The incredible marathon of New Zealand Tawaki penguins

Yahoo – AFP, Ivan Couronne, August 29, 2018

A Fiordland penguins - as pictured here by researcher Thomas Mattern - will swim
with its pack from its home in New Zealand halfway to Antarctica and back
each December (AFP Photo/Thomas MATTERN)

Washington (AFP) - Each year in December, penguins with long blonde eyebrows swim away from the shores of New Zealand for a two-month marathon swim halfway to Antarctica and back.

The breathtaking distance was recorded by researchers, who for the first time managed to track the birds.

Penguins, universally adored and the stars of cartoons, are actually not well studied.

One third of all penguin species live in New Zealand, where they are part of the landscape, mostly in the wilder south. Nevertheless most penguin species are considered vulnerable or endangered.

Until now it was unclear where one penguin species -- the Fiordland crested penguin (Eudyptes pachyrhynchus) -- migrated each year in search of food.

Zoologists assumed that they stayed near the coast. To find out, researchers with the Tawaki Project -- which uses the bird's local name -- attached satellite tracking tags to 20 penguins and followed their migration daily.

"My first reaction was there's something wrong with the data," said Thomas Mattern, a research fellow in Department of Zoology, University of Otago, New Zealand and the project director.

"Then I was just puzzled, I was completely flabbergasted -- where are they going, when will they stop?"

The penguins swam halfway to Antarctica, in areas where the warm northern waters collide with the cold waters of the south. Then they swam back New Zealand.

Round trip, a female traveled 6,801 kilometers (4,226 miles) in 67 days. A male swam 5,597 kilometers (3,478 miles) in 77 days.

The complete data relates to only five animals, because the tags seem to have detached from the 15 others being tracked during their trip.

This new information confirms that penguins are among the most extraordinary vertebrate swimmers on the planet.

According to Mattern, the Russians had even studied the hydrodynamics of penguin feathers to mimic it for their submarines.

The penguin study was published Wednesday in the scientific journal PLOS One.

A Humboldt penguin (Spheniscus humboldti), native to the coasts of Chile and 

Peru, at a zoo in Bremerhaven, Germany (AFP Photo/Patrik STOLLARZ)

Mysterious penguins

Researchers had a tough time finding funding for their project. Each tag costs between $1,500 and $2,000. And according to Mattern, research like this "has completely fallen off of fashion."

"If you seek academic funding, it has to be these days a topic that is en vogue, be it ancient DNA or microbiology," Mattern said.

"Field studies that conduct baseline research are often considered to be too descriptive and boring."

Instead, non-governmental organizations and the public helped fund the research.

Why focus on penguin migration in the first place?

"Penguins are seabirds, they spend up to 80 percent of their life out in the ocean, and we have not the faintest idea of what they do there," Mattern said.

While the birds are suspected to be in decline, "in order to do something about that, you have to know what is affecting the species."

The warming of the oceans, tourism and fishing probably affects the penguins, but effects on their lives still need to be studied scientifically.

"Penguins are in trouble around the globe, and mostly it's because there's problems in changes in the ocean," said P. Dee Boersma, a biologist at the University of Washington, Seattle, and an expert in South American penguins.

Boersma, who did not participate in the project, noted that the warming climate has not been good for penguins.

"The other big problem is the competition with fisheries," Boersma said.

African penguins used to number in the millions, now they're down to about 30,000, she said. Why? "Because they don't have any food to eat, because humans are taking almost all of the sardines," he said.

The unresolved mystery is why the Tawaki penguins swim so far, especially when the costal waters of New Zealand in December are swarming with fish and other food.

Scientists believe that this could be an instinct inherited from an ancestral species of penguins that lived further south, before populating New Zealand.

To answer this question further research is needed -- if possible with international funding.

"The penguins do not belong to New Zealanders or Australians, it is the whole of humanity who is responsible for it," Mattern said.

Unfit for porpoise: Naughty dolphin causes French beach ban

Yahoo – AFP, August 27, 2018

Unfit for porpoise: Naughty dolphin causes French beach ban

Rennes (France) (AFP) - A love-lorn dolphin has prompted a French coastal town to ban bathing on its beaches, fearing people may be hurt by the antics of the over-excited mammal.

Roger Lars, mayor of Landevennec, on the western tip of Brittany, issued a ban on voluntarily approaching within 50 metres (yards) of the dolphin and outlawed bathing and diving from the district's beaches whenever the animal is spotted in local waters.

The move was made on the basis of advice from marine specialists after the visibly excited three-metre (10-foot) dolphin -- nicknamed Zafar -- bumped against boats and bathers, he said.

"I issued the decree to ensure safety... Several bathers were really afraid -- he even lifted up a woman bather with his snout," Lars told the local newspaper Ouest France.

The ban took effect on August 20.

Sami Hassani, a specialist in marine mammals at the Oceanopolis sea park, said the dolphin could accidentally cause "serious injuries" with its tail fin.

But the ban has run into legal problems.

Lawyer Erwan Le Cornec told AFP he plans to file a petition to overturn the restrictions on the grounds of administrative over-reach.

"How many accidents involving a dolphin and a human have occurred in the region of Finistere since the two species have lived side-by-side?" he asked scornfully. "None."

"With this decree the mayor is trying to make out that the dolphin is almost like a ferocious beast, something that is completely unpredictable, able to drown people."

The mayor, he said, "will overturn the rightly positive approach that people have towards dolphins into a fear of these intelligent animals."

Caspian Sea nations sign landmark deal

Yahoo – AFP, Christopher RICKLETON, August 12, 2018

The Caspian Sea borders Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Iran, Russia and
Turkmenistan (AFP Photo/BEHROUZ MEHRI)

Aktau (Kazakhstan) (AFP) - The leaders of the five states bordering the resource-rich Caspian Sea signed a landmark deal Sunday on the legal status of the inland sea which boasts a wealth of oil and gas reserves and sturgeon.

The leaders of Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan signed the agreement on the status of the inland sea, which has been disputed since the collapse of the Soviet Union rendered obsolete agreements between Tehran and Moscow.

The host, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, said before the signing that the leaders were "participants in a historic event."

"We can admit that consensus on the status of the sea was hard to reach and not immediate, the talks lasted more than 20 years and called for a lot of joint efforts from the parties," Nazarbayev said.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin, whose country was seen as driving the deal, said the convention had "epoch-making significance" and called for more military cooperation between the countries on the Caspian.

Nazarbayev said the convention allows for the construction of underwater oil and gas pipelines as well as setting national quotas for fishing and forbids any foreign military presence.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani was quick to hail the clause that prevents non-Caspian countries from deploying military forces.

"The Caspian Sea only belongs to the Caspian states," he said.

Putin also praised this clause, saying it would help "ensure the peaceful status of the Caspian Sea."

National boundaries

The deal provides a means of delimiting national boundaries in the sea whose underground energy resources are estimated at 50 billion barrels of oil and just under 300 trillion cubic feet (8.4 trillion cubic metres) of natural gas.

But Rouhani stressed several times during the summit that these boundaries still need to be worked out between the countries.

Iran, which ended up with the smallest share of the sea under the terms of the convention, is viewed as a potential loser in the deal.

Sunday's summit was the fifth of its kind since 2002 but there have been more than 50 lower-level meetings since the Soviet breakup spawned four new countries on the shores of the Caspian.

The deal goes some way to settling a long-lasting dispute on whether the Caspian is a sea or a lake -- which means it falls under different international laws.

A map of the Caspian Sea locating Aktau, in Kazakhstan, where a deal was 

signed Sunday by surrounding countries which ends decades of dispute over the 

inland sea rich in oil, gas and caviar. (AFP Photo/Valentina BRESCHI)

While the convention refers to the Caspian as a sea, provisions in the agreement give it "a special legal status", Russian deputy foreign minister Grigory Karasin told Kommersant daily earlier this week.

The agreement also offers hope for the Caspian's ecological diversity and its depleted stocks of the beluga sturgeon, whose eggs are prized globally as caviar.

While it remains to be seen how the deal will be implemented, the summit in Aktau was another opportunity for Moscow to present itself as a diplomatic deal-maker.

After years of unsuccessful negotiations on the Caspian the Kremlin "gains political kudos for breaking a log-jam," said John Roberts, a non-resident senior fellow at Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center.

Trans-Caspian plan

Turkmen leader Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov greeted the deal enthusiastically as his country wants to send gas to markets in Europe via a long-planned Trans-Caspian underwater pipeline.

The project is billed as allowing European countries to ease their dependence on gas from Russia at a time of heightened geopolitical confrontation.

Nevertheless, Iran and Russia could still challenge the pipeline on ecological grounds. They have previously blocked the project, which could cost up to $5 billion to build and would have a projected capacity of 30 billion cubic metres per year.

Kate Mallinson, Associate Fellow for the Russia and Eurasia Programme at Chatham House, urged caution over the prospects for the pipeline, saying the Aktau deal "is not a legal prerequisite for the construction."

"Neither will a major transport corridor to export Turkmen gas to Europe emerge overnight."

Hot weather brings surprise guests, dolphins spotted in the North Sea

DutchNews, July 31, 2018

The recent spate of unusually hot water has brought some unexpected guests to the North Sea. A Dutch fisherman spotted a group of about ten dolphins in waters between the Netherlands and the coast of England and filmed the group. 

The animals have been feeding in the area for weeks near a big sandbank where there is plenty of food. 

According to Jessica Meerbeek of SOS Dolfijn the animals are definitely dolphins, ‘What we don’t know is the exact species. We think they may be bottlenose dolphins or perhaps white-beaked dolphins. They are definitely not porpoise,’ she told broadcaster NOS. 

Experts say the hot weather has made food in the North Sea more plentiful and that has attracted the dolphins.

Related Article:

"A Summary" – Apr 2, 2011 (Kryon channelled by Lee Carroll)

(Subjects: Religion, Shift of Human Consciousness, 2012, Intelligent/Benevolent Design, EU, South America, 5 Currencies, Water Cycle (Heat up, Mini Ice Ace, Oceans, Fish, Earthquakes ..), Middle East, Internet, Israel, Dictators, Palestine, US, Japan (Quake/Tsunami Disasters , People, Society ...), Nuclear Power Revealed, Hydro Power, Geothermal Power, Moon, Financial Institutes (Recession, Realign integrity values ..) , China, North Korea, Global Unity,..... etc.) - (Text version)

“… The Weather

Let's talk about the weather. We retreat to exactly what we told you before in this very chair. The water cycle is a cooling cycle, not a heating cycle. You're going to have more severe winters and storms. It's going to get colder. But it gets warmer before it gets colder. That is the cycle, and it has always been the cycle. You can see it in the rings of the trees and the cores of the ice. Don't let your scientists pull the political wool over your eyes for their own purposes. Start seeing these things for what they are. It's a recurring cycle based on four Earth alignment attributes, including the wobble (the precession). You're in this cycle. Prepare.

The beginnings of it will be with you from now at least until the end of the 2012 36-year window, and you can watch it work. The first thing that happens is that the ice melts at the poles, but not completely. It's the way it has happened before. As the redistribution of weight from the poles to the oceans of the earth takes place, the weight is redistributed to the crust, and that creates earthquakes. And the earthquakes that will be the most powerful are the ones that are closest to the poles. We told you that some time ago. So it's not a mystery that suddenly you have some of the most powerful earthquakes that you've ever had. Not only that, but a cooling ocean creates larger storms.

What do the conspiracists do with all this? "See? We're doomed. Here it comes," they say. "Here it comes! The end is here!" Twenty-two years ago, we gave you the information that is happening today. We told you about the weather. We told you to get ready for it, but we still haven't told you why the water cycle is needed. We've hinted at it since it is very controversial, and we'll lose many readers right here and now. Here's the prediction: The scientists are going to laugh and biologists are going to scratch their heads and roll their eyes.

The Refreshing of the Cycle of Life

When you change the temperature of the waters of the planet, it changes the life cycle of the ocean and it eventually renews itself. The life cycle of the planet has a limit to its viability over time. There has to be a refreshing of the very cycle of life, and this is what the water cycle does. Are there any places you've seen too many fish lately? Yes. Millions of salmon in the north. Odd that it was in Alaska, isn't it? Alaska is very close to the poles where the water temperature is being felt first. Oh, again the experts will tell you that this is not the reason. It's about hatcheries and rivers. But nobody predicted this, did they? Science is fast to give you reasons, but slow to give you logic in advance. They always seem to be surprised.

We are saying things we haven't said before. Again, watch for this, an actual change in the life cycle of the planet's oceans because of the water temperature shift. Biologists are going to have to start redesigning the paradigm of how everything works, including reefs, ocean bottoms, and how plankton survive and reproduce. Listen, this is not the first time that the life cycle has been refreshed! But again, this may take generations of humanity to complete. In the process, you may again lose species. This is normal. Gaia is slow, and Humans are impatient. Your textbooks may someday tell of how naive humanity was back in 2011 when they tried to blame weather changes on everything but a natural cycle. Now you know why there is a water cycle.

So what does that tell you about Gaia? Gaia is beginning the cycle of refreshing life on over-fished oceans. It tells you that in the cracks, there is love and caring about the Humans who live on the earth. There's a reason you're here. There's a plan here, and a benevolent Universe and quantum energy with intelligent design. All is there for you, precious, sacred Human Being. …”