If Hogle Zoo’s plans to jump-start an elephant pregnancy are successful, it could be years before officials will be able to identify the father.

German animal insemination experts made two attempts to set Christie down the road of motherhood as part of a national species conservation project, zoo spokeswoman Holly Braithwaite said. It will be at least six months before blood tests reveal whether the elephant is pregnant. A paternity test would have to wait until after the birth.

In 2004, Christie received an ultrasound that showed her reproductive tract was structurally sound. This week’s are the first attempts at artificial insemination.

The German team stopped at the zoo in Pittsburgh, Pa., on Sunday to collect a fresh sperm sample from a male elephant, she said. They then carried the sample onto a flight to Salt Lake City.

Genetic material from the Indianapolis zoo also was overnighted as part of the insemination procedure. A total of three samples - two from Pittsburgh - were implanted in Christie.

If the pregnancy takes, the German team would return to perform a follow-up ultrasound, which must be done inside the elephant, as the skin is too thick for traditional ultrasound techniques.

Christie has a 2 1/2 day fertility window that occurs three times a year, and she would carry her offspring for two years.

There is a special something that happens in the soul when a human looks up to see an eagle soaring. Some American Indian cultures are built around eagles and the American founding fathers made the bald eagle the symbol of the country, despite the contrary opinion of Benjamin Franklin.

Now comes word that Sussex County’s bald eagle population doubled this year with confirmation a new pair has built, and appears to be using, a nest in Sparta. Last year, a pair raised two young in a nest on the shores of Little Swartswood Lake in Stillwater, the first confirmed nest in the county in several decades. That pair appears to be caring for eggs again this year, according to state officials.

Last year there were 55 active nests in New Jersey of which 47 nests produced 82 young.

“We believe there’s going to be four to five new active nests this year over last year,” said Kathleen Clark, principal biologist for the state Department of Environmental Protection’s endangered species program. “Over the last five years, we’ve seen new records, three to five new nests per year,” she said.

While the location of eagle nests is only publicized in general terms by state and federal officials, the specific location is usually an open secret in the areas where eagles are found. With a growing population of bald eagles, nests now are often located much closer to human habitation, despite the eagles’ well-known aversion to human disruption.

Last year, the pair on Little Swartswood Lake were quickly spotted by the public and DEP personnel set up buoys in the lake to keep boaters the recommended minimum 1,000 feet away from an active nest. This past winter, the presence of ice fishermen on the lake seemed to be upsetting the eagles, even though the anglers were outside the markers.

DEP expanded the prohibited territory, a move which the eagles apparently liked since they are tending a clutch of eggs.

One problem for the new nests may arrive as the weather warms up and human outdoor activity increases. “What may be deserted and looks great to a pair of eagles in December (when nest building begins), could be heavily used in May,” said Clark. The Sparta location fits that description.

The fear of more human activity around new nests is also a concern for Pat Lynch, chief biologist for the National Park Service in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area, a 70,000-acre preserve which straddles the border between New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

Biologists there have spotted three active nests and one possible active nest, all on the Pennsylvania side of the river. One of the active nests is also readily accessible to the public.

Bald eagles take five years to mature and get their distinctive white heads and tails. At that point, they pair up and will stay mated until one of the set dies. Often an older eagle which has lost its mate will pair off with a young eagle and the newly paired couple will use the nesting site of the older partner.

It is possible, Lynch said, for a nest to have been used for several years and neither of the original nest builders is still alive. An eagle in the wild, once it matures, lives about 10 years, but there’s an estimated 80 percent mortality rate among juvenile eagles.

A pair can also outlive the life of a nest. One pair was on an active nest on the New Jersey side of the park in 2005 when a windstorm blew the nest out of the tree. Biologists recovered two eaglets, but one had a broken wing and could not be put back in the wild.

A temporary nest was built for the other youngster which the parents cared for until it learned to fly and left home.

While the 2005 adult pair finished raising that chick, the pair then disappeared. Because they were not banded, Lynch said it’s not known if that is the same pair which has established the new nest. This new site, in an oak tree in full view of the river, was partially built by the pair early last year.

It may take a couple of years for a pair of young eagles to “learn” to nest.

“They practice,” Lynch said. “They may build two or three nests. They may abandon a nest because it was being disturbed. When they decide on a spot, they begin housekeeping,” a sign they are laying eggs and trying to raise a brood.

The bald eagle population in the contiguous 48 states was down to a precious handful of successful nesting pairs in the 1960s and 1970s because of contamination from the pesticide DDT. While it did not kill eagles, DDT caused the eggs laid by females to have such thin shells, they would break in the nest.

In 1976, New Jersey had just one nesting pair, located in Bear Swamp in the southern part of the state. For six years, the pair tended to eggs, but no chicks hatched. Beginning in 1982, humans climbed into the nest, carefully removed the eggs and incubated them until they hatched.

The hatchlings were returned to the nest and the adult eagles successfully hacked ( raised ) several young.

The state began its own hacking program in the 1980s, importing very young eaglets from Manitoba which were then raised. Because they were brought here at a young age, the eagles imprinted on this area as their home territory.

The theory is that eagles, as they mature, will wander back to their home territory to find a mate and raise their own young. For the most part, the theory has proven correct and only Vermont still has a “hacking” program.

Eagles have rebounded so well there are hearings schedule this year on a move to take the bald eagle off the federal endangered species list, although several other federal and most state laws will still provide protection.

The state effort is augmented by a strong volunteer corps which provides much of the observation and protection of the eagle sites. “It takes a good neighborhood to protect an eagle nest,” Clark said. “They are our eyes and ears out there.”

The general public can also help. There is a check-off line on the state income tax form with the money going to the endangered species program. Fees from special license plates also go to the fund.

As the population of eagles grows, nesting pairs will begin filling in habitat that is suitable and settle territorial disputes among themselves. As to tolerance of humans, Clark said individual birds may adapt, “but I don’t see tolerance changing as a species.”

And that will create more challenges in keeping a necessary separation.

“For people, it’s natural to want a close wildlife experience,” said Clark. “And eagles are always going to be high on that special scale.”

Another report of a mysterious black panther, roaming a densely wooded area in western Upshur County. The latest sighting of a reported black panther is in an area off of Highway 154 near Rhonesboro, in an area called Raintree Lake.In a remote wooded area called Raintree lakes, residents are unnerved by the night time yowls of a big cat they believe is in their community.

“It’s a big black panther that’s what it looks like a big black cat” said area resident Mitchell Bransford.

For weeks many have heard it, and some have come face to face with it. Residents say they’ve not only heard the sound like a woman screaming, but they’ve seen it.

“I’ve seen him on two or three occasions and I’m not talking about a glance I’m talking just straight at him and him just looking at me, kind of gave me chills” said Bransford.

But wildlife experts say a black panther in east Texas is near impossible.

“It’s just not likely, there’s no such thing as a black panther, there are black jaguars, but it’s more likely that they’re seeing a black hog or a black otter” said Texas Parks And Wildlife biologist Charlie Muller.

But now pets are missing in the area, and some livestock has been killed, leading many to think a big cat is responsible.

“A lot of dogs have come up missing” said one neighbor.

“One of my calves was torn up torn a part stomach was ripped open throat ripped open” said area rancher Wayne Ballard.

Mountain lions do reside in East Texas and experts think, in low light, they are being mistaken for black panthers, which are actually South American Jaguars.

“It could and most likely is a cougar or mountain lion” said Muller.

If they’re out there Muller says someone will have to prove it.

“You’d have a better chance of finding bigfoot” said Muller.

Jaguars have been seen in Texas in the past, but Muller says the odds of a black one, which are very rare in the wild, residing in East Texas are extremely remote.

An environmental group said Tuesday it had captured a “monster” toad the size of a small dog. With a body the size of a football and weighing nearly 2 pounds, the toad is among the largest specimens ever captured in Australia, according to Frogwatch coordinator Graeme Sawyer.

“It’s huge, to put it mildly,” he said. “The biggest toads are usually females but this one was a rampant male … I would hate to meet his big sister.”

Frogwatch, which is dedicated to wiping out a toxic toad species that has killed countless Australian animals, picked up the 15-inch-long cane toad during a raid on a pond outside the northern city of Darwin late Monday.

Cane toads were imported from South America during the 1930s in a failed attempt to control beetles on Australia’s northern sugar cane plantations. The poisonous toads have proven fatal to Australia’s delicate ecosystems, killing millions of native animals from snakes to the small crocodiles that eat them.

As part of its so-called “Toad Buster” project, Frogwatch conducts regular raids on local water holes, blinding the toads with bright lights then scooping them up by the dozen.

“We kill them with carbon dioxide gas, stockpile them in a big freezer and then put them through a liquid fertilizer process” that renders the toads nontoxic, Sawyer said.

“It turns out to be sensational fertilizer,” he added.

A dog in China, given a drug used for treating human erectile problems, had to be hospitalized after mating with three females in a single day.

The dog was given intravenous drip in a hospital in Sichuan, reports the China Daily. Its owner, who considers her pet good looking, had been offering the dog’s services during mating seasons to other female dog owners wanting to raise puppies sired by the popular pet.

The report said the woman wanted to increase her seasonal stud fee income, which had averaged $128. She fed her dog the sex drug and forced it to mate with three females in a single day last week.

Be-Lona is starting to get used to standing on her own two feet — the only bad thing is, she’s used to four.

The 11-year-old sheep dog has had some medical problems recently and because of those problems she lost the use of her two hind legs. Although the dog is small for a sheep dog, between 60 and 70 pounds, her owner found he did not like having to carry the paraplegic pooch everywhere. He decided to do something about it.

To remedy the problem, Be-Lona’s owner Louis Nichols decided to build his dog a walker.

“She has arthritis in her hips and calcium growing in her vertebrate so she lost control of her hind quarters. I have had her about nine years and she started to have problems about a month and a half ago,” he said. “When it got to the point that we had to carry her around to do anything, we had to do something.”

To build the walker, Nichols said it cost about $40 and took about a day to build. The materials included a couple used walkers, wheels and then Nichols started sawing. Although Tuesday was her second day with her new wheels, Nichols said his dog is taking to the walker just fine.

“She took to it pretty good. We just use it when she is outside and we help her around in the house. Her and it take too much space up,” Nichols said. “Once we got her outside, she took off like a streak. It did not take her long to figure it out.”