya rounds up zebras for starving lions

Nairobi, Kenya (CNN) -- Kenyan wildlife officials are ferrying thousands of zebras and wildebeest to a park in the country's south to feed starving lions and hyenas, and prevent a conflict with humans.

The animals will be hauled from four locations to restock Amboseli National Park's population, which lost 80 percent of its herbivores in a recent drought, said Kentice Tikolo, spokeswoman for the Kenya Wildlife Service.

"It was the worst drought in 26 years," Tikolo said. "The Amboseli ecosystem was severely affected. ... Lots of herbivores died, carnivores don't have anything to feed on, and have been attacking neighboring livestock."

The imbalance has sparked a row with villagers who lost animals in the drought and have threatened to kill lions and hyenas preying on remaining livestock.

Should the zebras be brought in to help the lions?

"There are only 2,000 lions left nationwide, and we are concerned because the numbers are dropping," the spokeswoman said.

"Maasais are getting angry and threatening to spear them -- the human versus wildlife conflict is getting out of hand -- and our carnivores are already greatly endangered."

About 4,000 zebras and 3,000 wildebeest will be transferred to Amboseli. The zebras will go first. The wildebeest will follow, after calving season, Tikolo said. Once at Amboseli, they're expected to breed and sustain the lions over the long term.

Shipping the animals from Soysambu Conservancy in the Rift Valley and three other nearby locations will cost about $ 1.4 million, according to Tikolo.

The animals are herded into a funnel-shape enclosure using helicopters and loaded into trucks to Amboseli. From there, they are released into the wild, she said.

Tourism is the second-largest source of foreign exchange in the east African nation. About 20 percent of the income comes from tourism, with Amboseli as the second -highest earner, Tikolo said

Lions are among the big five -- the list of top wildlife tourist attractions in the nation. Others are elephants, leopards, rhinos and buffalo.

Source :http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/africa/02/11/lions.kenya/index.html

Brand new American Chopper for you Motorcycle Fans

If you're a fan of motorbikes, you've probably seen our new American Chopper website by now. But if the website launch (just in time for the new series) has passed you by, you might want to check out our new exclusive content!

Watch American Chopper video clips and be sure to take a look at the exclusive Top 10 Fights, a collection of the Teutuls' most heated exchanges!

Catch up on shows you might have missed with the episode guide, and go grab your very own piece of American Chopper in the free downloads section.

Plus, you can have your say on the show in the new American Chopper forum.

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Florida panthers getting mauled by cars

Florida panthers (Puma concolor coryi) and cars do not get along so well. Last year, cars struck and killed a record number of the federally endangered cats. Wildlife officials confirmed the sixteenth Florida panther death for 2009 on December 30th. The previous year only ten were struck and killed by cars, and the previous record was set in 2007 with 15 killed. With only a hundred in the wild, every single individual matters.

In a press release, Florida director for Defenders of Wildlife, Laurie Macdonald, said “Unless we take actions to avoid such tragic losses to Florida’s native wildlife, records such as these will continue to be reached each year as more and more roads and developments are built. The toll that vehicle collisions are taking on the panther’s population is a serious obstacle to their recovery, and the roads and vehicles themselves are inhibiting the panther’s efforts to expand its range.”

Still, the Florida panthers have started on the path toward recovery. In 1987, only 20 to 30 Florida panthers remained in the wild. This smaller and geographically isolated subspecies of the broader ranging mountain lion (also known as cougar, puma, panther, or catamount) may already suffer from inbreeding. Over the past couple of decades, conservation biologists have implemented some very successful measures to help the tawny cats recover, including building wildlife crossings that allow the panthers to cross busy roads without encountering traffic, and directional fencing that guides panthers away from busy roads. These measures have been taken on some roads but obviously not all, including the stretch where the sixteenth Florida panther of 2009 was killed.

Source : http://blogs.discovery.com/animal_news/2010/02/florida-panthers-getting-mauled-by-cars.html

American pikas denied federal protection

American pika were denied protection under the Endangered Species Act/ Credit National Park Service

They were poised to become the first species endangered due to climate change in the lower 48 states, but … they didn't. The Center for Biological Diversity had petitioned the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) to consider each of the subspecies of American pika (Ochotona princeps) as either threatened or endangered under the Endangered Species Act (which I wrote about in June: pikas threatened on the mountaintops). But after reviewing the latest scientific information, FWS decided to deny protection for the pika, announcing their decision on Thursday, February 4th.

These cute rabbit relatives live primarily in and among alpine talus slopes (aka boulder fields) throughout the West, and research has shown that many populations have disappeared. Biologists recently failed to document pikas at many locales wher they lived in the 20th century.

A couple of years ago, I hiked up talus slopes in search of pikas in Glacier National Park with graduate student Lucas Moyer-Horner, who has studied pikas in the park for the past several years. I wrote about his research and the species' dilemma in “Silence of the Pikas” in the January issue of Bioscience. Despite the fact that many pikas live near the tiptops of mountains in cold and wind-swept regions, they are one of few species that do not hibernate in winter. Instead, they live off of haypiles they created during the summer months. Pikas live solitary lives, each defending its own territory. And they're highly sensitive to microclimate and can't tolerate increases in temperature within ther homes in the spaces between boulders, or interstices, during both warm months or cold snaps if there's not enough snow-pack to insulate their homes.

The FWS does not deny the importance of climate change for natural communities. When deciding to review the species, spokesperson Diane Katzenberger said, “The Service knows that climate change is real. It is the biggest conservation challenge of our time.” FWS used NOAA-led computer models to predict temperatures in typical pika habitat will likely rise 4.5 degrees Fahrenheit over the next century. Conservation groups, including the Center for Biological Diversity and Earthjustice were not happy with the decision to not list the pika. Some think that the decision is political, given that deciding to list the species due to the threat of global warming could have opened the floodgates to innumerable more petitions for species threatened by climate change.

Source: http://blogs.discovery.com/animal_news/2010/02/pikas-denied-federal-protection.html