Animal-rights group sues over ‘disturbing’ work on sea lions
Conservation effort criticized for branding pups.
Branding can be justified in vital conservation research
SIR — Exchange of information about biodiversity is mandated by the legally binding international Convention on Biological Diversity, as are monitoring and benefit sharing. Yet researchers in the developing world, where most of the biodiversity is found, are unable to access much of this information. This impedes the monitoring of biodiversity: monitoring depends on the proper identification of species, and this is hindered by a lack of both specialists and access to relevant taxonomic information. The number of online publications with taxonomic content is increasing, and online tools are becoming available to mash up taxonomic with other information, for example at ispecies.org (see “Mashups mix data into global service” Nature 439, 6–7; 2006). But copyright and high costs put this information beyond the reach of many in the developing world — which is home to more than 95% of species whose descriptions have been published. More than half the 1,600 descriptions of new ant species published in the past ten years are copyrighted, for example, but none are in journals published in the developing world (see antbase.org). This seems little better than biopiracy: taking biodiversity material from the developing world for profit, without sharing benefit or providing the people who live there with access to this crucial information. A simple solution would be to treat species descriptions as we do gene sequences, and have them openly accessible. Open-access descriptions of new species could then be a mandatory factor in making them valid under the various codes of biological nomenclature. A recent Commentary by Andrew Polaszek and colleagues (“A universal register for animal names” Nature 437, 477; 2005) describes how the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature proposes to facilitate this process for animal descriptions, through a register called ZooBank. However, present copyright laws prevent the mandatory inclusion of what would be an immensely useful piece of information, the actual description of the species. Donat Agosti American Museum of Natural History, New York, New York 10024-5192, USA
Digestive efficiency and dry-matter digestibility in Steller sea lions fed herring, pollock, squid, and salmon
Dry-matter digestibility and energy digestive efficiency were measured in six juvenile Steller sea lions (Eumetopias jubatus) fed three diets each consisting of a single species: herring, pollock, and squid. Two of the animals were also fed pink salmon. Dry-matter digestibility (DMD) and digestive efficiency (DE) were measured using the energy and manganese concentration in fecal and food samples. DE values were high for all prey species (herring: 95.4 ± 0.7% (mean ± SD), pollock: 93.9 ± 1.4%, salmon: 93.4 ± 0.5%, squid: 90.4 ± 1.3%). Steller sea lions appear to digest prey of high energy density more efficiently than prey of low energy density. DMD values were also high for all prey species (herring: 90.1 ± 1.8%, pollock: 86.5 ± 3.4%, salmon: 87.3% ± 2.6, squid: 90.5 ± 1.2%). The low DMD value for pollock compared with herring and squid was due to the high proportion of bony material in pollock. There was a strong linear relationship between DE and DMD for each prey type, but the terms cannot be used interchange- ably. DE measures are more meaningful than DMD in conveying the energetic benefits derived by sea lions from dif- ferent types of prey. Species-specific measures of the digestible energy obtained from an array of prey items are a necessary component in understanding the bioenergetic consequences of consuming different prey species. Resume : Las digestibilite des matieres seches et l'efficacite de l'energie digestive ont ete mesurees chez six Otaries de Steller juveniles (Eumetopias jubatus) gardees a une diete monospecifique constituee de hareng, de goberge ou de calmar. Deux animaux ont aussi recu du Saumon rose en nourriture. La digestibilite des matieres seches (DMD) et