title: "Black-footed ferret" content: and the preputial region are sooty-black. The area midway between the front and back legs is marked by a large patch of dark umber-brown, which fades into the buffy surrounding parts. A small spot occurs over each eye, with a narrow band behind the black mask. The sides of the head and the ears are dirty-white in color. The black-footed ferret is solitary, except when breeding or raising litters. It is nocturnal and primarily hunts for sleeping prairie dogs in their burrows. It is most active above ground from dusk to midnight and 4 a.m. to mid-morning. Aboveground activity is


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: greatest during late summer and early autumn when juveniles become independent. Climate generally does not limit black-footed ferret activity, but it may remain inactive inside burrows for up to 6 days at a time during winter. Female black-footed ferrets have smaller home ranges than males. Home ranges of males may sometimes include the home ranges of several females. Adult females usually occupy the same territory every year. A female that was tracked from December to March occupied . Her territory was overlapped by a resident male that occupied during the same period. The average density of black-footed ferrets near Meeteetse,


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: Wyoming, is estimated at 1 black-footed ferret /99 to . As of 1985, 40 to 60 black-footed ferrets occupied a total of of white-tailed prairie dog habitat. From 1982 to 1984, the average year-round movement of 15 black-footed ferrets between white-tailed prairie dog colonies was 1.6 miles/night (2.5 km) (with a spread of 1.1 miles or 1.7 km). Movement of black-footed ferrets between prairie dog colonies is influenced by factors including breeding activity, season, sex, intraspecific territoriality, prey density, and expansion of home ranges with declining population density. Movements of black-footed ferrets have been shown to increase during the breeding


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: season; however, snow-tracking from December to March over a 4-year period near Meeteetse, Wyoming revealed that factors other than breeding were responsible for movement distances. Temperature is positively correlated with distance of black-footed ferret movement. Snow-tracking from December to March over a 4-year period near Meeteetse, Wyoming, revealed that movement distances were shortest during winter and longest between February and April, when black-footed ferrets were breeding and white-tailed prairie dogs emerged from hibernation. Nightly movement distance of 170 black-footed ferrets averaged (range ). Nightly activity areas of black-footed ferrets ranged from ), and were larger from February to March ()


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: than from December to January (). Adult females establish activity areas based on access to food for rearing young. Males establish activity areas to maximize access to females, resulting in larger activity areas than those of females. Prey density may account for movement distances. Black-footed ferrets may travel up to to seek prey, suggesting that they will interchange freely among white-tailed prairie dog colonies that are less than apart. In areas of high prey density, black-footed ferret movements were nonlinear in character, probably to avoid predators. From December to March over a 4-year study period, black-footed ferrets investigated 68 white-tailed


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: prairie dog holes per of travel/night. Distance traveled between white-tailed prairie dog burrows from December to March averaged over 149 track routes. The reproductive physiology of the black-footed ferret is similar to that of the European polecat and the steppe polecat. It is probably polygynous, based on data collected from home range sizes, skewed sex ratios, and sexual dimorphism. Mating occurs in February and March. When a male and female in estrus encounter each other, the male sniffs the genital region of the female, but does not mount her until after a few hours have elapsed, which is contrast to


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: the more violent behavior displayed by the male European polecat. During copulation, the male grasps the female by the nape of the neck, with the copulatory tie lasting from 1.5–3 hours. Unlike other mustelids, the black-footed ferret is a habitat specialist with low reproductive rates. In captivity, gestation of black-footed ferrets lasts 42–45 days. Litter size ranges from 1–5 kits. Kits are born in May and June in prairie dog burrows. Kits are altricial and are raised by their mother for several months after birth. Kits first emerge above ground in July, at 6 weeks old. They are then separated


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: into individual prairie dog burrows around their mother's burrow. Kits reach adult weight and become independent several months following birth, from late August to October. Sexual maturity occurs at one year of age. Intercolony dispersal of juvenile black-footed ferrets occurs several months after birth, from early September to early November. Dispersal distances may be short or long. Near Meeteetse, Wyoming, 9 juvenile males and 3 juvenile females dispersed following litter breakup. Four juvenile females dispersed a short distance (<) but remained on their natal area. Up to 90% of the black-footed ferret's diet is composed of prairie dogs. The diet


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: of the black-footed ferret varies depending on geographic location. In western Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, and Montana, black-footed ferrets historically associated with white-tailed prairie dogs and were forced to find alternative prey when white-tailed prairie dogs entered their four-month hibernation cycle. In Wyoming, alternative prey items consumed during white-tailed prairie dog hibernation included voles ("Microtus" spp.) and mice ("Peromyscus" spp. and "Mus" spp.) found near streams. In South Dakota, black-footed ferrets associate with black-tailed prairie dogs. Because black-tailed prairie dogs do not hibernate, little seasonal change in black-footed ferret diet is necessary. In Mellette County, South Dakota, black-tailed prairie dog remains


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: occurred in 91% of 82 black-footed ferret scats. Mouse remains occurred in 26% of scats. Mouse remains could not be identified to species; however, deer mice, northern grasshopper mice, and house mice were captured in snap-trap surveys. Potential prey items included thirteen-lined ground squirrels, plains pocket gophers, mountain cottontails, upland sandpipers, horned larks, and western meadowlarks. Based on 86 black-footed ferret scats found near Meeteetse, Wyoming, 87% of black-footed ferret diet was composed of white-tailed prairie dogs. Other food items included deer mice, sagebrush voles, meadow voles, mountain cottontails, and white-tailed jackrabbits. Water is obtained through consumption of prey. A


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: study published in 1983 modeling metabolizable energy requirements estimated that one adult female black-footed ferret and her litter require approximately 474 to 1,421 black-tailed prairie dogs per year or 412 to 1,236 white-tailed prairie dogs per year for sustenance. They concluded that this dietary requirement would require protection of of black-tailed prairie dog habitat or of white-tailed prairie dog habitat for each female black-footed ferret with a litter. The historical range of the black-footed ferret was closely correlated with, but not restricted to, the range of prairie dogs ("Cynomys" spp.). Its range extended from southern Alberta and southern Saskatchewan south


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: to Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. , the only known wild black-footed ferret population was located on approximately in the western Big Horn Basin near Meeteetse, Wyoming. Since 1990, black-footed ferrets have been reintroduced to the following sites: Shirley Basin, Wyoming; UL Bend National Wildlife Refuge and Fort Belknap Indian Reservation, Montana; Conata Basin/Badlands, Buffalo Gap National Grassland, and the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation in South Dakota; Aubrey Valley, Arizona; Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge and Wolf Creek in Colorado; Coyote Basin, straddling Colorado and Utah, northern Chihuahua, Mexico, and Grasslands National Park, Canada Historical habitats of the black-footed


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: ferret included shortgrass prairie, mixed-grass prairie, desert grassland, shrub steppe, sagebrush steppe, mountain grassland, and semi-arid grassland. Black-footed ferrets use prairie dog burrows for raising young, avoiding predators, and thermal cover. Six black-footed ferret nests found near Mellette County, South Dakota, were lined with buffalo grass, prairie threeawn, sixweeks grass, and cheatgrass. High densities of prairie dog burrows provide the greatest amount of cover for black-footed ferrets. Black-tailed prairie dog colonies contain a greater burrow density per acre than white-tailed prairie dog colonies, and may be more suitable for the recovery of black-footed ferrets. The type of prairie dog burrow


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: may be important for occupancy by black-footed ferrets. Black-footed ferret litters near Meeteetse, Wyoming, were associated with mounded white-tailed prairie dog burrows, which are less common than non-mounded burrows. Mounded burrows contain multiple entrances and probably have a deep and extensive burrow system that protects kits. However, black-footed ferrets used non-mounded prairie dog burrows (64%) more often than mounded burrows (30%) near Meeteetse, Wyoming. Primary causes of mortality include habitat loss, human-introduced diseases, and indirect poisoning from prairie-dog control measures. Annual mortality of juvenile and adult black-footed ferrets over a 4-year period ranged from 59% to 83% (128 individuals) near


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: Meeteetse, Wyoming. During fall and winter, 50% to 70% of juveniles and older animals perish. Average lifespan in the wild is probably only one year but may be up to five years. Males have higher rates of mortality than females because of longer dispersal distances when they are most vulnerable to predators. Given an obligate-dependence of black-footed ferrets on prairie dogs, black-footed ferrets are extremely vulnerable to prairie dog habitat loss. Habitat loss results from agriculture, livestock use, and other development. Black-footed ferrets are susceptible to numerous diseases. They are fatally susceptible to canine distemper virus, introduced by striped skunks,


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: common raccoons, red foxes, coyotes, and American badgers. A short-term vaccine for canine distemper is available for captive black-footed ferrets, but no protection is available for young born in the wild. Black-footed ferrets are also susceptible to rabies, tularemia, and human influenza. They can directly contract sylvatic plague ("Yersinia pestis"), and epidemics in prairie dog towns may completely destroy the ferrets' prey base. Predators of black-footed ferrets include golden eagles, great horned owls, coyotes, American badgers, bobcats, prairie falcons, ferruginous hawks, and prairie rattlesnakes. Oil and natural gas exploration and extraction can have detrimental impacts on prairie dogs and black-footed


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: ferrets. Seismic activity collapses prairie dog burrows. Other problems include potential leakages and spills, increased roads and fences, increased vehicle traffic and human presence, and an increased number of raptor perching sites on power poles. Traps set for coyotes, American mink, and other animals may harm black-footed ferrets. Native American tribes, including the Crow, Blackfoot, Sioux, Cheyenne, and Pawnee, used black-footed ferrets for religious rites and for food. The species was not encountered during the Lewis and Clark Expedition, nor was it seen by Nuttall or Townsend, and it was not until it was first described in Audubon and Bachman's


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: "Viviparous Quadrupeds of North America" in 1851 that it became known to the scientific world. For a time, the black-footed ferret was harvested for the fur trade, with the American Fur Company having received 86 ferret skins from Pratt, Chouteau, and Company of St. Louis in the late 1830s. During the early years of predator control, black-footed ferret carcasses were likely discarded, as their fur was of low value. This likely continued after the passing of the Endangered Species Act of 1973, for fear of reprisals. The large drop in black-footed ferret numbers began during the 1800s through to the


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: 1900s, as prairie dog numbers declined because of control programs and the conversion of prairies to croplands. Sylvatic plague, a disease caused by "Yersinia pestis" introduced into North America, also contributed to the prairie dog die-off, though ferret numbers declined proportionately more than their prey, thus indicating other factors may have been responsible. Plague was first detected in South Dakota in a coyote in 2004, and then in ~50,000 acres of prairie dogs on Pine Ridge Reservation in 2005. Thereafter 7,000 acres of prairie dog colonies were treated with insecticide (DeltaDust) and 1,000 acres of black-footed ferret habitat were prophylactically


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: dusted in Conata Basin in 2006–2007. Nevertheless, plague was proven in ferrets in May 2008. Since then each year 12,000 acres of their Conata Basin habitat is dusted and about 50–150 ferrets are immunized with plague vaccine. Inbreeding depression may have also contributed, as studies on black-footed ferrets from Meeteetse, Wyoming revealed low levels of genetic variation. Canine distemper devastated the Meeteetse ferret population in 1985. A live virus vaccine originally made for domestic ferrets killed large numbers of black-footed ferrets, thus indicating that the species is especially susceptible to distemper. The black-footed ferret is an example of a species


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: which benefits from strong reproductive science. A captive-breeding program was initiated in 1987, capturing 18 living individuals and using artificial insemination. This is one of the first examples of assisted reproduction contributing to conservation of an endangered species in nature. The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service (USFWS), state and tribal agencies, private landowners, conservation groups, and North American zoos, have actively reintroduced ferrets back into the wild since 1991. Beginning in Shirley Basin in Eastern Wyoming, reintroduction expanded to Montana, 6 sites in South Dakota in 1994, Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Saskatchewan, Canada and Chihuahua, Mexico. The Toronto Zoo has bred


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: hundreds, most of which were released into the wild. Several episodes of "Zoo Diaries" show aspects of the tightly controlled breeding. In May 2000, the Canadian Species at Risk Act listed the black-footed ferret as being an extirpated species in Canada. A population of 35 animals was released into Grasslands National Park in southern Saskatchewan on October 2, 2009, and a litter of newborn kits was observed in July 2010. Reintroduction sites have experienced multiple years of reproduction from released individuals. The black-footed ferret was first listed as endangered in 1967 under the Endangered Species Preservation Act, and was relisted


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: on January 4, 1974, under the Endangered Species Act. In September 2006, South Dakota's ferret population was estimated to be around 420, with 250 (100 breeding adults consisting of 67 females and 33 males) in Eagle Butte, South Dakota which is 100,000 acres, less than 3 percent of the public grasslands in South Dakota, 70 miles East of Rapid City, South Dakota in the Buffalo Gap National Grassland bordering Badlands National Park, 130 ferrets northeast of Eagle Butte, SD on Cheyenne River Indian Reservation and about 40 ferrets on the Rosebud Indian Reservation. Arizona's Aubrey Valley ferret population was well


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: over 100 and a second reintroduction site with around 50 animals is used. An August 2007 report in the journal Science counted a population of 223 in one area of Wyoming (the original number of reintroduced ferrets, most of which died, was 228), and an annual growth rate of 35% from 2003–2006 was estimated. This rate of recovery is much faster than for many endangered species, and the ferret seems to have prevailed over the previous problems of disease and prey shortage that hampered its improvement. , the total wild population of black-footed ferrets in the U.S. was well over


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: 650 individuals, plus 250 in captivity. In 2008, the IUCN reclassified the species as "globally endangered", a substantial improvement since the 1996-assessment, when it was considered extinct in the wild, as the species was indeed only surviving in captivity. , about 1,200 ferrets are thought to live in the wild. Conservation efforts have been opposed by stock growers / ranchers, who have traditionally fought prairie dogs. In 2005, the U.S. Forest Service began poisoning prairie dogs in private land buffer zones of the Conata Basin of Buffalo Gap National Grassland, SD. Because 10–15 ranchers complained the measure was inadequate, the


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: forest service advised by Mark Rey, then Undersecretary of Agriculture, expanded its "prairie-dog management" in September 2006 to all of South Dakota's Buffalo Gap and the Fort Pierre National Grassland, and also to the Oglala National Grassland in Nebraska, against opinions of biologists in the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. Following exposure by conservation groups including the Climate, Community & Biodiversity Alliance and national media public outcry and a lawsuit mobilized federal officials, and the poisoning plan was revoked. The contradictory mandates of the two federal agencies involved, the USFWS and the U.S. Forest Service are exemplified in what the


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: Rosebud Sioux tribe experienced: The ferret was reintroduced by the USFWS, which according to the tribe promised to pay more than $1 million a year through 2010. On the other hand, the tribe was also contracted for the U.S. forest service prairie dog poisoning program. The increasing numbers of ferrets led to conflicts between the tribe's Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe Game, Fish and Parks Department and the Tribal Land Enterprise Organization. When the federal government started an investigation of the tribe's prairie dog management program, threatening to prosecute tribal employees or agents carrying out the management plan in the ferret


title: "Black-footed ferret" content: reintroduction area, the tribal council passed a resolution in 2008, asking the two federal agencies to remove ferrets, and reimburse the tribe for its expenses for the ferret recovery program. Black-footed ferret The black-footed ferret ("Mustela nigripes"), also known as the American polecat or prairie dog hunter, is a species of mustelid native to central North America. It is listed as endangered by the IUCN, because of its very small and restricted populations. First discovered by Audubon and Bachman in 1851, the species declined throughout the 20th century, primarily as a result of decreases in prairie dog populations and sylvatic


title: "Zinc finger" content: varying lengths. Zinc fingers often bind to a sequence of DNA known as the GC box. The modular nature of the zinc finger motif allows for a large number of combinations of DNA and RNA sequences to be bound with high degree of affinity and specificity, and is therefore ideally suited for engineering protein that can be targeted to and bind specific DNA sequences. In 1994, it was shown that an artificially-constructed three-finger protein can block the expression of an oncogene in a mouse cell line. Zinc fingers fused to various other effector domains, some with therapeutic significance, have since


title: "War of the Pacific" content: foreign powers in Lima, Bolivia announced that a state of war existed with Chile. This declaration was aimed to impede further Chilean arms purchase in Europe and to scuttle the Peruvian mediation in Chile. Bolivia called on Peru to activate the alliance treaty, arguing that Chile's invasion constituted a casus foederis. Also on March 14, Alejandro Fierro, Chile's minister of foreign affairs, sent a telegram to the Chilean representative in Lima, Joaquin Godoy, requesting immediate neutrality from the Peruvian government. On March 17, Godoy formally presented the Chilean proposal in a meeting with Peruvian President Prado. On March 21, Godoy


title: "Charlie Watts" content: to "The Wanderer" and U2 would later emulate it in the 2004 video for "All Because of You".) Watts remembered this was a common way for New Orleans jazz bands to promote upcoming dates. Moreover, with Jagger, he designed the elaborate stages for tours, first contributing to the lotus-shaped design of that 1975 Tour of the Americas, as well as the 1989–1990 Steel Wheels/Urban Jungle Tour, the 1997 Bridges to Babylon Tour, the 2002–2003 Licks Tour, and the 2005–2007 A Bigger Bang Tour. Watts has been involved in many activities outside his life as a member of The Rolling Stones.


title: "Prosper of Aquitaine" content: of Pope Leo I, who had been in Gaul, where he may have met Prosper. In any case Prosper was soon in Rome, attached to the pope in some secretarial or notarial capacity. Gennadius of Massilia's "De viris illustribus" (lxxxiv, 89) repeats the tradition that Prosper dictated the famous letters of Leo I against Eutyches. The date of his death is not known, but his chronicle goes as far as 455, and the fact that the chronicler Marcellinus mentions him under the year 463 seems to indicate that his death was shortly after that date. Prosper was a layman, but


title: "The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians" content: a more modern style and a large number of entirely new articles. Many of the articles were written by Blom personally, or translated by him. An additional Supplementary Volume, prepared for the most part by Eric Blom, followed in 1961. Blom died in 1959, and the Supplementary Volume was completed by Denis Stevens. The fifth edition was reprinted in 1966, 1968, 1970, 1973, and 1975. The next edition was published in 1980 under the name "The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians" and was greatly expanded to 20 volumes with 22,500 articles and 16,500 biographies. Its senior editor was


title: "Sargent Shriver" content: the America First Committee, an organization started in 1940 by a group of Yale Law School students, also including future President Gerald Ford and future Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart, which tried to keep the US out of the European war. Nevertheless, Shriver volunteered for the US Navy before the attack on Pearl Harbor and said he had a duty to serve his country even if he disagreed with its policies. He spent five years on active duty, mostly in the South Pacific, serving aboard the , reaching the rank of lieutenant (O-3). He was awarded a Purple Heart for


title: "Migraine (book)" content: he had an awakening and thought to himself, "Who shall be the Edward Liveing of our time? And there was a very disingenuous clamor of names that came to me, followed by a very loud inner voice which said, 'You Silly Bugger! You're the man!'" Migraine (book) Migraine is the first book written by Oliver Sacks, a well-known neurologist and author with a practice in New York City. The book was written in 1967, mostly over a nine-day period, and first published in 1970. A revised and updated version was published in 1990. As with Sacks's other writings, "Migraine" is


title: Loriini content: Loriini Lories and lorikeets (tribe Loriini) are small to medium-sized arboreal parrots characterized by their specialized brush-tipped tongues for feeding on nectar of various blossoms and soft fruits, preferably berries. The species form a monophyletic group within the parrot family Psittacidae. Traditionally, they were considered a separate subfamily (Loriinae) from the other subfamily (Psittacinae) based on the specialized characteristics, but recent molecular and morphological studies show that the group is positioned in the middle of various other groups. They are widely distributed throughout the Australasian region, including south-eastern Asia, Polynesia, Papua New Guinea, Timor Leste and Australia, and the majority


title: Loriini content: have very brightly coloured plumage. The usage of the terms "lory" and "lorikeet" is subjective, like the usage of "parrot" and "parakeet". Species with longer tapering tails are generally referred to as "lorikeets", while species with short blunt tails are generally referred to as "lories". Traditionally, lories and lorikeets have either been classified as the subfamily, Loriinae, or as a family on their own, Loriidae, but they are currently classified as a tribe. Neither traditional view is confirmed by molecular studies. Those studies show that the lories and lorikeets form a single group, closely related to the budgerigar and the


title: Loriini content: fig parrots ("Cyclopsitta" and "Psittaculirostris"). Two main groups are recognized within the lories and lorikeets. The first consist of the genus "Charmosyna" and the closely related Pacific Ocean genera "Phigys" and "Vini". All remaining genera, except "Oreopsittacus" are in the second group. The position of "Oreopsittacus" is unknown, although one study suggests it could be a third group next to the other two. Classification of parrots in the subfamily, Loriinae: Lories and lorikeets have specialized brush-tipped tongues for feeding on nectar and soft fruits. They can feed from the flowers of about 5,000 species of plants and use their specialized


title: Loriini content: tongues to take the nectar. The tip of their tongues have tufts of papillae (extremely fine hairs), which collect nectar and pollen. The multi-coloured rainbow lorikeet was one of the species of parrots appearing in the first edition of "The Parrots of the World" and also in John Gould's lithographs of the Birds of Australia. Then and now, lories and lorikeets are described as some of the most beautiful species of parrot. In the wild, rainbow lorikeets feed mainly on pollen and nectar, and possess a tongue adapted especially for their particular diet. Many fruit orchard owners consider them a


title: Loriini content: pest, as they often fly in groups and strip trees containing fresh fruit. They are also frequent visitors at bird feeders that supply lorikeet-friendly treats, such as store-bought nectar, sunflower seeds, and fruits such as apples, grapes and pears. Occasionally they have been observed feeding on meat. The ultramarine lorikeet is endangered. It is now one of the 50 rarest birds in the world. The blue lorikeet is classified as vulnerable. The introduction of European rats to the small island habitats of these birds is a major cause of their endangerment. Various conservation efforts have been made to relocate some


title: Loriini content: of these birds to locations free of predation and habitat destruction. A "Lory" famously appears in Chapter III of Lewis Carroll's Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Alice argues with the Lory about its age. Loriini Lories and lorikeets (tribe Loriini) are small to medium-sized arboreal parrots characterized by their specialized brush-tipped tongues for feeding on nectar of various blossoms and soft fruits, preferably berries. The species form a monophyletic group within the parrot family Psittacidae. Traditionally, they were considered a separate subfamily (Loriinae) from the other subfamily (Psittacinae) based on the specialized characteristics, but recent molecular and morphological studies show that


title: "Nth root" content: real. Finally, if "x" is not real, then none of its "n"th roots is real. Roots are usually written using the radical symbol or "radix" with formula_2 denoting the principal square root of formula_3, formula_4 denoting the principal cube root, formula_5 denoting the principal fourth root, and so on. In the expression formula_6, "n" is called the "index", formula_7 is the "radical sign" or "radix", and formula_3 is called the "radicand". Since the radical symbol denotes a function, it is defined to return only one result for a given argument formula_3, which is called the principal "n"th root of formula_3.


title: Chainsaw content: Chainsaw A chainsaw is a portable, mechanical saw which cuts with a set of teeth attached to a rotating chain that runs along a guide bar. It is used in activities such as tree felling, limbing, bucking, pruning, cutting firebreaks in wildland fire suppression and harvesting of firewood. Chainsaws with specially designed bar and chain combinations have been developed as tools for use in chainsaw art and chainsaw mills. Specialized chainsaws are used for cutting concrete. Chainsaws are sometimes used for cutting ice, for example for ice sculpture and in Finland for winter swimming. Someone who uses a saw is


title: Chainsaw content: a sawyer. The origin is debated, but a chainsaw-like tool was made around 1830 by the German orthopaedist Bernhard Heine. This instrument, the osteotome, had links of a chain carrying small cutting teeth with the edges set at an angle; the chain was moved around a guiding blade by turning the handle of a sprocket wheel. As the name implies, this was used to cut bone. The prototype of the chain saw familiar today in the timber industry was pioneered in the late 18th century by two Scottish doctors, John Aitken and James Jeffray, for symphysiotomy and excision of diseased


title: Chainsaw content: bone respectively. The chain hand saw, a fine serrated link chain which cut on the concave side, was invented around 1783-1785. It was illustrated in Aitken's Principles of Midwifery or Puerperal Medicine (1785) and used by him in his dissecting room. Jeffray claimed to have conceived the idea of the chain saw independently about that time but it was 1790 before he was able to have it produced. In 1806, Jeffray published Cases of the Excision of Carious Joints by H. Park and P. F. Moreau with Observations by James Jeffray M.D. In this communication he translated Moreau's paper of


title: Chainsaw content: 1803. Park and Moreau described successful excision of diseased joints, particularly the knee and elbow. Jeffray explained that the chain saw would allow a smaller wound and protect the adjacent neurovascular bundle. While a heroic concept, symphysiotomy had too many complications for most obstetricians but Jeffray's ideas became accepted, especially after the development of anaesthetics. Mechanised versions of the chain saw were developed but in the later 19th Century, it was superseded in surgery by the Gigli twisted wire saw. For much of the 19th century, however, the chain saw was a useful surgical instrument. The earliest patent for a


title: Chainsaw content: practical "endless chain saw" (a saw comprising a chain of links carrying saw teeth and running in a guide frame) was granted to Samuel J. Bens of San Francisco on January 17, 1905. His intent being to fell giant redwoods. The first portable chainsaw was developed and patented in 1918 by Canadian millwright James Shand. After he allowed his rights to lapse in 1930 his invention was further developed by what became the German company Festo in 1933. The company now operates as Festool producing portable power tools. Other important contributors to the modern chainsaw are Joseph Buford Cox and


title: Chainsaw content: Andreas Stihl; the latter patented and developed an electrical chainsaw for use on bucking sites in 1926 and a gasoline-powered chainsaw in 1929, and founded a company to mass-produce them. In 1927, Emil Lerp, the founder of Dolmar, developed the world's first gasoline-powered chainsaw and mass-produced them. World War II interrupted the supply of German chain saws to North America, so new manufacturers sprang up including Industrial Engineering Ltd (IEL) in 1947, the forerunner of Pioneer Saws. Ltd and part of Outboard Marine Corporation, the oldest manufacturer of chainsaws in North America. McCulloch in North America started to produce chainsaws


title: Chainsaw content: in 1948. The early models were heavy, two-person devices with long bars. Often chainsaws were so heavy that they had wheels like dragsaws. Other outfits used driven lines from a wheeled power unit to drive the cutting bar. After World War II, improvements in aluminum and engine design lightened chainsaws to the point where one person could carry them. In some areas the skidder (chainsaw) crews have been replaced by the feller buncher and harvester. Chainsaws have almost entirely replaced simple man-powered saws in forestry. They come in many sizes, from small electric saws intended for home and garden use,


title: Chainsaw content: to large "lumberjack" saws. Members of military engineer units are trained to use chainsaws as are firefighters to fight forest fires and to ventilate structure fires. There are three main types of chainsaw sharpeners - Handheld File, Electric Chain Saw and Bar Mounted. A chainsaw consists of several parts: Chainsaw engines are traditionally either a two-stroke gasoline (petrol) internal combustion engine (usually with a cylinder volume of 30 to 120 cm) or an electric motor driven by a battery or electric power cord. Combustion engines today (2016) are supplied through a traditional carburetor or an electronically adjustable carburetor. The traditional


title: Chainsaw content: carburetor needs to be adjusted, i. e. when operating in high or low altitudes, or their fuel oil-to-gasoline ratios must be adjusted to run properly. Electrically influenced carburetors make all adjustments automatically. These systems are provided by most large chain saw producers. Husqvarna calls its "Autotune," and it is commonly standard on most saws of the 5XX saw series. To reduce user fatigue problems, traditional carburetors can be de-vibrated (protected from vibrations) or they can be heated as well. Many saws offer a Winter and Summer mode of operation. Winter mode applies in temperatures below 0 °C / 32 °F


title: Chainsaw content: where inside the cover a hole is opened leaving warm air to the air filter and carburetor to prevent icing. In warmer environment the hole is closed and both units are not ventilated with warm air. To ensure clean air supply to the carburetor, chainsaw producers offer different filters with fine or less fine mesh. In clean surrounding air a less fine filter can be used, in dusty environment the other. The fine filter keeps the air clean to its optimum (i.e. 44 µm) but has the tendency to clog. This leads to the engine dying. The engines are designed


title: Chainsaw content: so that they may be operated in different positions, upside-down or tilted 90 degrees. Early engines died when tilting (two man saw from Dolmar, Germany from 1930 to 1937). Typically a centrifugal clutch and sprocket. The centrifugal clutch expands with raising spinning speed towards a drum. On this drum sits either a fixed sprocket or an exchangeable one. The clutch has three jobs to do: When the saw runs idle (typically 2500-2700 rpm) the chain does not move. When the clutch is engaged and the chain stops in the wood or another reason, it protects the engine. Most important it


title: Chainsaw content: protects the operator in case of a kickback. Here the chain brake stops the drum and the clutch releases immediately. Clutches and drums can be in two positions: either turned outside (Husqvarna) or inside (Stihl). An elongated bar with a round end of wear-resistant alloy steel typically 40 to 90 cm (16 to 36 in) in length. An edge slot guides the cutting chain. Specialized loop-style bars, called bow bars, were also used at one time for bucking logs and clearing brush, although they are now rarely encountered due to increased hazards of operation. All guide bars have some elements


title: Chainsaw content: for operation: The lower part of the chain runs in the gauge. Here the lubrication oil is pulled by the chain to the nose. This is a very important mechanism. At the end of the saw power head there are two oil holes, one on each side. These holes must match with the outlet of the oil pump. The pump pumps the oil through the hole in the lower part of the gauge. (See also below) Saw bar producers provide a large variety of bars matching different saws. Through this hole grease is pumped, typically each tank filling to keep


title: Chainsaw content: the nose sprocket well lubricated. Here one or two bolts from the saw run through. The clutch cover is put on top of the bar and it is secured though this/these bolts. It depends on the size of the saw if one or two bolts are installed. There are different bar types available: These bars consist of different layers to reduce the weight of the bar. These bars are solid steel bars intended for professional use. They have commonly an exchangeable nose since the sprocket at the bar nose wears out faster than the bar. These bars are laminated bars


title: Chainsaw content: with a small sprocket at the nose. The small nose reduces the kickback effect. Such bars are used on consumer saws. Usually each segment in this chain (which is constructed from riveted metal sections similar to a bicycle chain, but without rollers) features small sharp cutting teeth. Each tooth takes the form of a folded tab of chromium-plated steel with a sharp angular or curved corner and two beveled cutting edges, one on the top plate and one on the side plate. Left-handed and right-handed teeth are alternated in the chain. Chains come in varying pitch and gauge; the pitch


title: Chainsaw content: of a chain is defined as half of the length spanned by any three consecutive rivets (e.g., 8 mm, 0.325 inch), while the gauge is the thickness of the drive link where it fits into the guide bar (e.g., 1.5 mm, 0.05 inch). Conventional "full complement" chain has one tooth for every two drive links. "Full skip" chain has one tooth for every three drive links. Built into each tooth is a depth gauge or "raker" which rides ahead of the tooth and limits the depth of cut, typically to around 0.5 mm (0.025"). Depth gauges are critical to safe


title: Chainsaw content: chain operation. If left too high they will cause very slow cutting, if filed too low the chain will become more prone to kick back. Low depth gauges will also cause the saw to vibrate excessively. Vibration is not only uncomfortable for the operator but is also detrimental to the saw. Some way to adjust the tension in the cutting chain so that it neither binds on nor comes loose from the guide bar. The tensioner is either operated by turning a screw or a manual wheel. The tensioner is either in a lateral position underneath the exhaust or integrated


title: Chainsaw content: in the clutch cover. The lateral tensioner has the advantage that the clutch cover is easier to mount but the disadvantage that it is more difficult to reach nearby the bar. Tensioners through the clutch cover are easier to operate, but the clutch cover is more difficult to attach. When turning the screw, a hook in a bar hole moves the bar either out (tensioning) or in, making the chain loose. Tension is right when it can be moved easily by hand and not hanging loose from the bar. When tensioning, hold the bar nose up and pull the bar


title: Chainsaw content: nuts tight. Otherwise the chain might derail. The underside of each link features a small metal finger called a "drive link" (also DL) which locates the chain on the bar, helps to carry lubricating oil around the bar, and engages with the engine's drive sprocket inside the body of the saw. The engine drives the chain around the track by a centrifugal clutch, engaging the chain as engine speed increases under power, but allowing it to stop as the engine speed slows to idle speed. Dramatic improvements, chainsaw safety devices and overall design have taken place since the chainsaw's invention,


title: Chainsaw content: saving many lives and preventing countless serious injuries. These include chainbrake systems, better chain design and anti-vibration systems. As chainsaw carving has become more popular, chainsaw manufacturers are making special short, narrow-tipped bars for carving. These are called "quarter tipped," "nickel tipped" or "dime tipped" bars, based on the size of the round tip. Chainsaw manufacturer Echo sponsors a carving series, as well as carvers such as former Runaways singer Cherie Currie. Some chainsaws such as the RedMax G3200 CV are built specifically for carving applications. Today's chainsaws show all a number of safety features to protect the operator. All


title: Chainsaw content: these features are not a 100% guarantee that the operator will not be harmed. The best protection, even still, is experience. The chain brake is located in the clutch cover. Here a band tensions around the Clutch drum stopping the chain within milliseconds. The chain brake is released by the upper handle with the hand or wrist. The brake is intended to be used in kick-back moments. The chain catcher is located between the saw body and the clutch cover. In most cases it looks like a hook made in aluminum. It is used to stop the chain when it


title: Chainsaw content: derails from the bar and shortens the length of the chain. When derailing the chain swings from underneath the saw towards the operator. The shorting prevents hitting the operator, but it hits the rear handle guard. The rear handle guard protects the hand of the operator when the chain derails. Some chains show safety features as safety links as on micro chisel saws. These links keep the saw close to the gap between two cutting links and lift the chain when the space at the safety link is full with saw chips. This lifts the chain and lets it cut


title: Chainsaw content: slower. Two-stroke chainsaws require about 2–5% of oil in the fuel to lubricate the engine, while the motor in electrical chain-saws is normally lubricated for life. Most modern gas operated saws today require a fuel mix of 2% (1:50). Regular gas from most gas stations contain 5 to 10% ethanol which can result in problems of the equipment. Ethanol dissolves plastic, rubber and other material. This leads to problems especially on older equipment. A workaround of this problem is to run fresh fuel only and run the saw dry at the end of the work. Separate "chain oil" or "bar


title: Chainsaw content: oil" is used for the lubrication of the bar and chain on all types of chain-saw. The chain oil is depleted quickly because it tends to be thrown off by chain centrifugal force, and it is soaked up by sawdust. On two-stroke chainsaws the chain oil reservoir is usually filled up at the same time as refuelling. The reservoir is normally large enough to provide sufficient chain oil between refuelling. Lack of chain-oil, or using an oil of incorrect viscosity, is a common source of damage to chain-saws, and tends to lead to rapid wear of the bar, or the


title: Chainsaw content: chain seizing or coming off the bar. In addition to being quite thick, chain oil is particularly sticky (due to "tackifier" additives) to reduce the amount thrown off the chain. Although motor oil is a common emergency substitute, it is lost even faster and so leaves the chain under-lubricated. Chain oil is either non-biodegradeable or degradable. Professionals have to use biodegradeable oil in Germany by law. The oil is pumped from a small pump to a hole in the bar. From here the lower ends of each chain drive link take a portion of the oil into the gauge towards


title: Chainsaw content: the bar nose. Pump outlet and bar hole must be aligned. Since the bar is moving out and inwards depending on the chain length, the oil outlet on the saw side has a banana style long shape. Chains must be kept sharp to perform well. They become blunt rapidly if they touch soil, metal or stones. When blunt, they tend to produce powdery sawdust, rather than the longer, clean shavings characteristic of a sharp chain; a sharp saw also needs very little force from the operator to push it into the cut. Special hardened chains (made with tungsten carbide) are


title: Chainsaw content: used for applications where soil is likely to contaminate the cut, such as for cutting through roots. A clear sign of a blunt chain are vibrations of the saw. A sharp chain pulls itself into the wood without pressing on the saw. The air intake filter tends to clog up with sawdust. This must be cleaned from time to time, but is not a problem during normal operation. Despite safety features and protective clothing, injuries can still arise from chainsaw use, from the large forces involved in the work, from the fast-moving, sharp chain, or from the vibration and noise


title: Chainsaw content: of the machinery. A common accident arises from "kickback", when a chain tooth at the tip of the guide bar catches on wood without cutting through it. This throws the bar (with its moving chain) in an upward arc toward the operator which can cause serious injury or even death. Another dangerous situation occurs when heavy timber begins to fall or shift before a cut is complete — the chainsaw operator may be trapped or crushed. Similarly, timber falling in an unplanned direction may harm the operator or other workers, or an operator working at a height may fall or


title: Chainsaw content: be injured by falling timber. Like other hand-held machinery, the operation of chainsaws can cause vibration white finger, tinnitus or industrial deafness. These symptoms were very common when such equipment was not de-vibrated. On today's equipment there are damping elements (in rubber or steel spring) lowering these risks. Heated handles are an additional help. Newer, cordless electric chainsaws use brushless motors which further decrease noise and vibration while being lighter and easier to wield than traditional petroleum-powered models. The risks associated with chainsaw use mean that protective clothing such as chainsaw boots, chainsaw trousers and hearing protectors are normally worn


title: Chainsaw content: while operating them, and many jurisdictions require that operators be certified or licensed to work with chainsaws. Injury can also result if the chain breaks during operation due to poor maintenance or attempting to cut inappropriate materials. Gasoline-powered chainsaws expose operators to harmful carbon monoxide (CO) gas, especially indoors or in partially enclosed outdoor areas. Drop starting, or turning on a chainsaw by dropping it with one hand while pulling the starting cord with the other, is a safety violation in most states in the U.S. Keeping both hands on the saw for stability is essential for safe chainsaw use.


title: Chainsaw content: Safe and effective chainsaw and crosscut use on Federally-administered public lands within the United States has been codified since July 19th, 2016 in the publication of the "Final Directive for National Saw Program" issued by the United States Forest Service, USDA which specifies the training, testing, and certification process for employees as well as for unpaid volunteers who operate chainsaws within public lands. The new directive specifies Forest Service Manual (FSM) 2358 (PDF) which covers classification of sawyers, their Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and numerous other aspects of required safety training and behavior when operating chainsaws or crosscut saws on


title: Chainsaw content: Federally-administered public lands. Chainsaw training is designed to provide working technical knowledge and skills to safely operate the equipment. Special chainsaws can cut concrete, brick and natural stone. These use similar chains to ordinary chainsaws, but with cutting edges embedded with diamond grit. They may use gasoline or hydraulic power, and the chain is lubricated with water, because of high friction and to remove stone-dust. The machine is used in construction, for example in cutting deep square holes in walls or floors, in stone sculpture for removing large chunks of stone during pre-carving, by fire departments for gaining access to


title: Chainsaw content: buildings and in restoration of buildings and monuments, for removing parts with minimal damage to the surrounding structure. More recently concrete chainsaws with electric motors of 230 volts have also been developed. Because the material to be cut is non-fibrous, there is much less chance of kickback. Therefore, the most-used method of cutting is plunge-cutting, by pushing the tip of the blade into the material. With this method square cuts as small as the blade width can be achieved. Pushback can occur if a block shifts when nearly cut through and pinches the blade, but overall the machine is less


title: Chainsaw content: dangerous than a wood-cutting chainsaw. Chainsaw A chainsaw is a portable, mechanical saw which cuts with a set of teeth attached to a rotating chain that runs along a guide bar. It is used in activities such as tree felling, limbing, bucking, pruning, cutting firebreaks in wildland fire suppression and harvesting of firewood. Chainsaws with specially designed bar and chain combinations have been developed as tools for use in chainsaw art and chainsaw mills. Specialized chainsaws are used for cutting concrete. Chainsaws are sometimes used for cutting ice, for example for ice sculpture and in Finland for winter swimming. Someone


title: "Maureen O'Hara" content: time not well received critically—director Nicholas Ray himself was dissatisfied with it. She next had a role as a wealthy widow who falls in love with an alcoholic artist ( Dana Andrews) in the Victorian melodrama "The Forbidden Street", which was shot at Shepperton Studios in London. O'Hara felt that her performance was poor and admitted that she did not have her heart set on the film. After the poorly received comedy "Father Was a Fullback", dismissed by "Picturegoer" magazine as an "unhappy mixture of Freud and football", she starred in her first film with Universal Pictures, the escapist adventure,


title: "Erwin Chargaff" content: and best known achievement was to show that in natural DNA the number of guanine units equals the number of cytosine units and the number of adenine units equals the number of thymine units. In human DNA, for example, the four bases are present in these percentages: A=30.9% and T=29.4%; G=19.9% and C=19.8%. This strongly hinted towards the base pair makeup of the DNA, although Chargaff did not explicitly state this connection himself. For this research, Chargaff is credited with disproving the tetranucleotide hypothesis (Phoebus Levene's widely accepted hypothesis that DNA was composed of a large number of repeats of


title: "Canopic jar" content: Canopic jar Canopic jars used by the ancient Egyptians during the mummification process to store and preserve the viscera of their owner for the afterlife. They were commonly either carved from limestone or were made of pottery. These jars were used by the ancient Egyptians from the time of the Old Kingdom until the time of the Late Period or the Ptolemaic Period, by which time the viscera were simply wrapped and placed with the body. The viscera were not kept in a single canopic jar: each jar was reserved for specific organs. The name "canopic" reflects the mistaken association


title: "Canopic jar" content: by early Egyptologists with the Greek legend of Canopus. Canopic jars of the Old Kingdom were rarely inscribed and had a plain lid. In the Middle Kingdom inscriptions became more usual, and the lids were often in the form of human heads. By the Nineteenth dynasty each of the four lids depicted one of the four sons of Horus, as guardians of the organs. |url= https://art.thewalters.org/detail/77403 The canopic jars were four in number, each for the safekeeping of particular human organs: the stomach, intestines, lungs, and liver, all of which, it was believed, would be needed in the afterlife. There


title: "Canopic jar" content: was no jar for the heart: the Egyptians believed it to be the seat of the soul, and so it was left inside the body. Many Old Kingdom canopic jars were found totally empty and damaged, even in undisturbed tomb context. Therefore it seems that they were never used as container for entrails. Instead it seems that they were part of burial rituals and were placed after these rituals empty into the burial. The design of canopic jars changed over time. The oldest date from the Eleventh or the Twelfth dynasty, and are made of stone or wood. The last


title: "Canopic jar" content: jars date from the New Kingdom. In the Old Kingdom the jars had plain lids, though by the First Intermediate Period jars with human heads (assumed to represent the dead) began to appear. Sometimes the covers of the jars were modeled after (or painted to resemble) the head of Anubis, the god of death and embalming. By the late Eighteenth dynasty canopic jars had come to feature the four sons of Horus. Many sets of jars survive from this period, in alabaster, aragonite, calcareous stone, and blue or green glazed porcelain. The sons of Horus were also the gods of


title: "Canopic jar" content: the cardinal compass points. Each god was responsible for protecting a particular organ, and was himself protected by a companion goddess. They were: Early canopic jars were placed inside a canopic chest and buried in tombs together with the sarcophagus of the dead. Later, they were sometimes arranged in rows beneath the bier, or at the four corners of the chamber. After the early periods there were usually inscriptions on the outsides of the jars, sometimes quite long and complex. The scholar Sir Ernest Budge quoted an inscription from the Saïte or Ptolemaic period that begins: "Thy bread is to


title: "Canopic jar" content: thee. Thy beer is to thee. Thou livest upon that on which Ra lives." Other inscriptions tell of purification in the afterlife. In the Third Intermediate Period and later, dummy canopic jars were introduced. Improved embalming techniques allowed the viscera to remain in the body; the traditional jars remained a feature of tombs, but were no longer hollowed out for storage of the organs. Copious numbers of the jars were produced, and surviving examples of them can be seen in museums around the world. Canopic jar Canopic jars used by the ancient Egyptians during the mummification process to store and


title: Axolotl content: Axolotl The axolotl (, from ; plural axolotls or rarely axolomeh), "Ambystoma mexicanum", also known as the Mexican walking fish, is a neotenic salamander related to the tiger salamander. Although the axolotl is colloquially known as a "walking fish", it is not a fish, but an amphibian. The species was originally found in several lakes, such as Lake Xochimilco underlying Mexico City. Axolotls are unusual among amphibians in that they reach adulthood without undergoing metamorphosis. Instead of developing lungs and taking to the land, adults remain aquatic and gilled. Axolotls should not be confused with waterdogs, the larval stage of


title: Axolotl content: the closely related tiger salamanders ("A. tigrinum" and "A. mavortium"), which are widespread in much of North America and occasionally become neotenic. Neither should they be confused with mudpuppies ("Necturus" spp.), fully aquatic salamanders that are not closely related to the axolotl but bear a superficial resemblance. , wild axolotls were near extinction due to urbanization in Mexico City and consequent water pollution, as well as the introduction of invasive species such as tilapia and perch. They are currently listed by CITES as an endangered species and by IUCN as critically endangered in the wild, with a decreasing population. Axolotls


title: Axolotl content: are used extensively in scientific research due to their ability to regenerate limbs. Axolotls were also sold as food in Mexican markets and were a staple in the Aztec diet. Surveys in 1998, 2003, and 2008 found 6,000, 1,000, and 100 axolotls per square kilometer in its Lake Xochimilco habitat, respectively. A four-month-long search in 2013, however, turned up no surviving individuals in the wild. Just a month later, two wild ones were spotted in a network of canals leading from Xochimilco. The city is currently working on conserving axolotls by building "axolotl shelters" and conserving remaining and potential habitats


title: Axolotl content: for the salamanders. A sexually mature adult axolotl, at age 18–24 months, ranges in length from , although a size close to is most common and greater than is rare. Axolotls possess features typical of salamander larvae, including external gills and a caudal fin extending from behind the head to the vent. Their heads are wide, and their eyes are lidless. Their limbs are underdeveloped and possess long, thin digits. Males are identified by their swollen cloacae lined with papillae, while females are noticeable for their wider bodies full of eggs. Three pairs of external gill stalks (rami) originate behind


title: Axolotl content: their heads and are used to move oxygenated water. The external gill rami are lined with filaments (fimbriae) to increase surface area for gas exchange. Four gill slits lined with gill rakers are hidden underneath the external gills. Axolotls have barely visible vestigial teeth, which would have developed during metamorphosis. The primary method of feeding is by suction, during which their rakers interlock to close the gill slits. External gills are used for respiration, although buccal pumping (gulping air from the surface) may also be used to provide oxygen to their lungs. Axolotls have four pigmentation genes; when mutated they


title: Axolotl content: create different color variants. The normal wild type animal is brown/tan with gold speckles and an olive undertone. The four mutant colors are leucistic (pale pink with black eyes), albino (golden with gold eyes), axanthic (grey with black eyes) and melanoid (all black with no gold speckling or olive tone). In addition, there is wide individual variability in the size, frequency, and intensity of the gold speckling and at least one variant that develops a black and white piebald appearance on reaching maturity. Because pet breeders frequently cross the variant colors, animals that are double recessive mutants are common in


title: Axolotl content: the pet trade, especially white/pink animals with pink eyes that are double homozygous mutants for both the albino and leucistic trait. Axolotls also have some limited ability to alter their color to provide better camouflage by changing the relative size and thickness of their melanophores. The axolotl is only native to Lake Xochimilco and Lake Chalco in the Valley of Mexico. Lake Chalco no longer exists, as it was artificially drained to avoid periodic flooding, and Lake Xochimilco remains a remnant of its former self, existing mainly as canals. The water temperature in Xochimilco rarely rises above , though it


title: Axolotl content: may fall to 6 to 7 °C in the winter, and perhaps lower. The wild population has been put under heavy pressure by the growth of Mexico City. The axolotl is currently on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's annual Red List of threatened species. Non-native fish, such as African tilapia and Asian carp, have also recently been introduced to the waters. These new fish have been eating the axolotls' young, as well as its primary source of food. Axolotls are members of the tiger salamander, or "Ambystoma tigrinum" species complex, along with all other Mexican species of "Ambystoma".


title: Axolotl content: Their habitat is like that of most neotenic species—a high altitude body of water surrounded by a risky terrestrial environment. These conditions are thought to favor neoteny. However, a terrestrial population of Mexican tiger salamanders occupies and breeds in the axolotl's habitat. The axolotl is carnivorous, consuming small prey such as worms, insects, and small fish in the wild. Axolotls locate food by smell, and will "snap" at any potential meal, sucking the food into their stomachs with vacuum force. Axolotls exhibit neoteny, meaning that they reach sexual maturity without undergoing metamorphosis. Many species within the axolotl's genus are either


title: Axolotl content: entirely neotenic or have neotenic populations. In the axolotl, metamorphic failure is caused by a lack of thyroid stimulating hormone, which is used to induce the thyroid to produce thyroxine in transforming salamanders. The genes responsible for neoteny in laboratory animals may have been identified; however, they are not linked in wild populations, suggesting artificial selection is the cause of complete neoteny in laboratory and pet axolotls. Neoteny has been observed in all salamander families in which it seems to be a survival mechanism, in aquatic environments only of mountain and hill, with little food and, in particular, with little


title: Axolotl content: iodine. In this way, salamanders can reproduce and survive in the form of a smaller larval stage, which is aquatic and requires a lower quality and quantity of food compared to the big adult, which is terrestrial. If the salamander larvae ingest a sufficient amount of iodine, directly or indirectly through cannibalism, they quickly begin metamorphosis and transform into bigger terrestrial adults, with higher dietary requirements. In fact, in some high mountain lakes there live dwarf forms of salmonids that are caused by deficiencies in food and, in particular, iodine, which causes cretinism and dwarfism due to hypothyroidism, as it


title: Axolotl content: does in humans. Unlike some other neotenic salamanders (sirens and "Necturus"), axolotls can be induced to metamorphose by an injection of iodine (used in the production of thyroid hormones) or by shots of thyroxine hormone. The adult form resembles a terrestrial plateau tiger salamander, but has several differences, such as longer toes, which support its status as a separate species. Six adult axolotls (including a leucistic specimen) were shipped from Mexico City to the in Paris in 1863. Unaware of their neoteny, Auguste Duméril was surprised when, instead of the axolotl, he found in the vivarium a new species, similar


title: Axolotl content: to the salamander. This discovery was the starting point of research about neoteny. It is not certain that "Ambystoma velasci" specimens were not included in the original shipment. Vilem Laufberger in Prague used thyroid hormone injections to induce an axolotl to grow into a terrestrial adult salamander. The experiment was repeated by Englishman Julian Huxley, who was unaware the experiment had already been done, using ground thyroids. Since then, experiments have been done often with injections of iodine or various thyroid hormones used to induce metamorphosis. Today, the axolotl is still used in research as a model organism, and large


title: Axolotl content: numbers are bred in captivity. They are especially easy to breed compared to other salamanders in their family, which are almost never captive-bred due to the demands of terrestrial life. One attractive feature for research is the large and easily manipulated embryo, which allows viewing of the full development of a vertebrate. Axolotls are used in heart defect studies due to the presence of a mutant gene that causes heart failure in embryos. Since the embryos survive almost to hatching with no heart function, the defect is very observable. The axolotl is also considered an ideal animal model for the


title: Axolotl content: study of neural tube closure due to the similarities between human and axolotl neural plate and tube formation, which unlike the frog, is not hidden under a layer of superficial epithelium. There are also mutations affecting other organ systems some of which are not well characterized and others that are. The genetics of the color variants of the axolotl have also been widely studied. The feature of the salamander that attracts most attention is its healing ability: the axolotl does not heal by scarring and is capable of the regeneration of entire lost appendages in a period of months, and,


title: Axolotl content: in certain cases, more vital structures. Some have indeed been found restoring the less vital parts of their brains. They can also readily accept transplants from other individuals, including eyes and parts of the brain—restoring these alien organs to full functionality. In some cases, axolotls have been known to repair a damaged limb, as well as regenerating an additional one, ending up with an extra appendage that makes them attractive to pet owners as a novelty. In metamorphosed individuals, however, the ability to regenerate is greatly diminished. The axolotl is therefore used as a model for the development of limbs


title: Axolotl content: in vertebrates. The 32 billion base pair long sequence of the axolotl's genome was published in 2018 and is the largest animal genome completed so far. It revealed species-specific genetic pathways that may be responsible for limb regeneration. Although the axolotl genome is about 10 times as large as the human genome, it encodes a similar number of proteins, namely 23,251 (the human genome encodes about 20,000 proteins). The size difference is mostly explained by a large fraction of repetitive sequences, but such repeated elements also contribute to increased median intron sizes (22,759 bp) which are 13, 16 and 25


title: Axolotl content: times that observed in human (1,750 bp), mouse (1,469 bp) and Tibetan frog (906 bp), respectively. The axolotl is a popular exotic pet like its relative, the tiger salamander ("Ambystoma tigerinum"). As for all poikilothermic organisms, lower temperatures result in slower metabolism and a very unhealthily reduced appetite. Temperatures at approximately to are suggested for captive axolotls to ensure sufficient food intake; stress resulting from more than a day's exposure to lower temperatures may quickly lead to disease and death, and temperatures higher than may lead to metabolic rate increase, also causing stress and eventually death. Chlorine, commonly added to


title: Axolotl content: tapwater, is harmful to axolotls. A single axolotl typically requires a tank with a water depth of at least . Axolotls spend the majority of the time at the bottom of the tank. Salts, such as Holtfreter's solution, are usually added to the water to prevent infection. In captivity, axolotls eat a variety of readily available foods, including trout and salmon pellets, frozen or live bloodworms, earthworms, and waxworms. Axolotls can also eat feeder fish, but care should be taken as fish may contain parasites. Substrates are another important consideration for captive axolotls, as axolotls (like other amphibians and reptiles)


title: Axolotl content: tend to ingest bedding material together with food and are commonly prone to gastrointestinal obstruction and foreign body ingestion. Some common substrates used for animal enclosures can be harmful for amphibians and reptiles. If gravel (common in aquarium use) is used, it is recommended that it consist of smooth particles of a size small enough to pass through the digestive tract. One guide to axolotl care for laboratories notes that bowel obstructions are a common cause of death, and recommends that no items with a diameter below 3 cm should be available to the animal. There is some evidence that


title: Axolotl content: axolotls might seek out appropriately-sized gravel for use as gastroliths based on experiments conducted at the University of Manitoba axolotl colony. "Axolotl" is one of a number of words, mostly of foreign origin, adopted by "Mad" Magazine as nonsense words for use as running gags; "potrzebie" and "veeblefetzer" are two others. These achieved some popularity with readers of the magazine; see for example the discussion of a poem (quoted in full) centering on the word. The axolotl's real world ability to regrow limbs served as the inspiration for the Tleilaxu axlotl tanks in the fictional "Dune" universe created by Frank


title: Axolotl content: Herbert. Argentine writer Julio Cortázar included a short story entitled "Axolotl" in his 1956 collection "Final del juego". The story concerns a man who becomes obsessed with the salamanders after viewing them in an aquarium in Paris. In the Netflix series Bojack Horseman, there is an anthropomorphic axolotl character named Yolanda Buenaventura voiced by Natalie Morales. Axolotl The axolotl (, from ; plural axolotls or rarely axolomeh), "Ambystoma mexicanum", also known as the Mexican walking fish, is a neotenic salamander related to the tiger salamander. Although the axolotl is colloquially known as a "walking fish", it is not a fish,


title: Outsourcing content: fulfilling these profitable services has mostly taken place at the expense of industry since the agricultural sector in the early industrializing Global North had already been maximizing its labour capacity. Despite the variety of domestic and international factors affecting deindustrialization in the Global North, those concerning the external influence of the global market have been the most influential ones since 1994. The recent industrialization process outsourcing has encouraged in the Global South has taken place at a much faster pace than it did during its beginnings in the North, given that the well-developed technology was already developed, and merely spread


title: "Street Fighter II: The World Warrior" content: and was actually considered by many, while mediocre, to be still quite superior to the official DOS version. Despite being officially advertised by US Gold along with the C64 and ZX Spectrum conversions and anticipated on magazines, the Amstrad CPC development by Creative Materials was scrapped and the port finally never surfaced. The Game Boy version of "Street Fighter II" was released on August 11, 1995 in Japan, and in September 1995 internationally. It is missing three of the original characters (Dhalsim, E. Honda, and Vega), although the remaining nine are playable. The graphics, character portraits, and stages are based


title: "Pump and dump" content: and distort" the scammer first short-sells the stock, and then artificially "lowers" the price, using the same techniques as the pump and dump but using criticism or negative predictions regarding the stock. The scammer then covers their short position when they buy back the stock at a lower price. This tactic is commonly used by institutions and brokers to dupe individual traders in the Korean stock market, as only institutional traders are allowed to shortsell stocks. One method of regulating and restricting pump and dump manipulators is to target the category of stocks most often associated with this scheme. To


title: "Second Taranaki War" content: from the attack on Sentry Hill in April 1864, there was an absence of Māori aggression throughout the entire Second War, and that therefore Māori were never actually at war. It concluded: "In so far as Māori fought at all – and few did – they were merely defending their "kainga", crops and land against military advance and occupation." The conflict in Taranaki had its roots in the First Taranaki War, which had ended in March 1861 with an uneasy truce. Neither side fulfilled the terms of the truce, leaving many of the issues unresolved. Chief among those issues was


title: "SCO Group" content: on SCO's claim for breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, ordering the case to be closed. The company filed an appeal of "SCO v. Novell", scheduled to be heard on January 20, 2011. On August 30, 2011, the United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed SCO's loss to Novell in the second jury/bench trial. SCO's appellate brief had argued that there were evidentiary errors and other issues at trial. The affirmed verdict held that Novell did not transfer the UNIX copyrights to SCO in the amended asset purchase agreement, and that Novell


title: "Huddersfield Town A.F.C." content: Huddersfield Town A.F.C. Huddersfield Town Association Football Club is a professional football club in Huddersfield, West Yorkshire, England, which competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. In 1926, Huddersfield became the first English club to win three successive league titles, a feat which only three other clubs have matched. The first two league titles were won under manager Herbert Chapman, who also led the club to the FA Cup in 1922. In the late 1950s the club was managed by Bill Shankly and featured Denis Law and Ray Wilson. Following relegation from the First Division in


title: "Cabaret (1972 film)" content: on the piano in Fraulein Schneider's parlor and later heard on Sally's gramophone in a German translation ("Heiraten") sung by cabaret singer Greta Keller. The following songs from the original Broadway production were omitted from the film version: "So What?", "Don't Tell Mama", "Telephone Song", "Perfectly Marvelous", "Why Should I Wake Up?", "The Money Song" (replaced by "Money, Money"), "It Couldn't Please Me More", "Meeskite", "What Would You Do?", and "Married". Some of these selections are used as instrumentals as gramophone selections. The film was immediately successful at the box office. By May 1973 it had earned rentals of $4.5


title: "Cabaret (1972 film)" content: the period—Berlin, 1931—at a cool distance. We see the decadence as garish and sleazy; yet we also see the animal energy in it—everything seems to become sexualized. The movie does not exploit decadence; rather, it gives it its due. With Joel Grey as our devil-doll host—the master of ceremonies—and Liza Minnelli (in her first singing role on the screen) as exuberant, corruptible Sally Bowles, chasing after the life of a headliner no matter what; Minnelli has such gaiety and electricity that she becomes a star before our eyes." In 2013, film critic Peter Bradshaw listed "Cabaret" at number one on


title: "Follow the Leader (Korn album)" content: critic Janiss Garza described the album as "intensely tortured and savage as ever", while noting that "in spite of all this distress and suffering, Korn does loosen up". "Entertainment Weekly" reviewer Jim Farber called it "a big load of dumb fun" and "also incredibly perverse, going to almost laughable lengths to mess with metal cliché", concluding that if "hardly innovative enough to rival the classics of metal, at least Korn's LP gives this once-stagnant style kernels of something new". Jon Pareles from "The New York Times" said the album was "choppy", describing Davis as "wrestling with self-hatred, violent impulses, parental


title: Libor content: as ex officio members of the ARRC: In June 2017, the ARRC announced a broad Treasury repo financing rate, SOFR, as its recommended alternative to the USD LIBOR. In its justification for this choice the ARRC said: Ameribor is a benchmark overnight rate for unsecured loans based on transactions of members of the American Financial Exchange, an electronic marketplace where small and midsized banks trade $1 billion in loans daily as of 2018. The administration of Libor has itself become a regulated activity overseen by the UK's Financial Conduct Authority. Furthermore, knowingly or deliberately making false or misleading statements in


title: Quorum content: unless otherwise provided. In online groups, a quorum has to be determined in a different manner since no one is actually "present". The rules establishing such groups would have to prescribe this determination. An example is that a quorum in such groups could be established as "present" if enough members state that they are "present" at the designated meeting time. The chairman of the group has the responsibility to determine if a quorum is present. In addition, any member can raise a point of order about an apparent absence of a quorum. Because it is difficult to determine exactly when


title: "White-faced ibis" content: White-faced ibis The white-faced ibis ("Plegadis chihi") is a wading bird in the ibis family Threskiornithidae. This species breeds colonially in marshes, usually nesting in bushes or low trees. Its breeding range extends from the western United States south through Mexico, as well as from southeastern Brazil and southeastern Bolivia south to central Argentina, and along the coast of central Chile. Its winter range extends from southern California and Louisiana south to include the rest of its breeding range. The white-faced ibis is very similar to the glossy ibis in its non-breeding plumages, but it tends to be slightly smaller


title: "White-faced ibis" content: and the plumage color is somewhat warmer. Breeding adults have a pink bare face bordered with white feathers (rather than a bluish bare face with no bordering feathers), a grey bill, and brighter colored, redder legs. Adults have red eyes year-round, whereas glossy ibises have dark eyes. Juveniles of the two species are nearly identical. The white-faced ibis occurs in Canada, the United States, Central America and the southern half of South America. In 2012, the total population size was estimated to be 1.2 million individuals, and increasing. The IUCN rates it as being of Least Concern. The white-faced ibis


title: "White-faced ibis" content: bears a strong resemblance to the related glossy ibis and in the past was sometimes considered to be a subspecies of the glossy ibis. Another theory was that upon coming to the New World, a small isolated glossy ibis population evolved to become its own separate species. However, recent molecular phylogenetic studies show that the white-faced ibis may actually be paraphyletic. In fact, members of the white-faced ibis populations in the United States appear to be more closely related to glossy ibises than to members of white-faced ibis populations in Southern Brazil. The white-faced ibis eats a variety of organisms,


title: "White-faced ibis" content: including many invertebrates such as insects, leeches, snails, crayfish and earthworms. It may also eat vertebrates such as fish, newts, and frogs. Its feeding style is to use its bill to probe for prey. This species breeds colonially in marshes, usually nesting in bushes or low trees. Its breeding range extends from the western United States south through Mexico, as well as from southeastern Brazil and southeastern Bolivia south to central Argentina, and along the coast of central Chile. Its winter range extends from southern California and Louisiana south to include the rest of its breeding range. The white-faced ibis


title: "White-faced ibis" content: chooses to nest in the parts of a marsh with dense vegetation such as bulrush, cattails, shrubs and short trees. It will then build a nest from reeds. The white-faced ibis usually lays three or four blue-green eggs at a time. White-faced ibises in captivity live up to fourteen years on average. In the wild, white-faced ibises usually live for nine years; however the oldest recorded wild white-faced ibis lived for fourteen years and six months. In the past, the white-faced ibis faced many threats from humans. Studies completed in Utah in the 1960s (before this species was added to


title: "White-faced ibis" content: the Migratory Bird Treaty Act) showed that 82.9% of recorded deaths in banded birds were a result of being shot. However, the main causes of decline of this species previously were pesticides and habitat destruction. The pesticide DDT caused eggshells to be so thin and fragile that parent white-faced ibises crushed the eggs when they were incubating them. Also, since this species is so dependent on wetlands and marshes for both feeding and nesting, changes to water systems such as pollution and man-made draining of water habitats had devastating impacts on members of this species in the past. In order


title: "White-faced ibis" content: to correct these damages, DDT was banned in 1970 and various programs were created to better maintain and protect wetland nesting habitats. Yet, there is still some debate as to whether or not populations of white-faced ibises in all geographic areas are recovered and growing. White-faced ibis The white-faced ibis ("Plegadis chihi") is a wading bird in the ibis family Threskiornithidae. This species breeds colonially in marshes, usually nesting in bushes or low trees. Its breeding range extends from the western United States south through Mexico, as well as from southeastern Brazil and southeastern Bolivia south to central Argentina, and


title: "White stork" content: White stork The white stork ("Ciconia ciconia") is a large bird in the stork family Ciconiidae. Its plumage is mainly white, with black on its wings. Adults have long red legs and long pointed red beaks, and measure on average from beak tip to end of tail, with a wingspan. The two subspecies, which differ slightly in size, breed in Europe (north to Finland), northwestern Africa, southwestern Asia (east to southern Kazakhstan) and southern Africa. The white stork is a long-distance migrant, wintering in Africa from tropical Sub-Saharan Africa to as far south as South Africa, or on the Indian


title: "White stork" content: subcontinent. When migrating between Europe and Africa, it avoids crossing the Mediterranean Sea and detours via the Levant in the east or the Strait of Gibraltar in the west, because the air thermals on which it depends for soaring do not form over water. A carnivore, the white stork eats a wide range of animal prey, including insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, small mammals and small birds. It takes most of its food from the ground, among low vegetation, and from shallow water. It is a monogamous breeder, but does not pair for life. Both members of the pair build a


title: "White stork" content: large stick nest, which may be used for several years. Each year the female can lay one clutch of usually four eggs, which hatch asynchronously 33–34 days after being laid. Both parents take turns incubating the eggs and both feed the young. The young leave the nest 58–64 days after hatching, and continue to be fed by the parents for a further 7–20 days. The white stork has been rated as least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). It benefited from human activities during the Middle Ages as woodland was cleared, but changes in farming methods


title: "White stork" content: and industrialisation saw it decline and disappear from parts of Europe in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Conservation and reintroduction programs across Europe have resulted in the white stork resuming breeding in the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Sweden. It has few natural predators, but may harbour several types of parasite; the plumage is home to chewing lice and feather mites, while the large nests maintain a diverse range of mesostigmatic mites. This conspicuous species has given rise to many legends across its range, of which the best-known is the story of babies being brought by storks. English naturalist Francis


title: "White stork" content: Willughby wrote about the white stork in the 17th century, having seen a drawing sent to him by his friend and natural history enthusiast Sir Thomas Brown of Norwich. He named it "Ciconia alba". They noted they were occasional vagrants to England, blown there by storms. It was one of the many bird species originally described by Linnaeus in the landmark 1758 10th edition of his "Systema Naturae", where it was given the binomial name of "Ardea ciconia". It was reclassified to (and was designated the type species of) the new genus "Ciconia" by French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson in


title: "White stork" content: 1760. Both the genus and specific epithet, "cǐcōnia", are the Latin word for "stork", originally recorded in the works of Horace and Ovid. The Latin word survives in most Romance languages ("cicogna", "cigüeña", "cegonha" and the like). The word "stork" is derived from the Old English word "storc", and appeared in the 10th-century works the "Erfurt Glossary", where the word is equated with "Ciconia", and Aelfric's "Homilies". The word is related to the Old High German "storah", "stork", and similar words in many other European languages, all of which are descended from the Germanic "sturko-z". There are two subspecies: The


title: "White stork" content: stork family contains six genera in three broad groups: the open-billed and wood storks ("Mycteria" and "Anastomus"), the giant storks ("Ephippiorhynchus", "Jabiru" and "Leptoptilos"), and the "typical" storks, "Ciconia". The typical storks include the white stork and six other extant species, which are characterised by straight pointed beaks and mainly black and white plumage. Its closest relatives are the larger, black-billed Oriental stork ("Ciconia boyciana") of East Asia, which was formerly classified as a subspecies of the white stork, and the maguari stork ("C. maguari") of South America. Close evolutionary relationships within "Ciconia" are suggested by behavioural similarities and, biochemically,


title: "White stork" content: through analysis of both mitochondrial cytochrome "b" gene sequences and DNA-DNA hybridization. A "Ciconia" fossil representing the distal end of a right humerus has been recovered from Miocene beds of Rusinga Island, Lake Victoria, Kenya. The 24–6 million year old fossil could have originated from either a white stork or a black stork ("C. nigra"), which are species of about the same size with very similar bone structures. The Middle Miocene beds of Maboko Island have yielded further remains. The white stork is a large bird. It has a length of , and a standing height of . The wingspan


title: "White stork" content: is and its weight is . Like all storks, it has long legs, a long neck and a long straight pointed beak. The sexes are identical in appearance, except that males are larger than females on average. The plumage is mainly white with black flight feathers and wing coverts; the black is caused by the pigment melanin. The breast feathers are long and shaggy forming a ruff which is used in some courtship displays. The irises are dull brown or grey, and the peri-orbital skin is black. The adult has a bright red beak and red legs, the colouration of


title: "White stork" content: which is derived from carotenoids in the diet. In parts of Spain, studies have shown that the pigment is based on astaxanthin obtained from an introduced species of crayfish ("Procambarus clarkii") and the bright red beak colours show up even in nestlings, in contrast to the duller beaks of young white storks elsewhere. As with other storks, the wings are long and broad enabling the bird to soar. In flapping flight its wingbeats are slow and regular. It flies with its neck stretched forward and with its long legs extended well beyond the end of its short tail. It walks


title: "White stork" content: at a slow and steady pace with its neck upstretched. In contrast, it often hunches its head between its shoulders when resting. Moulting has not been extensively studied, but appears to take place throughout the year, with the primary flight feathers replaced over the breeding season. Upon hatching, the young white stork is partly covered with short, sparse, whitish down feathers. This early down is replaced about a week later with a denser coat of woolly white down. By three weeks, the young bird acquires black scapulars and flight feathers. On hatching the chick has pinkish legs, which turn to


title: "White stork" content: greyish-black as it ages. Its beak is black with a brownish tip. By the time it fledges, the juvenile bird's plumage is similar to that of the adult, though its black feathers are often tinged with brown, and its beak and legs are a duller brownish-red or orange. The beak is typically orange or red with a darker tip. The bills gain the adults' red colour the following summer, although the black tips persist in some individuals. Young storks adopt adult plumage by their second summer. Within its range the white stork is distinctive when seen on the ground. The


title: "White stork" content: winter range of "C. c. asiatica" overlaps that of the Asian openbill, which has similar plumage but a different bill shape. When seen at a distance in flight, the white stork can be confused with several other species with similar underwing patterns, such as the yellow-billed stork, great white pelican and Egyptian vulture. The yellow-billed stork is identified by its black tail and a longer, slightly curved, yellow beak. The white stork also tends to be larger than the yellow-billed stork. The great white pelican has short legs which do not extend beyond its tail, and it flies with its


title: "White stork" content: neck retracted, keeping its head near to its stocky body, giving it a different flight profile. Pelicans also behave differently, soaring in orderly, synchronised flocks rather than in disorganised groups of individuals as the white stork does. The Egyptian vulture is much smaller, with a long wedge-shaped tail, shorter legs and a small yellow-tinged head on a short neck. The common crane, which can also look black and white in strong light, shows longer legs and a longer neck in flight. The nominate race of the white stork has a wide although disjunct summer range across Europe, clustered in the


title: "White stork" content: Iberian Peninsula and North Africa in the west, and much of eastern and central Europe, with 25% of the world's population concentrated in Poland, as well as parts of western Asia. The "asiatica" population of about 1450 birds is restricted to a region in central Asia between the Aral Sea and Xinjiang in western China. The Xinjiang population is believed to have become extinct around 1980. Migration routes extend the range of this species into many parts of Africa and India. Some populations adhere to the eastern migration route, which passes across Israel into eastern and central Africa. A few


title: "White stork" content: records of breeding from South Africa have been known since 1933 at Calitzdorp, and about 10 birds have been known to breed since the 1990s around Bredasdorp. A small population of white storks winters in India and is thought to derive principally from the "C. c. asiatica" population as flocks of up to 200 birds have been observed on spring migration in the early 1900s through the Kurram Valley. However, birds ringed in Germany have been recovered in western (Bikaner) and southern (Tirunelveli) India. An atypical specimen with red orbital skin, a feature of the Oriental white stork, has been


title: "White stork" content: recorded and further study of the Indian population is required. North of the breeding range, it is a passage migrant or vagrant in Finland, Great Britain, Iceland, Ireland, Norway and Sweden, and west to the Azores and Madeira. In recent years, the range has expanded into western Russia. The white stork's preferred feeding grounds are grassy meadows, farmland and shallow wetlands. It avoids areas overgrown with tall grass and shrubs. In the Chernobyl area of northern Ukraine, white stork populations declined after the 1986 nuclear accident there as farmland was succeeded by tall grass shrubs. In parts of Poland, poor


title: "White stork" content: natural foraging grounds have forced birds to seek food at rubbish dumps since 1999. White storks have also been reported foraging in rubbish dumps in the Middle East, North Africa and South Africa. The white stork breeds in greater numbers in areas with open grasslands, particularly grassy areas which are wet or periodically flooded, and less in areas with taller vegetation cover such as forest and shrubland. They make use of grasslands, wetlands, and farmland on the wintering grounds in Africa. White storks were probably aided by human activities during the Middle Ages as woodland was cleared and new pastures


title: "White stork" content: and farmland were created, and they were found across much of Europe, breeding as far north as Sweden. The population in Sweden is thought to have established in the 16th century after forests were cut down for agriculture. About 5000 pairs were estimated to breed in the 18th century which declined subsequently. The first accurate census in 1917 found 25 pairs and the last pair failed to breed around 1955. The white stork is a rare visitor to the British Isles, as about 20 birds are seen in Britain every year, but there are no records of nesting since a


title: "White stork" content: pair nested atop St Giles High Kirk in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1416. A decline in population began in the 19th century due to industrialisation and changes in agricultural methods. White storks no longer nest in many countries, and the current strongholds of the western population are in Portugal, Spain, Ukraine and Poland. In the Iberian Peninsula, populations are concentrated in the southwest, and have also declined due to agricultural practices. A study published in 2005 found that the Podhale region in the uplands of southern Poland had seen an influx of white storks, which first bred there in 1931 and


title: "White stork" content: have nested at progressively higher altitudes since, reaching 890 m (3000 ft) in 1999. The authors proposed that this was related to climate warming and the influx of other animals and plants to higher altitudes. White storks arriving in Poznań province (Greater Poland Voivodeship) in western Poland in spring to breed did so some 10 days earlier in the last twenty years of the 20th century than at the end of the 19th century. Systematic research into migration of the white stork began with German ornithologist Johannes Thienemann who commenced bird ringing studies in 1906 at the Rossitten Bird Observatory,


title: "White stork" content: on the Curonian Spit in what was then East Prussia. Although not many storks passed through Rossitten itself, the observatory coordinated the large-scale ringing of the species throughout Germany and elsewhere in Europe. Between 1906 and the Second World War about 100,000, mainly juvenile, white storks were ringed, with over 2,000 long-distance recoveries of birds wearing Rossitten rings reported between 1908 and 1954. White storks fly south from their summer breeding grounds in Europe in August and September, heading for Africa. There, they spend the winter in savannah from Kenya and Uganda south to the Cape Province of South Africa.


title: "White stork" content: In these areas they congregate in large flocks which may exceed a thousand individuals. Some diverge westwards into western Sudan and Chad, and may reach Nigeria. In spring, the birds return north; they are recorded from Sudan and Egypt from February to April. They arrive back in Europe around late March and April, after an average journey of 49 days. By comparison, the autumn journey is completed in about 26 days. Tailwinds and scarcity of food and water en route (birds fly faster over regions lacking resources) increase average speed. To avoid a long sea crossing over the Mediterranean, birds


title: "White stork" content: from central Europe either follow an eastern migration route by crossing the Bosphorus to Turkey, traversing the Levant, then bypassing the Sahara Desert by following the Nile valley southwards, or follow a western route over the Strait of Gibraltar. These migration corridors maximise help from the thermals and thus save energy. The eastern route is by far the more important with 530,000 white storks using it annually, making the species the second commonest migrant there (after the European honey buzzard). The flocks of migrating raptors, white storks and great white pelicans can stretch for 200 km (125 mi). The eastern


title: "White stork" content: route is twice as long as the western, but storks take the same time to reach the wintering grounds by either. Juvenile white storks set off on their first southward migration in an inherited direction but, if displaced from that bearing by weather conditions, they are unable to compensate, and may end up in a new wintering location. Adults can compensate for strong winds and adjust their direction to finish at their normal winter sites, because they are familiar with the location. For the same reason, all spring migrants, even those from displaced wintering locations, can find their way back


title: "White stork" content: to the traditional breeding sites. An experiment with young birds raised in captivity in Kaliningrad and released in the absence of wild storks to show them the way revealed that they appeared to have an instinct to fly south, although the scatter in direction was large. White storks rely on the uplift of air thermals to soar and glide the long distances of their annual migrations between Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa. For many, the shortest route would take them over the Mediterranean Sea; however, since air thermals do not form over water, they generally detour over land to avoid the


title: "White stork" content: trans-Mediterranean flights that would require prolonged energetic wing flapping. It has been estimated that flapping flight metabolises 23 times more body fat than soaring flight per distance travelled. Thus, flocks spiral upwards on rising warm air until they emerge at the top, up to above the ground (though one record from Western Sudan observed an altitude of ). Long flights over water may occasionally be undertaken. A young white stork ringed at the nest in Denmark subsequently appeared in England, where it spent some days before moving on. It was later seen flying over St Mary's, Isles of Scilly, and


title: "White stork" content: arrived in a poor condition in Madeira three days later. That island is 500 km (320 mi) from Africa, and twice as far from the European mainland. Migration through the Middle East may be hampered by the "khamsin", winds bringing gusty overcast days unsuitable for flying. In these situations, flocks of white storks sit out the adverse weather on the ground, standing and facing into the wind. The white stork is a gregarious bird; flocks of thousands of individuals have been recorded on migration routes and at wintering areas in Africa. Non-breeding birds gather in groups of 40 or 50