Ship lay-up woes near Singapore could worsen

Smaller operators resort to anchorage outside port limits
Vincent Wee, Business Times 21 May 09;

(SINGAPORE) If more ships are laid up in the waters around Singapore, it would pose a difficult situation in the future, warned prominent shipmanager Thome's general manager of its marine consulting arm.

'I believe there should be some sort of agreement between Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia to deal with the situation,' said Thome Marine Consultants general manager Raul Matovic.

The outside port limits anchorages, commonly referred to as OPL, are stretches of water just outside the port limits of the respective ports and the approaches to the port.

They are generally unsupervised and unregulated.

The demand for lay-up services continues to rise as the shipping industry remains in the doldrums.

While the majority of big shipowners and operators would not lay up their vessels in these places, there are smaller operators that may have no qualms about doing so.

Thome provides services for owners to lay up their ships properly and only anchors vessels in approved anchorages in Labuan and Batam.

And if the level of enquiries that Mr Matovic is seeing for these services is mirrored in the non-approved sector of the lay-up market there is set to be an explosion of ships at OPL anchorages.

The outside port limits anchorage problem is not just in the waters around Singapore.

In the Middle East, a lay-up anchorage is starting to emerge around Fujairah as ships trading the Middle East and Europe start to find refuge there.

Reputable lines like Maersk, Mitsui OSK Lines and NYK Lines will not jeopardise their reputation and expensive vessels, some of which are fresh out of the newbuild yards, by laying them up in unapproved areas.

There are risks from collision as well as safety and maintenance issues, Mr Matovic pointed out.

But with so many ships being mothballed, both anchorage space and the capacity of the ship managers is being stretched.

'Lay-up anchorages are getting very full and I know of at least four managers that are not taking anymore ships,' said Mr Matovic, adding that there are currently an estimated 100 ships laid-up off Batam.

'The level of enquiries has been hot,' he said.

Mr Matovic said he would ideally not like to take on more than 20 vessels at a time for his lay-up services in order to maintain the level of service that Thome guarantees, although this might be increased if more space is found near Batam, where it is easy for the supervisors to monitor the vessels from Singapore.

It is a big responsibility as Thome takes care of everything from dealing with the port authorities to handling the paperwork as well as the technical aspects such as ensuring the ship's equipment is maintained and the vessel is able to be reactivated quickly and without problems when there is a need for it.

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Snorkel teams can assess climate impact on corals

Deborah Zabarenko, Reuters 20 May 09;

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Teams of snorkel-wearing scientists could be warriors against the ravages of climate change on coral reefs, the International Union for Conservation of Nature reported on Wednesday.

Small teams of observers, wearing snorkels, swim fins and masks and carrying underwater note paper or slates and measuring tape, could make rapid assessments of how coral formations are faring as the world's oceans get warmer, the group said at a briefing.

Warmer waters can contribute to the bleaching of coral reefs, a process in which microscopic plants that live on and nourish the coral are lost; without these plants, coral can die in a matter of weeks.

Coral reefs are also under threat from ocean acidification as a result of long-term emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

Oceans have absorbed some 525 billion tons of this gas over the last 200 years, about a third of all the carbon dioxide humans have generated; when carbon dioxide combines with sea water, it forms the corrosive carbonic acid.

Coral reefs are considered sentinel ecosystems, one of several on Earth that are now showing the impact of climate change. They also furnish food and medicines to coastal communities worldwide and act as protection for coastlines.

"It's probably one of the first ecosystems, together with maybe mountain systems, that show a global change in response to climate change," said Jerker Tamelander, a specialist in the conservation group's Indian Ocean Marine Program.

"It warns us of future change. ... It also gives us an opportunity, it gives us a testing ground and methods for ensuring adaptation, for ensuring that the systems don't degrade any further," Tamelander said at the briefing.

Global climate change causes much of the damage to coral reefs, but human activities on a local scale -- including overfishing and pollution from agriculture and other land-based sources -- are the main drivers of damage, said the group's Gabriel Grimsditch.

Fast assessments of the coral's condition can help guide policy and ease protection, Grimsditch said.

There are 40 variables that can indicate whether the coral is resilient, but three of the main ones are the size of the coral population, how many plant-eating fish and how big the algae populations are around the reef, Grimsditch said.

Sea level rise, which is projected to occur this century as the world's glaciers melt, would not necessarily kill coral reefs, Tamelander said, since the reefs can grow as waters get higher.

"A healthy reef should be able to keep up," Tamelander said.

Manage corals - Minimize climate change
IUCN 20 May 09;

A better assesment of the threats to coral reefs along with improved management will give corals a much higher chance of survival in the face of warming oceans, says IUCN’s latest report.

“We already know that climate change is destroying coral reefs through warming waters that cause coral bleaching and through acidifying oceans that hinders coral skeleton growth. We also know that if we want to save these beautiful living entities we must do something about it immediately,” says Gabriel Grimsditch, IUCN Corals Expert.

“By better understanding and management of stresses on corals such as unsustainable and destructive fishing practices or unregulated coastal development, we can increase the chance of coral survival, even as climate change warms the oceans.”

The report, Resilience Assessment of Coral Reefs - Rapid assessment protocol for coral reefs, focusing on coral bleaching and thermal stress, shows that the amount of damage done to corals depends not only on the rate and extent of climate change, but also on the ability of coral reefs to cope with change. This report outlines a protocol that defines basic resilience indicators that can be quantified using rapid assessment methods.

“Unmanaged, these stresses have the potential to act in synergy with climate change to functionally destroy many coral reefs,” says David Obura, Director of Coastal Oceans Research and Development East Africa. “While science is providing important insights about climate change impacts on coral reefs, strategies for managing them are only just emerging.”

The need for quick results for measuring coral reef resilience is becoming increasingly acute, especially in the developing world. It is crucial to develop monitoring and assessment protocols to build an understanding of bleaching resistance and resilience indicators for application in management, and to determine how Marine Protected Area management actions can influence resilience and resistance.

"Research assessment for coral reefs builds our understanding of past management actions in maintaining the resilience of coral reefs, and helps managers combat the effects of climate change,” says Carl Gustaf Lundin, Head of IUCN’s Global Marine Programme. “Greater investment must be made in using research findings for adaptive management.”

“The story of coral reefs is particularly powerful and compelling, being one of the first ecosystems to clearly show climate change impacts, and being well-understood, highly visible and charismatic,” adds Lundin. “As a result, increasing our knowledge base of resilience-based science, management and policy for coral reefs has broader value for other ecological and human systems globally.”

“Findings from coral reefs should be more efficiently incorporated into the United Nations’ climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in December.”

Download the report: Resilience Assessment of Coral Reefs: Rapid assessment protocol for coral reefs, focusing on coral bleaching and thermal stress (2.32MB)

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Heat-tolerant Coral Reefs Discovered: May Survive Global Warming

ScienceDaily 19 May 09;

Experts say that more than half of the world's coral reefs could disappear in the next 50 years, in large part because of higher ocean temperatures caused by climate change. But now Stanford University scientists have found evidence that some coral reefs are adapting and may actually survive global warming.

"Corals are certainly threatened by environmental change, but this research has really sparked the notion that corals may be tougher than we thought," said Stephen Palumbi, a professor of biology and a senior fellow at Stanford's Woods Institute for the Environment.

Palumbi and his Stanford colleagues began studying the resiliency of coral reefs in the Pacific Ocean in 2006 with the support of a Woods Institute Environmental Venture Project grant. The project has expanded and is now being funded by Conservation International and the Bio-X program at Stanford.

"The most exciting thing was discovering live, healthy corals on reefs already as hot as the ocean is likely to get 100 years from now," said Palumbi, director of Stanford's Hopkins Marine Station. "How do they do that?"

Corals in peril

Coral reefs form the basis for thriving, healthy ecosystems throughout the tropics. They provide homes and nourishment for thousands of species, including massive schools of fish, which in turn feed millions of people across the globe.

Corals rely on partnerships with tiny, single-celled algae called zooxanthellae. The corals provide the algae a home, and, in turn, the algae provide nourishment, forming a symbiotic relationship. But when rising temperatures stress the algae, they stop producing food, and the corals spit them out. Without their algae symbionts, the reefs die and turn stark white, an event referred to as "coral bleaching."

During particularly warm years, bleaching has accounted for the deaths of large numbers of corals. In the Caribbean in 2005, a heat surge caused more than 50 percent of corals to bleach, and many still have not recovered, according to the Global Coral Reef Monitoring Network, an international collaboration of government officials, policymakers and marine scientists, including Palumbi.

Havens of healthy reefs

In recent years, scientists discovered that some corals resist bleaching by hosting types of algae that can handle the heat, while others swap out the heat-stressed algae for tougher, heat-resistant strains. Palumbi's team set out to investigate how widely dispersed these heat-tolerant coral reefs are across the globe and to learn more about the biological processes that allow them to adapt to higher temperatures.

In 2006, Palumbi and graduate student Tom Oliver, now a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford, traveled to Ofu Island in American Samoa. Ofu, a tropical coral reef marine reserve, has remained healthy despite gradually warming waters.

The island offered the perfect laboratory setting, Oliver said, with numerous corals hosting the most common heat-sensitive and heat-resistant algae symbionts. Ofu also has pools of varying temperatures that allowed the research team to test under what conditions the symbionts formed associations with corals.

In cooler lagoons, Oliver found only a handful of corals that host heat-resistant algae exclusively. But in hotter pools, he observed a direct increase in the proportion of heat-resistant symbionts, suggesting that some corals had swapped out the heat-sensitive algae for more robust types. These results, combined with regional data from other sites in the tropical Pacific, were published in the journal Marine Ecology Progress Series in March 2009.

Global pattern

To see if this pattern exists on a global scale, the researchers turned to Kevin Arrigo, an associate professor of environmental Earth system science at Stanford and an expert on remote satellite sensing of marine microalgae. Arrigo gathered worldwide oceanographic data on a variety of environmental variables, including ocean acidity, the frequency of weather events and sea-surface temperature.

Oliver then compiled dozens of coral reef studies from across the tropics and compared them to Arrigo's environmental data. The results revealed the same pattern: In regions where annual maximum ocean temperatures were above 84 to 88 degrees Fahrenheit (29 to 31 degrees Celsius), corals were avoiding bleaching by hosting higher proportions of the heat-resistant symbionts.

Most corals bleach when temperatures rise 1.8 F (1 C) above the long-term normal highs. But heat-tolerant symbionts might allow a reef to handle temperatures up to 2.6 F (1.5 C) beyond the bleaching threshold. That might be enough to help get them through the end of the century, Oliver said, depending on the severity of global warming.

A 2007 report by the United Nations International Panel on Climate Change concluded that the average surface temperature of the Earth is likely to increase 3.6 to 8.1 F (2 to 4.5 C) by 2100. In this scenario, the symbiont switch alone may not be enough to help corals survive through the end of the century. But with the help of other adaptive mechanisms, including natural selection for heat-tolerant corals, there is still hope, Oliver said.

"These findings show that, given enough time, many corals can match hotter environments by hosting heat-resistant symbionts," he explained. "While hopeful, the work also suggests that modern environments are changing so rapidly that corals may not be able to keep up. It comes down to a calculation of the rates of environmental change versus the rates of adaptation."

Heat-resistant corals also turn out to be more tolerant of increases in ocean acidity, which occurs when the ocean absorbs excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere—another potential threat to coral reefs. This finding suggests that corals worldwide are adapting to increases in acidity as well as heat, Oliver said, and that across the tropics, corals with the ability to switch symbionts will do so to survive.

Future protection

The problem of coral bleaching comes down to a collapse of the algae at the cellular level, Oliver explained. But the molecular biology of corals and their zooxanthellae under stress is shockingly understudied, he added.

To examine the corals and their symbionts at the molecular level, the researchers are collaborating with John Pringle, a professor of genetics at Stanford. Pringle and his lab have set up tanks where anemones, corals and their algae are exposed to a variety of treatments, including changes in temperature, acidity and light. That research is ongoing.

"What I hope is that we will learn some really deep and interesting things about the cellular and genetic mechanisms that allow this symbiosis to function, and about the mechanisms that come into play when the symbiosis is breaking down under stress," Pringle said. "The longer-range hope is that having that understanding will contribute to efforts in coral conservation."

The ultimate goal is to find protein biomarkers that indicate signs of heat stress and potential heat resistance, Oliver explained. Then coral reef managers could go to a reef, take small coral samples and test for the presence of the biomarkers to see how resilient the reef will be to higher temperatures.

"With this tool, managers could identify existing populations that may be more resistant to climate change and potentially prioritize their protection from everything else that kills coral reefs, like fishing and [agricultural] runoff," Oliver said.

"Although we are doing things to the planet we have never done before, it's hard to imagine that these corals, which have existed for a quarter of a billion years, only have 50 years left," Palumbi said. "And part of our job might be to figure out where the tougher ones live and protect those places."

Journal reference:

Oliver TA, Palumbi SR. Distributions of stress-resistant coral symbionts match environmental patterns at local but not regional scales. Marine Ecology Progress Series, 2009; 37893 DOI: 10.3354/meps07871

Adapted from materials provided by Stanford University.

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Fungus threatens to wipe out Philippine frogs

Yahoo News 20 May 09;

MANILA (AFP) – A deadly frog fungus that has wiped out hundreds of amphibian species in the Americas is now devastating the populations of five frog species in the Philippines, experts said Wednesday.

A two-year nationwide survey by a team of US and Filipino scientists found that the Philippines has become the third country in Asia to be hit by the chytrid fungus.

The fungus, which attacks the skin of frogs and salamanders and affects the formation of tadpoles' body parts, is also present in Japan and Indonesia.

The Luzon striped frog, Rana similis, one of five affected endemic species, has practically disappeared from the lowland forests of Mount Labo on the southeast tip of the main Philippine island of Luzon, said Arvin Diesmos, curator of amphibians and reptiles at the National Museum of the Philippines.

The Luzon stream frog (Rana luzonensis), two species of the Luzon fanged frog (Limnonectes woodworth and Limnonectes macrocephalus), and the Puddle frog (Occidozyga laevis) were also found to be infected in Labo and the Palay-palay mountain range near Manila.

The nocturnal, stream-dwelling frogs form part of the diet of Philippine fauna, many of them threatened with extinction.

"This is a very serious threat to amphibian biodiversity in the Philippines," said Rafe Brown, Diesmos' counterpart at the University of Kansas Biodiversity Institute and a member of the study team.

"The Philippines is home to an incredibly diverse amphibian fauna. Along with forest destruction, pollution, and climate change, chytrid fungus may turn out to be the 'final blow' that sparks major amphibian extinctions in the archipelago," he added.

He said the team that took part in the study suspects all of these factors could be linked to the spread of the fungus.

At least 592 of the country's 1,137 endemic species of amphibians, birds and mammals are either threatened or endangered, according to the environment and natural resources department.

The Philippines has about 110 species of frogs, 80 percent of them endemic to the country, Diesmos said.

The naturally-occurring chytrid fungus has been linked to "hundreds" of amphibian extinctions in Europe, Australia and the Americas, according to Brown.

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Europe's frogs and snakes in danger: study

Reuters 20 May 09;

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - One fifth of Europe's reptiles and nearly a quarter of its amphibians are in danger because of the threat humans pose to their natural habitat, according to a study carried out for the European Commission.

The tortoise family, vipers, wall lizards such as the Tenerife speckled lizard, and pond turtles are among those threatened, said the report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature.

Carpetane Rock Lizard. Photo: Iñigo Martinez-Solano

"Natural habitats across Europe are being squeezed by growing human populations, agricultural intensification, urban sprawl and pollution -- that is not good news for either amphibians or reptiles," said Dr Helen Temple, co-author of the Red List.

It highlighted Spain, Portugal, Italy, the Balkans and the Mediterranean islands as some of the most important reptile habits.

"Southern Europe is particularly rich in amphibians, but climate change and other threats are placing its freshwater habitats under severe stress," Temple said.

About 42 percent of reptiles and 59 percent of amphibians are in decline, compared to 27 percent of mammals, the report found.

The frog family, midwife toads and fire-bellied toads are among those threatened, as are all three families of newts and salamanders.

Shrinking habitats was the biggest threat to amphibians, affecting 17 of the 76 species, followed by pollution and invasive foreign species, such as predatory fish and fungal diseases.

The Red List is publicly available at http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/conservation/species/redlist/

(Reporting by Pete Harrison; Editing by Angus MacS here (Reporting by Pete Harrison; Editing by Angus MacS wan)

Europe’s amphibians and reptiles under threat - IUCN
IUCN 20 May 09;

One fifth of Europe’s reptiles and nearly a quarter of its amphibians are threatened, according to new studies carried out by IUCN for the European Commission.

The studies, released on International Biodiversity Day, are the first European Red Lists for amphibians and reptiles, and reveal alarming population trends. More than half of all European amphibians (59 percent) and 42 percent of reptiles are in decline, which means that amphibians and reptiles are even more at risk than European mammals and birds.

For 23 percent of amphibians and 21 percent of reptiles the situation is so severe that they are classified as threatened in the European Red List. Most of the pressure on these declining species comes from mankind's destruction of their natural habitats, combined with climate change, pollution and the presence of invasive species.

“Southern Europe is particularly rich in amphibians but climate change and other threats are placing its freshwater habitats under severe stress," says Dr Helen Temple, co-author of the study and Programme Officer for the IUCN Red List Unit. "Natural habitats across Europe are being squeezed by growing human populations, agricultural intensification, urban sprawl and pollution. That is not good news for either amphibians or reptiles.”

"On World Biodiversity Day, this is a sobering discovery," says Stavros Dimas, European Commissioner for the Environment. "Despite strong legislation protecting our habitats and most of the species concerned, almost a quarter of Europe's amphibians are now under threat. This reflects the enormous pressure we are placing on Europe's plants and animals, and underlines the need to rethink our relation to the natural world. I therefore call on citizens, politicians and industrialists to reflect on our recent Message from Athens, and factor a concern for biodiversity into the decisions they make. These trends cannot continue."

Europe is home to 151 species of reptiles and 85 species of amphibians, many of which are found nowhere else in the world. Six reptile species including the Tenerife Speckled Lizard (Gallotia intermedia) and the Aeolian Wall Lizard (Podarcis raffonei) have been classified as Critically Endangered, meaning that they face an extremely high risk of extinction in the wild.

Eleven more are classified as Endangered, meaning they face a very high risk of extinction in the wild, and 10 as Vulnerable, meaning they face a high risk of extinction in the wild. Among amphibians, a group that includes frogs, toads, salamanders and newts, two species have been classified as Critically Endangered: the Karpathos Frog (Pelophylax cerigensis) and the Montseny Brook Newt (Calotriton arnoldi), Spain's only endemic newt. Five more, including the Appenine Yellow-bellied Toad (Bombina pachypus) are Endangered, and 11 are classified as Vulnerable.

Amphibians and reptiles are doing even worse than other species groups. Fifteen percent of mammals and 13 percent of birds are under threat. Other groups too are almost certainly in danger, but only these groups have been comprehensively assessed at the European level according to IUCN regional Red List guidelines.

Notes to editors

Biodiversity – the web of life on which we depend – is in decline around the world. Habitat loss is the greatest threat to both reptiles and amphibians in Europe. Other threats include climate change, pollution and invasive alien species.

The European Union has a commitment to halt biodiversity loss by 2010, and a Biodiversity Action Plan to implement that commitment. Last month, the eight-point "Message from Athens" stressed the need to step up efforts to halt the loss, through measures such as increasing public understanding of the importance of the issue, better funding and more rigorous integration of biodiversity concerns into other policy areas.

Compiled by the IUCN, the European Red Lists are a framework to classify species according to their extinction risk. Threatened species are those who are classified as Critically Endangered, Endangered, or Vulnerable.

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African penguin numbers in sharp decline: scientists

Yahoo News 20 May 09;

CAPE TOWN (AFP) – African penguins are disappearing at an alarming rate, as commercial fishing decimates food stocks and global warming affects breeding patterns, experts said Wednesday.
"Last year there were only about 26,000 pairs of African Penguins left in southern Africa (this represents their global population) -- a decline of about 121,000 breeding pairs since 1956," read a statement issued after an international African penguin conference in Cape Town.

Research presented at the conference showed that urgent action was needed to halt the decline in the Western Cape province where the annual survival rate in key breeding colonies had halved since 2000.

"We need to understand the underlying causes. Of course, food supply must be a major factor," said researcher Peter Barham of Britain's Bristol University.

He said the food supply may have been disrupted by overfishing, or by fish stocks moving with changing ocean currents due to the effects of global warming.

Pollutants may also have weakened penguins and affected their ability to find fish.

"Other issues affecting penguins include increased predation by fur seals around some colonies, the continuing risk of oil spills, and as the climate warms up, the lack of suitable, cool, places to breed within the traditional colonies."

In recent years researchers have set up nesting boxes in colonies to shelter the birds from the heat and protect eggs from opportunistic gulls.

Sardines and anchovies, their major source of food, have been affected by fishing and sea temperature changes, pushing penguins to form new colonies closer to food supplies.

The African Penguin, also known as a jackass penguin because of its donkey-like bray, is the only species of the charismatic animal which breeds in Africa and is found only around southern Africa.

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Owls replace pesticides in Israel

BBC News 20 May 09;

Owls and kestrels are being employed as agricultural pest controllers in the Middle East.

Many farmers are installing nest boxes to encourage the birds, which hunt the crop-damaging rodents.

In Israel, where there is a drive to reduce the use of toxic chemical pesticides, this has been turned into a government-funded national programme.

Scientists and conservation charities from Jordan and Palestine have joined the scheme.

According to the charity BirdLife International, hundreds of birds of prey - including many endangered species - have been killed in Israel through eating rodents containing poisonous "rodenticides" sprayed on to crop fields.

But scientists in Israel are now working with farmers to combat this problem - deploying the birds as natural pest controllers.

"There is a real need to reduce the use of chemicals in agriculture here," said Motti Charter, a researcher from Tel Aviv University and team leader of the Global Owl Project in Israel.

No boundaries

"Many farmers think that chemicals are their only option. They use very large amounts of them - spraying them on to their fields from planes," said Dr Charter.

"We have been reaching out to the farmers, to encourage them to reduce their use of rodenticides and install nest boxes instead."

The scheme started in 1983, when a few nesting boxes were erected near a kibbutz, or farming village, in the Bet-She'an Valley, south of the Sea of Galilee.

The project has gradually been expanded to include boxes for nesting kestrels.

"Kestrels hunt during the day and barn owls at night," said Dr Charter.

"This constant 24-hour threat of predation has caused changes in the pests' behaviour, resulting in less crop damage."

According to the World Owl Trust, who have funded some of Dr Charter's research, there are currently about 1,000 barn owl nest boxes in various locations around Israel.

The trust has even installed a webcam in one of those boxes.

Because the sub-species of barn owl in Israel is less territorial than those in Europe, and because the population of rodents is stable throughout the year, the nest boxes can be placed relatively close together.

"Jordan recently came on board to take part in the scheme," said Tony Warburton, honourary president of the World Owl Trust. "So the project is really bringing people together."

Dr Charter added: "The birds will nest wherever there is food and a suitable habitat. They don't know the national boundaries."

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Hungry vultures get daily feast in Spain

Sebastien Guine Yahoo News 20 May 09;

VALDERROBRES, Spain (AFP) – Hundreds of vultures surround retired sailor Jose Ramon Moragrega before noisily feasting on the mass of dead rabbits he dumps from a red wheelbarrow onto a patch of gravel.

Fueled by a passion for the large birds, the 57-year-old has repeated this ritual each morning for the past two decades at his property near the town of Valderrobres in the mountains of Aragon in eastern Spain.

Each day, "Vultureman", as he calls himself, feeds the predators between 100 and 200 rabbits not fit for human consumption that he gets for free at a local slaughterhouse.

It takes them only half an hour to devour the meal.

But his vulture refuge, complete with drinking trough and perches, did not always enjoy its current success, with 400 and 500 birds now turning up for the feeding on a good day. At the beginning they stayed away.

"It took three years before the vultures descended to eat," he told AFP as he stood on one of two observatories on his property that are open to the public for a fee of between four to 15 euros (5.5 to 20.5 dollars).

"At the beginning it was like a game. I would lay down the food in the morning and I would collect it at night. When the first ones came to eat, I was really pleased," added Moragrega.

"Man is the only predator of the vulture. It is a species which has been persecuted since ancient Greece for cultural reasons, a species that is very afraid of us," he said.

Spain is home to 80 percent of Europe's vultures, according to Aragon forest ranger Esteban La Torre Abella.

But the ranger said the birds, often described as "nature's cleaners", have been threatened by both urbanisation and eating poisoned meat left in open fields by farmers seeking to kill pesky foxes.

Their woes increased in 2002 when the European Union adopted a law aimed at halting the spread of mad cow disease, which required that the countryside be kept clear of dead livestock even if they died of natural causes.

The law forced some of the vulture population to embark on long-haul trips in search for food. Many of Spain's black vultures -- considered the largest birds of prey in Europe with a wingspan up to 2.5 metres (eight feet) -- starved to death.

Last month the 27-member EU modified the law, allowing farmers to leave dead livestock in their fields -- providing conditions are deemed safe and hygienic.

But Moragrega said this is not enough to ensure the big birds' survival.

"If they have to feed themselves with what is left in nature, the little space of fauna which we have left them, they can't survive, we have to help them," he said as a pair of binoculars hand from his neck.

Abella said Moragrega's initiative was an example for the government to follow.

"His feeding trough is five stars," he said, describing vultures as "highly sensitive" animals.

"A whole colony can disappear in a month. The vulture population has increased in recent years, thanks to food aid like this, they virtually disappeared in this region in the 1970s," he said.

Moragrega's wife Loly guides visitors to the feeding centre and also feeds the vultures herself on the rare days when her husband is not available to do so.

Guests are instructed not to get too close to the observatory's glass windows -- tinted to mask the human presence -- and not to make noise while the vultures feast on the rabbits.

Even after all these years, Moragrega said he must take great care when feeding the birds to avoid making any brusque moves that may frighten them away.

"They notice right away any sudden or strange movement, or if another person takes my place and shows signs of fear, they panic and go away," he said.

"I've been successful in managing to mingle with them without causing them to panic... even if it has taken 21 years."

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Evidence of right whales found off Greenland

H. Josef Hebert, Associated Press Yahoo News 21 May 09;

WASHINGTON – Government scientists believe they have some good news about the endangered right whale, whose population in the Atlantic Ocean is struggling to come back.

Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Wednesday they have found evidence of a significant right whale population in waters off the southern tip of Greenland. The whale was thought to have largely disappeared from that area decades ago. Only two of the whales have been sighted in the area in the last 50 years.

But now scientists, over a yearlong period, recorded 2,000 whale calls from underwater listening devices in the area. No whales were sighted.

There are 300 to 400 North Atlantic right whales off the U.S. Atlantic coast. It's not known if the newly discovered whales in an area known as the Cape Farewell Ground, 200 to 400 miles off Greenland, are a separate population of right whales or ones that migrated from U.S. waters.

The discovery raises the possibility that the eastern North Atlantic right whale population, believed by many to be extinct, may still exist, said David Mellinger, a chief scientist at NOAA who presented the teams findings Wednesday at an Acoustical Society of America meeting in Portland, Ore.

Mellinger in a telephone interview with several reporters said no whales were sighted during the yearlong monitoring effort, but that by triangulating the five underwater listening devices it is certain at least three whales could be heard. "It gives us greater confidence that there are a significant number of right whales in the area," he said.

The North Atlantic right whale is protected under the U.S. Endangered Species Act as well as international treaty. Over the centuries its population was devastated by whaling, especially in the eastern North Atlantic between Greenland and Iceland. Off the United States, fewer than 400 right whales are known to migrate annually between their southern Atlantic breeding grounds to feeding areas off New England.

Hunting the right whale, which can grow to 55 feet long and weigh more than 70 tons, has been illegal since 1936, but too often it has been the victim of ship traffic as it moves through heavily traveled Atlantic coastal waters on its migrations north. Last year NOAA directed new speed limits for commercial ships along the Atlantic coast to better avoid collisions with the whale.

The underwater recordings of right whale sounds off Greenland were made from July to December of 2007, although the recording devices were not removed until July of last year. But it would be months later before the scientists knew what they had discovered. Mellinger said the recordings contained tens of thousands of various whale calls, and it took sophisticated acoustical detection software to separate the right's call from those of other whales.

The humpback whale makes a very similar sound, said Mellinger and "we took a lot of our time distinguishing humpback sounds from right whale sounds."

"We were thrilled to hear these calls on the recordings," he said. "But we knew it was a historic habitat area and an unstudied one. Now the question is how many whales are there, and what population do they belong to."

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Whale chief says Japan must compromise

Shaun Tandon Yahoo News 20 May 09;

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The outgoing head of the International Whaling Commission voiced regret Wednesday that his controversial drive to reach a compromise had failed, and said Japan needed to cede more ground.

William Hogarth steps down as both US delegate and the head of the deeply divided world whaling body after a meeting next month in Portugal, where he doubted any major progress would be reached.

The biologist, appointed by former president George W. Bush, faced heated questions at a congressional hearing from members of President Barack Obama's Democratic Party who accuse him of surrendering too much to Japan.

Pressed by the panel, Hogarth said that Japan -- which kills whales under a loophole in a global moratorium that allows "lethal research" on the ocean giants -- had not put enough on the table.

"The US does not think that it's a reasonable proposal whatsoever," Hogarth said.

"I think that if Japan is not willing to discuss (further), then I do not see any future for any resolution to this issue."

Hogarth, who is also dean of the University of South Florida's College of Marine Science, spearheaded a series of closed-door negotiations with Japan and other nations.

Japan offered to reduce but not end its annual Antarctic hunts which infuriate whale-loving Australia and New Zealand, participants say. Japan has also pushed for the International Whaling Commission, or IWC, to accept whaling off its coasts.

"I am very disappointed that I'm leaving the chairmanship and the US commission with the IWC (while) still killing lots of whales, doing scientific whaling and that we just can't seem to resolve it," Hogarth said.

However, Hogarth said his efforts brought civility to the IWC, where annual meetings had long been showdowns between pro- and anti-whaling nations.

Under a compromise brokered by Hogarth, Japan agreed in 2007 to suspend plans to expand its hunt to include humpback whales -- beloved by Australian whale-watchers -- for the first time in decades.

Japan says that whaling is its tradition and accuses Western nations of cultural insensitivity.

Norway and Iceland are the only nations that hunt whales in open defiance of the 1986 IWC moratorium.

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Circus captivity is beastly for wild animals

Andy Coghlan, New Scientist 20 May 09;

Stars of the show they may be, but elephants, lions and tigers are the wild animals least suited to life in a circus, concludes the first global study of animal welfare in circuses.

"It's no one single factor," says Stephen Harris of the University of Bristol, UK, and lead researcher of the study. "Whether it's lack of space and exercise, or lack of social contact, all factors combined show it's a poor quality of life compared with the wild," he says.

The survey concludes that on average, wild animals spend just 1 to 9 per cent of their time training, and the rest confined to cages, wagons or enclosures typically covering a quarter the area recommended for zoos.

Worst affected are elephants, lions, tigers and bears. Often they're confined to cages where they pace up and down for hours on end.

"Even if they are in a larger, circus pen, there's no enrichment such as logs to play with, in case they use them to break the fence and escape," says Harris.
Travel sick

Travel also takes its toll, although the evidence is limited. The study cites data showing that concentrations of the stress hormone cortisol in saliva from circus tigers remains abnormal up to 6 days after transport, and up to 12 days in tigers who've never travelled before.

The itineries can be gruelling too. When Harris and his colleagues analysed 153 European and North American circus trips, troupes only stayed at each single location for an average of a week before moving on, with an average of almost 300 kilometres between locations.

Even when they reach their destinations, the animals are often kept in conditions drastically different from their natural habitat. Elephants can be shackled for 12 to 23 hours per day when not performing, in areas from just 7 to 12 square metres. Often, they could only move as far as the chain would let them, just 1 to 2 metres.

In the wild, elephants spend 40 to 75 per cent of their time feeding, and cover up to 50 kilometres in a day.

Evidence also shows that circus elephants, lions, tigers, bears and even parrots, adopt repetitive abnormal movements and pacing, called sterotypies.

Also, the animals suffer ill-health both from confinement and from the tricks they learn to perform. Elephants, for example, become obese through inactivity and develop rheumatoid disorders and lameness as a result, as well as joint and hernia problems through having to adopt unnatural positions during performance.
Unnatural behaviour

"There is no evidence to suggest that the natural needs of non-domesticated animals can be met through the living conditions and husbandry offered by circuses," concludes the study. "Neither natural environment nor much natural behaviour can be recreated in circuses."

Although their conditions are not ideal, the species best suited to circus life include animals domesticated generations ago, such as dogs and horses. Horses, for example, have long adapted to travel between racecourses.

The same is not true, however, of the most glamorous wild animals. "It fits in with what you would intuitively imagine, that given the extensive transport, the sterile environment and the cramped conditions, you get welfare problems," says Rob Atkinson, head of the wildlife department at the UK Royal Society for the Protection of Animals.

The study notes that some countries such as Austria have already banned wild animals from circuses, but they still feature prominently in major circuses of the US and Europe. Elephants disappeared from UK circuses for 10 years, but three have been on display since February at the Great British Circus.

Journal reference: Animal Welfare, vol 18, p 129

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Government 'greatly concerned' by palm oil production

Martin Hickman, The Independent 19 May 09;

The Government has joined calls for Britain’s best-selling household groceries to use sustainable palm oil.

The Environment Secretary Hilary Benn said the Government was “greatly concerned” by the impact of palm oil production in South-east Asia, where it causes extensive deforestation and threatens the survival of the orangutan and other rare animals.

Producers chop down forests in Sumatra and Borneo to plant high-yielding oil palms whose oil is poured into food, soaps and skin creams.

As the Independent disclosed earlier this month palm oil is in, or suspected to be in, 43 of the UK’s 100 best-selling grocery brands, including Cadbury Dairy Milk, Mr Kipling cakes and Dove soap.

It is often labelled as “vegetable fat” or “vegetable oil,” making it difficult for the public to exercise choice.

In his first intervention in the palm oil debate, Mr Benn told the Independent: “The UK Government is greatly concerned by the potential environmental impacts of unrestrained palm oil production, regardless of end use, and I want to see sustainability standards adopted to help halt damaging practices.”

The Cabinet minister added: “I am pleased that some UK businesses have already made commitments to using only sustainably-sourced palm oil and would strongly encourage others to do the same.”

His comments were welcomed by the World Wildlife Fund and will intensify pressure on food and household products firms to change their buying policies.

Last week WWF announced it would start scoring companies on whether they were matching their public commitments on sustainability with purchases of certified sustainable palm oil.

Almost four per cent of global palm oil production has been certified sustainable by the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (Rspo) on the grounds that they have not been sited on recent rainforest land, limit pesticide use and treat workers well.

However since the first Rspo-certified supplies arrived in Europe in November, businesses have bought only 1 per cent of the amount available, 15,000 out of the 1.3m tonnes available. Unilever, which set up the Rspo with WWF in 2002, and Sainsbury’s are two companies which have bought the oil, which is about 15 per cent more expensive than normal supplies.

“This sluggish demand from palm oil buyers, such as supermarkets, food and cosmetic manufacturers, could undermine the success of sustainability efforts and threatens the remaining natural tropical forests of Southeast Asia as well as other forests where oil palm is set to expand, such as the Amazon,” saidDavid McLaughlin, WWF vice president of agriculture.

Ginny Ng, WWF’s senior program officer for Borneo and Sumatra, urged companies to act quickly. She warned: “The tropical forests of Borneo and Sumatra are being cleared at such a rapid pace that the carbon emissions from this deforestation are greater than the industrial emissions of some developed countries.

“The orangutans, elephants, tigers and rhinos on these islands don’t stand a chance of survival if their forests aren’t protected. Creating a demand for sustainably grown palm oil is essential to their survival.”

WWF urged companies to make public commitments that they would use 100 per cent Rspo-certified palm oil by 2015.

Although most companies say they want to move to source palm oil sustainably, only a few have named a date when they will switch to an Rspo-only supply. Premier Foods says it will do so by 2011, United Biscuits by 2012, Sainsbury’s by 2014, and Unilever, Northern Foods, Kraft and

Tesco all say they will do so by 2015.

Companies that have not set a date include Kellogg’s, Cadbury, Heinz, Mars, Nestle, Procter & Gamble, Reckitt Benckiser, Morrisons, Co-operative Group, Marks & Spencer, and Waitrose.

The Food and Drink Federation, which represents food manufacturers, said its members were fully aware of the need for palm oil to be from more sustainable sources and its “leading members” were actively participating in the Rspo.

“We hope other companies will follow this lead,” the FDF told the Independent.

“FDF fully supports the aims and the multi-stakeholder approach of the RSPO to bring more sustainable palm oil to the market. But the UK is only a small player in the complex global market for palm oil, importing approximately 1 per cent of the world’s annual crop”.

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