Notes Of A Dead Man Sequel (Notes - #3), Clive Cooper [free ebook novel .txt] 📗

help humans, for instance, by producing fuel or meat alternatives, MacPhee said. Or maybe this science could be used to insert or activate genes in plants and animals that could help them survive in an era of climate change, he added.  

Some of this work is already a reality, said Church, who pointed out that scientists have made some plants more resistant to drought and pests.

Also, there have been other successful de-extinction efforts, albeit for local, not worldwide extinctions. For instance, horses used to live in North America, but went extinct at the end of the last ice age. When European explorers arrived in the New World, they inadvertently re-introduced horses to the continent, where they have since flourished.

Likewise, a fungus has rendered the American chestnut functionally extinct, meaning the species is still around (at least in lab-monitored spaces), but not in its natural environment; but scientists have tweaked the chestnut's genome to make it fungus-resistant, Greely said.

The experts agreed that this technology could also be used for evil — for instance, to bring back an extinct virus or to alter an existing virus to make it more contagious.

As this science moves forward, it's crucial to educate and involve the public, the panel said.

"We actually have to have that [discussion] to some degree, case by case, because each effort at de-extinction raises its own unique considerations," Kaebnick said.

Capable

 Ain't gonna tell anyone... that's in what we all are capable... that's the truth, like it or not. That's a fact, take it!

'Sharknado' Down Under? Cyclone Debbie Deposits Shark on a Street

 By Kacey Deamer, Staff Writer

 

A dead five-foot-long bull shark was found in a floodwater puddle in the town of Ayr after Australia was hit by a tropical cyclone.Credit: QldFES/Twitter

 

Forget about the "Sharknado" film series. A town in Australia experienced a real-life shark-cyclone of sorts when a shark washed up on the street after Cyclone Debbie hit the area, according to news reports.

The tropical cyclone hit the Australian state of Queensland this week, with heavy rainfall causing flash flooding in some areas along the coast, according to NASA. The rotating storm reached maximum sustained wind speeds estimated at over 115 mph (185 km/h), NASA reports, and drenched the ground with more than 20 inches (50 centimeters) of rain along much of its route. (Such storms are called hurricanes when they form in the Atlantic and Northeast Pacific oceans.)

Cyclone Debbie also deposited a shark on a road in the town of Ayr, in the north Queensland region of Burdekin, Queensland Fire & Emergency Services tweeted on Thursday (March 30). [On the Brink: A Gallery of Wild Sharks]

 

 

 

The 5-foot-long (1.5 meters) bull shark was found dead in a floodwater puddle, reported News.com.au. Bull sharks are common in the area, according to local journalist Philip Calder, who told the news agency that bull sharks live in the small waterways like the nearby Burdekin River close to communities.

With the heavy rainfall from the cyclone, the Burdekin River rapidly reached a peak of 31 feet (9.5 m), rising more than 16 feet (5 m) in just 5 hours late Wednesday (March 29), Ash Ryder, senior firefighter at the Ayr Fire and Rescue station, told The Courier Mail.

"He must've gotten caught in a torrent and [gotten] confused, beached himself on the side of the road," Calder told News.com.au. "We were pretty amazed, we were turning up to shoot a flooding road, we weren't expecting to see wildlife as well."

 

FollowQld Fire & Emergency ✔@QldFES

Think it's safe to go back in the water? Think again! A bull shark washed up in Ayr. Stay out of floodwater. #TCDebbie#ifitsfloodedforgetit

8:00 AM - 30 Mar 2017

3,2433,243 Retweets 3,2233,223 likes

Bull sharks will live in both freshwater and saltwater, John Carlson, a research biologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Fisheries Service, previously told Live Science. They survive in freshwater by regulating the salt in their bodies, according to Carlson. Bull sharks have a special salt gland that keeps the salt concentration inside their bodies in balance with the concentration in the water — a process known as osmoregulation.

Manatees: Facts About Sea Cows

 By Alina Bradford, Live Science Contributor

 

 

A manatee munching down on some sargassum.Credit: USGS - Sirenia Project

 

The manatee is a large marine mammal with an egg-shaped head, flippers and a flat tail. Manatees are also known as sea cows. This name is apt, due to their large stature; slow, lolling nature; and propensity to be eaten by other animals. However, despite the name, they are more closely related to elephants. Though they may seem like cumbersome creatures, manatees can swim quickly and gracefully.

Manatees range in size from 8 to 13 feet (2.4 to 4 meters) and can weigh 440 to 1,300 lbs. (200 to 590 kilograms). They have large, strong tails that power their swimming. Manatees usually swim about 5 mph (8 km/h), but they can swim up to 15 mph (24 km/h) in short bursts when they feel a need for speed, according to National Geographic.

Habitat

There are three species of manatee: the Amazonian manatee (Trichechus inunguis); the West Indian manatee, or the American manatee (Trichechus manatus); and the African manatee (Trichechus senegalensis). Their names indicate the regions in which they live. Typically, manatees stay in rivers, seas and oceans along the coast of several countries. The African manatee lives along the coast and in the rivers of western Africa. The Amazon manatee lives in the Amazon River's drainage, from the headwaters in Colombia, Peru and Ecuador to the mouth of the Amazon in Brazil. Their range is estimated to be around 2.7 million square miles (7 million square kilometers), according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).  The West Indian manatee lives in the southern and eastern United States, although a few "vagrants" have been known to reach the Bahamas, according to the IUCN.

 

 

 

Manatees often swim alone or in pairs. They are not territorial, so they have no need for a leader or followers. When manatees are seen in a group, it is either a mating herd or an informal meeting of the species simply sharing a warm area that has a large food supply. A group of manatees is called an aggregation. An aggregation usually never grows larger than about six individuals, according to the Save the Manatee Club.

Diet

Manatees are herbivores. At sea, they tend to prefer sea grasses. When they live in rivers, they consume freshwater vegetation. Manatees also eat algae. According to National Geographic, a manatee can eat a tenth of its own weight in 24 hours. That can equal up to 130 lbs. (59 kg).

Offspring

During mating, a female manatee, which is called a cow, will be followed around by a dozen or more males, which are called bulls. The group of bulls is called a mating herd. Once the male has mated, though, he takes no part in the raising of the young.

A female manatee is pregnant for about 12 months, according to Save the Manatee Club. The calf, or baby manatee, is born underwater. The mother helps the calf get to the water's surface for air, and within the first hour of life, the calf will be able to swim on its own. In five years, the young manatee will be sexually mature and ready to have its own young. Manatees usually live about 40 years.

Classification/taxonomy 

According to the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS), the manatee's full classification is:

Kingdom: Animalia Subkingdom: Bilateria               Infrakingdom: Deuterostomia               Phylum: Chordata Subphylum: Vertebrata Infraphylum: Gnathostomata               Superclass: Tetrapoda               Class: Mammalia Subclass: Theria Infraclass: Eutheria Order: Sirenia Family: Trichechidae Genus:Trichechus Species: Trichechus inunguis (Amazonian manatee, South American manatee), Trichechus manatus (West Indian manatee, American manatee, Caribbean manatee), Trichechus senegalensis (African manatee, West African manatee) Subspecies: Trichechus manatus latirostris (Florida manatee), Trichechus manatus manatus (Antillean manatee)

Conservation status

The IUCN's Red List of Threatened Species lists all manatees as vulnerable or endangered and facing a high risk of extinction. Populations are expected to decline by as much as 30 percent over the next 20 years. Numbers are hard to come by, especially for the secretive Amazonian manatee; the IUCN says the estimate of 10,000 manatees should be regarded with caution because the numbers are supported by little empirical data. Similarly, the exact number of African manatees is unknown, but the IUCN estimates there are fewer than 10,000 manatees in West Africa.

The Florida manatee and the Antillean manatee were listed as endangered in 1967 and 1970, respectively, under the Endangered Species Preservation Act of 1966; the number of mature individuals was estimated to be fewer than 2,500 for each subspecies, and the populations were expected to decline by more than 20 percent over the next two generations, or about 40 years.

 

On March 31, 2017, however, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) downgraded the West Indian manatees' status from endangered to threatened. Both significant increases in the manatee population numbers and habitat improvements led to the downlisting, according to the FWS.

 

As many as 6,620 Florida manatees and 6,300 Antillean manatees are estimated to live in the wild currently, according to the FWS.

"Today, we both recognize the significant progress we have made in conserving manatee populations while reaffirming our commitment to continuing this species' recovery and success throughout its range," Jim Kurth, acting director of the FWS, said in a statement by the FWS.

But manatees aren't out of the woods yet, and are still considered a