The Dirt: This Week in Nature

1. Madagascar Finds a Missing Dinosaur.

   An absence of dinosaur fossils from a period between 70 million and 165 million years ago formed an disconcerting gap for paleontologists who have searched for dinosaur remains in Madagascar. But it is now clear that Joseph Sertich of the Denver Museum of Nature & Science has found and identified a new species of carnivorous dinosaur that lived in Madagascar 90 million years ago. Sertich’s love of dinosaurs began as a childhood fascination,and he has already found a dozen new species. Dahalokely tokana (meaning “lonely small bandit” in the local tongue, Malagasy) was between 9 and 14 feet long and is related to other meat eaters from the southern hemisphere whose fossils already have been discovered.

   More at Denver Post.

2. Pumas on the Edge of Civilization.

   In California’s Santa Cruz mountains a distinctive mountain lion known as a puma lives its life in the shadow of human civilization. After three years of tracking pumas in the region, researchers have published their findings on how well the puma has adjusted to human incursion into its mountainous terrain. Pumas are most susceptible to human activity when it comes to reproductive behavior and denning. They need a significant amount of buffer between these activities and human presence. In the study, about 37 animals were harnessed with radio and GPS transmitting collars. The results show that the greatest dangers pumas face are the gunshots from ranchers when they attack livestock such as goats. Next on the list are highways, which pumas sometime cross only to become traffic casualties.

3. New Zealand Tree Rings Hint at Past Climate.

   Tree rings have long been used to count the years each ring representing a year of growth. However, the kauri tree of New Zealand is revealing much more. The kauri tree rings are so distinct and readable that researchers say they act as a “diary” of earth’s weather in the Southern Hemisphere. For example, the 5 to 7 year El Niño cycle, which causes global storms during its peak, has left a distinct impression on the kauri trees. Dendrochronologist Anthony Fowler has studied the rings and has concluded that El Niños have become more severe over the past 500 years. Gretel Boswijk, a dendrochronologist from New Zealand’s South Island has led the field in studying the kauri tree rings and in this interview with National Geographic, she explains the importance of her work.

4. Cloning the Redwoods.

   California’s iconic giant redwood trees the world’s largest have earned the awe of tourists for decades. Today, climate change threatens their very existence. An organization called the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive (AATA), the brainchild of David Milarch, a layman who has made this cause his life’s work, has come up with an audacious long term plan to save the redwoods forests. Using new technology, experts have cloned saplings from some of the largest and most successful of the redwoods. In addition to new sites in California and Oregon, the cloned saplings will be exported to seven foreign countries where the climate is expected to be hospitable: Germany, Ireland, Wales, Great Britain, New Zealand, and Australia. Although the clones are only 18” tall today, when successfully planted and cared for, they can grow up to ten feet a year and live for thousands of years.

5. Not Your Average Petting Zoo.

   The Lujan Zoo outside Argentina’s Buenos Aires is not your average petting zoo. For a fee of around $25, visitors get to “pet” and feed exotic animals, including tigers and lions. The 37 acres of zoo house wild animals that have been tamed with the help of dogs, to acclimate the animals to close contact with human visitors. The animals are also kept well-fed, especially the predators. Critics charge that the concept is flawed and that the zoo is dangerous for humans as well as the animals. Some visitors report that the animals seemed sedated. A representative from Florida’s Big Cat Rescue group was more direct, “The risk of injury and disease to humans, associated with big cat cub handling, is significant.

6. Nature’s Ugly Side.

   Nature is not always beautiful to the human eye, and its logic is sometimes cold. National Geographic reports on rare footage of a male leopard killing and eating a leopard cub. Although not often discussed, infanticide is relatively common, especially among large cats. The reasons are in a sense evolutionarily sound. Killing the cub of another male will bring the mother leopard back into estrus, and thus make it more likely that the killer male leopard will father his own brood of cubs with her. Once he does father his own cubs, the male leopard will care for and protect them.

7. “Brinicles” and the Search for Life’s Origins.

   Over the years, much has been written about hot thermal vents in the ocean as a potential source for the origin of life on earth. Recently, however, a phenomenon known as brinicles has been getting some attention from scientists. Brinicles form in very cold water, usually under sea ice, when a column of freezing water moves downward away from the surface. The brinicle that results is nonsalinized ice that can foster the formation of “membranes, electric potentials and chemical gradients,” all of which might be precursor conditions needed for life to form. Scientists are also interested in whether the brinicle process takes place in extraterrestrial environments, such as the liquid seas of Jupiter’s moons.

8. The Other Pollinator.

   What insect pollinates flowers? Bees, of course, but don’t overlook another important pollinator: ants. Ants, which also love sweet nectar, are important pollinators and in some flowers, nectar chemistry is specifically adapted to producing the kind of nectar ants favor. But the relationship is complicated. It is now known that ants introduce yeast cells carried on their bodies into the flowers they visit, which in turn changes their chemistry. The yeast cells cause the sugars fructose and glucose to be created in greater quantities, while sucrose sugar levels decrease. This is good for ants but it may have a negative impact on other pollinators who visit, such as bees. The complex relationship between flowers, ants, yeast and other pollinators will be the subject of researchers for some time to come.

9. Meet “Tinkerbell,” A New Species of Microscopic Insect.

   The fairyfly is a kind of parasitic wasp that lends new meaning to the word diminutive. A new species from Costa Rica, nicknamed “Tinkerbell” (Tinkerbella nana), has recently been identified. It like other fairy flies feeds off the eggs and larvae of other insects. They are so small (just one quarter of a millimeter the size of the tip of a fine point pen) that they can only be spotted under the microscope, usually while scientists sift through the insect eggs that the fairy flies infest. Although small, the insect’s microscopic features are fully formed including six legs, eyes, and wings. They are also farmer friendly; in fact,farmers import fairy flies to reduce insect pest populations that attack their crops.

“The Dirt: This Week in Nature” curated and written by Robert Raciti.