|
Hippopotamuses In Colombia
Hippopotamuses are an introduced species in Colombia. Four hippopotamuses were first kept by Pablo Escobar in his private zoo in the late 1970s, and upon his death in 1993, they were allowed to wander his unattended estate. The hippos eventually broke out of the estate and were left to roam the outside area, due to difficulty in containment. By 2019, their population had grown to approximately one hundred individuals, causing concerns about harming the native flora and fauna in the area, as well as posing a significant threat to the human population. History In the late 1970s, Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar kept four hippopotamuses in a private menagerie at his residence in Hacienda Nápoles, east of Medellín, Colombia. They were deemed too difficult to seize and move after Escobar's death, and hence left on the untended estate. By 2007, the animals had multiplied to 16 and had taken to roaming the area for food in the nearby Magdalena River. In early 2014, there were repor ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
West Indian Manatee
The West Indian manatee (''Trichechus manatus''), also known as the North American manatee, is a large, aquatic mammal native to warm coastal areas of the Caribbean, from the Eastern United States to northern Brazil. Living alone or in herds, it feeds on underwater plants and uses its whiskers to navigate. It is divided into two subspecies, the Florida manatee (''T. m. latirostris'') in the United States and the Antillean manatee (''T. m. manatus'') in the Caribbean, both of which are endangered and face pressure from habitat loss, pollution, and other human activity. The West Indian manatee is the largest living member of the sirenians (order Sirenia), a group of large aquatic mammals that includes the dugong, other manatees, and the extinct Steller's sea cow. Manatees are herbivores, have developed vocal communication abilities, and are covered in highly sensitive whiskers (called vibrissae) that are used for feeding and navigation. In breeding season, several males form mating ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ministry Of Environment And Sustainable Development (Colombia)
{{forestry-agency-stub ...
The Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development () is the national executive ministry of the Government of Colombia in charge of formulating, implementing, and orienting environmental policy to ensure the sustainable development of the country. List of Ministers References Colombia, Environment and Sustainable Development Environmental policies organizations Colombia Colombia, officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country primarily located in South America with Insular region of Colombia, insular regions in North America. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Caribbean Sea to the north, Venezuel ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ABC News (United States)
ABC News is the news division of the American television network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast '' ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include morning news-talk show '' Good Morning America'', ''Nightline'', '' 20/20'', and Sunday morning political affairs program '' This Week with George Stephanopoulos''. The network also includes daytime talk shows '' The View'', '' Live with Kelly and Mark'', and '' Tamron Hall''. In addition to the division's television programs, ABC News has radio and digital outlets, including ABC News Radio and ABC News Live, plus various podcasts hosted by ABC News personalities. History 20th-century origins ABC began in 1943 as the NBC Blue Network, a radio network that was spun off from NBC, as ordered by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in 1942. The reason for the order was to expand competition in radio broadcasting in the United States, specifically news and political broadcasting, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
GnRH
Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) is a releasing hormone responsible for the release of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) and luteinizing hormone (LH) from the anterior pituitary. GnRH is a tropic peptide hormone synthesized and released from GnRH neurons within the hypothalamus. GnRH is inhibited by testosterone. The peptide belongs to gonadotropin-releasing hormone family. It constitutes the initial step in the hypothalamic–pituitary–gonadal axis. Structure The identity of GnRH was clarified by the 1977 Nobel Laureates Roger Guillemin and Andrew V. Schally: pyroGlu-His-Trp-Ser-Tyr-Gly-Leu-Arg-Pro-Gly-NH2 As is standard for peptide representation, the sequence is given from amino terminus to carboxyl terminus; also standard is omission of the designation of chirality, with assumption that all amino acids are in their L- form. The abbreviations are the standard abbreviations for the corresponding proteinogenic amino acids, except for ''pyroGlu'', which refers ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ecotourism
Ecotourism is a form of nature-oriented tourism intended to contribute to the Ecological conservation, conservation of the natural environment, generally defined as being minimally impactful, and including providing both contributions to conservation and environmental education. The definition sometimes also includes being financially beneficial to the host community or making conservation financially possible. There are a range of different definitions, and the correct definition of the term was an active subject of debate as of 2009. The term is also used more widely by many organizations offering nature tourism, which do not focus on being beneficial to the environment. Since the 1980s, ecotourism has been considered an important endeavor by environmentalists for conservation reasons. Organizations focusing on ecotourism often make direct or indirect contributions to conservation or employ practices or technology that reduce impacts on the environment. However (according to Bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Toxodon
''Toxodon'' (meaning "bow tooth" in reference to the curvature of the teeth) is an extinct genus of large ungulate native to South America from the Pliocene to the end of the Late Pleistocene. ''Toxodon'' is a member of Notoungulata, an order of extinct South American native ungulates distinct from the two living ungulate orders that had been indigenous to the continent for over 60 million years since the early Cenozoic, prior to the arrival of living ungulates into South America around 2.5 million years ago during the Great American Interchange. ''Toxodon'' is a member of the family Toxodontidae, which includes medium to large sized herbivores. ''Toxodon'' was one of the largest members of Toxodontidae and Notoungulata, with ''Toxodon platensis'' having an estimated body mass of . Remains of ''Toxodon'' were first collected by Charles Darwin during the voyage of the Beagle in 1832-33, and later scientifically named by Richard Owen in 1837. Both Darwin and Owen were puzzled by ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pleistocene Rewilding
Pleistocene rewilding is the advocacy of the reintroduction of extant Pleistocene megafauna, or the close ecological equivalents of extinct megafauna. It is an extension of the conservation practice of rewilding, which aims to restore functioning, self-sustaining ecosystems through practices that may include species reintroductions. Towards the end of the Pleistocene era (roughly 13,000 to 10,000 years ago), nearly all megafauna of Eurasia, Australia, and South/North America, dwindled towards extinction, in what has been referred to as the Quaternary extinction event. With the loss of large herbivores and predator species, niches important for ecosystem functioning were left unoccupied. In the words of the biologist Tim Flannery, "ever since the extinction of the megafauna 13,000 years ago, the continent has had a seriously unbalanced fauna". This means, for example, that the managers of national parks in North America have to resort to culling to keep the population of ungul ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Algae Bloom
An algal bloom or algae bloom is a rapid increase or accumulation in the population of algae in fresh water or marine water systems. It is often recognized by the discoloration in the water from the algae's pigments. The term ''algae'' encompasses many types of aquatic photosynthetic organisms, both macroscopic multicellular organisms like seaweed and microscopic unicellular organisms like cyanobacteria. ''Algal bloom'' commonly refers to the rapid growth of microscopic unicellular algae, not macroscopic algae. An example of a macroscopic algal bloom is a kelp forest. Algal blooms are the result of a nutrient, like nitrogen or phosphorus from various sources (for example fertilizer runoff or other forms of nutrient pollution), entering the aquatic system and causing excessive growth of algae. An algal bloom affects the whole ecosystem. Consequences range from benign effects, such as feeding of higher trophic levels, to more harmful effects like blocking sunlight from reaching o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cyanobacteria
Cyanobacteria ( ) are a group of autotrophic gram-negative bacteria that can obtain biological energy via oxygenic photosynthesis. The name "cyanobacteria" () refers to their bluish green (cyan) color, which forms the basis of cyanobacteria's informal common name, blue-green algae. Cyanobacteria are probably the most numerous taxon to have ever existed on Earth and the first organisms known to have produced oxygen, having appeared in the middle Archean eon and apparently originated in a freshwater or terrestrial environment. Their photopigments can absorb the red- and blue-spectrum frequencies of sunlight (thus reflecting a greenish color) to split water molecules into hydrogen ions and oxygen. The hydrogen ions are used to react with carbon dioxide to produce complex organic compounds such as carbohydrates (a process known as carbon fixation), and the oxygen is released as a byproduct. By continuously producing and releasing oxygen over billions of years, cyanobacte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magdalena River Turtle
The Magdalena River turtle or Rio Magdalena river turtle (''Podocnemis lewyana'') is a species of turtle in the family Podocnemididae,''Podocnemis lewyana'' Reptile Database which diverged from other turtles in the , 100 million years ago. It is to northern , where its home range consists of the [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
