Male aggression caused by hormones, or something?

Wild and Weird: Male Squids Go Berserk

Even wonder why squids go berserk? We didn't either, until we read about scientists who recently discovered a molecule that makes male squids go mad with aggression. Investigating the longfin squid during mating season, biologists found that males were visually attracted to masses of eggs laid on the sea floor -- and when they came into contact with a single protein on the eggs' surface, they instantly went from swimming calmly to extreme belligerence. Males grappled with each other, lunged at each other and beat their fins, apparently in an attempt to get at females (even when females were nowhere to be seen). The molecule appears to be the first aggression-causing pheromone -- a secreted chemical that triggers a social reaction in animals -- known in any marine creature.

Interestingly, the pheromone in question is similar to a protein found in other animals . . . including at high levels in human males. The bar-brawl molecule, perhaps?

Read more in The Christian Science Monitor.

Condoms..... huh?

I was reading my daily 'Center for biological diversity' email and it provide this interesting - even titilating - point of view regarding endangered species and overpopulation -- yeah, I know.... huh?

Endangered Species Condoms Win Ad Award; Take Action Against Overpopulation

Our wildly popular Endangered Species Condoms are getting some additional love. This week we found out the colorfully packaged condoms, part of our campaign highlighting the connection between overpopulation and species extinction, won the American Advertising Federation's gold ADDY Award in Tucson in the "public service" category. In case you haven't seen them, the nifty condom packages feature illustrations of six different endangered species, along with catchy slogans like "Cover your tweedle, save the burying beetle" and "Wear a jimmy hat, save the big cat." The Center handed out 350,0000 condoms last year and hopes to send more out soon to draw attention to this crucial issue. Through the empowerment of women, education of all people and universal access to birth control, we can curb our population to an ecologically safe level.

But some members of Congress are making that very hard. In fact, the House has just passed a bill to cut government funding for critical programs like women's health clinics -- which for millions of people provide the only available access to reproductive services, family planning and birth control. With this February marking Global Population Speak Out month, it's time to tell our elected representatives they should be expanding those programs, not cutting them -- for the sake of our planet and the public.

Check out our Endangered Species Condoms Project and sign the GPSO pledge. Then learn more about the legislative attack on family-planning services from politico.com and contact your senators asking them to counter it.

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Wind energy in Kingman, Arizona

Two or three years ago it was announced by our local newspaper, 'The Kingman Daily Miner' (KDM) that Western Wind Energy had purchased desert land to install windmills for renewable energy.

Having seen quite often when living in northern California the spectacular windmills at Altamont Pass and also the windmills in Tehachapi and those just north of Palm Springs, I became excited by the idea because we certainly have as much if not more wind here in Kingman, Arizona.

It is not always windy here, but I live on a ridge south of town and the wind here is more prevalent than absent. I have a heavy ceramic tile roof and the wind can be strong enough to dislodge some tiles and last year my non-tiled south porch roof was peeled back onto the house with a loud boom! Fortunately insurance took care of it. Many mobile homes down in town have old used tires to weigh down their roofs. This is not tornado country, and the winds are called "straight winds" but they can happen as "micro-bursts" and quite unexpectedly.

I looked into the company, Canadian, which has interests in the California windfarms so primarily to be "Green" I bought a thousand shares which were and still are cheap but my primary interest in them was that they've been around for a number of years and they do good things. I certainly don't, at my age, expect to make any money but rather to do the right thing - isn't that what "Greenies" do?

The following is a piece in today's KDM indicating that the project is finally coming to fruition, since I can see forever to the south, I hope next spring to see windmills on my horizon! I should mention that small private windmills are cropping up all over town.

KINGMAN - Western Wind Energy has started work on the first renewable energy project under construction in Mohave County.

"We will be erecting five 270-foot towers with blades that are about 175 feet," Western Wind Energy Vice-President of Development Mike Boyd said. "This is a unique project. The pads are almost completed. This is the first utility-scale, integrated wind and solar energy project in the United States."

According to the Western Wind website, construction on the company's "wholly owned 10.5-megawatt combined wind and solar project" began in "December 2010, and commercial operations are estimated to commence in the third quarter of 2011 ... The project is fully zoned for wind energy ... The company has signed a power purchase agreement with UNS Electric, Inc., a subsidiary of UniSource Energy Corporation of Arizona."

The project is east of Interstate 40 and the railroad tracks, south of Kingman, "approximately one section of land east of the Nucor Steel plant," Boyd said. "It's at the end of Old Trails Road. The project is on 808 acres. The area is currently being graded. We expect the turbines to arrive and start going up on April 15. This project will be completed in the middle of July."

A 10-acre area is currently being prepared for photovoltaic solar panels, he said. Power from the wind turbines and solar panels will go to the substation and, from there, go on a line "across BLM (Bureau of Land Management) land to the interconnect utility" to feed the power to UniSource. The total of 10.5-megawatts is enough to power approximately 4,000 homes.

"Western Wind is an energy development company," Boyd said. "RMT, our environmental procurement contracting company, is a huge international construction company. We have a number of local contractors, as well. Whenever it is not a totally specialized service, we hire local contractors."

RMT, Inc. Project Manager Bob Tepp is overseeing construction.

"We broke ground on December 28," Tepp said. The roads and pads are currently being graded. "The road will be widened to 32 feet across" to allow a crane to be brought up and assembled "on the site and be able to walk from pad to pad" to construct the towers and turbines along a ridge that is between 3,400 and 3,600 feet above sea level.

"I commend Western Wind Energy and UniSource for locating this sustainable energy project in Mohave County," County Economic Development Department Director Travis Lingenfelter said. "According to Western Wind Energy's corporate office, this project represents a total investment of approximately $28 million, which demonstrates their confidence in the future of the renewable energy sector here in northwest Arizona."

Western Wind "has been very easy to work with," Mohave County Planning and Zoning Manager Christine Ballard said. "They have always kept a good line of communication open. If we needed anything, they got it to us. Once they got the green light to go, they have been very responsive in getting information back to us."

"Their initial contact with us was back in 2005," County Planner John Montgomery said. "In the beginning, they were looking at more turbines of a smaller size. But that changed. First they got their zoning approved and then things were on hold for a while. We went through a series of extensions of time for them and then, in the last few months, they've had big activity."

"RMT is currently cutting in roads and doing the pads for the wind generators and the solar field," County Chief Building Official Ronald Durgin said. "They will be picking up the permits for the foundations for the five wind generators. They just submitted the final plans for the wind generators yesterday (Wednesday, Feb. 16). This is pretty much a six-month time frame from start to finish."

As well as a $28 million investment in the area, which includes many construction jobs, Mohave County will potentially garner between $80,000 and $100,000 in permitting fees to pay for the review and inspection processes, Ballard said.

"I'm dealing with the RMT project manager on the field operations," Durgin said. "My (Building) division is involved in the review of construction plan documents and getting materials ready for permits to be issued. We also do all the field inspections and follow through on construction. Our job goes through the whole process until the project is completed. They (RMT) are very well organized and efficient in what they do. Their schedule has been pretty aggressive."

Mohave County has two types of renewable energy projects on the books, Ballard said. "We have the large-scale types that are going to tie into the WAPA (Western Area Power Administration) grid. Then we have the smaller plants that will tie into another merchant or local utility, like UniSource."

UniSource has its own proposed photovoltaic project, Durgin said.

"The next one (wind energy project) that seems to be moving forward is the BP (British Petroleum) project up in White Hills," Montgomery said. "Right now they are in the process with BLM on the environmental impact statement."

Brace for a showdown as Tea Party sponsored government shutdown looms

If enacted as is, the GOP plan would eliminate numerous programs, including the Corporation for National and Community Service, which runs the AmeriCorps program, and it would terminate federal funding of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. It would cut $600 million from border security and immigration programs. It would eliminate nearly $80 million for the District and slash funding for the cleanup of the Chesapeake Bay.

On Friday and Saturday, Republicans approved measures that would provide narrow savings but impose sharp policy prescriptions, including the abolition of any federal funding going to Planned Parenthood and the restriction of any funds going toward the implementation of Obama's health-care law.

The cuts to government would amount to 61 billion dollars which is a drop in the bucket for the deficit which amounts to 1.7 trillion dollars or about 3.4%. So we would reduce the amount we add to the national debt by that much, but what each and every one of us would have to pay to eliminate the national debt would be $44,900! Now, most of us have mortgages on our homes which amount to more than that and at the rate of inflation, we'd probably never feel the pinch if we actually had to pay it off.

On the other hand, the aforementioned programs involve some very talented employees who would necessarily lose their jobs just when employment is at its lowest. Do those of you in the workforce want to compete with these newly unemployed?

I'm sure that those of us in the southwest would hate to have the government reduce spending on border security and immigration, but that will be the case under the new rules if enacted. I'd suspect that we'd revert to open borders like we used to have with Canada.

After all, we're all good trading partners and open borders are much cheaper to maintain. Mexicans are willing to do work most Americans won't. As to the drug trade, if we were to legalize drugs and tax their sale, just as we have (even here in Arizona) with marijuana, we'd quickly eliminate our national debt. ...and, of course, if we were to drastically cut Pentagon spending and bring our boys home, we'd quickly eliminate our deficit!!!

It is highly time for us to reconsider our priorities. What is it that we want government to do? Should we police the world or should we care about our citizens and make their lives better through health care, education and the elimination of poverty?

ARIZONA -- what else

I found this an interesting approach to the belligerency of Arizona politicians who are making sounds similar to those made by the politicians in South Carolina just before the Civil War.

The following was just published in the Kingman Daily Miner newspaper as an e-comment to a letter to the editor:

Posted: Thursday, February 03, 2011
Article comment by: Robert E. Lee

Please, Get rid of everything the Federal Government ever did for Arizona. Dismantle Hoover Dam, pull up I-40, I-10, I-8, and I-17.

Get rid of the CAP canal. Get rid of Roosevelt Dam. Get rid of the Wellton Mohawk Irrigation District. Pull down Davis Dam, and especially for Ron Gould, get rid of Parker Dam.

Move Luke Air Force Base out, move the Yuma Proving Ground and MCAS Yuma out. Get rid of Davis-Monthan Airbase, close Fort Huachuca. Close Grand Canyon National Park, and all other National Parks and Mounuments, and give them to Jim Rhodes, Ned Warren, and Fife Symington. Close all mines on Federal Land. Stop all grazing on BLM land. Not one more tree to be cut on Federal Forest Lands. When the forest fires hit do not call the Smoke jumpers, they are Federal employees. All Indian tribes should put fences around their properties and keep everyone else out, since they were federal establishements.

And by gosh, make sure no one in this State gets any social security, Medicare, or VA benefits [hmmm...well....?], Get rid of the those Veterans' Cemeteries, and VA Hospitals. Bring back slavery. Open the border, since the Border Patrol is Federal, and no more Customs Enforcement or INS at the border. Leave the border security to Arizona's Sheriff's offices.

But make sure you don't raise any taxes to support those Sheriff's [like Arpaio], we are all against any tax increases. Please do not give any pay to any Federal judge nor Jon Kyl, or Senator Senile, and especially not to Trent Franks. Please Federal Government, do absolutely nothing for Arizona. That is what they want, give it to them.