Birds

Iris Schneider's comparison of a night heron to a gull tells me that she does not know much about birds, which is OK ("Kids' 'Paradise' in San Diego," Weekend Escape, Feb. 17). But comparing this handsome bird's beak to Barbra Streisand's nose is not only ignorant but petty and mean. SUSAN HUTSON Agoura

My nomination for American hero of the 20th century is someone who lived half his life in disguise and the other half as the world's most recognizable man. He appeared on more radio broadcasts than Ellery Queen and in more movies than Marlon Brando, who once played his father. He helped give America the backbone to wage war against the Nazis, the Depression and the Red Menace. He remains an intimate to kids from Boston to Belgrade and has adult devotees who, like Talmudic scholars, parse his every utterance.

Modern day birds may simply be dinosaurs that never grew up, researchers say. A comparison of fossilized skulls of juvenile dinosaurs with those of birds shows remarkable similarities, adding further evidence to the growing consensus that birds are evolutionary descendants of dinosaurs. A team from Harvard University reported online in the journal Nature that for some as-yet-unknown reason, some dinosaur infants began to mature much more rapidly than normal. That rapid maturation altered the expression of genes, changing the physical characteristics of the animals and keeping them much smaller in size.

Federal wildlife officials took the unprecedented step Friday of telling private companies that they will not be prosecuted for inadvertently harassing or even killing endangered California condors. In a decision swiftly condemned by conservationists and wildlife advocates, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said operators of Terra-Gen Power's wind farm in the Tehachapi Mountains will not be prosecuted if their turbines accidentally kill a condor during the expected 30-year life span of the project.

Sometimes, an animal protection issue has a clear moral path to follow, notes Wayne Pacelle, the chief executive of the Humane Society of the U.S.  But other times, he writes on his blog, “the protection of one species appears to conflict with the protection of another.”  He was talking about birds and feral cats. And once again, the conflict between the two species is in the spotlight. A new report , published in the online journal Nature Communications and based on a systematic review of existing studies, estimates that “free-ranging domestic cats kill 1.4-3.7 billion birds” annually in the United States.

On a recent weekday morning, Tom and Jo Heindel strode to the top of a hill at the edge of town and held hands, savoring the panoramic views below of elk grazing in alfalfa fields, strips of willows along streams and elm trees glistening with the remnants of rain. Then Tom, 73, and Jo, 71, got down to business. "A few dozen scaup, 10 eared grebes, 12 Clark's grebes, 20 canvasbacks and a Northern harrier gliding low and fast," Jo said, peering through a spotting scope. "Got it," said Tom, transcribing the information on a tally sheet spread across the hood of their aging white mini-pickup truck.

Here's a breath of fresh air for people flying through Amsterdam : a new park-like space at the city's Schiphol Airport , where travelers waiting for takeoff can sit at picnic tables amid real and fake plants, listen to birds sing and grab organic snacks. The " Airport Park ," opened Wednesday, occupies more than 2,100 square feet in the middle of the airport. Part art installation and part airport lounge, it displays pictures of parks from around the world, projects images of butterflies onto walls and floors and pipes in recorded sounds of birds chirping and children playing.

Some of the earliest birds hailing from the age of the dinosaurs may have sported four flying limbs, a team of Chinese researchers says. If so, 11 fossils from the lower Cretaceous period, about 120 million years ago, could represent a missing link in the development of modern birds, according to a new paper released Thursday by the journal Science. Modern birds generally work with two wings, using small, clawed hind legs for ground travel. A few, like the golden eagle, have fuzzy down on their back limbs, which is for insulating their appendages, not flying.

Re "A New Life for Bolsa Chica," Oct. 10: Environmentalists are willing to spend $65 million for birds to live better in the Bolsa Chica wetlands. Will these birds be happier after ... that much money [is spent]? We have thousands of human beings living in the streets, parks, under the bridges, in cars. Do environmentalists care only about birds, not human beings? K.C. Wu Fullerton

Marine biologist Dan Madigan stood on a dock in San Diego and considered some freshly caught Pacific bluefin tuna. The fish had managed to swim 5,000 miles from their spawning grounds near Japan to California's shores, only to end up the catch of local fishermen. It was August 2011, five months since a magnitude 9 earthquake and tsunami had struck in Japan, crippling the Fukushima Daiichi power plant. Madigan couldn't stop thinking about pictures he'd seen on TV of Japanese emergency crews dumping radioactive water from the failing reactors into the Pacific Ocean.

Chinese health officials are warning that the death toll from the H7N9 bird flu is likely to rise in the weeks and months ahead. In a report on the outbreak that began in China in February, doctors and researchers from from several public health agencies said they suspected that most of the 82 people with confirmed cases of bird flu contracted the H7N9 virus from healthy-looking animals. “To date, the mortality rate is 21%, but since many of [sic] patients with confirmed H7N9 virus infection remain critically ill, we suspect that the mortality may increase,” they wrote in their study, published online Wednesday by the New England Journal of Medicine.

GERMANY Presentation Peter Wortsman will read from and discuss his new book, "Ghost Dance in Berlin: A Rhapsody in Gray," which has been described as "the perfect guide to all aspects of life in Berlin - the best and the wurst of it. " When, where: 7:30 p.m. Monday at Distant Lands, 20 S. Raymond Ave., Pasadena. Admission, info: Free. RSVP to (626) 449-3220. BICYCLING Presentation After four continents, 41 countries and almost 30,000 miles, Stephen Fabes, a British doctor, has reached California and will talk about his adventure on two wheels that took him from the mid-winter Alps to the blistering heat of the Syrian desert, and from the wilds of Africa to the magnificent peaks of the Andes.

BEIJING - On a subway car in Shanghai, commotion breaks out when someone spots a live chicken poking its head out of a bag tucked under one of the seats. On a highway in Zhejiang province, a motorist is so panicked by bird droppings landing on her windshield that she stops the car and calls traffic police for help. Internet photos of dead sparrows on a Nanjing sidewalk are ordered removed by police, fearing they might go viral. The fowl phobia gripping China is the result of a new strain of avian flu that has led to 18 deaths and 95 diagnosed illnesses over the last month.

Academic researchers and federal scientists have for the first time come up with direct evidence of feral cats killing endangered Hawaiian petrels. The study, by scientists from the University of Hawaii, the National Park Service and the U.S. Geological Survey, confirms what has been widely suspected, that wild cats are playing an important role in the population decline of the rare birds. The study involved monitoring of 14 Hawaiian petrel burrows with digital infrared video cameras in 2007 and 2008 on the island of Hawaii.

AT&T has released a bonus video featuring Magic Johnson, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Larry Bird and Bill Russell. The four NBA champions and Hall of Famers shot a couple of spots for AT&T's " It's not complicated " campaign, and in the new outtakes video Johnson struggles repeatedly with his lines as Russell tells him, "Take your time. No turnovers today. " Russell, who has as many championships as Johnson and Abdul-Jabbar combined gets a respectful, "Yes, sir" from Johnson.

Slower growth has to be for the birds--and against the red foxes at the Bolsa Chica Ecological Reserve and the Seal Beach National Wildlife Refuge. Without the birds, and especially the endangered species, the refuges start to lose their reason for existing. Then you can be sure another breed of fox would convince the politicians to hand over these areas for more hotels, yacht harbors and malls. Let's hope we can continue to protect our endangered birds as well as our endangered open spaces.

The toll from China's new strain of bird flu climbed to seven on Monday with the death of a 64-year-old retiree in Shanghai and the number of cases spread to 24, but officials expressed confidence the outbreak could be contained. The World Health Organization's representative for China, Michael O'Leary, said the flu known as H7N9 did not appear to be transmitted between humans, which should limit its spread. "The recent reports from China are the first cases of human infection with H7N9 viruses.

BEIJING -- A new form of bird flu has infected more than a dozen people and caused six deaths in China in the last two months, according to official Chinese media reports. As of Friday, Chinese media reported 14 people were infected with the virus, a bird-borne strain of influenza known as H7N9. Six of the 14 patients lived in Shanghai, with the remaining patients from nearby provinces. Most patients reportedly worked in direct contact with birds in the poultry industry. No cases of human-to-human transmission of the virus have been reported.