Weekend Rounds - 12.10

Hi ,It was a big week:

Jonathan, the world's oldest living land mammal, celebrated his 190th birthday on the island of St. Helena.

The tortoise was a gift to Sir William Grey-Wilson in 1882, but since there is no record of his birth he may be even older than 190. 

December 10th was International Animal Rights Day. 

Founded in 1998, the day was intentionally chosen as the same as Human Rights Day to remind us that dignity and respect are owed to animals, as well as humans.

The World Cup is down it's final 4 teams.

After a string of upsets in the knockout stage, Croatia, Argentina, Morocco and France are the only teams left playing for football's most prestigious trophy. 

Now that you're caught up on the water cooler talk, let's get to the real news:

🌎 World leaders are working on a plan to save nature (again)🧠 Neuralink faces animal abuse inquiry📸 Nature inFocus Photography Awards 🚀 Quick hits

Delegates from more than 190 countries are convening in Montreal for COP15 - also known as the UN Biodiversity Conference. The goal is to agree on a plan to halt the decline of ecosystems, wildlife, and the life-supporting services they provide.COP15 brings together nations involved in a major treaty called the Convention on Biological Diversity. This agreement, along with one focused on Climate Change that was convened at COP27 last month, are the most important tools the world has to protect the planet.Many experts call COP15 the last chance to reverse the decline of nature, but as Vox reported, finalizing the framework won't be easy for a few reasons: there’s a noticeable rift between rich and poor nations, no heads of state except Justin Trudeau are attending as of yet, and negotiators are already exhausted from COP27. Whereas Climate Change has a measurable goal, to keep warming below 1.5°C by limiting the emission of greenhouse gases, COP15 is about finding ways protect remaining natural environments, restore those that are damaged, and get corporations to stop further destruction. It's a lot harder to set tangible goals against it, but one popular proposal is to conserve at least 30 percent of Earth’s land and water by 2030. The target has the very marketable name of 30 by 30 and we all know good branding is half the battle. 

Elon Musk has been making headlines for all the wrong reasons as he makes sweeping changes at his newest company, Twitter. But this week it was one of his other companies dominating headlines, as The Guardian reported.Neuralink, a company developing a brain implant it hopes will help paralyzed people walk again, restore vision and cure other neurological ailments, is under federal investigation in the United States for potential animal-welfare violations after multiple staff complained that its animal testing is being rushed. The news broke after the company announced that it could be moving to human trials in just six weeks.  Since 2018, records have shown that trials have killed about 1,500 animals. However, the total number of animals does not necessarily constitute any violation as animals are often euthanized after procedures in order to be examined post-mortem for research purposes. Instead, the complaint centers around allegations from current and former employees who say the number of animal deaths is higher than it needs to be due to Musk’s demands of speedier research. So far, Reuters has identified four experiments involving 86 pigs and two monkeys that were marred in recent years by human errors. The mistakes weakened the experiments’ research value and required the tests to be repeated, leading to more animals being killed.It would also appear Musk has been motivating the Neuralink team in some interesting ways such as telling employees to imagine they had a bomb strapped to their heads in an effort to get them to move faster, and threatening to shut down operations unless they made more progress. While this is not entirely surprising, it's certainly disappointing. 

The last story was a bit of a downer, so hopefully we can boost spirits by sharing some of our favorite pictures from the 2022 Nature inFocus Photography

Awards

. Each year, the awards showcase surprising and fascinating animal behaviors across the world in some of the most stunning photographs you'll ever see. 

The natural world never ceases to amaze...

From top to bottom, left to right:Tranquillity by Lakshitha KarunarathnaRefuge in Sponge by Magnus LundgrenJailbreak by Kapil Sharma, Yogendra SatamCloaked In Lilac by Sanjay Nair

Here are some stories we're following this week from around the veterinary world and animal kingdom:

The contribution of veterinarians to wildlife health [AVMA] 

How virtual reality may play a role in veterinary education [Colorado State] 

Animals Are Running Out of Places to Live [New York Times] 

The industry that ‘Tiger King’ made famous will soon be illegal [National Geographic] 

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