Fish and Amphibians

BALTIMORE — To recognize the impact super fan Mo Gaba had on the Orioles, the City of Baltimore announced that Thursday, July 28, will be recognized as "Mo Gaba Day." On the second anniversary of his passing, the Orioles welcome Gaba's mom, his friends and family, and caretakers from Johns Hopkins Children's Center to celebrate his life and celebrate. Those fans who purchase tickets for the game, can choose to include a donation to the Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Gaba's honor. The late 14-year-old super fan was elected to the Orioles Hall of Fame just a day before his passing. He was the second recipient of The Wild Bill Hagy Award as one of the most passionate and devoted fans in franchise history. Gaba endured four different battles with cancer and lost his eyesight before passing. At the age of nine, he began to call into local sports radio shows to share his knowledge of Baltimore sports. This helped him establish relationships with ...

by Xinhua writers Li Jiayu, Ren Yaoting XINING, April 29 (Xinhua) -- Dubbed the "roof of the world," the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau is often associated with only snow-capped mountains, grasslands and a cold climate, but photographer Bao Yongqing has captured an entire wildlife paradise for the world to behold. Bao, 56, won the prestigious Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2019 for his image titled "The Moment" which captured a standoff between a Tibetan fox and a marmot. The first Chinese photographer to receive the international honor, awarded annually by the London's Natural History Museum, Bao said he is happy to use his camera to bring the plateau to the world. Bao was born in Tianjun County in northwest China's Qinghai Province. Covered by the Qilian Mountain National Park, his hometown is ideal for capturing wildlife because of its rich biodiversity. His odyssey with the camera began in 2012 when he was working at a local livestock company. He used t...

Analysis of oviparous and viviparous individuals of the common lizard reveals the genetic architecture of pregnancy. Most research into live birth focuses on therian mammals — eutherian mammals and marsupials. But the body of literature exploring viviparity in squamate reptiles and fishes is growing rapidly. Concurrently, physiological similarities are being recognized between viviparous species and egg-laying animals with elaborate forms of parental care, such as the marsupial frogs and syngnathid fishes that brood their embryos in/on the body of the parent 4 . This research identifies a core set of functions that appears to be common to gestational tissues across taxa, in support of internally developing embryos, including adaptations to facilitate respiratory gas exchange, immune modulation to protect developing e...

Beginning life in a big pool of cannibals is a tough gig, but that's the reality for tadpoles of the dyeing poison dart frog Dendrobates tinctorius . The unconventional creche sees tadpoles Battle Royale it out to make it to adulthood, but research has found several factors can influence an individual's odds of survival. Fights to the death usually go better for bigger individuals, and the same is true for tadpoles trying to survive in the perilous ponds they're placed into by their fathers. The small bodies of water that house D. tinctorius juveniles in the tropics have scarce resources (hence all the cannibalism), but muscle isn't the only deciding factor in staying alive. Intraspecies aggression like cannibalism frees up resources, but it can also reduce your genetic material's ability to spread (also known as inclusive fitness) if you're wiping out your close relatives in the process. As such, some animals have evolved to avoid kin when on a killing sp...

It all started when Scott Smith was around 12 years old. "I discovered toads in the window wells of my family home and I've always had something since," he said. "At the most, I probably had 200 animals at one point. I got a USDA permit and I had a ring-tailed lemur, a lesser bush baby coatimundi, chinchillas, hedgehogs, flying squirrels … skunks. Skunks actually make really good pets. They're just illegal in Illinois without a USDA (permit)." Nowadays, the Woodstock resident is down to just two dogs, two cats and a bird as pets, but he still encounters hundreds of animals every couple of weeks at Scott Smith's All Animal Expo, held twice a month at the Kane County Fairgrounds in St. Charles. "It's a different experience," Smith said. "It's educational. It's a petting zoo, it's a sale. It's just different. It's kind of a beast of its own." The expo brings together animal lovers and vendors for a day of educatio...

On this Tuesday, March 29, edition of Sundial: Stone Crabs Unless you're a crabber, the last time you might have thought about stone crabs might have been when you had your claws with a side of butter at dinner. And when you got the bill for that, you might also have noticed that the price of your crab claw has gone up. Stone crab season will be coming to an end in a little over a month. And there are concerns that we need to get a better handle on the stone crab population. As the pandemic continues, you can rely on WLRN to keep you current on local news and information. Your support is what keeps WLRN strong. Please become a member today. Donate now. Thank you.  WLRN's environment Reporter Jenny Staletovich joined Sundial. She's been looking into the status of stone crabs in Florida for an upcoming report. "When I started asking around about the numbers themselves and how the population was doing, I was actually surprised to find out that they had declined ...

Get full access to Outside Learn, our online education hub featuring in-depth fitness, nutrition, and adventure courses and more than 2,000 instructional videos when you sign up for Outside+ >","name":"in-content-cta","type":"link"}}">Sign up for Outside+ today. When it comes to charismatic megafauna, bears are at the top of nearly everyone's list—and not just in North America. Hikers around the world hit the trail both afraid and excited to spot one of these fuzzy apex predators, but as long as you stay at a safe distance, bear-watching can be a wildlife experience like no other. Head to these eight spots to get to know the globe's bears a little better, from the familiar to the elusive to the possibly extinct. Carpathian Mountains, Romania Carpathian Mountains (Photo: Photo by Andrei Tanase: https://ww...

I have a new favorite for kids and big fish story and photo. It's Walker Gosa, 6, Kash Gustafson, 7, and Mason Mitton, 7, catching and releasing a 48-pound flathead catfish on the Rock River earlier this spring. The three boys are from Port Byron. "No new record sturgeons, yet, but we did get some kids on a monster flathead," Troy Gustafson emailed last week. "We had them take turns fighting it. Took them forever to get it in." Gustafson briefly held the Illinois record for shovelnose sturgeon before his uncle Marty Gustafson bested him in December (Jan. 8, 2022 Sun-Times). When Troy Gustafson emailed that the flathead ate a piece of gizzard shad, I mentioned that one of my life dreams is to catch a 50-pound flathead. "Yeah, they have me beat!" he replied. "I would like a 50 as well. We were surprised. You could tell it was a big fish, but 48 was not expected! They worked together and eventually drug it in. Pretty funny. We were happy the hook hel...

Show Caption Hide Caption Bob Baffert by the numbers: Look into the horse trainer's career stats Take a look at some of the numbers behind Hall of Fame trainer Bob Baffert's career. Jeff Faughender, Louisville Courier Journal LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The year was 1976, and fledgling trainer Bob Baffert was desperate.  "I couldn't win a race, and I wanted to win so badly before the meet ended," he wrote years later in his autobiography, "Dirt Road to the Derby." So he let a virtual stranger give his horse a painkiller. "I didn't know what it was, and I barely knew the guy," Baffert said in his book.  The drug turned out to be morphine, and the horse lost anyway. California regulators suspended Baffert for a year.  But he managed to flout the sanction: Each day, he would sneak into the backside ...