Tracking Bees, Bugs and the Birds That Love Them

(From NPR) For decades now, ecologists have been attaching radio transmitters to the bodies of large animals: whales, bears, elephants, condors and eagles for starters. What these scientists haven't done is stick the same devices onto animals like song birds and big insects, those migratory flying things that sometimes mow down crops and spread diseases.

For eight years now, Wikelski's been the leader of a group of scientists who do collect those data points, with the help of radio transmitters no bigger than a baby's thumbnail. These scientists are known as "microtrackers" and for now they're few and far between.

But Wikelski's work is changing that by forcing ornithologists to change the way they think about migration. His first microtracking studies started nearly a decade ago when Wikelski captured groups of mid-Western thrush and glued extremely sophisticated radio transmitters to the bellies of these birds.

"The transmitters recorded heartbeat, breathing, wing beats and location," he said. "Once every second, they sent all this information out in concentrated bursts."

Wikelski says we know very little about how small animals migrate. Scientists would find out where birds are born and where they die. They would discover where birds are making pit stops on their trips home. And they would be able to track locust swarms and birds that could carry avian flu across international boundaries.

Wikelski turned the focus of his research to flying insects. With the help of prominent entomologists like Mike May of Rutgers University, he's been attaching even smaller transmitters to the backs and bellies of insects. Listen and read more on NPR.

100 Years of Club Plummers Island

The Washington Post Features the The Washington Biologists' Field Club which is celebrating 100 years of self-professed geekdom (six years late) this year, with a 150-page volume summarizing a century of counting every living thing on Plummers Island, the club's buggy, overgrown paradise a few steps into the Potomac, just downriver from the American Legion Bridge.

Established in 1901 as a weekend retreat, Plummers Island, called by the field club "the most thoroughly studied island in North America," today represents one of the most comprehensive, longest-running biological inventories in the country.

Scrambling over Plummers Island's rock and scrub, club members have documented every living thing known to have existed there. To date, that includes 885 species of vascular plants, 70 mosses and 597 beetles -- not to be confused with the five different cockroaches they have found

The stories begin in 1899, when botanist Charles Pollard formed the Washington Biologists' Field Club, and began the search for a suitable field camp.
In 1901, the group leased Plummers Island, which it bought seven years later. For about $200, the members built at its rocky pinnacle a wooden cabin with few amenities beyond a big fieldstone fireplace and lean-to kitchen.

At the time, the island was a mix of untended farmland, forest, rock and shoreline. The blend drew plenty of creatures and plant life, and the members began collecting, each in his area of expertise.

For about three decades, Shetler has collected plants on the island. Opening a steel cabinet down the hall from his Smithsonian office, he flipped through yellowed folders. Inside rested mistflower specimens collected as early as 1917, the vivid blue blossoms on some still colorful.

*Washington Biologists' Field Club Website

West Nile Virus Depends on Robin Distribution

A recent study of West Nile Virus transmission in the DC area found that the number of infections in humans depends on the density of the local population of American Robins. Researchers set up mosquito traps baited with dry ice in several local parks: the 26th Street Dog Run, National Mall, and Fort Dupont Park in DC; and Camden Yards, Takoma Park, and Bethesda in Maryland. Birds at the same sites were caught in mist nets for blood tests.

Robins, it turns out, appear to be taking the hit forhumans, getting sick and dying as did thousands of crows that wereinfected in the first wave of West Nile virus after it arrived in NorthAmerica. Thanks to the robins, humans who frequent the 26th Street dogpark and similar areas have a lower chance of contracting the virus, atleast in spring and early summer months. The reason? To mosquitoes,robins are far more tempting meals.

Then the scene changes.

"Robinsbegin to migrate south in late July and August," Kilpatrick said,"leaving mosquitoes on the hunt for blood from another source."

That source turns out to be Homo sapiens. The number of human infections with the virus shoots up come the dogdays of August. Then it's mosquito vs. man or woman, instead ofmosquito vs. robin.

The authors of the original article in PLoS Biology argue that the pattern of infection - birds in early summer and humans in late summer - has increased the prevalence of the disease in both mosquitos and humans:

Feeding shifts have two synergistic effects on the intensity of WNV transmission to humans. First, we have shown that the increase over time in the probability of Cx. pipiens feeding on humans results in a greater number of human WNV infections than if the mosquitoes fed on humans with the same probability as in early summer (Figure 1C). Second, feeding primarily on WNV-competent avian hosts during the amplification period of the epidemiological cycle maximizes the intensity of the epidemic in mosquitoes.... This is because mosquito WNV prevalences are already beginning to decline (possibly as a result of increased acquired immunity in juvenile birds) when mammals begin to make up an important fraction of the blood meals. Thus, the shift in feeding from competent hosts early in the season to humans later leads first to greater amplification of the virus as transmission intensifies between birds and mosquitoes and subsequently to an even greater number of human WNV infections.

The continuing presence of the West Nile Virus in the DC area is a reminder to take reasonable precautions against mosquito bites, especially in late summer: do not keep standing water around your house; use insect repellent on bare skin or keep skin covered. (See this CDC advice on avoiding bites.)

Droppings Blamed For "Contamination"

A major source of chemical contamination in the Arctic turns out to be bird droppings. Wind currents and human activities long have been blamed for fouling the pristine Arctic. But a study by a group of Canadian researchers found that the chemical pollution in areas frequented by seabirds can be many times higher than in nearby regions.

Scientists report in Friday's issue of the journal Science that the ponds, which receive falling guano from a colony of northern fulmars that nest on the cliffs, have highly elevated amounts of chemicals. More from the Washington Post.