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Out Of Place Animals

Lion 'on the loose in Belfast'

ITN - 31.08.2008 22:01

Lion 'on the loose in Belfast' (© ITN 2008)

A hunt has been launched after police received reports of a lion on the loose in a Belfast park.

The animal was said to have been seen in Cavehill Park - only a short distance from the city's zoo.

But police said later that keepers had checked all cages in the zoo and all the animals were accounted for.

A police helicopter is scouring the area from the air and officers were deployed on the ground.

A spokesman said: "We are taking this seriously, there have been a string of calls about sightings."

A statement from police headquarters said: "Police in North Belfast are warning the public to be aware of sightings of what appears to be a lion in the Upper Hightown end of Cavehill Park.

"Police are currently responding to the incident and would urge the public to avoid the area.

"Anyone who thinks they may have seen the animal should not attempt to approach it."

There aren't any lions missing.
 
Deadly jellyfish return to coast

Deadly jellyfish which wiped out salmon worth more than £1m last year have returned to Northern Ireland's waters.

Mauve Stinger jellyfish were spotted on Sunday on Portrush's West Strand by an Environment Agency worker.

Scientists confirmed the small purple creatures were the same species which killed more than 150,000 salmon in cages off the Antrim coast last year.

The Environment Agency said there was no indication there would be a repeat of last year's "catastrophic bloom".

Marine Conservation Officer Joe Breen said the authorities had informed Northern Salmon, the company which was devastated by the jellyfish invasion.


"A further survey carried out this morning has reported the jellyfish are present at West Strand, East Strand Portrush and White Rocks. No jellyfish have yet been detected further east at Ballycastle beach.
"The species have also been observed in the Republic of Ireland, off the County Sligo coast."

Mr Breen advised people to stay clear of the jellyfish, "which are capable of a nasty powerful sting".

In recent years, increasing numbers of Mauve Stinger jellyfish in the Mediterranean have posed a danger for swimmers.

Their presence in the colder northern waters is thought to be due to wind and tidal factors.

A marine biology lecturer said he had heard reports that the jellyfish stretched all the way from Sligo to the County Antrim coast, but it was not yet clear if they were in isolated bunches or a continuous plume.

Dr Jon Houghton of Queen's University Belfast said: "They occur hundreds of miles out to sea so it is very rare to find them inshore.

"It is to do with the water. If a prevailing wind comes down, they can be carried in."

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/u ... 655568.stm
 
Ant invader knocks on UK's door
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7761342.stm
By Richard Black
Environment correspondent, BBC News website

The ant is capable of forming supercolonies, pushing out native species
A recently discovered ant species may soon be colonising parks and gardens across northern Europe, including the UK, scientists suggest.

The ant, Lasius neglectus, was identified only 20 years ago after establishing a colony in Budapest.

Writing in the journal PLoS One, scientists say the species probably originated in west Asia.

A garden infested with them can contain between 10 and 100 times more ants than if it bears native European varieties.

"When I saw this ant for the first time, I simply could not believe there could be so many garden ants in the same lawn," said Professor Jacobus Boomsma from the University of Copenhagen, who oversaw the research. A number of them have become invasive pests with giant supercolonies

Dr Sylvia Cremer

Although superficially similar in appearance to the common black garden ant, the invasive species is very different in its behaviour, and particularly in the social structure within colonies.

This, the researchers believe, is key to understanding why it can invade parks and gardens and exterminate varieties that previously held sway.

The ants have probably been transported across Europe in soil used to grow pot plants. Colonies now exist in France, Germany, Poland and Belgium.

Although it is thought to have west Asian origins, its "home patch" has never been found.

Into the cold

Species of ants and other social insects differ in the way mates are selected and in what happens to new queens.

In Lasius neglectus, queens mate within the existing colony rather than leaving and establishing a new one.

Over time, this probably carries an evolutionary cost as it limits the mixing of different genetic variants.

However, for an invasive species it is a highly advantageous trait.

A queen leaving a colony that had been transported to new pastures would find no mates.

But if she can mate with other males from the same colony, it can just expand, with the ever-growing number of ants burrowing through soil and building new nests connected to the old one, until the entire area is populated with one "supercolony".

"It is now becoming clear that rather many ant species share this lifestyle, so it is no surprise that a number of them have become invasive pests with giant supercolonies based on the same principles," said lead scientist Dr Sylvia Cremer, who now works at the University of Regensburg in Germany.

Other invasive ant species include the Argentine ant. Having come to Europe about 1900, by 2002 it had established what was effectively a single supercolony along thousands of kilometres of coast, from northwestern Italy round southern France and the Iberian peninsula to the northern coast of Spain.

Northern Europe has escaped its attention so far; but researchers believe the invasive garden ant is sure to establish itself further in the region, with the UK unlikely to find itself exempt.


[email protected].
 
crazy creatures

I grew up in the farm country of Northern Oklahoma in the late 60's and 70's and back then you could order all sorts of creatures out the back of Boy's Life magazine, including alligators. Our dads and uncles used to do it as well when they were young. We had one rogue alligator specimen that was living wild and I personally saw it when I was like 13 years old and it was like six feet long in the local Salt Fork River hanging around a sheep carcass. We also had these two vultures that hung around from time to time that were usually called "African" vultures in the local press. All I know is that they were BIG and not native to the area. Nobody knew where they came from. When I was a young boy the neighbor down the road shot a "Timber Wolf" down by the river, apparent only usually found in Canada. But the weirdest thing was the occasional bigfoot sightings, but I should leave that for another thread.
 
Another Cornish sighting of a bird that shouldn't be here:

Meet Rambo - the tough little swallow who forgot to fly South this winter
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 3:29 PM on 14th January 2009

This hardy swallow was today hailed as Britain's toughest bird after it became the only one of its species to survive the coldest winter for 30 years.
Most swallows migrate to southern Africa during the autumn and the few that remain here die out as winter sets in.
But this stoic swallow survived temperatures of -12C degrees, amazing experts so much that they nicknamed him Rambo after the tough guy character played by Sylvester Stallone.

Now birdwatchers - or 'twitchers' are flocking to catch a glimpse of Rambo who lives at the RSPB's Marazion Marsh nature reserve near Penzance in Cornwall.

RSPB spokesman Dave Flumm said: 'It's very rare that we have swallows wintering here at all.
'But this bird has survived temperatures that no other swallow could ever have been put through before.
'In a very mild winter it is possible for a swallow to survive in this country - but it is just amazing that this one has lasted so long.'

Swallows usually fly south in September and it is thought Rambo has lost nearly half its body weight by staying here.

The majority of the species have left Britain by Christmas but a handful remain into the New Year before dying out in the cold.

By January 5 birdwatchers around the country had reported seeing seven - four in Cornwall and three in Milford Haven, Pembrokeshire.
Sadly six were found dead and now just Rambo remains.
Mr Flumm added: 'Now we're down to just the one bird - certainly the only one left in the country.
'You wonder how it is able to cope. I felt sure it was going to be wiped out. It is a young bird and so it is impossible to gender.

'The problem for the birds in cold weather is that they need to eat all the time to have enough energy to survive.
'But when it gets down to a certain temperature the flying insects they rely on for food just disappear.
'The temperature here was down to -7C recently and we haven't seen any insects in the air at all.'

Swallows are characterised by an ability to feed in the air and have adapted to hunting insects on the wing by developing a slender streamlined body.

They are able to produce many different calls or songs, which are used to express excitement, courtship, or as an alarm when a predator is in the area.

Swallows can be found across the world as they breed on all the continents except Antarctica.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/ ... inter.html

I went past Marazion Marsh last week, and it was frozen over! This is a pretty rare event, as the marsh is only separated from the sea by the beach and a road. We're back to wet'n'windy weather now, but much warmer. Let's hope it's more to Rambo's liking.
 
Re: crazy creatures

rexmundy said:
I grew up in the farm country of Northern Oklahoma in the late 60's and 70's and back then you could order all sorts of creatures out the back of Boy's Life magazine, including alligators. Our dads and uncles used to do it as well when they were young. We had one rogue alligator specimen that was living wild and I personally saw it when I was like 13 years old and it was like six feet long in the local Salt Fork River hanging around a sheep carcass. We also had these two vultures that hung around from time to time that were usually called "African" vultures in the local press. All I know is that they were BIG and not native to the area. Nobody knew where they came from. When I was a young boy the neighbor down the road shot a "Timber Wolf" down by the river, apparent only usually found in Canada. But the weirdest thing was the occasional bigfoot sightings, but I should leave that for another thread.

Fascinating! I'd love to hear you Bigfoot stories, the thread is here:
http://www2.forteantimes.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4733
 
rynner2 said:
Another Cornish sighting of a bird that shouldn't be here:

Meet Rambo - the tough little swallow who forgot to fly South this winter
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 3:29 PM on 14th January 2009
Did it forget, or was it just in love with a reed?
 
Raccoon rescued from town garden

A raccoon has been rescued from a tree in a garden in Dorset after a surprised couple found it while birdwatching.

David and Ena Webber, who live in Walcott Avenue, Christchurch, spotted the animal on Saturday morning.

They called police, who said they had no reports of a missing raccoon, and then the RSPCA, which collected it.

The charity said it did not know where it had come from but said the animal was in good condition and was probably someone's escaped pet.

Mrs Webber, 71, told BBC News: "We were trying to do the RSPB birdwatch this morning when we spotted it at about 10 o'clock. We thought it was a cat.

"Well, cats and birds don't go together so I fired the water gun at it and its little face came out and it just looked at me and said, in no uncertain terms: 'Stop I want to go back to sleep'.

"It wasn't impressed at all. 8)

"It had such a cute little face. It stayed in the same tree, on the same branch and didn't move. It was fast asleep.

"It's a total mystery, nobody knows where it's come from. Police told us they had no records of a missing raccoon."

Katie Geary, RSPCA spokeswoman, said it was unusual, but not unheard of, to find an escaped raccoon.

She said: "The officer tried to use an apple to coax the animal down but it failed so he used a grasper around its middle to gently get it down from the tree.

"Raccoons are semi-nocturnal animals so it was very sleepy.

"It was in a very good condition. It was about 10kg (22lb), the size of quite a large cat.

"We think it's owned by someone in the local area so if someone has lost a raccoon they should contact us."

The raccoon is being cared for at a local RSPCA rescue centre.

Anyone who has lost a raccoon can contact the RSPCA on 0300 1234999 and leave a message.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/dorset/7849012.stm
 
Greengrocer stung by scorpion hidden in bananas
A greengrocer was stung by a venomous scorpion as he unloaded a box of bananas.

Last Updated: 12:04PM GMT 02 Feb 2009

Daniel Amey, 30, thought he had scratched himself until he noticed his finger was swelling up.

He was rushed to hospital where doctors discovered part of a scorpion's tail in his finger.

Mr Amey, from Colchester, Essex, said: "I put my hand in the box and thought I had cut it but by the time I was carrying the bananas, my finger had swollen up to twice its size and it felt like it was burning.

"The doctor was ex-Army and he knew straight away that it was a scorpion as there was a single impact wound from the sting. He told me that if it had been the other kind of scorpion from Africa, I would have been dead within 15 minutes.

"My wrist and finger seized up tight but as soon as they released the pressure it was not too bad and I could see the venom coming out."

The scorpion is thought to have been a stowaway in a box of bananas Mr Amey had bought at Spitalfields Market in London.

The greengrocer, who has been nicknamed 'the scorpion king' by workmates, was rushed to Colchester General Hospital from The Food Company in Marks Tey.

Doctors removed the tail and drew out the venom.

The scorpion was found by staff at The Food Company, but had died after his encounter with Mr Amey.

The hardy greengrocer returned to work the same day but says he will be more cautious when unpacking bananas.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstop ... nanas.html
 
Pictured: The bizarre South American armoured fish found in a Leicestershire canal
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 1:00 PM on 26th March 2009

A schoolboy got the catch - and the shock - of his life when he stumbled upon a scaly reptilian-like fish in a calm Leicestershire canal.
Shawn Brown, 14, found the armoured suckermouth catfish, normally found in South America, on the banks of the Grand Union Canal.
Despite the fierce looks of the creature, it is a herbivore which lives off the algae at the bottom of rivers.

The schoolboy found the remains of the fish - which is believed to have struggled with the cold winter temperatures - on the canal-bank, and had to get experts to identify it.

It was finally named as an armored catfish - more officially known as Hypostomus plecostomus - normally live in Panama, Costa Rica and South America and experts say the 10inch long specimen is the first time one has been found in our waterways.

John Hall, who runs All Seasons Angling tackle shop in Wigston, Leics, said: 'We are only 300 yards from where Shawn found it and he came in here and showed me the photo.
'It's scales were very shiny and very hard, almost like a crocodile.
'He went home and looked it up on the internet to try and see what it was but he had to send it off to experts to identify it.
'It had teeth as well and I'm sure it was scare a lot of anglers who saw it swimming up river. But it looks worse than it actually is.
'He is a good little fisherman and as soon as he saw it Shawn knew it didn't belong here.'

The fish pose no threat to humans although it is not known what effect they would have on native fish if they were to ever breed here.
Their tough armoured plating acts as a defence mechanism to ward off predators in tropical waters.

How it found its way to Leicestershire is still a mystery but it is unlikely it has migrated here. Instead its believed to have been a pet released into the canal after growing too big for an aquarium.
Ian Wellby, a fisheries scientist, said: 'It is not something you want in your freshwaters but it is quite harmless.
'It is the first one I have ever heard of in Britain before.
'It is a warm water fish and could not survive our winters.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... canal.html
 
THIS is the mini Beast of Bodmin – caught on camera in a back garden in the Cornish town.

299.jpg


A stunned couple spotted the exotic intruder and filmed it when it returned for food they left out.

It was identified as a palm civet – a cat-sized mammal normally found in the forests of the Philippines, Himalayas and China.

Experts were called in from nearby Newquay Zoo who caught the creature in a humane trap.

Zoo curator Stewart Muir said the civet had probably escaped from a private collection.

He said: ''This is not the sort of animal you would expect to find roaming in the countryside, so it came as a big surprise to see the film footage of a civet.


''A small number are kept and bred in the UK as pets so I strongly suspect that it has escaped from a private collection.

''They are omnivorous and will eat almost anything. While they are not aggressive, they are capable of giving a nasty bite if cornered and would wreak havoc in anyone's hen house.

''For a tropical animal they are surprisingly hardy. I remember seeing them in Moscow Zoo living and breeding quite happily in sub-zero temperatures.

''With the mild climate in Cornwall, this chap could easily survive in the wild.

''Unfortunately we do not have the facilities to hold the civet here at Newquay Zoo but have found a specialist home in Hertfordshire.''


Common palm civets are kept as pets in parts of southern Asia and eat mice and snakes.

They are found in palm trees and woodland areas but often make their home in the roofs of houses.

They weigh between 4lbs and 11lbs and are up to 44ins long from head to tail. Their ears are small and pointed and they have a long and slender body with short legs.

Three rows of black spots run along each side of its body and the beasts are expert climbers and spend most of their lives in trees.

They eat the outer fruit of coffee beans which pass through their digestive tract and which is later harvested from their droppings and turned into an expensive coffee called kopi luwak.



http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article2389860.ece
 
Fish that triggers hallucinations found off British coast
A species of bream, sarpa salpa, which can trigger hallucinations when eaten, has been been discovered in British waters due to global warming.
Last Updated: 1:09PM BST 13 May 2009

The species of bream is normally found in the balmier waters of the Mediterranean and South Africa, was found by fisherman Andy Giles in his nets in the English Channel.

Mr Giles, 38, caught the fish, which is instantly recognised by its gold stripes running along its body, six miles south of Polperro, Cornwall.

"We were trawling for lemon sole and hauled up the net at the end of the day and almost immediately saw this striped fish, we didn't have a clue what it was," he said.

"I had never seen one before and after taking a photograph of it I tried to look it up on the internet and called some friends to see if they knew what it was.

"I put it in the fish box and brought it back for experts to have a look at it.

"Now I realise what it was and the effects it can have, perhaps I should have taken it into town to sell to some clubbers!" 8)

There have only been three previous recordings of sarpa salpa in British waters before, with one of them being off the Channel Islands in 1983.

James Wright, a senior biologist at the National Marine Aquarium in Plymouth, said: "These are a fairly common fish off Tenerife, Malta and Cyprus but it is very rare to get them this far north.

"It could be a single fish that was shoaling with a different species but it could be that there are more of them in our waters."

Sarpa salpa are a popular dish in many Mediterranean restaurants.

But according to marine experts, certain species of plankton-eating fish, like the sarpa salpa, can give off hallucinogenic fish poisoning if the heads or other body parts are consumed.

The effects include vivid hallucinations within minutes of eating it which can last for days.

In 2006 two men, one aged 90, were hospitalised in the south of France after eating sarpa salpa.

The elderly man suffered from auditory hallucinations a couple of hours after eating the fish followed by a series of nightmares over the next two nights.

The younger man, aged 40, endured similar effects which took 36 hours to disappear.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthn ... coast.html
 
Wallaby spotted in Cornish garden

A wallaby with a baby joey has been photographed hopping around the back garden of a house in Cornwall.

The marsupial and her youngster were spotted by an "amazed" Brian Nash on his neighbour's patio in St Breward, near Bodmin on Thursday morning.

"She was just hopping about enjoying the morning sun," he said

It is thought the female may have mated with a male wallaby which escaped two years ago from Trevathan Farm near St Endellion - about eight miles away.

Trevathan Farm owner Mark Symons said his wallaby is regularly spotted in the area.

"I've never seen him myself, but lots of other people apparently have," he told BBC News.

"He was a healthy youngster, capable of living for years, so it could well be his mate and little joey."

No parks or farms in Cornwall have reported a missing female wallaby, but she may have escaped from a private collection or been dumped by an owner who no longer wanted her.

Breeders and animal experts say a growing number of people in the UK are buying wallabies to keep their lawns and gardens in trim.

Mr Symons said wallabies could survive easily in the Bodmin Moor area, with an almost unlimited amount of vegetation for food.

"They've no natural predators, although the joey could possibly be nabbed by a buzzard or a fox," he said.

"A large dog could be a risk, but then a wallaby has the speed to escape."

Mr Nash said the wallaby did not appear nervous of him, but was scared off by a cat.

"She bounced off over a hedge and was gone and I couldn't see her after that," he said.

"It was very strange - I couldn't believe what I was seeing."

Experts say wallabies are well known for being able to find each other in the wild.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cornwall/8064473.stm
 
Prairie dog is seen on moorland

A couple from Cornwall have photographed a prairie dog while they were on a moor in Cornwall.

Linda and Godfrey Stevens were on the Goss Moor trail when they spotted a small furry creature that they could not recognise.

Godfrey Stevens said: "We didn't expect to see anything like that."

Newquay Zoo confirmed the picture was that of a prairie dog. They are mammals from the squirrel family and are from the grasslands of North America.

Mr Stevens said: "We expected to see wild flowers. It was a real surprise for us."

John Meeks from Newquay Zoo said it was a black-tailed prairie dog "without a doubt".

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cornwall/8117692.stm
 
Floundering budgie rescued swimming off Devon coast
Simon de Bruxelles

Perched inside an aviary in Exeter is the luckiest budgerigar in the world.

The budgie is the survivor of a dramatic sea rescue that took place half a mile off the South Devon coast, where it had been bobbing between the waves on the brink of death.

No one at the Little Valley Animal Shelter knows its real name, nor how it came to be out of its depth so far out to sea, but its miraculous story is already the talk of RSPCA rescue workers, to whom it is known variously as “The Brixham Budgie” and “Captain”.

Budgerigars are small parrots that survive in the wild in the desert of Western Australia. In Britain they tend to survive only in cages inside warm living rooms. It is believed that “Captain” may have escaped from such a cage, become disoriented and then flown out beyond Berry Head, near Brixham, to crash land in the Channel.

There it floundered, a tiny creature on the point of drowning and departing from this world to join the choir invisible.

It was at that moment that the Torbay British Sub-Aqua Club happened to pass by. One of the members, Cathy Jackman, said: “I saw something struggling and flapping just up ahead. It was a sunny day, so I thought perhaps it was an illusion from the reflection of the sun on the water. It was bobbing up then going down again and fluttering like a moth. I shouted, ‘There’s something in the water’.

“We realised that it was a bird of some sort. His feathers were saturated, so he was heavy with water trying to keep himself afloat to breathe.

“We spun around on our boat. It took three passes as it was extremely windy, but we eventually managed to rescue the bird. It couldn’t open its eyes at first and I didn’t think he was going to make it. He was like a floppy, wet rag.”

Kevin Jeremiah, 46, the diving club’s training officer, said: “We had to wash him off and I held him in my hands, covering his head and back until he started to come back to life — chirping and running around.”

Ms Jackman, in her 40s, looked after Captain overnight before handing it over to the RSPCA. “He was all fluffed up with his eyes open and he hopped on to my finger. I was quite sad when he left,” she said.

An RSPCA spokesman said: “It’s an unbelievable story. He’s just lucky that the boat was passing at that exact moment and that they spotted him in the water. He’s quite a plump little bird so he must be well loved and cared for by somebody.”

A ring on one leg gives details of its pedigree rather than an address. The shelter is appealing for the owner to come forward.

Wild adventures

- Two fishermen rescued a cairn terrier that had paddled a mile out to sea last October after losing its owner on a walk along the Northumbrian coast

- A deer that was swept out to sea in April last year after trying to swim across the mouth of the Looe in Cornwall was saved by a lifeboat. While the animal was being hauled into the boat it gave one of its rescuers a kick “in a dodgy area”

- In May 2007 a lobster fisherman spotted a male roe deer off Portreath, Cornwall. He dragged the exhausted animal into his boat by its antlers

- In December 2005 workers in Chippewa, in the US state of Wisconsin, saw a husky dog, pictured, standing in deep snow. When it had not moved for more than an hour they took a closer look and found it was frozen to rail tracks. They managed to pull it free ten minutes before a train passed

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/u ... 667569.ece
 
Ocean-going budgie back on his home perch
By Daily Mail Reporter

The budgie found floating half a mile out to sea was finally reunited with his delighted owner yesterday.

The bedraggled bird was barely alive when he was spotted in choppy waters by the astonished members of a diving club.

They managed to fish him from the sea and look after him before returning to shore and handing him over to the RSPCA to recover.

And yesterday the budgie, named Captain by his rescuers, was safely back at the home of his owner, bird enthusiast Mike Peel, 64.

Mr Peel explained that Captain was one of 140 birds he keeps in an aviary at the bottom of his garden in Brixham, Devon.
A handful of the birds made a break for freedom after Mr Peel forgot to put the catch on their enclosure on Saturday.

'I wasn't very happy about it,' said Mr Peel. 'You don't usually see them again because the seagulls get them.' [Boo! Hiss!]
It seems Captain managed to evade any predators and was well out to sea before tiredness began to overtake his little wings.

It was purely by chance that he was spotted by the dive boat.

Mr Peel then recognised the bird when it was later pictured in his local paper - on what happened to be Mr Peel's birthday.

'It was a lovely birthday present,' said the retired cleaning firm boss, who is chairman of the Torbay Budgerigar and Foreign Birds Society.

Fortunately, Captain is ringed, which means that he carries a number which identifies his breeder and gives his age, and Mr Peel was able to claim him.

And far from being harmed by his adventures, the budgie is thriving. Mr Peel said: 'I've never seen a bird look so healthy - it's done him a world of good.' :D

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... perch.html
 
Skunk pack 'spotted' in English countryside
North American skunks are thought to be stalking the English countryside.
Published: 8:35AM BST 31 Jul 2009

A young skunk, which has been nicknamed Ozzy, was handed into a wildlife centre after it was spotted in the isolated Forest of Dean, Glos.

Experts believe the animals could have been released into the wild after being kept as pets when new legislation banned removing their scent gland in 2007.

The foreign invaders - known for their pungent scent and distinctive white stripe - are thought to have mated and multiplied in the wild.

They have recently been reported rummaging through rubbish and prowling allotments near Coleford.

This black and white skunk - whose nickname is loosely based on 'osme', the Greek word for smell - is now being cared for at the Vale Wildlife Hospital and Rehabilitation Centre in nearby Tewkesbury, Glos.

Caroline Gould, the centre's founder, said: "When he was bought in we had no idea what to do with him and frantically searched the internet for advice.

"There could well be a family of wild skunks which are living quite well in the countryside.

"There have been reports of sightings of adults and young after some were released in the wild elsewhere.

"We are getting her used to humans, so she has no fear of them and will not spray her scent.

"She can also give a nasty bite. She's really cute. Everyone here has fallen in love with her, but we don't know what will happen to her in the long term.

"After Ozzy was bought in I went on a wildlife forum and asked for skunk sightings anywhere in England and three people replied to say they had seen them - all in the Forest of Dean."

The animals - native to north America - were de-scented and kept as exotic pets during the '80s and '90s.

But under new legislation, which was introduced two years ago, dozens are thought to have been released into the wild as owners feared of being sprayed by the foul smell.

Denise Edmonds, 39, a nurse, took a photograph of a skunk prowling her garden in Milkwall near Coleford.

She said: "I first saw one at about 4am as it rummaged through my bins.

"I thought it was a cat so went down to investigate and there it was eating a waffle and staring at me.

"I enticed it to me but as it waddled over I quickly shut the door in case it sprayed or bit me.

"Since then I've seen at least one different one, which had different white markings on its face.

"They're not too timid and will walk up to you if you encourage it, which would indicate they had been tamed.

"Neighbours have also said they've seen a few."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildli ... yside.html
 
Actually wild skunks aren't timid at all - they have the ultimate defense, and they know it. The only thing they have to fear is owls, since birds have no sense of smell. So one walking up to you doesn't necessarily mean it's been tamed, just that it has some reason to find you interesting and expects you to know who's boss.

They make good neighbors. I once emptied the compost after dark and only realized at the last moment that I was dumping it on top of a skunk, and it just dodged and went back under the shed. They're omnivores, which is handy for keeping bugs and rodents down, but they also dig for roots and leave holes all over the yard, and they'll get in your trash if you put edibles in it; but then so do dogs and cats. However, introducing a non-native omnivore into an ecosystem isn't good for the ecosystem, and unless you've got some sizable owls in the Forest of Dean, nothing's going to keep the population in check. So I hope they can all be tracked down and kept in zoos or shipped back to the US.
 
Fire risk 'super' ants discovered

Ants believed to have a "kamikaze attraction" to electricity have been discovered in one of England's finest National Trust gardens.

Colonies of lasius neglectus, the so-called Asian super ant, have being found at Hidcote Manor, near Chipping Campden, in Gloucestershire.

It is thought to be the first recorded sighting in the UK, although they have been spotted in mainland Europe.

They are naturally drawn to electrical currents so can pose a fire risk.

The species was first identified in Budapest 20 years ago and look like a common black garden ant.

English Heritage and the National Trust carried out investigations into infestations within the Hidcote estate to identify them as lasius neglectus.

The Asian super ant is highly-dependent on aphid honeydew and are associated with a wide range of tree species.

Their compulsion to follow electricity is stronger than their need for food or drink.

Swarms of ants around electrical cables can cause blackouts.

Brian Ridout, English Heritage entomologist and architectural conservator, said they may have gone unnoticed for some time.

"The behaviour of the ants didn't agree with that of any known UK species," he said.

"Our suspicions were confirmed when samples were sent to the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona which has been studying major infestations of them in Spain.

"They look just the same as the common black garden ant, although there will be ten to a hundred times as many of them."

The National Trust said 35,000 ant carcasses were found in one electrical junction box at Hidcote.

Simon Ford, nature conservation advisor for the National Trust in Wessex, said: "The ants themselves pose little direct threat to us as they don't bite people or pets.

"Their habit of creating super-colonies means they pose a threat to native species by out-competing them for food and space, and their attraction to electrical circuitry means they could pose a fire risk.

"Researchers have feared for several years that this species would make it to the UK, and while the Hidcote colony is the first case recorded, it is not clear if it is the first in the UK or indeed that it is the only one.

"It is very likely the ants are more prolific."

The super ant is resistant to traditional insect poison so the National Trust is now working with pest controllers to investigate other options, including bait systems.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/glou ... 179872.stm
 
Piranha found in Devon river
A piranha has been found in a river in Devon, the Environment Agency said.
Published: 1:52PM BST 28 Aug 2009

Environment Agency fisheries workers found the dead piranha in the East Okement tributary of the River Torridge in Devon while conducting a survey of fish species using electric fishing equipment.

The piranha, the most ferocious freshwater fish in the world, is more commonly found in the Amazon River basin.

The Red Bellied Piranha found at East Okement was about 14 inches long, bigger than the species average of up to eight inches.

A examination of the fish revealed its stomach was full of sweetcorn, suggesting it might have been kept as a domestic pet.

The Environment Agency said the piranha was most likely to have been placed in the river once the fish became too large for its tank and died because it could not tolerate the low temperature of the water.

Eddie Stevens was one of the three-man monitoring team who found the piranha.

''What we actually came across was something which we would not expect to find in our wildest dreams - we could hardly believe our eyes," he said. ''After completing 20 metres of the survey a large tail emerged from the undercut bank on the far side of the river.

''Our first thought was that a sea trout had become lodged in amongst the rocks and debris collected under the bank. But when it was removed from the river we were speechless to find it was a piranha.''

Although piranhas would not survive in UK rivers, the Environment Agency has warned that the introduction of non-native species poses a serious threat to native wildlife.

Mark Diamond, ecology manager at the Environment Agency, said: ''Whilst piranhas can't survive the colder climates of the UK, this latest find highlights a real issue - that releasing unwanted exotic pets or plants into rivers can have serious consequences for native wildlife.

''Rather than dumping things in the wild, we would urge people to seek advice about what to do with exotic species.''

The Environment Agency says it is concerned about increasing numbers of non-native fish and plant species in UK waters.

River banks are being weakened by Chinese mitten crabs and the American signal crayfish, which are also killing native crayfish, it says.

Topmouth gudgeon are displacing native fish in lakes while the mink is having a harmful affect on the number of water voles.

Floating pennywort, originally from North America, was brought to Britain in the 1980s as a plant for tropical aquaria and garden ponds.

After being released into the wild, it is now starving rivers across the south of England and south Wales of light, nutrients and oxygen, killing many of the species living in it.

The aggressive North American red-eared terrapin was once a popular pet but huge numbers have been dumped in rivers, eating native fish, newts, toads and even ducklings.


http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildli ... river.html
 
Is it true that a shoal of piranha can reduce a man to a skeleton in about a minute, or was that just what Tarzan movies will tell you?
 
Tufted puffin reported for first time in UK
Birdwatchers flock to Kent coast after a reported sighting of the Pacific seabird, never seen before in the UK
Press Association
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 16 September 2009

Birdwatchers are heading to the Kent coast after reports of a sighting of a Pacific seabird never before seen in the UK, ornithology experts said today.

The sighting of the tufted puffin was reported to birdwatching information service Birdguides this morning, after the bird was apparently seen in the Oare Marshes nature reserve on the Swale estuary.

If verified, it will be the first time the puffin, which is found in the Pacific and is recognisable by its thick red bill and yellow tufts, has been seen in the UK, and possibly the first time in Europe.

Fiona Barclay, of Birdguides, said the puffin was a "completely unprecedented" bird to spot in this country, and the sighting could lead to the biggest "twitch" for years as birdwatchers keen to spot it head to the area.

She said the bird was seen flying up and down the Swale this morning but had not been sighted since.

Grahame Madge, of the RSPB, said of the sighting: "If it's accepted it will be a first for Britain and will obviously attract a great deal of attention. It's possibly the first time it's been seen in Europe too, though I haven't had that confirmed yet. It's something that's clearly significant, to get a seabird from another ocean in the north Atlantic."

He said that, if verified, the bird's arrival would be the latest in a run of such seabirds turning up in the Atlantic.

Some people believe there could be a corridor of open water opening up to the north of Canada as a result of melting ice in the Arctic, allowing a northern route through for seabirds from one ocean to another, he added.

While the bird is a similar size to puffins found in the UK, it differs in its plumage, which in the breeding season includes blond tufts on its head.

Madge said it would be surprising to see any puffins, which are sea-going birds, in an estuary area such as the Swale, and suggested it could be because the bird was hungry or exhausted after its long journey.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2 ... -puffin-uk
 
Scientists find snake in the River Slaney
http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/bre ... ing76.html

Tue, Sep 15, 2009

A routine river survey took an unexpected twist today after scientists pulled a 10-foot python from the water.

Relieved fisheries staff hauled in their nets on the River Slaney to discover the dead reptile - believed to be an aggressive African rock python.

Experts said the giant snake had not eaten for some time but may have only died recently.

Dr Cathal Gallagher, Central Fisheries Board director of research, warned about keeping exotic and dangerous animals.

“The real message from our point of view is that we have a lot of problems with invasive and non-native species,” he said. “Although this is very unusual.”

The exotic Slaney snake was pulled out of the river estuary near Enniscorthy and is believed to have been about 10 years old and recently dead.

It is thought to be an African rock python, a large snake more at home on the Savannah which kills prey by squeezing it to death. Its usual diet as an adult in the wild is small mammals such as antelope but it can live on rats and rabbit.

The pythons can grow to more than 20ft long making it third largest snake in the world.

They are regarded as aggressive, mean and worryingly they can also live for one year without feeding, if their last meal is large enough.

Ben Lyons, owner of Reptile Haven in Dublin, said this breed of python was relatively cheap to keep with food costing about €25 a month.

“The last rock python I had I donated it to the zoo about 20 years ago - it was psychotic,” Mr Lyons said. “They are not necessarily a great pet. This is a bit of a generalisation but they are known for being temperamental and angry.”

Despite being in the water it had not yet begun to decompose or rot. Nature and wildlife experts were said to be debating what to do with the dead creature.

The possibility of stuffing and mounting the giant reptile has been discussed but it is understood that is unlikely.

The snake has been frozen and taken to Dublin where it will be stored for tests with experts in the zoo and universities believed to be keen to examine it.
 
Posted: Thursday, 17 September 2009 6:03AM

The Wheaton mystery animal a cougar? Maybe

Steve Miller Reporting
WBBM Newsradio 780


(WBBM) - It's still a mystery - whatever that animal is that's been prowling around Wheaton.

It was first reported as a possible cougar sighting in a wooded area of Wheaton. That was almost two weeks ago.

Then a second sighting this Tuesday along a creek bed in a more residential area of Wheaton.

Wheaton Deputy Police Chief Thomas Meloni says almost a dozen experts at Brookfield Zoo have looked at plaster impressions of the paw prints.

"The results were inconclusive, however they did conclude it was not a dog or coyote or fox. It's not a canine. It's a cat, most likely a cat, either a medium-sized cougar or another type of exotic cat."

The people who reported the sightings say the animal was black and, they thought, looked like a cougar.

Meloni says Wheaton has asked the Illinois Department of Natural Resources for help, and he says the DuPage County Forest Preserve police will patrol the area.



Contents of this site are Copyright 2009 by WBBM.
 
Swordfish find shocks fisherman
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/scot ... 292805.stm

The swordfish was discovered in the River Forth near Alloa
A 14 stone swordfish has been landed by a shocked fisherman in the River Forth.

Brian Hynd, 48, said he had set lobster pots in the river near Alloa "as an experiment" after hearing they had been caught in nearby Kincardine.

However, he instead caught a swordfish which was more than 9ft (2.7m) long and weighed about 200lb (90.7kg).

Mr Hynd, from Alloa, said that he plans to barbeque the swordfish, which is more commonly found in warmer, temperate waters.

He said that he set out with his nephew aboard their boat, the Telstar, from Alloa Harbour at about midday on Sunday to see if their lobster pots had proven successful.

He said: "There were no lobsters, which wasn't much of a surprise, but thrashing about caught in the ropes was this enormous swordfish.

"We got the shock of our lives."

Mr Hynd said the pair hauled in the fish and gutted it.

'Unusual creatures'

He added: "I've been fishing the river off Alloa man and boy since I was 10 years old and I've never seen anything like it.

"I've seen plenty of porpoises and even leatherback turtles, but never a swordfish so far up the river."

Dr Krishen Rana, a senior lecturer at the Institute of Aquaculture at Stirling University, who has studied photographs of the giant catch, said he was "surprised" it had been found in the River Forth.

He said: "Finding a swordfish on the River Forth would be very unlikely, although it's not an impossibility.

"There was a porpoise that had strayed up all the way to River Allan just a couple of years ago, which shows unusual creatures can be found far inland, but a razorbill swordfish would be very rare around these parts."

Dr Rana said that the tidal nature of the Forth meant there was a "good chance" it could have been washed up river.
[/quote]
 
Falkland Wolf Mystery

This is new to me:

How scientists cracked puzzle of the Falklands wolf
By Steve Connor, Science Editor
Monday, 2 November 2009

The origin of the mysterious Falkland Islands wolf, which was persecuted to extinction in the late 19th century, may finally have been solved – 175 years after Charles Darwin puzzled over the nature of this curious fox-like creature.

A DNA analysis of four stuffed museum specimens has revealed that the wolf did not, as previously thought, come to the Falklands as the pets of early South American natives who voyaged to the islands, but travelled there long before humans had populated the Americas.

The genetic study of tissue samples taken from the four stuffed specimens has revealed that they last shared a common ancestor more than 70,000 years ago, showing that the species must have come to the Falklands long before the end of the last ice age.

But even though the study has gone some way to clarifying the evolutionary origins of the Falklands wolf, the species still represents a great biogeographical conundrum because the Falklands have never been connected to the South American mainland and no other land mammals – not even small rodents – have managed to live there.

“It is really strange that the only native mammal on an island would be a large canid. There are no other native terrestrial mammals, not even a mouse,” said Graham Slater of the University of California, Los Angeles, whose DNA analysis of the Falklands wolf is published in the journal Current Biology.

“It’s even stranger when you consider that the Falklands are 480km [300 miles] from the South American mainland. The question is, how did they get there?”

When Darwin wrote about the wolf in 1834 during his travels on HMS Beagle, he noted how peculiar it was for such a large animal to be living on a remote archipelago. He also commented on its unusually tame nature, which led others to speculate that the animals must be the descendents of escaped pets brought to the archipelago by natives.

The wolves grow to the size of coyotes or large foxes, but are much stockier with thick, reddish fur and short muzzles, rather like grey wolves. Little is known about their behaviour but they probably lived off nesting ground birds, seal pups, insects and other grubs.

The DNA study found that the closest living relative of the Falkland Islands wolf, Dusicyon australis, is the maned wolf, an unusually long-legged, fox-like canid that lives on the South American mainland. But they last shared a common ancestor some 6 million years ago, Dr Slater said. “Canids don’t show up in the South American fossil record until 2.5 million years ago, which means these lineages must have evolved in North America. The problem is that there are no good fossils that can be assigned to the Falklands wolf lineages in North America,” he said.

Another close relative of the Falklands wolf is likely to be a canid species, called Dusicyon avus, which lived in Patagonia but went exinct about 7,000 years ago, Dr Slater said.

The Falklands wolf quickly went extinct after Europeans arrived on the islands from the 17th century. The last wolves are believed to have been killed in the 1870s by sheep farmers.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/scien ... 13521.html

The headline is misleading - the puzzle remains: how did they get there?
 
There were reports a few weeks ago of a wolf being spotted in the west Lothian area of Scotland
http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/break ... 5587955.jp
Given the description i`d guess it was a husky rather than a wolf (we have a husky who is incredibly wolf like). European wolves tend to have more of a reddish buff to their fur than their grey cousins. I guess its possible that some ABC sightings and the like can be mistaken for other beasts, but thats not to say that ABCs don`t exist! When i was 4 years old i saw what i thought at the time to be a brown bear during one of our family holidays to Ayrshire, my father had pulled into a garage to get some petrol and out of the corner of my eye i saw a huge lumbering brown fuzzy creature on the edge of a nearby woodland area. Of course, at that age i wasn`t aware it could have possibly been an angus cow or something like that lol!
 
Octopus found in Cornish crab pot

A fishing crew from Cornwall has hauled up a rare Mediterranean octopus in one of its crab pots.

The crabber was fishing off Falmouth when the octopus, measuring more than a metre (3ft), was discovered.

The species is normally found in warmer waters, but numbers are on the increase, possibly due to a gradual rise in sea temperatures.

The creature, which has been named Inka, is being cared for by staff at the Blue Reef Aquarium in Newquay.

An octopus has no skeleton, meaning it is very manoeuvrable and can fit through very small crevices and gaps.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/cornwall/8424715.stm
 
Although they weren't this rare Mediterranean species and thus not really out-of-place, friends of mine encountered octopuses (could it really be octopii?) while swimming in St. Austell Bay.
One afternoon I ventured into the garden to be greeted by the sight of the cat making it's way down the path with an octopus in it's mouth ! It was about 18inches long, and dead. We never had this confirmed but assumed it had crawled into a crab pot set by our neighbour, a keen boat fisherman, and that his wife didn't want to cook it ( well, there's not a lot on them really once you've removed the tentacles)
As an answer to that oft-asked, perennial question 'what's the strangest thing your cat ever brought home?' it takes some beating !
 
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