The four species of newly-discovered tiger moths. Left to right: First row: O. suryamal rekhae, O. suryamal. Second row: O. zedesi and O. ghatmatha [Image credits: Aparna Kalawate]
Thus hath the candle sing'd the moth.
O, these deliberate fools! When they do choose,
They have the wisdom by their wit to lose.
(a) Shola reedtail (Protosticta sholai) [Image credits: K. A. Subramanian]; (b) blue-legged reedtail (Protosticta cyanofemora) [Image credits: Shantanu Joshi]; (c) Myristica reedtail (Protosticta myristicaensis) [Image credits: Shantanu Joshi]
Eastern Ghat Cricket Frog [Image credits: Prudhvi Raj]
Researchers discover a visibly different individual of the Eastern Ghats cricket frogs, in the Western Ghats
Some cryptic species of frogs in the Western Ghats (Left Top: Indirana semipalamata (Image credits: Saunak Pal), Left-Bottom: Indirana beddomii (Image Credits: Saunak Pal), Right-Top:
In a recent study, scientists have discovered two new species in the Western Ghats of Kerala, India. To date, this group of termites has been documented only in the Western Ghats of India. The termite species were named after Sri K.A. Dineshan and Sri. Manikandan Nair of the Zoological Survey of India, Kozhikode, who collected the samples from the field and contributed greatly to the entire faunal survey.
In a recent study, Mr Kamath, now a researcher at Gubbi Labs, Bengaluru, along with Dr Seshadri KS, a researcher at The Madras Crocodile Bank Trust and Centre for Herpetology, Tamil Nadu, has reported the feeding behaviour of Brown mongoose. Though accidental, the study adds knowledge about some previously unknown behavioural aspects of these elusive mongooses. It is published in the Journal of Threatened Taxa.
In a recent study, researchers from Sai Nath University, Ranchi, and Bharathiar University, Coimbatore, set out to quantify the impacts of natural radioactivity on the surrounding environment in the Nilgiris of Tamil Nadu. Their findings have been published in the Journal of Radiation Research and Applied Sciences.
Avian malaria or bird malaria has been linked to significant declines in captive and wild birds, such as penguins and Hawaiian forest birds. Common blood parasites, like Plasmodium that spread through mosquitoes and Haemoproteus that are transmitted through louse flies and biting midges, cause the disease in birds.
A team of researchers from the ATREE, Bengaluru, Concordia University, Canada, Quebec Centre for Biodiversity Science, Canada, and Jawaharlal Nehru Tropical Botanical Garden and Research Institute, Kerala, have traced the biogeographical origins of Piper genus in India.
The team of researchers, from the Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru were attempting to study and classify snakes in the Western Ghats systematically. That's when they came across Proahaetulla antiqua, which is endemic to the southern Western Ghats. What's more interesting is that it is an ancient species, thought to have evolved around 26 million years ago during the mid-Oligocene.
