Slow Burn: Fall Foliage Taking Its Time

Posted on October 3, 2013 by

Fall Color at Rendezvous Mountain Educational State Forest

One good place in North Carolina to see spectacular fall color is Rendezvous Mountain Educational State Forest in Wilkes County

No, it’s not another sign of the federal government shutdown. North Carolina’s hardwood trees are taking their time to change colors this fall because of a low-stress growing season that included plenty of moisture and mild temperatures, a North Carolina State University expert says.

“Growing conditions have been good, so trees have postponed shutting down the food factories in their leaves,” says Dr. Robert Bardon, forestry and environmental resources professor. “I expect the fall colors will arrive a little bit later than usual.”

While the federal closures mean that leaf peepers won’t be able to check National Park Service websites or use the visitor centers on the Blue Ridge Parkway, Bardon says it’s still possible to map out a spectacular fall foliage tour. “Through our state and local governments, we have access to a lot of information. We can still enjoy the colors.”

The North Carolina Forest Service is open for business, along with eight educational state forests across the state. Both are keeping their websites updated with information for visitors. Check http://www.ncforestservice.gov/ or http://www.ncesf.org/ for the latest conditions.

Two of Bardon’s scenic picks are Rendezvous Mountain Educational State Park in Wilkes County and Merchant Mills Pond State Park in Gates County. The earliest color displays will be at high-elevation sites like Mount Mitchell and Grandfather Mountain.

“The nice thing about our state is that we have a wider window for fall colors because of our topography,” says Bardon, who leads extension programs in the College of Natural Resources. “Color moves gradually across the state from mountains to coast, giving us plenty of opportunities to enjoy the foliage.”

Yellow and orange leaves come from carotenoids, the pigments that give carrots and sweet potatoes their color. Anthocyanin provides rich reds later in the growing season as nighttime temperatures fall. Both pigments are present in leaves, but during the growing season they’re overshadowed by bright green chlorophyll, Bardon says.

Media Contacts: Dr. Robert Bardon, 919/515-5575 or rebardon@ncsu.edu
D’Lyn Ford, News Services, 919/513-4798 or dcford@ncsu.edu

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NC State Scientist Among Team that Discovers New Species of Carnivore

Posted on August 15, 2013 by

Species is First Find of Its Kind in More Than Three Decades

Observed in the wild, tucked away in museum collections, and even exhibited in zoos, there is one mysterious creature that has been a victim of mistaken identity for more than 100 years.

Dr Roland Kays shares the olinguito discovery in a press conference at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences

A team of scientists – including Roland Kays of North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences – uncovered overlooked museum specimens of this remarkable animal.Their investigation eventually took them on a journey from museum cabinets in Chicago to cloud forests in South America to genetics labs in Washington, D.C.

The result: the olinguito (Bassaricyon neblina) ―the first carnivore species to be discovered in the Western Hemisphere in 35 years.

The team’s discovery is published in the Aug. 15 issue of the journal ZooKeys.

THE OLINGUITO

The olinguito (oh-lin-GHEE-toe) looks like a cross between a house cat and a teddy bear. It is actually the latest scientifically documented member of the family Procyonidae, which it shares with raccoons, coatis, kinkajous and olingos. (Olinguito means “little olingo.”)

The 2-pound olinguito, with its large eyes and woolly orange-brown fur, is native to the cloud forests of Colombia and Ecuador, as its scientific name, “neblina” (Spanish for “fog”), hints. In addition to being the latest described member of its family, another distinction the olinguito holds is that it is the newest species in the order Carnivora ―an incredibly rare discovery in the 21st century.

“The discovery of the olinguito shows us that the world is not yet completely explored, its most basic secrets not yet revealed,” said Kristofer Helgen, curator of mammals at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and leader of the team reporting the new discovery. “If new carnivores can still be found, what other surprises await us? So many of the world’s species are not yet known to science. Documenting them is the first step toward understanding the full richness and diversity of life on Earth.”

Discovering a new species of carnivore, however, does not happen overnight. This one took a decade, and was not the project’s original goal ―completing the first comprehensive study of olingos, several species of tree-living carnivores in the genus Bassaricyon, was. Helgen’s team wanted to understand how many olingo species should be recognized and how these species are distributed ―issues that had long been unclear to scientists. Unexpectedly, the team’s close examination of more than 95 percent of the world’s olingo specimens in museums, along with new DNA testing and the review of historic field data, revealed existence of the olinguito, a previously undescribed species.

The first clue came from the olinguito’s teeth and skull, which were smaller and differently shaped than those of olingos. Examining museum skins revealed that this new species was also smaller overall with a longer and denser coat; field records showed that it occurred in a unique area of the northern Andes Mountains at 5,000 to 9,000 feet above sea level―elevations much higher than the known species of olingo. This information, however, was coming from overlooked olinguito specimens collected in the early 20th century.

The question Helgen and his team wanted to answer next was: Does the olinguito still exist in the wild?

To answer that question, Helgen called on Roland Kays, director of the Biodiversity Lab at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences and a professor in the College of Natural Resources at North Carolina State University, to help organize a field expedition.

“The data from the old specimens gave us an idea of where to look, but it still seemed like a shot in the dark,” Kays said. “But these Andean forests are so amazing that even if we didn’t find the animal we were looking for, I knew our team would discover something cool along the way.”

The team had a lucky break that started with a camcorder video. With confirmation of the olinguito’s existence via a few seconds of grainy video shot by their colleague Miguel Pinto, a zoologist in Ecuador, Helgen and Kays set off on a three-week expedition to find the animal themselves. Working with Pinto, they found olinguitos in a forest on the western slopes of the Andes, and spent their days documenting what they could about the animal – its characteristics and its forest home. Because the olinguito was new to science, it was imperative for the scientists to record every aspect of the animal. They learned that the olinguito is mostly active at night, is mainly a fruit eater, rarely comes out of the trees and has one baby at a time.

In addition to body features and behavior, the team made special note of the olinguito’s cloud forest Andean habitat, which is under heavy pressure from human development. Computerized mapping of museum records allowed the team to estimate that 42 percent of olinguito habitat likely has already been converted to agriculture or urban areas.

“The cloud forests of the Andes are a world unto themselves, filled with many species found nowhere else, many of them threatened or endangered,” Helgen said. “We hope that the olinguito can serve as an ambassador species for the cloud forests of Ecuador and Colombia, to bring the world’s attention to these critical habitats.”

While the olinguito is new to science, it is not a stranger to people. People have been living in or near the olinguito’s cloud forest world for thousands of years. And, while misidentified, specimens have been in museums for more than 100 years, and at least one olinguito from Colombia was exhibited in several zoos in the United States during the 1960s and 1970s. There were even several occasions during the past century when the olinguito came close to being discovered but was not. In 1920, a zoologist in New York thought an olinguito museum specimen was so unusual that it might be a new species, but he never followed through in publishing the discovery.

Giving the olinguito its scientific name is just the beginning.

“This is the first step,” Helgen said. “Proving that a species exists and giving it a name is where everything starts. This is a beautiful animal, but we know so little about it. How many countries does it live in? What else can we learn about its behavior? What do we need to do to ensure its conservation?”

The team is already planning its next mission into the clouds.

Watch the Untamed Science Video about the Olinguito

See the Olinguito in this Untamed Science Video

LEARN MORE:

Participate in the Live Bilingual Go ogle Hangout – Friday 8/16/2013

Read New Carnivore in Cloud Forest in the NC State Abstract Research Blog
Media Contacts:
D’Lyn Ford NC State Uuniversity

Emelia Cowans NC Museum of Natural Sciences

Rojas Honored as 2013 ACS Fellow

Posted on August 8, 2013 by

Dr. Orlando J. Rojas, a professor in the Department of Forest Biomaterials and the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at North Carolina State University has been selected by the American Chemical Society as a member of the 2013 class of ACS Fellows.

ACS Fellows are nominated by their peers and selected for their outstanding achievements in and contributions to the sciences/profession and for providing excellent volunteer service to the ACS community.

Rojas, along with the other 2013 ACS Fellows, will be honored at a special ceremony during the ACS National Meeting in Indianapolis, IN on Monday, September 9, 2013 at the J.W. Marriott Indianapolis.

The list of 2013 ACS Fellows appeared in the July 29 issue of Chemical & Engineering News and can be found at http://cenm.ag/2013acsfellows. Information about the ACS Fellows Program, including lists of Fellows named in earlier years and more details about the 2013 class, is available on the ACS website at http://www.acs.org/fellows.

Dr Rojas is also a Finland Distinguished Professor at Aalto University and the past chair of the ACS Division of Cellulose & Renewable Materials. More information about Dr. Rojas and his research group can be found at http://www4.ncsu.edu/~ojrojas/index.html

Harcharik Forestry International Studies Endowment Established

Posted on August 2, 2013 by

David and Angelica Harcharik

The College of Natural Resources is honored to announce that David and Angelica Harcharik have named the NC State Natural Resources Foundation, Inc. in their estate plans. When funded, the David and Angelica Harcharik Forestry International Studies Endowment in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources will encourage and entice students to go beyond their national borders in pursuit of scientific knowledge and the understanding of other cultures.

Dr. David Harcharik earned a Ph.D. in forest genetics from NC State in 1984 after earning his bachelor’s degree in forest management from Iowa State University and a master’s degree in forest ecology from Duke University.” David Harcharik is a true role model for our students,” says Dr. Larry Nielsen. “His fundamental concern for narrowing the gap between rich and poor nations, and for achieving a sustainable world economy and environment, are the core values we work to instill in every student at NC State.” He was NC State’s College of Natural Resources 2002 Distinguished Alumnus.

Harcharik retired in 2007 as Deputy Director-General of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations, a position he held for ten years. In this capacity, he assisted the Director-General with the overall leadership and management of this international organization dedicated to world food security and the sustainable management of natural resources. Previously he served as Assistant Director-General and Head of the FAO Forestry Department and as a Forestry Officer with FAO.

Harcharik also held a number of positions in the U.S. Department of Agriculture Forest Service, including Director of International Forestry and Associate Deputy Chief. Early in his career he was a Peace Corps Volunteer and Visiting Professor in the Department of Forest Sciences at Agrarian University in Lima, Peru. He also served our country in the US Army in Vietnam.

He and his wife, Angelica, met while studying Italian in Rome, where she was visiting from Argentina. They married in Rome and lived there for some 18 years. In Italy, Angelica developed a passion for cooking and went on to earn three degrees from professional chef schools in Rome and Paris. In addition to fine cooking with natural ingredients, especially based on Italian recipes, she enjoys travel and nature, and a keen love of animals.

This endowment will be used to support fellowships, research funding, study abroad, student recruiting and/or other related forestry international study purposes for graduate students enrolled in the Department of Forestry and Environmental Resources in the College of Natural Resources at NC State University.

Powerful Animal Tracking System Helps Research Take Flight

Posted on July 11, 2013 by

Call it a bird’s eye view of migration. Scientists are taking a fresh look at animal movement with a big data approach that combines GPS tracking data with satellite weather and terrain information.

Scientists used a powerful new tracking system, Env-DATA, to better understand migration patterns of the Galapagos Albatross. Image by MaxCine.

The new Environmental-Data Automated Track Annotation (Env-DATA) system, featured in the journal Movement Ecology, can handle millions of data points and serve a hundred scientists simultaneously, said co-founder Dr. Roland Kays, a zoologist with North Carolina State University and the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences.

“This is a powerful tool for understanding how weather and land forms affect migration patterns,” Kays said. “Ultimately it will help us answer global questions about how changes to our planet affect animal populations and movement.”

The publicly available system is sophisticated enough for ecologists and simple enough for budding scientists, including North Carolina science fair entrants, who are using it to track the movements of great egrets along the East Coast. Scientific users can share their data or limit access, depending on the project.

In a case study of the system’s application, researchers used Env-DATA to analyze the flight paths of the Galapagos Albatross. In addition to GPS tracking of individual birds, scientists collected satellite data on weather patterns and glowing chlorophyll concentrations in the ocean associated with food sources, captured in a YouTube video.

Scientists learned that the birds’ chosen paths took them to preferred areas on the Peruvian coast where they could forage. The albatrosses took a clockwise route that allowed them to take advantage of tailwinds on much of the long journey.

In addition to allowing scientists to work with layers of information, Env-DATA simplifies the tedious work of data manipulation. Tasks that used to take graduate students countless hours now require only a click of the mouse, Kays said.

The Env-DATA team was led by Dr. Gil Bohrer from Ohio State University and includes researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Ornithology in Germany, the U.S. Geological Survey in Alaska, the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Lafayette College and the University of Konstanz in Germany.

Media Contacts:
Dr. Roland Kays, 919/707-8250 or roland_kays@ncsu.edu
D’Lyn Ford, News Services, 919/513-4798 or dcford@ncsu.edu

Note to editors: An abstract of the paper follows.

“The environmental-data automated track annotation (env-data) system: linking animal tracks with environmental data”

Published: Online July 3 in Movement Ecology

Authors: Somayeh Dodge, Gil Bohrer, Rolf Weinzierl, Sarah C. Davidson, Roland Kays, David Douglas, Sebastian Cruz, Jiawei Han, David Brandes and Martin Wikelski

Abstract: The movement of animals is strongly influenced by external factors in their surrounding environment such as weather, habitat types, and human land use. With advances in positioning and sensor technologies, it is now possible to capture animal locations at high spatial and temporal granularities. Likewise, scientists have an increasing access to large volumes of environmental data. Environmental data are heterogeneous in source and format, and are usually obtained at different spatiotemporal scales than movement data. Indeed, there remain scientific and technical challenges in developing linkages between the growing collections of animal movement data and the large repositories of heterogeneous remote sensing observations, as well as in the developments of new statistical and computational methods for the analysis of movement in its environmental context. These challenges include retrieval, indexing, efficient storage, data integration, and analytical techniques.