Revisiting the Tree of Life

from BloombergView:

SCIENCE

The Tree of Life Gets Redrawn (Sorry, Humans) 

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APRIL 15, 2016 8:35 AM EST

This week, we found out some "humbling" things about the tree of life, which has been redrawn to accommodate thousands of newly discovered forms of bacteria. Some people may be inclined to feel diminished by such advances in science, though this one could just as easily make people feel more elite, given that, unlike the bacterial multitudes, we’re made from many cells working together.

There are, however, a couple of features of the new tree that upend the way humankind sees its place in the cosmos -- features that are known to scientists but whose impacts have yet to work their way through the culture at large.

First, there is the fact that the tree has no "top." It’s more of a tumbleweed of life. The branches that lead to E. coli are as long as the ones leading to humans. There are no higher or lower organisms any more than there are higher or lower cousins in a genealogical tree.

Beyond that, the tree of life is still growing. When human activities lead to the extinction of a plant or animal, a whole branch is severed. The extinct animal or plant

Friendly, but too misleading?

from the Trees in Space blog:

The four types of plants

Botany has an image problem. Part of the issue is that it’s perceived as possessing arcane and esoteric language, making it impenetrable to outsiders. There is some justification in this; an average reader would need a large glossary to hand in order to tackle the more recondite specialist floras. That said, for readers in the UK, there are excellent and accessible floras that anyone can use, which, combined with a guide to plant families should be enough to set anyone on the right path.

As Kew Gardens’ recent State of the World’s Plants report attests, there are almost 400,000 known plant species, a number which is only set to increase. This is daunting complexity. There have therefore been multiple attempts to simplify the diversity of plants into a set of categories, based on their taxonomy, appearance or function, to help break down the problem into manageable chunks.

One of the most influential attempts to do this was by the great Danish botanist Christen Raunkiær, a founding figure in plant ecology, who recognised a series of plant life forms:

Plant life forms as determined by Raunkiaer (1907). Plant parts are distinguished between those which are ephemeral or temporary (thin lines) and those which persist through unfavourable seasons such as cold winters (dark lines). Names are given in the text.

These sketches appear to be straightforward divisions. One could easily map them onto common vernacular terms: tree, shrub, vine and so forth. Alas, would that it were so easy. The numbers on the

Project Feederwatch - Cornell Citizen Science and Phenology

Project Feederwatch from Cornell  -  http://feederwatch.org/

Razorback Sucker Habitat

from the Nature Conservancy:

Utah

Gently Down the Stream

Planning a fish nursery at the Matheson Wetlands Preserve

“AFTER 20 YEARS OF PLANNING AND CONCERTED EFFORTS TO BRING THIS SPECIES BACK FROM THE BRINK OF EXTINCTION, IT’S EXCITING TO THINK THAT MOAB’S DESERT OASIS MAY BE A PART OF THE SOLUTION FOR THIS ENDANGERED FISH.”

- Linda Whitham, Central Canyonlands Program Manager

The Colorado River, flowing near Moab, is home to many endangered fish species, including the razorback sucker. For many years, the razorback sucker was thought to have almost completely disappeared from this section of the river. Yet, in just the past three years there has been an exciting and unexpected resurgence of this elusive species.

HISTORY OF RAZORBACK SUCKER HABITAT

Twenty years ago, The Nature Conservancy and its partners were looking at areas along the Colorado River that could serve as potential nursery habitats for razorback sucker larvae, including the Scott M. Matheson Wetlands Preserve located in Moab. Although the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources stocks the razorback sucker each year, studies show that natural recruitment, which occurs when water floods into off-channel nursery habitat, may be necessary to ensure self-sustaining populations.

Unfortunately, changing river dynamics caused by dam operations and the appearance of tamarisk along river bankshave reduced the availability of slow-moving, back-eddy fish habitat like that found in the Scott M. Matheson Wetlands Preserve.

HOPE FOR RECOVERY

Recently, the Conservancy and its partners at the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources (UDWR) began to revisit the preserve as a potential nursery habitat. After conducting research last summer, fish biologists have found existing razorback sucker larvae along the shoreline of the preserve. This find brings renewed hope that with a little innovative engineering the preserve could become a place where these larvae would be protected from predation during that vulnerable part of their lifecycle. Once they are big enough, the fish would then be released back into the river, giving them a much better chance of survival and opportunity for recovery.

LOOKING FORWARD

The Conservancy has hired an engineer to do a feasibility study to determine what it would take to bring fish larvae into the preserve’s central pond during spring flows and then release them back into the river in the fall. Meanwhile, Linda Whitham, Central Canyonlands Program Manager for the Conservancy in Utah and manager of the Scott M. Matheson Wetlands Preserve, and her UDWR partners are moving ahead with plans to develop a nursery and working to secure funding for this exciting project.

“We’re hoping that by this summer we’ll have a design plan and some funding in hand to get started on the project this fall,” says Whitham. “There’s a tremendous groundswell of enthusiasm from all our different partners. After 20 years of planning and concerted efforts to bring this species back from the brink of extinction, it’s exciting to think that Moab’s desert oasis may be a part of the solution for this endangered fish.”

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Australian Privet Hawk Moth

Here is a short video clip of an Australian Privet Hawk Moth (Sphinx ligustri). It's similar to our Hermit Sphinx moth in the same family (Lintneria eremitus). The similar but somewhat more Northeastern US Canadian Sphinx (Sphinx canadensis) is in the same Genus.

Earth with no water