Minke whales are among the most widely distributed whales. They’re the only marine mammal species I’ve observed on both coasts of the United States, and to me that’s amazing. I’ve seen them a couple of times on trips to Monterey, California, but I used to see minke whales most often in the decade we lived in Maine.

“Jeffrey was appearing thousands of feet above where it should be,” Safford said. “Now everything is moving uphill, but Jeffrey pines are jumping, and that’s our mystery. We’re looking at the result, without having looked much at causes.”

He has a hypothesis, however.

Climate models predicted that the highest-altitude trees would continue to migrate up mountainsides, climbing — slowly — until they couldn’t climb anymore. And that’s happening. Last summer Safford and his team found three trees above 4,000 meters (13,124 feet), the first trees ever found at that altitude in the U.S. and Canada, outside of the southern Rockies.

But Safford says those models haven’t accounted for the role of seed dispersal by birds and other species. His number one suspects are Clark’s nutcrackers (named for explorer William Clark but slated to be renamed), clever corvids who use their strong beaks to extract pinecone seeds. They often bury them to eat later, serving as accidental gardeners in the process.

“The Clark’s nutcracker is a huge part of the story,” Safford says.

Dr Natalia Przelomska, from the University's Institute of the Earth and Environment, was part of an international team led by scientists from the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute (NZCBI) and the National Museum of Natural History.

The study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, place both extinct and living Hawaiian honeycreeper species into their evolutionary context, helping scientists better understand biodiversity loss and informing future conservation priorities.

More than 60 Hawaiian honeycreeper species evolved from a single ancestor on the Hawaiian Islands over a relatively short period, making them one of the world's best examples of adaptive radiation – the rapid diversification of one species into many new ones.

However, rapid diversification can make it difficult to reconstruct evolutionary relationships accurately. Today, that challenge is especially important because only 17 Hawaiian honeycreeper species remain, with most threatened by habitat loss, introduced diseases, invasive predators and climate change.

link to open access paper https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.2536533123

Until the Panamanian isthmus formed about 2.8 million years ago, North and South America were isolated continents with unique groups of animals. A riot of marsupials — mammals with brood pouches — and sloths in the south contrasted with camels, horses, pronghorn antelopes and saber tooth cats in the north.

Biologists thought that only after the isthmus formed did animals surge north and south, what biologists refer to as the Great American Biotic Interchange or GABI. That resulted in the extinction of a lot of South American species as North American species took over.

Yet this picture of mammal movements across continents is too simple, UC Berkeley paleontologists argue. After assembling and analyzing a new database of fossil mammals discovered in Mexico, they conclude that northern North American animals had already migrated into southern North America by about 10 million years ago, where they waited around in a kind of holding pen until opportunities arose for some of them to continue crossing to the south starting about 7 million years ago.

“Our study demonstrates for the first time that not only was there a set of significant pre-GABI phases that are different from the traditional Great American Biotic Interchange events 3 million years ago, but that this ramp up is much older than people thought or imagined,” said Jack Tseng, a Berkeley professor of integrative biology and leader of the study. “The ramp up began at the latest about 10 million years ago.”

New work explains how avocado trees coordinate a complex reproductive strategy, switching every day between male and female

The study: Balanced polymorphism in a floral transcription factor underlies the ancient rhythm of daily sex alternation in avocado

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/67645

Africa’s smallest wildcat uses abandoned springhare burrows to raise its kittens, according to new research. There are fewer than 10,000 black-footed cats (Felis nigripes) left in the wild and studies on these nocturnal animals are rare. To learn more about them, a team of researchers tracked five female black-footed cats (Felis nigripes) with radio collars and scanned more than 50 burrows in southern Namibia between 2020-21. The research found that 98% of the dens used by the cats had originally been dug, then abandoned, by springhares (Pedetes capensis), an endemic rodent which looks like a cross between a small kangaroo and a rabbit. The cats depend on springhares to provide the underground dens where the felines raise their kittens for the first six to seven weeks of life.  “I can’t prove black-footed cats would disappear without springhares, but at this site they would be much more vulnerable,” Harold Brindley, the study’s lead author and a researcher at the University of Cape Town, South Africa, told Mongabay contributor María de los Ángeles Orfila. F. nigripes in a springhare burrow in southern Namibia. Image courtesy of Harold Brindley. Researchers used laser-based, remote-sensing technology to measure tunnel dimensions and determine which species created them. The cats selected burrows with tunnel entrances between 10 and 27 centimeters (4 and 11 inches) in diameter. They ignored smaller rodent holes and larger aardvark or porcupine burrows. After the kittens reached about seven weeks of age, mothers typically transitioned from staying in one location for nearly a…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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link to open access paper https://academic.oup.com/ismej/article/20/1/wrag177/8725364

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/67449

"Shark Week," which kicks off this week, has captivated audiences for decades with stories of these powerful ocean predators. But the secret behind their extraordinary swimming abilities lies far deeper than their impressive teeth or iconic tails—it's hidden inside their spines.

From Biology News - Evolution, Cell theory, Gene theory, Microbiology, Biotechnology via This RSS Feed.

also see https://ecomagazine.com/news/research/fau-researchers-uncover-how-shark-vertebrae-are-engineered-for-speed-and-agility/

A new study, published in Royal Society Open Science, reveals that moss cushions produce surprisingly complex electrical activity, with patterns that undulate across the velvety patch in dynamic waves.

Stomata In-Sight: A new window into plant "breathing" could pave the way for crops that grow more food with far less water.

link to open access paper https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/marine-science/articles/10.3389/fmars.2026.1848226/full

From an ecological perspective, transboundary corridors like MOCOR are far superior to isolated MPAs, Verónica Relaño, a postdoctoral fellow at Spain’s University of Santiago de Compostela whose work focuses on marine protection effectiveness, told Mongabay in an email. Relaño is also the oceans director at the Germany-based NGO Onewater.

“Marine life — especially migratory species, larvae, and pelagic fish — does not adhere to EEZ [Exclusive Economic Zone] boundaries,” Relaño said. “Isolated MPAs often end up functioning as ecological islands and industrial fleets simply wait at the edges to ‘fish the line’. A corridor design connects critical habitats and protects entire migration routes.”

But large-scale designs can make governance challenging, according to Relaño, who codeveloped an index identifying “paper parks” by measuring the gap between a site’s formal protection status and on-the-ground enforcement. Relaño said that while well-protected MPAs can halt extraction and allow depleted populations of fish and other marine species to bounce back to healthy levels, paper parks lacking adequate management and enforcement often permit fishing fleets to continue extraction. Because these ineffective protected areas still count toward global 30×30 targets, nations might prioritize quantity over quality, she said.

“The greatest risk in a corridor design is the ‘weakest link’ scenario. If one country in the network lacks the monitoring or managing capacity or the political drive to enforce its boundaries, illegal and distant-water fleets will concentrate their extraction in that specific zone, undermining the integrity of the entire corridor,” Relaño said.

Researchers mapped their observations of hyperiid amphipods against depth, association behavior (associating in orange, free-swimming in purple), and eye structure (complex in blue, simple in yellow, and reduced in green). Illustration courtesy of Vanessa Stenvers

While water depth is an important factor in driving animal adaptations in the deep sea, scientists increasingly recognize that behavioral ecology may be just as important. Some hyperiid amphipods are symbiotic hitchhikers on gelatinous animals, while others have a free-swimming, predatory lifestyle. Combining a literature review, blackwater scuba photography, and submersible observations, the team has demonstrated that association behavior is linked to both eye diversity and camouflage.

Approximately one-third of hyperiid genera have adopted a free-swimming lifestyle, challenging the longstanding assumption that these amphipods only live on or in close association with gelatinous animals. The evolution of a free-swimming lifestyle correlates with body transparency and eye structure in hyperiids living in the upper waters of the ocean’s twilight, or mesopelagic, zone.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/9002851

A window on the wild: The best of British wildlife photography | Country Life

It's boxing day for the brown hares of Bintree in Norfolk, captured in Sarah Darnell's 'The Fur Flew'

(Image credit: Sarah Darnell/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Hello petal: A shower of pollen is scattered by a foraging bee illuminated in the glow of the sun in Alison Bell's highly commended 'A Kind of Magic'.

(Image credit: Alison Bell/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

A camouflaged flower crab spider blends in with the colour of the blooms in the hope of ambushing any unsuspecting bees, moths and other insects in Adam Ferry's 'Waiting on a Daisy'.

(Image credit: Adam Ferry/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Turning heads: Cate Barrow attracts the icy stare of a short-eared owl in her 'Upside Down Owl'

(Image credit: Cate Barrow/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

More than 250 of the winning and shortlisted images are published in 'British Wildlife Photography Awards Collection 14' (£35, Graffeg Books). Entries are now open for the 2027 competition.

(Image credit: British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Trouble afoot: A plucky juvenile starling struggles to escape the clutches of a sparrowhawk in Mark Parker's 'Nemesis', winner of the Animal Behaviour category.

(Image credit: Mark Parker/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

'So glad you could come': A dew-doused azure damselfly appears to beckon the viewer through a nibbled leaf that forms Lee Frost's 'Nature's Window'.

(Image credit: Lee Frost/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Someone to look up to: A fox cub is a study in adoration under the watchful care of its mother in Victor Soares's 'Admiration in a Fox's Eyes'.

(Image credit: Victor Soares/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

When time flies: A flurry of feathered seeds dances from the shaken head of a delicate dandelion clock as a bank vole contemplates sinking its teeth into the stem in Paul Williams's 'Zephyr'.

(Image credit: Paul Williams/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Flyleaf: a patchwork leaf-cutter bee in Chris Jackson's 'Bringing in the Leaves', which was highly commended in the Hidden Britain category. The bees cut discs out of greenery and glue them together with saliva to build cells to house their larvae.

(Image credit: Chris Jackson/British Wildlife Photography Awards)

Plants can detect the vibrations produced by running water, but they do not hear in the human sense. Their mechanosensory cells respond to these subtle movements, sometimes triggering changes in growth or gene expression that help locate moisture.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/8995275

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/63708

President Donald Trump's administration on Friday paved the way for letting US corporations destroy the habitats of endangered species by rescinding a longtime interpretation of the Endangered Species Act.

As reported by The New York Times, the Interior Department and the Commerce Department announced that they were narrowing the law's definition of what constitutes harming endangered species.

Whereas the law has for decades been interpreted as protecting endangered animals' habitats from significant "modification or degradation," the administration said that offenders would have to directly injure or kill an endangered animal to be considered in violation of the law.

"The change could open the door for fossil fuel companies, agricultural interests, land developers, and others," wrote the Times, "to disturb or even destroy the habitats of vulnerable species."

The Endangered Species Act has been interpreted as protecting animals' habitats for decades, and that interpretation upheld by the US Supreme Court in 1995.

Environmental advocates expressed horror in response to the rule change, which they said would put endangered species at unprecedented risk.

Kristen Boyles, attorney for Earthjustice, vowed that the administration would face legal challenges for its rule change, which she said would jeopardize endangered animals' ability to "raise their young, or search for food."

"Let’s be clear: There is no support for the Trump Administration’s rule—no scientific support, no legal support, no public support," Boyles said. "We will see the Trump Administration in court."

Ben Greuel, wildlife campaign manager at the Sierra Club, called the rule changed "a direct attack on the foundation of the Endangered Species Act" that, if kept in place, would put species "on a path to extinction."

"This rule ignores that reality in an unlawful attempt to open the door for corporate polluters to degrade vitally important habitats, wildlife be damned," Greuel emphasized. "The Endangered Species Act is a bedrock law that must be followed."

Tara Zuardo, a senior campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity, pointed out that "habitat destruction is the number one threat to endangered species," while calling the Trump administration's new policy "a death knell for America’s wildlife."

"If animals don’t have a place to live, they can’t live," Zuardo said. "Spotted owls, Atlantic salmon, Florida panthers, and thousands of other species need protections for the wild places where they make their homes."

Andrew Bowman, president and CEO of Defenders of Wildlife, accused the Trump administration of embracing an "erroneous and nonsensical interpretation" of the Endangered Species Act that he vowed to challenge in court.

"We intend to fight back with the full force of the law," said Bowman, "to defeat this attack and innumerable others by the administration on the statutes and regulations that protect America’s cherished wildlife."

From Common Dreams via This RSS Feed.

cross-posted from: https://hexbear.net/post/9013920

cross-posted from: https://news.abolish.capital/post/63630

The Smith family referred to the back part of their property as “the wasteland.” It opens up to the North Fork Toutle River in the U.S. state of Washington, which was swamped with volcanic sediment and runoff from the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens. The sediment was further backed up when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers constructed a sediment retention structure, or SRS, in 1989, and then raised it again in 2013, less than a mile, or a kilometer and a half, downstream from the Smiths. The goal of the project was to hold back sediment that would otherwise threaten the Columbia River’s shipping routes and southwest Washington communities. But it created a backlog of volcanic material that filled the stretch of the North Fork Toutle River that ran beside the Smiths’ property and to the dam. After the SRS was raised the first time, Mark Smith and his wife, Dawn, watched over the next few years as volcanic material accumulated for miles along the riverside portion of the Eco Park Resort: “So if you can imagine seeing a big gray sediment dune of no life, just ash, sediment from Mount St. Helens, volcanic material,” Smith told Mongabay by phone. Smith runs the nearly 80-acre (32-hectare) resort, a lodging and campground site alongside the Spirit Lake Memorial Highway. It offers the closest overnight accommodations to the volcano, so he often hosts groups of restoration ecologists and scientists. Through these researchers, and his family’s involvement in local environmental advocacy…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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