England's
Breast milk has been shown to be a major vector for the transmission
of HIV, posing a dilemma for nursing mothers. According to The
Economist, half of the world's 3.8 million HIV-positive children
contracted the disease from breast milk. In wealthy countries,
HIV-positive women have the option of bottle-feeding. But 90 percent
of infected children live in poor countries, where bottle formula
can cost up to $700 a year per child that's more than the per
capita Gross Domestic Product of some HIV-afflicted countries.
even when formula is easily available, it is often made with unsafe
drinking water, posing as dire a threat as HIV.
Pup Problems
New Zealand
More than 1400 rare New Zealand sea lion pups about half the pups
born in the last year were found dead of starvation in the Auckland
Islands in January and February. While El Niņo-related disruptions
in the oceanic food web are thought to be a major cause, the sea
lions' food base has been severely over-fished in recent years.
New Zealand will review the allowable sea lion by-catch by squid
trawlers in the wake of this blow to the species' numbers. The
New Zealand sea lion (a.k.a. Hooker's Sea Lion) was hunted nearly
to extinction in the early 19th century but had begun to increase
in numbers in recent years. Before this year's deaths, the sea
lion's numbers were estimated at 1,216,000. The total number of
deaths this past year may never be known, as biologists have been
able to count only those pups that washed ashore [http://www.doc.gov.nz].
Bonobo
Byways
Africa: Our
closest non-human relatives may have better symbolic language
skills than suspected. Primatologists have found that bonobos,
also called pygmy chimpanzees, use sophisticated trail markers
to keep their troops together as they travel through the forests
of Equatorial Africa. Bonobos, foraging in small groups by day,
must travel silently to avoid attracting predators. When a lead
group of bonobos comes to a trail junction, they indicate which
route they've taken by marking the trail with two broken plants
or by placing a large leaf pointing in the direction of travel,
indicating that bonobos may possess some understanding of mathematics
and symbolic logic. Bonobos and chimps are humans' closest relatives,
sharing a common ancestor less than [?] million years ago.
Trees
Cut Down in Amazon
Brazil: Though
the rate of Amazon deforestation is slackening from its peak in
1995, nearly 5000 square-miles of Brazil's unique forests were
cleared in 1997. While the Brazilian government claims much of
the credit for slowing deforestation, environmentalists say the
decrease is due to 1997's heavy rains, which hampered the use
of heavy machinery to clear the forest and build roads. Although
fewer trees have been cut, much of the clearing is taking place
in small patches, further accelerating the decline of the remaining
forest through increased edge effect. Ecosystems are most vulnerable
to disruption at their edges.
Fished
Out
The Philippines:
A study published in Science magazine in February claims that
over-fishing by industry is changing the global marine food web,
and calls the changes unsustainable. The study jointly conducted
by the University of British Columbia and the International Center
for Living Aquatic Resources Management in the Philippines says
that over the last half-century long-lived, highly nutritious
fish such as snapper have largely vanished from commercial nets.
These fish have been replaced by squid and other invertebrates,
signaling a deterioration of the oceanic food web. The average
age, weight and nutritional value of netted fish have also declined.
Derring-do?
Herring Do!
Norway: The
Associated Press reported in January that a school of herring
caught in a trawler's net fought back and sank the 60-foot boat.
The trawler Steinholm, fishing off Norway's northern coast, netted
a huge catch of herring. When the crew tried to haul in the net,
the entire school turned en masse and swam straight for the bottom,
capsizing the ship. Crew members were forced to abandon ship.
Steinholm sank in 10 minutes. All hands were rescued by another
trawler. It is not known whether the fish escaped the net.
Manatees
Menaced
US: A continuing
rise in the number of US powerboats, combined with the effects
of a lethal microorganism, conspired to make 1997 the second-deadliest
year on record for Florida's manatees. At least 240 of the gentle,
slow-moving marine mammals died last year, more than ten percent
of the species' total numbers. (415 manatees died in 1996, the
worst year on record.) The chief threat to the manatee is collisions
with speedboats. If the manatees are not killed outright, spinning
outboard propeller blades inflict serious injuries. As more people
settle in Florida, declines in water quality threaten the manatee's
major food source, sea grass. Red tide, a bloom of a toxic algal
microorganism, also kills manatees. Sixteen of last year's deaths
were blamed on red tide. Perhaps the most serious threat to manatees,
however, is habitat loss due to housing and commercial development.
Ivory
Sale Imminent
Tanzania:
Tanzania announced in February that it will sell its 88 ton stockpile
of elephant tusks to buyers in China and Japan. The stockpile
is the result of confiscations from ivory poachers. The Convention
on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) lifted a
ban on the sale of confiscated tusks in 1997. Zimbabwe, Namibia
and Botswana pushed CITES to lift the ban, saying South Central
Africa's elephant population is unsustainably high. (Tanzania's
elephant population is considered to be at a sustainable level.)
Environmentalists and the US Interior Department worry that the
sale will sustain demand for ivory, encouraging further poaching.
Polar
Plastic Peril
Antarctica:
Biologists in Antarctica say that waste plastic is threatening
the lives of petrel chicks hundreds of miles from the nearest
landfills. Researchers with Australian National Antarctic Research
Expeditions dissected dead petrel chicks and found hard plastic
in many of their stomachs. While visiting expeditions and fishing
boats dump plastic in Antarctic waters, most marine plastic is
kept from the region by the Antarctic Convergence, a circumpolar
ocean current. The plastic is thought to have been collected by
adult petrels that feed in waters further north and return to
regurgitate their stomach contents to feed their chicks. The further
north a species of petrel flies, the more plastic is found in
their chicks' stomachs. Chicks of one species, the Wilson's storm
petrel, had an average of five pieces of plastic in their stomachs.
The plastic suppresses hunger, impeding the weight gain the birds
need to survive Antarctic weather. The plastic may also leach
toxic contaminants into the birds' bloodstreams.
Galapagos
News
Galapagos:
In response to charges that vessels from Japan, North America
and Ecuador were depleting fish stocks and killing sea lions,
sharks, sea turtles, dolphins, marine iguanas and birds, the Ecuadoran
Congress expanded a no-fishing zone around Ecuador's Galapagos
Islands from 15 to 40 nautical miles this January. Meanwhile,
scientists at the Charles Darwin Research Station in the Galapagos
say that the archipelago's unique biota are suffering from warm
water associated with a severe El Niņo. Exposed to warmer water,
the coral reefs fringing the islands have shown accelerated bleaching,
signaling a die-off of the marine organisms that build the reef.
Fur seals and hammerhead sharks have had their migration patterns
altered by the unusually warm sea. Albatrosses, cormorants and
penguins nesting on the islands have had trouble breeding. Researchers
fret that the islands' famous marine iguanas, captivatingly described
in Darwin's The Voyage of the Beagle, may suffer as El Niņo promotes
the growth of red algae over green algae (the iguanas' preferred
diet).
Poached
Ginseng
Russia: Environmental
officials in Russia are complaining that poachers from China have
been raiding the Siberian taiga's precious ginseng. Centuries
of overharvesting in China have brought the valued medicinal root
close to extinction in the wild, but demand for ginseng continues
to grow. Farming accounts for nine-tenths of the world supply,
but purists claim that wild-harvested ginseng is superior. Siberian
ginseng is reputed to be better than wild Chinese ginseng, with
a less-earthy flavor and more moderate pharmacological effects.
Siberian ginseng also holds the potential to be a renewable crop,
as the plant can survive after a root pruning, unlike its Chinese
and North American cousins, which die after harvest. But poachers'
thefts from experimental ginseng farms in Siberia pose a serious
threat to the fledgling industry.
Don't
Buy Swordfish
US: Environmentalists
launched a boycott of swordfish in January at a ceremonial lunch
in New York, calling for limits on the catch of this increasingly
rare fish. According to the Natural Resources Defense Council
[address] and the National Audubon Society [address], the average
swordfish caught these days weighs 90 pounds, down from about
400 pounds in mid-century. Female swordfish, which can weigh half
a ton and live a century and a half, don't reproduce until they
weigh about 150 pounds. Thus, many female swordfish caught today
have not yet spawned, a fact that concerns fisheries biologists.
Atlantic swordfish are caught on hook-studded lines up to 30 miles
long, suspended hundreds of feet below the surface. Jim Chambers,
a retired National Marine Fisheries Service biologist now working
to promote the boycott, predicts North Atlantic swordfish will
be extinct within six years if fisheries practices don't change.
Dozens of US restaurants have pledged to support the boycott.
Davy Jones'
Laundry
US: Diversa,
a San Diego, California firm, has obtained a $300,000 grant from
the National Science Foundation to attempt to produce esterases
and lipases enzymes that break down fat molecules by cloning bacteria
found feeding on lipid-rich whale bones resting on the ocean floor.
When whales die, their carcasses settle to the bottom of the ocean,
where their bones leak whale fat for as long as 20 years. Bacteria
have evolved means of breaking down this fat in the deep ocean's
extremely cold water. Diversa hopes to harness the bacterial enzymes
for cold-water detergents. The firm has also signed biodiversity
agreements in which a nation's genetic diversity becomes Diversa's
property in exchange for a royalty with Indonesia, Costa Rica,
Iceland and Yellowstone National Park.
Secret
Salmon
