Wildlife biologist looks for the jersey devil…

ok… he’s actually looking for a giant weasel… called a fisher…

jaguars just over the NY border?

Big cat sitings in Palisades NY? Really? And not cougar or bobcat, we’re talking Jaguar or black panther, those sleek sexy big black cats. Odds are it’s mis-identification since those cats do not live anywhere but South America and Asia, still…

new PBS web video about NBI

PBS has a new series on it’s website called The City Concealed. it’s first episode focuses on North brother Island, and it’s use by birds as a nesting ground. It’s short but interesting and features interviews with the Audubon Society. Below is a press release about the show.

THIRTEEN LAUNCHES UPDATED WEBSITE THIRTEEN.ORG/VIDEO
With Niall Ferguson’s ASCENT OF MONEY and THE CITY CONCEALED: NORTH BROTHER ISLAND July 8th

FULL-LENGTH PROGRAMS NOW AVAILABLE ONLINE INCLUDING NATIONAL AND LOCAL SHOWS

New York, NY – July 1 – To kick off the launch of the newly updated Thirteen.org/Video, the local website of New York public media provider, THIRTEEN, the station will feature the full-length mini-series of Niall Ferguson’s ASCENT OF MONEY. Each episode of the program, which premieres on PBS stations nationwide on July 8, 15, 22 and 29 at 9 p.m. (ET), will be available online the morning of its broadcast air-date. This groundbreaking four-part series traces the rise of the modern financial system by taking viewers on a global trek through the history of money.

With its new video capabilities, Thirteen.org/video, will deliver hundreds of hours of programming to its users, including national programs such as NATURE, ANTIQUES ROADSHOW, FRONTLINE, MASTERPIECE, PBS NEWSHOUR, WIDE ANGLE, and NOVA and locally produced programs including THE CITY CONCEALED, REEL13 SHORTS, WORLDFOCUS, and IT’S THE ECONOMY, NY.

In addition, THIRTEEN will continue to produce its own original online content, catering to a hyper-local New York audience with shows like THE CITY CONCEALED and REEL13 SHORTS. THE CITY CONCEALED is a series of short documentaries about New York City’s hidden treasures. The latest episode, North Brother Island, will premiere with the new video player. Past episodes include Fresh Kills Park in Staten Island, The United Palace Theatre in Harlem, and Weeksville, the city’s first African-American free town established in the 1800s. REEL13.org is a destination for short film submissions, voting and viewing. Three shorts are presented each week and the winner of a public online vote is broadcast on THIRTEEN on Saturday nights. The REEL 13.org video library has close to 130 films available for streaming.

Thirteen.org/video will provide superior improved navigation capabilities, allowing users to search and find their favorite shows by theme, episode, host and date and watch full-length programs on demand.

I’m ready for my close up Mr Demille

TLC now has the zombie cake episode of Cake Boss up on their site.

You can see us several times in the video including…

1:56 all of us can be seen shambling with the other zombies
20:24 briefly you see me
20:31 longer shot of me
20:57 andrew and my wife are directly behind the zombie king and queen
21:11 andrew can be seen with zombie benny
21:36 you can see my son and wife, and my wife taking the zombie hand (which now resides in my freezer)I’m ready for my close up Mr Demille

lots of underground to explore in Naples…

and the underground is easily accessible…

//marks off Naples on my list of places to visit.

cannons make big boom

Ringwood manor will be having a cannon demonstration at Sunday. They will be showing of cannons, talking about their manufacture and use, and at noon and 2 pm: BOOM!

set your tivo’s cause my son’s gonna be on tv

When we went o the As-Buried Park zombie walk, a cake was presented at the afterparty by Buddy Valostro, start of the TLC series, Cake Boss. Afterwards they interviewed some of the zombies, including my son. No guarentee that his interview will make the episode, but at least you’ll be able to see the cake, and you’ll definitely see me.

The episode airs 6/22 at 10 pm on TLC.

Life After People discusses what will happen to Atlantic City

First of all, if you’re not watching life after people on the History channel, why not?!? It discusses what will happen to the world if we suddenly disapeared. As the ads say “this is not the story of why we disappear, but of what happens to the world we leave behind.” The most recent episode Sin City, discusses what will happen to places like LV and AC in a world without people.

white nose syndrome killing bats in northeast in staggering numbers

story

Between the densely forested banks of the Musconetcong River, a lone brown bat fluttered and tilted through a light drizzle to scoop up the newly hatched mayflies hovering over the dark water as it flowed through Stephen’s State Park.

It is a scene quickly disappearing from New Jersey — and the rest of the Northeast.

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Extinction is a possibility for North American bats, biologists said last week as they continued to battle the enigmatic “white-nose syndrome” that has killed more than 1 million of the winged mammals since 2007 in nine states from Vermont to Virginia.

Bats help nature maintain an ecological balance and assist agriculture by feeding on insects. They also devour the pests that tend to bug people cooking or camping out in the summer months. Biologists contend a bat population of 100,000 eats upward of 21 tons of insects from spring to fall.

Last month, scientists entered the Hibernia mine in Rockaway Township, one of the region’s largest bat “hibernaculum” or hibernating locations, to check on the bats before they normally fly out to summer roosting areas.

“We counted only 750 bats. … We normally find between 26,000 and 29,000 bats in our counts there at the same time each year,” said Mick Valent, a zoologist with the state Division of Fish and Wildlife.

It is unclear whether the missing bats, 95 percent of the population, are dead. But that has been the trend in other states since New York biologist Alan Hicks discovered the syndrome in 2006.

“White-nose syndrome” was discovered in New Jersey in January when Valent found hundreds of dead bats in the Hibernia mine. Other bats displayed classic traits of the syndrome — prematurely leaving hibernation and frantically taking to the skies in search of insects that had not yet hatched. With their fat reserves exhausted and food unavailable, the bats froze and died.

Valent said there is a chance that some of the Hibernia mine bats survived and left the mine days before he got there.

“Some states had found bats in the areas of their summer roosts two to three weeks earlier than normal,” Valent said. “I do know we had a high mortality. But we’ll have a better sense of mortality in the fall when we see how many survived the summer and return to the hibernaculum.”

Yet white-nose syndrome — so-named because of a strange white fungus that appears on the noses and wings of affected bats –stresses bats even after they emerge from hibernation. Scientists are finding the wing membranes damaged on many bats and they fear the females may not be able to reproduce.

“We’ve found scar tissue and actual decomposition on the wings. If they can’t navigate properly in flight, they can’t feed and they can’t reproduce,” said Professor Thomas Kuhns, director of the Center for Ecology and Conservation Biology at Boston University.

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The nine species of bats found in New Jersey, for example, mate in the fall before entering the hibernaculum, but suspend fertilization throughout hibernation and until they re-emerge in the spring. If the female bat has enough fat reserves, it will ovulate, become pregnant and give birth to one pup in summer.

“We predict some of them will not have enough fat to ovulate and ones with damaged wings will not get enough food to produce milk for the pups,” said Kuhns, who will lead a research team this summer to observe female bat roosting sites known as “maternity colonies” in old barns and trees.

Other biologists from several states, private organizations and government agencies may be close to determining a cause, how it spreads, and how to stop a potential wildfire-run across the nation. The fear is that white-nose syndrome will move to North America’s largest bat colonies in the South and Southwest.

“We have a strong circumstantial case for the fungus,” said microbiologist David Blehert at the National Health Center of the United States Geological Survey in Wisconsin, noting that until now, scientists were unsure whether the fungus was a symptom, side effect or the actual culprit.

“We have a paper coming out in the next two weeks, which … describes the fungus as a new species and names it. The best data we have to date is, that it is associated with and causes severe skin infections with the bats we studied,” he added.

Yet the bat deaths may still be part of a more complex relationship between the fungus and other factors, said Kuhns of Boston University, noting studies have found hibernating bats lack necessary unsaturated fats — an important ingredient for survival and reproduction.

“It seems likely if the animals are not coming out in good condition from hibernation, the chances of raising young is not going to be successful. I think were are facing a double whammy,” said Hicks, the New York biologist.

Abandoned Camp in Sussex County

Located in between two active camps in the heart of Sussex County, lie two abandoned camps. There are the remains of a road which leads to one of the camps, and there’s evidence of recent vehicular traffic, but this camp has not seen use for at least 2-3 decades if not more. I’m still researching it’s name and history, so for now, I can only provide photographs. You can see all of them here on Flickr but below are a few teaser shots.

We hiked from the other camp (the one which doesn’t have road access, and followed a trail, but went the wrong way at the fork. Then the trail disappeared and we couldn’t find any more blazes. We knew it was at the base of a ridge so we followed the base of the ridge, mainly following deer trails. We encountered a snake, several tree frogs, but luckily no bears. We found bear scat and even owl vomit along the way before finally hitting the camp itself. At that very moment, the batteries on my camera died, and I did not have any spares as the camera gave me no warning at all. Luckily the boy scout leader who was leading the way gave me his batteries (since he didn’t have a memory card in his camera rendering it useless anyway) We had hiked (bushwhacked really) nearly 2 hours, and over the course of the day covered 7-8 miles.

Enjoy the pics…