The reintroduction of wolves to Yellowstone National Park has had a dramatic effect on its environment, helping to restore its ecological balance to a more natural state that was last seen half a century ago.

Since wolves were returned to America’s most celebrated national park in 1995 after an absence of 70 years, young aspen trees have started to grow again for the first time in more than 50 years, research has shown.

Although wolves have no direct impact on the growth of aspens – deciduous hardwood trees that are typical of the American West but in long-term decline – they have made their influence felt through what scientists have termed the “ecology of fear”.

Their return has halved the park’s elk population over the past decade, and those that remain have started to avoid browsing on young tree shoots in areas where they feel particularly vulnerable. The combination of these factors has allowed more saplings to thrive, so that some have reached heights at which they are no longer likely to be eaten by elk and other herbivores.

Scientists say that the phenomenon shows how the existence of a natural food web, complete with a top predator such as wolves, can benefit an entire ecosystem. The aspen is not the first tree to show signs of recovery since the wolves’ return.

“This is really exciting, and it’s great news for Yellowstone,” said William Ripple of the Oregon State University College of Forestry, who led the aspen study. “We’ve seen some recovery of willows and cottonwood, but this is the first time we can document significant aspen growth, a tree species in decline all over the West. We’ve waited a long time to see this, but now we’ re optimistic that things may be on the right track.

“The issue of aspen decline in the American West is huge, and their recovery will depend on local conditions and issues in many areas. In northern Yellowstone, we finally have some good news to report. It’s just a start, but it’s a pretty good start.”

Wolves were eradicated from Yellowstone, which is largely in Wyoming and takes in small areas of Montana and Idaho, in the 1920s, and the decline of aspen and cottonwood trees has been dated to precisely this period. Large trees that were at least 70 years old still stand, but few younger trees survived as new shoots were rapidly eaten by large herds of grazing animals, principally elk, that were no longer kept under control by predation. The loss of trees and shrubs had a major ripple effect throughout the ecosystem, say scientists. There was greater water erosion, a loss of beaver dams, and a breakdown of food webs. Birds, insects, fish and plants were all affected.

The new study, which is published in the journal Biological Conservation, has looked chiefly at aspen growth on land near to streams. It found that over the past decade – since wolves were reintroduced to the park in 1995 – some aspen saplings have grown more than 7ft, putting them above the height at which they can readily be browsed by elk.

The recovery has probably been influenced more by changed elk behaviour than by lower numbers – the elk population is still higher than it was in the mid1960s when aspens were in decline, even though it is much lower than it was a decade ago.

Professor Ripple said: “In riparian zones, where wolves can most easily sneak up on elk, and gullies or other features make it more difficult for elk to escape, we’ve seen the most aspen recovery.

“We did not document nearly as much recovery in upland areas, at least so far, where elk apparently feel safer. But even there aspen are growing better in areas with logs or debris that would make it more difficult for elk to move quickly.”

Robert Beschta, Professor Emeritus of Forestry at Oregon State, said: “When I first looked at these degraded ecosystems in the mid1990s in Yellowstone, I had doubts we would ever be able to bring the aspen back. There were so many elk, and the stream ecosystems were in such poor shape. The level of recovery we’re seeing is very encouraging.”

Duchess, the cow that broke records during her last lactation by milking 80 litres a day, has just given birth to a baby girl which is already showing signs of being a big producer.

Proud owners and Dairy Farmers suppliers, Cameron and Marie Lou Janke, of Westbrook, 15km west of Toowoomba, said the yet unnamed baby heifer has already shown traits of her mother.

“She’s huge,” Cameron said.

“And very particular - she’ll have a go at you if you try to get close.”

Cameron said he named all his cows, but so far, had not decided on a name for Duchess’s newborn.

“Somebody suggested Isabella because it was what Princess Mary called her new baby,” he said.

“I quite like it, as we think Duchess has a touch of royal blood.

“But I’d love to hear if anybody else has got any other suggestions – it gets hard finding names for a whole herd.”

Duchess is still recovering from the June 24 birth, which coincided with a cold snap.

“Also, it was a big baby, so she needs time to recuperate,” he said.

During her last lactation, Duchess produced 80 litres of milk per day, more than double the litres of any ordinary cow.

In an amazing feat, this genetically superior Holstein Friesian clocked up 17,750 litres at 3pc protein and 3.7pc butter fat within 305 days on just two milkings per day.

With Cameron’s herd average peaking at 35 litres per cow per day and considering Duchess was fed the same ration and mix of silage and grain as the rest of the herd, 27 year-old Cameron admitted she was a “pretty special” cow.

“We bought Duchess as a dry cow from a local breeder for $1200, but she originally arrived in Australia as an imported embryo from the US,” Cameron said.

“Her genetic make-up has a lot to do with her ability to produce milk, but you only get a cow this good after many generations of balanced breeding.

“She’s tall and wide and has a dominant personality – she also has a top udder.”

Interestingly, Cameron’s current number-one milk producer is actually Duchess’s first daughter, which is on her second lactation and producing 67 litres of milk per day.

“This is currently double that of my herd average, which leads me to think, she may even outperform her mother,” he said.

Cameron and Mary Lou manage a herd of 350 cows with Cameron’s parents, David and Cindy Janke, who own 400 hectares of land which they use to run their milking and dry herd, and grow silage crops.

A startling discovery of two massive prehistoric tusks - possibly the largest ever found in the world - could prove to be a “gold mine” for scientists seeking clues into Europe’s past, say Greek and Dutch researchers excavating the site in northern Greece.

The petrified remains of a mastodon - an elephant-like creature - with tusks measuring up to five metres long, were found in an area where excavations have uncovered the remains of several prehistoric animals over the past decade.

The research team said it was the largest tusk ever found from the primitive relative of the elephant.

“To find a tusk five metres long, that was a big surprise,” Evangelia Tsoukala, Assistant Professor of Geology at the University of Thessaloniki, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview from the site.

The second tusk found at the site near the village of Milia, 430km north of Athens, measured 4.6 metres.

“That’s absolutely astonishing. This is a fantastic find,” said Dave Martill, a palaeontologist at the University of Portsmouth in England, an independent expert not connected with the excavation.

“These animals, in their bones, hold a whole load of information about the environment at the time - not just the animal,” Martill said.

Because the tusks have “growth rings in them and you can analyse each individual layer and pick up signals about seasonality and climate. These offer fantastic potential for studying not just the animals themselves but ancient climates.”

Tsoukala led a team which excavated the two tusks from the same animal, together with leg bones and its upper and lower jaw still bearing teeth.

“It’s a very significant find because with these sections of the skeleton we can draw conclusions about this animal and its development,” she said. “We are also looking for clues about its extinction.”

Mastodons were similar to woolly mammoths but had straighter tusks as well as different teeth and eating habits.

They roamed Europe, Asia and North America, but how they became extinct remains a mystery. Mastodons are thought to have disappeared in Europe and Asia some 2 million years ago but survived in North America until 10,000 years ago.

Tsoukala said the male animal discovered in Milia lived about 2.5 million years ago.

“This animal was in its prime. It was 25 to 30 years old; they lived until about 55. It was about 3.5 metres tall at the shoulder, and weighed around 6 tons,” Tsoukala said.

Veteran Dutch researcher Dick Mol, who aided the Greek excavation, said he hoped the find at Milia could also yield clues about the mastodon’s extinction.

“It’s really a gold mine,” said Mol, a research associate at the Museum of Natural History in Rotterdam. “These are the best preserved skeletons in the world of this species.”

Plant material found near the tusks will be analysed in Greece and the Netherlands, and could give scientists a “better idea of the environment this animal was living in,” Mol said.

The Milia bone remains will also be scoured for the remote chance of finding DNA material.

Researchers from Germany and the United States recently analysed genetic material from an American mastodon recovered from fossils up to 130,000 years old found in Alaska, providing clearer insight into elephants’ evolutionary development.

If DNA is recovered from the much older Milia animal - which Mol acknowledges is “very doubtful” - it could allow researchers to compare it directly to European and American mastodons at an unprecedented level of detail.

The five-metre tusk at Milia was discovered last October by an excavation machine operator working at a sand quarry, but it took months for the scientific investigation of the site to be organised.

Tsoukala, who has been conducting excavations in the region since 1990, found another mastodon tusk measuring 4.39 metres in the same area 10 years ago. She said the latest discovery is more significant because the skeleton remains are more complete.

Locally excavated fossils are carefully removed from the ground after being protected in plaster “jackets,” and are currently displayed at the village’s tiny museum of natural history.

Tsoukala is urging the government to fund a new site.

“We need a new museum because this is valuable material for international reference,” she said. “Whoever wants to study this animal must come to Milia.”

A well-known tourist destination is preparing to welcome 250,000 overseas visitors.

Every year, migrating birds from as far away as Iceland, Scandinavia and Russia flock to Southport’s Ribble Estuary (UK) to rest and refuel.

A quarter of a million birds visit the estuary every year and the huge numbers and variety of birds make the Ribble one of the most important estuaries for wildlife in Britain.

RSPB guides will be at the end of Southport Pier from 11am to 4pm every Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday throughout August to help visitors get closer to the birdlife.

The RSPB’s Danny Hawker-Bond said: “We want to help people discover the amazing birdlife while getting views of some beautiful animals.”

Aniki is one tough and lucky Rottweiler as he managed to spend 29 days lost in the woods of Mount Seymour before being rescued by strangers.

The four-year-old dog was found on Saturday by a female hiker who saw him on her way to Brockton Point on the mountain. She saw the dog before telling a worker who was on the mountain. She figured that since the dog was alone in that manner that it must have been the missing dog Aniki.

Rescue coordinator Tim Jones stated “People actually found the dog and raised the alert. It was a textbook case of a dog rescue where the public was engaged and they found the dog.”

Aniki was hit by a car in the past and had to go through $11,000 surgery for a metal pin in his left hip. He was noticably tired towards the end of the rescue.

Paula Kelley is a reading volunteer on Tuesdays for the Grand Traverse/Antrim Migrant Summer School at Lakeland Elementary School in Elk Rapids. Bear, her golden retriever/collie mix, is a reading therapy dog.

They could go by car, but that’s 50 minutes away.

Instead, they take a 22-foot powerboat on a 15-minute jaunt across East Bay, and then a shuttle to the school where Paula reads to migrant students.

Bear, a trained therapy dog, is considered a “tool” that helps create a safe, inviting and non-judgmental environment for the kids.

“The dog is right there, but it’s a different approach,” school director Frances Medina said. “He’s like a buddy to get kids interested in reading.”

Younger students sat on the floor as Kelley read a book with Bear at her feet. The children learned that Bear, like each of them, needed to listen, sit down and not become distracted while Kelley read. Otherwise, Bear would get a “lizard brain,” or excited, she explained. Older students learned lessons on how animals, like humans, can make mistakes.

“It’s a different way of helping the idea of reading into a child’s mind,” teacher Lu-Ellen Baty said.

The six-week migrant education school is one of two operated in the Grand Traverse region by the 43-year-old Northwestern Michigan Migrants Projects. The other is based in Suttons Bay and is called Leelanau-Benzie Migrant School. The program will end Friday.

The Elk Rapids school has had 75 children from the ages of 3 to 21 enrolled this summer. The children come from Old Mission Peninsula, parts of Traverse City, Acme, Williamsburg, Kewadin, Ellsworth and East Jordan and are picked up in two buses.

Kelley adopted Bear from the Roscommon County Animal Shelter three years ago and the duo also volunteer in reading programs operated by the Peninsula Community Library based in Old Mission Elementary School.

MANILA, Philippines — Was the love bird searching for its pair?

An African love bird caused a commotion inside a Philippine Airlines (PAL) flight from Bangkok upon landing in Manila Sunday evening after it was seen fluttering through the passenger cabin as the last passengers disembarked from the aircraft.

PAL flight PR 731 had almost completed deplaning more than 260 passengers from the Airbus A-340 around 6:40 p.m. when flight crew spotted the lone bird flying inside the passenger cabin, said Glen Pastorfide, head of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources Wildlife Traffic Monitoring Unit (DENR-WTMU) at the airport.

“Customs officials boarded the plane for a routine check and saw that the flight crew were trying to catch the bird flying in the cabin … We are not sure yet how the bird ended up inside the plane,” Pastorfide told the Philippine Daily Inquirer on Monday.

The bird, about as tall as an outstretched palm, should not have been allowed entry into the country even through importation, said Pastorfide. The Philippines has a standing ban on live birds and poultry products from most Asian countries, including Thailand, to keep the country free from avian flu.

The airline could not say how the bird ended up inside the jet, but Rolly Estabillo, PAL corporate communications manager, said an unidentified passenger might have sneaked the bird into the aircraft during boarding back in Bangkok.

“Apparently, the passenger brought it inside but no one has come forward to say the bird was his,” Estabillo said when reached by phone.

Pastorfide could only surmise that the bird was placed in its owners’ carry-on bag, or kept inside the carrier’s jacket. If indeed it came all the way from Thailand, he wondered how the bird could have made it through screening at the airport there.

As soon as the bird was caught, WTMU officers carefully wrapped it in cheesecloth and turned it over to the airport quarantine office. The aircraft was meanwhile sanitized to get rid of any contamination inside the passenger areas.

“We had it sanitized immediately just to be sure because we don’t want the next passengers to be affected,” said Pastorfide.

Doctor Simeon Amurao, officer-in-charge of the airport Veterinary Quarantine Service, said the bird died due to extreme stress Monday morning, just before it was supposed to be euthanized per routine procedure.

The bird will undergo testing at the Bureau of Animal Industry’s (BAI) laboratory in Quezon City to determine whether it was ill before it died. WTMU will meanwhile continue investigation and locate the bird’s owner.

An albatross, found on a Somerset beach by a walker, has been released after a check-up by animal rescuers.

The bird, believed to be either a yellow-nosed or black-browed albatross, was discovered, apparently uninjured, on the beach at Brean on Friday.

After a once over by staff at the Secret World Wildlife Rescue Centre, near Burnham-On-Sea, it was released from a cliff top on Saturday afternoon.

The centre said it had been years since an albatross was seen in the county.

What do you feed worms? Worm Chow, of course, made by Purina just like Puppy Chow and Dog Chow and Cat Chow.

You can also feed them organic material.

And what do you get?

Wonderful stuff to enrich your garden.

“Everything they produce is used in organic gardening,” worm entrepreneur John Lask said last week, standing in the worm-breeding area in his Alamogordo home.

He and his wife Penny have a room-full of hybrid red worms in two incubators. There are thousands of red worms, the adults around 2 inches long.

It’s s hobby, Lask said. They’re really good pets, you just have to feed them. They don’t make any noise and you don’t have to house-break them or walk them.”

As a matter of fact, the worm droppings are valuable for fertilizer and compost.

When the Lasks are not raising worms, John runs the Alamo Tire service department and Penny is a certified patient account technician for gastroenterologist Dr. Juergen Muller.

Lask, 63, heard about the worm potential from a friend in Texas who was raising them. He decided it would be a good sideline as well as a hedge against the day he retires.

“It’s a business adventure and a hobby,” he said.

Worms are good things. They improve the soil. Our alkaline rock- and caliche-ridden soil does not provide a good environment for worms. If put directly into the soil, they would die.

However, a gardener can add worms into compost after it has heated and cooled, and add the worm-enriched compost to the soil, which will then improve the soil. The worms can continue to live and continue improving the soil.

Worms should be handled with plastic gloves, Lask said.

“They tell you to do that because the acids and oils on human skin could eventually render them sterile, and that would not be good for breeding worms,” he explained.

Worms are hermaphrodites; each is both male and female, but they require another worm to mate.

According to the literature, mature breeding worms mate, then release a ring, which sheds off and has both sperm and eggs inside. Both ends of the ring seal and form a cocoon. Two or more baby worms will hatch from one end of the cocoon in around three weeks.

“Every day I learn something I don’t want to know. I’m not really a worm person,” Penny said.

Maybe that’s because the worm operation took over what was going to be the family room.

“Now I live with John and the incubators of worms,” she said.

There are two 3-feet by 6-feet incubators, made of fiberglass and computer-controlled to keep the temperature between 72 and 80 degrees.

“If everything is just right, if they have food and water and the right temperature, they keep breeding all the time,” John Lask said. “I just come in every day and say, ‘Get to work, guys.’”

Lask has been in the worm business for about a year. “It takes about seven months to build up to the point you can harvest them. When you start with 30 pounds of worms, it doesn’t take long.”

Penny agreed: “They’re as bad as rabbits.”

To harvest the larger worms, Lask first lets them get a little hungry by not feeding them for a week. (Don’t worry about cruelty to worms; they can safely go a month without being fed, he said.) The larger worms come to the top of the damp paper and peat moss bedding, looking for food.

Then he places a filter of sorts made of 1/8-inch netting on top of the incubator, and puts Worm Chow or organic material on it. The adult worms go to the top to feed, and the babies drop through the mesh back into the incubator.

Lask dumps the worms into a plastic kid-sized pool, and feeds them. “Just like anything else, cows or pigs, you fatten them up before you send them to market,” he said.

He packages them for delivery, usually sending them in 60-pound packages, 20 pounds to a bag.

For every pound of worms, he puts in a pound of dirt and uses peat moss wet to the consistency of a damp sponge to keep them alive en route. “They ship well,” he said.

For example, he said he is sending worms to Kansas City and Iowa in the next two weeks. One batch goes to a company called Ecology Technology.

“They use the worms, thousands of pounds of them, from different suppliers all over the United States, to clean up organic waste and matter in old dumps, and the worms are real good at that,” Lask said.

He sifts the castings out of the bedding, and harvests the urine through a spout on a lower chamber on the incubator.

“It’s one of the best fertilizers, their castings worm manure and their urine,” he said. “The more you break down what you feed them, the faster they work on it and the more they breed, And the smaller the pieces are, the less smell there will be.”

Lask said the worm products are then tilled into the soil.

“You can’t put your compost pile in direct sunlight, it will be too hot,” he said. “Put it under a tree or in the shade, or build a lean-to over it.”

Lask said he “doesn’t make a habit” of selling his worms other than in bulk commercially, but he will make an exception for fishermen and local gardeners.

He usually sells worms in 3-pound packages, for $15 a pound.

Call him at 434-2251 for a price quote.

Better compost with worms

First, don’t use night crawlers.

“They are nomads, they will leave,” Dr. Curtis Smith said in a telephone interview. He is the New Mexico State University Extension horticultural expert.

Red wigglers, like those Lask sells, will stay in the compost.

Smith said worms will compost kitchen waste as well as yard waste. For an in-depth discussion, he refers gardeners to the NMSU Extension composting with worms guide, “Vermicomposting Guide H-164,” which is available at the Otero County Extension office at the fairgrounds, or online at www.cahe.nmsu.edu under Resources, Gardeners.

Vermicomposting says, in part, “Red worms and brandling worms prefer the compost or manure environment. Passing through the gut of the earthworm, recycled organic wastes are excreted as castings, or worm manure, an organic material rich in nutrients that looks like fine-textured soil.

“… Earthworm castings in the home garden often contain five to 11 times more nitrogen, phosphorous, and potassium as the surrounding soil. Secretions in the intestinal tracts of earthworms, along with soil passing through the earthworms, make nutrients more concentrated and available for plant uptake, including micronutrients.”

Here’s the method Smith said he would use in his own garden.

Build a worm bed. Take a 3-foot by 10-foot (or larger) piece of black plastic, and lay it on the ground. Start in a corner and put kitchen waste, like coffee grounds, carrot tops, lettuce trimmings, tea bags and corn cobs, and yard waste, under a corner of the plastic.

“Once you have a good population of worms you can use ‘forbidden compost,’ like macaroni and cheese, meat, bread, almost anything you could eat and didn’t,” Smith said.

Add worms. If you start with a quarter of a pound (In this small area), you should be OK. Cover the plastic with something like burlap bags of leaves and dry grass for insulation.

“When you see them begin to decompose the material, continue adding the kitchen waste in a zigzag pattern under the plastic, touching what’s already there,” Smith explained. “When you are ready to harvest your worms, when they have reached the end of the plastic where you started, pick up the worm castings with the worms in it, and build a pile in a sunny location. The worms will retreat to the center of the pile because they prefer darkness.

“Scrape off the outer edges of the castings pile and put them in the garden or use in potting soil. When you get to the center of the pile, you’ll find your worms have congregated there and you can collect those worms to start a new worm bed.

“The old worm bed can be roto-tilled and become an excellent garden.”

Lask said gardeners can use the castings for roses, tomatoes, whatever. “You are recycling kitchen waste, turning it into better soil, and providing yourself with fishing worms.”

Gardeners’ mailbag

Q. The leaves on my tomato plants near the ground get yellow spots then turn yellow and drop off. What do you suggest?

A. The easiest thing to do, according to “vegetable guy” Master Gardener Jim Money, is to simply snap off the spotted leaves before they drop. You should be feeding tomatoes at least at least once a week, with a good diluted soluble fertilizer, he said.

I note that the hot wind, in addition to the general heat and low humidity are taking a toll and putting your tomatoes, as well as most other plants, in stress.

Watering and a dose of fertilizer should help. Due to our water restrictions, I water three times a week. Try deep watering; if water doesn’t get to the roots it doesn’t do any good. One way to do this is punch holes in a piece of PVC pipe and sink it to root level. Another is to stick the hose nozzle into the dirt at the drip line (NOT the stem) and turn the hose on, medium-fine, for around 20 minutes. Bigger woody perennials like my apple trees I do 30 minutes.

Again, try using a Moisture Meter, which can be purchased in garden supply departments. Stick the metal probe into the soil at root-depth, and read the meter.

You cannot tell from looking at the soil, or sticking a finger into it, whether the roots are moist or dry.

Plan ahead

The next Master Gardener class sponsored by the Otero County Master Gardener Association through the New Mexico State University Extension will be held in the fall of 2008.

“In this area, we are way too busy in the spring,” said Connie Klofonda, president of the OCMGA.

Previously, the 14-week class has been held in the spring. It brings in expert NMSU speakers on a variety of topics.

Bev Eckman-Onyskow is an Alamogordo-based freelance writer and vice president of the Otero County Master Gardener Association.

A study conducted by University of Leeds researchers suggests that proteins that cause mad cow disease may be exploited to protect against Alzheimer’s.

In laboratory tests, the researchers observed that high levels of the prions in the brain prevented the accumulation of beta amyloid, the building blocks of Alzheimer’s ‘plaques’.

Study leader Professor Nigel Hooper says that the findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, are significant as they may lead to the development of new treatments for the disease.

In the human version of mad cow disease called variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (vCJD), the infectious prions corrupt the normal version of the prion protein present in brain cells, causing them to change their shape which in turn results in brain damage and death.

Given that Alzheimer’s and variant CJD are similar, the researchers looked for a link between the two diseases.

They found that the build-up of beta-amyloid protein was reduced when the levels of prions were high in the brain. Whereas, the formation of plaques went back up again when the level of the prions was low or absent.

The findings, which have also been confirmed by experiments on mice genetically engineered to lack the prion proteins, suggest that the prions may have a preventive effect on the development of Alzheimer’s.

The researchers are now planning to study whether ageing has an effect on the ability of the prion proteins to protect against Alzheimer’s.

‘Until now, the normal function of prion proteins has remained unclear, but our findings clearly identify a role for normal prion proteins in regulating the production of beta-amyloid and in doing so preventing formation of Alzheimer’s plaques,’ the BBC quoted Professor Hooper as saying.

‘Whether this function is lost as a result of the normal ageing process, or if some people are more susceptible to it than others we don’t know yet,’ he added.

He further said that more research was needed to determine whether the effects of the prions could be imitated to develop a treatment to halt the progression of Alzheimer’s.

The Alzheimer’s Society has hailed Professor Hooper’s findings by saying that this is the first time a link has been established between prions and Alzheimer’s.

‘These are early findings, which suggest prion proteins may have a regulatory effect on the development of beta amyloid,’ said Professor Clive Ballard, Director of Research, Alzheimer’s Society.

‘This provides the foundations for a novel approach to finding new therapeutic targets in Alzheimer’s disease,’ he added.