Pigeons

So, wow its been a while, but tests are done and papers are turned in  (for now), so I have time to a bit of research and bring you guys a new post. Though, now I am wishing I had not picked such a huge topic.

Pigeons are one of the biggest pests of urban environments.They seem to thrive in cities, going after people's wasted or dropped food, and are looked down upon as disease ridden, and disgusting. But they haven't always been seen that way. In fact pigeons used to be part of high society.

Our interactions with pigeons go back a loooooooong time. Mesopotamians had domesticated the pigeon at least 5,000 years ago, and pretty much every western civilization since then has realized just how awesome these birds are and used them for art, sport, food or even war.

A note here: This is not be going  to be on the morphology, physiology, taxonomy or evolutionary history of the pigeon. Rest assured that such a post will come later as they are freaking crazy and and can sense magnetic fields and are related to the Dodo and can play ping-pong and... but I digress. This is going about to focus mainly on the long and interconnected relationship that pigeons have had with humans.

If you have ever been to a church any where, ever, you have probably seen a picture of a beautiful white dove carrying an olive branch back to Noah, informing him that there was land and that God's flood was over. The dove is now a symbol of peace, and "offering and olive branch" means offering peace. But what you may not realize is that that Noah's dove, was a pigeon.

In fact the terms "dove" and "pigeon" can refer to the same animal, and are often used interchangeably, although the term "white pigeon of peace" admittedly does not have the same ring to it.

Pigeons themselves have not only been important, but so has their poop. Yes, the white droppings that carpet city streets and the occasional car, would have made you quite wealthy in ancient Egypt. The pigeon feces were a manure so desired that they were considered semi-precious to Egyptians. Even in 16th England, the manure was so prized that pigeon poop was considered the property of the royal crown.

But the English's need for pigeon poop went beyond usual agricultural use. The feces were a major source of saltpeter, a main ingredient in gunpowder. Pigeon houses even had to have stationed guards to prevent pigeon, or pigeon poop, theft. Something to think about next time you find yourself shooing a pesky pigeon away.

The use of pigeons in warfare is not limited to gunpowder and, and goes much, much farther back in history. Pigeons have long been renowned for their ability to fly back to their nest, no matter where they are taken. The technique is not fully understood by scientists (though under constant investigation) but non-the-less was the basis of long distance communication from the 5th century until the creation of the telegraph. Used by Syrians, Romans, Egyptians, French, English, Germans, Americans, and pretty much every western, and many eastern nations, the pigeons not only functioned as a mail service but were unoveremphasizably important in warfare (unoveremphasizably being a word I just created).

Used to report things like troop movements and loses and defeats, pigeons saved hundreds of thousand of lives in WWI alone, and countless more in the wars before then. During WWII, British forces captured an Italian town much quicker than they had thought they would, a town that the Americans were 20 minutes away from bombing as an intended reinforcement to the British attack, but now would kill over a thousand British troops. With radio's down, the British sent a Pigeon, G. I. Joe, to the American base, stopping just before they took off. G. I. Joe is now considered a war hero.

Additionally, Paul Reuters created his world famous news agency with news carried by pigeons. So successful have pigeons been in long distance communication that the last 'Pigeon Post' was closed only in 2004, in India.

Their success as postmen (postbirds?) has been due, not only to their incredible homing ability, but also to their natural athletic ability. Pigeon racing might not be as well known as horse or dog racing, but it is much, much faster. In fact, pigeons usually fly at over 60 mph, and can regularly fly for over 500 miles a day without stopping. one has even been recorded flying for several hours at 110 mph.

And Pigeons are no small deal in the aesthetic department either. Picasso himself liked pigeons so much that he not only included them in his paintings, but even named his daughter Paloma, Spanish for pigeon. Many people admire these birds, not for their flying abilities or war prowess, but for how they look (so shallow). At least since the 19th century (I was unable to find a better estimate) Pigeon breeders have been creating pigeons of all kinds by choosing some traits over others which they find aesthetically pleasing, creating breeds like roller, tumblers, fantails, and a number of others. Like dog and cat shows, pigeon shows show off the best of the breeds and are highly competitive. This breeding and presentation of fancy pigeons has a surprisingly large and devoted following, including the Queen of England.

Even Charles Darwin, the father of Evolution and writer of the Origin of Species, was an avid pigeon lover and had many breeds. He saw that by choosing for certain traits, he could artificially alter his pigeons' appearances over time, an observation which influenced his discovery and description of evolution, a process which does this naturally,  although does not choose traits for their aesthetics.

And what other roles have pigeons played in history? Countless! In fact it seems as if the only time they have been reviled is in modern times. Their success in our cities may have made them into pests in our minds, but those pests have played a part in almost every facet of our history and I highly encourage you to read up on them on on your own, seeing as how I have only scratched the surface here.

Here are my sources:
http://andrewblechman.com/pigeons/cool_facts.html
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pigeonwatch/resources/cool-facts-about-pigeons
http://www.npausa.com/index.htm
http://animals.about.com/od/pigeons-doves/p/pigeons-doves.htm
http://www.deterapigeon.com/21-amazing-facts-about-pigeons.htm
http://www.radiolab.org/2011/jan/25/birds-eye-view/

The picture above was found at: http://www.pestremovalatlanta.com/critters/pigeon-control-atlanta-ga/

What's the Difference? Slugs and Snails

The Banana Slug. Go Santa Cruz!

Happy Friday the 13th!

So friend asked me a question about last weeks post: whats the difference between snails and slugs anyway?

Not only is this a great question, but it has inspired me to start a new series of posts called Whats the Difference, where I'll be addressing the differences (and similarities) between commonly mixed up animals and features. So if you've ever been confused about the difference between apes and monkeys, antlers and horns, whales and dolphins, or any one of the numerous other pairs that seem like basically the same thing. If you have a particular pair of things you want to know about, please let me know. Also, "What's the difference"is admittedly a weak name... so I'm taking suggestions!

Todays I'll cover the question that started this, what is the difference between snails and slugs?

Luckily this is a pretty easy distinction. Snails have shells, slugs don't.

Unimpressed? I am sorry to disappoint, but they are very similar in almost every other way. Both snails and slugs are molluscs, which meaning they belong to the phylum Mollusca along with all sorts of other cool critters like mussels, chitons and octopuses/ octopi (yes, both are correct).

But why would a slug ever give up it's shell? Well, there are the obvious disadvantages to the snail shell in terms of body's *ahem* orientation (see last post). But even more than that, slugs have found many ways around the disadvantages of lacking a shell without actually investing in making one. For one thing, slugs live only in humid climates, and even then only come out at night or when it's is especially wet out. Water is vital, and without a shell to protect them from some of that water loss, snails deal with it by choosing their environments carefully. Slugs also don't have to worry about collecting calcium. Calcium is one of the primary elements in building a snail shell, and for marine snails this is not a problem. Calcium is one of the many "salts" that make sea water salty, and if you are making a shell from calcium being surrounded by it makes your job considerably easier. But in a terrestrial environment calcium can be a lot harder to come by. Terrestrial slugs have tried to make the best of a bad situation and simply given up on calcium shells altogether.

However, there are marine slugs as well, meaning that finding calcium might not be the biggest driving factor behind shell loss. Many slugs have taken up burrowing in sediment in order to escape the heat of the day or to find food. As one might imagine, a large coiled shell is rather an inconvenience when burrowing, and it is much more convenient to go without.

Slugs are also not without their own forms of protection. Though they lack a shell, slugs depend greatly on the chemicals in their slime. Slugs are sticky, slimy, and taste terrible. Although different from the protection of a hard shell, the chemicals are never-the-less effective, as some slugs, like the banana slug (GO SLUGS!) have no major natural predators.

So this turned into a post about slugs more than about the difference between slugs and snails, but I think you get my point that there are really just a couple of major differences: Slugs don't have a shell, and a snail is ass-backwards.

Sources I trusted were surprisingly hard to find, but here are the ones I used:
http://www.andrewgray.com/essays/molluscs.htm
http://www.molluscs.at/gastropoda/index.html

The picture is my own

Snails Part 2

Well hello all, did you miss me?
I know that you must be chomping at the bit for more information on snails, and I am here to deliver. However, I should let you know that this is going to focus more on snails in general, rather than focus on the European garden snail from my last post.

While the notion of of a snail carrying it's home on it's back is often depicted as helpful or wise, popular culture seems to miss out on a very important drawback of the snail's shell. That is to say that a snail's butt it located right next to it's head. The drawbacks to such engineering are obvious. And though you might be thinking of a land snail right now, this system is seems especially ill designed for any marine or freshwater snails who live in habitats where everything can just sort of, float around...

Why then, you might ask, would such a creature ever evolve? Well as it turns out, pooping next to your head doesn't much matter if you aren't alive, and shells are especially good at keeping you alive. Evolution favored a shell that was small and compact, yet could be drawn over the entire body in case of emergency. The spiral shell of a snail achieved exactly that. It is small, yet because of it's stacked spiral loops, the snail is able to fit a surprising amount of body mass into it. This design, however, came with a side effect. The snails entire internal body was essentially rotated 180 degrees in a process known as torsion, putting it's anus in that unfortunate position. The exact reason for this torsion has been the topic of some debate by scientists. It was hypothesized that the rotation helped to place body parts so that they would be easier to draw into the shell when needed. This hypothesis, however, has recently been challenged by the "asymmetry hypothesis" which says that the current gastropod (that's snails and slugs) body plan developed from a single side of what was once a bilateral body.

Still, despite their drawbacks, the snails body obviously works. They have become so numerous that entire sates have taken action to try to stop them. Even if you don't seem them directly, the marks they leave on household plants, or national-bound crops, are obvious. Yet, they lack a jaw, or even teeth with which to chew, so how do they cause so much destruction?

Gastropods, and molluscs in general, have (as they so often do) developed a unique structure specifically for this purpose. Located just withing the mouth, the radula consists of rows of chitinous "teeth" (yes, I know I said they didn't have teeth. What I meant is that they don't have proper teeth made of calcium. Theirs are made of chitin). Pulled in and out of the mouth by the muscular odontophore , the radula is feeding organ for the snail. Its teeth can scratch, scrape and cut away at its food, allowing it to become the insatiable "pest" that it is today.

Lots of words that you don't recognize? Well, welcome to the world of Biology.
If you have any more questions about snails or suggestions for future posts please let me know in the comments.

Almost all the information in this post came from: Invertebrate Zoology: A Functional Evolutionary Approach by Edward E. Ruppert and Robert D. Barnes

Additional sources:

http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7427.html

Modern Insights on Gastropod Development: Reevaluation of the Evolution of a Novel Body Plan

Louise R. Page

Integrative and Comparative Biology , Vol. 46, No. 2 (Apr., 2006), pp. 134-143

Published by: Oxford University Press

Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3884787

Garden Snail

Anyone who has stepped outside during summer in California has no doubt seen the signs of the great success of the garden snail. Whether you see its slime trails, or its shells, the snail itself or just its squashed remains, it is clear that this scourge of gardeners everywhere is not going away anytime soon. However, it may surprise you to learn that this wasn't always the case, at least not until 1850.
The garden snail, Cornu aspersum (or Helix aspersa), is also known as the European garden snail for good reason. Originating in the Mediterranean region, the snail has since moved and thrived throughout the world with the help of Humans. Although sometimes transported by humans by accident, more often it was transported to different parts of the world to be eaten as a delicacy known as escargot. This was the case for California, as well as other parts of North America, and once the snails arrived here, they thrived.
If you are having trouble finding snails in your area, it because snails are mostly nocturnal, but do come out during the day sometimes, especially after a rainstorm. If you ever just really want to find cool snails and their slug cousins, you can find them hiding during the day in damp soils, usually beneath rocks. However, even if you don't see them around, they leave tell-tale signs of there presence in the form of destroyed greenery and slime trails. Snail's are well known for their mucus making abilities, and they should be! Although they don't make as much as some other animals (I'm looking at you hagfish) slime is vitally important to the snail's life style. When you only have one muscular foot to get you around, anything that can the make the ground a bit slicker and easier to move on is important, and the snail's slime does exactly that. Additionally, the slime makes them rather unappetizing and difficult to digest for most predators, the exception to this rule apparently being Europeans.
There was so much information on garden snails, and snails in general that I will be doing a snails part 2 post very soon. After all, we haven't even begun to talk about their shell torsion or their radula, or their simultaneous hermaphrodism! Confused? Don't worry, you wont be for long.

Sources:
http://entomology.ifas.ufl.edu/creatures/misc/gastro/brown_garden_snail.htm
http://www.arkive.org/garden-snail/helix-aspersa/#text=All
http://www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/research/projects/species-dictionary/species/cornu_aspersum.html
http://hypertextbook.com/facts/AngieYee.shtml
http://www.topnews.in/law/amateur-scientist-discovers-snails-have-homing-instinct-222938
Invertebrate Zoology: A Functional Evolutionary Approach by Edward E. Rupert and Robert D. Barnes

Picture source:http://www.topnews.in/law/files/garden-snails.jpg

Wood Ducks

And now for of the classiest looking birds you are ever likely to find, the wood duck. They are some of my very favorite water fowl, and why? Well for one their Latin name, Aix sponsa, literally means “waterfowl in a wedding dress.” And for good reason! Male wood ducks are immediately recognizable by their classy drooping green crests with stylish white stripes. While, females are not quite as colorful, they are still sport an elegant brown crescent and white tear-drop markings around the eye.

Wood ducks are the second most popular game duck in America (the first being, of course, the Mallard). But they haven’t always been so abundant. In fact, in the early 1900s, wood sucks were so popular for their beautiful feathers and for their taste, that they had been driven virtually extinct. However, due to the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, passed by congress in 1918, and the tireless efforts of conversationalists, wood ducks have made a huge comeback, and are now of very little concern. *sniff* I love a good species success story.

One of the most intriguing aspects of wood duck recovery is their tie to the American beaver. Beavers go a long ways to create the ideal habitat for wood ducks, and the spread of beavers throughout wood duck range has been one of the many steps in helping the ducks rebound. This however, is not to downgrade any of the steps that conversationalists did on their own. Protecting habitat and building and placing nest boxes have been some of the most important steps to helping the wood duck recover.

What else has helped them recover? Why their own reproductive abilities of course! Almost all ducks will reproduce only once per year, but not this one. In fact, the Wood duck is the only North American duck to reproduce twice in a year, greatly helping to increase their numbers. Also unlike other ducks, wood ducks have sharp claws on their feet; this allows them to perch in trees and tree hollows, their preferred nesting areas. When there are not enough adequate tree cavities, wood ducks will use the large amount of nest boxes that have been provided by volunteers and conversationalists. These nest boxes, however, have caused a new wood duck phenomenon to come to light. Female wood ducks housed in nest boxes are known to carry their eggs over and place them in a neighbor’s nest while the neighbor is away. This phenomenon, known as brood parasitism (brood=children) allows mothers to pass along their genes without actually spending energy in raising the child, and is not uncommon among birds. However, what makes this so intriguing is that this was not noticed in wood ducks until they began using the nest boxes. Why only then? Well we don’t really know, but the most likely answer is that this happens in nature, but only when females are nesting close together. So when people began building lots of nest boxes close together, this brood parasitism immediately began to stand out.

Spring is just around the corner! So if you see any cute and fuzzy spring animals (or any kind of animal really, since they’re all amazing) that you want to know about, please leave the request in the comments.

Here are my sources:

http://www.npwrc.usgs.gov/resource/birds/woodduck/wddump.htm

http://www.ducks.ca/resource/general/naturenotes/woodduck/index.html

ftp://ftp-fc.sc.egov.usda.gov/WHMI/WEB/pdf/woodduck%281%29.pdf

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Wood_Duck/lifehistory/ac

http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/wood_duck

The source for the image above was: http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Wood_Duck/lifehistory/ac

it was taken by Brian L. Sullivan http://www.briansullivanphotography.com/

Hey all!

Hey guys,

A great new post is coming tomorrow about one of my favorite birds ever! In the mean time I highly encourage you all to check out this video on common animal misconceptions by CPG Grey!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F9-iSl_eg5U&list=PLB64ABFAB33C2647B&index=1&feature=plpp_

Wow, Sorry About That (i.e. California Gull)

Oh my, its been a while since I last updated. I would like to let you all know how sorry I am, and assure you that I will try to be more consistent. Its just been a crazy couple of weeks.

Well, for those of you who haven't given up on me yet, I have a new post for you guys (yaaaaay!). As promised here is more than you want to know about the California Gull.

Like most common animals, gulls are considered pests. This is not without reason, as the California gull is known to eat just about anything, including fish, small mammals, trash, crumbs, and even food out of people's hands (as I know from personal experience). This has made the California gull one of the most successful birds on the west coast, as they can survive even in the largest of cities and in thrive in dumps. In fact, the California gull is so versatile in its food and habitats, that they are even common around alkaline lakes, such as mono lake, despite the fact that no fish live there.

Gulls that live around such lakes mainly feed on brine shrimp and, believe it or not, alkaline flies. As one might imagine, gulls are poorly equipped to capture tiny insects such as flies, but the gulls are actually able to capture them by running along the shoreline with its mouth wide open and snapping at the clouds of insects.

But the California gull is not a pest to everyone. In fact, gulls often help agriculturalists and farmers by eating small rodents and insects that might otherwise destroy crops. The gulls have even been known to follow behind plows in a field, picking up whatever the plow might turn over.

But not everything that a gull picks up is food. California gulls are known to line their nests with various odds and ends, known as "juju", which can be anything from trash or hair, to small bits of plastic and toys that they pick up. Who knew they could be so artsy?!

On top of it all, California gulls are equal opportunity parents. Both males and females help to construct a nest on the ground, and once the female lays the eggs, parents each take 3-4 hour shifts sitting on the nest while the other parent goes out to hunt. Though they are only with a mate for a single season, they are faithful throughout it, despite the fact that will nest with up to 40,000 other gulls.

And what about when they are not nesting, eating? Well... not much. They spend about 20-30% if their day sleeping. I guess the life of a pest can be rather exhausting.

Sources: http://www.monolake.org/images/bomgull.pdf

http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/site/accounts/information/Larus_californicus.html

http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/california_gull

http://birdweb.org/birdweb/bird/california_gull