The Future Of Birds In North America, 190th Birthday For Tortoise. December 9, 2022, Part 1
Science Friday
Science Friday and WNYC Studios
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🗓️ 9 December 2022
⏱️ 48 minutes
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Summary
A birthday should always be celebrated. For Jonathan the tortoise, who turned 190 this week, that celebration involved a salad cake and a three-day party. Jonathan is the oldest known living animal, hatched in 1832. Jonathan, who calls the island of St. Helena home, may be blind and unable to smell, but he maintains a good quality of life and even continues to mate with his companions. Jonathan’s ripe old age surpasses the typical tortoise life expectancy of 150 years.
In other “old” news, scientists have found fragments of DNA one million years older than the previous record: making these samples two million years old. The fragments were found in Ice Age sediment in Northern Greenland, and are from a time where the climate was much warmer than it is now.
Vox staff writer Umair Irfan joins Ira to talk about these and other science stories of the week, including an end to the monoclonal antibodies we have for COVID and the FDA’s first approval of fecal transplant therapy.
The Joy And Sadness Of Bird Counting
The state of the birds is not looking good. That’s the conclusion from a new report that looks at decades of community-collected population data from surveys like the annual Christmas Bird Count and the Breeding Bird Survey. Species that inhabit grasslands seem to fare the worst, with their populations down over 30 percent in the last 50 years. Meanwhile, dozens of newly identified “tipping point” species have lost 50 percent of their populations in the same time, and are poised to lose the same proportion in the coming half century.
Dr. Amanda Rodewald of Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology helps unpack the report’s key findings, including the good news: Decades of cooperative efforts to protect waterfowl have paid off in thriving duck populations. Rodewald explains what this can tell us about reversing declines in other habitats.
Plus, birder and science writer Ryan Mandelbaum joins Ira and listeners to talk about the joys of winter birding, the upcoming Christmas Bird Count, and the feathery sightings that brighten our lives.
Transcripts for each segment will be available the week after the show airs on sciencefriday.com.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is Science Friday, I'm Ira Flado. This hour will be for the birds. Yes, as we look forward to |
| 0:06.3 | the Christmas bird count and take your calls and tweets, give us a call. 844-724-8255-844-Sighttalk, |
| 0:15.1 | or you can find us on Twitter at Sci-Fry. Tell us what birds you're seeing at your favorite |
| 0:19.6 | backyard sites or your local parks. But first, some news from the world's biggest island, |
| 0:25.6 | scientists in Greenland have made a big discovery, the oldest DNA fragments ever found, |
| 0:31.6 | and they were trapped in permafrost. These fragments contain samples from various plants and animal |
| 0:37.2 | life, some long extinct. And it's from a time when Greenland was pretty bombing, a big departure |
| 0:43.6 | from the icy country we know today. This DNA is a big deal, a full 1 million years older than |
| 0:50.0 | the previous record. So why are scientists so excited about this find? Joining me to talk about this |
| 0:56.0 | and other science news of the week is someone who knows, Umar Irfan, Science writer at Vox, |
| 1:01.8 | based in Washington. Welcome to Science Friday, welcome back. Thanks for having me back, Ira. |
| 1:07.4 | Nice to have you. Okay, Umar, just how old are we talking about for this oldest DNA? |
| 1:12.9 | Well, we're talking 2 million years old, and as you noted, this is almost twice as old as our |
| 1:17.6 | previous record for genetic fossils that we found. And this was exciting as you noted for a |
| 1:23.2 | couple of reasons. One, it's sort of a validation of this technique, rather than, you know, |
| 1:27.8 | looking at a specific fossil or some piece of resin or something like that, what they did was they |
| 1:33.0 | actually collected a general sample from this sediment in the permafrost. And so this is sort of a |
| 1:38.0 | broad spectrum genetic time capsule that they were able to use. And they from there, they were |
| 1:43.2 | able to decode a lot of fragments of different organisms that were around at the time. You know, |
| 1:49.0 | DNA is actually a fairly fragile molecule. Right. You know, your body has to use a lot of different |
| 1:53.6 | mechanisms and enzymes to keep it up to date. So it breaks down very quickly. And so they were |
| 1:58.3 | surprised to find anything usable at all. And then from there, they were able to reconstruct |
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