Green Expander

2008 is here and it’s time to resume our activity! We hope you had a nice New Year’s Party and you already made the 2008 resolution. To begin the year with some good news, here is a follow up to the successful New Animal Species article. The lost world of animals is teeming with life that scientists are just discovering. Here’s a look at some animal species recently found by scientists in the depths of the jungles.

Even though the discovery is not as fresh as the others, the Rorqual whales is definitely worth mentioning, since whale species are in a rapid decline. They range from 26 to 92 ft. (8 to 28 meters) in length and weigh up to 220,000 pounds (100,000 kilograms), have no teeth and are found in most of the world’s oceans, being recognized for their long bodies. The Japanese scientists identified a new species of rorqual, Balaenoptera omurai, showing that the species previously referred to as Bryde’s whale are distinct species. “Currently, all baleen whales are protected by an international moratorium on commercial hunting. If this moratorium were to be overturned, however, you need to understand both taxonomic identity and population structure in order to estimate abundance and calculate an appropriate catch limit,”said Tadasu Yamada, a biologist at the National Science Museum in Tokyo and co-author of the research describing the species.

A new discovery comes from the Peruvian Amazon, where a previously unknown species of bird has been discovered. The scientists say the brownish-red colored bird remained hidden since it is located in a largely inaccessible habitat: thickets of thorny bamboo (Guadua weberbaueri) in southeastern Peru. “Presumably, there is a healthy population within this protected zone,” write the authors. Little information is known about the new bird: it apparently eats small arthropods (mostly insects) and has a call similar to that of the Sulfur-bellied Tyrant-Manakin (Neopelma sulphureiventer). Even though this particular specie was just discovered, the “type specimen” dates back from February 22, 1990. The specimen was deposited at the Museo Nacional de Historia Natural de la Universidad San Marcos but was studies 12 years later.

The Peruvian Andes hid until now a hitherto unknown genus of mammal. The discovery of the animal, a tree rat the size of a domestic cat, was made by Dr Louise Emmons, a researcher with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC. The animal was found near the ruins of the Inca city of Macchu Picchu, the rat just being killed by an Andean weasel. “It was a really exciting discovery. I knew it was something I had never seen before, but it’s wonderful to realise that this is a totally new genus of rodent.It was tremendous luck for me that the weasel had just struck, because the rat is too big to be caught in the traps we set for mice and other small mammals, so I wouldn’t have seen it but for the weasel. It is a powerfully-built animal, pale grey, with a white streak running along its head to its snout, and possesses large claws.” said the doctor in an interview to BBC.

What appears to be a half-squid, half-octopus was found at Keahole Point on the Big Island. The specimen was found caught in a filter in one of Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority’s deep-sea water pipelines in July, last year. “When we first saw it, I was really delighted because it was new and alive,” said Jan War, operations manager at NELHA. “I’ve never seen anything like that.” Octosquid is about a foot long, with white suction cups, eight tentacles and an octopus head with a squidlike mantle. “It’s quite fascinating,” War said. “When you get below 700 feet, it’s a totally different world. Lots of fish have heads like a fish and a body like an eel. There are fish floating in a vertical position, with the head up, and don’t move unless they’re disturbed.”

A team of young scientists came across a new poison dart frog in a remote mountainous region in Colombia. After careful analysis it was determined that the golden frog of Supatá is unique and only found within a 20 hectare area in Colombia’s Cundinamarca region. The discovery is only natural, since Colombia is one of the world’s richest countries in amphibian diversity, being home to more than 583 species. So far, scientists say that the golden frog of Supatá belongs to a group of “dart frogs” that are known to be highly venomous. “The importance of this project is not just the discovery of the new frog,” said Oswaldo Cortes, team leader and one of the winners of the 2007 Conservation Leadership Programme awards. “But, most importantly, what this new discovery shows is how little we still know about our planet, and the many species that haven’t yet been discovered. This is why it is so important to work with local communities and educate them about the need for conservation.”

Back to Colombia, where a previously unknown blue-and-green-throated hummingbird species has been found. Ornithologists Alexander Cortés-Diago and Luis Alfonso Ortega first sighted the bird in the mountain cloud forest in the Serrania del Pinche in southwest Colombia during 2005. “The isolated nature of the Serrania del Pinche within the biodiverse Choco region makes it likely that further new species await discovery,” said Luis Mazariegos-Hurtado of The Hummingbird Conservancy. “Yet a major threat to these forests exists: the increase in coca fields and ‘slash and burn’ agriculture. It is estimated that 500 hectares are lost each year.”

sources: National Geographic, BBC News, Mongabay

Filed under: Documentary on January 7th, 2008