Old Sailors' Almanac - Week 14, 2020 (Fluid Design based on percentage of screen platform

Mr. Answer Man Please Tell Us: Why Don't Vultures Eat Live Prey?

As an animal that is synonymous with death and disease, the vulture understandably has a poor reputation in many cultures across the globe, despite, ironically enough, being a huge boon to humans in terms of being able to reduce instances of death and disease.

While it’s important to note that many animals eat carrion, vultures are fairly unique in that they’re able to eat carrion that has succumbed to the effects of decay and disease, a feat few stomachs in the animal kingdom can match.

As an idea of just how ridiculously hardy vultures are, experiments have shown that they are all but immune to botulism and that they can happily chow down on the flesh of an animal coated in Bacillus anthracis which is better known as the bacteria that causes anthrax! They also have no problem eating an animal infected with rabies, hog cholera and numerous other diseases that would ultimately be lethal to most other scavengers.

So how do they do it? Vultures are able to comfortably eat diseased carrion thanks in large part to their highly acidic gastric juices which are sufficiently strong enough to kill most bacteria before they ever become an issue.

In the extreme a turkey vulture’s stomach acid could technically be almost 1000 times more acidic than yours at a given instance. In fact, it’s so acidic that it can dissolve many metals. For further reference, battery acid has a pH of about 0.8.

Even when bacteria does survive the gauntlet that is the turkey vulture’s stomach, it then has to compete with its amazing vulture immune system. In regards to the latter, vultures are noted as having one of the “strongest immune systems of all vertebrates” and there are few food-borne diseases that truly pose a threat to it.

There is a point at which even a vulture will say no and flesh will be deemed too putrid or foul to eat. However, this doesn’t necessarily stop the vulture from eventually eating some of the remains. For example, the bearded vulture can live on a diet of 70%-90% bone. In fact, according to studies conducted on bearded vultures, this diet is actually more efficient than a diet of fresh meat because bones have a higher caloric content and the bones will last indefinitely, unlike flesh. So long after the flesh has gone, the remaining bones are still fair game for the bearded vulture.

Vultures notably urinate and defecate all over themselves while they eat which, thanks to the highly acidic nature of their bodily waste, kills any bacteria that makes its way onto the vulture’s legs. This also has the side effect of sterilising the area around the carcass, also stopping disease from spreading.

To illustrate what can happen without the vultures in some areas, in India, a massive decline in vulture populations led to an explosion in the population of feral dogs and rats with whom the vultures formerly competed for carcasses. These animals, unlike the “dead-end” vultures, are vectors for numerous diseases including rabies.

The remains of the carcasses that were formerly picked clean by the vultures are also now contaminating water supplies causing further disease issues.

It may surprise you to learn the bulky vulture is actually one of the highest flying animals on Earth, with some varieties capable of flying at elevations as high as 40,000 feet! For reference, Mount Everest is about 29,029 feet in elevation.

Audubon.org / Wikipedia / Hawk Mountain.org / Live Science / National Geographic / Mental Floss / Quora / Today I Found Out / Why Don't Vultures Eat Live Prey? (YouTube)

NAVSPEAK aka U.S. Navy Slang

LPOD: Last Plane On Deck: The time when all aircraft should be on the ground.

Love Boat:

(1) A sub tender crewed primarily by female sailors; see also “Tuna Boat”.

(2) Nickname for the CVN-69.

LSO: Landing Safety Officer or Landing Signals Officer. On a carrier, this officer stands just to the port side of the landing area and talks to each pilot as he makes his approach for an arrested landing. On a “small boy”, the LSO sits under a bubble on the flight deck and talks to helo pilots as they attempt to land in the Rapid Securing Device, or “trap”. Both types of LSO are referred to as “Paddles”.

LSD: Dock landing ship, or Large Sitting Duck, so called due to their slow speed and absence of any significant offensive weaponry. “I survived a six-month trip on LSD”, commonly heard slogan from sailors who have made a deployment aboard such a vessel.

LST: Tank landing ship, or Large Slow Target, a now disused type of amphibious warfare ship.

L.T.D.B: “Living the Dream, Baby” - Often used sarcastically in reference to Naval lifestyle.

Lucky Bag: Collected unclaimed personal items, or such things confiscated as gear adrift, which were auctioned to the crew on paydays.

Lucky Charms: Nickname for Tripler Army Medical Center, which due to its coral pink color and location in the Moanalua hills of Honolulu, is used as a navigational aid for ships sailing into Pearl Harbor.

Wiktionary.org

Just for you MARINE

Lost Lieutenant Finder: Hand-held GPS unit, a joke term on the reputation for new lieutenants to be incompetent in land navigation.

LPCs: Abbreviation for Leather Personnel Carriers, aka combat boots.

LPD: Abbreviation for Landing Platform/Dock, aka Amphibious transport dock.

LT: Abbreviation for lieutenant, inappropriate to address as such verbally.

LWH: Light Weight Helmet.

LZ: Landing Zone a clearing designated as the place where a helicopter (or other VTOL aircraft) can land.

Wikipedia.org

Naval Aviation Squadron Nicknames

HSC-23 Helicopter Sea Combat (HSC) Squadron Twenty Three (Helicopter Anti-Submarine Squadron Twenty Three or HSC-23) - nicknamed the “Wild Cards”

United States Navy - Naval Air Station - Naval Air Station, Naval Air Station North Island, San Diego, California: September 29, 2006 - present.

Where Did That Saying Come From?

“A place for everything and everything in its place:”

Meaning: The proverbial notion that there should be 'a place for everything and everything in its place' is the idea that everything should have somewhere to be stored and that it should be tidily returned there when not in use.

History: This proverb is variously associated with Samuel Smiles, Mrs Isabella Beeton and Benjamin Franklin. The Oxford Book of Quotations dates it from the 17th century. Such a reference is usually accurate, although the authors supply no evidence for their assertion. If correct, it would pre-date all of the above notables.

If it is indeed that old, it has made heroic efforts to keep itself out of print. It may be that the Oxford book is making a reference to a line in A Century of Sermons, John Hacket, Bishop of Lichfield, 1675:

“The Lord hath set every thing in its place and order.”

That isnt the full proverb as we now use it though, which I can't find any printed citations of from before the late 18th century. It appears in a story published by the Religious Tract Society in 1799 - The Naughty Girl Won:

“Before, however, Lucy had been an hour in the house she had contrived a place for everything and put everything in its place.”

Several other early citations are from nautical contexts, which isn't surprising considering the need to conserve space and promote tidiness aboard ship. Here's an example from Frederick Marryat's Masterman Ready; or the Wreck of the Pacific, 1842:

“In a well-conducted man-of-war every thing is in its place, and there is a place for every thing.”

Slightly earlier, a modified version of the phrase was in use in the USA. This is from an item headed 'Brother Jonathan's Wife's Advice to her Daughter on her Marriage', in the Hagerstown Mail, Maryland, January 1841:

“A place for everything and everything in time are good family mottos.”

The phrase is typical of the uplifting homilies that were promoted during the Victorian era (beginning 1837), e.g. 'cleanliness is next to godliness' (circa 1880s).

Phrases.org UK

Science & Technology

A new theory to explain how the dunes on Titan formed • DeNeRD: an AI-based method to process whole images of the brain • SUPERB survey detects new slowly-spinning radio pulsar • Stormy cluster weather could unleash black hole power and explain lack of cosmic cooling Phys.org / MedicalXpress / TechXplore

‘Outlandish’ competition seeks the brain’s source of consciousness • Here’s how skimping on sleep can change your appetite • Want to put your dog on a raw meat diet? It could be dangerous for both of you • ‘Bingo!’ In a remarkable first, humpback whales spotted using their fins to scoop up fish Science AAAS

Bizarre News (we couldn’t make up stuff this good - real news story)

Dead Elephant Found Lying on Top of a Squashed Crocodile

There was no winner in the deadly showdown between these two titans.

A recent confrontation between an elephant and a crocodile ended in a surprising twist that left both combatants dead, with the crocodile flattened underneath the fallen pachyderm.

A photo that was captured in Zambia's South Luangwa National Park by a guide with Kafunta Safaris showed the grim and surprising scene: A dead elephant lay on top of an equally dead crocodile, the reptile's long tail extending beyond the elephant's splayed hind legs. Other photos of the gruesome scene show dozens of vultures and other scavengers crowding around the carcasses.

The safari company shared images of the remains on Facebook, calling the death poses “extremely strange”. But what may have led to this highly unusual tableau?

Beastly Feasts: Amazing Photos of Animals and Their Prey

Safari guide Andrew Mwanza discovered the carcasses on a bank of the Luangwa River near one of Kafunta Safaris' campsites. Accompanying Mwanza at the time were several safari guests and an armed scout from Zambia's Department of National Park and Wildlife (DNPW).

The dead elephant and crocodile both appeared to be young individuals, based on their body sizes; a later inspection by the DNPW and officials with Conservation South Luangwa ruled out poaching as the elephant's cause of death, as there were no bullets found in the body, according to the email.

Nile crocodiles (Crocodylus niloticus) are plentiful in the Luangwa River, and they often prey on elephants that come to cross the river or to drink from the water's edge, the representative said. Adult crocodiles can grow to be 20 feet (6 meters) long and can weigh as much as 1,650 lbs. (748 kilograms), according to National Geographic. By comparison, an adult African elephant (Loxodonta africana) weighs between 5,000 and 14,000 lbs. (2,268 and 6,350 kg), so crocodiles typically avoid attacking healthy adult elephants, said Marisa Tellez, co-founder of the Crocodile Research Coalition with the Marine Science Institute at the University of California in Santa Barbara.

“From the pictures I've seen, the croc was a small subadult or small adult, and I highly doubt it was trying to take an injured adult elephant down. That seems like a lot of work for a smaller predator, and not in its favor”, Tellez told Live Science in an email. “Of course, you will always have more bold individuals that will take more than they bargained for”, Tellez added. “I am also wondering if this may have been a young female defending her nest from an elephant possibly trampling all over it.”

In general, crocodiles are more likely to target elephants that are young, ill or injured. The dead elephant in the photo was probably sick or hurt - “maybe previously attacked by lions” - when it encountered the crocodile, said the representative.

Crocodiles are ambush predators, and when they lunge at an elephant they usually grab its vulnerable trunk, said Agata Staniewicz, a crocodile researcher and doctoral candidate with the Behavioural, Acoustic and Sensory Ecology Lab at the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom.

“A healthy adult (sometimes with the assistance of the herd) can usually fight off the crocodile, though it may sustain severe injuries to the trunk”, Staniewicz told Live Science in an email. “However, an injured or sick elephant might not have been strong enough to fight.”

After struggling with the river predator, the elephant may have simply collapsed from its injuries or from exhaustion, and as it fell it landed on the reptile and crushed it to death, the Kafunta Safaris representative said.

Although this story had an unhappy ending for the elephant and crocodile, plenty of nearby scavengers were clearly thrilled with the outcome, Kafunta Safaris representatives wrote on Facebook.

“All this made for a huge and happy meal for dozens of vultures”, the representatives said.

• Alligators vs. Crocodiles: Photos Reveal Who's Who

• Exquisite Corpses: Biologists Share #BestCarcass Photos

• Top 10 Deadliest Animals (Photos)

Live Science (10/10/2019)