Dublin Zoo chimp Bossou ‘rescues’three ducklings from danger
It is ”an incredible, truly touching and inspiring story of humanity and compassion shown by a gentle giant.
A chimp named Bossou in Dublin Zoo has come to the rescue of three baby ducklings by cradling them close to his chest after he spotted the three-day-old ducks in their nest close to danger .
The ducklings’ mother had built her nest on the edge of the zoo’s Chimp Island.
Days after the chicks hatched, Bossou the chimp – who was said to be worried they were in danger from his island mates – ”rescued” the little ones from the water.
Cradling them to his chest, the nine-year-old 60kg chimp brought the ducklings to safety.
A concerned member of the public contacted zookeepers, saying she had noticed a large chimp holding onto the ducklings.
Zookeeper Yvonne McCann enticed Bossou to the edge of the chimp habitat and traded each duckling for a banana.
The ducklings have been named Paddle, Waddle and Drake by their new home, the Dublin SPCA.
Dublin SPCA spokesperson Miriam Kerins said it is ”an incredible, truly touching and inspiring story of humanity and compassion shown by a gentle giant. Bossou is indeed a hero, I think it’s so touching,” she said. .
”The Dublin SPCA are pleased to announce that Paddle, Waddle and Drake are none the worse for their adventure and are having the time of their lives at the shelter.”
Mother of six children jailed for €229,000 social welfare fraud
A mother of six children who claimed nearly €250,000 in social welfare payments, while she had hundreds of thousands of euros in the bank, has been jailed for three years.
Mary Connors (36) claimed the money over the course of 14 years. In that time over €1.2 million from her husband’s business passed through her multiple bank accounts.
Judge Martin Nolan imposed the maximum sentence allowed for the offence, stating he had to send out a message to those who commit social welfare fraud.
The judge rejected Connors’ claim that her husband would not allow her to use the money in the accounts for the family and that she had to claim social welfare to get by.
Noting that the accounts were in Connors’ name, he said: “I don’t think I can accept she was under her husband’s control; she’s responsible for her own actions”
The court heard the money in the accounts came from her husband buying and selling cars but that the accounts were in her name because he couldn’t be trusted due to his chronic alcoholism.
Judge Nolan said such crimes are “by their nature difficult to detect” and that the courts must send a message.
He noted that all the money has since been repaid but said that a custodial sentence must be imposed. Connors wailed and screamed as she was led away by prison officers to begin her sentence.
Connors of Cloonmore Park, Tallaght pleaded guilty at Dublin Circuit Criminal Court to eight sample counts of failing to notify the Department of Social Protection of an increase in her means between July 1996 and April 2010. She has six previous convictions including burglary and handling stolen property.
Detective Garda Gary Sheridan told prosecuting counsel Fiona Murphy BL that gardai were searching Connors home in connection with a separate matter when they came across documentation showing she had €131,000 in a Permanent TSB account.
An investigation was started and it was found she had another TSB account containing €155,400 as well as an investment bond worth €15,000. Since the first account was opened in 1992, over €1.2 million was lodged into them and €969,000 withdrawn.
Since 1996 Connors claimed social welfare payments for her and her husband totalling €229,453. When she was caught she was claiming €504 a week.
When investigators discovered the fraud her accounts were frozen. Connors attempted to withdraw the cash shortly afterwards but was stopped by the bank.
Defence counsel Kieran Kelly BL said the money in the accounts came from her husband’s car business and that he was not registered as a business owner.
He said Connors used the social welfare money for day to day living as she was not allowed to spend the business money on the family.
Counsel said Connors has been admitted to women’s refuges forty times, sometimes with injuries, because of her husband’s drink problem. He said she is a member of the travelling community and that she married at 17.
Mr Kelly submitted she is extremely remorseful and unlikely to come before the courts again.
Dancing on the streets of Baku:
Jedward celebrate their Euro qualification
JEDWARD CELEBRATING IN BAKU TONIGHT.
After qualifying for the Eurovision final last night with their song Waterline, brothers John and Edward Grimes were on the streets of Baku in Azerbaijan today soaking up the sun and the sweet, sweet taste of success.
JOHN AND EDWARD Grimes (Jedward) have won a place in the Eurovision final for the second year in a row.
Following a glittering performance (featuring a waterfall) in Baku this evening, Ireland’s Jedward have been selected to compete in the final of the Eurovision song contest this weekend.
The nine other countries to qualify are: Moldova, Romania, Iceland, Hungary, Denmark, Albania, Cyprus, Greece, and Russia.
Six other countries automatically qualified for the final on Saturday night: the UK, France, Italy, Spain, Germany and hosts Azerbaijan.
The second semi-final is being held on Thursday night to determine the last of the qualifying entrants.
On Saturday, they will be looking to better their performance in last year’s Eurovision by winning the contest for Ireland for the first time in 16 years.
Summer arrives in Ireland as warm spells set to continue into this weekend
It’s official – summer’s here. Blue skies and soaring temperatures can be expected across most of the country today, and for the rest of the week.
Met Éireann said it would dry, warm and sunny today with highest temperatures of 18 to 22 degrees.
The unseasonably cold start to the month is set to give way to something of a heatwave, in Irish terms at least, according to the national forecaster.
Forecaster Evelyn Cusack said while temperatures at the beginning of the month were below average they will increase rapidly over the next few days, with daytime temperatures expected to be well into the 20s.
“We have well and truly lost that cold polar air,” she said, referring to the unseasonably cooler weather experienced last month.
However, she warned it may remain slightly cooler along east coast and in the south due to onshore breezes, and there may be some patches of drizzle and sea fog.
While Thursday will be much the same as today, Friday is set to be the hottest day of the current warm spell with temperatures expected to climb as high as 25 or 26 degrees.
The generally dry, sunny weather will continue over the weekend, but there is still the risk of a few thundery showers breaking out, especially in southern parts.
The beginning of next week will also be generally dry, warm and sunny, the forecaster said.
While March was unseasonably warm, April temperatures were colder than they had been for at least a decade.
How whales open their huge mouths and feed
A blue whale can consume 500,000 calories in one lunging gulp
Researchers have discovered how very large whales co-ordinate their jaw muscles and bones to take gigantic mouthfuls of prey.
For a blue whale, the largest animal that has ever existed, each mouthful can scoop up 100 tonnes of krill-filled water in less than 10 seconds.
Scientists have now found a sensory organ in whales’ jaws which they say links bones and muscles to the brain, making the vast lunging gulps possible. They report their findings in Nature.
When a rorqual whale, such as a blue whale, senses that there is sufficient prey suspended in the water, it dives. Then at some point in that dive it opens its mouth, rotates its body and accelerates in order to force krill-laden water into its mouth.
A blue whale has separate right and left lower jawbones, allowing them to expand their gape to approximately 3m in width. Pleats of skin and blubber below the mouth, extending to the belly, form a stretchy cavern to accommodate the vast volume of water.
Plates of a comb-like structure called baleen (pictured), which hangs from a rorqual whale’s upper jaw, trap up to 500kg of small marine creatures – that is approximately 500,000 calories in a single mouthful.
Writing in the journal, lead researcher Nicholas Pyenson, from the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC, explained that the rorqual whales he studied had “one of the most extreme feeding methods in aquatic vertebrates”.
This whale-specific mouth organ seems to facilitate that.
Dr Pyenson said the structure looked like a “gelatinous mess”, which could be the reason it was previously overlooked and assumed simply to be a fluid-filled joint between the two lower jaw bones.
By dissecting whale carcasses in fine detail, the researchers found that the structure was actually far more complex.
Found at the front tip of the lower jaws, the structure is laden with nerve endings. The team says that these are sensors which pick up signals from the jaw as it starts to open. Nerves from the organ then send signals to the brain, triggering the whales’ dramatic and complex feeding lunge.
The study, carried out with colleagues from the University of British Columbia, was possible because the team had access to carcasses landed at a whaling station in Iceland.
The organ, pictured on the right of this image, is at the tip or “chin” of the whales’ lower jaws
“We were able to work with tissue samples that were freshly dead,” explained Dr Pyenson. “It was a unique opportunity to look at these animals’ anatomy in detail.
“And that’s what we’d been missing.”
Dr Pyenson and his colleagues examined the jaws of fin and minke whales, dissecting them and using high resolution medical imaging to examine the carcasses.
Finding this structure, the researcher said, “answered a lot of outstanding questions”.
A rorqual whale’s feeding lunge was “one of the largest biomechanical events on Earth”, said Dr Pyenson.
“This shows us how they do it so quickly, co-ordinating the inflation of the throat pouch with the opening of the jaws… and closing their mouth to prevent prey escaping – all in under 10 seconds.”
Working at a whaling station allowed the team to dissect freshly dead whales
Dr Bill Sellers, a zoologist from the University of Manchester, said that this was an “amazing discovery”.
“They’ve found an organ we didn’t know was there, which is remarkable considering people have been chopping up whales for hundreds of years.”
Dr Gareth Fraser from the University of Sheffield added that the discovery revealed a unique adaptation that mammals had made to an “aquatic lifestyle”.
It showed, he said, “how much we still have much to discover, even from the largest ocean residents”
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