title: Yurt content: with steeper roof profiles and waterproof canvas. In essence they are yurts, but some lack the felt cover and ornate features across the exterior that is present in traditional yurt. There are UK-made yurts that feature a metal frame in use in at least two glamping sites in Somerset and Dorset. The palloza is a traditional building found in the Serra dos Ancares in northern Spain. Pallozas have stone walls and a conical roof made of stalks of rye. Different groups and individuals use yurts for a variety of purposes, from full-time housing to school rooms. In some provincial parks


title: Yurt content: in Canada, and state parks in several US states, permanent yurts are available for camping. Yurt A traditional yurt (from the Turkic languages) or ger (Mongolian) is a portable, round tent covered with skins or felt and used as a dwelling by nomads in the steppes of Central Asia. The structure comprises an angled assembly or latticework of pieces of wood or bamboo for walls, a door frame, ribs (poles, rafters), and a wheel (crown, compression ring) possibly steam-bent. The roof structure is often self-supporting, but large yurts may have interior posts supporting the crown. The top of the wall


title: "Eudokia Makrembolitissa" content: dictionary of history and mythology, called Ἰωνιά (i.e. "Collection" or "Bed of Violets"). It is prefaced by an address to her husband Romanos Diogenes, and the work is described as "a collection of genealogies of gods, heroes, and heroines, of their metamorphoses, and of the fables and stories respecting them found in the ancients; containing also notices of various philosophers." However, the book is now thought to be a modern (16th-century) compilation, falsely attributed to Eudokia, and compiled by the counterfeiter Constantine Paleocappa around 1540. The sources from which the work was compiled include Diogenes Laërtius and the Suda. By


title: "USS Arizona (1858)" content: the Union ships from maneuvering to bring their broadsides to bear on their attackers, they were compelled to retire. As they descended, the Northern vessels met a large force led by Rear Admiral David Dixon Porter who ordered "Arizona" and "Estrella" to join him in a much more powerful drive up the Red River. He allowed , the third ship, to return to the Mississippi to report to Farragut. The next morning, Porter's force arrived at Fort DeRussy - an uncompleted stronghold the South had been building on the banks of the river - and found it abandoned. After partially


title: "Cracking (chemistry)" content: products have a very low content of sulfur and other contaminants. It is very common in Europe and Asia because those regions have high demand for diesel and kerosene. In the US, fluid catalytic cracking is more common because the demand for gasoline is higher. The hydrocracking process depends on the nature of the feedstock and the relative rates of the two competing reactions, hydrogenation and cracking. Heavy aromatic feedstock is converted into lighter products under a wide range of very high pressures (1,000-2,000 psi) and fairly high temperatures (750°-1,500 °F, 400-800 °C), in the presence of hydrogen and special


title: "Fokker 100" content: Fokker 100 The Fokker 100 is a medium-sized, twin-turbofan jet airliner from Fokker, the largest such aircraft built by the company before its bankruptcy in 1996. The type possessed low operational costs and initially had scant competition in the 100-seat short-range regional jet class, contributing to strong sales upon introduction in the late 1980s. However, an increasing number of similar airliners were brought to market by competitors during the 1990s, leading to a substantial decline in both sales and long-term prospects for the 100. Fokker also encountered financial difficulties and was bought up by Deutsche Aerospace AG, which in turn


title: "Fokker 100" content: had financial troubles of its own, restricting its ability to support multiple regional airliner programmes. Accordingly, in 1997, production of the Fokker 100 was terminated after 283 airframes had been delivered. By July 2017, a total of 113 Fokker 100 aircraft remained in airline service with 25 airlines around the world. Although airlines are currently retiring the aircraft, there are still large numbers in operation in both Australia and Iran. The "F28 Mark 0100" “Fokker 100” is based on the Fokker F28 Mark 4000 re-engineed with two Rolls-Royce RB.183 Tay high by-pass ratio turbofans and a fuselage stretched by .


title: "Fokker 100" content: Its wing is wider by , has new flaps and larger ailerons, and extended leading and trailing edges improve aerodynamics and increase the wing chord. The landing gear is strengthened and has new wheels and brakes, and the horizontal stabilizer is widened by . Maximum weights are increased while fuel capacity, max speed and ceiling remain the same, passenger capacity went from 85 to 109. The flight deck went digital with a flight management system, an autopilot/flight director including CAT III autoland, thrust management system, electronic flight instrument displays and full ARINC avionics. The new wing was claimed to be


title: "Fokker 100" content: 30% more efficient in cruise, while retaining the simplicity of a fixed leading edge. The cockpit was updated with a Rockwell Collins DU-1000 EFIS. Like the Fokker Fellowship, the Fokker 100 retained the twin rear fuselage-mounted engines and T-tail configuration, like the Douglas DC-9 family. It lacks the F28 eyebrow windows above the cockpit. A Type Certificate was applied for on 25 March 1983. The program was announced in 1983. A pair of prototypes were built. On 30 November 1986, the first prototype, "PH-MKH", flew for the first time, while the second, "PH-MKC", followed on 25 February 1987. The variant


title: "Fokker 100" content: was approved on 20 November 1987. In February 1988, the first deliveries of the Tay 620-15 powered versions started to Swissair. Major customers included American Airlines with 75 orders, TAM Transportes Aéreos Regionais with 50 and USAir with 40, their aircraft were powered by the more powerful Tay 650-15. During the early 1990s, Fokker and DASA explored a commercial relationship for regional aircraft. DASA purchased 40% of Fokker in 1993. However, by 1995, both Fokker and DASA were suffering financial difficulties, leading to DASA leaving the regional aircraft market. In June 1996, DASA sold the majority of Dornier to Fairchild


title: "Fokker 100" content: Aircraft, leading to the creation of Fairchild Dornier, emerging as the third largest regional aircraft manufacturer. Although the Fokker 100 was successful, Fokker accumulated losses for several years, contributing to its collapse in 1996. Fokker 100 production stopped in early 1997. Discussions regarding the potential for either portions or the entirety of Fokker being purchased by Bombardier Inc. are known to have taken place, but talks ultimately fell through without a deal being reached. Dutch firm Stork B.V. has since acquired the maintenance business for the type and has since been providing services to existing operators, having adopted the name


title: "Fokker 100" content: "Fokker Aviation". Like any number of regional airliner designs, the Fokker 70/100 was being increasingly squeezed from below by stretched versions of the Bombardier and Embraer regional jets; this intense competitive pressure had also been responsible for killing off plans for the Fairchild Dornier 528JET/728JET/928JET along with an unnamed design being considered by ATR. At one point, there was a proposal for a stretched version of the Fokker 100, known as the "Fokker 130", however this was never built. In 1999, it was announced that an Amsterdam-based group, Rekkof Restart ("Rekkof" is "Fokker" spelled backwards), had entered into negotiations with


title: "Fokker 100" content: the intention of reopening both the Fokker 70 and 100 lines. During the 2000s, the Netherlands Aircraft Company (otherwise known as "NG Aircraft") was formed for the purpose of restarting production. However, the ambition has suffered some delays, including some false starts. In March 2010, NG Aircraft stated that it had securing funding from the Ministry of Economic Affairs to adapt an existing Fokker 100 to serve as a prototype for a planned improved new-build series; that same month the company announced its interest in converting existing aircraft to a proposed new-build equvilent standard, in addition to its primary focus


title: "Fokker 100" content: of constructing wholly new Fokker 100s. In March 2011, it was announced that the government of Brazil had formed a partnership for the revival of the Fokker 100. In July 2014, Maarten Van Eeghen, chief executive of NG Aircraft, revealed more details about the pending revival and the new generation of aircraft that would be produced. Dubbed the "F120NG", it would be a new-build aircraft, seating a maximum of 125 to 130 passengers, that would be essentially a stretched model of the base Fokker 100. It would adopt a new powerplant, the Pratt & Whitney PurePower PW1X17G turbofan engine rated


title: "Fokker 100" content: at 17,600 lb thrust, which is claimed to result in the new generation airliner burning 50 per cent less fuel per seat than the original Fokker 100. It was claimed in 2014 that the earliest entry-to-service date for the F120NG would be 2019, based on a five-year development and testing programme after obtaining official clearance to proceed. By 1991, Fokker had produced 70 units and had orders for more than 230. In 1993, an extended-range version of the Fokker 100, outfitted with additional fuel tanks in the centre fuselage, was introduced; it was followed by a quick-change passenger/freighter version in


title: "Fokker 100" content: 1994, designated as the "Fokker 100QC". In 1993, a shortened version of the airliner was introduced, designated as the Fokker 70; this aircraft was intended as a replacement for the earlier Fokker F28 and featured the removal of 4.70 m (15.42 ft) of the fuselage and reduced seating to 80. Third party aircraft companies, such as Phoenix Aero Solutions, have since offered their own conversion programs to produce freights from former airliner configuration Fokker 100s. While studies were conducted on a proposed 130-seat "Fokker 130", this proposal ultimately did not reach further stages of development. In 2003, a Fokker 100EJ


title: "Fokker 100" content: (Executive Jet) variant was introduced, these were remanufactured aircraft produced by Fokker Services as conversions from used Fokker 100 airliners. Priced at around $12 million, the Fokker 100EJ seated between 19 and 31 passengers in three different luxury configurations, all which featured galleys, while two were outfitted with shower-equipped master suites; additional features include an auxiliary fuel system to extend the aircraft's range by roughly 1,600 km. By late 2009, a total of six Fokker 100s were in VIP service, while a further two were used in a 50-seat corporate layout. Following the end of production in 1997, existing Fokker


title: "Fokker 100" content: 100 airliners continued to be supported and used by operators. As a consequence of the Great Recession of the late 2000s, a large number of the type were retired from airline service, some later returned to operations while a considerable portion were broken up instead. In March 2009, Mexicana announced that the confirmation of an agreement with Boeing to lease 25 Boeing 717s as a replacement for its fleet of 25 Fokker 100s. In September 2009, one of the last Asian operators of the type, Mandarin Airlines, phased out the last of its Fokker 100. According to maintenance and servicing


title: "Fokker 100" content: company Fokker Services, Fokker 100 airliners constructed during the 1990s had been anticipated to be serviceable until 2035, while the type was expected to remain competitive without modification until at least 2020. In August 2009, Australian airline Skywest Airlines announced that it would be outfitted its fleet of Fokker 100 and Fokker 70 aircraft with a new global navigation satellite system navigational suites; these had the advantage of enabling shorter approaches at night and in bad weather, saves time and fuel, and increases safety and schedule reliability, as well as increasing the number of usable airports by the type. From


title: "Fokker 100" content: 2015, the French DGA Essais en Vol had used the Fokker 100 as a flying testbed; it is referred to as the "ABE-NG", standing for "". It has replaced the DGA's previous testbed of choice, the Dassault Falcon 20 business jet, and has been outfitted with various systems of the Dassault Rafale fighter aircraft for testing purposes, including the Rafale's nose section, Thales RBE2 active electronically scanned array (AESA) radar and optronics equipment, as well as a Reco NG targeting pod under the fuselage and a compliment of MBDA Mica air-to-air missiles. The first aircraft, which was formerly used by


title: "Fokker 100" content: Régional, is to be followed by four more used Fokker 100s. In June 2015, Austrian Airlines, then one of the larger operators of the Fokker 100, announced its approval of a plan to procure used Embraer 195 regional jets to replace its inventory of Fokker 100 and Fokker 70 jets, which had an average age of 21 years across the fleet. In November 2015, Alliance Airlines has announced that it shall acquire the entire Austrian Airlines Fokker fleet which consists of 15 Fokker 100 and 6 Fokker 70 airliners. As of July 2017, 113 aircraft are still in operational use


title: "Fokker 100" content: with airlines. Many of them are used in Australia by Alliance Airlines, Virgin Australia Regional Airlines and QantasLink in support of the mining industry, with low utilisation rates for an airline, around 1,200 hours per year. Fokker 100 The Fokker 100 is a medium-sized, twin-turbofan jet airliner from Fokker, the largest such aircraft built by the company before its bankruptcy in 1996. The type possessed low operational costs and initially had scant competition in the 100-seat short-range regional jet class, contributing to strong sales upon introduction in the late 1980s. However, an increasing number of similar airliners were brought to


title: "Guion Bluford" content: 3630th Flying Training Wing, Sheppard Air Force Base, Texas, as a T-38 A instructor pilot. He served as a standardization/evaluation officer and as an assistant flight commander. In early 1971, he attended Squadron Officer School and returned as an executive support officer to the Deputy Commander of Operations and as School Secretary for the Wing. In August 1972, Bluford entered the U.S. Air Force Institute of Technology residency school at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, Ohio. Upon graduating in 1974 with his master's degree, he was assigned to the Air Force Flight Dynamics Laboratory at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base as a


title: Earwax content: East Asians and Native Americans are more likely to have the dry type of cerumen (gray and flaky), African and European people are more likely to have the wet type (honey-brown, dark orange to dark-brown and moist). 30-50% of South Asians, Central Asians and Pacific Islanders have the dry type of cerumen. Cerumen type has been used by anthropologists to track human migratory patterns, such as those of the Eskimos. In Japan, wet-type earwax is more prevalent among the Ainu, in contrast to that country's Yamato majority. The wet type earwax differs biochemically from the dry type mainly by its


title: "William Sloane Coffin" content: with his position on sexuality. Coffin started a strong nuclear disarmament program at Riverside, and hired Cora Weiss (a secular Jew he had worked with during the Vietnam War and had traveled with to North Vietnam in 1972 to accompany three released U.S. prisoners of war), an action which was uncomfortable for some parishioners. Broadening his reach to an international audience, he met with numerous world leaders and traveled abroad. His visits included going to Iran to perform Christmas services for hostages being held in the U.S. embassy during the Iran hostage crisis in 1979 and to Nicaragua to protest


title: Illyrians content: and it is unlikely that they utilized any collective nomenclature for themselves. The term "Illyrioi" may originally have designated only a single people who came to be widely known to the Greeks due to proximity. This occurred during the Bronze Age, when Greek tribes were neighboring the southernmost Illyrian tribe of that time in the Zeta plain of Montenegro. Indeed, such a people known as the "Illyrioi" have occupied a small and well-defined part of the south Adriatic coast, around Skadar Lake astride the modern frontier between Albania and Montenegro. The name may then have expanded and come to be


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: Kilkenny Castle Kilkenny Castle () is a castle in Kilkenny, Ireland built in 1195 to control a fording-point of the River Nore and the junction of several routeways. It was a symbol of Norman occupation and in its original thirteenth-century condition it would have formed an important element of the defences of the town with four large circular corner towers and a massive ditch, part of which can still be seen today on the Parade. The property was transferred to the people of Kilkenny in 1967 for £50 and the castle and grounds are now managed by the Office of


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: Public Works. The gardens and parkland adjoining the castle are open to the public. The Parade Tower is a conference venue. Awards and conferring ceremonies of the graduates of "Kilkenny Campus" of National University of Ireland, Maynooth have been held there since 2002. Kilkenny Castle has been an important site since Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke, commonly known as "Strongbow" constructed the first castle, probably a wooden structure, in the 12th century. The Anglo-Normans had established a castle in 1173, possibly on the site of an earlier residence of the Mac Giolla Phádraig kings of Osraighe. Kilkenny formed


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: part of the lordship of Leinster, which was granted to Strongbow. Strongbow’s daughter and heiress, Isabel married William Marshall in 1189. The Earl Marshall owned large estates in Ireland, England, Wales and France and managed them effectively. He appointed Geoffrey fitz Robert as seneschal of Leinster and so began a major phase of development in Kilkenny, including the construction of Kilkenny Castle and the agreement of rents and privileges with burgesses or citizens of the borough. The first stone castle on the site, was completed in 1213. This was a square-shaped castle with towers at each corner; three of these


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: original four towers survive to this day James Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormonde, bought the castle in 1391 and established himself as ruler of the area. The powerful Butler family were to be the owners of the castle for over 500 years. In 1967 James Arthur Butler, 6th Marquess of Ormonde, sold Kilkenny Castle to Kilkenny Castle Restoration Committee for £50 after a period of neglect. The Kilkenny Castle Restoration Committee handed the castle over to the State, and it has since been refurbished and is open to visitors. There are ornamental gardens on the city side of the castle,


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: and extensive land and gardens to the front. It has become one of the most visited tourist sites in Ireland. Now a property in state care. Part of the National Art Gallery is on display in the castle. Richard de Clare (also known as Strongbow) and other Norman knights came to Kilkenny in 1172, the high ground beside the River Nore was as an ideal site on which to build a wooden tower. He built a wooden castle of the type known as motte-and-bailey. This strategic site was where the local Kings of Osraige had their chief residence before the


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: Norman invasion. Twenty years later, de Clare's son-in-law, William Marshal, Earl of Pembroke, built the first stone castle on the site, of which three towers still remain. The castle was owned by the seneschal of Kilkenny Sir Gilbert De Bohun who inherited the county of Kilkenny and castle from his mother in 1270, in 1300 he was outlawed by Edward I but was reinstated in 1303, he held the castle until his death in 1381. It was not granted to his heir Joan, but seized by the crown and sold to the Butler family. The Castle became the seat to


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: a very powerful family, the Butlers of Ormonde. The Butler family (who changed their name from FitzWalter in 1185) arrived in Ireland with the Norman invasion. They originally settled in Gowran where James Butler, 3rd Earl of Ormonde built Gowran Castle in 1385. The family had become wealthy and James bought Kilkenny Castle in 1391 and established himself as ruler of the area. The Butler dynasty then ruled the surrounding area for centuries. Many of the family, including James, 3rd Earl of Ormonde are buried in St. Mary's Collegiate Church Gowran. Among the many notable members of the Butler family


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: was Lady Margaret Butler (c. 1454 or 1465–1539) the Irish noblewoman, the daughter of Thomas Butler, 7th Earl of Ormond. Lady Margaret Butler was born in Kilkenny Castle. She married Sir William Boleyn and was the paternal grandmother of Anne Boleyn, second wife of King Henry VIII of England. By the 18th century, the castle had become run down, reflecting the failing fortunes of the Butler family. However, some restoration was carried out by Anne Wandesford of Castlecomer, who brought wealth back into the family upon marrying John Butler, 17th Earl of Ormonde. In the 19th century, the Butlers then


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: attempted to restore it to its original medieval appearance, also rebuilding the north wing and extending the south curtain wall. More extensions were added in 1854. In 1904, King Edward VII of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and his wife Queen Alexandra visited Kilkenny Castle. The Castle continued to be the principle seat of the Marquesses of Ormonde and their families until 1919, when James Butler, 3rd Marquess of Ormonde died. As Lord Ormonde had only two daughters, it was agreed that in order to reduce the double-taxation of the estate that his brother and heir, Arthur


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: Butler, 4th Marquess of Ormonde would forgo his inheritance in favour of his son, George Butler, 5th Marquess of Ormonde who used the courtesy title 'Earl of Ossory'. Lord and Lady Ossory took up residence in the Castle in 1921, with their children Antony, Viscount Thurles and Lady Moyra Butler. In the 1920s and 30s, the succession of the title and estates seemed secure, with three generations of direct male heirs still living. In 1938, Arthur, George and Antony Butler agreed to resettle the Trust in which the estates were held. George Butler, Earl of Ossory and his family remained


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: living in the castle until 1935, when they sold its contents for £6,000, moved to London, and abandoned it for thirty years. The impact of rising taxes, death duties, economic depression and living costs had taken their toll. While the Ormondes had received £22,000 in rental income in the 1880s, investment income in the 1930s was in the region of £9,000 and by 1950 these investments yielded only £850. They disposed of the bulk of their tenanted estates in Tipperary and Kilkenny, 21,000 acres (85 km²), by 1915 for £240,000. Death duties and expenses following the death of James Butler,


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: 3rd Marquess of Ormonde in 1919 amounted to £166,000. Antony Butler, Viscount Thurles died unexpectedly in 1940, and therefore after the death of the 4th Marquess in 1943 and the 5th Marquess in 1949, the estate was inherited by Arthur Butler, 6th Marquess and 24th Earl of Ormonde. In 1967, this Lord Ormonde sold the abandoned and deteriorating castle to the Castle Restoration Committee for a ceremonial £50, with the statement: "The people of Kilkenny, as well as myself and my family, feel a great pride in the Castle, and we have not liked to see this deterioration. We determined


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: that it should not be allowed to fall into ruins. There are already too many ruins in Ireland." He also bought the land in front of the castle from the trustees "in order that it should never be built on and the castle would be seen in all its dignity and splendour". The handover ceremony also marked the foundation of The Butler Society, a still thriving organisation that connects, preserves and unites a family once dominant in the British Isles. Mick Jagger and Marianne Faithfull turned up at the castle hand over party, with Jagger telling the newspapers "We just


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: came to loon about." In the 17th century, the castle came into the hands of Elizabeth Preston, wife of then Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, another James Butler, also 12th Earl and 1st Duke of Ormonde. Butler, unlike most of his family, was a Protestant and throughout the Irish Confederate Wars of the 1640s was the representative of Charles I in Ireland. However, his castle became the capital of a Catholic rebel movement, Confederate Ireland, whose parliament or "Supreme Council" met in Kilkenny Castle from 1642-48. Ormonde himself was based in Dublin at this time. The east wall and the northeast


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: tower of the Castle were damaged in 1650 during the siege of Kilkenny by Oliver Cromwell during the Cromwellian conquest of Ireland. They were later torn down. Then, in 1661, Butler remodelled the castle as a “modern” château after his return from exile. A new entrance gateway in the south wall was built around this time. During the Irish Civil War in 1922, Republicans were besieged in the Castle by Irish Free State forces. The Ormondes, together with their pet Pekinese, chose to remain "in situ" in their bedroom over the great gate, which was the main focus of attack.


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: There was a machine gun outside their door. Only one man was injured but a great deal of damage was inflicted on the castle, which took many years to repair. Ireland's highest officially recognised air temperature, , was measured at Kilkenny Castle on 26 June 1887. The rest of the 20th century saw a large amount of restoration and maintenance take place, as well as the castle being opened to visitors. The Butler Gallery, in the castle basement, holds rotating exhibitions put on by the Kilkenny Art Gallery Society in a venue named for Peggy and Hubert Butler. There are


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: ornamental gardens on the city side of the castle, and extensive land and gardens to the front. It has become one of the most visited tourist sites in Ireland. Now a property in state care. Part of the National Art Gallery is on display in the castle. Excavations and building surveys by Ben Murtagh in the 1990s revealed traces of an earlier castle, exposed a postern gate (side entrance) and section of the castle ditch facing on to the Parade (now visible), and also partly uncovered the lost south-east side of the castle. The entrance was through the (now missing)


title: "Kilkenny Castle" content: east wall. Various other features of the original castle have also been excavated, including original stone buttressing and a garderobe. Parts of this castle survive to the present day but the castle has changed over centuries. The south curtain wall is long gone, the elaborate entrance gate is a 17th-century addition, and in much of what can be seen from the castle park side is a 19th-century reconstruction. Kilkenny Castle Kilkenny Castle () is a castle in Kilkenny, Ireland built in 1195 to control a fording-point of the River Nore and the junction of several routeways. It was a symbol


title: "Joe Hoeffel" content: He won re-election twice, though not without difficulty. In 2000 he won an expensive race against Republican State Senator Stewart Greenleaf, who represented most of the eastern portion of the congressional district. He thus became the first Democrat to serve more than one term in the district in decades. In 2002, he defeated wealthy ophthalmologist Melissa Brown by less than expected; the 13th had been made somewhat more Democratic with the addition of part of Philadelphia. During the 2002 election, Hoeffel's website was praised as among the best of the 2002 election cycle. In Congress, Hoeffel was a member of


title: "Ian Hamilton (British Army officer)" content: England in April 1898 and was appointed Commandant of the School of Musketry at Hythe. Amidst mounting tensions between the United Kingdom and the Boer republics in South Africa Lieutenant General White was dispatched to take command in Natal in September 1899, with Hamilton accompanying him as Chief Staff Officer (Assistant Adjutant General). The Second Boer War broke out shortly after their arrival and Hamilton commanded the infantry at the Battle of Elandslaagte. At the Battle of Ladysmith Hamilton continued to lead his brigade sized column, but played no role in the fighting. Defeated in the field, White's Natal Field


title: "Mass–energy equivalence" content: extended version of Einstein's equation, called the relativistic energy–momentum relation: or Here the formula_10 term represents the square of the Euclidean norm (total vector length) of the various momentum vectors in the system, which reduces to the square of the simple momentum magnitude, if only a single particle is considered. This equation reduces to formula_2 when the momentum term is zero. For photons where formula_12, the equation reduces to formula_13. Mass–energy equivalence states that any object has a certain energy, even when it is stationary. In Newtonian mechanics, a motionless body has no kinetic energy, and it may or may


title: "Mass–energy equivalence" content: example be something greater than the local background radiation. It is also worth noting that the ambient irradiated power would change with the mass of the black hole, increasing as the mass of the black hole decreases, or decreasing as the mass increases, at a rate where power is proportional to the inverse square of the mass. In a "practical" scenario, mass and energy could be dumped into the black hole to regulate this growth, or keep its size, and thus power output, near constant. This could result from the fact that mass and energy are lost from the hole


title: "Aslan Abashidze" content: when Special Forces entered the region and Adjarian paramilitary forces began to swap sides and disarm. The next day, after being granted assurances that he would not be extradited, Abashidze left for Moscow, without a shot being fired in the region. Abashidze's property in Georgia, as well as that of his close relatives, was frozen by the Georgian courts and eventually transferred to the state's ownership. According to "The New York Times", as of December 2012, Abashidze was living in Barvikha village in Odintsovsky District of Moscow Oblast. In August 2016, the Batumi City Court sentenced Abashidze to a 15-year


title: "Chris Grayling" content: and 2009, Grayling claimed expenses for his flat in Pimlico, close to the Houses of Parliament, despite having a constituency home no further than 17 miles away. Grayling says he uses the flat when "working very late" because he needs to "work very erratic and late hours most days when the House of Commons is sitting." During the Parliamentary expenses scandal, "The Daily Telegraph" reported that Grayling refitted and redecorated the flat in 2005 costing over £5,000. Grayling's expenses issue was seen as embarrassing for the Conservative Party as he had previously criticised Labour ministers for being implicated in sleaze


title: "Slovenian Democratic Party" content: to emigrate to Germany in the 1960s. Under Pučnik's leadership, The Social Democratic Union of Slovenia gradually developed into a moderate social-democratic party, which combined the plea for a social market economy with the support of a welfare state based on a German, Austrian and Scandinavian social model. The Slovenian Democratic Union, on the other hand, was founded in January 1989, as opposition to the Communist Party of Slovenia, emphasizing establishment of the rule of law and respect for human rights and fundamental political freedoms, respect for minority rights, and the inclusion of Slovenia in the Euro-Atlantic integrations (the European


title: Tautog content: Tautog The tautog or blackfish, "Tautoga onitis", is a species of wrasse native to the western Atlantic Ocean from Nova Scotia to South Carolina. This species inhabits hard substrate habitats in inshore waters at depths from . It is currently the only known member of its genus. Barlett (1848) wrote, "[Tautaug] is a Native American word, and may be found in Roger Williams' "Key to the Indian Language"." The name is from the Narragansett language, originally "tautauog" (pl. of "taut"). It is also called a "black porgy" ("cf." Japanese black porgy), "chub" ("cf." the freshwater chub), "oyster-fish" (in North Carolina)


title: Tautog content: or "blackfish" (in New York/New Jersey, New England). Tautog are brown and dark olive, with white blotches, and have plump, elongated bodies. They have an average weight of and reach a maximum size of , . Tautog have many adaptations to life in and around rocky areas. They have thick, rubbery lips and powerful jaws. The backs of their throats contain a set of teeth resembling molars. Together, these are used to pick and crush prey such as mollusks and crustaceans. Their skin also has a rubbery quality with a heavy slime covering, which helps to protect them when swimming


title: Tautog content: among rocks. Goode (1884) said, "The tautog has always been a favorite table fish, especially in New York, its flesh being white, dry, and of a delicate flavor." Davidson recommends grilling, baking, and using it in fish chowder. Popular among fishermen, tautog have a reputation for being a particularly tricky fish to catch. Part of this is because of their tendency to live among rocks and other structures that can cause a fisherman’s line to get snagged. The favorite baits for tautog include green crabs, Asian shore crabs, fiddler crabs, clams, shrimp, mussels, sandworms, and lobsters. Tautog fishing may also


title: Tautog content: be difficult due to the tendency of fishermen try to set the hook as soon as they feel a hit, rather than wait for the tautog to swallow the bait. Rigs with minimal beads, swivels and hooks should be used to prevent entanglement with the rocks, reefs or wrecks that tautog frequent. Because they are often found in wrecks, they are often seen by scuba divers. They are also popular with spearfishermen, as they are remarkably calm in the presence of divers and are relatively easy to spear. Spawning occurs offshore, in late spring to early summer. The eggs hatch


title: Tautog content: and develop while drifting. All of the young take residence in shallow protected waters and live and hide in seaweed, sea lettuce, or eelgrass beds for protection, and are green in color to camouflage themselves. During the late fall, they move offshore and winter in a state of reduced activity. Slow reproduction and growth make tautog more vulnerable to overfishing. The species is managed by focusing on reducing fishing mortality rates, as well as restrictions on gear, size limits, possession limits, and limited fishing seasons. At present, the Blue Ocean Institute recommends that consumers avoid eating this fish because the


title: Tautog content: populations are at low levels that are not considered sustainable. Around 1920, 750 tons were harvested annually off the New England coast. Tautog The tautog or blackfish, "Tautoga onitis", is a species of wrasse native to the western Atlantic Ocean from Nova Scotia to South Carolina. This species inhabits hard substrate habitats in inshore waters at depths from . It is currently the only known member of its genus. Barlett (1848) wrote, "[Tautaug] is a Native American word, and may be found in Roger Williams' "Key to the Indian Language"." The name is from the Narragansett language, originally "tautauog" (pl.


title: "Chatsworth, Ontario" content: water-driven turbine up to that point to provide one-third of its energy. The fire was likely caused by an electrical accident. A new facility was rebuilt on the outskirts of the village and started operations in March 1986. The original sawmill was used for storage until the early 2000s when the remaining building was demolished and an inn was built in its place. The area surrounding the inn features a river, a dam, a large waterfall and a forest with outcroppings of the Niagara Escarpment. The area is maintained in a picturesque condition and is considered a local tourist attraction.


title: "Thermodynamic system" content: brought by Prigogine, when he and his collaborators investigated the systems of chemically reacting substances. The stationary states of such systems exists due to exchange both particles and energy with the environment. In section 8 of the third chapter of his book , Prigogine has specified three contributions to the variation of entropy of the considered open system at the given volume and constant temperature formula_10 . The increment of entropy formula_11 can be calculated according to the formula The first term on the right hand side of the equation presents a stream of thermal energy into the system; the


title: Carbonara content: Carbonara Carbonara () is an Italian pasta dish from Rome made with egg, hard cheese, guanciale (or pancetta), and pepper. The recipe is not fixed by a specific type of hard cheese or pasta. The cheese is usually Pecorino Romano. Spaghetti is the usual pasta, however, fettuccine, rigatoni, linguine, or bucatini are also used. Either guanciale or pancetta can be used. Another common substitute outside Italy is lardons of smoked bacon. The dish was created in the middle of the 20th century. The pasta is cooked in moderately-salted boiling water. The guanciale is briefly fried on the pan without the


title: Carbonara content: use of oil (the fat of the guanciale will behave the same as the olive oil and prevent it from becoming too crispy). A mixture of raw eggs, grated pecorino (or a mixture of pecorino and Parmesan), and a good amount of ground black pepper is combined with the hot pasta away from additional direct heat to avoid curdling the egg, either in the pasta pot or in a serving dish. The fried guanciale is added, and the mixture is tossed, creating a creamy sauce. Although various pasta shapes can be used, the raw egg can only cook properly with


title: Carbonara content: a shape that has a sufficiently large ratio of surface area to volume, such as spaghetti, linguine or fettuccine. Guanciale is the most commonly used meat for the dish in Italy, but pancetta is also used and in English speaking countries bacon is often used as a substitute. The usual cheese is Pecorino Romano, or occasionally Parmesan. Recipes differ in the use of egg: some use the whole egg, others only the yolk, some a mixture. Cream is not used in most Italian recipes, though there are exceptions; but it is often used elsewhere. Garlic is similarly found mostly outside


title: Carbonara content: Italy. Other variations on carbonara outside Italy may include peas, broccoli, mushrooms, leeks or other vegetables. Many of these preparations have more sauce than the Italian versions and subsequently types of pasta better at holding sauce are used, such as penne. As with many recipes, the origins of the dish and its name are obscure. The dish forms part of a family of dishes involving pasta with bacon, cheese, and pepper, such as "spaghetti alla gricia". Indeed, it is very similar to the Italian pasta "cacio e uova", dressed with melted lard and mixed eggs and cheese. There are many


title: Carbonara content: theories for the origin of the name, which may be more recent than the dish itself. Since the name is derived from "carbonaro" (the Italian word for charcoal burner), some believe the dish was first made as a hearty meal for Italian charcoal workers. In parts of the United States the etymology gave rise to the term "coal miner's spaghetti". It has even been suggested that it was created as a tribute to the "Carbonari" ("charcoalmen"), a secret society prominent in the early, repressed stages of Italian unification. It seems more likely that it is an urban dish from Rome,


title: Carbonara content: although it has nothing to do with the Roman restaurant of the same name. The name may also have derived from "Carbonada", the word for bacon in central Italy's dialect. Pasta alla carbonara is unrecorded before the Second World War; notably, it is absent from Ada Boni's 1930 "La Cucina Romana". The dish is first attested in 1950, when it was described in the Italian newspaper "La Stampa" as a dish sought by the American officers after the allied liberation of Rome in 1944. It was described as a Roman dish, when many Italians were eating eggs and bacon supplied


title: Carbonara content: by troops from the United States. It was included in Elizabeth David's "Italian Food", an English-language cookbook published in Great Britain in 1954. Carbonara Carbonara () is an Italian pasta dish from Rome made with egg, hard cheese, guanciale (or pancetta), and pepper. The recipe is not fixed by a specific type of hard cheese or pasta. The cheese is usually Pecorino Romano. Spaghetti is the usual pasta, however, fettuccine, rigatoni, linguine, or bucatini are also used. Either guanciale or pancetta can be used. Another common substitute outside Italy is lardons of smoked bacon. The dish was created in the


title: "John G. Rowland" content: began circulating that contractors doing business with the state, paid for and made improvements to his private weekend home. He also benefited improperly from the sale of a condominium in Washington, D.C. at an inflated price, took bribes from subordinates in state government and took partial ownership in businesses immediately before they were granted state contracts. These eventually led to federal investigations and then indictments of some of Rowland's close aides, who then cooperated with federal investigators. Rowland publicly denied the allegations. However, in December 2003, Rowland abruptly appeared on television and admitted that work had been done by contractors


title: "Helen Jones" content: MP, Minister of State for Health. On 19 June 2015, she was announced as having been elected to the chairmanship of the Business, Innovation and Skills Select Committee. On 19 June 2015, it was announced that she had been elected to the chairmanship of the Petitions Select Committee. In the cabinet reshuffle of October 2008, Jones was promoted to a junior Government role in the position of Assistant Government Whip. In Opposition in the next Parliament, she became Shadow Minister for Communities and Local Government and was subsequently appointed Shadow Home Office Minister by Ed Miliband in an October 2013


title: Saint-Nazaire content: is twinned with: It has also cooperation agreements with: In 2008, 0.41% of the children attended bilingual primary schools. Saint-Nazaire Saint-Nazaire (; ; Gallo: "Saint-Nazère/Saint-Nazaer") is a commune in the Loire-Atlantique department in western France, in traditional Brittany. The town has a major harbour on the right bank of the Loire River estuary, near the Atlantic Ocean. The town is at the south of the second-largest swamp in France, called "la Brière". Given its location, Saint-Nazaire has a long tradition of fishing and shipbuilding. The Chantiers de l'Atlantique, one of the largest shipyards in the world, has constructed notable superliners


title: "Swamp sparrow" content: Swamp sparrow The swamp sparrow ("Melospiza georgiana") is a medium-sized sparrow related to the song sparrow. Adults have streaked rusty, buff and black upperparts with an unstreaked gray breast, light belly and a white throat. The wings are strikingly rusty. Most males and a few females have a rust-colored caps. Their face is gray with a dark line through the eye. They have a short bill and fairly long legs. Immature birds and winter adults usually have two brown crown stripes and much of the gray is replaced with buff. Swamp sparrows breed across the northern United States and boreal


title: "Swamp sparrow" content: Canada. The southern edge of their breeding range coincides largely with the Line of Maximum Glaciation. A small number of morphologically distinct birds inhabit tidal marshes from northern Virginia to the Hudson River Estuary. This subspecies ("M. g. nigrescens") winters in coastal marshes of the Carolinas and differs from the two inland swamp sparrow subspecies in having more black in a grayer overall plumage, larger bill, different songs, and a smaller average clutch size. Their breeding habitat is marshes, including brackish marshes, across eastern North America and central Canada. The bulky nest is attached to marsh vegetation, often just above


title: "Swamp sparrow" content: the ground or surface of the water with leaves or grass arching over the top. The female builds a new nest each year and lays an average of four eggs per clutch. Females give a series of chips as they leave the nest, probably to ward off attacks by their mate or neighboring males. While swamp sparrows can be found year-round in small numbers on the southern edge of their breeding range, individuals are probably all migratory, primarily migrating to the southeastern United States. Swamp sparrows generally forage on the ground near the water's edge, in shallow water or in


title: "Swamp sparrow" content: marsh vegetation. In winter, their diet is principally fruit and seeds, while during the breeding season their diet is mainly arthropods. The song of the swamp sparrow is a slow monotone trill, slower than that of the chipping sparrow. A male can have a repertoire of several different trills. The common call note is a loud chip reminiscent of a phoebe. This bird's numbers have declined due to habitat loss in some parts of its range. Swamp sparrow The swamp sparrow ("Melospiza georgiana") is a medium-sized sparrow related to the song sparrow. Adults have streaked rusty, buff and black upperparts


title: "Grasshopper sparrow" content: Grasshopper sparrow The grasshopper sparrow ("Ammodramus savannarum") is a small American sparrow. The genus "Ammodramus" contains nine species that inhabit grasslands and prairies. The Florida grasshopper sparrow ("Ammodramus savannarum floridanus") is endangered. These small sparrows measure in length, span about across the wings and weigh from , with an average of . Adults have upperparts streaked with brown, grey, black and white; they have a light brown breast, a white belly and a short brown tail. Their face is light brown with an eye ring and a dark brown crown with a central narrow light stripe. There are regional variations


title: "Grasshopper sparrow" content: in the appearance of this bird. Their breeding habitat is open fields and prairie across southern Canada, the United States, Mexico and Central America, with a small endangered population in the Andes of Colombia and (perhaps only formerly) Ecuador. The northern populations migrate to the southern United States, Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean. Like many grassland birds, this bird's numbers have declined across many parts of its range, including a 98% drop in New York State. The nest is a well-concealed open cup on the ground under vegetation. They forage on the ground in vegetation, mainly eating insects, especially


title: "Grasshopper sparrow" content: grasshoppers, and seeds. This bird's song is a buzzy "tik tuk zee", resembling the sound made by a grasshopper. Unlike some other members of the Ammodramus family of sparrows, they will readily sing from open and exposed perches. Grasshopper sparrow The grasshopper sparrow ("Ammodramus savannarum") is a small American sparrow. The genus "Ammodramus" contains nine species that inhabit grasslands and prairies. The Florida grasshopper sparrow ("Ammodramus savannarum floridanus") is endangered. These small sparrows measure in length, span about across the wings and weigh from , with an average of . Adults have upperparts streaked with brown, grey, black and white;


title: "Lepa Brena" content: the Olympic Hall Juan Antonio Samaranch in the Bosnian capital city Sarajevo for the Roma in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Brena arrived in Sarajevo two days before the concert so that she could enjoy the city with friends before the concert. She said in an interview: ""Sarajevo has suffered and survived so much, I'm really glad to see positive people and happiness in this city"". Lepa Brena and Steven Seagal were the stars of Belgrade 2016 New Year party, an event held at Nikola Pašić Square in front of the Serbian National Assembly, and attended by 60,000 people. In December 2017,


title: "Old Compton Street" content: are numerous other gay bars including Comptons of SOHO and G-A-Y. Also on the street are a variety of cafés, tea rooms (including the original branch of the renowned Patisserie Valerie chain) and restaurants (including Bincho, London's only authentic yakitori restaurant, and Balans, which unusually for much of England is open 24 hours a day), and sex shops. Old Compton Street is also the home of some of London's film and video post-production houses. An interesting local feature can be found in the middle of Charing Cross Road at its junction with Old Compton Street. Beneath the grill in the


title: "Human Touch" content: and peaked at #2 on the Billboard 200 selling 246,000 copies during its first week. The album is generally disliked by Springsteen fans, and in 2012 was ranked last among Springsteen's albums by the online magazine "Nerve". Regarding the bad reputation of "Human Touch" and "Lucky Town" among his fans, Springsteen said: "I tried it [writing happy songs] in the early '90s and it didn't work; the public didn't like it." Springsteen's first album without the E Street Band featured numerous outtakes, many of which have been released. A cover of "Viva Las Vegas" was released as a b-side and


title: Umbellularia content: Umbellularia Umbellularia californica is a large hardwood tree native to coastal forests of California, as well as to coastal forests extending into Oregon. It is endemic to the California Floristic Province. It is the sole species in the genus Umbellularia. The tree was formerly known as "Oreodaphne californica". In Oregon, this tree is known as Oregon myrtle, while in California it is called California bay laurel, which may be shortened to California bay or California laurel. It has also been called pepperwood, spicebush, cinnamon bush, peppernut tree, headache tree, mountain laurel, and balm of heaven. The tree's pungent leaves have


title: Umbellularia content: a similar flavor to bay leaves, though stronger, and it may be mistaken for bay laurel. The dry wood has a color range from blonde (like maple) to brown (like walnut). It is considered an excellent tonewood and is sought after by luthiers and woodworkers. The tree is a host of the pathogen that causes sudden oak death. This tree mostly inhabits redwood forests, California mixed woods, yellow pine forest, and oak woodlands. Bays occur in oak woodlands only close to the coast, or in extreme northern California where moisture is sufficient. During the Miocene, oak-laurel forests were found in


title: Umbellularia content: Central and Southern California. Typical tree species included oaks ancestral to present-day California oaks, and an assemblage of trees from the laurel family, including "Nectandra, Ocotea, Persea," and "Umbellularia". Only one native species from the laurel family, "Umbellularia californica", remains in California today. In the north, it reaches its distributional limit through southwest Oregon to (infrequently) Newport, Lincoln County, Oregon, on the coast, extending from there south through California to San Diego County. It is also found in the western foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountains. It occurs at altitudes from sea level up to 1600 m. An isolated, more


title: Umbellularia content: northern occurrence of the species can be found in Tacoma, Washington, around Snake Lake near the Tacoma Nature Center. There are also two recorded instances of trees growing in coastal British Columbia. It is an evergreen tree growing to 30 m tall with a trunk up to 80 cm thick. The largest recorded tree is in Mendocino County, California, and measured (as of 1997) 108 feet (33 m) in height and 119 feet (36 m) in spread. The fragrant leaves are smooth-edged and lance-shaped, 3–10 cm long and 1.5–3 cm broad, similar to the related bay laurel, though usually narrower,


title: Umbellularia content: and without the crinkled margin of that species. The flowers are small, yellow or yellowish-green, produced in small umbels (hence the scientific name "Umbellularia", "little umbel"). Unlike other "bay laurels" of the genus "Laurus", "Umbellularia" has perfect flowers (male and female parts in the same flower). The fruit, also known as "California bay nut", is a round and green berry 2–2.5 cm long and 2 cm broad, lightly spotted with yellow, maturing purple. Under the thin, leathery skin, it consists of an oily, fleshy covering over a single hard, thin-shelled pit, and resembles a miniature avocado. "Umbellularia" is in fact


title: Umbellularia content: closely related to the avocado's genus "Persea", within the Lauraceae family. The fruit ripens around October–November in the native range. "Umbellularia" has long been valued for its many uses by Native Americans throughout the tree's range, including the Cahuilla, Chumash, Pomo, Miwok, Yuki, Coos, and Salinan people. The Concow tribe call the plant sō-ē’-bä (Konkow language). The leaf has been used as a cure for headache, toothache, and earache—though the volatile oils in the leaves may also cause headaches. Poultices of "Umbellularia" leaves were used to treat rheumatism and neuralgias. A tea was made from the leaves to treat stomach


title: Umbellularia content: aches, colds, sore throats, and to clear up mucus in the lungs. The leaves were steeped in hot water to make an infusion that was used to wash sores. The Pomo and Yuki tribes of Mendocino County treated headaches by placing a single leaf in the nostril or bathing the head with a laurel leaf infusion. The chemical responsible for the headache-inducing effects of "Umbellularia" is known as umbellulone. Both the flesh and the inner kernel of the fruit have been used as food by Native Americans. The fatty outer flesh of the fruit, or mesocarp, is palatable raw for


title: Umbellularia content: only a brief time when ripe; prior to this the volatile aromatic oils are too strong, and afterwards the flesh quickly becomes bruised, like that of an overripe avocado. Native Americans dried the fruits in the sun and ate only the lower third of the dried mesocarp, which is less pungent. The hard inner seed underneath the fleshy mesocarp, like the pit of an avocado, cleaves readily in two when its thin shell is cracked. The pit itself was traditionally roasted to a dark chocolate-brown color, removing much of the pungency and leaving a spicy flavor. Roasted, shelled "bay nuts"


title: Umbellularia content: were eaten whole, or ground into powder and prepared as a drink which resembles unsweetened chocolate. The flavor, depending on roast level, has been described variously as "roast coffee," "dark chocolate" or "burnt popcorn". The powder might also be used in cooking or pressed into cakes and dried for winter storage. It has been speculated that the nuts contain a stimulant; however this possible effect has been little documented by biologists. The leaf can be used in cooking, but is spicier and "headier" than the Mediterranean bay leaf, and should be used in smaller quantity. "Umbellularia" leaf imparts a somewhat


title: Umbellularia content: stronger camphor/cinnamon flavor compared to the Mediterranean bay. Some modern-day foragers and wild food enthusiasts have revived Native American practices regarding the edible roasted fruit, the bay nut. "Umbellularia californica" is also used in woodworking. It is considered a tonewood, used to construct the backs and sides of acoustic guitars. The wood is very hard and fine, and is also made into bowls, spoons, and other small items and sold as "myrtlewood". It is also grown as an ornamental tree, both in its native area, and further north up the Pacific coast to Vancouver in Canada, and in western Europe.


title: Umbellularia content: It is occasionally used for firewood. According to a modern Miwok recipe for acorn soup, "it is essential that you add a generous amount of California laurel" when storing acorns to dry, to keep insects away from the acorns. One popular use for the leaves is to put them between the bed mattresses to get rid of, or prevent, flea infestations. The wood is used as lumber in furniture making, especially highly figured specimens. "Myrtlewood" is the only wood still in use as a base "metal" for legal tender. During the 1933 "interregnum of despair" between Franklin Roosevelt's election and


title: Umbellularia content: his inauguration, the only bank in the town of North Bend, Oregon—the First National—was forced to temporarily close its doors, precipitating a cash-flow crisis for the City of North Bend. The city solved this problem by minting its own currency, using myrtlewood discs printed on a newspaper press. These coins, in denominations from 25 cents to $10, were used to pay employees, with the city promising to redeem them for cash as soon as it became available. However, when the bank reopened and the city appealed for people to bring their myrtlewood money in to redeem it, many opted to


title: Umbellularia content: keep their tokens as collector's items. After several appeals, the city announced that the tokens would remain legal tender in the city of North Bend in perpetuity. The unredeemed tokens have become very valuable, because of scarcity and historical interest. Fewer than 10 full sets are believed to exist. "Umbellularia californica" is a host of "Phytophthora ramorum", the pathogen that causes the disease sudden oak death. It is important in this sense because it is one of two tree species (tanoak is the other) on which the pathogen readily produces spores. Umbellularia Umbellularia californica is a large hardwood tree native


title: "Eastern oyster" content: Eastern oyster The eastern oyster ("Crassostrea virginica")—also called Wellfleet oyster, Atlantic oyster, Virginia oyster, or American oyster—is a species of true oyster native to the eastern seaboard and Gulf of Mexico coast of North America. It is also farmed in Puget Sound, Washington, where it is known as the Totten Inlet Virginica. Eastern oysters are and have been very popular commercially. Today, less than 1% of the original 17th-century population (when the original colonists arrived) is thought to remain in the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries, although population estimates from any era are uncertain. The eastern oyster is the state


title: "Eastern oyster" content: shellfish of Connecticut, its shell is the state shell of Virginia and Mississippi, and its shell in cabochon form is the state gem of Louisiana. Like all oysters, "Crassostrea virginica" is a bivalve mollusk with a hard calcium-carbonaceous shell. Its shell provides protection from predation. This particular type of oyster has an important environmental value. Like all oysters, "C. virginica" is a filter feeder. They suck in water and filter out the plankton and detritus to swallow, then spit the water back out, thus cleaning the water around them. One oyster can filter more than 50 gallons of water in


title: "Eastern oyster" content: 24 hours. Eastern oysters also provide a key structural element within their ecosystem, making them a foundation species in many environments, and they serve as ecosystem engineers in western Atlantic estuaries. Similar to coral reefs, oyster beds provide key habitat for a variety of different species by creating hard substrate for attachment and habitation. Oyster beds have an estimated 50 times the surface area of an equally sized flat bottom. The beds also attract a high concentration of larger predators looking for food. The eastern oyster, like all members of the family Ostreidae, can make small pearls to surround particles


title: "Eastern oyster" content: that enter the shell. These pearls, however, are insignificant in size and of no value; the pearl oyster, from which commercial pearls are harvested, is of a different family. The lifecycle of "C. virginica" is: spawning, floating fertilized egg, trochophore, swimming straight-hinge veliger, swimming late veliger, swimming and crawling pediveliger, early spat, later spat, and adult oysters. Spawning of "C. virginica" is controlled by water temperatures and varies from north to south; northern oysters spawn at temperatures between 60 and 68 °F (15.5 and 20 °C), whereas southern oysters spawn at temperatures above 68 °F (20 °C). Spawning can also


title: "Eastern oyster" content: occur throughout the warm months. Eastern oysters can reach sexual maturity at four months old. The eastern oyster has a complex reproductive cycle. The cycle begins during late summer and autumn months with the storage of glycogen energy reserves. This glycogen is then used to support gametogenesis during the next winter and early spring when food intake is at a minimum. The gametes begin to mature in late spring and then, from June to August they are spawned into the water column, where fertilization occurs. Each female produces from 75 to 150 million eggs, but only one in 1000 survive.


title: "Eastern oyster" content: Then, fertilized eggs develop into planktonic, free-swimming, trochophore larvae, also known as the early umbo stage, which have cilia and a small shell, in about six hours. The trochophore larvae depend on their internal yolk supply for energy. They then develop into a fully shelled veliger larvae, also known as the late umbo stage, which have a hinged side and a velum, formed within 12 to 24 hours. During this time, the shelled veliger larvae use their ciliated vela to capture food and swim. The larvae remain planktonic for about 2 to 3 weeks, depending on food and temperature conditions,


title: "Eastern oyster" content: and towards the end of this period, they develop into pediveliger larvae, also known as eyed larvae, which have an umbo, an eyespot, and a foot. During this time. the pediveliger larvae "settle to the bottom of the water column where they seek a hard substrate". Ideally, the pediveliger larvae try to locate an adult oyster shell to which they attach, but other hard surfaces will suffice. Lastly, "after careful selection of the proper attachment site, in or during relatively still water, the pediveliger larvae cement themselves to a firm clean surface and metamorphose to the adult form; these newly


title: "Eastern oyster" content: attached oysters are known as 'spat'". Upon being stimulated to settle, a larva cements its left valve to the substrate and metamorphoses into an oyster spat by discarding its velum, reabsorbing its foot, and enlarging its gills. During the first year of life, "C. virginica" oysters are protandric. Most spat are male, but once they reach sexual maturity, within four months in southern waters, some males change to females after the first or second spawning. Then, some females can even change back to males again. The prodissoconch, the shell of the free-swimming veliger larval stage of "C. virginica", is composed


title: "Eastern oyster" content: of aragonite, as opposed to the calcite composition of a postlarval adult oyster shell. The epithelium of the oyster's mantle secretes both the prodissoconch and the postlarval shells, but at different times. Tests were conducted to try to determine why larval and adult shells have different compositions. At the Biological Laboratory of the U.S. Bureau of Commercial Fisheries in Milford, Connecticut, larvae from the eastern oyster were reared in breeding tanks and were then collected, washed with distilled water, and dried as they died. The sample included a variety of larval stages, starting with the straight-hinge veliger larva with its


title: "Eastern oyster" content: shell, the protostracum, to the last stage of the umbo larva with its shell, the prodissoconch. Both of these larval stages have very thin, hyaline, and translucent shells. The study showed the specific gravity of aragonite is 2.95 and calcite is 2.72, so as far as weight is concerned, no advantage results for a larval oyster to have a shell made of one composition over the other. Then, oyster larval shells were compared not with adult shells, but instead with other bivalve larval shells. All, or almost all, bivalves have aragonitic larval shells because the majority of them have aragonitic


title: "Eastern oyster" content: adult shells, and "C. virginica" oyster larvae are assumed to have an aragonitic shell simply to conform to the general pattern in the bivalves. No adaptive need is seen for free-swimming larvae to have shells of a composition other than aragonite; they have that composition because their ancestors did. Adaptations for a thicker shell are required for defense against predators because the oysters are permanently immobilized and therefore live in different environments than those of the free-swimming larvae. Before Columbus and the rise of industrial oyster operations, oysters abounded in the bay. Oysters first arrived in the Chesapeake 5,000 years


title: "Eastern oyster" content: ago, and shortly after, local Indians began eating them. Archaeologists found evidence the local Native Americans returned to the same place to collect oysters for 3,000 years. John Smith, on a voyage up the Chesapeake, stated oysters, "lay as thick as stones." In fact, the word Chesapeake derives from an Algonquian word meaning 'Great Shellfish Bay'. Because of the abundance of oysters filtering the waters of the Chesapeake, the water was much clearer than it is now. Visibility would sometimes reach 20 feet. When the English began settling the area, they evidently had a localized impact of the oyster population.


title: "Eastern oyster" content: One archaeological site measured oyster sizes near Maryland's old capital St. Mary's city from 1640 to 1710. In 1640, when the city was still small, oysters measured 80 mm, and in the city's maximum population in 1690, they measured to 40 mm. When the capital moved to Annapolis, the population moved with it, and by 1710, the oysters were back up to 80 mm. However, the effect of local overharvesting would remain local until after the Civil War, when a combination of new technologies led to the removal of nearly all the bay oysters. During the industrial revolution, several new


title: "Eastern oyster" content: technologies were introduced to the Chesapeake Bay area, which allowed for more intensive oyster harvesting. First was the invention of canning. This allowed oysters to be preserved much longer, and created demand for oysters across the world. Secondly, the invention of the dredge enabled oyster harvesters to reach untouched depths of the Chesapeake. And finally, the proliferation of steam-powered ships and railroads made transportation more reliable, enabling merchants to sell oysters far and wide. Estimates for the harvest in 1839 give a figure of 700,000 bushels. After the Civil War, dredges were legalized, and harvesting exploded to 5 million bushels


title: "Eastern oyster" content: that year. By 1875, 17 million bushels were taken from the bay. The harvesting would reach its peak in the 1880s, with 20 million bushels being harvested from the bay each year. Not only were they being taken for food, but also oyster reefs, where oysters had built hills of their dead shells over thousands of generations, were being dredged out. Surplus oyster shells had many uses then. They were ground into mortar, used as filler in roads, and used as a source of lime in agricultural fertilizer. By the 1920s, harvests would be down to just 3–5 million bushels


title: "Eastern oyster" content: per year because of overharvesting. Overharvesting would eventually deplete the remaining oyster population in the bay to just 1% of its historical level, where it stands today. Oyster harvests began to decline in the 1890s. They were being taken much faster than they could reproduce. Also, many of the shells and reefs were being taken and not being replaced. Oyster spat need a hard surface on which to attach, and these were vanishing because of the destruction of oyster reefs. By the 1920s, harvests were down to 3–5 million bushels per year, stabilized for a time by returning oyster shells


title: "Eastern oyster" content: back to the bay. But in the 1950s, the weakened oyster population had to deal with the diseases "dermo" and MSX. These decimated the remaining oyster population. The parasites which carried the disease are alien to eastern waters, and they were thought to have been brought to the Chesapeake by Asian oysters. Currently, oyster harvests average less than 200,000 bushels a year. The eastern oyster used to be of great commercial value. Due to the steep decline in the number of oysters in various traditionally harvested areas, primarily because of overfishing and diseases, the annual catch has declined significantly. In


title: "Eastern oyster" content: Maryland, the 2006–2007 catch was 165,059 bushels (about 7600 m³) of oysters. Other regions of the East Coast of the United States have successful oyster farms, including most notably Cotuit and Wellfleet, Massachusetts, on Cape Cod. Harvestable size of a "C. virginica" oyster is 75 mm, which can take from 12 to 36 months, depending on temperature, salinity of the water, and food supply. Salinity is a very important climatological variable that affects spatfall. Oysters do best where salinities range from 10 to 30 ppt; the range of 15 to 18 ppt is considered optimal. Typically, when salinity levels are


title: "Eastern oyster" content: less than 6 ppt, larvae will not settle and metamorphose into spat. In 2010, 665 miles of coastline were affected by the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. To keep the oil at bay and to spare the oystermen, the authorities of Louisiana made an unprecedented decision to maximize the fresh water flow through the region's canals to three times usual levels. At the mouth of the canals, salinity fell to almost zero, which was probably why most of the oysters died. Sujata Gupta ventured into the marshlands and Gulf of Mexico with Brad Robin, a man from a line of generations


title: "Eastern oyster" content: of oystermen in southeastern Louisiana. Robin and his crew threw a net over the side to haul in a catch. There were dozens of palm-sized oysters, but 75% of them were "boxes" or empty shells. However, as they traveled further towards the Gulf of Mexico, where the water was less salinity-stressed by the flush, only 20% of the haul came back as boxes, a promising sign the oysters are trying to come back. Gupta reported, "Now since there are so many empty shells scattered on the sea floor, the larvae have more to latch onto, improving their odds". However, salinity


title: "Eastern oyster" content: levels are not the only concern. Eastern oysters are filter feeders, so they are greatly affected by their surroundings since they are sessile organisms. This means if the water around them was contaminated with oil and the dispersant used to get rid of the oil, then these chemicals were collected by the oysters as they filtered the water. This is cause for great concern that the oysters are being killed by the toxins in the dispersant, as well. An added dilemma is oysters are in their weakest state after spawning season, which may have caused some of them to close


title: "Eastern oyster" content: their shells, resulting in death by suffocation within just a few days due to warm temperatures in the Gulf if the shells remain closed. The toxins in the oil and dispersants can also kill the larvae. To highlight the recovery of the state's oyster industry, the shell of "C. virginica" cut into cabochons was made Louisiana's official state gem in 2011. "Dermo" ("Perkinsus marinus") is a marine disease of oysters, caused by a protozoan parasite. It is a prevalent pathogen of oysters, causing massive mortality in oyster populations, and poses a significant economic threat to the oyster industry. Multinucleated sphere


title: "Eastern oyster" content: X (MSX) ("Haplosporidium nelsoni"), another protozoan, was first described along the mid-Atlantic coast in 1957. Mortalities can reach 90% to 95% of the oyster population within 2 to 3 years of being seeded. MSX slows the feeding rates of infected oysters, leading to a reduction in the amount of stored carbohydrates, which in turn inhibits normal gametogenesis during spawning, resulting in reduced fecundity. Eastern oyster The eastern oyster ("Crassostrea virginica")—also called Wellfleet oyster, Atlantic oyster, Virginia oyster, or American oyster—is a species of true oyster native to the eastern seaboard and Gulf of Mexico coast of North America. It is


title: Coleraine content: Party, 1 Northern Ireland Conservatives and 1 Social Democratic and Labour Party councillors. Coleraine is the main town of the world famous Causeway Coast, which attracts over three million visitors per year, spending in excess of £47 million. The world famous Giant's Causeway is a twenty–five-minute bus ride away. The distillery village of Bushmills is well-served by buses from the town and there is a narrow-gauge steam train running in the summer from Bushmills to the Giant's Causeway. The train journey takes approximately fifteen minutes from the town to the Causeway. Also north of Coleraine is the scenic coastal town


title: Kaskaskia content: the Plains Indians in 1719. The fate of the Kaskaskia, and the rest of the Illiniwek/Illinois, was irrevocably tied up with that of France. Until their dissolution in France, French Jesuits built missions and ministered to the Kaskaskia. By 1763 and the end of the Seven Years' War in North America (called the French and Indian War in the United States), the Kaskaskia and other Illinois tribes were greatly in decline. Early French explorers had estimated their original population from 6,000 to more than 20,000. By the end of the war, their numbers were a fraction of that. Contemporary historians


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: Orb-weaver spider Orb-weaver spiders or araneids are members of the spider family Araneidae. They are the most common group of builders of spiral wheel-shaped webs often found in gardens, fields and forests. "Orb" was previously used in English to mean "circular", hence the English name of the group. Araneids have eight similar eyes, hairy or spiny legs, and no stridulating organs. The family is cosmopolitan, including many well-known large or brightly colored garden spiders. With 3122 species in 172 genera worldwide, Araneidae is the third-largest family of spiders (behind Salticidae and Linyphiidae). Araneid webs are constructed in a stereotyped fashion.


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: A framework of nonsticky silk is built up before the spider adds a final spiral of silk covered in sticky droplets. Orb-webs are also produced by members of other spider families. The long-jawed orb weavers (Tetragnathidae) were formerly included in the Araneidae; they are closely related, being part of the superfamily Araneoidea. The family Arkyidae has been split off from the Araneidae. The cribellate or hackled orb-weavers (Uloboridae) belong to a different group of spiders. Their webs are strikingly similar, but use a different kind of sticky silk. Generally, orb-weaving spiders are three-clawed builders of flat webs with sticky spiral


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: capture silk. The building of a web is an engineering feat, begun when the spider floats a line on the wind to another surface. The spider secures the line and then drops another line from the center, making a "Y". The rest of the scaffolding follows with many radii of nonsticky silk being constructed before a final spiral of sticky capture silk. The third claw is used to walk on the nonsticky part of the web. Characteristically, the prey insect that blunders into the sticky lines is stunned by a quick bite, and then wrapped in silk. If the prey


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: is a venomous insect, such as a wasp, wrapping may precede biting and/or stinging. Many orb-weavers build a new web each day. Most orb-weavers tend to be active during the evening hours; they hide for most of the day. Generally, towards evening, the spider will consume the old web, rest for approximately an hour, then spin a new web in the same general location. Thus, the webs of orb-weavers are generally free of the accumulation of detritus common to other species, such as black widow spiders. Some orb-weavers do not build webs at all. Members of the genera "Mastophora" in


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: the Americas, "Cladomelea" in Africa, and "Ordgarius" in Australia produce sticky globules, which contain a pheromone analog. The globule is hung from a silken thread dangled by the spider from its front legs. The pheromone analog attracts male moths of only a few species. These get stuck on the globule and are reeled in to be eaten. Both types of bolas spiders are highly camouflaged and difficult to locate. The spiny orb-weaving spiders in the genera "Gasteracantha" and "Micrathena" look like plant seeds or thorns hanging in their orb-webs. Some species of "Gasteracantha" have very long, horn-like spines protruding from


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: their abdomens. One feature of the webs of some orb-weavers is the stabilimentum, a crisscross band of silk through the center of the web. It is found in a number of genera, but "Argiope", the yellow and banded garden spiders of North America, is a prime example. The band has been hypothesized to be a lure for prey, a marker to warn birds away from the web, and a camouflage for the spider when it sits in the center of the web. However, recent research suggests the stabilimentum actually decreases the visibility of the silk to insects, thus making it


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: harder for prey to avoid the web. The orb-web consists of a frame and supporting radii overlaid with a sticky capture spiral, and the silks used by orb-weaver spiders have exceptional mechanical properties to withstand the impact of flying prey. During the Cretaceous, a radiation of angiosperm plants and their insect pollinators occurred. Fossil evidence shows that the orb web was in existence at this time, which permitted a concurrent radiation of the spider predators along with their insect prey. The capacity of orb–webs to absorb the impact of flying prey led orbicularian spiders to become the dominant predators of


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: aerial insects in many ecosystems. Insects and spiders have comparable rates of diversification, suggesting they co-radiated, and the peak of this radiation occurred 100 Mya before the origin of angiosperms. Vollrath and Selden (2007) make the bold proposition that insect evolution was driven less by flowering plants than by spider predation – particularly through orb webs – as a major selective force. Most arachnid webs are vertical and the spiders usually hang with their head downward. A few webs, such as those of orb-weavers in the genus "Metepeira" have the orb hidden within a tangled space of web. Some "Metepiera"


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: are semisocial and live in communal webs. In Mexico, such communal webs have been cut out of trees or bushes and used for living fly paper. In 2009, workers at a Baltimore Wastewater Treatment Plant called for help to deal with over 100 million orb-weaver spiders, living in a community that managed to spin a phenomenal web that covered some 4 acres of a building with spider densities in some areas reaching 35,176 spiders per cubic meter. The oldest known true orb-weaver is "Mesozygiella dunlopi", from the Lower Cretaceous. Several fossils provide direct evidence that the three major orb-weaving families,


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: namely Araneidae, Tetragnathidae and Uloboridae, had evolved by this time, about 140 million years ago. They probably originated during the Jurassic (). Based on new molecular evidence in silk genes, all three families are likely to have a common origin. The two families, Deinopoidea and Araneoidea, have similar behavioral sequences and spinning apparatuses to produce architecturally similar webs. The Araneidae weave true viscid silk with an aqueous glue property, and the Deinopoidea use dry fibrils and sticky silk. The Deinopoidea (including the Uloboridae), have a cribellum – a flat, complex spinning plate from which the cribellate silk is released. They


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: also have a calamistrum – an apparatus of bristles used to comb the cribellate silk from the cribellum. The Araneoidea, or the "ecribellate" spiders, do not have these two structures. The two families of orb-weaving spiders are morphologically very distinct, yet there is much similarity between their web form and web construction behavior. The cribellates retained the ancestral character, yet the cribellum was lost in the escribellates. The lack of a functional cribellum in araneoids is most likely synapomorphic. If the orb-weaver spiders are a monophyletic group, the fact that only some species in the group lost a feature adds


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: to the controversy. The cribellates are split off as a separate taxon that retained the primitive feature, which makes the lineage paraphyletic and not synonymous with any real evolutionary lineage. The morphological and behavioral evidence surrounding orb webs led to the disagreement over a single origin or a dual origin. However, molecular analysis provides more support for a monophyletic origin. Araneid species either mate at the central hub of the web, where the male slowly traverses the web, trying not to get eaten, and when reaching the hub, mounts the female; or the male constructs a mating thread inside or


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: outside the web to attract the female via vibratory courtship, and if successful, mating occurs on the thread. In the cannibalistic and polyandrous orb-web spider "Argiope bruennichi", the much smaller males are attacked during their first copulation and are cannibalized in up to 80% of the cases. All surviving males die after their second copulation, a pattern observed on other "Argiope" species. Whether a male survives his first copulation depends on the duration of the genital contact: males that jump off early (before 5 seconds) have a chance of surviving, while males that copulate longer (greater than 10 seconds) invariably


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: die. Prolonged copulation, although associated with cannibalism, enhances sperm transfer and relative paternity. It was observed that when males mated with a non-sibling female, the duration of their copulation was prolonged, and consequently the males were cannibalized more frequently. When males mated with a sibling female, they copulated briefly, and thus were more likely to escape cannibalism. By escaping, their chance of mating again with a non-kin female likely would be increased. These observations suggest that males can adaptively adjust their investment based on the degree of genetic relatedness of the female in order to avoid inbreeding depression. Sexual dimorphism


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: refers to physical differences between males and females of the same species. One such difference can be in size. Araneids often exhibit size dimorphism typically known as extreme sexual size dimorphism, due to the extent of differences in size. The size difference among species of Araneidae ranges greatly. Some females, such as those of the "Nephila pilipes", can be at least 9 times larger than the male, while others are only slightly larger than the male. The larger size female is typically thought to be selected through fecundity selection, the idea that bigger females can produce more eggs, thus more


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: offspring. Although a great deal of evidence points towards the greatest selection pressure on larger female size, there is some evidence that selection can favor small male size as well. Araneids also exhibit a phenomenon called sexual cannibalism, which is commonly found throughout Araneidae. Evidence suggests a negative correlation between sexual size dimorphism and incidences of sexual cannibalism. Other evidence, however, has shown that differences in cannibalistic events among araneids when having smaller or slightly larger males is advantageous. Some evidence has shown that extreme dimorphism may be the result of males avoiding detection by the females. For males of


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: these species, being smaller in size may be advantageous in moving the central hub of a web so female spiders may be less likely to detect the male, or even if detected as prey to be eaten, the small size may indicate little nutritional value. Larger-bodied male araneids may be advantageous when mating on a mating thread because the thread is constructed from the edge of the web orb to structural threads or to nearby vegetation. Here larger males may be less likely to be cannibalized, as the males are able to copulate while the female is hanging, which may


title: "Orb-weaver spider" content: make them safer from cannibalism. In one subfamily of Araneid that uses a mating thread, Gasteracanthinae, sexual cannibalism is apparently absent despite extreme size dimorphism. , the World Spider Catalog placed 172 genera (comprising over 3,100 species) in the family Araneidae. Orb-weaver spider Orb-weaver spiders or araneids are members of the spider family Araneidae. They are the most common group of builders of spiral wheel-shaped webs often found in gardens, fields and forests. "Orb" was previously used in English to mean "circular", hence the English name of the group. Araneids have eight similar eyes, hairy or spiny legs, and no


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: Red-whiskered bulbul The red-whiskered bulbul ("Pycnonotus jocosus"), or crested bulbul, is a passerine bird found in Asia. It is a member of the bulbul family. It is a resident frugivore found mainly in tropical Asia. It has been introduced in many tropical areas of the world where populations have established themselves. It feeds on fruits and small insects. Red-whiskered bulbuls perch conspicuously on trees and have a loud three or four note call. They are very common in hill forests and urban gardens within its range. The red-whiskered bulbul was originally described with the shrikes within the genus "Lanius" in


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: 1758 by Carl Linnaeus in his "Systema Naturae". Hybrids have been noted in captivity with the red-vented, white-eared, white-spectacled, black-capped and Himalayan bulbuls. Leucism has also been recorded. Nine subspecies are recognized: The red-whiskered bulbul is about in length. It has brown upper-parts and whitish underparts with buff flanks and a dark spur running onto the breast at shoulder level. It has a tall pointed black crest, red face patch and thin black moustachial line. The tail is long and brown with white terminal feather tips, but the vent area is red. Juveniles lack the red patch behind the eye,


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: and the vent area is rufous-orange. The loud and evocative call is a sharp "kink-a-joo" (also transcribed as "pettigrew" or "kick-pettigrew" or "pleased to meet you") and the song is a scolding chatter. It is more often heard than seen, but will often perch conspicuously especially in the mornings when they call from the tops of trees. The life span is about 11 years. This is a bird of lightly wooded areas, more open country with bushes and shrubs, and farmland. Irruptions have been noted from early times with Thomas C. Jerdon noting that they "periodically visiting Madras and other


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: wooded towns in large flocks." It has established itself in Australia and in Los Angeles, Hawaii, and Florida in the United States, as well as in Mauritius, on Assumption Island and Mascarene Islands. In Florida, it is only found in a small area, and its population could be extirpated easily. It was eradicated from Assumption Island in 2013–2015 to prevent colonisation of nearby Aldabra, the largest introduced bird-free tropical island. The red-whiskered bulbul was introduced by the Zoological and Acclimatization Society in 1880 to Sydney, became well established across the suburbs by 1920, and continued to spread slowly to around


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: 100 km away. It is now also found in suburban Melbourne and Adelaide, although it is unclear how they got there. On the island of Réunion, this species established itself and also aided the spread of alien plant species such as "Rubus alceifolius". In Florida they feed on fruits and berries of as many as 24 exotic plants including loquat ("Eriobotrya japonica"), "Lantana" spp., Brazilian pepper ("Schinus terebinthifolius") and figs ("Ficus"). In Mauritius they aid the dispersal of "Ligustrum robustum" and "Clidemia hirta". Seeds that pass through their gut germinate better. Populations of the red-whiskered bulbul on the island of


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: Reunion have diversified in the course of thirty years and show visible variations in bill morphology according to the food resources that they have adapted to utilize. The breeding season is spread out and peaks from December to May in southern India and March to October in northern India. Breeding may occur once or twice a year. The courtship display of the male involves head bowing, spreading the tail and drooping wings. The nest is cup-shaped, and is built on bushes, thatched walls or small trees. It is woven of fine twigs, roots, and grasses, and embellished with large objects


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: such as bark strips, paper, or plastic bags. Clutches typically contain two to three eggs. Adults (possibly the female) may feign injury to distract potential predators away from the nest. The eggs have a pale mauve ground colour with speckles becoming blotches towards the broad end. Eggs measure 21 mm and are 16 mm wide. Eggs take 12 days to hatch. Both parents take part in raising the young. Young birds are fed on caterpillars and insects which are replaced by fruits and berries as they mature. The chicks are psilopaedic (having down only in the pterylae). Eggs and chicks


title: "Red-whiskered bulbul" content: may be preyed on by the greater coucal and crows. They defend territories of about during the breeding season. They roost communally in loose groups of a hundred or more birds. The red-whiskered bulbul feeds on fruits (including those of the yellow oleander that are toxic to mammals), nectar and insects. Several avian malaria parasites have been described from the species. This species was once a popular cage bird in parts of India. C. W. Smith noted that The species continues to be a popular cagebird in parts of Southeast Asia. Red-whiskered bulbul The red-whiskered bulbul ("Pycnonotus jocosus"), or crested


title: "Field sparrow" content: Field sparrow The field sparrow ("Spizella pusilla") is a small New World sparrow in the family Passerellidae. It is about long and weighs about . The head is grey with a rust-coloured crown, white eye-ring and pink bill. The upper parts are brown streaked with black and buff, the breast is buff, the belly is white and the tail is forked. There are two different colour morphs, one being greyer and the other more rufous. The field sparrow is distributed across eastern Canada and the eastern United States, with northern populations migrating southwards to southern United States and Mexico in


title: "Field sparrow" content: the fall. The typical habitat of this bird is bushy country with shrubs and grassland. The nest is a cup-shaped construction built on the ground and hidden beneath a bush or clump of grass. The birds forage on the ground or in low vegetation, feeding mainly on seeds and insects. The population is thought to be in slow decline, but it is a common species with a wide range, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed its conservation status as being of "least concern". Adults have brown upperparts, a buffy breast, a white belly, two whitish wing


title: "Field sparrow" content: bars and a dark-brown forked tail. They have a grey face, a rusty crown, a white eye ring and a pink bill. They have rusty markings behind the eye. There are grey and rufous colour variants. Their breeding habitat is brushy, shrubby fields across eastern North America. The nest is an open cup on the ground under a clump of grass or in a small thicket. These birds are permanent residents in the southern parts of their range. Northern birds migrate to the southern United States and Mexico. These birds forage on the ground or in low vegetation, mainly eating


title: "Field sparrow" content: insects and seeds. They may feed in small flocks outside the nesting season. The male sings from a higher perch, such as a shrub or fencepost, which indicates his ownership of the nesting territory. The song is a series of sad whistles ending in a trill, often compared to the accelerating sound of a bouncing ball. This bird's numbers expanded as settlers cleared forests in eastern North America, but may have declined in more recent times. Despite this, it is a common species with a wide range, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature has assessed its conservation status


title: "Field sparrow" content: as being of "least concern". Field sparrow The field sparrow ("Spizella pusilla") is a small New World sparrow in the family Passerellidae. It is about long and weighs about . The head is grey with a rust-coloured crown, white eye-ring and pink bill. The upper parts are brown streaked with black and buff, the breast is buff, the belly is white and the tail is forked. There are two different colour morphs, one being greyer and the other more rufous. The field sparrow is distributed across eastern Canada and the eastern United States, with northern populations migrating southwards to southern


title: "Scottish Amateur Football Association" content: This was referred to the Special Committee who reported back in November of that year that a decision would be deferred until a full list of SAFA member clubs was submitted for approval. At this time five SAFA clubs had applied for direct membership of the SFA. It was not at all unusual to have joint membership as it permitted clubs to participate in competitions organised by the SFA. It is less common today, although amateur clubs such as retain dual membership. At a meeting on 14 December 1909, the SFA approved the membership of the SAFA. The SAFA AGM


title: Esher content: Esher Esher ( ) is a town in Surrey, England, to the east of the River Mole. Esher is an outlying suburb of London, and with Esher Commons at its southern end, the town marks one limit of the Greater London Built-Up Area. Esher has a linear commercial high street and is otherwise suburban in density, with varying elevations, few high rise buildings and very short sections of dual carriageway within the ward itself. Esher covers a large area, between 13 and 15.4 miles southwest of Charing Cross. In the south it is bounded by the A3 Portsmouth Road which


title: Peony content: Peony The peony or paeony is a flowering plant in the genus Paeonia, the only genus in the family Paeoniaceae. They are native to Asia, Europe and Western North America. Scientists differ on the number of species that can be distinguished, ranging from 25 to 40, although the current consensus is 33 known species. The relationships between the species need to be further clarified. Most are herbaceous perennial plants tall, but some are woody shrubs tall. They have compound, deeply lobed leaves and large, often fragrant flowers, in colors ranging from purple red to white or yellow, in late spring


title: Peony content: and early summer. Peonies are among the most popular garden plants in temperate regions. Herbaceous peonies are also sold as cut flowers on a large scale, although generally only available in late spring and early summer. All Paeoniaceae are deciduous perennial herbs or shrubs, with thick storage roots and thin roots for gathering water and minerals. Some species are caespitose (tufted), because the crown produces adventitious buds, while others have stolons. They have rather large compound leaves without glands and stipules, and with anomocytic stomata. In the woody species the new growth emerges from scaly buds on the previous flush


title: Peony content: or from the crown of the rootstock. The large bisexual flowers are mostly single at the end of the stem. In "P. emodi", "P. lactiflora", "P. veitchii" and many of the cultivars these contributed to, few additional flowers develop in the axils of the leaves. Flowers close at night or when the sky is overcast. Each flower is subtended by a number of bracts, that may form a sort of involucre, has 3-7 tough free sepals and mostly 5-8, but occasionally up to 13 free petals. These categories however are intergrading, making it difficult to assign some of them, and


title: Peony content: the number of these parts may vary. Within are numerous (50–160) free stamens, with anthers fixed at their base to the filaments, and are sagittate in shape, open with longitudal slits at the outer side and free pollen grains which have three slits or pores and consist of two cells. Within the circle of stamens is a more or less prominent, lobed disc, which is presumed not to excrete nectar. Within the disk is a varying number (1-15) of separate carpels, which have a very short style and a decurrent stigma. Each of these develops into a dry fruit (which


title: Peony content: is called a follicle), which opens with a lengthwise suture and each of which contains one or a few large fleshy seeds. The annual growth is predetermined: if the growing tip of a shoot is removed, no new buds will develop that season. Paeoniaceae are dependent on C3 carbon fixation. They contain ellagic acid, myricetin, ethereal oils and flavones, as well as crystals of calcium oxalate. The wax tubules that are formed primarily consist of palmitone (the ketone of palmitic acid). The basic chromosome number is five. About half of the species of the section "Paeonia" however is tetraploid (4n=20),