Saturday, October 25, 2008

Snake makes friends with its food

This is old news... but I find it interesting so here it is...

A rat snake and a dwarf hamster have struck up a strange friendship, living side by side at a zoo near Tokyo.

Aochan the snake was offered the rodent to munch on after it turned its nose up at its usual diet of frozen mice.

But instead of killing the hamster the snake made friends with it and the two have lived happily together in the same cage since October last year.

The hamster has been named Gohan, which means 'meal' in Japanese. Aochan has gone back to eating frozen mice.

Gohan appears to be so happy in the presence of his new buddy that keepers say he is regularly seen to fall asleep on top of the reptile.

"I don't think there's any danger. Aochan seems to enjoy Gohan's company very much," zookeeper Kazuya Yamamoto told the Associated Press news agency.

Unusual partnerships

It's not the first time predators have befriended animals they might usually view as a potential meal.

In 2002, a lioness at Samburu National Park adopted a number of baby antelopes.

Taken from CBBC Newsround... For pics click link...

Friday, October 17, 2008

Brisk trade in tiger parts in Myanmar, says WWF

Tue Oct 14, 8:16 pm ET

PARIS (AFP) – Skins, claws and bones from at least 1,158 tigers and other protected big cats have been spotted in open markets in Myanmar during surveys conducted over the last 18 years, according to a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) report.

More than half came from five species banned from international trade, among them four species listed at threatened with extinction.
The tally included more than 100 tigers, whose numbers in the wild have dwindled to a few thousand worldwide, according to conservation experts.

"This can only be the tip of the iceberg," said Chris Shepherd, who coordinated the investigation carried out by TRAFFIC, a wildlife trade monitoring network supported by WWF.

"The cats were openly displayed for sale and the dealers quite frank about the illegality of the trade, which suggests a serious lack of law enforcement," he said in a statement.

Three of four markets monitored in a dozen surveys -- the most recent in late 2006 -- are located on borders with China and Thailand, with prices quoted in Chinese yuan, Thai baht and US dollars.

Myanmar, formerly known as Burma, is plagued with corruption, and was ranked in September as one of the world's two most corrupt nations by watchdog group Transparency International.
Yangon is a signatory to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES), and thus is legally bound by its provisions.

"The sale of endangered cat parts ... is an appalling and brazen violation of the law in Myanmar and should not be tolerated," said Susan Lieberman, director of the WWF's wildlife programme.

"Most of these species have very low population numbers and will not be able to withstand the amount of poaching that is feeding this trade."

Parts of rare mammals -- especially the penis and bones -- are used in traditional Chinese medicine to enhance sexual potency or health.
Four of the big cats whose parts were for sale figure on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature's (IUCN) Red List as threatened with extinction: the tiger, the clouded leopard, the marbled cat and the Asiatic golden cat.

Along with a fifth, the leopard, they are all banned from international trade by CITES.
While most of the specimens from these five species were found in surveys during the 1990s, more than 120 turned up after 2000, showing that the illegal trade is still going strong, the report concluded.

Taken from Yahoo! News.

Monday, October 6, 2008

No Exotic Pets For Children

CHICAGO - Warning: young children should not keep hedgehogs as pets — or hamsters, baby chicks, lizards and turtles, for that matter — because of risks for disease.

That's according to the nation's leading pediatricians' group in a new report about dangers from exotic animals.

Besides evidence that they can carry dangerous and sometimes potentially deadly germs, exotic pets may be more prone than cats and dogs to bite, scratch or claw — putting children younger than 5 particularly at risk, the report says.

Young children are vulnerable because of developing immune systems plus they often put their hands in their mouths.

That means families with children younger than 5 should avoid owning "nontraditional" pets. Also, kids that young should avoid contact with these animals in petting zoos or other public places, according to the report from the American Academy of Pediatrics. The report appears in the October edition of the group's medical journal, Pediatrics.

"Many parents clearly don't understand the risks from various infections" these animals often carry, said Dr. Larry Pickering, the report's lead author and an infectious disease specialist at the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

For example, about 11 percent of salmonella illnesses in children are thought to stem from contact with lizards, turtles and other reptiles, Pickering said. Hamsters also can carry this germ, which can cause severe diarrhea, fever and stomach cramps.

Salmonella also has been found in baby chicks, and young children can get it by kissing or touching the animals and then putting their hands in their mouths, he said.

Study co-author Dr. Joseph Bocchini said he recently treated an infant who got salmonella from the family's pet iguana, which was allowed to roam freely in the home. The child was hospitalized for four weeks but has recovered, said Bocchini, head of the academy's infectious diseases committee and pediatrics chairman at Louisiana State University in Shreveport.

Hedgehogs can be dangerous because their quills can penetrate skin and have been known to spread a bacteria germ that can cause fever, stomach pain and a rash, the report said.

With supervision and precautions like hand-washing, contact between children and animals "is a good thing," Bocchini said. But families should wait until children are older before bringing home an exotic pet, he said.

Those who already have these pets should contact their veterinarians about specific risks and possible new homes for the animals, he said.

Data cited in the study indicate that about 4 million U.S. households have pet reptiles. According to the American Veterinary Medical Association, all kinds of exotic pets are on the rise, although generally fewer than 2 percent of households own them.

The veterinarian group's Mike Dutton, a Weare, N.H., exotic animal specialist, said the recommendations send an important message to parents who sometimes buy exotic pets on an impulse, "then they ask questions, sometimes many months later."

But a spokesman for the International Hedgehog Association said there's no reason to single out hedgehogs or other exotic pets.

"Our recommendation is that no animal should be a pet for kids 5 and under," said Z.G. Standing Bear. He runs a rescue operation near Pikes Peak, Colo., for abandoned hedgehogs, which became fad pets about 10 years ago.

article gotten from

Sunday, October 5, 2008

Boy, 7, Feeds Zoo Animals To Croc

By Sky News SkyNews - Friday, October 3 11:05 am

A boy of seven has broken into a zoo in the Australian Outback, fed a string of animals to the resident crocodile and bashed several lizards to death with a rock.

The boy scaled a security fence and went on a 30-minute spree, even killing the zoo's beloved, 20-year-old goanna lizard , which he then fed to "Terry," an 11-foot saltwater crocodile.

Rex Neindorf, director of the Alice Springs Reptile Centre in central Australia, said the boy also threw several live animals to Terry over the two fences surrounding the crocodile's enclosure.
At one point he climbed over the outer fence to get closer to the giant reptile.
In CCTV pictures, the boy's face remains largely blank, Mr Neindorf said. "It was like he was playing a game."

He killed 13 animals worth more than £3,000, including a turtle, bearded dragons and thorny devil lizards. Although none were rare, some would be difficult to replace.
"We're horrified that anyone can do this, and saddened by the age of the child," said Mr Neindorf.

Police said they had identified the boy, who lives locally, but were unable to press charges because of his age. Children under 10 are not criminally liable under the law in the Northern Territory.

"By all accounts, he's quite a nasty seven-year-old," said Mr Neindorf, who plans to sue the boy's parents. "If we can't put the blame onto the child, then someone has to accept the responsibility."

The zoo's security system, which relies on sensors, probably did not detect the boy because he is so small, he added

Taken from Yahoo! News.