RESTRICTION-ENDONUCLEASE ANALYSIS OF MITOCHONDRIAL-DNA OF MUNTJACS AND RELATED DEER

Twelve restriction endonucleases were employed to analyze the mitochondrial DNA of four species of muntjacs and two related species of deer: red muntjac (M. muntjak), Gongshan muntjac (M. gongshanensis), black muntjac (M. crinifrons), Chinese muntjac (M. reevesi), tufted deer (Elaphodus cephalophus), and forest musk deer (Moschus berezovskii). A total of 170 restriction fragments were detected among the samples. Fragments data were used to calculate the genetic distance (i.e. percent sequence divergency) among species, which in turn were used to construct a phylogenetic tree and to estimate divergency times. Our analysis indicates that the black muntjac and the Gongshan muntjac are most closely related, and that they are closely realted to the red muntjac and the Chinese muntjac. Additionally, the tufted deer is genetically closer to muntjacs than the musk deer is.

Fractal dimension, wavelet shrinkage and anomaly detection for mine hunting

An anomaly detection approach is considered for the mine hunting in sonar imagery problem. The authors exploit previous work that used dual-tree wavelets and fractal dimension to adaptively suppress sand ripples and a matched filter as an initial detector. Here, lacunarity inspired features are extracted from the remaining false positives, again using dual-tree wavelets. A one-class support vector machine is then used to learn a decision boundary, based only on these false positives. The approach exploits the large quantities of 'normal' natural background data available but avoids the difficult requirement of collecting examples of targets in order to train a classifier. © 2012 The Institution of Engineering and Technology.

Water requirements as a bottleneck in the reintroduction of European roe deer to the southern edge of its range

Success rates of reintroduction programs are low, often owing to a lack of knowledge of site-specific ecological requirements. A reintroduction program of European roe deer (Capreolus capreolus (L., 1758)) in a dry Mediterranean region in Israel provides an opportunity to study the bottleneck effect of water requirements on a mesic-adapted species. Four does were hand-reared and released in a 10 ha site consisting of an early succession scrubland and a mature oak forest. We measured daily energy expenditure (DEE) and water turnover (WTO) using the doubly labeled water technique during summer and winter. DEE was similar in the summer and winter, but there was a significant difference in WTO and in the source of gained water. In winter, WTO was 3.3 L/day, of which 67% was obtained from vegetation. In summer, WTO dropped to 2.1 L/day, of which only 20% was obtained from the diet and 76% was gained from drinking. When the water source was moved to a nonpreferred habitat, drinking frequency dropped significantly, but water consumption remained constant. In a dry Mediterranean environment, availability of free water is both a physiological contraint and a behavioral constraint for roe deer. This study demonstrates the importance of physiological and behavioral feasibility studies for reintroduction programs.

Can we characterise ‘openness’ in the Holocene palaeoenvironmental record? Modern analogue studies of insect faunas and pollen spectra from Dunham Massey deer park and Epping Forest, England

This paper examines the degree to which tree-associated Coleoptera (beetles) and pollen could be used to predict the degree of ‘openness’ in woodland. The results from two modern insect and pollen analogue studies from ponds at Dunham Massey, Cheshire and Epping Forest, Greater London are presented. We explore the reliability of modern pollen rain and sub-fossil beetle assemblages to represent varying degrees of canopy cover for up to 1000m from a sampling site. Modern woodland canopy structure around the study sites has been assessed using GIS-based mapping at increasing radial distances as an independent check on the modern insect and pollen data sets. These preliminary results suggest that it is possible to use tree-associated Coleoptera to assess the degree of local vegetation openness. Additionally, it appears that insect remains may indicate the relative intensity of land use by grazing animals. Our results also suggest most insects are collected from within a 100m to 200m radius of the sampling site. The pollen results suggest that local vegetation and density of woodland in the immediate area of the sampling site can have a strong role in determining the pollen signal.

Dendrochronology and Deer Park Farms

This chapter examines some aspects of the environmental
context for the constructional activity observed at Deer
Park Farms (DPF). This can be done at several levels by
observing what dendrochronology suggests in terms of
environment and environmental change across the period
from around AD 500 to 1000. Looking at the broad sweep
of tree growth across the period, something not previously
attempted, we can make comparisons between tree
growth in Ireland and elsewhere in Europe. We can study
abrupt events in the records and draw on information
from other sources in an attempt to paint a picture of the
period against which to view the constructional activity
on the site itself. It is worth remarking that there is no
blueprint for this work. Most of the information used has
only recently been produced and it is largely independent
of conventional history.

Palaeobiology of an extinct Ice Age mammal: Stable isotope and cementum analysis of giant deer teeth

The extinct giant deer, Megaloceros giganteus, is among the largest and most famous of the cervids. Megaloceros remains have been uncovered across Europe and western Asia. but the highest concentrations come from Irish bogs and caves Although Megaloceros has enjoyed a great deal of attention over the centuries, paleobiological study has focused oil morphometric and distributional work until now. This paper presents quantitative data that have implications for understanding its sudden extirpation in western Europe during a period of global climate change approximately 10.600 C-14 years ago (ca 12,500 calendar years BP). We report here the first stable isotope analysis of giant deer teeth. which we combine with dental cementum accretion in order to document age, diet and life-history seasonality from birth until death Enamel delta C-13 and delta O-18 measured in the second and third molars from seven individual giant deer Suggest a grass and forbbased diet supplemented with browse in a deteriorating. possibly water-stressed, environment, and a season of birth around spring/early summer Cementurm data indicate that the ages of the specimens ranged from 6.5 to 14 years and that they possessed mature antlers by autumn, similar to extant cervids. In addition. the possibility for combining these two techniques in future mammalian paleoccological studies is considered. The data presented in this study imply that Megoloceros would have indeed been vulnerable to extirpation during the terminal Pleistocene in Ireland. and this information is relevant to understanding the broader pattern of its extinction.

Deer Park

The score to a musical setting of a text by J. K. Randall.

The anonymity of the hunt: A critique of hunting as sharing

Hunter-gatherers are often ascribed a “monistic” worldview at odds with the nature-society dichotomy. The centerpiece of this claim is that they view hunting as similar to sharing within the band and prey animals as part of a common sphere of sociality. This article challenges this thesis. An examination of the work of its main proponents shows that it conflates two different senses of “animal”—the flesh-and-blood animals of the hunt and the animal Spirit that is said to control the animals. The sharing motif in hunting makes sense with respect to the anthropomorphic Spirit but not to the animals hunted. The conditions of the hunt as a spatiotemporal event provide further grounds for skepticism toward the idea of hunting-as-sharing. Drawing on biologist Robert Hinde’s model of relationships, I argue that hunting represents an anonymous one-off interaction that cannot develop into a personal relationship, in stark contrast to the durable forms of personalized sociality associated with the hunter-gatherer band. This is not to deny the possibility of human-animal cosociality in the form of personal relationships but rather to redirect the search away from the hunt to the interface with domesticated animals.

Vocal rate as an assessment process during fallow deer contests

Two types of model propose that strategic decisions during contests are determined either by (i) a mutual-assessment process or (ii) a self-assessment process. Vocal signals are thought to convey information about the competitive abilities of individuals, the ultimate function of which is a reduction in costs associated with fighting consistent with the principle of mutual assessment. Nevertheless, the limited evidence that male ungulates engage in mutual assessment of vocal rates during dyadic contests has been questioned. Therefore, we examined the vocal rates of winners and losers during escalated dyadic contests between male fallow deer in order to further inform on this issue. Our results showed that winners and losers did not differ in vocal rate. The best model fit that accounted for individual vocal rates included a preponderance of factors related to the opponent indicating that contestants were attending to their opponent during fights. Vocal rate was, therefore, dependent on estimates of opponent quality without reference to self, supporting an 'opponent-only' rather than a mutual assessment process. © 2012 Elsevier B.V.