Adventure Ausrama Blog

Mystery egg of the Night Parrot in Tanami Desert? A mystery egg was found in the Tanami Desert of northern Australia 30 years ago. Many latched on to this specimen as being from the Night Parrot, thought to be extinct. DNA from the egg was compared to DNA of Night Parrot specimens in the Queensland Museum. The Brown Quail was found to be the "mother" of the Tanami egg. All hope was not lost, however. In 2013 the Night Parrot was found to be still with us. A small population was discovered living in Western Australia, far away from Queensland. Much has been leaned about the environmental requirements for the rare bird's survival. This shows that human hope is very strong. We will attribute links to things that are very weak. The egg does have unusual characteristics : it is sand white, not like the quail egg which is pale but speckled brown. It is pointed at one end though, typical of the quail. ◆ Ornithology by Ty Buchanan   ◆ Tys Country Amusing Animal Photos...

Cats are cuddly pets, but if they get into the wild they can cause native animals to become extinct. This has been the case in Australia. They hunt little marsupials until there are none left to eat then move on to consume something else. growing larger in the wild certainly help cats to survive very well indeed. Where did the cats originally come from? It was thought that Asia was the most likely place as Asian fishermen came to Australia's northern shores well before Europeans. However, research shows that they did come on boats from European countries whether as "stowaways" or more likely brought as pets to remind new arrivals of home. Moreover, having cats to hunt rodents on European ships was common in the early 1800s. Island cats were tested as they had not crossed with new cats imported from countries across the world, so the findings were accurate and Europeans are the culprits for spreading this pest. Keep your cat in the house and don't let it roam. ...

Despite extinctions the number of animal types in the world is at an all-time high. This is due to a proliferation over the last 200 million years. It seems as time goes on the number of species increases. This seems to be a law on this planet and maybe the universe. There are indications that humans could be changing this by causing extinctions. However, it will be a long time before the variation of species declines significantly. With the poles melting a tipping point could be reached where even humans are under threat of disappearing. This is just a theory at this time. Perhaps, changing the way we live will make things better for all creatures. Human knowledge is going on a pace. There are new discoveries minute to minute. Indeed, it is difficult for specialists to keep up with all the reading that is necessary. Even general practitioners say there are not enough hours in the day to keep abreast of the latest breakthroughs. ◆   Evolution by Ty Buchanan ...

Australia has always been seen as remote. Yet new new things are being discovered about its history. It has been identified as the "target" of one of the world's largest asteroid impacts. Two craters found by Andrew Glikson and his team are thought to have been caused by a large meteor which broke into two pieces. Each crater is 200 kilometers in diameter. One of these craters on its own is larger than the impact in Mexico: the Central American collision wiped out the dinosaurs. It isn't the biggest, however. The Sudbury comet did a great deal of damage, but the world's widest crater is the Vredefort in South Africa. The twin craters in Australia have been flattened out over eons of time. They were found by geothermal research. It appears that asteroid impact covers the Northern Territory, Queensland and South Australia, a very large area. Seismic traverses is going to be applied next. This will hopefully bring new things to light. If the as...

It's a tough time for the orange-bellie. This species of parrot is about to become extinct. It is estimated to have five years left to live. A few years ago there were 70 pairs. Now only 50 birds remain. The last species of bird to go extinct in Australia ceased its existence 70 years ago. For the most part, people don't seem to care. However, there are more close to extinction. A fight ensues to keep the orange-bellie alive. In 1984 the Orange-Bellied Parrot (OBP) Recovery Team was created to monitor and protect the bird. A protected breeding program was established in south-west Tasmania. Fifteen years of drought has seen the birds' supply of seeds dwindle to almost nothing. Water has been allocated for irrigation and piped away from the region. A last throw of the dice involves catching 10 pairs then breeding them in a caged area. This kind of action is unusual. It would be expected that eggs be taken from nests of wild birds, with hatching done in an incubator then...

Not much can be done about saving endangered species when the great majority of people "don't give a damn". Like global warming many just do not want to hear the truth. Money is not forthcoming for conservation. Stopping animals from going extinct is only being done on a piecemeal basis. We have to choose what to save. This really means that the blame for the loss of some animals lies solely with Mankind. Just who is to decide the fate of creatures is not yet known. It will have to be bodies that receive funding for such purposes. They are probably doing the selection process as we speak. If what is to be saved and what is to be lost was publicly known there would probably be an outcry - everyone has their favorites. More funding is the answer of course. Whether times be good or bad giving money for conservation has never been popular. Other things seem more important. It is really inevitable that prioritizing what goes extinct will occur. The global warming ...

Jurassic Park is getting closer to reality. Australian scientists have managed to get DNA from fossilised eggshells of extinct birds. The Team warns though that bringing ancient creatures back to life is a long way off. Particles of fossilised eggshells from Australia, New Zealand and Madagascar were used in the research. A target species was the Moa bird which lived in New Zealand into the 18th century. Another was the Elephant Bird which went extinct in Madagascar during the 17th century. Older birds were also worked on: the New Zealand Duck, Australian Owl and an Emu which was 19,000 years old. Work on older fossils did not come up with usable DNA, but the relatively recent ones did give promising results. Techniques used were the usual reduction of samples and polymerase amplification. These were very short pieces of DNA obtained from minute samples. Eggshells were found to be even better than bones and hair for storing DNA. http://www.adventure--australia.blogspot.com/ http:/...

We have heard so much about how scientists are going to clone a mammoth. For many this idea remains "pie in the sky" - a lot of talk and no action. There is plenty of mammoth raw material around to do tests on. The problem is getting good DNA that can be cloned. Scientists are jumping up and down again with the recent find of a frozen mammoth in Siberia. They say this time their will be "living cells". This is very optimistic. The new mammoth will probably be like all the others. Only partial DNA will be found. Even though bone marrow has been identified this time, cloning is a long shot. No living cells have so far been found in any extinct animal, as far back as 10,000 years when mammoths roamed the Earth. There are problems in analyzing human DNA even though the human genome is known. The complete DNA of mammoths has not yet been determined. A prize is offered by the X Prize Foundation for the first cloned extinct animal. Scientists can hope I s...

It was believed that the Tasmanian Tiger perished in mainland Australia due to the dingo taking over their habitat. New findings show the dingo did not directly compete with the marsupial dog. They had different ways of getting their food. Dingos were brought to Australia from Asia in recent times. It is not native to Australia. The demise of the Tasmanian tiger on the larger part of Australia 3,000 years ago was coincidental. Settlers in Tasmania feared their cattle and sheep would be slaughtered so they eradicated the quite timid animal in the early twentieth century. Dingoes are wild dogs that run for long periods running down their prey. Tasmanian tigers were not distance runners. They ambushed sick and young animals. The tiger's skeletal structure was more like cats than dogs, particularly the elbow joint which was feline in character. The dingo has elbows that lock, while the marsupial dog had a flexible joint. This undermines the theory that the Tasmanian tiger fil...

A new type of crocodile now extinct has been found in northern Africa. It had three sets of fangs like wild boar tusks for killing other animals. Another kind of crocodile was found nearby. This one used a flat, wide snout to catch fish. A third species of crocodile also located close by was only three feet long. This had "buckteeth" for eating plants. It was a rich find with two other known kinds of crocodile being dug up there. The National Geographic Society sponsored the successful project. The new crocodiles show that the region had unique animals 100 million years ago. much different than in surrounding regions. These reptiles could run along at quite a fast pace then dive into the water and swim off. Unlike modern crocodiles which have legs on the side of their bodies these had longer legs set underneath. Luckily there were no people around for them to chase and eat. The three new species are as follows: 1) BoarCroc (Kaprosuchus saharicus) 20 feet in length wit...