Transcript

6.11.26 · Science Show KY

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Radiowized Diary of Science and Nature, your readers,
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Speaker 1: Kelly Taylor. I'll have articles on the topics of science
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Speaker 1: and nature, but first a reminder that radioi is a
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Speaker 1: reading service intended for people who are blind or have
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Speaker 1: other disabilities that make it difficult to read printed material.
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Speaker 1: Beginning today, we'll have an article from Smithsonian. The headline
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Speaker 1: is quote stupid hot uote. Heat waves muddle the minds
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Speaker 1: of animals and humans as confusion and aggression seem to
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Speaker 1: rise with the temperature. This is dated June fifth, on
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Speaker 1: a blazing hot day in South Africa, female Southern pied
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Speaker 1: babblers can't think straight. The medium sized black and white
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Speaker 1: birds are trying to get at tasty meal worms placed
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Speaker 1: behind a sea through barrier on cooler days. The birds
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Speaker 1: can quickly figure out that all they have to do
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Speaker 1: is go around the small wall of plastic, but when
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Speaker 1: the mercury goes up, the birds just keep stubbornly pecking
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Speaker 1: at the barrier. That experiment is part of a growing
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Speaker 1: body of research suggesting that animals get their minds muddled
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Speaker 1: during heat waves. When it's hot outside, birds struggle to learn,
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Speaker 1: dogs bite more often, and goat like chammis pick fights.
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Speaker 1: This is bad news, and not just for those who
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Speaker 1: get on Fido's toasted nerves. If the animals can't stay
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Speaker 1: alert enough to find food or avoid predators, their chances
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Speaker 1: of survival go downhill, says a man To Ridley, a
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Speaker 1: behavioral ecologist at the University of Western Australia who worked
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Speaker 1: on the study. With climate change making heat waves more common,
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Speaker 1: such cognitive impairments across the animal kingdom could ripple through
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Speaker 1: entire ecosystems, putting already fragile species at greater risk. If
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Speaker 1: pollinators forget which flowers to visit, crops and wild plants
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Speaker 1: may fail. If birds can't find food as easily, their
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Speaker 1: young may not serve. And on a warming planet, a
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Speaker 1: sharp mind is particularly vital. Quote A changing climate means
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Speaker 1: that your ability to behaviorally adapt is even more important,
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Speaker 1: Ridley says. Scientists have uncovered plenty of evidence that animals
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Speaker 1: are affected by heat. Some birds, for example, spend less
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Speaker 1: time looking for food and feeding their young at higher temperatures,
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Speaker 1: they even seeing less. Instead, they'll sit around for hours
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Speaker 1: with wings spread to dissipate the heat, and pant with
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Speaker 1: their beaks wide open. Some animals retreat to shade or
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Speaker 1: hide in cool burrows. Again skipping meals. Bees meanwhile splash
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Speaker 1: their faces with droplets of water mid flight when the
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Speaker 1: weather is sizzling. This way quote they get convective cooling
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Speaker 1: for their brain, says Emily Baard, a neuroscientist at Stockholm University.
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Speaker 1: Some of the first hints that hot temperatures can mess
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Speaker 1: up mine, however, came from studies on humans. Back in
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Speaker 1: the eighteen hundreds. Belgian mathematician Adolf Quitellet noticed that violent
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Speaker 1: crime in France peaked in the summer. Later studies linked
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Speaker 1: high temperatures with gun violence, mental health related hospital admissions, suicide,
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Speaker 1: and gambling. When it's hot, people have trouble making decisions
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Speaker 1: and their memory suffers. For students at schools without air
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Speaker 1: conditioning a school year, just one degree fahrenheit hotter reduces
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Speaker 1: test scores by one percent, a study found in twenty twenty. Increasingly,
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Speaker 1: there's evidence that other species may also be more aggressive
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Speaker 1: when mercury spikes. A twenty twenty three study comb through
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Speaker 1: nearly seventy thousand reports of dogs biting people across eight
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Speaker 1: cities in the United States, including Chicago and Baltimore, and
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Speaker 1: found that such incidents were more likely to happen on hot, sunny,
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Speaker 1: and smoggy days. The risk was ten percent higher on
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Speaker 1: a ninety degree day than on a sixty degree day,
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Speaker 1: and not only because people are more apt to venture
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Speaker 1: out for walks when the sun is shining. The researchers
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Speaker 1: controlled for seasonal effects in their data. Still, the scientists
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Speaker 1: were unable to determine whether dogs get more aggressive as
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Speaker 1: it gets hot, or if cranky humans provoke more attacks.
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Speaker 1: It's likely that both humans and dogs get stressed and
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Speaker 1: more irate at higher temperatures, says Claus Linman, neuroscientists at
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Speaker 1: the Universey to Miami. It's not only dogs. A twenty
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Speaker 1: twenty five study out of China showed that many animals,
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Speaker 1: including snakes and cats, are more inclined to bite people
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Speaker 1: when he gets hot. Animals also seem to lose their
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Speaker 1: cool with each other, especially if there is food involved.
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Speaker 1: Scientists use binoculars and spotting scopes to spy on wild
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Speaker 1: chammis that feed on protein rich plants on the slopes
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Speaker 1: of the Italian Apennine Mountains. Than sixteen hundred hours of
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Speaker 1: observations across two summers revealed that when temperatures rose from
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Speaker 1: fifty four to sixty four degrees, vegetation grew scarcer and
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Speaker 1: Shammy's aggression, in turn shot up. The animals became territorial
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Speaker 1: over patches of food, assuming threatening postures, and chasing each other,
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Speaker 1: attacks that at times escalated. Based on simulations, the study
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Speaker 1: authors predict that shammy aggression will go up fifty percent
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Speaker 1: by twenty eighty due to climate change. The small tropical
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Speaker 1: fish called a golden july also gets confrontational in the heat. Ordinarily,
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Speaker 1: when a golden Julie is placed in front of a mirror,
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Speaker 1: it sees its reflected image as a stranger and shows
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Speaker 1: some hostility, raising its stin for example. But if the
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Speaker 1: normally seventy eight degree water is raised to eighty four degrees,
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Speaker 1: the fish is more likely to get aggression aggressive, and
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Speaker 1: it may bite and slap its tail against the mirror
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Speaker 1: as it tries to scare or attack the reflected image.
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Speaker 1: Heat waves can also hamper the ability of animals to learn,
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Speaker 1: as Riddley in her colleagues observed with the Southern pied babblers.
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Speaker 1: In one of their experiments, the birds were presented with
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Speaker 1: a simple wooden block with two holes in it, each
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Speaker 1: covered with a lid. If the bird pecked at a lid,
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Speaker 1: it would rotate, revealing either an empty hole or a
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Speaker 1: tasty mealworm. The babbler ridly says, or highly motivated by mealworms.
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Speaker 1: One lid was dark and the other a lighter shade
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Speaker 1: of the same color. During heat waves, the birds needed
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Speaker 1: twice as many trials to learn that the mealworm was
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Speaker 1: always hidden under the lid of the same shade. Another
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Speaker 1: group of scientists tested zebra finches, Australian song birds, and
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Speaker 1: discovered that if temperatures are high, they too have cognitive problems.
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Speaker 1: When figuring out how to get a mealworm out of
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Speaker 1: a sea through tube with an opening at one end,
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Speaker 1: they would just keep pecking at the tube, says Elizabeth Dairyberry,
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Speaker 1: and evolutionary biologist the University of Tennessee. It's the bird
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Speaker 1: equivalent of banging your head against a brick wall, she says,
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Speaker 1: adding to the tally. Several years ago, researchers showed that
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Speaker 1: when the heat is on, mice have trouble finding their
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Speaker 1: way around a maize and forget objects that they've seen
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Speaker 1: the day before. More recently, researchers found that male guppies,
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Speaker 1: popular aquarium fish, also have trouble getting through a maze
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Speaker 1: after spending several days in heat wave like ninety degree water.
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Speaker 1: For animals such as fish and insects that can't control
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Speaker 1: their body temperature, heat waves will be especially detrimental. Quote
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Speaker 1: changes in air temperature will affect brain temperature. A hotter
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Speaker 1: brain could hinder the functioning of nerves, and that might
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Speaker 1: affect sensing, memory, and learning. When doctor Baird and her
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Speaker 1: colleagues tried to teach bumblebees to associate sweet sucrose with
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Speaker 1: the color blue and bitter quinine with yellow, most of
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Speaker 1: the bumblebees learned the trick at seventy seven degrees, but
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Speaker 1: less than half managed to do so at ninety Such
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Speaker 1: impaired cognition could spell trouble in the field. If the
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Speaker 1: insects forget which flowers they should pollinate or how to
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Speaker 1: get back home with nectar, not only will the pollinators suffer,
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Speaker 1: but human agriculture will too. Baird says heat appears to
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Speaker 1: dangerously diminish animal vigilance as well. In Ridley's more recent experiments,
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Speaker 1: once mercury in the Kalahari desert reached ninety six degrees,
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Speaker 1: pied babblers lost their ability to properly respond to predators.
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Speaker 1: In their studies, researchers lured birds toward a mystery shape
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Speaker 1: covered in a sandy colored blanket, using worms as bait.
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Speaker 1: Once a babbler approached, the scientist would reveal what was
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Speaker 1: hidden underneath, either a taxidermied cat like carnivore or a
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Speaker 1: roughly equalqual sized and colored wooden box. The birds seemingly
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Speaker 1: got scared of the carnivore. In cooler temperatures, they call out,
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Speaker 1: scan their surroundings, or simply flee, but once it got hot,
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Speaker 1: they behaved similarly whether they were facing the carnivore or
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Speaker 1: the box. Ridley suggests that this could translate into higher
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Speaker 1: chances of fatal predator attacks as heat rises, which could
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Speaker 1: harm populations of babblers and other pre species. These studies
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Speaker 1: are not just abstractions. In the Kalahari, where southern pive
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Speaker 1: babblers use their wits to search for worms, temperatures are
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Speaker 1: rising twice as fast as the global average. In tropical
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Speaker 1: rivers where male guppies seek mates, heat waves are growing
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Speaker 1: longer and more intense It's the same story across much
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Speaker 1: of the planet. Temperatures climb and animal thinking becomes strained,
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Speaker 1: potentially putting species at risk. The effects may be magnified
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Speaker 1: in certain areas, such as cities, which often exhibit even
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Speaker 1: warmer t temperatures than non urban areas. If anything really says,
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Speaker 1: we are probably underestimating the impacts of increased heat on
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Speaker 1: animal mines. Now we'll turn to Popular Science for a headline.
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Speaker 1: We have fifty million pounds of invasive fish removed from
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Speaker 1: Illinois River, written by Laura Basis. There's no date on this.
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Speaker 1: While swimmers and boaters don't have to fear sharks or
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Speaker 1: giant squid in the Great Lakes Watershed, invasive fish the
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Speaker 1: size of large dogs lurk in the fresh water. Invasive
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Speaker 1: carp have reaped havoc on the ecosystem for over a century,
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Speaker 1: but officials have hit a milestone worth celebrating in the
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Speaker 1: fight against these megafish. In the past fifteen years, wildlife
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Speaker 1: officials have removed fifty million pounds of invasive carp from
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Speaker 1: the Illinois River. That's equivalent to roughly five thousand l elephants.
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Speaker 1: The removal is part of a broader and coordinated effort
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Speaker 1: to protect the rivers and lakes from this non native species. Currently,
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Speaker 1: four species of invasive carp cause harm in the Great
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Speaker 1: Lakes and beyond big head carp, silver carp, black carp,
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Speaker 1: and grass carp. According to the Great Lakes Fishery Commission,
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Speaker 1: all four species were imported to North America to help
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Speaker 1: with pest control in aquaculture facilities in the nineteen seventies.
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Speaker 1: The carp escaped confinement in only ten years and have
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Speaker 1: spread to the Mississippi River basin and other large rivers,
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Speaker 1: including the Missouri in Illinois. Each of the four invasive
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Speaker 1: carp species can weigh more than one hundred pounds and
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Speaker 1: grow to four feet from tip to tail. Big Head
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Speaker 1: carp and silver carp generally feed on the tiny plankton
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Speaker 1: in the water, while grass carp eats rooted plants in
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Speaker 1: shallow water and black carp feed primarily on mollusks and snails.
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Speaker 1: Quote they consume so much food and can exist in
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Speaker 1: such great numbers that they can really reduce the amount
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Speaker 1: of resources for resident species of fish, says Peter alsip
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Speaker 1: ecologists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Great Lakes
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Speaker 1: Environmental Research Lab quote. They can have indirect effects on
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Speaker 1: the whole ecosystem because silver carp are consuming phytoplankton and zooplankton,
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Speaker 1: which are essentially the base of the food web. Once
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Speaker 1: inside a watershed, they can reproduce rapidly and compete with
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Speaker 1: native fish species for resources. In areas where invasive carp
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Speaker 1: are abundant, they have harmed other fish species and interfered
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Speaker 1: with commercial and recreational fishing. They can also pose a
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Speaker 1: danger to humans, as the giant fish can jump out
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Speaker 1: of the lake and hit unsuspecting boaters. Carp eradication air
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Speaker 1: measures have been active for over one hundred years. These
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Speaker 1: efforts include targeted mass removal efforts, developing barriers to block
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Speaker 1: or impede their movement, and ongoing monitoring. The fifty million
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Speaker 1: pounds of fish removed from the Illinois River were part
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Speaker 1: of a program focusing on the northern part of the river,
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Speaker 1: about fifty miles from Lake Michigan. The removal project is
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Speaker 1: designed to suppress the mostly adult populations of karp living
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Speaker 1: in the area by limiting their ability to reproduce and
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Speaker 1: reduce their migration upstream towards the electric dispersal barrier system
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Speaker 1: located about thirty seven miles from Lake Michigan. This electric
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Speaker 1: barrier is designed to deter their movement through the Chicago area.
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Speaker 1: It is one of the main tools wildlife officials are
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Speaker 1: using to keep them from further entering to Great Lakes
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Speaker 1: through the Illinois River. Another program in the Illinois River
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Speaker 1: offers fish harvest incentives to commercial fissures in the river's
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Speaker 1: lower two hundred and forty miles. More invasive carp we remove,
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Speaker 1: the more we reduce their harmful impacts and the risk
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Speaker 1: of them reaching Lake Michigan. The US Fish and Wildlife
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Speaker 1: Service wrote on Facebook, quote, thanks to these and other
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Speaker 1: efforts to monitor our waters and prevent the spread of
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Speaker 1: invasive carp, Illinois and more than two dozen partners are
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Speaker 1: safeguarding some of our most prized native fisheries and the
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Speaker 1: Great Lakes regional economy. And now we'll read a related
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Speaker 1: article another related to invasive fish species. This is in
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Speaker 1: USA today from June to ninth. Frankenfish or Plaguing Ecosystems.
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Speaker 1: What to know about the species. Northern snakehead fish, known
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Speaker 1: as frankenfish, are creating problems for ecosystems up and down
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Speaker 1: the East coast. The predator can breathe there, survive out
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Speaker 1: of water, and walk more of a wriggling snakelike motion
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Speaker 1: on land for at least four days. They have the
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Speaker 1: potential to harm native fish, the recreational fishing industry, and
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Speaker 1: aquatic ecosystems. According to US Fish and Wildlife Service, they
15:13
Speaker 1: look like something out of a nightmare. In fact, they've
15:18
Speaker 1: been used as inspiration for horror movie characters, including a
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Speaker 1: two thousand and four TV movie titled Snakehead Terror. The
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Speaker 1: fish had been sold in US pet stores, fish markets,
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Speaker 1: and restaurants in major cities. According to the agency, They've
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Speaker 1: been spotted in Delaware, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and
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Speaker 1: West Virginia. Here's everything to know about the invasive species.
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Speaker 1: The fish is native to Asia, but colonize the Chesapeake
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Speaker 1: Bay Watershed. According to US Fish and Wildlife, Northern snakeheads
15:54
Speaker 1: are freshwater fish and live in small and large streams, canals, rivers, ponds, resermes,
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Speaker 1: and lakes. The fish may tolerate a wide range of
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Speaker 1: water temperature and environmental conditions, which is why they've been
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Speaker 1: able to spread across the region. The fish were first
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Speaker 1: found in a pond in Crofton, Maryland in two thousand
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Speaker 1: and two. Two years later, they were spotted in the
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Speaker 1: Potomac River. Since then, they've spread across the watershed. The
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Speaker 1: fish have also been found in rivers in New York, Pennsylvania,
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Speaker 1: and Arkansas. The fish is considered an injurious species under
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Speaker 1: the Lacy Act, meaning it cannot be possessed or transported live.
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Speaker 1: According to the agency, officials across the United States are
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Speaker 1: working to stop populations from growing and traveling to other waterways.
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Speaker 1: In Maryland, the state's Fish and Wildlife Conservation Office is
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Speaker 1: partnering with state and federal agencies to find an effective
16:51
Speaker 1: way to reduce the species population in Chesapeake Bay Watershed.
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Speaker 1: One technique that has caused a population to improve is
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Speaker 1: angler harvesting, which has been shown to reduce the population
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Speaker 1: about twenty five percent. The agency encourages anglers to target
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Speaker 1: and harvest northern snakehead when captured. It's not likely that
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Speaker 1: the fish can be eradicated from US waters, the agency notes,
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Speaker 1: still control efforts can improve the situation. Anyone who catches
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Speaker 1: a snakehead is advised not to release it or throw
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Speaker 1: it up on the bank. Instead, anglers should kill the
17:27
Speaker 1: fish by freezing it or placing it on ice for
17:30
Speaker 1: an extended period. Additionally, anglers should contact their state conservation
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Speaker 1: agency or US Fish and Wildlife and photograph the fish
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Speaker 1: so it can be positively identified. Keeping data on the size, number,
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Speaker 1: and location of where snakeheads are caught or seen is
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Speaker 1: vital to controlling the invasive fish, the agency states. Now,
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Speaker 1: for popular science, we have four common cat myths debunked.
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Speaker 1: What the science says about milk, sleep, and if your
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Speaker 1: cat really loves you. Cats are man's best friend. Never
18:08
Speaker 1: mind that other animal species jokes aside. Humans and cats
18:13
Speaker 1: have lived together for thousands of years, but not nearly
18:16
Speaker 1: as long as humans and dogs. It makes sense then
18:19
Speaker 1: that we don't always understand cats very well. This can
18:22
Speaker 1: result in all kinds of misunderstandings. In the interest of
18:26
Speaker 1: improved feline human relations, here are a few very common
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Speaker 1: cat myths debunked with actual science. Milk isn't good for cats.
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Speaker 1: It's any iconic image a cat lapping from a bowl
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Speaker 1: of milk. It's also a terrible idea. The majority of
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Speaker 1: cats are lactose intolerant, says Julia Henning, PhD candidate and
18:49
Speaker 1: feline behavior at the University of Adelaide. Quote. After weaning
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Speaker 1: around six to twelve years or sixty twelve years six
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Speaker 1: to twelve weeks of age, kittens stop producing the enzyme
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Speaker 1: lactase required to digest lactose in milk, wrote Hinting for
19:07
Speaker 1: the fast majority of cats, this means they are lactose intolerant.
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Speaker 1: Dairy can cause all kinds of problems from cats for cats,
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Speaker 1: from diarrheta to bloating to vomiting. It can even be
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Speaker 1: life threatening in some cases. And know your cat probably
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Speaker 1: isn't special. Quote. Cats are very good at hiding discomfort
19:26
Speaker 1: because in the wild, showing weakness would make them a
19:29
Speaker 1: target for predators. That means your milk drinking cat could
19:33
Speaker 1: be suffering and you'd have no idea. It's best to
19:36
Speaker 1: just cut the dairy, says Henning. A lot of the
19:40
Speaker 1: other myth cats are not nocturnal. A lot of people
19:45
Speaker 1: think that cats don't sleep at night, and it's true
19:48
Speaker 1: that their sleep schedule isn't exactly aligned with that of humans.
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Speaker 1: The average cat will sleep in the middle of the
19:54
Speaker 1: day and in some cases make a lot of noise
19:57
Speaker 1: while the humans are trying to get to sleep. However,
19:59
Speaker 1: that's not the same as being nocturnal, which means sleeping
20:03
Speaker 1: during the day and being awake at night. Cats are
20:07
Speaker 1: actually crepuscular, meaning they are most active at the beginning
20:11
Speaker 1: and end of the day. They sleep both at night
20:14
Speaker 1: and during the day. The reason for this has to
20:17
Speaker 1: do with hunting patterns. Quote. Birds and mice are very
20:20
Speaker 1: active at dawn, and cats evolve to take advantage of
20:23
Speaker 1: this by developing the ability to see in low like conditions.
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Speaker 1: That's a quote from Stephen quant cat behavioral specialists. They
20:33
Speaker 1: get the bulk of their hunting done while it's mostly
20:35
Speaker 1: but not entirely dark. If your cat's evening antics are
20:39
Speaker 1: a problem, consider a play session right before bed and
20:42
Speaker 1: feeding them a small amount. This can recreate the natural
20:46
Speaker 1: hunting cycle, allowing them to ease into the evening. Purring
20:52
Speaker 1: doesn't always mean happiness. We all imagine that purring means
20:56
Speaker 1: a happy cat, which makes sense. It's the most common
20:59
Speaker 1: reason for purring. It's not the only one, though. According
21:02
Speaker 1: to the American Animal Hospital Association, purring can't express contentment.
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Speaker 1: That can also mean a number of other things. In
21:10
Speaker 1: some cases, cats purr when they're stressed. It can be
21:13
Speaker 1: a way of self soothing. Cats also purr when they're
21:16
Speaker 1: in pain for the same reason. Cats have also been
21:20
Speaker 1: known to purr as a way to ask for food
21:22
Speaker 1: or as a way to help themselves fall asleep. Basically,
21:26
Speaker 1: you can't assume that a purring cat is a happy cat.
21:28
Speaker 1: You'll have to pay attention to the other ways cats communicate,
21:31
Speaker 1: like body language to understand what's going on. Cats love
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Speaker 1: their owners. Finally, it's commonly claimed that cats aren't as
21:42
Speaker 1: loving as dogs, and while it's true that cats don't
21:45
Speaker 1: express outright enthusiasm in quite the same way dogs do,
21:49
Speaker 1: that doesn't mean they don't feel connected with their human companions.
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Speaker 1: Doctor Christen Vattal, a feline researcher who studied for her
21:57
Speaker 1: PhD at the University of Oregon, published research in twenty
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Speaker 1: nineteen that shows cats develop attachments to their caregivers in
22:05
Speaker 1: much the same way dogs do. The study had cats
22:09
Speaker 1: in an unfamiliar environment. The cats would spend two minutes
22:12
Speaker 1: with their human caretakers than two minutes alone, followed by
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Speaker 1: a two minute reunion. Cats with a secure attachment to
22:20
Speaker 1: their human caregivers showed reduced stress while the caregiver was present.
22:25
Speaker 1: Quote our study indicates that when cats live in a
22:28
Speaker 1: state of dependency with a human, that attachment behavior is flexible, flexible,
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Speaker 1: and the majority of cats use humans as a source
22:36
Speaker 1: of comfort, wrote by tal Quote. In both dogs and cats,
22:40
Speaker 1: attachment to humans may represent an adaptation of the offspring
22:44
Speaker 1: caretaker bond. In other words, cats aren't less attached to
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Speaker 1: the humans when compared to dogs. I'm writing these sentences
22:52
Speaker 1: after my cat jumped onto my lap, so I guess
22:54
Speaker 1: I'm not exactly surprised. Now. Another popular science article, A
23:01
Speaker 1: mystery beetle is devouring North Carolina's precious blueberries. North Carolina's
23:08
Speaker 1: blueberries may have a beetle problem. For the first time,
23:12
Speaker 1: scientists in the tar Heel state have documented the presence
23:16
Speaker 1: of Prionus imbric hornis eating blueberry bushes. This longhorn beetle
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Speaker 1: and its larvae can chomp their way through the state's
23:25
Speaker 1: valuable blueberry fields. The findings are described in a study
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Speaker 1: published this week in the Journal of Integrated Pest Management.
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Speaker 1: Blueberries are native to North Carolina, but were not cultivated
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Speaker 1: until nineteen thirty five. The state is the sixth largest
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Speaker 1: blueberry producer in the United States, and the blueberry industry
23:43
Speaker 1: is valued at roughly seventy million dollars. Protecting the plants
23:47
Speaker 1: from pests as crucial. As blueberries are considered one of
23:50
Speaker 1: North Carolina's most valuable and desirable crops. Several species, including
23:55
Speaker 1: the blueberry maggot, plum Carculia and cranberry fruit worm, can
24:02
Speaker 1: threaten blueberry crops. The long horned beetle p Imbricornis may
24:09
Speaker 1: now join their ranks. Pambricornis is known for their long
24:13
Speaker 1: antenna and are considered wood boring beetles. The adult females
24:18
Speaker 1: typically lay their eggs in the soil near the roots
24:20
Speaker 1: of hardwood trees. The larvae then eat and destroy the roots.
24:25
Speaker 1: These larvae can grow up to five inches long and
24:28
Speaker 1: potentially kill trees since the adults don't feed. North Carolina
24:33
Speaker 1: is the first state to report that p Imbricornis is
24:36
Speaker 1: actively feeding on blueberry bushes. However, reports of unidentified larvae
24:41
Speaker 1: from the Prionus beetle genus feeding on and damaging blueberry
24:46
Speaker 1: bush roots go back to twenty ten. In the sixteen
24:50
Speaker 1: years since, identifying the specific species responsible has been difficult
24:55
Speaker 1: since the larvae lived near the roots of the plants.
24:58
Speaker 1: Different types of long horned beetle larvae also look very similar,
25:02
Speaker 1: and not identifying as species can harm efforts to combat
25:05
Speaker 1: harmful bugs quote before now. Researchers often just assume the
25:10
Speaker 1: species of Prionus on their commodities based on adult identification,
25:16
Speaker 1: says Kenneth Geisert, a co author of the study and
25:20
Speaker 1: NC State graduate student. If that guess was correct, it
25:24
Speaker 1: could mean using a treatment strategy that did not line
25:27
Speaker 1: up with the problem and incorrectly associating species and their hosts.
25:31
Speaker 1: In quote. For example, p imbercornis attacks roots, but another
25:36
Speaker 1: longhorn beetle species may go after a tree's dead branches
25:39
Speaker 1: or trunk quote without knowing which species of beetle you're
25:44
Speaker 1: dealing with and their ecology. Incorrect management can cause adverse
25:49
Speaker 1: effects on non target insects. Geyser added now from popular mechanics,
25:56
Speaker 1: massive booms shook the East Coast for over three hundred years.
26:00
Speaker 1: Scientists finally found the source of the explosions. Seneca Lake
26:06
Speaker 1: appears tranquil, a summer escape in upstate New York, where
26:10
Speaker 1: vacationers meander down the sand and sailboats bob lazily on
26:14
Speaker 1: rippling waves. Nearby villages are dotted with quaint cottages. Gazing
26:20
Speaker 1: across the deep blue expanse make because it almost impossible
26:23
Speaker 1: to think that something about this lake has caused nightmares,
26:27
Speaker 1: but the deepest part of the finger Lakes hide secrets
26:30
Speaker 1: down below. Many have heard what can only be described
26:33
Speaker 1: as cannon shots coming out of nowhere, known as Seneca
26:37
Speaker 1: guns or Senca drums. The phenomenon was thought by the
26:40
Speaker 1: local Senica tribe to be the bellowing shouts of Manitou,
26:44
Speaker 1: the great Spirit, when he was angry. Later, European settlers
26:48
Speaker 1: thought they were hearing ghosts of Seneca warriors still fighting
26:52
Speaker 1: for their land. But modern legends that attempt to account
26:58
Speaker 1: for the phenomenon include alien spaincraft plunging into the lake
27:01
Speaker 1: or sonic booms from developing technology being beta tested under
27:06
Speaker 1: cover by the government. Neither rumor can possibly be believed, since
27:10
Speaker 1: residents have been bombarded by explosive sounds since at least
27:14
Speaker 1: the seventeen hundreds. Reports sometimes made the papers when the
27:18
Speaker 1: lake boomed every few years before going silent. The rise
27:22
Speaker 1: of social media had everyone who heard the booms logging
27:26
Speaker 1: onto the Facebook and typing did you hear it? As
27:29
Speaker 1: fast as they could, so. Researcher Tim Morin of State
27:34
Speaker 1: University of New York Environmental Science and Forestry in Syracuse
27:38
Speaker 1: had another idea. There could be a physical explanation for it.
27:42
Speaker 1: As early as the nineteenth century, scientists were theorizing mysterious
27:47
Speaker 1: booms could be explosions of gas trapped in the lake bed,
27:51
Speaker 1: and turns out the explanation is bubbles of natural gas
27:55
Speaker 1: escaping from a layer of sandstone deep in the earth
27:58
Speaker 1: and coming up through the waters of the lake, where
28:00
Speaker 1: they burst with a booming sound. When a bubble reaches
28:07
Speaker 1: the surface, it ruptures with enough force to send a
28:10
Speaker 1: shockwave that sounds like cannon fire across the lake. Well
28:15
Speaker 1: that's all for today's Diary of Science and Nature. Your
28:17
Speaker 1: reader was Kelly Taylor. Now stay tuned for further programming
28:21
Speaker 1: on RADIOI