Ecos articles from April 2000

Ecos archives from April 2000

Terra satellite to track volcanic unrest.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... A global warning system for volcanic eruptions will soon be in place, following the launch late last year of a NASA Terra satellite from California. Dr Fred Prata of CSIRO Atmospheric Research is a co-investigator on the NASA team that...

Meet our associate editor.(Wendy Pyper of Ecos)
April 1, 2000... AN associate editor, Dr Wendy Pyper, has been appointed to the staff of Ecos. Wendy began her path into science journalism with a degree at the University of Queensland, majoring in microbiology and biochemistry. During the next four...

Waterweeds succumb to weevils.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... A COLLABORATIVE biological control effort between CSIRO, the Queensland Department of Natural Resources and Maroochy Shire Council has seen two rampant aquatic weeds subdued by weevils. For decades, salvinia, a South American floating fern,...

Minesite sleuths tail a midnight snacker.(koalas)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... New research into the dietary and lifestyle habits of koalas is helping scientists to re-establish the habitat of these vulnerable Australian icons in areas affected by tree clearing. By examining the faecal pellets of koalas living in...

Safe haven for tropical seeds.(Samford Seed Store)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... MORE THAN 27 000 lines of forage legume and grass seeds are housed at the Samford Seed Store, part of CSIRO's Australian Tropical Forages Genetic Resource Centre near Brisbane. The store was established in 1968 to house the germplasm of...

Walk a mile in my habitat.(board game )(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... `TELL ME and I'll forget, show me and I may remember, involve me and I'll understand.' This is the philosophy behind a new board game called Landscape Game, developed by members of the Grazed Landscape Management Project at CSIRO Tropical...

Bismarck bugs raise hopes of greener mining.(Bismarck Sea)
April 1, 2000... A team of CSIRO scientists has embarked on a pioneering search of active volcanic vents on the seabed of the Bismarck Sea, north of Papua New Guinea. If the mission proves a success, it will foster new ways of making Australia's $37 billion...

Echoes of the deep.(National Oceans Office and Scientific and Industrial Research for Australia ocean research)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... DURING a three-part voyage extending through April and May, scientists aboard the CSIRO research vessel Southern Surveyor are evaluating tools and techniques to efficiently map and classify large areas of deep seabed. They are building up...

Branches of evolution.(role of staghorn corals in tracing the history of Indonesia's spectacular marine biodiversity)(Brief Article)(Interview)
April 1, 2000... Wendy Pyper talks to Dr Carden Wallace about the role of staghorn corals in tracing the history of Indonesia's spectacular marine biodiversity. Surrounding the 17 000 islands that make up Indonesia are some of the most biodiverse marine...

Bad breath.(reducing livestock methane emissions)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... Steve Davidson digests our latest strategies for reducing livestock methane emissions. By belching their way through digestion, ruminant animals such as cattle and sheep produce 13% of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. In New Zealand...

rat cunning.(controlling rat populations)
April 1, 2000... Steve Davidson joins the hunt for better ways to manage resourceful rat populations. Rodents have accompanied we humans in our endeavours for millennia: mostly to their benefit and our detriment. Rats are serious agricultural pests,...

Fungal awakenings.(enzyme research in Australia)
April 1, 2000... Wendy Pyper describes the work of two ecologists whose tropical studies take them from sweltering rockpiles in the Top End to Queensland's squelching forest floors. Like bizarre Christmas tree baubles, the surface of many fungal spores are...

fruits of the forest.(fruit and seed research in Australia)
April 1, 2000... The cloying odour of insect repellent does little to deter the leeches as we squelch our way, single file, through the rainforest. After a week of unremitting rain that left large parts of Queensland's wet tropics submerged, this sucking...

feeding the soils of africa.(agroforestry)
April 1, 2000... In Kenya, Brad Collis finds a new kind of agroforestry that holds the promise of food security for millions of Africans. In the Embu district on the rolling slopes below Mt Kenya they call Frederick Kinyua `the professor'. It comes from his...

Walking with snakes.(brown snake venom research)
April 1, 2000... Steve Davidson treads carefully through the latest intelligence on brown snakes, and how to avoid them. In most regions of Australia, snakes are the only vertebrate animals that are dangerous to humans and our continent is the only one in...

Logs give seedlings a leg-up.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... PARENT PLANTS don't care for their offspring as some animals do, notably humans. But some forest trees, after crashing to the ground, inadvertently provide tree seedlings with a good start in life, and not just because they leave a gap in the...

Saving the dugong.(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... FOR THE dugong to escape extinction, a conservation strategy that identifies and protects areas that support large numbers of the marine mammal is essential, say Australian scientists. In the paper `A conservation strategy for dugongs:...

For these birds, fidelity's a lark.(bird breeding research)(Brief Article)
April 1, 2000... Birds use many different breeding strategies -- ranging from rampant promiscuity to life-long pair bonding -- to perpetuate their species. Ecologist Michelle Hall of the Australian National University has investigated in detail the...