Innholdsfortegnelse for October 2023 i BBC Wildlife Magazine

HANGING OUT An African leopard takes a welcome break on the accommodating branch of a candelabra tree in south-western Uganda. This image features in the photography book Remembering Leopards (Remembering Wildlife, £49.50) – all profits from the sale of which are donated to projects working to protect the species. THE LIGHT FANTASTIC This shot of a deer shield mushroom was taken by Agorastos Papatsanis on Mount Olympus in Greece. It shows billions of tiny oval-shaped spores, illuminated as they’re dispersed by air currents. The photograph was rewarded with a Highly Commended nod in this year’s Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition. See a selection of winners in the next issue.…

SOME TALES ARE JUST TOO good not to be true. The story goes that a little African bird called the honeyguide, which has a penchant for beeswax but is incapable of breaking open a hive, leads the honey badger, which is very strong and fond of honey, to bees’ nests. As a result of this partnership, both enjoy a meal that they would otherwise have missed out on. But does it actually happen? “It’s such a common belief,” says Jessica van der Wal of the University of Cape Town. “If you type ‘honeyguides and…’ into Google, the first thing that pops up is ‘badgers’. I’ve seen museum exhibits using taxidermied badgers and honeyguides set up in a way that takes this cooperation for granted. So many books and films assume…

THE FLAKES OF MEAT THAT SEPARATE when you prod a fish fillet with a fork are blocks of muscle, called myotomes. These correspond to the body segments of vertebrates’ worm-like ancestors. Humans have myotomes, too. It’s just that our individual segments have become increasingly specialised over the course of evolutionary history, so are no longer as obvious as they are in fish.…

BELINDA NALWAMBA WORKS WITHIN THE Lower Zambezi National Park and Chiawa Game Management Area (GMA), Zambia, protecting wildlife from poachers. She belongs to Kufadza, a team of 10 female anti-poaching scouts at an NGO called Conservation Lower Zambezi. “I want to encourage other women that would like to be part of wildlife conservation to pursue their dreams despite their gender,” says Belinda. “Our core responsibility is to ensure there are no illegal activities in our area of operation. We monitor fauna and flora and apprehend suspects involved in any illegal activities.” “I had to undergo intense paramilitary training for my anti-poaching scout role that included marksmanship, weaponry, tracking, and capturing and arresting poachers,” she says. “I was also equipped with wildlife management skills, which included learning animal behaviour, as well…

BBC SOUNDS On Your Farm: beavers, birds and beef – when farming meets conservation REWILDING EXPERTS HAVE REACTED WITH dismay after a group of MPs called on the UK government to remove the protected status for beavers that was only brought in last year. Sir Robert Goodwill, chair of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (EFRA) Committee, said current protections for beavers were too stringent and would discourage landowners from supporting reintroduction proposals. Sir Robert described a visit to Bavaria where the committee learned how beavers could be trapped and moved, or even culled, on the authorisation of a ‘beaver ambassador’ if their dams were flooding farmers’ fields or creating other problems. Alternatively, the landowner had the right to modify a dam to reduce its impacts. “In the UK, because…

JAPANESE MACAQUES ARE WILY primates. They like to throw snowballs and have learned to survive the winter by languishing in hot springs, hence their nickname ‘snow monkeys’. They’re sophisticated communicators with regional dialects and their habit of washing sweet potatoes in salty seawater before eating is passed down from one generation to the next, qualifying this peculiar learned behaviour as bona fide culture. Now, thanks to a revolutionary female called Yakei, we can add smashing the patriarchy to their record of cunning stunts. In 2021, Yakei, a nine-year-old female, became the alpha leader of her colony of 677 macaques at the Takasakiyama Natural Zoological Garden, which was established as a reserve for snow monkeys in 1952. The Japanese reserve has two macaque colonies, which spend most of their time roaming…

GOVERNMENTS WILL MEET IN DUBAI for the COP28 UN climate summit on 30th November 2023, to assess progress on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. It will come as no surprise to hear that we’re nowhere near on track. We’re stuffing it up. There is now little chance of limiting the global average temperature to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels (the legally binding pledge made by world leaders at the 2015 Paris summit). “The era of global boiling has arrived”, according to the UN secretary general, António Guterres. “It is terrifying,” he said. “And it is just the beginning.” Pay attention to the news headlines – which are sounding increasingly like the beginning of a cataclysmic end-of-the-world science fiction movie – and you’ll know instinctively that he is right. A global pattern of…

“ELEPHANTS ARE valued more in India than all other animals put together,” says Anish Andheria, CEO of Wildlife Conservation Trust. “Lord Ganesha, the most worshipped and revered Hindu God, is half-human and half-elephant.” Sadly, revered status isn’t keeping these animals safe. Elephants were declared the National Heritage Animal of India in 2010 and granted Schedule 1 status – the highest protection level in the country, on a par with tigers. But elephants and people are frequently coming into contact, leading to horrific flashpoints of violence in which both are losing their lives. “Around 1,400 human and 300 elephant casualties occurred in India due to human-elephant conflict between 2018 and 2020,” Andheria explains, the figure not including captive elephants. Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) are listed as Endangered on the IUCN’s Red…

Geographic isolation has enabled Australia’s parrots to adapt and diversify across the length and breadth of the country, and within a range of habitats. It’s no surprise that the Land Down Under is also known as the Land of Parrots, because there are some 57 species in Australia, divided into two groups: true parrots and cockatoos. Here are just a few of these incredibly colourful birds. Pale-headed rosella A medium-sized parrot that is native to eastern Australian forests and woodlands Australian king parrot Primarily found in the eastern parts of Australia. Only males have red heads. Sulphur-crested cockatoo A highly intelligent and social bird that is often found in flocks, especially near wooded areas Red-tailed black cockatoo Highly adaptable and found in a range of habitats, including forests, woodlands and…

Email your questions to wildquestions@immediate.co.uk What is a rainbow squirrel? SQUIRRELS DON’T COME MUCH BIGGER than the Malabar giant variety. Weighing four times as much as a grey squirrel, this robust rodent is about the size of a domestic cat. But it’s not the Malabar giant’s size that turns heads and drops jaws. Endemic to India, where it is the state animal of Maharashtra in the west of the country, it has become quite a hit on social media in recent years thanks to its exquisite pelage, which will leave you in no doubt as to why it has come to be known colloquially as the rainbow squirrel. While its undercarriage is a fairly standard beige, its back and flanks are adorned with bands of deep, rich reds and blues…

MALE AND FEMALE ANIMALS OF the same species usually come in different forms or ‘morphs’. The two sexes have distinctive features that include not only visible differences in features such as colour, size and shape, but also in unseen traits that dictate physiology and behaviour. So why does this sexual dimorphism exist? What’s a sexual morph? Ignore the genitals! Biological sex is defined by an individual’s capacity to create sperm, eggs or both – making them male, female or hermaphrodite. Organs that produce reproductive cells (like testes and ovaries), plus structures for fertilisation (like the penis and vagina), are primary sexual characteristics. Dimorphism is defined by secondary sexual characteristics – traits typical of males or females that aren’t directly involved in reproduction. Such traits help animals identify the opposite sex…

Motherly love The famous Bengal tigress, Dhawa Jhandu of Kanha National Park in Madhya Pradesh, with her cubs. Sandipan Ghosh, Bardhaman, India Bird battle This was the first time I saw a crested serpent eagle preying on a bird that itself has a reputation as a ‘big bad bully’ – the highly intelligent large-billed crow. Amartya Mukherjee, Bangalore, India Focus in This beautiful ringed plover on Scolt Head Island blended in so well against the flint and other stones, and was very hard to spot. Ian Harris, Elsing, Norfolk Sharp senses It was an honour to sit and watch this alert red squirrel seeking out nuts in the Galloway Forest Park, Scotland. Julie Pinborough, Blackheath, London Gone fishing Black-crowned night herons are found in various spots along the River Nile,…

BBC SOUNDS Open Country: red squirrels in Formby, with Helen Mark OCTOBER IS PRIME SQUIRREL-spotting season, for both the red variety native to Britain and its chunkier grey invasive competitor. These rodents don’t hibernate, so to get through the lean winter months, they must spend a lot of time fattening up on the autumnal bounty of nuts, seeds, fruits and fungi, hiding whatever they can’t consume now to eat when times are harder. The intense activity translates into excellent viewing opportunities – this is an ideal time to visit squirrel feeders in areas where reds are still holding their own, such as the Scottish Highlands, parts of northern England, Dorset’s Brownsea Island (boat trips run until the end of the month) and Anglesey in North Wales. Some red squirrels will…

AS EVERY SCHOOLCHILD KNOWS, THE blue whale is not just the biggest animal alive today, but the biggest ever to have existed. Or is it? This stalwart of zoological record-breaker lists is being challenged for its title by a remarkable fossil unearthed in Peru. When scientists came across the 13 vertebrae, four ribs and a single pelvic bone, there was doubt as to whether they were fossils at all. “The bones are so weird, so big and so dense that they look like pieces of marble,” says Eli Amson of the State Museum of Natural History in Stuttgart. Only when Amson’s colleagues examined them microscopically did their origin become clear. “Bone fossilises extremely well right down to the cellular level, so the structure could be seen very clearly.” The partial…

CROWS AND MAGPIES ARE NOTORIOUSLY clever birds. But in the light of new research, one could be forgiven for thinking that their intelligence extends to an ironic sense of humour. Why so? Because Dutch biologists have documented both species building their nests from the spikes deployed on buildings around the world to discourage roosting birds. Auke-Florian Hiemstra, who studies animal architecture at the Naturalis Biodiversity Center in the Netherlands, is particularly interested in how birds make use of human-made materials. “During the Covid period, we were finding birds incorporating face-masks into their nests,” he says. His latest research was inspired by a hospital patient in Antwerp, who had been reading a magazine article about Hiemstra’s work. “He put the magazine down, looked out of the window, and there was this…

VERY FEW PEOPLE ARE FANS OF TICKS, and this latest news could have many shuddering and feeling itchy. In a recent Current Biology study, biologists have shown that static electricity can cause tick nymphs to be launched through the air towards a potential host. Scientists held wild-caught sheep tick nymphs (Ixodes ricinus) with soft entomology forceps and exposed them to static electricity. Friction, and therefore an electric charge, was created by rubbing a dried rabbit foot against a plastic sheet of acrylic – rather like rubbing a balloon against your head. When held near the foot or the sheet and released from the forceps, the tick would be launched through the air towards them – and it didn’t matter whether it was being exposed to a negative or positive charge.…

OF ALL BRITAIN’S WILDLIFE spectacles, surely the hardest to miss is the fanfare of autumn colour marking both the end of summer and the long descent to winter. Providing the most fabulous fillip on any woodland walk, the precise reasons why so many of our trees undergo such a radical transformation at this time of year are still shrouded in mystery. The woody parts of Britain’s deciduous trees are more than able to survive the winter. But with light levels becoming too low to enable photosynthesis and trees needing to conserve water when the ground may be frozen, the leaves suddenly become an accessory that trees are simply unable to keep. Photosynthesis is the process by which plants use the sun’s rays to power the conversion of carbon dioxide and…

On the ground The Rekambo chimpanzee community (rekambo means ‘where English is spoken’ in the local language) consists of about 40 individuals. The Ozouga Chimpanzee Project team, led by Tobias Deschner and Simone Pika, head of the comparative biocognition research group at Osnabrück University’s Institute of Cognitive Science, has documented previously unknown chimp behaviour in Gabon’s Loango National Park. Green mosaic An aerial view of Loango National Park in Gabon. This protected natural paradise is a hotspot of biodiversity, containing a mosaic of different habitats including rainforest, wetlands, lagoons, savannahs, coastal rainforest, floodplains and mangrove forest. The park covers about 1,500km2 and is managed by Gabon’s National Agency for National Parks (ANPN). Mum’s taxi service Sassandra, an infant Rekambo chimpanzee, enjoys a ride on her mother Suzee’s back. Female chimps…

That depends how you’re measuring it. In terms of mass, it is probably the Etruscan shrew, found in the Mediterranean and Asia, which weighs as little as 1.2g – less than a quarter of a jelly baby. Incredibly, it’s small enough to squeeze through the tunnels left by large earthworms. The shrew’s main challenger to the title is Kitti’s hog-nosed bat from Thailand and Myanmar. Also known as the bumblebee bat, it’s a little heavier than the Etruscan shrew, but its skeletal dimensions are smaller. Life happens fast for such tiny mammals – the shrew’s heart beats up to 25 times every second.…

ALSO SOMETIMES KNOWN AS blackfish or pothead whales, pilot whales can be found almost worldwide and come in two varieties: short-finned and longfinned. Both are very similar in appearance, but it’s the latter that we’ll be taking a closer look at in this article. Where do they live? Long-finned pilot whales live throughout the cold and temperate waters of the southern hemisphere, as well as in the North Atlantic Ocean. Short-finned pilot whales live in temperate and tropical waters, and the distribution of both species can overlap in some parts of the world. What are their physical features? As their name suggests, long-finned pilot whales have two very long flippers, which are crescent-shaped with pointy tips. Pilot whales are long, robust whales and have a thick-set, curved (sometimes hooked) and…

WITH BBC WILDLIFE PICTURE EDITOR TOM GILKS How did your career begin? I grew up by the Mediterranean Sea, so from an early age I was snorkelling, diving and playing ‘underwater explorers’ with my brother. Photography naturally followed. What is it about the underwater world that appeals? It’s the mystery. There is so much unknown territory and wildlife under the sea. What’s been your most challenging shot? A photo of breeding groupers taken in the Fakarava reserve in French Polynesia. This reproductive event occurs during the full moon of the winter solstice and lasts barely 30 minutes. I needed to create a moonlight effect, so my assistant had to swim 5m above me holding a bar of seven strobe lights. It took us four consecutive years and 85,000 shots to…

THANK YOU MARK CARWARDINE FOR writing your article in the September issue in response to the revenge theory that has been promoted so absurdly in relation to the recent orca attacks on small boats in Europe. Since both sail and power boats have had their rudders targeted by orcas, my hypothesis has been that something about the rudder and propeller is enticing the playful behaviour. Perhaps when the prop is spinning, the motion of the water excites the orcas and makes them think the boats want to play. Regardless, maybe it’s the fragility of modern rudders that is the culprit here! Thank you for defending the orcas against our human tendency to personify the rest of the world. Brandon Forrest, via email I’d do the same I enjoyed Mark Carwardine’s…

1 Saw-scaled viper Found in the Middle East and Central Asia, this is a particularly aggressive snake that often lives in or close to densely populated areas. That explains why it is thought to be the snake that kills the most people annually, with an estimated 5,000 human fatalities per year in India alone. 2 Inland taipan When it comes to toxicity, the inland taipan takes the prize. Endemic to semi-arid regions of central east Australia, this snake hunts mammals (primarily rodents), so has evolved a potent venom adapted to kill warm-blooded animals. Just one bite is lethal enough to kill at least 100 adult humans! Due to its reclusiveness, it doesn’t actually kill very many at all, though: only a few fatalities have ever been recorded. 3 Black mamba…

“With its alien-like body, the harvestman looks like something from the mind of HG Wells” P.34 The presenter reflects on the rhythm of the changing seasons for birds and humans alike P.17 “Complacency is driving a wrecking ball through international climate commitments” P.29 “We can add smashing the patriarchy to the macaque’s record of cunning stunts” P.27 Our columnist turns his binoculars towards the rich reds and golds that the British autumn brings P.30 DON’T MISS… … how honey badgers and birds join forces to seek out the sweet stuff lurking in bee nests Page 14…

Autumn’s surge of salmon upstream is now but a trickle after decades of decline. Only on remote Scottish rivers does the age-old spectacle retain anything like its former glory. But the surprise return of spawning salmon to ‘rewiggled’ watercourses, such as at Swindale in Cumbria, shows that if we restore our rivers to their natural, healthy state, these mighty fish may be back.…

An outlier among British crows, the jay is colourful, secretive and seldom leaves wooded areas, adept at slipping through the trees unnoticed. But in October your odds of a sighting improve as this nut-loving corvid loses all caution to begin hoarding masses of fallen acorns and beech mast. It hops along as bold as brass, intent only on rummaging through the leaf litter. FACT. The only bird able to fly backwards for any serious amount of time is the hummingbird. This is down to each of its wings boasting a rotator cuff – a ball-and-socket joint that gives it an extraordinary range of movement. This dexterity also allows upside-down flight.…

BBC SOUNDS Tweet of the Day: Paul Brook on the redwing STEP OUTSIDE ON A CLEAR OCTOBER night and take a few moments to let your ears adjust to your surroundings. There’s a decent chance you will tune into the faint, high-pitched ‘seep’ of birds calling overhead, especially if the wind is from the north and east. These are flocks of small thrushes called redwings, calling to each other during their nocturnal migration to Britain from birch forests and scrub in Scandinavia, Russia and Iceland. You can hear redwing migration just about anywhere. In fact, an acoustic study by the BTO (British Trust for Ornithology) in eastern England, using sound recorders left on all night, found that the calls of redwings and other migratory thrushes are heard more frequently over…

Known as spraint, otter droppings are normally coarse and black, full of fish scales, shell fragments, fish and crayfish parts, and sometimes feathers or fur. As otter poo dries out, it becomes pale and crumbly. Otter spraint may also just be oil deposited to mark a territory, but whether or not it contains poo, it has a unique odour. Some people describe it as a very musky and fishy smell, with a sweet taint surprisingly similar to jasmine tea. Look for otter spraint in prominent spots along a stream, lake or river, such as grass mounds or rocks.…

Missing green For those still wanting a dose of green therapy in autumn, look out for the perennially green holly and ivy in the understory. There are also extra marks on offer for anyone able to spot the much scarcer native box shrub, or the prickly butcher’s broom. How galling Once the leaves have fallen, try spotting galls. These are the product of a group of minute insects called gall wasps. Oak leaves have two distinct galls: the tiny, flattened flying saucers hold the larvae of the common spangle gall wasp, while those resembling little Yorkshire puddings are produced by the silk button gall wasp. Leaf art Why not collect fallen leaves with subtly different hues to produce some wildlife-themed art? Check out nature artist Andy Galsworthy’s stunning autumnal leaf patterns…

THE RECENT WILDFIRE events in Europe, Canada and Hawaii – and, prior to that, other US states and Australia – may dominate the headlines, yet wildfire is an issue faced by the UK, too. Before the soggy affair that was July and August, a spell of hot weather meant wildfires were very much on our national agenda. In June, firefighters tackled a wildfire the size of 300 football pitches in woodland on Rhigos Mountain in South Wales. Around the same time, a nearly 2km-long patch of moor and woodland just south of Inverness went up in flames. A few days later, yet another wildfire was burning on Marsden Moor in West Yorkshire, the eighth in the area since February. These are just a few of the wildfire events that have…

I’VE SEEN MANY BUDGERIGARS IN my life but never, until recently, in the wild. They’d be in cages in shops, sold as low-maintenance but lively pets. Budgies are, in fact, the most popular pet bird in the world. But you can also find these vibrant little parrots in the wild. Budgerigars (Melopsittacus undulatus) are true Australian natives, travelling in vast flocks across much of the country’s interior, bringing a splash of colour and a healthy dose of noise to the rugged desert outback. I’ve always been intrigued by wild budgies, as has my husband, Juergen (Yogi). Yet remarkably, despite the fact that Yogi has been a wildlife photographer for three decades, and that we’ve been living in Far North Queensland for two, an opportunity to photograph the species has never…

The Collected Works (1924) Runs to 24 volumes, which is extraordinary considering his first book wasn’t published until he was 44 Idle Days in Patagonia (1892) A wonderfully entertaining account of his explorations in search of undiscovered birds Fan: The Story of a Young Girl’s Life (1892) A novel about a young woman’s life in the slums of East London Green Mansions (1904) A “romance of the tropical forest”. In 1959 it was made into a Hollywood movie starring Audrey Hepburn and Anthony Perkins. A Little Boy Lost (1905) His only book for children A Shepherd’s Life (1910) A celebrated study of Wiltshire communities at the end of an era Far Away and Long Ago (1918) A classic memoir of a Pampas childhood Lost British Birds (1923) A litany of…

Do some people suffer more bug bites than others? Yes. The mosquito-magnets among us are bitten up to 100 times more often, while Scottish biting midges prefer taller men and heavier women. These injustices are not well understood, but suggested factors include the amount of carbon dioxide a person exhales, or the levels of carboxylic acids in their sweat. People with Type O blood also seem to get bitten more, though on the plus side they’re also less susceptible to malaria, which is spread by mosquitos. Are there any snakes in Ireland? No. Much of Britain and Ireland’s flora and fauna arrived here after the last ice age. As the glaciers retreated about 10,000 years ago, animals and plants were able to recolonise from mainland Europe, to which Britain was…

ACROSS 1 Dove (6) 4 ___ mist, another name for the plant wood bedstraw (6) 9 ___ whale, the largest animal ever to have lived (4) 10 Centre for housing, studying and exhibiting marine creatures (10) 11 Male honeybees (6) 12 Flowering plants also known as monkshoods (8) 13 Fruit of a tree in the genus Diospyros (9) 15 Home of an otter (4) 17 Vocalisation of a lion or leopard (4) 18 Plants that grow upon other plants (9) 21 Marsupial midway in size between a kangaroo and a wallaby (8) 23 Gull-like seabird related to the petrels and shearwaters (6) 25 Another name for a geranium (10) 26 ___-throated hummingbird, common hummingbird of North America (4) 27 ___ kestrel, small Eurasian falcon (6) 28 Reptile of Central and…

October is a great time to go hunting for wild mushrooms. BBC cameraman John Aitchison explains how to capture sprouting specimens on film using a stills camera. • FIND YOUR LOCATION “Scour the forest floor one morning for the earliest signs of an emerging fungal fruiting body, then set up your camera” • DO THE MATHS “To end up with a film sequence lasting 10 seconds, you’ll need to take 250 (10x25) frames. If the daylight is going to last 10 hours that gives a 2.4-minute gap between frames” • GET THE TIMING RIGHT “Some cameras have built-in timers, but you can also use gadgets called intervalometers” You can read more photography tips at discoverwildlife.com/how-to/photograph-wildlife…