They says the temperature rise was caused by climate change.
Experts say it is the first time that Galapagos sea lions have set up a colony outside the islands.
The monitors say the water temperature in Piura, off the coast of northern Peru, has risen from 17C to 23C over the last 10 years.
The temperature is much closer to the sea temperature around the Galapagos Islands, which averages about 25C.
Now that the conditions of the sea around northern Peru are so similar to the Galapagos, they say, even more sea lions and other new marine species could start arriving.
Like so many native species in the Galapagos Islands, the sea lions are unique to the archipelago, located about 600 miles west of continental Ecuador.
Ever since the English naturalist, Charles Darwin, first visited the islands more than 150 years ago, they have become known as a living museum of evolution.
Now, thanks to global warming, that unique ecosystem could face unprecedented changes.
As a result, Zhucheng City has become known locally as “dinosaur city“.
The footprints were uncovered on a 2,600 sq m (0.64 acre) rock slope in a gully following three months of excavation work, Xinhua reported.
The find is unusual because of the quantity and size of footprints uncovered, scientists said.
The footprints, which range from 10cm (3.9in) to 80cm in length, belong to dinosaur types including tyrannosaurs, coelurosaurs and hadrosaurs, Xinhua said.
Sat 06/02/2010 - 12:17 For the 10th winter in a row Natuurpunt is organising a count of the birds in people’s gardens. Thousands of Flemish families are counting the birds that come to their feeders and giving the information to Natuurpunt.
From 1 October to 31 March Natuurpunt collects and compiles the results of the bird counts by a number of volunteers.
Apart from the monthly information from volunteers a national Bird Counting Weekend is held once a year.
That is what is taking place this weekend.
And how does this work?
After having replenished the feeder you count how many birds come during a period of 30 minutes. Per species, they write down the largest number in the garden at a given moment.
According to Natuurpunt you do not have to be an expert to count the birds in your garden.
Several dailies also periodically include posters with the most common birds in Belgium.
Last year 450 people were involved in the monthly counting. More than 6,600 took part in last year’s national Bird Counting Weekend. Some 290,000 birds were counted last year.
The information compiled by Natuurpunt is clearly not scientific, but it gives an idea of the trend from year to year.
Last winter was the coldest winter since the counting started and the result was that there were spectacularly more species of birds than in the previous winters. This winter is also much colder and Natuurpunt expects a wide variety of birds to be counted this weekend again.
Paleontology Field Prospecting in Angola 2009, looking for vertebrate fossils. This video shows the size of the Cretaceous outcrops in Angola. By Octávio Mateus. See also www.paleoangola.org
An international team of scientists has announced the discovery of “turtle of Angola,” a Late Cretaceous reptile that was one of the earliest known marine turtles from Africa. The seafaring turtle, Angolachelys mbaxi, lived 90 million years ago.
Octavio Mateus, who led the project, informed me of the find today. He is a researcher at both the New University of Lisbon and the Museu da Lourinhã.
The Dinosaur Era marine turtle “represents one of the first marine amniote lineages to have invaded the South Atlantic after separation of Africa and South America,” according to Mateus and his team. The researchers believe the turtle first emerged in the North Atlantic. When the new opening to the southern part of the ocean occurred, this animal, and apparently others, made a bee-line southward. A marine lizard, Angolasaurus, from the same time period has also been found, and it too was one of the first to invade the South Atlantic.
An annual snow festival began Friday in Sapporo in Hokkaido, featuring some 240 snow sculptures at three sites in the northern city. Organizers expect more than 2 million people will visit those sites during the festival through next Thursday. Among the sculptures are those of polar bears and penguins from popular Hokkaido zoos and that of the Church of Our Lady in Dresden, Germany, which is the highest on record in the annual events at some 26 meters high.
VietNamNet Bridge – Researchers have found out a new species of gecko in the Ta Cu Nature Reserve in Binh Thuan province.
The new endemic gecko is named Gekko takouensis sp. nov. Ngo & Gamble since it was discovered by Ngo Van Tri, an expert from the HCM City Institute of Tropical Biology and Dr. Tony Gamble from the Minnesota University, USA.
This is the second endemic gecko species found on Ta Cu mountain. The other is bent-toe gecko named Cyrtodactylus takouensis Ngo & Bauer.
Recently, many rare species of animals have been discovered in the Ta Cu Nature Reserve, including francolin, mountain hawk, Truong Son silver douc and black-legged monkey (Pygathrix nigripes).
According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the Ta Cu Nature Reserve has 751 floral species and at least 15 species are very rare. It is also the home to around 178 species of terrestrial spinal [vertebrate] animals.
Dr. Vu Ngoc Long, Director of the HCM City Institute of Tropical Biology‘s Bio-diversity and Development Centre, there are at least 25 species of endangered animals at the Ta Cu Nature Reserve.
To protect the important nature reserve, a project has been launched to improve management capacity of local authorities and raise people’s awareness of protecting environment.
