Best Rare-bird Pictures!

1.Asian Crested Ibis

 A picture of an endangered Asian crested ibis soaring over China is a first-prize winner in the first annual World’s Rarest Birds international photo competition, organizers announced in January.Launched in 2010, the competition ranked pictures of birds that fall into three categories determined by the International Union for Conservation of Nature: endangered or data deficient, critically endangered or extinct in the wild, and critically endangered migratory species.

2.Scaly-Sided Merganser

Two endangered scaly-sided mergansers glide across the water in a picture that won fifth place in the “endangered or data deficient” category.
Habitat loss and illegal hunting have reduced the bird’s population to about 2,500 individuals in Russia and China, according to the nonprofit BirdLife International.

This post is sponsored by:Dr Mobiles Limited
1 Huron Street, Takapuna, North Shore 0622
Tel: (09) 551-5344 and Mob: (021) 264-0000
Web - Map - Email - Posterous - Twitter - Blogger - Flickr
    

Nature is Beautiful - Flying Fishes (animal, sea, ocean, amazing, rare, Auckland, davidlim)

This post is sponsored by:Dr Mobiles Limited
1 Huron Street, Takapuna, North Shore 0622
Tel: (09) 551-5344 and Mob: (021) 264-0000
Web - Map - Email - Posterous - Twitter - Blogger - Flickr
    

Some exotic dish you might want to try! Snake-bite chicken 'off the menu'

China's health authorities are reported to be putting a stop to restaurants serving chickens which have been bitten to death by poisonous snakes.

The dish, which is served by a small number of restaurants in Guangdong and Chongqing, is billed as detoxing.

But it has generated a storm of controversy in the media and among bloggers after a video of its preparation was circulated online.

The video shows a cook holding a snake and forcing it to bite a live chicken.

A week of intense internet discussion has reached the near-unanimous decision that it is cruel to kill live chickens by forcing deadly snakes to bite them repeatedly.

Some voices noted, however, that they found the cooked dish delicious.

"It's disgusting and really cruel," read one post on the popular portal sina.com.cn.

"Not only is it cruel and blood-thirsty, but totally amoral," the Chongqing Business Daily cited a neighbour to one of the restaurants as saying.

"Although nobody has been poisoned, this at the very least is an irregular way of slaughtering poultry," the business newspaper quoted a local health official as saying.

According to Reuters news agency, health authorities in Guangdong have already told restaurants to stop serving "poisonous snake-bitten chicken". It said officials in Chongqing had joined the ban.

Restaurants in China have long specialised in exotic dishes which have provoked condemnation from animal rights activists and health watchdogs - such as monkey brains scooped from a live animal, civet cat and deer foetus soup.

Rare New Zealand bumblebee coming back to UK

A bumblebee which is extinct in the UK is to be reintroduced from New Zealand under plans being announced.

The short-haired bumblebee was exported from the UK to New Zealand on the first refrigerated lamb boats in the late 19th Century to pollinate clover crops.

It was last seen in the UK in 1988, but populations on the other side of the world have survived.

Now Natural England and several other conservation groups have launched a scheme to bring the species home.

International rescue

Poul Christensen, Natural England's acting chairman, said; "Bumblebees are suffering unprecedented international declines and drastic action is required to aid their recovery.

"Bumblebees play a key role in maintaining food supplies - we rely on their ability to pollinate crops and we have to do all we can to provide suitable habitat and to sustain the diversity of bee species.

"This international rescue mission has two aims - to restore habitat in England, thereby giving existing bees a boost; and to bring the short-haired bumblebee home where it can be protected."

As many as 100 of the bees will initially be collected in New Zealand and a captive breeding plan established, with the aim of eventually releasing them at Dungeness, Kent, where they were last seen.

They will be flown back on planes in cool boxes, and will not be disturbed, according to Natural England, as they will be in hibernation during transit.

The scheme's project officer Nikki Gammans, of the Stirling-based Bumblebee Conservation Trust, said the bee was a "keystone species" which was key to pollinating around 80% of important crops.

"By creating the right habitat for these bumblebees, we are recreating wildflower habitat that has been lost, which will be good for butterflies, water voles and nesting birds."

The partnership project is being run by Natural England, the Bumblebee Conservation Trust the RSPB and Hymettus.

Cell Phones Reach for Zero

Here is a bizarre idea: a company that offers all-you-can-eat voice and data service across a network of data lines and cell infrastructure it does not own. Meet Las Vegas-based Zer01 Mobile. The company has developed its own VoIP system that runs not only on the landed Internet, but on the mobile Web as well. Details are hazy.

More will come out at the coming Cable Telecommunications and Internet Association trade show in Las Vegas early April. But the buzz on the Zer01 is compelling: The product will offer all the voice, data and cell usage a customer wants for $70 a month. That's right, $70, with nary a contract or commitment.

New Company Likely to Raise Ire

The system will emulate landed broadband phones by running on data networks and not phone systems. And Zer01 is almost certain to raise traditional carrier ire.

But, still, in these cost-conscious times, expect value-hungry cell phone users to take this product seriously: Since who really has the money these days to throw away on pricey data plans?

This is True: Winston Churchill's Breakfast Menu.

Winston Churchill wrote his own breakfast menu - including whisky and a cigar - on his last official flight to the US. The breakfast menu on the 1954 BOAC flight was not to the Prime Minister's liking so he wrote one out himself. He requested a two-course meal to be brought on two trays, reports the Daily Telegraph. In his own hand, Churchill ordered: "1st Tray. Poached egg, Toast, Jam, Butter, Coffee and milk, Jug of cold milk, Cold Chicken or Meat. "2nd Tray. Grapefruit, Sugar Bowl, Glass orange squash (ice), Whisky soda." He then added: "Wash hands, cigar." The menu was kept by the air steward and the item is now being sold along with press cuttings from the trip. The menu is expected to fetch up to £1,500 when it is sold at Mullock's auctioneers in Ludlow, Shropshire, on St George's Day. Auctioneer Richard Westwood-Brookes said: "This is one of the most remarkable pieces of Churchill memorabilia we have seen. "It shows what a hearty breakfast he ate and it was all washed down with a whisky, after which he smoked a cigar. "It is the type of indulgence we've come to associate with Churchill and it reassuring to know he ate so well in his 80th year."

5 Things You Didn't Know: The Department Of Defense

The United States Department of Defense is an agency of superlatives: the DOD is the country’s largest government agency and its oldest, and it is the primary occupant of the Pentagon, the biggest office building in the world. Yet for all that, its official statement on what it does is remarkably blunt: “We are war-fighters first and as such, have no peers.” In general, the DOD handles issues related to national security and military affairs, making it the primary target for groups who resent U.S. military involvement overseas. Love it or hate it, we present 5 things you didn’t know about the United States Department of Defense.

1- The DOD's budget equals Exxon and Wal-Mart combined

Just what kind of monstrosity is the DOD? It employs over three million people, 1.3 million of them on active duty in the military, qualifying it as America’s largest employer. It operates on a gargantuan annual budget of $419 billion, a 2006 total that falls just shy of matching the annual budgets of retail behemoth Wal-Mart ($227 billion) and ExxonMobil ($200 billion) combined. Furthermore, the DOD’s three million total employees is more than double that of those two companies put together, a figure that falls shy of 1.5 million.

2- The DOD no longer investigates UFOs

Another thing you didn’t know about the DOD is that it long ago gave up on finding Martians in the skies over the U.S. In 1948, the U.S. Air Force launched Project Sign to look into the rash of reported UFO sightings. Over the next 21 years (and through two name changes -- first Project Grudge, then Project Blue Book), they investigated over 12,618 reports of UFOs and found explanations for 11,917 of them. The remaining 701 went unexplained. In 1969, Blue Book was shut down, having concluded that none of the investigated UFOs presented any threat to national security, none displayed technology any more advanced than what was known at the time and none suggested they might be occupied by little green men.

3- The DOD only commands the Coast Guard in wartime

The U.S. Coast Guard, long the whipping-boy of the military’s five branches, is the one branch that does not ordinarily fall under the authority of the DOD. Rather, during peace time it falls under the authority of Homeland Security (as of 2003). Prior to that, it was part of the Department of Transportation from 1967. As law enforcement officers, the members of the Coast Guard also have the same legal authority as U.S. Customs officers. During war-time, the Coast Guard becomes an agency of the U.S. Navy, although this may only apply to combat units within the Guard. Historically, despite their role to “serve and protect America’s coastlines and waterways”, units of the Guard have seen action in almost every major military conflict in U.S. history over the past 100 years.

4- The DOD's Secretary of Defense does not sign autographs

You might think the mailbox of the head of a military force despised by much of the world would be overrun by death threats, but apparently the problem is autograph requests. Robert Gates, in an evident break from his predecessors, “has decided not to provide what have come to be considered customary autographs for collectors.” The DOD will, on request, send you his photo, but they’re so tight about the whole thing that they inform you of your motives beforehand: “Your request implies respect and support.” In other words, no using Sharpies to give Gates a prison tear tattoo. The Secretary of Defense is a Cabinet post and is likely to change with the new administration, signaling good news for the Cabinet-level autograph-seeking multitudes.

5- The DOD licenses insignia to retailers

The last thing you didn’t know about the DOD is that they’ve got your back. In an effort to boost its image and even land a few new recruits, the DOD -- specifically, the U.S. Army -- is a client of big-time brand licensing firm the Beanstalk Group, whose diverse client list includes Ford Motor Company, Universal Studios, Paris Hilton, and Mary-Kate and Ashley, to name just a few. Beanstalk’s recommendations to the U.S. Army were to establish a “line of Army-inspired clothing… using insignia from the First Infantry Division” since “strong brand identification through retail sales of products potentially can enhance the Army’s recruiting efforts and the public’s general goodwill towards the Army and its activities.”