title: "Giant panda" content: the number of pandas living in the wild may have been underestimated at about 1,000. Previous population surveys had used conventional methods to estimate the size of the wild panda population, but using a new method that analyzes DNA from panda droppings, scientists believe the wild population may be as large as 3,000. In 2006, there were 40 panda reserves in China, compared to just 13 reserves in 1998. As the species has been reclassified to "vulnerable" since 2016, the conservation efforts are thought to be working. Furthermore, in response to this reclassification, the State Forestry Administration of China announced


title: "Giant panda" content: that they would not accordingly lower the conservation level for panda, and would instead reinforce the conservation efforts. The giant panda is among the world's most adored and protected rare animals, and is one of the few in the world whose natural inhabitant status was able to gain a UNESCO World Heritage Site designation. The Sichuan Giant Panda Sanctuaries, located in the southwest province of Sichuan and covering seven natural reserves, were inscribed onto the World Heritage List in 2006. Not all conservationists agree that the money spent on conserving pandas is well spent. Chris Packham has argued that the


title: "Giant panda" content: breeding of pandas in captivity is "pointless" because "there is not enough habitat left to sustain them". Packham argues that the money spent on pandas would be better spent elsewhere, and has said he would "eat the last panda if I could have all the money we have spent on panda conservation put back on the table for me to do more sensible things with", though he has apologized for upsetting people who like pandas. He points out, "The panda is possibly one of the grossest wastes of conservation money in the last half century." However, a 2015 paper found


title: "Giant panda" content: that the giant panda can serve as an umbrella species as the preservation of their habitat also helps other endemic species in China, including 70% of the country's forest birds, 70% of mammals and 31% of amphibians. In 2012, Earthwatch Institute, a global nonprofit that teams volunteers with scientists to conduct important environmental research, launched a program called "On the Trail of Giant Panda". This program, based in the Wolong National Nature Reserve, allows volunteers to work up close with pandas cared for in captivity, and help them adapt to life in the wild, so that they may breed, and


title: "Giant panda" content: live longer and healthier lives. Pandas have been kept in zoos as early as the Western Han Dynasty in China, where the writer Sima Xiangru noted that the panda was the most treasured animal in the emperor's garden of exotic animals in the capital Chang'an (present Xi'an). Not until the 1950s were pandas again recorded to have been exhibited in China's zoos. Chi Chi at the London Zoo became very popular. This influenced the World Wildlife Fund to use a panda as its symbol. A 2006 "New York Times" article outlined the economics of keeping pandas, which costs five times


title: "Giant panda" content: more than that of the next most expensive animal, an elephant. American zoos generally pay the Chinese government $1 million a year in fees, as part of a typical ten-year contract. San Diego's contract with China was to expire in 2008, but got a five-year extension at about half of the previous yearly cost. The last contract, with the Memphis Zoo in Memphis, Tennessee, ended in 2013. The Face of the Giant Panda Sign is an MRI sign in patients with Wilson's disease, named for the midbrain's resemblance to a giant panda's face. Cryptozoologists use Giant Pandas as an example


title: "Giant panda" content: of an animal recently discovered by science. For example, Guy Edwards writes, "The Giant Panda was once as mythical and elusive as Bigfoot." He adds that there are "many animals that symbolize the search for Bigfoot is not over." Skeptical cryptozoologist Joe Nickell, notes that since Giant Pandas were known to local people, they qualify as cryptids. However, unlike Bigfoot, pandas specimens were quickly obtained after Armand David learned of them. Also, fossil evidence shows that pandas were once widespread, including the two million year old skull of "Ailuropoda microta". Giant panda The giant panda ("Ailuropoda melanoleuca", literally "black and


title: "George Harrison" content: efforts; with a budget of $5 million, it earned $35 million in the US within ten weeks of its release. Harrison served as executive producer for 23 films with HandMade, including "A Private Function", "Mona Lisa", "Shanghai Surprise", "Withnail and I" and "How to Get Ahead in Advertising". He made cameo appearances in several of these films, including a role as a nightclub singer in "Shanghai Surprise", for which he recorded five new songs. According to Ian Inglis, Harrison's "executive role in HandMade Films helped to sustain British cinema at a time of crisis, producing some of the country's most


title: Gunpowder content: traditional gunpowders caused corrosion problems with Cordite Mk I and this led to the introduction of a range of sulfur-free gunpowders, of varying grain sizes. They typically contain 70.5 parts of saltpeter and 29.5 parts of charcoal. Like black powder, they were produced in different grain sizes. In the United Kingdom, the finest grain was known as "sulfur-free mealed powder" ("SMP"). Coarser grains were numbered as sulfur-free gunpowder (SFG n): 'SFG 12', 'SFG 20', 'SFG 40' and 'SFG 90', for example; where the number represents the smallest BSS sieve mesh size, which retained no grains. Sulfur's main role in gunpowder


title: Generalization content: the generic, such as "peach" and "oak" which are included in "tree", and "cruiser" and "steamer" which are included in "ship". A hypernym is superordinate to a hyponym, and a hyponym is subordinate to a hypernym. An animal is a generalization of a mammal, a bird, a fish, an amphibian and a reptile. Generalization has a long history in cartography as an art of creating maps for different scale and purpose. Cartographic generalization is the process of selecting and representing information of a map in a way that adapts to the scale of the display medium of the map. In


title: "Geoffrey Chaucer" content: Galeazzo II Visconti, in Milan. Two other literary stars of the era were in attendance: Jean Froissart and Petrarch. Around this time, Chaucer is believed to have written "The Book of the Duchess" in honour of Blanche of Lancaster, the late wife of John of Gaunt, who died in 1369 of the plague. Chaucer travelled to Picardy the next year as part of a military expedition; in 1373 he visited Genoa and Florence. Numerous scholars such as Skeat, Boitani, and Rowland suggested that, on this Italian trip, he came into contact with Petrarch or Boccaccio. They introduced him to medieval


title: "History of Europe" content: city-states formed the Delian League to continue fighting Persia, but Athens' position as leader of this league led Sparta to form the rival Peloponnesian League. The Peloponnesian Wars ensued, and the Peloponnesian League was victorious. Subsequently, discontent with Spartan hegemony led to the Corinthian War and the defeat of Sparta at the Battle of Leuctra. At the same time at the north ruled the Thracian Odrysian Kingdom between the 5th century BC and the 1st century AD. Hellenic infighting left Greek city states vulnerable, and Philip II of Macedon united the Greek city states under his control. The son of


title: "GNU Hurd" content: was developed to use GNU Mach as the microkernel. This was a technical decision made by Richard Stallman, who thought it would speed up the work by saving a large part of it. He has admitted that he was wrong about that. Other Unix-like systems working on the Mach microkernel include OSF/1, Lites, and MkLinux. macOS and NeXTSTEP use hybrid kernels based on Mach. From 2004 onward, various efforts were launched to port the Hurd to more modern microkernels. The L4 microkernel was the original choice in 2004, but progress slowed to a halt. Nevertheless, during 2005, Hurd developer Neal


title: Hydrogen content: para form and 75% of the ortho form, also known as the "normal form". The equilibrium ratio of orthohydrogen to parahydrogen depends on temperature, but because the ortho form is an excited state and has a higher energy than the para form, it is unstable and cannot be purified. At very low temperatures, the equilibrium state is composed almost exclusively of the para form. The liquid and gas phase thermal properties of pure parahydrogen differ significantly from those of the normal form because of differences in rotational heat capacities, as discussed more fully in "spin isomers of hydrogen". The ortho/para


title: Hungary content: and thick sour cream). Desserts include the iconic Dobos Cake, strudels ("rétes"), filled with apple, cherry, poppy seed or cheese, Gundel pancake, plum dumplings ("szilvás gombóc"), "somlói" dumplings, dessert soups like chilled sour cherry soup and sweet chestnut puree, "gesztenyepüré" (cooked chestnuts mashed with sugar and rum and split into crumbs, topped with whipped cream). "Perec" and "kifli" are widely popular pastries. The "csárda" is the most distinctive type of Hungarian inn, an old-style tavern offering traditional cuisine and beverages. "Borozó" usually denotes a cozy old-fashioned wine tavern, "pince" is a beer or wine cellar and a "söröző" is a


title: Historiography content: or regions (the Andes, the Southern Cone, the Caribbean) with relatively little comparative work. Historians of Latin America have contributed to various types of historical writing, but one major, innovative development in Spanish American history is the emergence of ethnohistory, the history of indigenous peoples, especially in Mexico based on alphabetic sources in Spanish or in indigenous languages. For the early modern period, the emergence of Atlantic history, based on comparisons and linkages of Europe, the Americas, and Africa from 1450–1850 that developed as a field in its own right has integrated early modern Latin American history into a larger


title: "George Benson" content: he cut, two were released: "She Makes Me Mad" backed with "It Should Have Been Me", with RCA-Victor in New York; although one source indicates this record was released under the name "Little Georgie", the 45rpm label is printed with the name George Benson. The single was produced by Leroy Kirkland for RCA's rhythm and blues label, Groove Records. As he has stated in an interview, Benson's introduction to showbusiness had an effect on his schooling. When this was discovered (tied with the failure of his single) his guitar was impounded. Luckily, after he spent time in a juvenile detention


title: "Grammatical aspect" content: "I should have eaten" etc. In particular, the modals "will" and "shall" and their subjunctive forms "would" and "should" are used to combine future or hypothetical reference with aspectual meaning: The uses of the progressive and perfect aspects are quite complex. They may refer to the viewpoint of the speaker: But they can have other illocutionary forces or additional modal components: For further discussion of the uses of the various tense–aspect combinations, see Uses of English verb forms. English expresses some other aspectual distinctions with other constructions. "Used to" + VERB is a past habitual, as in "I used to


title: "Gray whale" content: Gray whale The gray whale ("Eschrichtius robustus"), also known as the grey whale, gray back whale, Pacific gray whale, or California gray whale is a baleen whale that migrates between feeding and breeding grounds yearly. It reaches a length of , a weight of , and lives between 55 and 70 years. The common name of the whale comes from the gray patches and white mottling on its dark skin. Gray whales were once called devil fish because of their fighting behavior when hunted. The gray whale is the sole living species in the genus Eschrichtius, which in turn is


title: "Gray whale" content: the sole living genus in the family Eschrichtiidae. This mammal descended from filter-feeding whales that appeared at the beginning of the Oligocene, over 30 million years ago. The gray whale is distributed in an eastern North Pacific (North American) population and an endangered western North Pacific (Asian) population. North Atlantic populations were extirpated (perhaps by whaling) on the European coast before AD 500 and on the American coast around the late 17th to early 18th centuries. However, on May 8, 2010, a sighting of a gray whale was confirmed off the coast of Israel in the Mediterranean Sea, leading some


title: "Gray whale" content: scientists to think they might be repopulating old breeding grounds that have not been used for centuries. In May and June 2013 a gray whale was sighted off the coast of Namibia – the first confirmed in the Southern Hemisphere. The round-trip journey of one gray whale has set a new record for the longest mammal migration, covering a distance of more than 22,000 kilometres across the Pacific Ocean. Her migration has shown new insight into how endangered species are making drastic changes in their life style. The gray whale is traditionally placed as the only living species in its


title: "Gray whale" content: genus and family, "Eschrichtius" and Eschrichtiidae, but an extinct species was discovered and placed in the genus in 2017, the Akishima whale ("E. akishimaensis"). Some recent DNA analyses have suggested that certain rorquals of the family Balaenopteridae, such as the humpback whale, "Megaptera novaeangliae", and fin whale, "Balaenoptera physalus", are more closely related to the gray whale than they are to some other rorquals, such as the minke whales. But other recent studies place gray whales as being outside the rorqual clade, but as the closest relatives to the rorquals. John Edward Gray placed it in its own genus in


title: "Gray whale" content: 1865, naming it in honour of physician and zoologist Daniel Frederik Eschricht. The common name of the whale comes from its coloration. The subfossil remains of now extinct gray whales from the Atlantic coasts of England and Sweden were used by Gray to make the first scientific description of a species then surviving only in Pacific waters. The living Pacific species was described by Cope as "Rhachianectes glaucus" in 1869. Skeletal comparisons showed the Pacific species to be identical to the Atlantic remains in the 1930s, and Gray's naming has been generally accepted since. Although identity between the Atlantic and


title: "Gray whale" content: Pacific populations cannot be proven by anatomical data, its skeleton is distinctive and easy to distinguish from that of all other living whales. Many other names have been ascribed to the gray whale, including desert whale, devilfish, gray back, mussel digger and rip sack. The name "Eschrichtius gibbosus" is sometimes seen; this is dependent on the acceptance of a 1777 description by Erxleben. The gray whale has a dark slate-gray color and is covered by characteristic gray-white patterns, scars left by parasites which drop off in its cold feeding grounds. Individual whales are typically identified using photographs of their dorsal


title: "Gray whale" content: surface and matching the scars and patches associated with parasites that have fallen off the whale or are still attached. They have two blowholes on top of their head, which can create a distinctive heart-shaped blow at the surface in calm wind conditions. Gray whales measure from in length for newborns to for adults (females tend to be slightly larger than adult males). Newborns are a darker gray to black in color. A mature gray whale can reach , with a typical range of . Notable features that distinguish the gray whale from other mysticetes include its baleen that is


title: "Gray whale" content: variously described as cream, off-white, or blond in color and is unusually short. Small depressions on the upper jaw each contain a lone stiff hair, but are only visible on close inspection. Its head's ventral surface lacks the numerous prominent furrows of the related rorquals, instead bearing two to five shallow furrows on the throat's underside. The gray whale also lacks a dorsal fin, instead bearing 6 to 12 dorsal crenulations ("knuckles"), which are raised bumps on the midline of its rear quarter, leading to the flukes. This is known as the dorsal ridge. The tail itself is across and


title: "Gray whale" content: deeply notched at the center while its edges taper to a point. The two populations of Pacific gray whales (east and west) are morphologically and phylogenically different. Other than DNA structures, differences in proportions of several body parts and body colors including skeletal features, and length ratios of flippers and baleen plates have been confirmed between Eastern and Western populations, and some claims that the original eastern and western groups could have been much more distinct than previously thought, enough to be counted as subspecies. Since the original Asian and Atlantic populations have become extinct, it is difficult to determine


title: "Gray whale" content: the unique features among whales in these stocks. However, there have been observations of some whales showing distinctive, blackish body colors in recent years. This corresponds with the DNA analysis of last recorded stranding in China. Differences were also observed between Korean and Chinese specimens. Two Pacific Ocean populations are known to exist: one of not more than 130 individuals (according to the most recent population assessment in 2008) whose migratory route is presumed to be between the Sea of Okhotsk and southern Korea, and a larger one with a population between 20,000 and 22,000 individuals in the eastern Pacific


title: "Gray whale" content: traveling between the waters off northernmost Alaska and Baja California Sur. Mothers make this journey accompanied by their calves, usually hugging the shore in shallow kelp beds, and fight viciously to protect their young if they are attacked. The western population has had a very slow growth rate despite heavy conservation action over the years, likely due to their very slow reproduction rate. The state of the population hit an all-time low in 2010, when no new reproductive females were recorded, resulting in a minimum of 26 reproductive females being observed since 1995. Even a very small number of additional


title: "Gray whale" content: annual female deaths will cause the subpopulation to decline. However, as of 2018, evidence has indicated that the western population is markedly increasing in number, especially off Sakhalin Island. Following this, the IUCN downlisted the population's conservation status from critically endangered to endangered. The gray whale became extinct in the North Atlantic in the 18th century. Other than speculations, large portions of historical characteristic of migration and distribution are unclear such as locations of calving grounds, existences of resident groups, and occurrences within Black and Azov Seas. They had been seasonal migrants to coastal waters of both sides of Atlantic,


title: "Gray whale" content: including the Baltic Sea, Wadden Sea, the Gulf of St. Lawrence, the Bay of Fundy, Hudson Bay (possibly), and Pamlico Sound. Radiocarbon dating of subfossil or fossil European (Belgium, the Netherlands, Sweden, the United Kingdom) coastal remains confirms this, with whaling the possible cause. Remains dating from the Roman epoch were found in the Mediterranean during excavation of the antique harbor of Lattara near Montpellier, France in 1997, raising the question of whether Atlantic gray whales migrated up and down the coast of Europe from Wadden Sea to calve in the Mediterranean. A 2018 study utilizing ancient DNA barcoding and


title: "Gray whale" content: collagen peptide matrix fingerprinting confirmed that Roman era whale bones east of the Strait of Gibraltar were gray whales (and North Atlantic right whales), confirming that gray whales once ranged into the Mediterranean. Similarly, radiocarbon dating of American east coastal subfossil remains confirm that gray whales existed there at least through the 17th century. This population ranged at least from Southampton, New York, to Jupiter Island, Florida, the latest from 1675. In his 1835 history of Nantucket Island, Obed Macy wrote that in the early pre-1672 colony a whale of the kind called "scragg" entered the harbor and was pursued


title: "Gray whale" content: and killed by the settlers. A. B. Van Deinse points out that the "scrag whale", described by P. Dudley in 1725 as one of the species hunted by the early New England whalers, was almost certainly the gray whale. Researchers used a genetic approach to estimate pre-whaling abundance based on samples from 42 California gray whales, and reported DNA variability at 10 genetic loci consistent with a population size of 76,000–118,000 individuals, three to five times larger than the average census size as measured through 2007. NOAA has collected surveys of gray whale population since at least the 1960s. They


title: "Gray whale" content: state that "the most recent population estimate [from 2007] was approximately 19,000 whales, with a high probability (88%) that the population is at 'optimum sustainable population' size, as defined by the Marine Mammal Protection Act. They speculate that the ocean ecosystem has likely changed since the prewhaling era, making a return to prewhaling numbers infeasible. Factors limiting or threatening current population levels include ship strikes, entanglement in fishing gear, and changes in sea-ice coverage associated with climate change. Several whales seen off Sakhalin and on Kamchatka Peninsula are confirmed to migrate towards eastern side of Pacific and join the larger


title: "Gray whale" content: eastern population. In January 2011, a gray whale that had been tagged in the western population was tracked as far east as the eastern population range off the coast of British Columbia. Recent findings from either stranded or entangled specimens indicate that the original western population have become functionally extinct and possibly all the whales appeared on Japanese and Chinese coasts in modern times are vagrants or re-colonizers from the eastern population. In mid-1980, there were three gray whale sightings in the eastern Beaufort Sea, placing them further east than their known range at the time. Recent increases in sightings


title: "Gray whale" content: are confirmed in Arctic areas of the historic range for Atlantic stocks, most notably on several locations in the Laptev Sea including the New Siberian Islands in the East Siberian Sea, and around the marine mammal sanctuary of the Franz Josef Land, indicating possible earlier pioneers of re-colonizations. These whales were darker in body color than those whales seen in Sea of Okhotsk. In May 2010, a gray whale was sighted off the Mediterranean shore of Israel. It has been speculated that this whale crossed from the Pacific to the Atlantic via the Northwest Passage, since an alternative route around


title: "Gray whale" content: Cape Horn would not be contiguous to the whale's established territory. There has been gradual melting and recession of Arctic sea ice with extreme loss in 2007 rendering the Northwest Passage "fully navigable". The same whale was sighted again on May 30, 2010, off the coast of Barcelona, Spain. In May 2013, a gray whale was sighted off Walvis Bay, Namibia. Scientists from the Namibian Dolphin Project confirmed the whale's identity and thus provides the only sighting of this species in the Southern Hemisphere. Photographic identification suggests that this is a different individual than the one spotted in the Mediterranean


title: "Gray whale" content: in 2010. As of July 2013, the Namibian whale was still being seen regularly. Genetic analysis of fossil and prefossil gray whale remains in the Atlantic Ocean suggests several waves of dispersal from the Pacific to the Atlantic related to successive periods of climactic warming - during the Pleistocene before the last glacial period and the early Holocene immediately following the opening of the Bering Strait. This information and the recent sightings of Pacific gray whales in the Atlantic, suggest that another range expansion to the Atlantic may be starting. Breeding behavior is complex and often involves three or more


title: "Gray whale" content: animals. Both male and female whales reach puberty at approximately eight years of age. Females show highly synchronized reproduction, undergoing oestrus in late November to early December. During the breeding season, it is common for females to have several mates. This single ovulation event is believed to coincide with the species’ annual migration patterns, when births can occur in warmer waters. Most females show biennial reproduction, although annual births have been reported. Males also show seasonal changes, experiencing an increase in testes mass that correlates with the time females undergo oestrus. Currently there are no accounts of twin births, although


title: "Gray whale" content: an instance of twins "in utero" has been reported. The gestation period for gray whales is approximately 13 months. In the latter half of the pregnancy, the fetus experiences a rapid growth in length and mass. Similar to the narrow breeding season, most calves are born within a six-week time period in mid January. The calf is born tail first, and measures about in length. Females lactate for approximately seven months following birth, at which point calves are weaned and maternal care begins to decrease. The shallow lagoon waters in which gray whales reproduce are believed to protect the newborn


title: "Gray whale" content: from sharks and orcas. On 7 January 2014 a pair of newborn or aborted conjoined twin grey whale calves were found dead in the Laguna Ojo de Liebre (alias Scammon’s Lagoon), off the west coast of Mexico. They were joined by their bellies. The whale feeds mainly on benthic crustaceans, which it eats by turning on its side and scooping up sediments from the sea floor. This unique feeding selection makes gray whales one of the most strongly reliant on coastal waters among baleen whales. It is classified as a baleen whale and has baleen, or whalebone, which acts like


title: "Gray whale" content: a sieve, to capture small sea animals, including amphipods taken in along with sand, water and other material. Mostly, the animal feeds in the northern waters during the summer; and opportunistically feeds during its migration, depending primarily on its extensive fat reserves. Calf gray whales drink of their mothers' 53% fat milk per day. The main feeding habitat of the western Pacific subpopulation is the shallow ( depth) shelf off northeastern Sakhalin Island, particularly off the southern portion of Piltun Lagoon, where the main prey species appear to be amphipods and isopods. In some years, the whales have also used


title: "Gray whale" content: an offshore feeding ground in depth southeast of Chayvo Bay, where benthic amphipods and cumaceans are the main prey species. Some gray whales have also been seen off western Kamchatka, but to date all whales photographed there are also known from the Piltun area. Predicted distribution models indicate that overall range in the last glacial period was broader or more southerly distributed, and inhabitations in waters where species presences lack in present situation, such as in southern hemisphere and south Asian waters and northern Indian Ocean were possible due to feasibility of the environment on those days. Range expansions due


title: "Gray whale" content: to recoveries and re-colonization in the future is likely to be happen and the predicted range covers wider than that of today. Each October, as the northern ice pushes southward, small groups of eastern gray whales in the eastern Pacific start a two- to three-month, trip south. Beginning in the Bering and Chukchi seas and ending in the warm-water lagoons of Mexico's Baja California Peninsula and the southern Gulf of California, they travel along the west coast of Canada, the United States and Mexico. Traveling night and day, the gray whale averages approximately per day at an average speed of


title: "Gray whale" content: . This round trip of is believed to be the longest annual migration of any mammal. By mid-December to early January, the majority are usually found between Monterey and San Diego such as at Morro bay, often visible from shore. The whale watching industry provides ecotourists and marine mammal enthusiasts the opportunity to see groups of gray whales as they migrate. By late December to early January, eastern grays begin to arrive in the calving lagoons and bays on the west coast of Baja California Sur. The three most popular are San Ignacio, Magdalena Bay to the south, and, to


title: "Gray whale" content: the north, Laguna Ojo de Liebre (formerly known in English as Scammon's Lagoon after whaleman Charles Melville Scammon, who discovered the lagoons in the 1850s and hunted the grays). Gray whales once ranged into Sea of Cortez and Pacific coasts of continental Mexico south to the Islas Marías, Bahía de Banderas, and Nayarit/Jalisco, and there were two modern calving grounds in Sonora (Tojahui or Yavaros) and Sinaloa (Bahia Santa Maria) until being abandoned in 1980s. These first whales to arrive are usually pregnant mothers looking for the protection of the lagoons to bear their calves, along with single females seeking


title: "Gray whale" content: mates. By mid-February to mid-March, the bulk of the population has arrived in the lagoons, filling them with nursing, calving and mating gray whales. Throughout February and March, the first to leave the lagoons are males and females without new calves. Pregnant females and nursing mothers with their newborns are the last to depart, leaving only when their calves are ready for the journey, which is usually from late March to mid-April. Often, a few mothers linger with their young calves well into May. By late March or early April, the returning animals can be seen from Puget Sound to


title: "Gray whale" content: Canada. A population of about 200 gray whales stay along the eastern Pacific coast from Canada to California throughout the summer, not making the farther trip to Alaskan waters. This summer resident group is known as the Pacific Coast feeding group. Any historical or current presence of similar groups of residents among the western population is currently unknown, however, whalers' logbooks and scientific observations indicate that possible year-round occurrences in Chinese waters and Yellow and Bohai basins were likely to be summering grounds. Some of the better documented historical catches show that it was common for whales to stay for


title: "Gray whale" content: months in enclosed waters elsewhere, with known records in the Seto Inland Sea and the Gulf of Tosa. Former feeding areas were once spread over large portions on mid-Honshu to northern Hokkaido, and at least whales were recorded for majority of annual seasons including wintering periods at least along east coasts of Korean Peninsula and Yamaguchi Prefecture. Some recent observations indicate that historic presences of resident whales are possible: a group of two or three were observed feeding in Izu Ōshima in 1994 for almost a month, two single individuals stayed in Ise Bay for almost two months in the


title: "Gray whale" content: 1980s and in 2012, the first confirmed living individuals in Japanese EEZ in the Sea of Japan and the first of living cow-calf pairs since the end of whaling stayed for about three weeks on the coastline of Teradomari in 2014. One of the pair returned to the same coasts at the same time of the year in 2015 again. Reviewing on other cases on different locations among Japanese coasts and islands observed during 2015 indicate that spatial or seasonal residencies regardless of being temporal or permanental staying once occurred throughout many parts of Japan or on other coastal Asia.


title: "Gray whale" content: The current western gray whale population summers in the Sea of Okhotsk, mainly off Piltun Bay region at the northeastern coast of Sakhalin Island (Russian Federation). There are also occasional sightings off the eastern coast of Kamchatka (Russian Federation) and in other coastal waters of the northern Okhotsk Sea. Its migration routes and wintering grounds are poorly known, the only recent information being from occasional records on both the eastern and western coasts of Japan and along the Chinese coast. Gray whale had not been observed on Commander Islands until 2016. The Sea of Japan was once thought not to


title: "Gray whale" content: have been a migration route, until several entanglements were recorded. Any records of the species had not been confirmed since after 1921 on Kyushu. However, there were numerous records of whales along the Genkai Sea off Yamaguchi Prefecture, in Ine Bay in the Gulf of Wakasa, and in Tsushima. Gray whales, along with other species such as right whales and Baird's beaked whales, were common features off the north eastern coast of Hokkaido near Teshio, Ishikari Bay near Otaru, the Shakotan Peninsula, and islands in the La Pérouse Strait such as Rebun Island and Rishiri Island. These areas may also


title: "Gray whale" content: have included feeding grounds. There are shallow, muddy areas favorable for feeding whales off Shiretoko, such as at Shibetsu, the Notsuke Peninsula, Cape Ochiishi on Nemuro Peninsula, Mutsu Bay, along the Tottori Sand Dunes, in the Suou-nada Sea, and Omura Bay. The historical calving grounds were unknown but might have been along southern Chinese coasts from Zhejiang and Fujian Province to Guangdong, especially south of Hailing Island and to near Hong Kong. Possibilities include Daya Bay, Wailou Harbour on Leizhou Peninsula, and possibly as far south as Hainan Province and Guangxi, particularly around Hainan Island. These areas are at the


title: "Gray whale" content: southwestern end of the known range. It is unknown whether the whales' normal range once reached further south, to the Gulf of Tonkin. In addition, the existence of historical calving ground on Taiwan and Penghu Islands (with some fossil records and captures), and any presence in other areas outside of the known ranges off Babuyan Islands in Philippines and coastal Vietnamese waters in Gulf of Tonkin are unknown. There is only one confirmed record of accidentally killing of the species in Vietnam, at Ngoc Vung Island off Ha Long Bay in 1994 and the skeleton is on exhibition at the


title: "Gray whale" content: Quang Ninh Provincial Historical Museum. Gray whales are known to occur in Taiwan Strait even in recent years. It is also unknown whether any winter breeding grounds ever existed beyond Chinese coasts. For example, it is not known if the whales visited the southern coasts of the Korean Peninsula, adjacent to the Island of Jeju), Haiyang Island, the Gulf of Shanghai, or the Zhoushan Archipelago. There is no evidence of historical presence in Japan south of Ōsumi Peninsula; only one skeleton has been discovered in Miyazaki Prefecture. once considered the Seto Inland Sea to be a historical breeding ground, but


title: "Gray whale" content: only a handful of capture records support this idea, although migrations into the sea have been confirmed. Even though South Korea put the most effort into conservation of the species among the Asian nations, there are no confirmed sightings along the Korean Peninsula or even in the Sea of Japan in recent years. The last record in Korean waters was the sighting of a pair off Bangeojin, Ulsan in 1977. Prior to this, the last was of catches of 5 animals off Ulsan in 1966. There had been 24 records along Chinese coasts including sighting, stranding, intended hunts, and bycatches


title: "Gray whale" content: since 1933. The last report of occurrence of the species in Chinese waters was of a stranded semi adult female in the Bohai Sea in 1996, and the only record in Chinese waters in the 21st century was of a fully-grown female being killed by entanglement in Pingtan, China in November, 2007. DNA studies indicated that this individual might have originated from the eastern population rather than the western. Most notable observations of living whales after the 1980s were of 17 or 18 whales along Primorsky Krai in late October, 1989 (prior to this, a pair was reported swimming in


title: "Gray whale" content: the area in 1987), followed by the record of 14 whales in La Pérouse Strait on 13th, June in 1982 (in this strait, there was another sighting of a pair in October, 1987). In 2011, presences of gray whales were acoustically detected among pelagic waters in East China Sea between Chinese and Japanese waters. Since the mid 1990s, almost all the confirmed records of living animals in Asian waters were from Japanese coasts. There have been eight to fifteen sightings and stray records including unconfirmed sightings and re-sightings of the same individual, and one later killed by net-entanglement. The most


title: "Gray whale" content: notable of these observations are listed below: Humans, large sharks, and killer whales (orcas) are the adult gray whale's only predators, although orcas are the most prominent predator. Aboriginal hunters, including those on Vancouver Island and the Makah in Washington, have hunted gray whales. Commercial whaling by Europeans of the species in the North Pacific began in the winter of 1845–46, when two United States ships, the "Hibernia" and the "United States", under Captains Smith and Stevens, caught 32 in Magdalena Bay. More ships followed in the two following winters, after which gray whaling in the bay was nearly abandoned


title: "Gray whale" content: because "of the inferior quality and low price of the dark-colored gray whale oil, the low quality and quantity of whalebone from the gray, and the dangers of lagoon whaling." Gray whaling in Magdalena Bay was revived in the winter of 1855–56 by several vessels, mainly from San Francisco, including the ship "Leonore", under Captain Charles Melville Scammon. This was the first of 11 winters from 1855 through 1865 known as the "bonanza period", during which gray whaling along the coast of Baja California reached its peak. Not only were the whales taken in Magdalena Bay, but also by ships


title: "Gray whale" content: anchored along the coast from San Diego south to Cabo San Lucas and from whaling stations from Crescent City in northern California south to San Ignacio Lagoon. During the same period, vessels targeting right and bowhead whales in the Gulf of Alaska, Sea of Okhotsk, and the Western Arctic would take the odd gray whale if neither of the more desirable two species were in sight. In December 1857, Charles Scammon, in the brig "Boston", along with his schooner-tender "Marin", entered Laguna Ojo de Liebre (Jack-Rabbit Spring Lagoon) or later known as Scammon's Lagoon (by 1860) and found one of


title: "Gray whale" content: the gray's last refuges. He caught 20 whales. He returned the following winter (1858–59) with the bark "Ocean Bird" and schooner tenders "A.M. Simpson" and "Kate". In three months, he caught 47 cows, yielding of oil. In the winter of 1859–60, Scammon, again in the bark "Ocean Bird", along with several other vessels, entered San Ignacio Lagoon to the south where he discovered the last breeding lagoon. Within only a couple of seasons, the lagoon was nearly devoid of whales. Between 1846 and 1874, an estimated 8,000 gray whales were killed by American and European whalemen, with over half having


title: "Gray whale" content: been killed in the Magdalena Bay complex (Estero Santo Domingo, Magdalena Bay itself, and Almejas Bay) and by shore whalemen in California and Baja California. A second, shorter, and less intensive hunt occurred for gray whales in the eastern North Pacific. Only a few were caught from two whaling stations on the coast of California from 1919 to 1926, and a single station in Washington (1911–21) accounted for the capture of another. For the entire west coast of North America for the years 1919 to 1929, 234 gray whales were caught. Only a dozen or so were taken by British


title: "Gray whale" content: Columbian stations, nearly all of them in 1953 at Coal Harbour. A whaling station in Richmond, California, caught 311 gray whales for "scientific purposes" between 1964 and 1969. From 1961 to 1972, the Soviet Union caught 138 gray whales (they originally reported not having taken any). The only other significant catch was made in two seasons by the steam-schooner "California" off Malibu, California. In the winters of 1934–35 and 1935–36, the "California" anchored off Point Dume in Paradise Cove, processing gray whales. In 1936, gray whales became protected in the United States. The Japanese began to catch gray whales beginning


title: "Gray whale" content: in the 1570s. At Kawajiri, Nagato, 169 gray whales were caught between 1698 and 1889. At Tsuro, Shikoku, 201 were taken between 1849 and 1896. Several hundred more were probably caught by American and European whalemen in the Sea of Okhotsk from the 1840s to the early 20th century. Whalemen caught 44 with nets in Japan during the 1890s. The real damage was done between 1911 and 1933, when Japanese whalemen killed 1,449 after Japanese companies established several whaling stations on Korean Peninsula and on Chinese coast such as near the Daya bay and on Hainan Island. By 1934, the


title: "Gray whale" content: western gray whale was near extinction. From 1891 to 1966, an estimated 1,800–2,000 gray whales were caught, with peak catches of between 100 and 200 annually occurring in the 1910s. As of 2001, the Californian gray whale population had grown to about 26,000. As of 2011, the population of western Pacific (seas near Korea, Japan, and Kamchatka) gray whales was an estimated 130. The North Atlantic population may have been hunted to extinction in the 18th century. Circumstantial evidence indicates whaling could have contributed to this population's decline, as the increase in whaling activity in the 17th and 18th centuries


title: "Gray whale" content: coincided with the population's disappearance. A. B. Van Deinse points out the "scrag whale", described by P. Dudley in 1725, as one target of early New England whalers, was almost certainly the gray whale. In his 1835 history of Nantucket Island, Obed Macy wrote that in the early pre-1672 colony, a whale of the kind called "scragg" entered the harbor and was pursued and killed by the settlers. Gray whales (Icelandic "sandlægja") were described in Iceland in the early 17th century. Formations of industrial whaling among the Mediterranean basin(s) have been considered to be feasible as well. Gray whales have


title: "Gray whale" content: been granted protection from commercial hunting by the International Whaling Commission (IWC) since 1949, and are no longer hunted on a large scale. Limited hunting of gray whales has continued since that time, however, primarily in the Chukotka region of northeastern Russia, where large numbers of gray whales spend the summer months. This hunt has been allowed under an "aboriginal/subsistence whaling" exception to the commercial-hunting ban. Anti-whaling groups have protested the hunt, saying the meat from the whales is not for traditional native consumption, but is used instead to feed animals in government-run fur farms; they cite annual catch numbers


title: "Gray whale" content: that rose dramatically during the 1940s, at the time when state-run fur farms were being established in the region. Although the Soviet government denied these charges as recently as 1987, in recent years the Russian government has acknowledged the practice. The Russian IWC delegation has said that the hunt is justified under the aboriginal/subsistence exemption, since the fur farms provide a necessary economic base for the region's native population. Currently, the annual quota for the gray whale catch in the region is 140 per year. Pursuant to an agreement between the United States and Russia, the Makah tribe of Washington


title: "Gray whale" content: claimed four whales from the IWC quota established at the 1997 meeting. With the exception of a single gray whale killed in 1999, the Makah people have been prevented from hunting by a series of legal challenges, culminating in a United States federal appeals court decision in December 2002 that required the National Marine Fisheries Service to prepare an Environmental Impact Statement. On September 8, 2007, five members of the Makah tribe shot a gray whale using high-powered rifles in spite of the decision. The whale died within 12 hours, sinking while heading out to sea. As of 2008, the


title: "Gray whale" content: IUCN regards the gray whale as being of "Least Concern" from a conservation perspective. However, the specific subpopulation in the northwest Pacific is regarded as being "Critically Endangered". The northwest Pacific population is also listed as endangered by the U.S. government’s National Marine Fisheries Service under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. The IWC Bowhead, Right and Gray Whale subcommittee in 2011 reiterated the conservation risk to western gray whales is large because of the small size of the population and the potential anthropogenic impacts. Gray whale migrations off of the Pacific Coast were observed, initially, by Marineland of the Pacific


title: "Gray whale" content: in Palos Verdes, California. The Gray Whale Census, an official Gray Whale migration census that has been recording data on the migration of the Pacific Gray Whale has been keeping track of the population of the Pacific Gray Whale since 1985. This census is the longest running census of the Pacific Gray Whale. Census keepers volunteer from December 1 through May, from sun up to sun down, seven days a week, keeping track of the amount of Gray Whales migrating through the area off of Los Angeles. Information from this census is listed through the American Cetacean Society of Los


title: "Gray whale" content: Angeles (ACSLA). South Korea and China list gray whales as protected species of high concern. In South Korea, the was registered as the 126th national monument in 1962, although illegal hunts had been taken place thereafter, and there have been no recent sightings of the species in Korean waters. In 2005, two conservation biologists proposed a plan to airlift 50 gray whales from the Pacific Ocean to the Atlantic Ocean. They reasoned that, as Californian gray whales had replenished to a suitable population, surplus whales could be transported to repopulate the extinct British population. this plan has not been undertaken.


title: "Gray whale" content: According to the Government of Canada's Management Plan for gray whales, threats to the eastern North Pacific population of gray whales include: increased human activities in their breeding lagoons in Mexico, climate change, acute noise, toxic spills, aboriginal whaling, entanglement with fishing gear, boat collisions, and possible impacts from fossil fuel exploration and extraction. Western gray whales are facing, the large-scale offshore oil and gas development programs near their summer feeding ground, as well as fatal net entrapments off Japan during migration, which pose significant threats to the future survival of the population. The substantial nearshore industrialization and shipping congestion


title: "Gray whale" content: throughout the migratory corridors of the western gray whale population represent potential threats by increasing the likelihood of exposure to ship strikes, chemical pollution, and general disturbance. Offshore gas and oil development in the Okhotsk Sea within of the primary feeding ground off northeast Sakhalin Island is of particular concern. Activities related to oil and gas exploration, including geophysical seismic surveying, pipelaying and drilling operations, increased vessel traffic, and oil spills, all pose potential threats to western gray whales. Disturbance from underwater industrial noise may displace whales from critical feeding habitat. Physical habitat damage from drilling and dredging operations, combined


title: "Gray whale" content: with possible impacts of oil and chemical spills on benthic prey communities also warrants concern. Along Japanese coasts, four females including a cow-calf pair were trapped and killed in nets in the 2000s. There had been a record of dead whale thought to be harpooned by dolphin-hunters found on Hokkaido in the 1990s. Meats for sale were also discovered in Japanese markets as well. Killer whales are "a prime predator of gray whale calves." Typically three to four killer whales ram a calf from beneath in order to separate it from its mother, who defends it. Humpback whales have been


title: "Gray whale" content: observed defending gray whale calves from orcas. Because of their size and need to migrate, gray whales have rarely been held in captivity, and then only for brief periods of time. The first captive gray whale, who was captured in Scammon's Lagoon, Baja California in 1965, was named Gigi and died two months later from an infection. The second gray whale, who was captured in 1972 from the same lagoon, was named Gigi II and was released a year later after becoming too large for the facilities. The last gray whale, J.J., first beached herself in Marina del Rey, California


title: "Gray whale" content: where she was rushed to SeaWorld San Diego. After 14 months, she was released because she also grew too large to be cared for in the existing facilities. Reaching and , J.J. was the largest creature ever to be kept in captivity. Gray whale The gray whale ("Eschrichtius robustus"), also known as the grey whale, gray back whale, Pacific gray whale, or California gray whale is a baleen whale that migrates between feeding and breeding grounds yearly. It reaches a length of , a weight of , and lives between 55 and 70 years. The common name of the whale


title: Geyser content: Geyser A geyser (, ) is a spring characterized by intermittent discharge of water ejected turbulently and accompanied by steam. As a fairly rare phenomenon, the formation of geysers is due to particular hydrogeological conditions that exist only in a few places on Earth. Generally all geyser field sites are located near active volcanic areas, and the geyser effect is due to the proximity of magma. Generally, surface water works its way down to an average depth of around where it contacts hot rocks. The resultant boiling of the pressurized water results in the geyser effect of hot water and


title: Geyser content: steam spraying out of the geyser's surface vent (a hydrothermal explosion). A geyser's eruptive activity may change or cease due to ongoing mineral deposition within the geyser plumbing, exchange of functions with nearby hot springs, earthquake influences, and human intervention. Like many other natural phenomena, geysers are not unique to planet Earth. Jet-like eruptions, often referred to as cryogeysers, have been observed on several of the moons of the outer solar system. Due to the low ambient pressures, these eruptions consist of vapor without liquid; they are made more easily visible by particles of dust and ice carried aloft by


title: Geyser content: the gas. Water vapor jets have been observed near the south pole of Saturn's moon Enceladus, while nitrogen eruptions have been observed on Neptune's moon Triton. There are also signs of carbon dioxide eruptions from the southern polar ice cap of Mars. In the latter two cases, instead of being driven by geothermal energy, the eruptions seem to rely on solar heating via a solid-state greenhouse effect. Geysers are temporary geological features. Geysers are generally associated with volcanic areas. As the water boils, the resulting pressure forces a superheated column of steam and water to the surface through the geyser's


title: Geyser content: internal plumbing. The formation of geysers specifically requires the combination of three geologic conditions that are usually found in volcanic terrain. The heat needed for geyser formation comes from magma that needs to be close to the surface of the earth. In order for the heated water to form a geyser, a plumbing system made of fractures, fissures, porous spaces, and sometimes cavities is required. This includes a reservoir to hold the water while it is being heated. Geysers are generally aligned along faults. Geyser activity, like all hot spring activity, is caused by surface water gradually seeping down through


title: Geyser content: the ground until it meets rock heated by magma. The geothermally heated water then rises back toward the surface by convection through porous and fractured rocks. Geysers differ from non-eruptive hot springs in their subterranean structure; many consist of a small vent at the surface connected to one or more narrow tubes that lead to underground reservoirs of water and pressure tight rock. As the geyser fills, the water at the top of the column cools off, but because of the narrowness of the channel, convective cooling of the water in the reservoir is impossible. The cooler water above presses


title: Geyser content: down on the hotter water beneath, not unlike the lid of a pressure cooker, allowing the water in the reservoir to become superheated, i.e. to remain liquid at temperatures well above the standard-pressure boiling point. Ultimately, the temperatures near the bottom of the geyser rise to a point where boiling begins which forces steam bubbles to rise to the top of the column. As they burst through the geyser's vent, some water overflows or splashes out, reducing the weight of the column and thus the pressure on the water below. With this release of pressure, the superheated water flashes into


title: Geyser content: steam, boiling violently throughout the column. The resulting froth of expanding steam and hot water then sprays out of the geyser vent. A key requirement that enables a geyser to erupt is a material called geyserite found in rocks nearby the geyser. Geyserite—mostly silicon dioxide (SiO), is dissolved from the rocks and gets deposited on the walls of the geyser's plumbing system and on the surface. The deposits make the channels carrying the water up to the surface pressure-tight. This allows the pressure to be carried all the way to the top and not be leaked out into the loose


title: Geyser content: gravel or soil that are normally under the geyser fields. Eventually the water remaining in the geyser cools back to below the boiling point and the eruption ends; heated groundwater begins seeping back into the reservoir, and the whole cycle begins again. The duration of eruptions and time between successive eruptions vary greatly from geyser to geyser; Strokkur in Iceland erupts for a few seconds every few minutes, while Grand Geyser in the United States erupts for up to 10 minutes every 8–12 hours. There are two types of geysers: "fountain geysers" which erupt from pools of water, typically in


title: Geyser content: a series of intense, even violent, bursts; and "cone geysers" which erupt from cones or mounds of siliceous sinter (including geyserite), usually in steady jets that last anywhere from a few seconds to several minutes. Old Faithful, perhaps the best-known geyser at Yellowstone National Park, is an example of a cone geyser. Grand Geyser, the tallest predictable geyser on earth, (although Geysir in Iceland is taller, it is not predictable), also at Yellowstone National Park, is an example of a fountain geyser. There are many volcanic areas in the world that have hot springs, mud pots and fumaroles, but very


title: Geyser content: few have erupting geysers. The main reason for their rarity is because multiple intense transient forces must occur simultaneously for a geyser to exist. For example, even when other necessary conditions exist, if the rock structure is loose, eruptions will erode the channels and rapidly destroy any nascent geysers. As a result, most geysers form in places where there is volcanic rhyolite rock which dissolves in hot water and forms mineral deposits called siliceous sinter, or geyserite, along the inside of the plumbing systems which are very slender. Over time, these deposits strengthen the channel walls by cementing the rock


title: Geyser content: together tightly, thus enabling the geyser to persist, as mentioned in the previous section. Geysers are fragile phenomena and if conditions change, they may go dormant or extinct. Many have been destroyed simply by people throwing debris into them while others have ceased to erupt due to dewatering by geothermal power plants. However, the Great Geysir of Iceland has had periods of activity and dormancy. During its long dormant periods, eruptions were sometimes artificially induced—often on special occasions—by the addition of surfactants to the water. The specific colours of geysers derive from the fact that despite the apparently harsh conditions,


title: Geyser content: life is often found in them (and also in other hot habitats) in the form of thermophilic prokaryotes. No known eukaryote can survive over . In the 1960s, when the research of the biology of geysers first appeared, scientists were generally convinced that no life can survive above around —the upper limit for the survival of cyanobacteria, as the structure of key cellular proteins and deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) would be destroyed. The optimal temperature for thermophilic bacteria was placed even lower, around . However, the observations proved that it is actually possible for life to exist at high temperatures and


title: Geyser content: that some bacteria even prefer temperatures higher than the boiling point of water. Dozens of such bacteria are known. Thermophiles prefer temperatures from , whilst hyperthermophiles grow better at temperatures as high as . As they have heat-stable enzymes that retain their activity even at high temperatures, they have been used as a source of thermostable tools, that are important in medicine and biotechnology, for example in manufacturing antibiotics, plastics, detergents (by the use of heat-stable enzymes lipases, pullulanases and proteases), and fermentation products (for example ethanol is produced). Among these, the first discovered and the most important for biotechnology


title: Geyser content: is "Thermus aquaticus". Geysers are quite rare, requiring a combination of water, heat, and fortuitous plumbing. The combination exists in few places on Earth. Yellowstone is the largest geyser locale, containing thousands of hot springs, and approximately 300 to 500 geysers. It is home to half of the world's total number of geysers in its nine geyser basins. It is located mostly in Wyoming, USA, with small portions in Montana and Idaho. Yellowstone includes the world's tallest active geyser (Steamboat Geyser in Norris Geyser Basin), as well as the renowned Old Faithful Geyser, Beehive Geyser, Giantess Geyser, Lion Geyser, Plume


title: Geyser content: Geyser, Aurum Geyser, Castle Geyser, Sawmill Geyser, Grand Geyser, Oblong Geyser, Giant Geyser, Daisy Geyser, Grotto Geyser, the Fan & Mortar Geysers, & the Riverside Geyser, all in the Upper Geyser Basin which alone contains nearly 180 geysers. The Valley of Geysers ("Dolina Geyzerov" in Russian) located in the Kamchatka Peninsula of Russia is the only geyser field in Eurasia and the second largest concentration of geysers in the world. The area was discovered and explored by Tatyana Ustinova in 1941. Approximately 200 geysers exist in the area along with many hot-water springs and perpetual spouters. The area was formed


title: Geyser content: due to a vigorous volcanic activity. The peculiar way of eruptions is an important feature of these geysers. Most of the geysers erupt at angles, and only very few have the geyser cones that exist at many other of the world's geyser fields. On June 3, 2007, a massive mudflow influenced two thirds of the valley. It was then reported that a thermal lake was forming above the valley. Few days later, waters were observed to have receded somewhat, exposing some of the submerged features. Velikan Geyser, one of the field's largest, was not buried in the slide and has


title: Geyser content: recently been observed to be active. The name "El Tatio" comes from the Quechua word for "oven". El Tatio is located in the high valleys on the Andes surrounded by many active volcanoes in Chile, South America at around above mean sea level. The valley is home to approximately 80 geysers at present. It became the largest geyser field in the Southern Hemisphere after the destruction of many of the New Zealand geysers, and is the third largest geyser field in the world. The salient feature of these geysers is that the height of their eruptions is very low, the


title: Geyser content: tallest being only high, but with steam columns that can be over high. The average geyser eruption height at El Tatio is about . The Taupo Volcanic Zone is located on New Zealand's North Island. It is long by and lies over a subduction zone in the Earth's crust. Mount Ruapehu marks its southwestern end, while the submarine Whakatane volcano ( beyond White Island) is considered its northeastern limit. Many geysers in this zone were destroyed due to geothermal developments and a hydroelectric reservoir, but several dozen geysers still exist. In the beginning of the 20th century, the largest geyser


title: Geyser content: ever known, the Waimangu Geyser existed in this zone. It began erupting in 1900 and erupted periodically for four years until a landslide changed the local water table. Eruptions of Waimangu would typically reach and some superbursts are known to have reached . Recent scientific work indicates that the Earth's crust below the zone may be as little as thick. Beneath this lies a film of magma and . Due to the high rate of volcanic activity in Iceland, it is home to some famous geysers in the world. Geysers and hot springs are distributed all over the island. Many


title: Geyser content: of the geysers are located in Haukadalur. Geysers are known to have existed in at least a dozen other areas on the island. "The Great Geysir", which first erupted in the 14th century, gave rise to the word "geyser". By 1896, Geysir was almost dormant before an earthquake that year caused eruptions to begin again, occurring several times a day, but in 1916, eruptions all but ceased. Throughout much of the 20th century, eruptions, usually following earthquakes, did happen from time to time. Some man-made improvements were made to the spring and eruptions were forced with soap on special occasions.


title: Geyser content: Earthquakes in June 2000 subsequently reawakened the giant for a time but it is not currently erupting regularly. The nearby Strokkur geyser erupts every 5–8 minutes to a height of some . There used to be two large geysers fields in Nevada—Beowawe and Steamboat Springs—but they were destroyed by the installation of nearby geothermal power plants. At the plants, geothermal drilling reduced the available heat and lowered the local water table to the point that geyser activity could no longer be sustained. Many of New Zealand’s geysers have been destroyed by humans in the last century. Several New Zealand geysers


title: Geyser content: have also become dormant or extinct by natural means. The main remaining field is Whakarewarewa at Rotorua. Two thirds of the geysers at Orakei Korako were flooded by the Ohakuri hydroelectric dam in 1961. The Wairakei field was lost to a geothermal power plant in 1958. The Taupo Spa field was lost when the Waikato River level was deliberately altered in the 1950s. The Rotomahana field was destroyed by the Mount Tarawera eruption in 1886. There are various other types of geysers which are different in nature compared to the normal steam-driven geysers. These geysers differ not only in their


title: Geyser content: style of eruption but also in the cause that makes them erupt. In a number of places where there is geothermal activity, wells have been drilled and fitted with impermeable casements that allow them to erupt like geysers. The vents of such geysers are artificial, but are tapped into natural hydrothermal systems. These so-called "artificial geysers", technically known as "erupting geothermal wells", are not true geysers. Little Old Faithful Geyser, in Calistoga, California, is an example. The geyser erupts from the casing of a well drilled in the late 19th century. According to Dr. John Rinehart in his book "A


title: Geyser content: Guide to Geyser Gazing" (1976 p. 49), a man had drilled into the geyser in search for water. He had "simply opened up a dead geyser". This is a natural hot spring that spouts water constantly without stopping for recharge. Some of these are incorrectly called geysers, but because they are not periodic in nature they are not considered true geysers. Geysers are used for various activities such as electricity generation, heating and tourism. Many geothermal reserves are found all around the world. The geyser fields in Iceland are some of the most commercially viable geyser locations in the world.


title: Geyser content: Since the 1920s hot water directed from the geysers has been used to heat greenhouses and to grow food that otherwise could not have been cultivated in Iceland's inhospitable climate. Steam and hot water from the geysers has also been used for heating homes since 1943 in Iceland. In 1979 the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) actively promoted development of geothermal energy in the "Geysers-Calistoga Known Geothermal Resource Area" (KGRA) near Calistoga, California through a variety of research programs and the Geothermal Loan Guarantee Program. The Department is obligated by law to assess the potential environmental impacts of geothermal development.


title: Geyser content: There are several bodies in the Solar System where jet-like eruptions, often termed cryogeysers ("cryo" meaning "icy cold"), have been observed or are believed to occur. Unlike geysers on Earth, these represent eruptions of volatiles, together with entrained dust or ice particles, without liquid. Geyser A geyser (, ) is a spring characterized by intermittent discharge of water ejected turbulently and accompanied by steam. As a fairly rare phenomenon, the formation of geysers is due to particular hydrogeological conditions that exist only in a few places on Earth. Generally all geyser field sites are located near active volcanic areas, and


title: "Gin and tonic" content: Gin and tonic A gin and tonic is a highball cocktail made with gin and tonic water poured over ice. It is usually garnished with a slice or wedge of lime. The amount of gin varies according to taste. Suggested ratios of gin to tonic are between 1:1 and 1:3. In some countries (e.g., UK), gin and tonic is also marketed pre-mixed in single-serving cans. In the United States, most bars use "soda out of a gun that in no way, shape or form resembles quinine water", according to bartender Dale DeGroff. To get a real gin and tonic, DeGroff


title: "Gin and tonic" content: recommends specifying bottled tonic. Alternatively, one can add tonic syrup to soda water. The drink is a particular phenomenon as its taste is quite different from the taste of its constituent liquids which are rather bitter. The chemical structures of both ingredients are of a similar molecular shape and attract each other, shielding the bitter taste. It is commonly referred to as a "G and T" in the UK, US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Ireland. In some parts of the world, it is called a "gin tonic" (e.g., Germany, Spain, the Netherlands, Japan ジン・トニック – phonetically "jin tonikku"). Some


title: "Gin and tonic" content: brands will replace the word "gin" with their own brand or initial in recipes. For instance, "Sapphire and Tonic" for Bombay Sapphire, "Hendrick's and Tonic" for Hendrick's Gin (garnished with cucumber to further distinguish it), or "T&T" for Tanqueray. Gin and tonic is traditionally garnished with a slice or wedge of lime, often slightly squeezed into the drink before being placed in the glass. In most parts of the world lime remains the only usual garnish; however, in the United Kingdom it has become common to use lemon as an alternative fruit; use of both fruit together is known as


title: "Gin and tonic" content: an "Evans". Although the origins of the use of lemons are unknown, their use dates back at least as far as the late 1930s. In addition lemons are often more readily available, and cheaper to purchase, than limes. The use of lemon or lime is a debated issue and while leading brands, such as Gordon's, Tanqueray and Bombay Sapphire recommend the use of lime, the founder of Fevertree Tonic Water prefers lemon. Some people garnish a Beefeater-based gin and tonic with a slice of orange, to complement the Seville oranges Beefeater uses in its botanicals. A gin and tonic served


title: "Gin and tonic" content: with Hendrick's Gin is typically garnished with a slice of cucumber. However, garnishes of cucumber are very rare, and garnishes of orange are rarer still. The cocktail was introduced by the army of the British East India Company in India. In India and other tropical regions, malaria was a persistent problem. In the 1700s it was discovered by Scottish doctor George Cleghorn that quinine could be used to prevent and treat the disease. The quinine was drunk in tonic water, however the bitter taste was unpleasant. British officers in India in the early 19th century took to adding a mixture


title: "Gin and tonic" content: of water, sugar, lime and gin to the quinine in order to make the drink more palatable, thus gin and tonic was born. Soldiers in India were already given a gin ration, and the sweet concoction made sense. Since it is no longer used as an antimalarial, tonic water today contains much less quinine, is usually sweetened, and is consequently much less bitter. Gin and tonic is a popular cocktail during the summer. A 2004 study found that after 12 hours, "considerable quantities (500 to 1,000 ml) of tonic water may, for a short period of time, lead to quinine


title: "Gin and tonic" content: plasma levels at the lower limit of therapeutic efficacy and may, in fact, cause transitory suppression of parasites". This method of consumption of quinine was impractical for malaria prophylaxis, as the amount of drug needed "can not be maintained with even large amounts of tonic". The authors conclude that it is not an effective form of treatment for malaria. In Spain, a variation on the drink called Gin-Tonic has become popular. This differs from a traditional gin and tonic as it is served in a balloon glass (copa de balon) or coupe glass with plenty of ice and a garnish


title: "Gin and tonic" content: tailored to the flavours of the gin. The drink could be fruit-based but the use of herbs and vegetables, reflecting the gin's botanicals, is increasingly popular. The balloon glass is used because the aromas of the drink can gather at its opening for the drinker to more easily appreciate. The popularity of this variation of the gin and tonic has led to the establishment of Gin-Tonic bars, in which customers can choose their preferred gin, tonic, and garnish from a menu. The transgalactic nature of the gin and tonic is imagined in Douglas Adams' novel "The Restaurant at the End


title: "Gin and tonic" content: of the Universe", which describes how "85% of all known worlds in the Galaxy, be they primitive or highly advanced, have invented a drink called jynnan tonnyx, or gee-N'N-T'N-ix, or jinond-o-nicks, or any one of a thousand or more variations on the same phonetic theme. The drinks themselves are not the same, and vary between the Sivolvian 'chinanto/mnigs' which is ordinary water served at slightly above room temperature, and the Gagrakackan 'tzjin-anthony-ks' which kills cows at a hundred paces; and in fact the one common factor between all of them, beyond the fact that the names sound the same, is


title: "Gin and tonic" content: that they were all invented and named before the worlds concerned made contact with any other worlds." James Bond specifies a recipe for a gin and tonic while in Kingston, Jamaica, in the book "Dr. No". Unusually it involves the juice of a whole lime. In the movie "The Year of Living Dangerously", Colonel Henderson, when he first meets Guy Hamilton, complains when his gin and tonic is served with ice, explaining that only Americans drink it like that. On the popular sitcom "How I Met Your Mother", character Barney Stinson played by Neil Patrick Harris is often heard ordering


title: "Gin and tonic" content: a gin and tonic. On one occasion where he serves as a bartender, the audience learns that he does not know what the drink consists of. Gin and tonic is one of John Constantine's drinks of choice in the "Hellblazer" comics. Gin and tonic is also the drink of choice for hero, Cat, in Jeaniene Frost's "Night Huntress" Series. Founded in 2010, International Gin & Tonic Day is celebrated worldwide on 19 October. Gin and tonic A gin and tonic is a highball cocktail made with gin and tonic water poured over ice. It is usually garnished with a slice


title: "George Eliot" content: a growing number of religious dissenters. In 1836 her mother died and Evans (then 16) returned home to act as housekeeper, but she continued correspondence with her tutor Maria Lewis. When she was 21, her brother Isaac married and took over the family home, so Evans and her father moved to Foleshill near Coventry. The closeness to Coventry society brought new influences, most notably those of Charles and Cara Bray. Charles Bray had become rich as a ribbon manufacturer and had used his wealth in the building of schools and in other philanthropic causes. Evans, who had been struggling with


title: Gecko content: Gecko Geckos are lizards belonging to the infraorder Gekkota, found in warm climates throughout the world. They range from 1.6 to 60 cm (0.64 to 24 inches). Most geckos cannot blink, but they often lick their eyes to keep them clean and moist. They have a fixed lens within each iris that enlarges in darkness to let in more light. Geckos are unique among lizards in their vocalizations, which differ from species to species. They use chirping or clicking sounds in their social interactions, and sometimes when alarmed. They are the most species-rich group of lizards, with about 1,500 different


title: Gecko content: species worldwide. The New Latin "gekko" and English "gecko" stem from the Indonesian-Malay "gēkoq", which is imitative of sounds that some species make. All geckos except species in the family Eublepharidae lack eyelids; instead the outer surface of the eyeball has a transparent membrane, the cornea. Species without eyelids generally lick their own corneas when they need to clear them of dust and dirt. Nocturnal species have excellent night vision; their color vision in low light is 350 times more sensitive than human color vision. The nocturnal geckos evolved from diurnal species which had lost the eye rods. The gecko


title: Gecko content: eye therefore modified its cones that increased in size into different types both single and double. Three different photopigments have been retained and are sensitive to UV, blue, and green. They also use a multifocal optical system that allows them to generate a sharp image for at least two different depths. Most gecko species can lose their tails in defense, a process called autotomy. Many species are well known for their specialised toe pads that enable them to climb smooth and vertical surfaces, and even cross indoor ceilings with ease. Geckos are well known to people who live in warm


title: Gecko content: regions of the world, where several species of geckos make their home inside human habitations. These (for example the house gecko) become part of the indoor menagerie and are often welcomed, as they feed on insects, including moths and mosquitoes. Unlike most lizards, geckos are usually nocturnal. The largest species, the kawekaweau, is only known from a single, stuffed specimen found in the basement of a museum in Marseille, France. This gecko was 60 cm (24 in) long and it was likely endemic to New Zealand, where it lived in native forests. It was probably wiped out along with much


title: Gecko content: of the native fauna of these islands in the late 19th century, when new invasive species such as rats and stoats were introduced to the country during European colonization. The smallest gecko, the Jaragua sphaero, is a mere 1.6 cm long and was discovered in 2001 on a small island off the coast of the Dominican Republic. Geckos occur in various patterns and colors, and are among the most colorful lizards in the world. Some species can change colour and may be lighter in colour at night. Some species are parthenogenetic, which means the female is capable of reproducing without


title: Gecko content: copulating with a male. This improves the gecko's ability to spread to new islands. However, in a situation where a single female gecko populates an entire island, the island will suffer from a lack of genetic variation within the geckos that inhabit it. The gecko's mating call sounds like a shortened bird chirping which attracts males, when they are nearby. Like other reptiles, geckos are ectothermic, producing very little metabolic heat. Essentially a gecko's body temperature is dependent on its environment. Also, in order to accomplish their main functions—such as locomotion, feeding, reproduction, etc.—geckos must have a relatively elevated temperature.


title: Gecko content: All geckos shed their skin at fairly regular intervals, with species differing in timing and method. Leopard geckos will shed at about two- to four-week intervals. The presence of moisture aids in the shedding. When shedding begins, the gecko will speed the process by detaching the loose skin from its body and eating it. For young geckos, shedding will occur more frequently, at once every week. But when they fully grow, they shed once every one or two months. About 60% of gecko species have adhesive toe pads that allow them to adhere to most surfaces without the use of


title: Gecko content: liquids or surface tension. Such pads have been gained and lost repeatedly over the course of gecko evolution. Adhesive toepads evolved independently in about 11 different gecko lineages and were lost in at least 9 lineages. The spatula-shaped setae arranged in lamellae on gecko footpads enable attractive van der Waals' forces (the weakest of the weak chemical forces) between the β-keratin lamellae/setae/spatulae structures and the surface. These van der Waals interactions involve no fluids; in theory, a boot made of synthetic setae would adhere as easily to the surface of the International Space Station as it would to a living-room


title: Gecko content: wall, although adhesion varies with humidity. A recent study has however shown that gecko adhesion is in fact mainly determined by electrostatic interaction (caused by contact electrification), not van der Waals or capillary forces. The setae on the feet of geckos are also self-cleaning and will usually remove any clogging dirt within a few steps. Teflon, which has very low surface energy, is more difficult for geckos to adhere to than many other surfaces. Gecko adhesion is typically improved by higher humidity, even on hydrophobic surfaces, yet is reduced under conditions of complete immersion in water. The role of water


title: Gecko content: in that system is under discussion, yet recent experiments agree that the presence of molecular water layers (water molecules carry a very large dipole moment) on the setae as well as on the surface increase the surface energy of both, therefore the energy gain in getting these surfaces in contact is enlarged, which results in an increased gecko adhesion force. Moreover, the elastic properties of the b-keratin change with water uptake. Gecko toes seem to be "double jointed", but this is a misnomer and is properly called digital hyperextension. Gecko toes can hyperextend in the opposite direction from human fingers


title: Gecko content: and toes. This allows them to overcome the van der Waals force by peeling their toes off surfaces from the tips inward. In essence, by this peeling action, the gecko separates spatula by spatula from the surface, so for each spatula separation, only some nN are necessary. (The process is similar to removing Scotch Tape from a surface.) Geckos' toes operate well below their full attractive capabilities most of the time, because the margin for error is great depending upon the surface roughness, and therefore the number of setae in contact with that surface. Use of small van der Waals


title: Gecko content: force requires very large surface areas: every square millimeter of a gecko's footpad contains about 14,000 hair-like setae. Each seta has a diameter of 5 μm. Human hair varies from 18 to 180 μm, so the cross-sectional area of a human hair is equivalent to 12 to 1300 setae. Each seta is in turn tipped with between 100 and 1,000 spatulae. Each spatula is 0.2 μm long (one five-millionth of a meter), or just below the wavelength of visible light. The setae of a typical mature gecko would be capable of supporting a weight of : each spatula can exert


title: Gecko content: an adhesive force of 5 to 25 nN. The exact value of the adhesion force of a spatula varies with the surface energy of the substrate to which it adheres. Recent studies have moreover shown that the component of the surface energy derived from long-range forces, such as van der Waals forces, depends on the material's structure below the outermost atomic layers (up to 100 nm beneath the surface); taking that into account, the adhesive strength can be inferred. Recent studies have also revealed that apart from the setae, phospholipids—fatty substances produced naturally in their bodies—also come into play. These


title: Gecko content: lipids lubricate the setae and allow the gecko to detach its foot before the next step. The origin of gecko adhesion likely started as simple modifications to the epidermis on the underside of the toes. This was recently discovered in the genus "Gonatodes" from South America. Simple elaborations of the epidermal spinules into setae have enabled "Gonatodes humeralis" to climb smooth surfaces and sleep on smooth leaves. Biomimetic technologies designed to mimic gecko adhesion could produce reusable self-cleaning dry adhesives with many applications. Development effort is being put into these technologies, but manufacturing synthetic setae is not a trivial material


title: Gecko content: design task. Gecko skin does not generally bear scales but appears at a macro scale as a papillose surface which is made from hair-like protuberances developed across the entire body. These confer superhydrophobicity, and the unique design of the hair confers a profound antimicrobial action. These protuberances are very small, up to 4 microns in length, and tapering to a point. Gecko skin has been observed to have an anti-bacterial property, killing gram-negative bacteria when it comes in contact with the skin. Geckos are polyphyodonts and able to replace each of their 100 teeth every 3 to 4 months. Next


title: Gecko content: to the full grown tooth there is a small replacement tooth developing from the odontogenic stem cell in the dental lamina. The formation of the teeth is pleurodont; they are fused (ankylosed) by their sides to the inner surface of the jaw bones. This formation is common in all species in the order Squamata. The infraorder Gekkota is divided into seven families, containing numerous genera of gecko species. More than 1,650 species of geckos occur worldwide, including these familiar species: Gecko Geckos are lizards belonging to the infraorder Gekkota, found in warm climates throughout the world. They range from 1.6


title: "Gerolamo Cardano" content: 1531. Before her death in 1546, they had three children, Giovanni Battista (1534), Chiara (1537) and Aldo (1543). Cardano later wrote that those were the happiest days of his life. With the help of a few noblemen, Cardano obtained a teaching position in mathematics in Milan. Having finally received his medical license, he practiced mathematics and medicine simultaneously, treating a few influential patients in the process. Because of this, he became one of the most sought-after doctors in Milan. In fact, by 1536, he was able to quit his teaching position, although he was still interested in mathematics. His notability


title: "Glen or Glenda" content: "I Changed My Sex"). Internationally, the film was also limited, and in France and Belgium, the title was translated as "Louis ou Louise" and in Argentina as "Yo Cambié Mi Sexo"; the film had a brief screening in the Republic of China. It was re-released to theaters in 1981 by Paramount. According to Tim Dirks, the film was one of a wave of "cheap teen movies" released for the drive-in market. They consisted of "exploitative, cheap fare created especially for them [teens] in a newly-established teen/drive-in genre." It was denied classification by the British Board of Film Classification upon submission


title: "George Fox" content: George Fox continued writing and preaching, feeling that imprisonment brought him into contact with people who needed his help—the jailers as well as his fellow prisoners. In his journal, he told his magistrate, "God dwells not in temples made with hands." He also sought to set an example by his actions there, turning the other cheek when being beaten and refusing to show his captors any dejected feelings. Parliamentarians grew suspicious of monarchist plots and fearful that the group travelling with Fox aimed to overthrow the government: by this time his meetings were regularly attracting crowds of over a thousand.


title: "George Fox" content: In early 1655 he was arrested at Whetstone, Leicestershire and taken to London under armed guard. In March he was brought before the Lord Protector, Oliver Cromwell. After affirming that he had no intention of taking up arms Fox was able to speak with Cromwell for most of the morning about the Friends and advised him to listen to God's voice and obey it so that, as Fox left, Cromwell "with tears in his eyes said, 'Come again to my house; for if thou and I were but an hour of a day together, we should be nearer one to


title: "Demographics of Haiti" content: with the protestants was less peaceful. The Protestants came to Haiti in 1970 and since then they have been bitter enemies of Voodoo, most often calling it devil worship. Although public education at the primary level is now free, private and parochial schools provide around 75% of educational programs offered. In recent years, several annual literacy campaigns launched in by the Martelly administration has increased overall literacy among adults in Haiti. UNESCO projects an overall literacy rate of 61.1% in Haiti by 2015. As of December 2014, World bank has reported that school enrollment has increased from 78% to 90%


title: Horace content: "Epistles" was another Germanic author, calling himself Sextus Amarcius, around 1100, who composed four books, the first two exemplifying vices, the second pair mainly virtues. Petrarch is a key figure in the imitation of Horace in accentual meters. His verse letters in Latin were modelled on the "Epistles" and he wrote a letter to Horace in the form of an ode. However he also borrowed from Horace when composing his Italian sonnets. One modern scholar has speculated that authors who imitated Horace in accentual rhythms (including stressed Latin and vernacular languages) may have considered their work a natural sequel to


title: Hesiod content: Hesiod Hesiod (; "Hēsíodos") was a Greek poet generally thought by scholars to have been active between 750 and 650 BC, around the same time as Homer. He is generally regarded as the first written poet in the Western tradition to regard himself as an individual persona with an active role to play in his subject. Ancient authors credited Hesiod and Homer with establishing Greek religious customs. Modern scholars refer to him as a major source on Greek mythology, farming techniques, early economic thought (he is sometimes considered history's first economist), archaic Greek astronomy and ancient time-keeping. The dating of


title: Handball content: Handball Handball (also known as team handball, fieldball, European handball or Olympic handball) is a team sport in which two teams of seven players each (six outfield players and a goalkeeper) pass a ball using their hands with the aim of throwing it into the goal of the other team. A standard match consists of two periods of 30 minutes, and the team that scores the most goals wins. There is no protective equipment worn while playing. Modern handball is played on a court of , with a goal in the middle of each end. The goals are surrounded by


title: Handball content: a zone where only the defending goalkeeper is allowed; goals must be scored by throwing the ball from outside the zone or while "diving" into it. The sport is usually played indoors, but outdoor variants exist in the forms of field handball and Czech handball (which were more common in the past) and beach handball. The game is fast and high-scoring: professional teams now typically score between 20 and 35 goals each, though lower scores were not uncommon until a few decades ago. Body contact is permitted by the defenders trying to stop the attackers from approaching the goal. The


title: Handball content: game was codified at the end of the 19th century in Denmark. The modern set of rules was published in 1917 in Germany, and had several revisions since. The first international games were played under these rules for men in 1925 and for women in 1930. Men's handball was first played at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin as outdoors, and the next time at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich as indoors, and has been an Olympic sport since. Women's team handball was added at the 1976 Summer Olympics. The International Handball Federation was formed in 1946 and, ,


title: Handball content: has 197 member federations. The sport is most popular in the countries of continental Europe, which have won all medals but one in the men's world championships since 1938. In the women's world championships, only two non-European countries have won the title: South Korea and Brazil. The game also enjoys popularity in the Far East, North Africa and parts of South America. There is evidence of ancient Roman women playing a version of handball called "expulsim ludere". There are records of handball-like games in medieval France, and among the Inuit in Greenland, in the Middle Ages. By the 19th century,


title: Handball content: there existed similar games of "håndbold" from Denmark, "házená" in the Czech Republic, "handbol" in Ukraine, and "torball" in Germany. The team handball game of today was codified at the end of the 19th century in northern Europe: primarily in Denmark, Germany, Norway and Sweden. The first written set of team handball rules was published in 1906 by the Danish gym teacher, lieutenant and Olympic medalist Holger Nielsen from Ordrup grammar school, north of Copenhagen. The modern set of rules was published on 29 October 1917 by Max Heiser, Karl Schelenz, and Erich Konigh from Germany. After 1919 these rules


title: Handball content: were improved by Karl Schelenz. The first international games were played under these rules, between Germany and Belgium by men in 1925 and between Germany and Austria by women in 1930. In 1926, the Congress of the International Amateur Athletics Federation nominated a committee to draw up international rules for field handball. The International Amateur Handball Federation was formed in 1928 and later the International Handball Federation was formed in 1946. Men's field handball was played at the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. During the next several decades, indoor handball flourished and evolved in the Scandinavian countries. The sport re-emerged


title: Handball content: onto the world stage as team handball for the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich. Women's team handball was added at the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal. Due to its popularity in the region, the Eastern European countries that refined the event became the dominant force in the sport when it was reintroduced. The International Handball Federation organised the men's world championship in 1938 and every four (sometimes three) years from World War II to 1995. Since the 1995 world championship in Iceland, the competition has been held every two years. The women's world championship has been held since 1957. The


title: Handball content: IHF also organizes women's and men's junior world championships. By July 2009, the IHF listed 166 member federations - approximately 795,000 teams and 19 million players. The rules are laid out in the IHF's set of rules. Two teams of seven players (six field players plus one goalkeeper) take the field and attempt to score points by putting the game ball into the opposing team's goal. In handling the ball, players are subject to the following restrictions: Notable scoring opportunities can occur when attacking players jump into the goal area. For example, an attacking player may catch a pass while


title: Handball content: launching inside the goal area, and then shoot or pass before touching the floor. "Doubling" occurs when a diving attacking player passes to another diving teammate. Handball is played on a court , with a goal in the centre of each end. The goals are surrounded by a near-semicircular area, called the zone or the crease, defined by a line six meters from the goal. A dashed near-semicircular line nine metres from the goal marks the free-throw line. Each line on the court is part of the area it encompasses. This implies that the middle line belongs to both halves


title: Handball content: at the same time. The goals are two meters high and three meters wide. They must be securely bolted either to the floor or the wall behind. The goal posts and the crossbar must be made out of the same material (e.g., wood or aluminium) and feature a quadratic cross section with sides of . The three sides of the beams visible from the playing field must be painted alternatingly in two contrasting colors which both have to contrast against the background. The colors on both goals must be the same. Each goal must feature a net. This must be


title: Handball content: fastened in such a way that a ball thrown into the goal does not leave or pass the goal under normal circumstances. If necessary, a second net may be clasped to the back of the net on the inside. The goals are surrounded by the crease. This area is delineated by two quarter circles with a radius of six metres around the far corners of each goal post and a connecting line parallel to the goal line. Only the defending goalkeeper is allowed inside this zone. However, the court players may catch and touch the ball in the air within


title: Handball content: it as long as the player starts his jump outside the zone and releases the ball before he lands (landing inside the perimeter is allowed in this case as long as the ball has been released). If a player without the ball contacts the ground inside the goal perimeter, or the line surrounding the perimeter, he must take the most direct path out of it. However, should a player cross the zone in an attempt to gain an advantage (e.g., better position) their team cedes the ball. Similarly, violation of the zone by a defending player is penalized only if


title: Handball content: they do so in order to gain an advantage in defending. Outside of one long edge of the playing field to both sides of the middle line are the substitution areas for each team. The areas usually contain the benches as seating opportunities. Team officials, substitutes, and suspended players must wait within this area. The area always lies to the same side as the team's own goal. During half-time, substitution areas are swapped. Any player entering or leaving the play must cross the substitution line which is part of the side line and extends from the middle line to the


title: Handball content: team's side. A standard match for all teams of at least age 16 has two 30-minute halves with a 10- to 15-minute halftime break. At half-time, teams switch sides of the court as well as benches. For youths the length of the halves is reduced—25 minutes at ages 12 to 15, and 20 minutes at ages 8 to 11; though national federations of some countries may differ in their implementation from the official guidelines. If a decision must be reached in a particular match (e.g., in a tournament) and it ends in a draw after regular time, there are at


title: Handball content: maximum two overtimes, each consisting of two straight 5-minute periods with a one-minute break in between. Should these not decide the game either, the winning team is determined in a penalty shootout (best-of-five rounds; if still tied, extra rounds afterwards until won by one team). The referees may call "timeout" according to their sole discretion; typical reasons are injuries, suspensions, or court cleaning. Penalty throws should trigger a timeout only for lengthy delays, such as a change of the goalkeeper. Since 2012, teams can call 3 "team timeouts" per game (up to two per half), which last one minute each.


title: Handball content: This right may only be invoked by team in ball possession. Team representatives must show a green card marked with a black "T" on the timekeeper's desk. The timekeeper then immediately interrupts the game by sounding an acoustic signal and stops the time. Before that, it was one per half. For purpose of calling timeouts, overtime and shootouts are extensions of the second half. A handball match is adjudicated by two equal referees. Some national bodies allow games with only a single referee in special cases like illness on short notice. Should the referees disagree on any occasion, a decision


title: Handball content: is made on mutual agreement during a short timeout; or, in case of punishments, the more severe of the two comes into effect. The referees are obliged to make their decisions "on the basis of their observations of facts". Their judgements are final and can be appealed against only if not in compliance with the rules. The referees position themselves in such a way that the team players are confined between them. They stand diagonally aligned so that each can observe one side line. Depending on their positions, one is called "field referee" and the other "goal referee". These positions