THE US NAVY SAYS CHIROPACTORS ARE DOCTORS

A prominent anti-vax doctor, who falsely claimed the COVID-19 vaccine could make people magnetic, had her medical license renewed, report says

sankel@businessinsider.com (Sophia Ankel) 

© The Ohio Channel Dr Sherri Tenpenny. The Ohio Channel

A prominent anti-vax doctor had her medical license renewed this month, the Ohio Capital reported.

Dr. Sherri Tenpenny told Ohio lawmakers in June that COVID-19 vaccines could make people magnetic.

Tenpenny was recently named one of the 12 most prolific sources of anti-vax misinformation

A prominent anti-vax doctor from Ohio, who pushed the false claim that COVID-19 vaccines could make people magnetic, has had her medical license renewed, according to the Ohio Capital Journal.

Dr. Sherri Tenpenny is an osteopathic physician who has spent years making unproven or exaggerated claims about vaccines.

Her license, first issued in 1984, was due to expire on October 1. It was renewed by the State Medical Board of Ohio on September 16.

Jerica Stewart, a spokesperson for the Board, confirmed to the Ohio Capital Journal that Tenpenny's license was automatically renewed until 2023.

"A recent renewal does not prevent the board from taking future disciplinary action," she said, according to the Ohio Capital Journal.

Tenpenny attracted nationwide media attention in June after she falsely told Ohio House Health Committee that the coronavirus vaccine could potentially make people "magnetized," Insider reported previously.

"You can put a key on their forehead. It sticks. You can put spoons and forks all over, and they can stick because now we think there is a metal piece to that," she said.

Tenpenny also falsely said that COVID-19 vaccines contain particles that connect a person to 5G mobile data networks.

The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) named Tenpenny among 12 anti-vaxxers responsible for spreading 65% of false information about vaccines in March this year.

The report caught the attention of President Joe Biden in July, who said: "These 12 people are out there giving misinformation. Anyone listening to it is getting hurt by it."

Tenpenny's Twitter account was permanently suspended in June after the company said her COVID-19 vaccine claims violated its misinformation policy.

Insider reached out to Tenpenny for further comment but did not hear back in time for publication.

Stewart said the Ohio board renews medical licenses automatically to keep up with the 92,000 practitioners in the state.

She told Insider that the complaints it receives about physicians are usually confidential, although if a licensee is disciplined by the board, the action is public record. She did not comment specifically about Tenpenny's renewal.

Mia Jankowicz contributed to this report.

Image: doctorsthatdo.osteopathic.org

An osteopath is a licensed physician who practices medicine using both conventional treatments and osteopathic manipulative medicine, which focuses on relieving pain and tension in the musculoskeletal system.

NDP ranks question leadership after election disappointments

Olivia Stefanovich 

© Darryl Dyck/Canadian Press NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh pauses during a post-election news conference in Vancouver on Sept. 21, 2021.

The NDP is conducting a review of its national campaign to find out what happened with its ground game, which left the party with limited gains and in fourth place despite throwing $25 million into the pot to burnish its appeal.

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh's campaign tour followed a planned path to grow the caucus, visiting 51 mostly Liberal-held or Conservative-held ridings. But the NDP is increasing its 24-seat count by only one seat.

"I'm disappointed that we didn't elect more MPs … and that we did not significantly increase the size of our caucus, because that was the goal," said Anne McGrath, the NDP's national director, in an interview with CBC News.

Some New Democrats want accountability, because they feel they lacked resources and training at the riding level to get the vote out.

"People talked about an orange wave coming, but the reality was there was no work being done on the ground," said Jessa McLean, the riding association president of York–Simcoe NDP in Ontario.

"There was nobody out there making sure that people who needed drives to the polls could do that, reminding them to get to the advance polls, to get to the final day, telling them how to do the mail-in ballots, walking them through it."

Calls for change in leadership

McLean, who ran unsuccessfully for NDP president earlier this year, said she wants McGrath to resign.

"If they keep her on, it's to put another checkmark beside this horrible strategy that saw us essentially lose ground," McLean said. "She has to go."

If the NDP's strategy doesn't change, McLean said, Singh should also step aside.

"If we just pour everything into his image, where will we be when he does leave," McLean said.

CBC News put those concerns to McGrath, who said that she has no plans to step down and that Singh isn't going anywhere.

"There is a special level of vitriol reserved for women in leadership positions in this country," McGrath said. "In my experience, it sometimes takes a few elections for things to gel."

McGrath, who was chief of staff to the former NDP Leader Jack Layton, noted that she went through four elections over the span of nearly a decade before triggering an orange wave that propelled into the role of Official Opposition by winning 103 seats in the 2011 vote.

She said Singh has grown as a leader since running in the 2019 federal election.

McGrath also noted that the NDP increased its share of the popular vote, from 16 per cent in 2019, to nearly 18 per cent in this election. She believes the party is laying the foundation for growth.

'More needs to be done to support local ridings'

But McGrath also believes a lack of on-campus voting, long line-ups for the ballot box and fewer polling station locations — some absent from Indigenous communities — suppressed the NDP vote.

"Part of the reason for having the election at this time was to keep the turnout numbers low in order to re-elect the incumbent government," McGrath said.

"I do believe that young voters and Indigenous voters, in particular, were disenfranchised."

McGrath said NDP fundraising is still strong and she feels confident the party will have the finances to put up a fight in the next election.

But McLean said NDP donations in York–Simcoe, a Conservative stronghold, ran dry after the party had to battle first in a February 2019 byelection, then the October 2019 election. She said the riding's resources were still depleted by the time Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made the August election call this year.

McLean said her riding can usually rely on Elections Canada campaign-expense reimbursements — money that commonly flows to candidates and helps electoral district associations or ridings — but New Democrat headquarters kept all the rebates in 2019 and again this year.

McLean said money is usually raised at nomination meetings, but her riding failed to hold one before the snap election was called for Sept. 20.

"We were left with almost no funds to start off this campaign, and we didn't find out who our candidate would be until a week into the campaign," McLean said.

"By the time we went to our members and said, 'Oh, we have a candidate now,' we looked completely unorganized. We didn't look like something that people wanted to plug money into."

The decision to keep Elections Canada campaign rebates was made by the NDP's federal council.

"We do take the rebates to be able to run an effective central campaign," McGrath said. "But I do agree that more needs to be done to support local ridings."

Why didn't likes appear to translate into votes?

Gabriel Masi, co-president of Jeunes NPD du Québec, said he would like to see the NDP grow its on-campus presence and thinks the party needs new young leadership at the top.

Having said that, Masi said the NDP's success in the future depends on Singh.

"If we didn't have a leader that people saw as a great person, I don't even think we would've done how we did," Masi said.

"It is incredibly dangerous to remove someone who is this popular."

Other New Democrats, who spoke to CBC, said they also support Singh, but they want him to spend more time talking about his plan and policies rather than attacking Trudeau.

They said they feel the party didn't pitch enough bold, progressive ideas to motivate voters, such as offering free post-secondary education or nationalizing telecoms.

Many New Democrats also believe strategic voting played against them, particularly in places such as the Greater Toronto Area, where the NDP was shut out.

Nearly half of the NDP's $25 million campaign budget was dedicated to advertisements, social media and online.

Although the strategy didn't appear to result in a surge of new votes, Masi believes it was money well spent, especially in countering the prejudices some people may have against Singh.

"His image was an asset to us," Masi said.

"We got a lot of comments from people in the Montreal-area saying I really like him, he's personable."

In the future, Masi said the party should take some of the money dedicated to social media and invest it in getting out the vote.

"The ground game organizing has to start now and we have to make sure that we have that local infrastructure," Masi said.

PERHAPS IT IS ALSO ABOUT WINNING A SECOND RIDING IN ALBERTA BEING MORE IMPORTANT THAN FIVE SEATS ELSEWHERE LIKE YORK SIMCOE

Edmonton leads country in missed payments among homeowners

Joel Schlesinger, for the Edmonton Journal 
Edmonton homeowners are tops in Canada for missed debt payments, a new study has found.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal

Free credit score provider Borrowell recently released a survey revealing Edmonton homeowners had 0.19 missed payments per homeowner. That’s almost two in 10 homeowners based on credit reports from August, says Andrew Graham, chief executive officer and co-founder of Borrowell.

“Edmonton has the highest rate of missed payments for homeowners … and also among non-homeowners for major cities in Canada,” he says.

RENTERS
Almost one in three consumers without mortgages in Edmonton had missed a payment, the study found.

Combined, nearly three in 10 Edmonton consumers had missed a payment among the more than 874,000 credits scores examined across Canada. That’s compared with the national average of about two in 10.

“In the case of homeowners, Edmonton is about twice the Canadian average of about one in 10,” Graham says. “That’s despite the fact mortgage debt in Edmonton is below the Canadian average.”

Nationally, homeowners had an average mortgage of $359,597 compared with Edmonton homeowners at $314,863.

By comparison, Toronto homeowners carried an average mortgage of about $574,246 with only about three in 100 missing a bill payment.

Calgary also had higher incidence of missed bill payments, about 16 per cent of homeowners with mortgages averaging about $354,000. Calgary also had the highest level of non-mortgage debt among homeowners in Canada at $36,330 compared with the national average of about $34,000. Calgary had the largest amount of non-mortgage debt among non-homeowners at $23,762 compared with the national average of about $20,000.

Edmonton had the second highest figure for non-mortgage debt at about $35,800 among homeowners and for non-homeowners at about $22,300.

Graham says the higher than average debt levels and missed payments could reflect the ill health of the Alberta economy over the past six years.

“There’s been a series of economic challenges, and that absolutely contributes,” he says.

Yet some metrics like higher levels of non-mortgage debt could reflect higher affordability in Edmonton as more people are likely to qualify for a mortgage.

“We are relatively fortunate in the Edmonton area in home prices compared to the larger markets in Canada,” says mortgage broker Jason Goodwin with Paragon Mortgage Inc. in Edmonton.

What’s more, he notes first-time buyers are more aware than ever of what they need to do to prepare to qualify for a mortgage.

Still, income requirements can be challenging with more part-time, seasonal and gig economy workers with fluctuating income, he adds.

In turn, more would-be buyers are looking for advice from professionals such as mortgage brokers to develop plans for a down payment and to budget while looking to family for help with a down payment.

Still, the study sheds light on how Alberta’s recent economic hardships have weighed on its housing market because of higher debt among consumers.

“You need to be able to make a down payment to buy a house,” Graham says. “So, if you’re carrying a lot of debt, that can make it harder to get that down payment.”

Saturday's letters: Alberta unions at risk from cabinet shuffle
Edmonton Journal

Of all the things Premier Kenney has done, removing Minister Shandro from the health portfolio has got to be the best. Now we can optimistically improve our public health system versus Shandro’s approach to destroy it or privatize it. The unfortunate side effect will be Shandro’s anti-union ideology.

.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal Tyler Shandro leaves Government House in Edmonton on Tuesday, Sept. 21, 2021. Shandro was shuffled out at a short ceremony, swapping roles with former labour and immigration minister Jason Copping who now takes over the health ministry.

I can see his plan already of destroying our public service unions. And making union membership even more difficult in this business-oriented province. But let’s remember, it is unions who are working for us, the working folks. The UCP would still have us on a six-day work week with one week off per year.

Almost all our social and work-related benefits were championed by unions and implemented because of union influence. Union membership declined as neo-liberal political views influenced our governments, but they are still one of the few organizations working to improve our lot and keep ultra-right governments at bay

Code Clements, Cherry Grove

Avoiding vaccines makes no sense

To all those choosing not to vaccinate, would you be so keen to trust natural immunity if this were a pandemic of smallpox or polio? COVID can (and does) kill. Survivors of severe infection may be permanently debilitated.

Vaccines have saved more lives than any other public health measure except for the provision of clean drinking water. Avoiding vaccination makes as much sense as choosing to drink from a dirty ditch.

D.M. Gilchrist, Edmonton

Answers needed on pandemic decisions

Dear Conservative politicians: After living through the last 19 months, and seeing you playing with decisions about our health — physically and mentally — you are now breaking our hearts.

Having a parent in long-term care has been heartbreaking. While we will all not be getting back any of the precious times we missed, there is definitely little future for our loved ones. Our most vulnerable, while many are triple-vaccinated now, have lost the last few years of their life. This without comfort from family, and unable to even see their faces.

Many questions over the last 19 months on how things were handled. Questioning now, why vaccines were not mandated for all staff earlier, and why proof of vaccination is still not required to visit in LTC. Questioning, why proof of vaccination is still not required everywhere possible. These are sad times for all of us, and we need answers, actions and better direction.

Saxon Wolf, Edmonton

Schools shouldn’t cater to unvaccinated

I have ethical concerns and legitimate questions to which I have yet to get conclusive answers. When are school boards going to mandate all staff and support staff to show proof of full vaccination?

Schools have an ethical duty to keep all children safe but what measures have been put into place to ensure all students are safe from being infected by unvaccinated school employees including maintenance and transportation staff?

By school districts enforcing school-wide vaccination mandates, students, staff, parents, volunteers and community members that visit schools would be safe, while schools upheld their ethical duty to keep children safe.

Schools do not have an ethical duty to pander to the unvaccinated. The unvaccinated have an ethical duty to comply with all safety and emergency health regulations by getting themselves vaccinated. Stop thinking it is your choice. It is not your choice; it is your ethical responsibility.

Tanna Somerfield, St. Albert

THEY'RE BACK - THE WAR WAS NEVER ABOUT THEM

Taliban hang body in public; signal return to past tactics

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — The Taliban hanged a dead body from a crane parked in a city square in Afghanistan on Saturday in a gruesome display that signaled the hard-line group’s return to some of its brutal tactics of the past.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

Taliban officials initially brought four bodies to the central square in the western city of Herat, then moved three of them to other parts of the city for public display, said Wazir Ahmad Seddiqi, who runs a pharmacy on the edge of the square.

Taliban officials announced that the four were caught taking part in a kidnapping earlier Saturday and were killed by police, Seddiqi said. Ziaulhaq Jalali, a Taliban-appointed district police chief in Herat, said later that Taliban members rescued a father and son who had been abducted by four kidnappers after an exchange of gunfire. He said a Taliban fighter and a civilian were wounded by the kidnappers, and that the kidnappers were killed in crossfire.

An Associated Press video showed crowds gathering around the crane and peering up at the body as some men chanted.

“The aim of this action is to alert all criminals that they are not safe,” a Taliban commander who did not identify himself told the AP in an on-camera interview conducted in the square.

Since the Taliban overran Kabul on Aug. 15 and seized control of the country, Afghans and the world have been watching to see whether they will re-create their harsh rule of the late 1990s, which included public stonings and limb amputations of alleged criminals, some of which took place in front of large crowds at a stadium.

Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, one of the founders of the Taliban and the chief enforcer of its harsh interpretation of Islamic law when they last ruled Afghanistan, told The Associated Press this week that the militant movement will once again carry out executions and amputations of hands, though perhaps not in public.

“Everyone criticized us for the punishments in the stadium, but we have never said anything about their laws and their punishments,” Turabi said. “No one will tell us what our laws should be. We will follow Islam and we will make our laws on the Quran.”

The group’s leaders remain entrenched in a deeply conservative, hard-line worldview, even if they are embracing technological changes, such as video and mobile phones.

President Joe Biden’s administration signaled on Friday that the U.S. would not tolerate the Taliban’s return to their past punishment methods.

“We condemn in the strongest terms reports of reinstating amputations and executions of Afghans,” State Department spokesman Ned Price told reporters. “The acts the Taliban are talking about here would constitute clear gross abuses of human rights, and we stand firm with the international community to hold perpetrators of these — of any such abuses — accountable.”

Also Saturday, a roadside bomb hit a Taliban car in the capital of eastern Nangarhar province, wounding at least one person, a Taliban official said. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing. The Islamic State group affiliate, which is headquartered in eastern Afghanistan, has said it was behind similar attacks in Jalalabad last week that killed 12 people.

The person wounded in the attack is a municipal worker, Taliban spokesperson Mohammad Hanif said.

The Associated Press

Turnbull and Forrest push “green only” hydrogen, dismiss carbon capture


Michael Mazengarb 24 September 2021

Andrew Forrest and Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull at an event in Canberra. 

(AAP Image/Mick Tsikas)


Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull and resources billionaire Andrew Forrest have joined forces to launch a new group that will advocate for the emerging hydrogen industry to focus solely on production using renewable energy.

The pair officially launched the Green Hydrogen Organisation on Thursday night as part of the New York Climate Week. They said that the new group would advocate for a global focus on hydrogen production using renewable energy, saying that ‘blue’ hydrogen – produced using fossil fuels – was a distraction.

Turnbull and Forrest were both critical of carbon capture and storage technologies, which they said had failed despite receiving huge amounts of government support, adding that industry must resist fossil fuel industry efforts to grow the amount of hydrogen produced using coal and gas.

“This is an organisation with a global mission to ensure that only green hydrogen is given the recognition as being the fuel of the future because the alternatives result in more emissions and actually tend to defeat the object of decarbonising the global economy,” Turnbull said during the launch.

“Hydrogen is the answer, but only if it is produced with renewable energy. If hydrogen is produced from gas or coal or with electricity generated by burning gas or coal, there is nothing clean about it,” he said.

“Now the fossil fuel sector, regrettably, but predictively has a vested interest in persuading us that they can produce so-called clean or blue hydrogen.”


Turnbull hit out at carbon capture and storage technologies, as Forrest has done previously, in direct contrast to the federal government, which is now pushing it as part of its technology roadmap and as a legitimate component of “blue hydrogen” made with gas.

“Carbon capture and storage has received billions of dollars in support over many years. There were high hopes for it,” Turnbull said.

“I had high hopes for it when I was Australia’s environment minister back in 2007. But it simply has not worked. It does not work consistently. In fact, it only works in very niche areas. And it’s failed. Blue hydrogen is a delaying exercise that we have to resist.”

In supporting the creation of the Green Hydrogen Organisation, Forrest – who has an estimated net worth of around $27 billion – said that he had not fully appreciated the threat posed by climate change at the time of forming Fortescue Metals, but had grown to appreciate the impact that major industrial consumers of fossil fuels were having on the environment.


“When I started the company, I didn’t really know a great deal about global warming. It was starting to be spoken about, of course, but it wasn’t taken seriously,” Forrest said.

“There was no societal expectations at all that you’d ever set up a huge industrial company, not using oil and gas, diesel and coal.

“But… I became serious about trying to understand global warming. So seriously, in fact, I sent myself back to school, I did a PhD in marine ecology.

“I began to understand that global warming literally has the oceans regurgitate its oxygen, it becomes barren… what we see just in the Anthropocene are major impacts now from climate warming, happening before our very eyes” Forrest added.

The organisation was launched as part of the New York Climate Week, timed to coincide with a meeting of the United Nations General Assembly.

Several world leaders have used the UN meeting to strengthen their commitments to cutting global greenhouse gas emissions, including a commitment from Chinese leader Xi Jinping to cease his country’s support for the overseas construction of new coal fired power stations.

On Wednesday, China’s hydrogen industry body, which is supported and supervised by the government, called for 100GW of green hydrogen electrolysers by 2030 – a target that Forrest has in mind for his own green hydrogen ambitions.

However, Australian prime minister Scott Morrison has made no new commitments, revealing that his government has yet to reach a position on whether it will join a number of key international allies in adopting a zero net emissions pledge for 2050.

Forrest made clear that he sees decarbonisation as the future of Australian, and international, industry.

“There is now an opportunity to use our industrial might – the fact that [Fortescue is] a heavy carbon-emitting company to use that as an example – to drive a wedge between the argument that if you’re a company, which society depends upon but you’re also heavy carbon emitter, then you have to still stay a heavy carbon emitter. That is a fallacious argument,” Forrest said.

Forrest also lamented the amount of funds spent on unsuccessful carbon capture and storage projects.

“Carbon sequestration has robbed the economies of the world of more money than any bank robber ever possibly could, then you’ll realise because it simply doesn’t work,” Forrest said.

Turnbull is already collaborating with Forrest through the latter’s clean energy spin-off – Fortescue Future Industries – which will drive the resources company’s push into renewable energy and green hydrogen production. The intention is to see the Fortescue group of companies shift from one predominantly built around iron ore and steel, to one focused on sustainable materials and renewable hydrogen.

Turnbull was appointed as Fortescue Future Industries’ chairman in February, with the subsidiary setting itself the ambitious goal of developing 1,000GW of new renewable energy projects globally, including plans for up to 40GW in Australia. Fortescue has also committed to invest at least 10 per cent of future earnings into the ‘future industries’ business.

The new Green Hydrogen Organisation will have a presence across Australia, the United States and Europe. It will be led by the former head of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative, Jonas Moberg.

Michael Mazengarb is a journalist with RenewEconomy, based in Sydney. Before joining RenewEconomy, Michael worked in the renewable energy sector for more than a decade.

Andrew Forrest spearheads global green hydrogen push
Bloomberg News | September 23, 2021 | 

Andrew Forrest (Credit: Ernst & Young)

Iron ore billionaire Andrew Forrest and former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will spearhead a new global body to promote greater use of hydrogen produced from renewable sources, targeting a 25% slice of the world energy market by 2050.


The Green Hydrogen Organization, to be known as GH2, was unveiled in New York Thursday to coincide with climate and energy discussions between world leaders at the United Nations. The group will seek to engage with governments to establish energy policies that stimulate demand and markets for the fuel, it said in a document.

“Green hydrogen is the sleeping giant of the energy transition and I believe it will have a bigger impact on tackling climate change than any other technology,” Forrest, chairman of Fortescue Metals Group Ltd. and founding member of the GH2 Board, said in a statement.

Forrest says his Fortescue business is pivoting to become a major clean energy producer over the next decade, and is trialing programs that use hydrogen as a substitute for metallurgical coal in the steel-making process.

While hydrogen produced from solar and wind power is not currently able to compete on cost with fossil fuels as a major source of energy supply, it is widely touted as the best future option to decarbonize industries like steel, cement, fertilizers, shipping and aviation.

GH2, of which Turnbull will be chairman, will host an international Green Hydrogen summit in Barcelona next May 2022.

(By James Thornhill)

 

Two New, Rare Freshwater Mussel Species Discovered

Sep 7, 2021 by News Staff / Source

An international team of scientists has discovered two new species of freshwater mussels endemic to the island of Borneo and established a new genus for them.

Khairuloconcha lunbawangorum and Khairuloconcha sahanae. Image credit: Zieritz et al., doi: 10.1002/aqc.3695.

Freshwater mussels are a crucial part of many freshwater habitats globally.

They live on the bottom of all kinds of freshwater habitats, where they filter algae, bacteria and other organisms from the water, thereby acting as biological filters and playing a major role in nutrient cycling.

They can remove algae, bacteria and other material at a rate of about one liter of water per hour per mussel.

Much of this material is subsequently transported to the benthos (organisms living on the bottom of the habitat), providing food for insects and other invertebrates, which thrive in mussel beds in terms of both abundance and diversity.

The island of Borneo has an exceptionally high number of freshwater mussels, with 15 of the 20 currently recognized native species being restricted to the island.

The two new species, named Khairuloconcha lunbawangorum and Khairuloconcha sahanae, are known from the basins of Limbang and Kinabatangan rivers, respectively.

“The new species are very rare, known only from a single site each (one in Sarawak, one in Sabah), and highly threatened by ongoing habitat destruction,” said Dr. Alexandra Zieritz, a researcher in the School of Geography at the University of Nottingham and the School of Environmental and Geographical Sciences at the University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus.

“One of these species is at especially high risk of extinction, as the only site it’s known from has already been dedicated for an industrial oil palm plantation.”

“We are in the process of preparing the paperwork with the University of Malaysia Sarawak to get this area protected.”

“This would not only help the unique biodiversity in this area but also the indigenous Lun Bawang tribe after which we named that species, Khairuloconcha lunbawangorum.”

The declines of existing populations of freshwater mussels on Borneo have likely been caused by industrial-scale deforestation and land-use change from primary rainforest to agricultural monocultures (predominantly oil palm plantations).

“These practices result in high levels of soil erosion, strongly increasing sediment yield (amount of sediment run-off), and organic and inorganic pollution (via agricultural run-off) of rivers, all of which negatively affects freshwater mussels directly, by degrading habitat quality, or indirectly by reducing host fish populations that they require to complete their life cycles,” the researchers said.

“Other potential drivers of declines in Borneo’s freshwater mussel populations include pollution from domestic and industrial sewage, hydrological alterations, mining, climate change and invasive species.”

The study appears in the journal Aquatic Conservation.

_____

Alexandra Zieritz et al. A new genus and two new, rare freshwater mussel (Bivalvia: Unionidae) species endemic to Borneo are threatened by ongoing habitat destruction. Aquatic Conservation, published online September 3, 2021; doi: 10.1002/aqc.3695

 

Researchers Identify Seven Behavior and Personality Traits in Cats

Sep 9, 2021 by News Staff / Source

A team of scientists at the University of Helsinki has studied cat personality and behavior by collecting a large dataset of 4,316 cats from 56 different breeds, house cats and mixed breed cats, with online questionnaires.

Mikkola et al. examined the structure, test-retest reliability, inter-rater reliability, convergent validity and discriminant validity of a feline behavior and personality questionnaire and briefly examined the breed differences in personality and behavior. Image credit: Jan Mallander.

Cats have personalities, just like humans and other animals, with stable behavior differences between individuals.

Identification of a cat’s personality type is important as cats with different personalities have different environmental needs to reach a good life quality.

For example, active individuals may need more enrichment, such as playing, than less active individuals, and fearful cats may benefit from extra hiding places and owners’ peaceful lifestyle.

Cat behavior and personality have been studied with different approaches, for example, with owner-completed questionnaires.

The majority of these studies, however, lack a sufficient validation and reliability assessment of the questionnaires used.

“Compared to dogs, less is known about the behavior and personality of cats, and there is demand for identifying related problems and risk factors,” said first author Salla Mikkola, a doctoral researcher at the University of Helsinki and the Folkhälsan Research Center.

“We need more understanding and tools to weed out problematic behavior and improve cat welfare.”

“The most common behavioral challenges associated with cats relate to aggression and inappropriate elimination.”

In a questionnaire designed by the team, personality and behavior were surveyed through a total of 138 statements.

The questionnaire included five personality and two problematic behavior-related factors: activity/playfulness, fearfulness, aggression towards humans, sociability towards humans, sociability towards cats, litterbox issues, and excessive grooming.

“While the number of traits identified in prior research varies, activity/playfulness, fearfulness and aggression are the ones from among the traits identified in our study which occur the most often in prior studies,” Mikkola said.

“Litterbox issues and excessive grooming are not personality traits as such, but they can indicate something about the cat’s sensitivity to stress.”

“In addition to individuals, clear personality differences can be found between breeds. In other words, certain personality and behavior traits are more common among certain cat breeds.”

“The most fearful breed was the Russian Blue, while the Abyssinian was the least fearful,” said senior author Professor Hannes Lohi, also from the University of Helsinki and the Folkhälsan Research Center.

“The Bengal was the most active breed, while the Persian and Exotic were the most passive.”

“The breeds exhibiting the most excessive grooming were the Siamese and Balinese, while the Turkish Van breed scored considerably higher in aggression towards humans and lower in sociability towards cats.”

The team’s results appear in the journal Animals.

_____

Salla Mikkola et al. 2021. Reliability and Validity of Seven Feline Behavior and Personality Traits. Animals 11 (7): 1991; doi: 10.3390/ani11071991

 

Scientists Observe Biofluorescence in Burrowing Mammals for First Time

Sep 21, 2021 by Sergio Prostak

An international team of researchers led by the University of Georgia has documented ultraviolet biofluorescence in live southeastern pocket gophers (Geomys pinetis) and in museum specimens of four additional gopher species.

Southeastern pocket gophers (Geomys pinetis) are biofluorescent, giving off a colored glow when illuminated with UV light. Image credit: Pynne et al., doi: 10.1674/0003-0031-186.1.150.

“Ultraviolet (UV) biofluorescence has been extensively documented in plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates,” said lead author Dr. J.T. Pynne from the D. B. Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources at the University of Georgia and colleagues.

“Among vertebrates, biofluorescence is widespread in fish, amphibians, and birds. However, documented occurrences of biofluorescence are limited in reptiles and mammals.”

“Biofluorescence in mammal pelage previously was known from the family Didelphidae (New World opossums), but recently was documented in the European hedgehog (Erinaceus europaeus), New World flying squirrels (Glaucomys sp.), the platypus (Ornithorhynchus anatinus), and the family Pedetidae (springhares).”

“Presence in monotremes and metatherians suggests biofluorescence may be a retained characteristic from the nocturnal lifestyle of early mammals, but occurrence in multiple eutherian lineages raises questions about the evolutionary and ecological significance.”

In the new study, Dr. Pynne and co-authors used a handheld UV light to determine presence and extent of fluorescence on the pelage, bare skin and in the cheek pouches of captured southeastern pocket gophers.

“When held under UV light, all live individuals examined fluoresced bright orange-pink on the venter with duller fluorescence on the dorsum,” they said.

“Biofluorescence was brighter on the legs and chin where pelage color is lighter. Some individuals also fluoresced blue around the mouth and vibrissae.”

The researchers also tested specimens of four pocket gopher species — plains pocket gophers (Geomys bursarius), desert pocket gophers (Geomys arenarius), northern pocket gophers (Thomomys talpoides), and yellow-faced pocket gophers (Cratogeomys castanops) — archived at the Georgia Museum of Natural History.

The specimens fluoresced similar colors, though visual intensity was reduced relative to the live individuals examined.

“While the reason for pocket gophers’ and other animals’ ability to glow under UV light is still up for debate, it can serve as a unique introduction to the animals’ world,” Dr. Pynne said.

“With UV flashlights readily available, most anyone can highlight a foraging opossum in their backyard, for example, or watch how different insects light up at night.”

The findings were published in The American Midland Naturalist.

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J.T. Pynne et al. 2021. Ultraviolet Biofluorescence in Pocket Gophers. The American Midland Naturalist 186 (1): 150-155; doi: 10.1674/0003-0031-186.1.150

 

Study: Vampire Bats Prefer to Hunt with Socially Bonded Roostmates

Sep 23, 2021 by News Staff / Source

 

During nightly foraging trips, closely bonded females of common vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus) depart their roost separately, but often reunite far outside the roost to hunt together, says a new paper published today in the journal PLoS Biology.

The common vampire bats (Desmodus rotundus). Image credit: Uwe Schmidt.

Vampire bats roost together in trees where they can be observed grooming each other and even sharing regurgitated blood meals with hungry roostmates.

Previous research has shown this cooperative behavior is directed towards close relatives and social partners.

In the new study, Dr. Simon Ripperger and Dr. Gerald Carter from the Ohio State University, the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, and the the Museum fur Naturkunde at the Leibniz-Institute for Evolution and Biodiversity Science, aimed to investigate whether the bats’ social bonds also influence their foraging behavior.

The researchers attached tiny proximity sensors to 50 female vampire bats — including 27 wild bats and 23 that had been captive for nearly 2 years — before releasing them back into their wild roost on a cattle pasture in Tolé, Panama.

They found that although the tagged bats almost never left the roost together, closely bonded females often re-united far from the roost.

Bats that associated with more partners in the roost also met up with more partners during foraging trips.

“The bats may meet up with trusted partners during foraging trips to share information about hosts or access to an open wound,” the scientists said.

“This collaboration might save on the time and effort involved in selecting and preparing a wound site on the cattle.”

“The downward sweeping calls, which are similar to contact calls used to recognize partners in the roost, may also help the bats to identify friends and foes on the wing.”

“How far does ‘friendship’ go? We show that social bonds of vampire bats are not restricted to grooming and food sharing at the roost, but bonded individuals even hunt together, highlighting the complexity of their social relationships.”

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S.P. Ripperger & G.G. Carter. 2021. Social foraging in vampire bats is predicted by long-term cooperative relationships. PLoS Biol 19 (9): e3001366; doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.3001366