Ogasawara Islands:a unique ecosystem..[ 1722 ]

The Ogasawara Islands: Maintaining the balance of a unique ecosystem

The Ogasawara okamono aragai, with its semi-translucent body and small shell.

(Mainichi Japan) August 30, 2010
The Ogasawara Islands, a subprefecture of Tokyo floating in the Pacific, has attracted much attention this year because of the possibility that it may be registered as Japan's fourth Natural World Heritage site in the summer of next year. Believed never to have been contiguous with any other land mass, the Ogasawara Islands have fostered the evolution of unique organisms only found on the islands. However, the islands are rapidly losing diversity. Ahead of the October meeting of the 10th Conference of the Parties (COP10), a U.N. conference that will discuss how to best protect biodiversity, I visited the Ogasawara Islands to see some of the unique creatures there myself.

The light-pink blossom of a Hahajima nobotan.

In July, I climbed 463-meter-tall Mount Chibusa, the tallest peak on the inhabited island Hahajima. Even among the lush nature of the Ogasawara Islands, Mount Chibusa has a particularly large number of unique plants and animals.
Near the top of the mountain, atop the lustrous leaves of Ogasawara Biro palm trees, there was a snail carrying an extremely small shell upon its back. Hideaki Mori, a 29-year-old member of the foundation Japan Wildlife Research Center identified the snail as an Ogasawara okamono aragai. Only about half the size of an adult human's thumb and semi-transparent, I probably wouldn't have ever noticed the snail if it hadn't been pointed out to me. Mori said that the snail only lives in high-humidity areas of Hahajima.

A meguro sparrow, a designated national treasure. It's name means "black eyes."

Other unique species I saw here were wadan no ki, chrysanthemums that have evolved to be almost three meters tall, and Hahajima nobotan, a type of melastome with light pink blossoms. Both grow naturally only in the foggy, high-moisture environment of Hahajima. Additionally, I was able to see the Ogasawara lizard, and the hishikata maimai, a snail. At the foot of the mountain, I found a meguro, a type of sparrow that is black around its eyes and is designated a special natural treasure by the government.
Chichijima, an island with about 2,000 people -- five times the population of Hahajima -- is another island with many unique species. Here, on 302-meter-tall Mount Tsutsuji, a type of azalea called munin tsutsuji grew with white flowers, while a type of buzzard and the only bird-of-prey unique to the Ogasawara Islands, an Ogasawara nosuri, flew the skies. Additionally, on Chichijima, there are estimated to be about 150 of the Ogasawara okomori or the Bonin flying fox, a fruit bat and the only mammal unique to the Ogasawara Islands. The sizable bats have bodies 25 centimeters long and a wingspan of one meter. When the islands were under the control of the army of the United States, the bat was hunted for food and came close to extinction.

An Ogasawara nosuri, a buzzard unique to the Ogasawara Islands.

These islands are sometimes called "evolution's laboratory." Of the plants that grow here, 36 percent are unique to the islands, and of the insects that have been catalogued, 24 percent are unique. A dramatic example is found in land snails, with 114 of the 120 species catalogued here being unique to the islands. While generally not very mobile, it is thought that the snails made it onto the islands thanks to their ancestors being carried by birds from elsewhere. The snails then evolved into new species in response to their environments. The Ogasawara Islands even have a greater number of unique species than the similarly isolated Galapagos Islands of Ecuador, despite the latter having over 70 times the land area. If you compare the number of unique species per unit of area, the Ogasawara Islands have dozens of times more than the Galapagos.
"In the Ogasawara Islands, there are no earthworms or other such competitors in the soil, and there are few natural predators. It's a different environment to what is found on the mainland, and evolution in response to that environment proceeded at a rapid pace," says Satoshi Chiba, associate professor of ecology at Tohoku University.

An Ogasawara okomori, a large fruit bat native to the islands that was nearly hunted to extinction.

Gene analysis has found that the Ogasawara okamono aragai is a descendent of a snail found on the Marquesas Islands, located in French Polynesia. It is unknown when the snail arrived on the Ogasawara Islands, but over a long period, the snail lost much of its shell and evolved into its current form. Chiba infers that, being in a humid environment, the snail no longer had to protect its body from dehydration with a shell. The snail also shows a behavior of hiding in narrow spaces between plants, which may have reduced the need of the shell for protection from predators.
Even now, it seems every year new species are discovered on the Ogasawara Islands. There has even been discovered a species that only lives on the leaves of the agave plant, a foreign species thought to have been introduced since humans settled on the islands 180 years ago. (By Kosuke Hatta, Science and Environment writer)

Click here for the original Japanese story

Shock at Bratislava shooting..[ 1721 ]

Slovakia gunman shoots six dead before killing himself

 

Police rushed to the area and residents were warned to stay off the streets

 

BBC.,30 August 2010 Last updated at 14:11 GMT

A gunman has opened fire in Slovakia's capital, killing six people in a flat and injuring 14 others outside before shooting himself dead, police say.

Latest reports say four women and two men were killed in the incident, in the Devinska Nova Ves district, on the north-western outskirts of Bratislava.

The man, aged 50, shot himself dead after being surrounded, said officials.

Police said he had been armed with an automatic assault rifle and two handguns.

Cmdr Jaroslav Spisiak said police arrived as the gunman was leaving a house in which he had shot six people dead - one of the victims was found dead in a corridor outside the flat.

All those killed were believed to be members of the same family.

"He was alone. He fired at everything that moved during his escape bid," Cmdr Spisiak told reporters.

"More officers came, surrounded him, and he had no choice but to commit suicide."

Earlier reports had suggested the attacker was a 15-year-old boy.

Broken glass

• In pictures: Shock at Bratislava shooting

Details of the shooting remain sketchy and the motive for the attack is not yet known.

Eyewitnesses said the shooting took place on a busy street, near a supermarket and a kindergarten. Police rushed to the scene and sealed off the area.

A teacher at the nursery school, Marta Vozdranukova, told Slovak TV that a Roma (Gypsy) man was among those shot dead and that the gunman had attacked a family in a flat above the school.

There were no casualties in the school, she said. "An injured man crawled in, but he has been already taken away in an ambulance for treatment. We just gave him first aid."

A spokeswoman at Bratislava University Hospital said nine people were being treated there but none was in a serious condition.

"The most seriously injured patient has multiple shots in the stomach but I don't have the information that his life would be directly threatened," she said.

Local media reports said one of those injured was a police officer.

An emergency services spokeswoman, Dominika Sulkova, was quoted earlier as saying the death toll might rise.

"A three year-old child was present at the attack, but he is fortunately out of danger," she said.

"People who were injured by broken glass received treatment on the spot."

Canada: ship stuck in the Arctic Ocean..[ 1720 ]

Canada aids cruise ship stuck in the Arctic Ocean

By the CNN Wire Staff

August 30, 2010 -- Updated 0239 GMT (1039 HKT)

The crew of the Clipper Adventurer was unable to dislodge it during high tide.

(CNN) -- The Canadian coast guard began ferrying passengers on Sunday from a cruise ship that ran aground an unmapped rock.
Officials aboard the Clipper Adventurer reported their troubles on Friday. The crew failed to dislodge the ship during high tide on Saturday, while Sunday, a coast guard icebreaker arrived to transport the people on board to land.
No one of the estimated 128 passengers and 69 crew members were hurt or injured, said Theresa Nichols, a spokeswoman with the Canadian coast guard.
"They are in the midst of completing the operation of ferrying the passengers off," she said. "That operation should be just about finished."
The passengers are being taken to Kugluktuk, a small town on the shore of the Arctic Ocean, where accommodations have been arranged by the cruise ship company, said Nichols. They are then expected to fly to the Canadian city of Edmonton.
The grounded vessel is stable, but rests with a slight list, according to the company that operates the cruise ship, Adventure Canada.

"Weather remains favourable as passengers continue to enjoy onboard programming and hospitality," the company said in a statement.

Sudan, Two Russian pilots abducted.. [ 1719 ]

Two Russian pilots abducted in Sudan's troubled Darfur region

Darfur Independence Front / Darfur Independence Army (DIF/DIA) militants

05:43 30/08/2010

© AFP/ Mustafa Ozer

MOSCOW, August 30 (RIA Novosti)

Two Russian pilots were abducted on Sunday in the city of Nyala in Sudan's South Darfur province, the country's SUNA news agency reported on Monday.
Both pilots were employees of the Khartoum-based Badr Airlines, the agency said without giving further details. The airliner provides cargo and passenger air services for various international aid programs.
The civil war that broke out in the western region of Darfur in early 2003 has claimed the lives of more than 300,000, according to United Nations estimates, and forced 2.7 million people from their homes. Sudan puts the number of dead at 10,000.
Abductions of foreigners, including aid workers and peacekeepers, have been on the rise in the war-torn region in the past months. In most cases, foreign nationals are being abducted for ransom.
In the most recent similar incident, a Mi-8 helicopter of the Russian aviation company UTAir was seized by an armed tribal group in late July. The helicopter, with a crew of four Russians, later returned to its base in Nyala.

Related News

• Two peacekeepers abducted in Sudan's Darfur
• Moscow confirms release of Russian pilot in Sudan
• Russian helicopter pilots in Sudan beaten, one still missing - UN (Update 1)
• MSF confirms 3 international staff abducted in Darfur

Thessaloniki, Greece ..[ 1718 ]

Thessaloniki , Greece, image at an early       afternoon