Family feuds - the animals also keep their distance with relatives!
June 10, 2008 by Elaine
Filed under Species Adaptation and Biodiversity
Closely related species of Pairie dog don’t live together (Photo credit Imperial College) Ever wondered why family feuds result in fighting relatives keeping their distance … often for a very long time? Well, reseachers at Imperial College, UK have observed that steering clear of your rels may have evolutionary beginnings. Mammals cannot share their habitat with closely related species because the need for the same kind of food and shelter would lead them to compete to the death. This idea that closely related species would be unlikely to be found together because they compete ferociously was first put forward by Charles Darwin in 1859. This study provides the most evidence so far for Darwin’s prediction, thanks to the new complete ‘family tree’ for mammals, developed by Imperial biologists last year, and new comprehensive data on the location and make-up of different mammal communities worldwide. The new research focused on communities of three different types of mammals: new world monkeys (including marmosets, tamarins and spider monkeys), possums, and ground squirrels (including marmots, prairie dogs and chipmunks). For further information, click on: http://www3.imperial.ac.uk/newsandeventspggrp/imperialcollege/newssummary/news_28-5-2008-10-20-29?newsid=37114 Elaine Warburton www.geneticsandhealth.com
Species protection - Pledge to set up deep sea nature reserve
June 2, 2008 by Elaine
Filed under Species Adaptation and Biodiversity
(Photo credit: www.marinebio.org)
At the Convention on Biological Diversity meeting in Bonn nearly 200 countries agreed on measures to protect the world’s most threatened wildlife. They pledged:
1. To set up a deep-sea nature reserve and increase by tens of millions of hectares the area of land protected (the resulting protected area would be twice the size of Germany).
2. To ban experiments to boost plankton growth to reverse climate change, because of the potential risks to other animals.
3. To set global standards for developing biofuels, a renewable energy that has been blamed for deforestation.
But environmentalists said the progress achieved at the conference was still failing the UN Millennium Development Goal, which aims to “substantially reduce” biodiversity loss by 2010.
Elaine Warburton www.geneticsandhealth.com
