Innholdsfortegnelse for May 2024 i BBC Wildlife Magazine

ARCTIC TERNS ARE OFTEN SAID TO HAVE THE longest migration of all birds. Some spend one polar summer in the Southern Ocean, as far south as the icy Antarctic coast, then experience a second polar summer north of the Arctic Circle, meaning they see more daylight each year than any other species. Tagged birds have flown over 90,000km in a year. And they make it look so easy! These seabirds are the epitome of grace, with long, slim wings translucent at the tip, a swallow-like tail extended into ‘streamers’, and a super-relaxed way of flying. By the end of May, many of the Arctic terns in Britain will hopefully be nesting. You can see them just offshore, dipping to the surface to catch sandeels and other small fish. A recent…

SOME BUTTERFLIES ARE GENERALISTS, able to adapt to a variety of habitats and foodplants, while others have very particular requirements. Perhaps inevitably, the fussy species tend to be most at risk. The Duke of Burgundy is one such rare and precious gem. It’s a tiny but handsome May butterfly, with chequered orange-and-brown wings, just 3cm across. Lost to much of the UK, it’s confined now to a handful of locations in southern England, Cumbria and North Yorkshire. A couple of human generations ago, the ‘Duke’ was reasonably widespread in coppiced woods and scrubby, chalk or limestone grassland, where its caterpillars munch the leaves of cowslips and primroses. But to thrive, it needs things to be just right – not too exposed and dry, yet not too shady and overgrown either.…

WHAT IS IT? At less than 3mm long, this new species of jumping spider is easy to miss. Yet it’s not hard to find, if you know where to look. WHERE WAS IT FOUND? In the grounds of the University of Exeter’s campus in Penryn, Cornwall. “This doesn’t happen very often,” says Tylan Berry, the British Arachnological Society’s Devon and Cornwall area organiser. “Britain is one of the best-scoured countries in the world for arachnids.” The tiny spider can be found in good numbers by beating the lower branches of trees and shrubs over a sheet, and has since turned up at a second site 48km away. HOW WAS IT IDENTIFIED? At a bioblitz event organised by students to engage the public in species identification, Berry was handed a spider…

NEW RESEARCH INTO THE BEHAVIOUR OF chimpanzee mothers, published in Current Biology, shows that they prioritise tickling, chasing and playing with their youngsters, in order to help give them the best start in life. Play is not very common in the wild, at least among adult animals. It might be fun but it uses up a lot of energy, so the practice tends to be restricted to youngsters, where it plays a key role in developing physical and social skills. Adult chimps are unusual because they play with each other and with their young, but researchers expected to see that when food supplies dwindle, the adults would ditch play in favour of foraging. Drawing on 10 years of observational data on wild chimpanzees in Uganda’s Kibale National Park, researchers from…

SOMETHING NOT apparent in The Lion King was Pumba the warthog’s most remarkable magic trick: the ability to disappear. Surprise a warthog in the African wild and it’ll take off like a Formula One driver. Often you can trace its course through the grass by its aerial-like tail, which is at full mast when sprinting. Then, suddenly, it’ll vanish as if it had never been there. Being a favourite dish of so many predators, warthogs are constantly on alert, and they seldom venture far from their burrows, into which they’ll escape when threatened. Typically deep and narrow, these underground lairs are where they seek shelter, and rear their young. But warthogs, and many other animals, are in fact rent-free lodgers. They have no part in the design and construction of…

GOO, GUNGE, GUNK… WHILE THERE are many names for the stuff that makes things slippery or sticky, slime isn’t a single material but a label for a variety of substances with similar physical properties. Those qualities are desirable to many living things, which is why slime is made by such a wide range of organisms. What is slime? There’s no exact definition: the word reflects characteristics. So you could say (perhaps unhelpfully!) slime is any substance that feels slimy – it’s something that will slip or ooze from your hand when you hold or squeeze it, for instance. The best-known slime is mucus, a material that covers many external and internal body surfaces. Mucus keeps an amphibian’s skin moist, for example, and prevents the lining of a mammal’s lungs from…

Intimate moment The courtship ritual between tigers involves both sexes moving around in circles and growling at each other. This photograph shows the initial phase of mating. Sandipan Ghosh, Barddhaman, India Garden visit I spend a lot of time taking photographs in the National Botanical Garden of Bangladesh, and one day I noticed this jungle myna feeding her chicks. Sajib Kumar Singha, Sylhet, Bangladesh River dance This dipper was one of a pair collecting nesting material along the River Brock in Lancashire, unfazed by passing walkers and dogs. Gordon Speirs, Longton, Staffordshire Bringing back the blues It was a privilege to see the wonderful large blue butterfly, which has been successfully reintroduced to Britain. Verity Hill, Weymouth Pray, be still A praying mantis commands attention as it rests upon the…

WE WENT ON A BIRDING TRIP IN THE hills of Nagaland, India, looking for the Naga wren-babbler, a vulnerable species found near streams, whose distribution is restricted to Nagaland and Manipur. We climbed the Khonoma Dzükou Valley trail, which sits at an elevation of 1,800-2,400m. The wise saying of elders, “You get the best view after the hardest climb”, proved correct as we found what we were seeking after the hardest climb. It was a truly suprising moment when we enjoyed a wonderful view of both the male and female of the species foraging. Tomal Gogoi, via email No to wolves Despite all the drama, Derek Gow said very little about “How bringing back wolves could heal our landscape” in his feature (The Lost Wolf, spring 2024). The undoubted benefits…

A NEW REPORT HAS REVEALED THAT THE number of birds illegally trapped and killed on the Mediterranean island of Cyprus increased to more than 400,000 in the autumn of 2023. The report, published by BirdLife Cyprus and supported by the RSPB and the Committee Against Bird Slaughter (CABS), details how the number of birds killed has increased by an estimated 90,000 to 435,000. Cyprus acts as a strategically important stop-off point every autumn for vast numbers of birds, including blackcaps and garden warblers, on their annual migration from breeding grounds in Europe to winter homes in Africa. Many birds touching down are illegally trapped and killed by criminal gangs using mist nets and sticky ‘limesticks’ hidden in vegetation, before being sold to restaurants where they are eaten as an expensive…

GREEN SHORE CRABS ARE THE ONES WE are most likely to meet in rockpools or when dangling baited lines from quaysides and piers. A phenomenally successful species, they’re abundant not just in their native European range but in the many other parts of the world where they’ve been let loose (and where they’re busy devouring local marine life). You can tell if a green shore crab is male or female by carefully – mind those pincers – turning it over. Look at the central section on the shell’s underside, known as the tail. In males, this is a thin, upside-down ‘v’. But in females, it forms a wider, arched flap that the crabs lift up to hold their eggs – a lumpy mass of orange caviar. From May or June…

EUROPE’S GREEN REVOLUTION DIDN’T last very long, did it? The latest stumbling block was the hullabaloo caused by furious farmers wreaking havoc across the continent. They have been blocking roads, ports and border crossings with their tractors, dumping manure outside government buildings, and generally making a nuisance of themselves. Admittedly, small-and medium-sized farmers do have plenty to moan about. For years, they have been squeezed by powerful supermarkets (farmers receive a minuscule share of the profits from the sale of food); browbeaten by agrochemical multinationals (who raise the price of fertilisers, animal drugs and other essentials); and undercut by cheap and often unregulated foreign imports. Meanwhile, the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) funnels most subsidies to the largest landowners and most industrialised farms (the bigger your farm, the bigger your subsidy).…

EVERY SUMMER IN ICELAND, AN AVIAN odyssey takes place. A squad of seabird fanatics makes a grand tour of the length and breadth of the country, visiting a dozen or so Atlantic pufn colonies in an expedition known enticingly as the Pufn Rally. In July 2023, we joined the adventure – the second year in a row we were lucky Eenough to do so – as photographers. The squad comprised Erpur Snær Hansen (a world expert on seabird ecology), seabird researcher Björg Harðardóttir (conveniently married to Erpur), and Rodrigo Martínez Catalan, a researcher who apparently got so fed up of the gorgeous Spanish climes that he moved to Iceland. This trio of experts, who work for the South Iceland Nature Research Centre (SINRC), bestowed on us the affectionate nickname of…

“ I CAN WATCH A TUSKER ELEPHANT FOR HOURS. It’s such a majestic animal to see in the forest,” Jose Louies, CEO of the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI), tells me. “When you see that same animal dead, its head cut open for the tusks, it’s horrific.” Louies and his team’s work to combat the killing of Asian elephants is the subject of Poacher, a major new Amazon Original Series. Based on the real-life events of Operation Shikar, the series covers the sprawling investigation that took place between 2015-2017 into elephant poaching in the southern state of Kerala, which led to 72 arrests across India, including elephant poachers, government officials, carvers and high-end ivory art dealers. “It’s the largest ever elephant-poaching case in India,” says Louies, who was chief of…

Email your questions to wildlifemagazine@ourmedia.co.uk Are there any plants in Antarctica? CONTINENTS DON’T COME ANY MORE inhospitable than Antarctica, where life must contend with the longest, darkest, coldest winters and a year-round blanket of snow and ice. There are certainly no trees in the frozen south, or even shrubs. On the Antarctic mainland, there are just two native species of flowering plant. Both occur only on the Antarctic Peninsula, which is the most northerly, warmest and wettest part of the continent. Antarctic hair grass is most abundant around penguin and seal colonies, where it benefits from nutrients in the animals’ waste. Antarctic pearlwort, a diminutive relative of carnations, forms moss-like cushions bearing numerous yellow flowers. Both species’ ranges have increased in recent decades as temperatures rise. A more recent addition…

THIS PREHISTORIC-LOOKING BIRD IS affectionately known by some as ‘king of the marshes’ as it is huge (up to 1.5m tall with a 2.4m wingspan) and resides in the freshwater marshes and swamps of East Africa. Of several common names, the most frequently used is shoebill, a reference to its unmistakable long bill, which resembles a clog. What other names does it go by? The shape of the shoebill’s bill has also been described as similar in appearance to the head of a baleen whale, hence its Latin name, Balaeniceps rex, meaning ‘whale-head king’. This explains why the species is also known as the whale-headed stork and the whalebill. Other common names for this grey giant include shoe-billed stork, boat bill, bog bird and swamp king. There is only one…

How did your career start? I came to wildlife photography through the conservation and research route. Having another day job (or, in my case, a scholarship) is immensely helpful in an industry where making a living can be a challenge. I spent about six months in the Maasai Mara in 2011, then decided I could be of more use (and have more fun) documenting the work of others, rather than staying in academia myself. Which of your shots is most important to you? Ten years ago, I photographed wildlife vets treating orphaned mountain gorillas in Virunga National Park, in the DRC. One of those shots was a finalist in the Wildlife Photographer of the Year competition, and one of the vets is now my wife. What’s been a particularly challenging…

The ocean covers more than 70 per cent of our planet, and our June issue celebrates this vast, beautiful ecosystem. We’ll bring stories on shark rewilding in Indonesia, the unique biology of the clownfish, how ferries serve citizen science and coral conservation on the Great Barrier Reef. Plus, don’t miss our interview with ‘Her Deepness’, the legendary oceanographer Sylvia Earle! ON SALE 30th MAY…

NICK BAKER “The mother gives a shrug and the cells rupture, releasing perfectly formed toads into the world” P.36 GILLIAN BURKE The biologist and broadcaster on why what we call animals matters more than we think P.23 MARK CARWARDINE Our frank columnist on recent farmers’ protests across the continent and EU agricultural policy P.31 LUCY COOKE “Studies of damselflies have revealed some crafty female mating counterstrategies” P.29 MIKE DILGER “Flamingos put on a spectacle with the pizzazz to match any West End or Broadway show” P.32 DON’T MISS… …the unlikely discovery of a new jumping spider species on a Cornish university campus Page 20…

WORK IS UNDERWAY ON A massive ‘first-of-its-kind’ rewilding project to develop South Africa’s Loskop Dam Nature Reserve and adjacent areas into one of the largest protected wildlife reserves in the country. Located about 180km east of Pretoria, the reserve is home to at least 30 endangered species, including the southern white rhino, Temminck’s pangolin and sable antelope, as well as unique plants, such as the Critically Endangered Middelburg cycad. The reserve is rich in cultural heritage, too. The project is the result of a strategic partnership between the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency and wildlife charity The Aspinall Foundation, and is the first time one of South Africa’s provincial conservation agencies has collaborated in this way with an international NGO. “We fell in love with the area, its potential for…

NEW RESEARCH IN INDONESIA HAS FOUND that a simple-yet-clever device can help restored coral reefs grow as fast as healthy reefs after just four years. The study, carried out by the University of Exeter and partners and published in Current Biology, took place off the south coast of Sulawesi, where vast areas of coral reef were decimated in the 1980s and 1990s by ‘blast fishing’ – a destructive practice that uses explosives to stun schools of fish. Researchers looked at the work of the Mars Coral Reef Restoration Programme, which has been restoring reefs using networks of Reef Stars – hexagonal, sand-coated steel frames transplanted with coral fragments from healthy reefs. Reef Stars work in two ways. They provide a structure on which coral can grow; and they stabilise coral…

LAST YEAR SAW THE REMOVAL OF MORE dams, weirs, culverts, levees and other river barriers in Europe than ever before, according to Dam Removal Europe’s (DRE) annual report, with 487 removed across the continent, compared to 325 in 2022. This action has reconnected 4,300km of healthy river habitat, allowing rivers to flow freely and migratory fish to reach breeding areas, as well as dispersing sediments and nutrients. “Dams, weirs and other barriers block the flow of rivers, sediments and nutrients, and the movement of animals, like fish and water insects,” says Herman Wanningen, director of World Fish Migration Foundation and founder of Dam Removal Europe. “A river that doesn’t flow and isn’t connected has low biodiversity and is slowly dying. In Europe, migratory fish stocks have plummeted by more than…

MAY IS MY FAVOURITE month in Britain. The countryside is bursting with fecundity as animals seek out partners to foster a new generation. As humans we like to think of these unions as romantic, but the truth is many are shaped by conflict. When males and females harbour warring mating strategies, evolution becomes an arms race, with genitals on the front line. The humble damselfly is a great example. In many species, females choose to mate with multiple males to find the best genetic fit for their eggs through internal sperm competition. Males would, of course, prefer their sperm to have no competition at all. So, their counterstrategy is to try and eradicate their rivals, and place their sperm in pole fertilising position. To achieve this end, the male’s penis,…

WHEN IT COMES TO DANCING AND dressing to impress, flamingos are capable of putting on an extravagant spectacle with the pizzazz to match any West End or Broadway show. These birds of a feather are, of course, dancing together to find a mate for the breeding season. Four species are distributed across the Americas, with another two found across Africa, parts of southern Europe, the Middle East and Asia. All six species are capable of complex mating displays, but most research has been conducted into the routines of the two Old World species – the greater and lesser flamingos. Flamingos spend most of their lives in the shallow waters of lagoons and lakes, some of which are characterised by a very high salt content that occasionally hits an unbelievably caustic…

Shining a light A fishing cat – a medium-sized feline native to South and South-East Asia – prowls a traditional shrimp farm near the border of Khao Sam Roi Yot National Park, Thailand. This rare wetland specialist is well adapted to its watery home, with partially webbed feet and non-retractable claws for spearing slippery fish. The species is in decline across its range, largely due to habitat loss and poaching. In this part of Thailand, fishing cat habitat has become fragmented by shrimp farms and fishponds – so researchers are investigating how the animals are navigating this altered landscape. To catch a cat Biologists Chaiwat Klakhaeng and Wiroon Mongkonsin set a box-trap to catch a fishing cat for radio-collaring. Bait goes in the small rear section, luring the animal into…

Poacher is based on a real-life story. How did you find out about it? I was directing a documentary titled India In A Day. People all over India shot footage of their own lives on their phones on one particular day (10th October 2015), uploaded it, and then I assembled it into a featurelength documentary. One of the pieces of footage I received was of an ivory raid in Delhi. I was confused at first – had this happened on that day? So I called the NGO that submitted it – the Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) – and they confirmed that they had executed the largest ivory bust in Indian history, after a nine-month investigation around the biggest wildlife smuggling ring in the country. I couldn’t show the footage,…

ACROSS 1 Name for flowering plants in the genus Gypsophila (5-6) 7 Insect in the order Hemiptera (3) 9 Mite subclass (5) 10 Mountain grouse, notable for its white winter plumage (9) 11 Country of Central America, famous for its biodiversity (5,4) 12 Ray-like cartilaginous fish (5) 13 Produce faeces (7) 15 Formic ___, wood ant defence (4) 18 Small, brown songbird, Troglodytes troglodytes (4) 20 Highland valley, known for its woods, moors and peat bogs (4,3) 23 Another name for the saltbush (5) 24 Darkling beetle larvae (4,5) 26 Spurge (9) 27 Monotypic moth genus (5) 28 North Yorkshire river, home to brown trout, grayling, barbel, chub and roach (3) 29 Streaked brown songbird of moors and heaths (6,5) DOWN 1 Boughs (8) 2 Mustard and cabbage genus (8)…

1. Inaccessible Island rail Endemic to a South Atlantic island with the very on-the-nose name of Inaccessible Island, it’s long been a mystery how this tiny brown bird (just 15.5cm long) arrived there in the first place. Genome sequencing has suggested that its closest-living relative is a flighted bird (the dot-winged crake), meaning that the common ancestor of these two had the ability to fly, and the ancestors of the Inaccessible Island rail likely simply flew to their island home. 2. Common ostrich The heaviest and tallest of all extant birds (let alone just flightless ones), adult males can stand above 2.5m and weigh more than 150kg. Contrary to the myth, these birds don’t stick their heads in the sand when scared, but sometimes put their heads in their sandy…