Oh my god! Why are these people dumping shit into the sea? ! | Nature Trumpet

In the past month or so, we've collected these interesting studies: artificial whale poop, newly hatched ghost sharks, northern elephant seals with self-navigating functions, cockatoos that play golf, and dinosaurs with super short arms.

Artificial whale shit

Recently, scientists will start a magical experiment: adding artificial whale poop into the ocean.

Sperm whale | Gabriel Barathieu / Wikimedia Commons

What is the use of whale feces? In fact, the process of whale defecation is actually fertilizing the ocean. The natural fertilizer provided by whales can make phytoplankton reproduce in large numbers, and these phytoplankton can feed billions of fish; phytoplankton also absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. When the fish that eat them die and sink to the seabed, the carbon will also be deposited on the seabed and no longer enter the carbon cycle. This is called a biological pump, which is a good way to remove greenhouse gases.

Whale poop is rich in iron, which is why it looks red | L. Flores-Cascante et al., 2012

However, after whales were hunted in large numbers in the last century, the amount of whale feces in the ocean also decreased, and scientists had to start studying alternatives - artificial whale feces.

What materials are used to make artificial feces? The researchers said they are considering using iron-rich sand or volcanic ash. In short, the final artificial feces will contain a mixture of nitrates, silicates, phosphates and iron. They also plan to use rice husks, an industrial waste, as a raft to transport artificial feces to the sea.

However, the ocean cannot be dumped at will, and strict regulations must be followed. Therefore, this experiment is currently only being carried out on a small scale off the west coast of India and will only last for three weeks. Scientists believe that once the whale population can slowly recover, we will no longer need artificial whale poop.

Whale poop floating in the ocean (it's even kind of pretty?) | Franco Banfi / Nature Picture Library

Baby "ghost shark"

Near New Zealand's South Island, researchers discovered a newly hatched "ghost shark."

Newly hatched ghost shark baby looks like an alien creature | Brit Finucci

It was caught accidentally while investigating other commercial fish. Its body is translucent and gelatinous, with big black eyes. In the egg sac, the embryo consumes the yolk to obtain energy, so its stomach is still full of yolk shortly after hatching. Researchers believe that it is likely to belong to one of the more than 50 ghost shark species that have been discovered.

Why do ghost sharks not look like sharks? In fact, they are not real sharks, but relatives of sharks and rays, belonging to the genus Chimaera. The "ghost" in their name is because they look weird, like underwater ghosts. Ghost sharks are also very strange in structure, their entire body is made of cartilage, without bones.

Ghost sharks of the deep ocean | NOAA / Wikimedia Commons

The researchers were very surprised to find this baby ghost shark. Ghost shark egg sacs develop and hatch on the seafloor. They are small and in the deep sea, so it is almost impossible to see them. The individuals collected so far are almost all adult specimens, and little is known about ghost shark larvae.

The researchers plan to perform genetic testing on the baby ghost shark to determine what species it belongs to. Then they can compare the juvenile with adults of the same species to study how the ghost shark's color, size and eating habits change as it grows.

Parrot playing golf

In this "mini golf course", the parrot must first throw a small ball into the field, then use a wooden stick to push the ball to the corresponding position to make it fall, and then the nut will fall out of the side of the device. Five of the 11 Goffin's cockatoos (Cacatua goffiniana) who participated in the test completed the test. They swung with different parts of the club, but they all ate the nuts in the end.

Three parrots use sticks in different ways | Antonio J. Osuna-Mascaró et al.

For parrots, playing golf is a remarkable achievement: this example of composite tool use is rare in the animal kingdom. The researchers were inspired to conduct this experiment by a parrot named Figaro. They happened to observe the parrot dropping a stone and then retrieving it with a stick. In the test, Figaro also performed very well. Not only was he the only parrot to solve the problem successfully in the first round, but he also learned to cheat in the second round - he used the stick as a lever to shake the "course" and got the nut without putting the ball into the hole.

Built-in navigation

Scientists have discovered that the northern elephant seal (Mirounga angustirostris) is an animal with precise navigation capabilities.

Northern elephant seal | Frank Schulenburg / Wikimedia Commons

Every year, pregnant female northern elephant seals leave the beach and travel about 10,000 kilometers in search of food. After spending about 240 days in the eastern North Pacific, they return to the beach of their breeding grounds and give birth within 5 days of arrival. What's amazing is that elephant seals far from the beach start their migration earlier than those close to the beach, as if they also know they need more time to reach their destination.

Northern elephant seal mother and pup | Brocken Inaglory / Wikimedia Commons

Researchers wanted to know how elephant seals scattered in the ocean decide when to set out to return to the beach. Between 2004 and 2015, they marked and tracked 108 adult female northern elephant seals and collected data on 126 complete migrations. The results showed that when the elephant seals set out to return to the beach had nothing to do with the success of foraging or the size of their body fat percentage. They seemed to know exactly how far they were from their homeland thousands of kilometers away, and how long it would take to get back to the beach from here.

Researchers hope to figure out in the future what clues northern elephant seals rely on to determine their location and move in the right direction at the right time. The better we understand them, the better we can protect their populations.

Dinosaurs also had short arms

Scientists discovered the skull of a new dinosaur and concluded that it had short, useless arms!

In Argentina, paleontologists have discovered a 70-million-year-old dinosaur skull. The newly discovered species, named Guemesia ochoai, belongs to the Abelisauridae family.

This newly discovered dinosaur probably looked like its abelisaurid relative, the horned Carnotaurus sastrei. Guemesia ochoai, however, lacked horns, but probably had the same short arms | Fred Wierum / Wikimedia Commons

The researchers believe that Guemesia ochoai probably had very short forelimbs, just like its abelisaurid relatives. These forelimbs were extremely degenerate and usually hung down in front of the chest, unable to bend or grasp - even worse than the short hands of Tyrannosaurus Rex! Studies have shown that the short hands of Tyrannosaurus Rex could still play a supporting role when hunting.

Despite their two useless arms, abelisaurids were able to subdue prey with their skulls and jaws - they were powerful enough to even take down titanosaurs.

Titanosaurs were giant herbivorous dinosaurs that could reach more than 30 meters in length | Nobu Tamura / Wikimedia Commons

However, Guemesia ochoai differs from other abelisaurids in two important ways: it has no horns, while the skulls of most abelisaurids are covered with horns; and it lived in what is now northern Argentina, while most abelisaurids lived in Patagonia in southern Argentina, suggesting that abelisaurids could adapt to different ecosystems.

Compared to its relatives living in Patagonia, Guemesia ochoai has rows of extra holes on the front of its skull, which allow it to pump blood to the surface of the skin, releasing heat to cool down its body temperature. Scientists believe this is the result of the species' adaptation to the warm climate there.

References

[1]https://www.newscientist.com/article/2309262-scientists-want-to-restore-the-oceans-with-artificial-whale-poo/

[2]https://www.livescience.com/ghost-shark-hatchling-new-zealand

[3]https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-05529-9

[4]https://www.cell.com/current-biology/fulltext/S0960-9822(22)00042-2

[5]https://www.livescience.com/new-armless-carnivorous-dinosaur

Author: Maotun, Mai Mai

Editor: Mai Mai, Rain Knocking on the Window

This article comes from the Species Calendar, welcome to forward

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