Nov
14
Neb. parents rush to leave kids before law changes
Filed Under Animals, Most Pepular, News | Leave a Comment
LINCOLN, Neb. - The mother was running out of more than patience when she abandoned her 18-year-old daughter at a hospital over the weekend under Nebraska’s safe-haven law. She was also running out of time: She knew that state lawmakers would soon meet in a special session to amend the ill-fated law so that it would apply to newborns only.
“Where am I going to get help if they change the law?” said the mother, who lives in Lincoln and asked to not be identified by name to protect her adopted child.
To the state’s surprise and embarrassment, more than half of the 31 children legally abandoned under the safe-haven law since it took effect in mid-July have been teenagers.
But state officials may have inadvertently made things worse with their hesitant response to the problem: The number of drop-offs has almost tripled to about three a week since Gov. Dave Heineman announced on Oct. 29 that lawmakers would rewrite the law.
With legislators set to convene on Friday, weary parents like the Lincoln mother have been racing to drop off their children while they still can.
On Thursday, authorities searched for two teens - a boy and girl, ages 14 and 17 - who fled an Omaha hospital as their mother tried to abandon them. The mother was trying to take them from the car to the emergency room when they took off.
Child welfare experts said the late deluge of drop-offs was probably inevitable. After all, they said, some date had to be picked to begin changing the law.
But some of them said lawmakers and the governor missed chances to change the law early because they underestimated the number of desperate families looking for help. Heineman called the special session only after a spate of five drop-offs in eight days.
Reluctance to pull senators away from their jobs and election campaigns, along with the estimated $70,000 to $80,000 cost of a special session, were among the reasons Heineman’s office cited in holding off on calling a special session sooner.
“I think there was a fair amount of denial on the part of legislators that it would snowball,” said Karen Authier, executive director of the Nebraska Children’s Home Society.
The safe-haven law was intended to save “Dumpster babies” by allowing desperate young mothers to abandon their newborns at a hospital without fear of prosecution. But lawmakers could not agree on an age limit, and the law as passed uses only the word “child.”
All states have safe-haven laws, but in every state but Nebraska, the law applies to infants only.
Authier said her group and others had warned senators after the law passed early this year that there could be problems, but the lawmakers did not believe it.
“It wasn’t like talking to a stone wall,” Authier said. “It was just that people who aren’t in the business of dealing with families, they aren’t aware how desperate some of these families are.”
Sure enough, 18 teenagers - five 17-year-olds, two 16-year-olds, six 15-year-olds, two 14-year-olds, three 13-year-olds - have been abandoned, along with eight children who were 11 or 12. Five of the children dropped off have been from out of state.
The Lincoln mother who dropped off her 18-year-old daughter said she was repeatedly turned down when she sought help from police, state social services authorities and the girl’s school. The woman said her daughter had been diagnosed with a mental illness when she was 12 and had deep psychological scars from childhood abuse and from being left alone with her dead biological mother for a week.
The woman said she felt she had no choice but to leave her daughter at the hospital after a recent flurry of assault, stealing, sleeping around and cutting school.
“I thought she would get help” through the safe-haven law, the mother said.
However, state authorities refused to take the young woman into custody, saying Nebraska law regarding juveniles does not let authorities take in anyone older than 17. The woman left with her daughter.
Fourteen children in all have been left at three hospitals operated by Alegent Health in the Omaha area.
“These are largely families at a point of incredible desperation,” said Wayne Sensor, chief executive of Alegent Health. “They aren’t bad parents or bad kids. They simply don’t know what services are available out there.”
Nov
10
Animals
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
Most of the tiny bit we hear right about families making allergic to cats. Did you understand this cats can hold allergies too? Find out larger amount of roughly too and a greater number of hints to continue your feline feeling fine.
Nov
10
Animals
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
San Diego Zoo’s official website has scads of realities and info on the king of the jungle, forest and savannah. Quick realities are arranged recipe style on the part for easy scanning, and a good amount in-depth hints can be at last found in the person of the page. Photo gallery included as immensely as sound and video bytes.
Nov
10
animals
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
This University of Michigan official website has all the tiger critical stats, pictures and scientific classifications for these types of fascinating creatures, based on information from habitats something like the world. The Specimens tab has up finish and custom photos of tiger skulls, provided detail of jaw house and teeth. Be insured to click on the Pictures tab to see true shots of such ample cats in action.
Nov
1
Virunga Gorillas
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
Nearly portion of the world’s 700-some remaining bundle gorillas-including right now infant-live in the Virunga mountains of significant Africa, at the intersection of Uganda, Rwanda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Virunga National Park, piece of real estate to all but 200 gorillas, has become a battleground for militia groups and the Congolese army. Poachers as well hunt park gorillas for meat and sale, and locals cut dwindled trees to start charcoal.
In the the first part of 2000s, through the assistance of dedicated rangers and more and more measures, the gorilla populace rebounded in the Virungas. But in 2007, at lowest ten apes in Virunga National Park got lost to murder and chaos, and the survival is uncertain.
Nov
1
Iberian Lynx
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
With a populace of just recently 84 to 143 adults in isolated pockets of Spain and Portugal, the Iberian lynx is classified as “critically endangered” on the 2008 Red List.
The lynx depends on rabbits for larger number of as opposed to 80 per cent of its diet. But as European rabbit areas stay to moderate due to disease, so do lynx.
Accidental deaths due to road money and snares set for rabbits–along provided disease, illegal shooting, and increasingly fragmented habitat–are in addition contributing to lynx declines.
Jul
21
Fish pedicures: Carp rid human feet of scaly skin
Filed Under Animals, Most Pepular, News | Leave a Comment
ALEXANDRIA, Va. - Ready for the latest in spa pampering? Prepare to dunk your tootsies in a tank of water and let tiny carp nibble away.
Fish pedicures are creating something of a splash in the D.C. area, where a northern Virginia spa has been offering them for the past four months. John Ho, who runs the Yvonne Hair and Nails salon with his wife, Yvonne Le, said 5,000 people have taken the plunge so far.
“This is a good treatment for everyone who likes to have nice feet,” Ho said.
He said he wanted to come up with something unique while finding a replacement for pedicures that use razors to scrape off dead skin. The razors have fallen out of favor with state regulators because of concerns about whether they’re sanitary.
Ho was skeptical at first about the fish, which are called garra rufa but typically known as doctor fish. They were first used in Turkey and have become popular in some Asian countries.
But Ho doubted they would thrive in the warm water needed for a comfortable footbath. And he didn’t know if customers would like the idea.
“I know people were a little intimidated at first,” Ho said. “But I just said, ‘Let’s give it a shot.’ “
Customers were quickly hooked.
Tracy Roberts, 33, of Rockville, Md., heard about it on a local radio show. She said it was “the best pedicure I ever had” and has spread the word to friends and co-workers.
“I’d been an athlete all my life, so I’ve always had calluses on my feet. This was the first time somebody got rid of my calluses completely,” she said.
First time customer KaNin Reese, 32, of Washington, described the tingling sensation created by the toothless fish: “It kind of feels like your foot’s asleep,” she said.
The fish don’t do the job alone. After 15 to 30 minutes in the tank, customers get a standard pedicure, made easier by the soft skin the doctor fish leave behind.
Ho believes his is the only salon in the country to offer the treatment, which costs $35 for 15 minutes and $50 for 30 minutes. The spa has more than 1,000 fish, with about 100 in each individual pedicure tank at any given time.
Dennis Arnold, a podiatrist who four years ago established the International Pedicure Association, said he had never heard of the treatment and doubts it will become widespread.
“I think most people would be afraid of it,” he said.
Customer Patsy Fisher, 42, of Crofton, Md., admitted she was nervous as she prepared for her first fish pedicure. But her apprehension dissolved into laughter after she put her feet in the tank and the fish swarmed to her toes.
“It’s a little ticklish, actually,” she said.
Ho said the hot water in which the fish thrive doesn’t support much plant or aquatic life, so they learned to feed on whatever food sources were available - including dead, flaking skin. They leave live skin alone because, without teeth, they can’t bite it off.
In addition to offering pedicures, Ho hopes to establish a network of Doctor Fish Massage franchises and is evaluating a full-body fish treatment that, among other things, could treat psoriasis and other skin ailments.
Ho spent a year and about $40,000 getting the pedicures up and running, with a few hiccups along the way.
State regulations make no provision for regulating fish pedicures. But the county health department - which does regulate pools - required the salon to switch from a shallow, tiled communal pool that served as many as eight people to individual tanks in which the water is changed for each customer.
The communal pool also presented its own problem: At times the fish would flock to the feet of an individual with a surplus of dead skin, leaving others with a dearth of fish.
“It would sometimes be embarrassing for them but it was also really hilarious,” Ho said
Source
Jul
21
Lipizzan horses’ white colour due to mutated gene: study
Filed Under Animals, Most Pepular, News | Leave a Comment
VIENN (AFP) - The white coat of the Lipizzan horses performing at Vienna’s prestigious Spanish riding school is caused by a mutated gene, a new study showed Sunday, solving a decades-old mystery over the horses’ colour.
White and grey horses, including Lipizzans, are born with a darker coat but lose their colour between the age of six and eight due to chromosome mutations, Austrian and Swedish researchers found in the study published Sunday in the scientific journal Nature Genetics.
These genetic changes cause pigment-producing melanocyte cells to be produced more rapidly in these horses so that the stock is quickly used up and the horses lose their pigmentation, according to one of the study’s co-authors, Monika Seltenhammer of Vienna’s University of Veterinary Medicine.
The study also found that the same chromosome was responsible for the horses’ heightened risk of melanoma, a serious skin cancer.
Between 70 and 80 percent of grey and white horses aged 15 or older develop skin disease, said Leif Andersson of the department of medical biochemistry and microbiology at Sweden’s Uppsala University.
But the horses are hardly at risk, as the disease cells do not spread as quickly as in humans, said Seltenhammer.
Jul
21
Lipizzan horses’ white colour due to mutated gene: study
Filed Under Animals, Most Pepular, News | Leave a Comment
VIENN (AFP) - The white coat of the Lipizzan horses performing at Vienna’s prestigious Spanish riding school is caused by a mutated gene, a new study showed Sunday, solving a decades-old mystery over the horses’ colour.
White and grey horses, including Lipizzans, are born with a darker coat but lose their colour between the age of six and eight due to chromosome mutations, Austrian and Swedish researchers found in the study published Sunday in the scientific journal Nature Genetics.
These genetic changes cause pigment-producing melanocyte cells to be produced more rapidly in these horses so that the stock is quickly used up and the horses lose their pigmentation, according to one of the study’s co-authors, Monika Seltenhammer of Vienna’s University of Veterinary Medicine.
The study also found that the same chromosome was responsible for the horses’ heightened risk of melanoma, a serious skin cancer.
Between 70 and 80 percent of grey and white horses aged 15 or older develop skin disease, said Leif Andersson of the department of medical biochemistry and microbiology at Sweden’s Uppsala University.
But the horses are hardly at risk, as the disease cells do not spread as quickly as in humans, said Seltenhammer.
Jul
18
Painting Oudry
Filed Under Animals | Leave a Comment
experience kept on studying Oudry’s painting and drawing supplies both for my own inspection as a painter and as half of the Artist-At-Work Demonstration sequence the I experience had the option to latest at the Getty Museum their summer.
One drawing in chosen pulls anybody in-the exquisite, flawless pastel projection of a fox head. When I initial saw the drawing, I wondered if it was calculated as a ended strive of art or whether it was a beautifully completed forecast for a painting. And I wondered how the present painting ought to check want as an oil painting.
The terminology of drawing and painting are remarkably different. With impasto textures and glazes of color, oil coat can vividly tighten space and the touch of the planet in a way the has larger number of build and space as opposed to drawing. My finished study, substantiated here, is 18 by 24 inches on linen through trigger reason and a raw umber imprimatura.