Cuba subasta caballos de raza por 500.000 euros

del feudo del comandante de la robo-ilusion guillermo garcia.
-------------------------- 
El Nuevo Diario

cubaconamalia.wordpress.com

Cuba vendió 33 caballos de salto por un valor total de 500.000 euros (equivalentes a unos 687.000 dólares) durante una subasta realizada la semana pasada en la isla, informaron hoy sus organizadores que calificaron de "exitoso" este resultado.

A la puja por los caballos de salto de la raza "Real Sangre Holandesa" acudieron 25 compradores de México, Panamá, Chile, Angola y España, reporta una nota de la agencia estatal cubana Prensa Latina.

El potro "Edelman", rematado por 41.000 euros (56.000 dólares), y "Fumuto", vendido en 40.000 euros (55.000 dólares), fueron los ejemplares que alcanzaron las mayores cifras del evento celebrado el viernes 15 de febrero en el Centro Ecuestre Nacional, situado en la periferia de La Habana.

Esos caballos de pura raza pertenecientes a la Empresa de Protección de la Flora y la Fauna son considerados de gran potencialidad para la práctica de la equitación.

La cifra recaudada producto de la V Subasta de Elite de caballos de salto será dedicada al programa cubano genético-equino, al tratamiento médico denominado equinoterapia y a proyectos de conservación.

Según la fuente, en Cuba existen 17.000 ejemplares de 17 razas de equinos, y los especialistas buscan recuperar la tradición del caballo de distintas esferas y potenciar su comercialización.

Además de la Empresa de Flora y Fauna, participaron en la preparación de la subasta la compañía comercializadora Alcona y la Agencia de Viajes Ecotur S.A.

Dolphin killing starts at Taiji cove in Japan

ITN

Go Pro camera on falcon's back: Mid-flight bird attack caught on camera

ITN

State-of-the-art bird-mounted cameras have unlocked secrets of how falcons hunt their prey. Footage filmed from cameras on the birds' backs and heads has just emerged after being used in a scientific study into the physics of falcons' flight while hunting. The videos revealed to scientists that the birds use a kind of 'motion camouflaging' as they zigzag their flight paths when pursuing prey. 

 

Squid vs. fish: Camera captures epic undersea battle on video

Read on NBC News >>

Cuba subastará 33 caballos de salto de fina raza

de la caballeriza del comandante de la robo-ilusion guillermo garcia frias.
------------------------ 
www.perlavision.icrt.cu

Raza Real Sangre Holandesa/  www.perlavision.icrt.cu

Cuba subastará 33 caballos de salto de fina raza el 15 de febrero en La Habana, como parte de su oferta turística especializada, informaron este lunes los organizadores.

Se trata del “quinto Remate Élite Internacional de Caballos de Salto”, organizado por la empresa de Protección de Flora y Fauna y la agencia de viajes Ecotur (ambas estatales), a realizarse en el Club Ecuestre del Parque Lenin, cerca de La Habana.

“Se subastarán 33 ejemplares, que incluyen 19 caballos montados y 14 en libertad, de la raza Real Sangre Holandesa, línea de sangre de nivel internacional”, dijo Ecotur en su sitio web.

Cuba trata de diversificar y dar mayor nivel a su oferta turística, que atrae cada año a 2,8 millones de visitantes y recauda unos 2.600 millones de dólares, segunda fuente de ingreso del país tras la venta de servicios médicos.

La isla intenta rescatar la exportación de caballos, que disminuyó en los últimos años, y puso en marcha un programa de fomento en 40 criaderos, que ya suman 17.000 ejemplares de 17 razas, según el semanario Opciones.

Un programa similar está aplicando con la crianza y exportación de aves ornamentales, para lo cual el gobierno autorizó la creación de 17 cooperativas.

Proliferación de ratas negras amenaza a Cuba

agencia de xinhua

Cuba está amenazada por la proliferación de la rata negra ("Rattus rattus"), una especie introducida hace cinco siglos en la isla por los colonizadores españoles, que hoy está en casi todo el país y causa daños a la economía y la fauna, según informa la prensa local.

Ese roedor, que al parecer llegó a Cuba durante las primeras expediciones de los colonizadores españoles, en la actualidad aparece en prácticamente todo el territorio nacional, y en la mayoría de las áreas protegidas.

El animal es considerado como una de las principales plagas que afectan el cultivo de la caña de azúcar, del café, el coco y el cacao, cultivo este último que en la parte oriental del país ha reportado pérdidas en ocasiones cercanas al 50 por ciento de la cosecha.

Esas ratas también ocasionan daños a los cultivos de frijoles, tomate, piña, maíz y a casi todos los frutales, mientras son depredadores de moluscos endémicos cubanos y en peligro de extinción como las polímitas.

Las ratas negras contribuyen a la desaparición o declinación de poblaciones de aves marinas y terrestres.

Especies de aves muy raras y endémicas de la isla, como la Gallinuela de Santo Tomás, y la Ferminia, pudieran estar acechadas por ese roedor, que ataca en particular sus nidos y pichones.

Para el doctor en Ciencias Biológicas Rafael Borroto, del Instituto de Ecología y Sistemática del Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología y Medio Ambiente, el complejo panorama creado por la presencia de mamíferos intrusos demanda aumentar el rigor de las investigaciones.

Borroto pidió que los estudios conduzcan a la adopción de programas más efectivos de control y manejo, sobre todo en aquellos lugares donde hay ejemplares endémicos en peligro de extinción.

En la isla, el número de mamíferos invasores, llegados de manera deliberada o accidental, ronda las tres decenas, y las ratas negras están entre las especies más dañinas y abundantes, aunque también aparecen el ratón casero o guayabito, la rata parda, los gatos, perros y puercos jíbaros, y la mangosta.

La mangosta, conocida erróneamente en Cuba con el nombre de hurón, fue introducida en la isla en la segunda mitad del siglo XIX, y en los últimos años se aprecia un incremento en su frecuencia de observación en la región oriental, como sucede en zonas montañosas del Parque Nacional Alejandro de Humboldt.

Los expertos consideran que ese animal también es uno de los posibles factores que influyen en la extinción de la fauna nativa.

Borroto, quien es autor del libro "Mamíferos en Cuba", considera que aunque hay en el presente una mayor conciencia de la real dimensión del problema creado por los mamíferos invasores, "las acciones para mitigar sus impactos son insuficientes".

"Ello deviene en una suerte de espada de Damocles que amenaza la supervivencia futura de valiosos ejemplares de la diversidad biológica cubana", subrayó el investigador.

Las investigaciones desarrolladas por diferentes instituciones científicas cubanas aseveran que ya en el Mioceno inferior, es decir hace unos 25 millones de años, existían en Cuba roedores, perezosos y primates.

En la actualidad, estos dos últimos grupos no tienen representantes vivientes en el país y sólo pueden conocerse a través del registro fósil.

Pigs eat man: Mafia boss Francesco Raccosta suffers brutal murder in Italy

ITN

Claim: World's First Vegan Condom

Read on breitbart >>

Scientists Confirm World's Oldest Creature...But Kill it Determining Its Age

Read on  breitbart >>

German zoo forced to change name of Fidel, the Cuban crocodile

digitaljournal

By Anne Sewell

Hoyerswerda - One of seven endangered Cuban crocodiles hatched at the Hoyerswerda Zoo was given the name "Fidel". Apparently his name has caused some problems due to associations with the Communist revolutionary, Fidel Castro, and has had to be changed.

Hatched in the zoo during August, zookeepers had made a decision to dub the hatchlings with names associated with their homeland of Cuba. However, one of the seven hatchings born, Fidel, turned out to be a bit of a problem. According to Carmen Lötsch, the director of the zoo, which is located in what was formerly Communist East Germany, they never expected to have any controversy with the naming of the hatchlings, saying: “We were simply looking for names which you immediately associate with their homeland of Cuba. Nobody intended it to be a direct reference to dictator Fidel Castro or indeed a glorification of him as a person.” Rhein Zeitung (German language) reports that the name wasn't the only problem when it came to young Fidel however, as he soon became notorious for behaving aggressively towards his siblings and would regularly attack and attempt to bite them. This caused some to call the crocodile by the nickname "Castro". Lötsch continued: “But that really refers most of all to the critical aspects of Fidel Castro as a person, so one can really not be accused of in any way trivializing these actions.” However, despite this, the committee who allocates funding in the region just didn't approve of the name. As they last year provided the zoo with €400,000 in funding, and the zoo would apparently not have been able to carry on without this, they have now appealed to the zoo directors to be more sensitive in their naming of its residents. Lötsch went on to explain that the cultural body is one of the zoo's most important partners and that Hoyerswerda Zoo needed their support to continue. "We therefore take its displeasure regarding the name very seriously, even if we cannot entirely understand it,” she said. Now former Fidel, who will look like the photo above when he is grown up, goes by the rather fancy new moniker of “Fidelio.” There is, however, also another aspect of the crocodile that could possibly cause yet another name change in the future. Apparently the hatchlings have not yet been tested to find out their sex. While it has been assumed that "Fidelio" is a male, zookeepers will need to run blood tests to confirm that. According to the zookeepers this is not really a problem, as if the crocodile turns out to be female, "Fidelia" sounds pretty good as an alternative. According to Wikipedia, the remaining wild Cuban crocodiles can only be found in Cuba's Zapata Swamp and the Isle of Youth. There are apparently only 4,000 remaining in the wild and the species is highly endangered.

Read more: http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/362053#ixzz2kXf2lNWW

18-Foot-Long Sea Creature Found Off CA Coast

breitbart

By CHRISTOPHER WEBER
Associated Press
LOS ANGELES
It took more than 15 people to help haul the catch of a lifetime out of the Pacific -- the silvery carcass of an 18-foot-long, serpent-like oarfish.

Marine science instructor Jasmine Santana of the Catalina Island Marine Institute was snorkeling off the Southern California coast when she spotted the giant sea creature with eyes the size of half dollars on Sunday.

Staffers at the institute are calling it the discovery of a lifetime.

Because oarfish dive more than 3,000 feet deep, sightings of the creatures are rare and they are largely unstudied, according to CIMI.

The obscure fish apparently died of natural causes. Tissue samples and video footage were sent to be studied by biologists at the University of California, Santa Barbara. 

First face? Prehistoric fish was a jawdropper

By Jennifer Viegas/

The earliest known species with what we would recognize as a face was an armored, beady-eyed prehistoric fish, according to a new paper in the journal Nature.

The fish, entelognathus primordialis (meaning “primordial complete jaw”), is the oldest known animal to have face-forming jaw and cheek bones comparable to those of today’s bony fishes and most terrestrial animals, including us.

Keep reading at Fox News >>

This dog looks like ... Putin

Cuba: Constituyen primera cooperativa importadora y exportadora

www.adelante.cu

que la misma "coincida" con el monopolico grupo de la asociacion cubana de ornitologia no es una coincidencia, pues esta ya venia realizando durante mas de dos decadas exportacion de aves cubanas a traves de la empresa de flora y fauna del comandante de la revolucion guillermo garcia. tampoco opaca el hecho de ser la primera cooperativa con licencia de comercio exterior.

Leer en el Granma >>

Desaparecen una jirafa y otros animales de un Zoo de La Habana

Diario de Cuba

Una jirafa, cuatro monos y un pony desaparecieron la semana pasada de un zoológico de La Habana, informó Radio Martí.

"Se habla de que la usan para prácticas de santería", dijo a la emisora Lázaro Yuri Valle Roca, periodista independiente residente en la capital.

Valle Roca explicó que el robo se lo confirmó un custodio del viejo zoológico de la Calle 26, en el Nuevo Vedado.

"Los monos y el pony pueden ser utilizados en algunas fincas privadas que montan espectáculos para los niños", agregó el periodista.

Víctor Álvarez, un babalao que vive en Miami, dijo que en la santería se utilizan animales como ofrendas rituales, pero no jirafas.

"Si se robaron la jirafa del Zoológico del Vedado, sería para comérsela", subrayó.

Animales del Zoológico de Santiago de Cuba también han terminado en la mesa de algunas personas.

"Hace dos semanas se comieron el ñandú, y los patos han ido desapareciendo", dijo desde Santiago el opositor José Daniel Ferrer.

Monos ladrones, 'pero no por hambre'

Dichos sucesos no son los únicos que involucran estos días a los zoológicos de la Isla.

El viernes pasado, una "carta al director", en el diario oficial Granma, reveló que los vecinos de Boyeros, cerca del aeropuerto José Martí, son víctimas de 30 monos que viven sueltos allí.

"Desde hace más de un año se viene planteando en las reuniones de asociados de nuestra cooperativa la situación que presentamos con nuestros cultivos, que son ferozmente atacados por un grupo de alrededor de 30 monos que están sueltos", señala la carta del campesino J. L. Herrera.

Los animales, según la queja, "se comen los cultivos de maíz, habichuela, guayaba, mango, etcétera".

Los afectados "han elevado" varias quejas, pero nadie les hace caso.

A la carta de Granma respondió un comentarista de la oficial Radio Habana Cuba, según el cual "a estos inquietos simios no les hace falta robar alimentos".

"En el Zoológico Nacional, al que pertenecen, tienen comida de sobra, pero, al parecer, aman el bosque y las frutas, aunque no sean suyas", escribe Alberto D. Pérez.

Dice que "no fue siempre así", y asegura, tirando del manido discurso oficial, que "cinco décadas atrás daban lástima los pocos jardines zoológicos del país".

Mississippi hunters catch record-breaking alligators

usnews

Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks

Beth Trammell of Madison, Miss., and her team pose with their catch Sept 1. The alligator is 13-feet and 5.5 inches and weighs 723.5 pounds. It broke the previous record of 697.5 pounds.

By Simon Moya-Smith, Staff Writer, NBC News

It’s only been three days since the start of Mississippi’s alligator hunting season, yet a pair of parties have already submitted two record-breaking ‘gators, state wildlife officials announced Monday.
Dustin Brockman of Vicksburg, Miss., ventured with his brother and friend into the Mississippi River by motorboat early Saturday night and emerged with a 727-pound, 13-feet and 4.5-inch record breaker.
The previous weight record was 697.5-pounds, according to Ricky Flynt, program coordinator with the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks.
“We chased him for about two hours,” Brockman said. “Then we got a shot on him.”
Brockman said that it took two hours after hooking the alligator with a crossbow before they could shoot it with a shotgun. It took an additional four hours to get it into the boat, but Brockman said it was too heavy to do with just the three of them, so they just waited in the middle of the river for the sun to rise.
“We killed the alligator at 4 a.m.,” he said. “We waited until 6:30 (a.m.) before I called three or four more guys to help us load it into the boat.”
And just one hour prior to Brockman’s epic catch, a hunting party led by Beth Trammell of Madison, Miss., hooked a 13-feet and 5.5-inch alligator near Redwood.
The Trammell party, which included six people, broke the previous weight record with their 723.5-pound catch and held it before Brockman broke their weight record 60 minutes later.
“It took about four hours to get it in the boat,” said Trammell. “We had to flag another boat down to help us out it was so big.”
Trammell said that when they had the hefty alligator hooked, their poles were bent like “candy canes.”

Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Parks

Dustin Bockman of Vicksburg, Miss., and his team pose with the alligator they caught near the Big Black River in Claiborne County. The alligator is 13-feet and 4.5 inches in length and weighs 727 pounds.

The current length record, which has yet to be broken, is 13-feet, 6.5 inches. That alligator was captured on the Pascagoula River in 2008, according to the Mississippi Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks department.
Brockman, who had never hunted alligator before this weekend, said the majority of the hunting occurs at night when it’s easier to spot the reptiles' eyes with a flashlight.
“It’s a lot easier to find them because their eyes reflect,” he said. “In the daytime, if they’re lying on a bank underneath the tree, you ain’t going to see them.”
Brockman said he plans to use the gator's skin for a gun strap, a picture frame and will eat the meat after providing some to his friends.
“We’re going to cook it for sure,” he said. “I got a bunch of people who want some and there’s plenty for me and everybody else.”
Trammell said she’s plans to get the meat back from the processor as early as Friday.
“We’ll eat the meat,” she added. “I think my brother in law is going to get the head mounted.”
And the Trammell party will be back out on the water this weekend, hoping to catch another record breaker.

Human baby brains are wired to hear the call of the lemur

NBC News.com

Nidhi Subbaraman

Sebastien Bozon / AFP / Getty Images

When human babies are 3 months old, they pay attention to lemur calls as well as human voices - but the attentiveness to a lemur call fades away by the time they're 6 months old.

Infants respond to the voices of their doting parents — but it's not just human voices that hold them spellbound. In what may be a hallmark of our ancestry, human brains begin life hard-wired to hear the calls of non-human primates, an ability that fades away after just a few months. 

Past studies with infants have shown that deep cognitive wheels are set turning as they listen to human speech. Now researchers have found that sounds from the blue-eyed Madagascar lemur engage their attention, too, in ways that artificial sounds don't.

"The link is sufficiently broad to include the call of this adorable lemur," Sandra Waxman, professor of cognitive psychology at Northwestern University and a co-author on the new study, told NBC News. "The fact that there's this precocious link between language and thought ... it's just hands-down amazing."  

In the first months of childhood, "twin engines of development" — nature and nurture — are at work, Waxman explained. Babies are born sensitive to primate sounds, even from non-humans. When they grow older, they no longer pay attention to the non-human sounds. It's the human voices that stay relevant in their lives. 

'Candy to a baby's ears'Waxman and colleagues studied how 72 infants between the ages of 3 months and 6 months responded to human, lemur and artificial sounds. The babies listened to high-pitched baby talk — "It's like candy to a baby's ears," Waxman said — and similarly high-pitched lemur calls. They also heard human speech played backward, and mechanical tones. 

The difference was clear. "They were doing some much fancier cognitive dancing during the lemur and human vocalization than in the case of backward speech or tones," Waxman explained. 

Babies can't answer questions verbally, and it will be years before they can fill out multiple-choice surveys. So for psychologists, the gaze of babies — where they look, and for how long — is a tried-and-true way of indicating whether they're engaged. 

Project on Child Development/Sandra Waxman/Northwestern University

A 3-month-old at Sandra Waxman's lab at Northwestern University gazes at a blue dinosaur projected on the screen (inset) in front of her.

In the tests conducted by Waxman and her colleagues, 3- and 4-month-olds were shown a series of eight similar shapes — all dinosaurs — projected on a screen in front of them. In the background, one of the four kinds of sounds would play on a loop. Then they were shown an image of a ninth dinosaur, placed next to a dissimilar image shaped like a fish.

"If the baby has noticed what's common about the objects, they're going to prefer this as one over the other," Waxman explained.

The babies who were trained on the first eight images while they listened to the speech played backward or the mechanical tones didn't master the categorization task as easily as they did when they heard the human or lemur sounds. That indicates that the babies were less engaged in the task while they were listening to the artificial sounds. 

The babies who were 6 months old exhibited a different trend: They seemed receptive to the human voices, but not to the lemur calls. That suggests that they lost their sensitivity to the non-human primate sounds because they were hearing human voices all the time. 

Having established that babies can be sensitive to the lemur sounds, Waxman and her colleagues are working on refining their understanding of the qualities of lemur calls and human voices that attract an infant's attention, and finding out what other kinds of sounds — primate or otherwise — can bring out a similar response. 

Meanwhile, a second study at Waxman's lab is investigating whether babies can retain their ability to engage with lemur calls and human voices, if their parents play them the lemur calls at bedtime every day.

350-pounds marlin hops into fishing yacht

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Flavio, the oldest tiger in the world

Read on http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2397316/Worlds-oldest-tiger-Flavio-plays-like-kid-sanctuary-water-fountain.html

Snake kills 2 boys in Canada

WGN-TV

Two boys were found dead after a sleep over at a friend’s home in a small town in Canada.

Investigators say they were strangled by a snake as they slept.

The two brothers, ages 5 and 7, were found dead Monday morning in an apartment above a reptile store in Campbellton, New Brunswick.

The friend’s father owns the store and the family lives above it.

Investigators say a 100-pound African rock python escaped from an enclosure and entered the apartment through the ventilation system.

The reptile store owner and his son were sleeping in a different room and were not injured.

Autopsies will be done on the boys today.

The snake was caught and the owner has asked that it be euthanized.

Read more: http://wgntv.com/2013/08/06/snake-kills-two-boys-in-canada/#ixzz2bDEW9Avp