Newfoundland, part of the easternmost province of Canada, is a place of wild nature where one can dive on WWII wrecks, in historic iron-ore mines, birdwatch, snorkel with humpback whales and kayak with minke whales. Brandi Mueller shares her adventure there.
Scientists studying endangered southern resident orcas have noticed a steady increase of mysterious gray patches and gray targets (circular lesions which may appear on concentric rings – ed.) on the whales’ skin from 2004 to 2016.
To date, researchers managed to identify six distinct types of lesions, with the two most common types being gray patches or targets. Some resemble tattooed skin.
They do not know the cause of the lesions and are worried that they could be due to underlying health problems in the struggling population.
A new study demonstrates how animals recognise self-images.
Some animals have the remarkable capacity for mirror self-recognition (MSR), yet any implications for self-awareness remain uncertain.
In a test of MSR ability in cleaner fish, mirror-naive fish initially attacked photograph models of both themselves and unfamiliar strangers. In contrast, after all fish had passed the mirror mark test, they did not attack their own (motionless) images, but still frequently attacked those of unfamiliar individuals.
When a swarm of tiger sharks attacked a Netflix video crew's boat, the boat was punctured, and they were forced to make an emergency landing on a beach in Hawaii.
The team had been gathering material for the David Attenborough documentary Our Planet II. They were operating an inflatable boat around the Laysan area of Northwestern Hawaiian Islands in order to capture footage of tiger sharks consuming young albatross fledglings.
