Chimpanzees in Senegal have been observed making wooden hunting spears according to a BBC news article.

Chimpanzees were observed jabbing the spears into hollow trunks or branches, over and over again. After the chimp removed the tool, it would frequently smell or lick it.



In the vast majority of cases, the chimps used the tools in the manner of a spear, not as probes. The researchers say they were using enough force to injure an animal that may have been hiding inside.



However, they did not photograph the behaviour, or capture it on film.



In one case, Pruetz and Bertolani, from the Leverhulme Centre for Human Evolutionary Studies in Cambridge, UK, witnessed a chimpanzee extract a bushbaby with a spear.

Maybe the anthropologists will capture this amazing event on video next time. Meanwhile, a Reuters article says an experiment has found that birds plan ahead by storing food.

They set up a careful experiment to allow the birds to cache food in a certain way if they were indeed planning, and found the birds were up to the task.



Their study, published in the journal Nature, adds to several others that show animals such as great apes and certain birds can plan ahead in much the same way as people do.



“Knowledge of and planning for the future is a complex skill that is considered by many to be uniquely human,” Nicola Clayton and colleagues at the University of Cambridge wrote.



“We show that the jays make provision for a future need, both by preferentially caching food in a place in which they have learnt that they will be hungry the following morning and by differentially storing a particular food in a place in which that type of food will not be available the next morning,” they added.

Nicola Clayton and the University of Cambridge research terms wrote in their report that, “Knowledge of and planning for the future is a complex skill that is considered by many to be uniquely human.” The experiment proves that birds are able to understand that they will be hungry in the future and plan for this future hunger by storing food.



Posted in Animals



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds

People who use wireless internet “show deeper engagement with cyberspace,” according to an American study.
While 54% of internet users check e-mail “on the typical day,” 72% of wireless users check daily.
Just under half of wireless users get news online every day, compared to 31% of internet users at large.
The Pew Internet and American Life Project […]

Skype is looking to a 1968 ruling by the U.S. Federal Communications Commission to open up the country’s mobile phone industry for “unlocked” devices and third-party applications—such as Skype.
The eBay unit, a pioneer in peer-to-peer VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol), petitioned the FCC this week to affirm that the landmark Carterphone decision applies to the […]

Google Inc. is unveiling a product today to compete with Microsoft Corp. and IBM Corp. in the multibillion-dollar business of providing e-mail, calendar, and other tools on corporate computer desktops.
The Web-based product, called Google Apps Premier Edition, also will include word processing and document sharing, instant messaging, and Internet voice capability. Google will offer […]

The Telegraph reports that global warming has allowed a vicious giant asian hornet called Vespa velutina to spread rapidly in France. The hornets are a huge threat to honey bees.

Thousands of football-shaped hornet nests are now dotted all over the forests of Aquitaine, the south-western region of France hugely popular with British tourists.



“Their spread across French territory has been like lightning,” said Jean Haxaire, the entomologist who originally identified the new arrival.



He said he had recently seen 85 nests in the 40-odd miles which separate the towns of Marmande and Podensac, in the Lot et Garonne department where the hornets were first spotted.



The hornets can grow to up to 1.8in and, with a wingspan of 3in, are renowned for inflicting a bite which has been compared to a hot nail entering the body.

The article says just a few of the hornets can “can destroy a nest of 30,000 bees in just a couple of hours.” It also says that France now has to import honey. 25,000 tons of honey are now imported into France each year. Global warming is already making many changes to ecosystems and the economy in Europe. The hornets are expected to eventually make it to Britain.



Some Asian bees actually have a unique defense trick to protect themselves from the giant hornets called heatballing. They bees surround a hornet and raise the temperature of the hornet with their body heat and literally cook it to death. Unfortunately, the European bees do not share this defensive behavior with Asian bees.



Posted in Insects



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds

Seattle’s KING5.com is reporting that some strange mystery dust in the form of an “ash-like powder” has been coating the vehicles and homes of Pugent Sound residents.

“We’ve never seen anything like this,” said David Creed.



About 30 miles away, residents in Lake Marcel north of Carnation awoke Sunday to the fine powder blanketing the neighborhood.



“Living out here in 40 years, I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Beth Marcey.



“Kind of volcanic. It reminded me of when Mount St. Helens blew,” said Bey Braun.



Above all, it has everyone scratching their heads.

So what is it tree pollen? A very thin layer of Volcanic ash? Pugent Sound residents want to know. KING5’s article also has a link to a video from KING5 that provides a much better look at the dust.



Posted in Weather



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds

There’s a new radiation symbol in town and it shows a person running away from dangerous radioactive waves. The red and black symbol also includes a skull and crossbones. The IAEA reported on their own launch of the symbol.

With radiating waves, a skull and crossbones and a running person, a new ionizing radiation warning symbol is being introduced to supplement the traditional international symbol for radiation, the three cornered trefoil.



The new symbol is being launched today by the IAEA and the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) to help reduce needless deaths and serious injuries from accidental exposure to large radioactive sources. It will serve as a supplementary warning to the trefoil, which has no intuitive meaning and little recognition beyond those educated in its significance.



“I believe the international recognition of the specific expertise of both organizations will ensure that the new standard will be accepted and applied by governments and industry to improve the safety of nuclear applications, protection of people and the environment,” said Ms. Eliana Amaral, Director, Division of Radiation, Transport and Waste Safety, IAEA.



The new symbol is aimed at alerting anyone, anywhere to the potential dangers of being close to a large source of ionizing radiation, the result of a five-year project conducted in 11 countries around the world. The symbol was tested with different population groups - mixed ages, varying educational backgrounds, male and female - to ensure that its message of “danger - stay away” was crystal clear and understood by all.

It is a scarier warning symbol than the old one.



Update 2-19-06: J-Walk has a funny explanation for the change: “My guess is that too many people were interpreting the old symbol to mean ‘reel-to-reel tapes nearby.’”



Posted in Health



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds

Google has created a searchable index of Google Earth data files, a feature that should make it easier for users to find and adopt third-party overlays for this popular mapping application.
Google Earth’s search engine now returns KML (Keyhole Markup Language) files which developers have created to add data to the application’s maps, the Mountain View, […]

Diggin’ Dinos is a summer celebration in honor of the 100th anniversary of the Science Museum of Minnesota. Diggin’ Dinos was announced today in St. Paul. Unveiling one of the 100 dinosaur statues that will roam the Twin Cities this summer were Dr. Eric J. Jolly, Science Museum of Minnesota, John Labosky, Capitol City Partnership, Jon Olson, Minneapolis Park Board, and Chris Coleman, Mayor of St. Paul.



They’ve also put out a call for artists to come and paint the dinosaur statues. What a cute idea!



Posted in Museums



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds

Parts of Upstate New York have seen tons over snow over the past few days — at least eight feet of it. The latest tally is 85 inches in Oswego country according to a 1010 WINS story. Some towns in Upstate New York have received 120 inches plus.

Persistent bands of squalls have swung up and down this part of central New York along the eastern shore of Lake Ontario since last Sunday, prompting Gov. Eliot Spitzer to declare a state disaster emergency in Oswego County.



The National Weather Service said Parish ? about 25 miles northeast of Syracuse ? reached a milestone early Saturday morning: 100 inches of snow over the past seven days. That was pushed to 110 inches by early Sunday with fresh snowfall. Unofficial reports pegged snowfall totals at 123 inches in Orwell and 131 in Redfield, but the weather service said those numbers included snow from a storm a couple of days before the latest run.



The winter wonderland was a magnet for snowmobilers, with one caveat ? stopping was out of the question. Dan Hojnacki of Syracuse was having a blast, flying over snowbanks along Main Street until his yellow Ski-Doo ground to a halt in a small field and he struggled mightily to get it out.



“You can’t stop or you’re done,” Hojnacki, 23, said. “I never got stuck until today, and I’ve been snowmobiling for 10 years.”



Hojnacki figured to have plenty of company before the day ended. After a morning respite, the storm picked up in earnest just after noon Saturday, cutting visibility to near zero.

Photographs and footage from the snow weary area show mountains of snow, buried cars and people shoveling snow off their roofs. Some photographs can be found at 9WSYR, News10Now, Flickr and the BBC.



Stu Ostro explains why the snow keeps banding over the same areas in this post on the Weather Channel Blog. There is some long overdue snow coming for the Northeast this week. Accuweather’s Henry Margusity is predicting a big storm with a widespread area getting a foot or more of snow.



Update: See a video of people digging out from all the snow here.



Posted in Weather



Permalink | Recent Headlines | News Feeds