Diet segregation between two colonies of little penguins Eudyptula minor in southeast Australia

We studied foraging segregation between two different sized colonies of little penguins Eudyptula minor with overlapping foraging areas in pre‐laying and incubation. We used stomach contents and stable isotope measurements of nitrogen (δ¹⁵N) and carbon (δ¹³C) in blood to examine differences in trophic position, prey‐size and nutritional values between the two colonies. Diet of little penguins at St Kilda (small colony) relied heavily on anchovy while at Phillip Island (large colony), the diet was more diverse and anchovies were larger than those consumed by St Kilda penguins. Higher δ¹⁵N values at St Kilda, differences in δ¹³C values and the prey composition provided further evidence of diet segregation between colonies. Penguins from each colony took anchovies from different cohorts and probably different stocks, although these sites are only 70 km apart. Differences in diet were not reflected in protein levels in the blood of penguins, suggesting that variation in prey between colonies was not related to differences in nutritional value of the diet. Anchovy is currently the only available prey to penguins throughout the year and its absence could have a negative impact on penguin food supply, particularly at St Kilda where the diet is dominated by this species. While it is difficult to establish whether diet segregation is caused by inter‐ or intra‐colony competition or spatial differences in foraging areas, we have shown that colonies with broadly overlapping foraging ranges could have significant differences in trophic position, diet composition and prey size while maintaining a diet of similar nutritional value.     

Mental health; a discussion of various program approaches used in California and the basic assumptions involved

The nation's Number One health problem, mental illness, compels careful reevaluation of past and current methods of attack. It also invites consideration of the ways and means of integrating preventive measures that emphasize the conservation of mental health with prophylactic efforts that stress the avoidance of mental illnesses.A REVIEW OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF BOTH LOCAL AND STATEWIDE MENTAL HEALTH PROGRAMS IN CALIFORNIA REVEALS THAT THREE FUNDAMENTALLY DIFFERENT APPROACHES HAVE BEEN USED: (1) The traditional approach which confines itself to the protection of society from the "insane" by the state, and to the treatment of those who are not legally insane through "private enterprise"; (2) the public health approach which seeks to minimize the causes and/or spread of selected types of psychiatric disorder regarded as mass phenomena; and (3) the sociological approach which stresses the importance of social factors both in the causation and in the rehabilitation of those mental conditions that are considered to be symptomatic of a "sick" society. An approach that combines the theoretical and practical implications of all three viewpoints offers some new solutions to the problems of (1) fitting mental health programs to populations; (2) financing; and (3) balancing preventive and clinical services. Mental illness is not a single disease-entity but a long list of distinctly different conditions. The causes and manifestations are multiple. Biological, psychological and social components in either mental health or mental illness cannot be dissociated in any attempt to understand and deal with so wide a range of illnesses and states of comparative health. Therefore, many professions and multiple public and private agencies are involved in planning, developing and administering a mental health program.     

DENATURING GRADIENT GEL ELECTROPHORESIS (DGGE) AS A RAPID METHOD FOR ASSESSING GASTROINTESTINAL TRACT MICROFLORA RESPONSES IN LAYING HENS FED SIMILAR ZINC MOLT INDUCTION DIETS

Induced molting through feed withdrawal can change the microenvironment of crop and ceca sufficiently to allow them to be the sites of Salmonella colonization in the chicken intestine. This study compares the denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE) profiles of microbial crop and cecal communities among molted hens fed similar zinc acetate or zinc propionate amended molt diets to hens either undergoing feed withdrawal or hens full fed and not molted. Dendrograms of DGGE amplicon patterns indicated over 85% similarity of cecal communities between zinc acetate fed hens and zinc propionate fed hens and over 60% similarity of crop communities between zinc acetate fed hens and zinc propionate fed hens. Rapid comparison of complex gastrointestinal microflora profiles in laying hens fed similar diets is possible using DGGE.     

The importance of green seed in the nitrogen nutrition of the Zebra Finch Taeniopygia guttata

Abstract Australian grass-finches are widely reported to consume large quantities of green seed when it becomes available, and the opportunistic breeding of wild Zebra Finches in the arid zone has been correlated with the occurrence of rain. In this study, green and ripe seeds were harvested from seven pasture and weed grasses grown in experimental plots and, along with three cereal flours and whole-egg powder, were analysed for the amino-acid composition of their protein. The relative levels of ten amino acids essential in the diets of growing birds were compared between samples using a cluster analysis dendrogram generated from Raabe's Similarity Index. The protein of all green seeds clustered with whole egg, and away from all but one of the ripe seeds and seed products. Green and ripe seed profiles were found to be significantly different by a two-sample multivariate test of significance (Hotelling's T²). Histidine, lysine, phenylalanine and threonine were the amino acids most different. Of these four amino acids, lysine and threonine (along with methionine) were potentially limiting in ripe seeds when compared with whole-egg protein. In green seeds, lysine was only marginally limiting, threonine was no longer limiting, but methionine was still limiting when compared with whole-egg protein. These results indicate that the benefit of green vs ripe seed in the diet of breeding Zebra Finches is partly a higher level of the limiting essential amino acid, lysine, and partly a higher intake and throughput of soft green seed and consequent greater extraction of limiting essential amino acids.     

Effect of Cutting on Production and Tillering in Prairie Grass (Bromus willdenowii Kunth) Compared With Two Ryegrass (Lolium) species. 2. Reproductive Plants

Effects of time of initial cut and subsequent cutting interval(1, 2 or 4 weeks) were examined in a glasshouse during summer1988 for reproductive plants of three prairie grass cultivars(Bromus willdenowii Kunth), Westerwolds ryegrass (Lolium multiflorumLam.) and perennial ryegrass (Lolium perenne L.). Measurementswere made of tiller and leaf numbers, sites of tillering, reproductivedevelopment, and herbage quality and yields. Effect of timeof initial cutting on regrowth appeared to be independent ofstage of reproductive development and unrelated to any of themeasured plant parameters. Characteristics for each cultivaras identified during undisturbed growth prior to the initialcuts, were modified by the subsequent cutting frequencies. Perennial ryegrass had the highest yields under frequent cuttingwith high herbage quality. Westenwolds ryegrass and the prairiegrass cultivars ‘Grasslands Matua’ and ‘Primabel’had the highest yields with infrequent cutting, but lower herbagequality than in perennial ryegrass. At each cut, tiller deathin prairie grass was determined by the number of reproductivetillers, and in the ryegrasses also by the numbers of elongatedvegetative tillers. Recovery of tiller numbers was rapid andprimarily from inhibited tiller buds at the base of reproductivetillers. In prairie grass, tiller numbers were relatively unaffectedby cutting frequency, but at frequent cutting, many axillarytillers originated from vegetative tillers rather than frominhibited tiller buds at the base of reproductive tillers. Prairie grass, Bromus willdenowii Kunth, Westerwolds ryegrass, Lolium multiflorum Lam., perennial ryegrass, Lolium perenne L., first (initial) cut, cutting frequency, regrowth, leaf appearance, tillering, yield, nitrogen, water-soluble carbohydrates, herbage quality