Coyotes thriving in big cities, suburbs

Coyotes are such wildly adaptive creatures that it's not surprising that they're doing well in suburban and urban areas. This article gives examples of how suburban sprawl is actually causing an increase in the coyote population. Don't start freaking out about coyotes though, even if there have been some attacks in the news lately, such as in New Jersey.

Still, experts urge perspective: In Cook County, which includes Chicago, there are some 3,000 dog bites on average each year, with a few hundred serious enough to require hospital care, Gerht says. Yet he is unaware of any reported coyote attacks.

They're wild animals and they have a right to living space just as we do.

Polar Bears at Risk as Warming Thaws Icy Home

After seeing the sad, tired (animated) polar bear in An Inconvenient Truth swim to a chunk of ice and have it fall apart under its feet (so sad!), I've been noticing that people are becoming more concerned about the polar bears. Even to the point where people are pushing to get them listed as endangered. And this all makes sense if scientists are right (and I think they are) about the melting ice caps.

Many scientific studies project that warming, widely blamed on emissions of greenhouse gases from burning fossil fuels, could melt the polar ice cap in summer, with estimates of the break-up ranging from decades to sometime beyond 2100.

Bears' favourite hunting ground is the edge of the ice where they use white fur as camouflage to catch seals.

"If there's no ice, there's no way they can catch the seal," said Sarah James of the Gwich'in Council International who lives in Alaska. "Gwich'in" means "people of the caribou", which is the main source of food for about 7,000 indigenous people in Alaska and Canada.

It just gets to me how people are so resistant to changing their lifestyle and don't care that the things we do have major effects on beings that have no control over what we do. We're so self-centered.

Wild Parrots Make a Home in Brooklyn

I'm going to help Steve Baldwin get the word out that there's wild parrots living in Brooklyn. These birds are not new inhabitants of Brooklyn College's soccer field, but many people don't know that they're there. These Quaker parrots come from a more temperate climate and thus, can survive the cold Northeastern winters. They build huge nests and share them with other birds, has anyone ever heard of that before?

"They're so astonishing. You see them and they're loud and they're green and you assume that they're tropical," said Eleanor Miele, associate professor of science education at the college, who has her students observe the birds for class projects. But "they are adaptable for winter."

And, says parrot fan Steve Baldwin, who has dedicated the past couple of years to chronicling the birds, there is no shortage of food because they will eat pretty much anything, like grass, the buds on trees, seeds, fruit.

Some states have banned the ownership of these birds out of fear that their large nests will cause problems or that they will damage agriculture, but Baldwin says they're not really that much of a threat. Perhaps I'll head over to Brooklyn one weekend soon and take some pictures.

Burger King Shifts Policy on Animals

It's no giant leap, but it is the first step (hopefully of many) in pressuring other fast food chains and factory farm industry into better treatment of animals. Burger King has decided that it will buy a percentage of its eggs and pork from suppliers who raise their animals in a cage free environment. While cage free is not the same thing as free range, which Steven Grover (vice president for food safety) makes sure to point out, this move is still pretty impressive coming from a fast food company that, like all others, is set on keeping costs low.

“When the big boys move, it makes the entire industry move,” said Ms. Grandin, who serves on the animal welfare task forces for several food companies, including McDonald’s and Burger King...

Burger King executives said the move was driven by their desire to stay ahead of consumer trends and to encourage farmers to move into more humane egg and meat production.

“We want to be doing things long before they become a concern for consumers,” Mr. Grover said. “Like a hockey player, we want to be there before the puck gets there.”

The company has expressed the wish to raise the percentage of products coming from cage free suppliers, only the supply isn't there yet. I have a feeling that we'll be hearing news like this coming from other companies in a relatively short time and that farmers will take heed. I can only hope that soon the day of the factory farm will be abolished, but I think that would take a lot more pressure from consumers and I don't know if enough people are willing to take up this cause.

Birds plan ahead, study shows

Clever scrub jays can plan on saving tasty treats for the future and do it in a way that shows they are truly planning ahead, British researchers reported Wednesday.

Okay, it's from about a week ago but it's new to me. I love reports like this which undermine the standard anthropocentric mindset that only humans are members of the moral community because a species has to be rational to have moral standing and most believe that only humans are rational. According to this report, it has been proven that scrub jays plan ahead for the future and store food through two experiments involving two rooms and different kinds of food.

"Knowledge of and planning for the future is a complex skill that is considered by many to be uniquely human," Nicola Clayton and colleagues at the University of Cambridge wrote.

I was raised believing that there is more to animals than base instincts (most people that are pet owners tend to think this way, I think) and I think it's hugely conceited of us humans to think that we don't have a moral obligation to the other inhabitants of this planet because popular thought deems them as irrational beings. Even if my higher opinion of the mental capabilities of animals is wrong, to me it certainly doesn't justify any ill treatment or destruction of habitats. I think it's nice to find reports that show animals capable of higher thought, even if experiments like this will not change the thinking of many people, it brightens up my day.