A passion for the natural world drives many of our adventures. When I’m not outside, I love exploring discoveries about where I live and travel. Here are some of the best natural history links I found this week.

Dolphin Networking: Bottlenose dolphins form large multi-level alliance networks. Humans are the only animals that form a larger group.

Australian Shark Bay male dolphins have formed two or three primary ties and up to 14 secondary alliances. Primary alliance dolphins work together to track individual females. Secondary groups of dolphins compete with other allies for female dolphins.

“Collaboration Between Groups, rather than just ally size, allow males to spend more time with females, thereby improving reproductive success,” says biologist Simon Allen.

31,000 year old mutilation

Earliest known mutilation: Archaeologists from Borneo believe they have found the earliest successful amputation. A 31,000-year-old skeleton shows that the left leg was removed and the young survived.

This finding suggests that Southeast Asian foragers possessed significant medical knowledge. The amputation predates the next oldest surgery known to him by 24,000 years. Scientists initially thought the lower limbs were separate from the skeleton. However, upon closer inspection, it was discovered that there were clean cuts with overgrowth on the tibia and fibula where the rest of the leg should be. Overgrowth is similar to that seen in modern amputations.

Bioarchaeologist Charlotte Roberts said, “This is an amazing finding and I think it’s consistent with a surgical amputation.

drumming primates

The primates perform their signature drum beat: Borneo’s primates communicate with each other through tree roots.

Different individuals have different characteristic sounds. This means they can transmit signals over long distances and reveal who they are.

“After just a few weeks in the woods, I was surprised to be able to recognize who was beating the drums. said researcher Vesta Eleturi.

The Campbell Island Sitka spruce is one of the most remote trees in the world. Photo: Jocelyn Turnbull/GNZ Science

The loneliest tree in the world: The Sitka spruce on New Zealand’s Campbell Island may be the loneliest tree in the world. A nine-metre tall spruce is the only tree on this remote Antarctic island.

Researchers plan to use the tree, which was planted in the early 1900s, to gain insight into the carbon sink capacity of the Antarctic Ocean.

The Antarctic Ocean accounts for 10% of our carbon emissions, but is proving difficult to study. The usual method is to take air samples and compare them with deep-sea samples. However, it is not possible to collect historical samples of air. Instead, scientists took small core samples from trees to study their rings.

“As plants grow, they take carbon dioxide out of the air through photosynthesis and use it to grow structures. The carbon in the air ends up in tree rings,” explained scientist Jocelyn Turnbull. .

Thwaites Glacier, Antarctica.Photo: Wikipedia

Thwaites Glacier retreats faster than ever

Domesday Glacier Degradation: “Doomsday Glacier” is a common name for Antarctica’s Thwaites Glacier. New data from underwater robots and nautical charts show glaciers are deteriorating faster than ever before.

Underwater maps reveal periods of rapid recession over the past few centuries, but climate change is accelerating this. We are now losing 50 billion tons of ice each year, twice as much as he was 30 years ago.

An underwater camera showed the ridges on the ocean floor that have supported the glacier. Along the ridge there are 160 parallel furrows. Glaciers have left these ridges behind at high tide. Each day the high tide lifted the glacier and moved a little further inland.

Oceanographer Alastair Graham said, “It’s like looking at a tide gauge on the ocean floor, and the beauty of the data is overwhelming.

From the ridge, scientists calculated that the glacier is retreating three times as fast as it was from 2011 to 2019.