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Mandy Conway, ACTHA Newsletter Editor, has again been featured in an article in the Canberra Times on the volume of native animals being cared for by ACT Wildlife. ACTHA has provided ACT Wildlife with a grant in the past to support their work - we wish them (and Mandy) all the best with this very large workload! Read the article in full on the Canberra Times website.
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Head over to The Conversation to read more of this unfortunate tale of likely extinction and thoughts on what could have been done to prevent it. 
Vale 'Gump' - the last known member of her species. Photo: Director of National Parks
 Image: Mark Bridger/Shutterstock One of the first studies conducted on young reptiles reared without contact with their siblings is challenging the assumption that only mammals and birds are shaped by social interactions.
"Our results demonstrate that rearing these animals in different environments strongly affects their social development," said Cissy Ballen, a PhD candidate in the University of Sydney's School of Biological Sciences and lead author of the paper published in Animal Behaviour. Read the article on Science Alert here. The first issue of a new informal newsletter communicating the results of recent research on freshwater turtles of Australasia and some of the impacts that research is having on policy and management has just come out. The newsletter is informal, in that it is not associated with any particular society, but rather an avenue for communicating discoveries and ideas among a loose collection of individuals interested in research on this fascinating element of our fauna. It's an excellent read and very much worthwhile checking out - head over here to subscribe to the newsletter.  The Canberra Times reported today of a snake vs. snake encounter: "Gavin Fletcher of Bonython got quite a surprise when the “ball of rope rolling around” on a walking track turned out to be two of Australia's most venomous snakes locked in a deadly duel." Head over to the Canberra Times to read the article.  Photo: Gavin Fletcher This isn't an uncommon occurrence - Neil Hurst provided ACTHA with footage of a similar encounter between two Eastern Brown Snakes three years ago. Check out the video below to learn a little bit about these unusual encounters, eastern brown snakes generally and see the footage of a brown snake eating another brown snake (trust me: it's fascinating). To learn more about snakes, and reptiles generally, be sure to head over to Snakes Alive! at the Australian National Botanic Gardens which is running from 20 - 26 January 2014. Learn more about Snakes Live! here.
 A lizard captures oxygen from air both when inhaling and exhaling—a feat normally associated with birds. Many scientists believe birds developed the adaptation to cope with the enormous requirements of energy needed to take flight, and the discovery of "unidirectional breathing" in the savannah monitor lizard raises questions about when and why the trait first evolved.
View the article and learn more.  When it comes to male-on-male chameleon battles, sometimes it’s not all about who’s the biggest or the strongest. Sometimes it’s about mastering what chameleons do best – changing colours.
View the article to learn more. |
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