Elk banished from 100 Mile Ranch B.C. after falling in love with Cow -

Elk banished from 100 Mile Ranch B.C. after falling in love with Cow - 



Somewhere east of this Cariboo community wanders an enormous bull elk, stripped of its six-point antlers and a misplaced attraction for one of Greg Messner’s cows.

The elk, a loner that had been turning up at the century-old 100 Mile Ranch to check out Messner’s herd for three years, was relocated earlier this month for its own safety and for the probity of the cow.

“He stuck around for a couple of days the first year,” said Messner, whose wife has had the ranch in her family for its entire history.

“Then last year, he was just hanging around again for a couple of weeks and not really doing anything, just hanging around and looking at the cows. This year, he decided to go for it.”

Messner said the elk’s visits have been a curiosity. Elk are so rare in the area that Messner and anyone else who stopped by to have a look at the impressive creature in the pasture simply call it The Elk.

“It’s kind of like the Queen,” Messner explained. “There’s only one of them.”

This year, the beast decided to stay a while and ended up mingling in the herd for about two months during its rutting season.

One of Messner’s cows was also in heat and the pair became a freakish but constant spectacle.

“If you were there watching, it would be an X-rated movie. Several times a day,” Messner said through a chuckle.

“He was pretty aggressive. He’d put his head down with his great big antlers and poke the little calves and push them away and send them for a little ride once in a while and flick them around.”

Messner estimated the elk at about six feet tall and four feet wide and weighing about half a tonne.

He said he finally called a biologist at the University of Northern British Columbia after inquiries from neighbours about whether his cow could have been impregnated by the elk.

“He had a huge rack, but he was too well-endowed by chromosomes,” Messner said.

Messner was told an elk has eight more chromosomes than a cow, making the likelihood of a hybrid calf a near impossibility.

But it wasn’t the amorous nature of the elk that finally prompted Messner to break up what he called “the harem” in his pasture.

The ranch is bordered by the highway and cars were stopping as passengers tried to get a look at the amorous ungulate, which from time to time would hop from one side of the pasture fence to the other.

Messner said the final straw was when hunters turned up, the lure of a six-point rack potentially dangerously enticing.

“Trucks were pulling over and people were watching this poor elk through the scope of their gun and people were doing U-turns on the highway. It was becoming a real dangerous situation.”

Messner called in the conservation officer. He, the officer and two RCMP officers sedated the elk and removed its antlers to make it less appealing to hunters and less of a threat to the cows should it decide to return.

The elk was then loaded into a truck and taken about 20 kilometres out of town, towards the mountains.

“I kind of think he will be back next year,” said Messner.

Read more - 
http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/article/1273175--elk-banished-from-100-mile-ranch-b-c-after-falling-in-love-with-cow

Shedding Pounds Could Ease ‘Pain At The Pump’ - losing weight could save you money at the gas pump -

Shedding Pounds Could Ease ‘Pain At The Pump’ - losing weight could save you money at the gas pump - 




Are you looking for another good reason to shed a few pounds? According to a new study, losing weight could save you money at the gas pump.

The study, conducted by Allstate Insurance and the Cars.com website, shows that for every 50 pounds inside a vehicle fuel efficiency decreases by one-percent.

Researchers say eventually manufacturers will get rid of CD players, which weigh five pounds, and replace them with MP 3 players. Cars.com editor in chief Patrick Olsen said the issue of spare tires, in a vehicle and around your waist, should also be considered.

“Well every American spare tire is adding to their cost. So they need to find ways to get rid of the one in the trunk and the one on them,” he said. “So that’s why it’s important whether just for yourself and health reasons, but also it’s gonna have an impact on how much it costs you to fill your car up for the entire year.”

In relation to vehicles, Olsen said in the future he sees manufacturers reducing vehicle weight by replacing the spare tire with an air pump or quick patch solution.

It’s also predicted that booklet forms of vehicle owner’s manuals will be replaced with flash drives.

With more than one-third of U.S. adults considered obese, passenger weight has only been growing. According to the study, between 1960 and 2002, an extra one billion gallons of gasoline were used due to the weight gain of motorists.

Read more - 
http://atlanta.cbslocal.com/2012/10/15/shedding-pounds-could-ease-pain-at-the-pump/

Celebrity sperm donor service gears up for launch... -

Celebrity sperm donor service gears up for launch... - 


A sperm donor service aimed at matching women with anonymous celebrity dads – such as rock stars and famous athletes – will launch next year, its owners have claimed.


Fame Daddy will offer would-be-mothers “top quality celebrity surrogate fathers” when it launches next February, according to Dan Richards, its chief executive.
Prices will start at £15,000 for a premium sperm service from the clinic.
The company’s website, which launched last week, claims that women can pick from a range of celebrated high-achievers when picking a prospective father for their offspring. The identities of each high-flying father will kept secret as the donors have been guaranteed anonymity. The men will also be required to sign a legal waiver of their rights to access to the child.
However would-be mothers using the Fame Daddy clinic will be able to identify their area of achievement and other personal attributes.
They can choose from donor dads who have excelled in a range of fields including sport, entertainment and business. The website lists a range of “sample profiles” of typical sperm donors, including an Oscar-winning actor, a member of the House of Lords and an ex-Premiership footballer.

Read more - 
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/9613099/Celebrity-sperm-donor-service-gears-up-for-launch.html

Earth's magnetic field overdue a flip -

Earth's magnetic field overdue a flip - 



The discovery by NASA rover Curiosity of evidence that water once flowed on Mars - the most Earth-like planet in the solar system - should intensify interest in what the future could hold for mankind.

The only thing stopping Earth having a lifeless environment like Mars is the magnetic field that shields us from deadly solar radiation and helps some animals migrate, and it may be a lot more fragile and febrile than one might think.

Scientists say earth's magnetic field is weakening and could all but disappear in as little as 500 years as a precursor to flipping upside down.

It has happened before - the geological record suggests the magnetic field has reversed every 250,000 years, meaning that, with the last event 800,000 years ago, another would seem to be overdue.

"Magnetic north has migrated more than 1,500 kilometres over the past century," said Conall Mac Niocaill, an earth scientist at Oxford University. "In the past 150 years, the strength of the magnetic field has lessened by 10 percent, which could indicate a reversal is on the cards."

While the effects are hard to predict, the consequences may be enormous. The loss of the magnetic field on Mars billions of years ago put paid to life on the planet if there ever was any, scientists say.

Mac Niocaill said Mars probably lost its magnetic field 3.5-4.0 billion years ago, based on observations that rocks in the planet's southern hemisphere have magnetisation.

The northern half of Mars looks younger because it has fewer impact craters, and has no magnetic structure to speak of, so the field must have shut down before the rocks there were formed, which would have been about 3.8 billion years ago.

"With the field dying away, the solar wind was then able to strip the atmosphere away, and you would also have an increase in the cosmic radiation making it to the surface," he said.

"Both of these things would be bad news for any life that might have formed on the surface - either wiping it out, or forcing it to migrate into the interior of the planet."

RIGHT HERE, RIGHT NOW

Earth's magnetic field has always restored itself but, as it continues to shift and weaken, it will present challenges - satellites could be more exposed to solar wind and the oil industry uses readings from the field to guide drills.

In nature, animals which use the field could be mightily confused - birds, bees, and some fish all use the field for navigation. So do sea turtles whose long lives, which can easily exceed a hundred years, means a single generation could feel the effects.

Birds may be able to cope because studies have shown they have back-up systems that rely on stars and landmarks, including roads and power lines, to find their way around.

The European Space Agency is taking the issue seriously. In November, it plans to launch three satellites to improve our fairly blurry understanding of the magnetosphere.

The project - Swarm - will send two satellites into a 450 kilometre high polar orbit to measure changes in the magnetic field, while a third satellite 530 kilometres high will look at the influence of the sun.

Read more - 
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/03/us-science-earth-magneticfield-idUSBRE8920X620121003

Autism Linked to High-Fructose Corn Syrup -

Autism Linked to High-Fructose Corn Syrup - 



A recent study published in the journal Clinical Epigenetics reveals that high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), which is a highly-processed chemical sweetener used in many processed foods and beverages, has been identified as a major factor in the rise of autism in the United States.

The rise of autism spectrum disorders in the United States has been staggering.

“The number of children ages 6 to 21 in the United States receiving special education services under the autism disability category increased 91% between 2005 to 2010 while the number of children receiving special education services overall declined by 5%.” – Dufault et al. Clinical Epigenetics, 2012

The ingestion of heavy metals, such as mercury (Hg), into the body is having a profound effect on the neurodevelopment of children. HFCS is not only exposing children’s bodies to mercury, but it is also responsible for inhibiting the elimination of toxins and heavy metals due to how it depletes the body of the natural mineral zinc.

“…the HFCS characteristics most likely contributing to autism include the zinc depleting effect that comes from consuming HFCS and certain food colors found in processed foods, and the additional Hg exposure that may occur from the low Hg concentrations sometimes found in HFCS as a result of the manufacturing process [4,17].” – Dufault et al. Clinical Epigenetics, 2012


FIGURE 1. The consumption of HFCS has increased substantially in the US over the 1980’s and 90’s.
(Source: http://www.clinicalepigeneticsjournal.com/content/4/1/6/figure/F3)

The study concludes:

“Consumption of HFCS may lead to mineral imbalances, including Zn [Zinc], Ca [Calcium] and P [Phosphorus] loss and Cu [Copper] gain and is a potential source of inorganic mercury exposure. These mineral imbalances create multiple pathways for oxidative stress in the brain from exposure to OP [organophosphate] pesticides and heavy metals, such as Pb [Lead] or Hg [Mercury].” - Dufault et al. Clinical Epigenetics, 2012

As health authorities and the FDA continue to pay little attention to ingredients such as HFCS, it is up to us to educate ourselves, other parents and our children. The importance of eating organic, pesticide-free fruits and vegetables, as well as whole foods rich in vitamins, minerals and nutrients such as Omega-3 Fatty acids, while eliminating processed foods from our diets, has never been more clear as public health epidemics skyrocket.

The study also identified the presence of mercury in vaccines and the overuse of agricultural pesticides, as potential causal factors for the increase in the rise of Autism in the United States.

Read more -
http://www.clinicalepigeneticsjournal.com/content/pdf/1868-7083-4-6.pdf

Billy Graham's group removes Mormon cult reference from website after Romney meeting -

Billy Graham's group removes Mormon cult reference from website after Romney meeting - 



Shortly after Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney enjoyed cookies and soft drinks with the Rev.  Billy Graham and his son Franklin Graham on Thursday at the elder Graham's mountaintop retreat, a reference to Mormonism as a cult was scrubbed from the website of the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association.

In a section of the website called Billy Graham's My Answer there had been the question "What is a cult?"

Answer: "A cult is any group which teaches doctrines or beliefs that deviate from the biblical message of the Christian faith."

"Some of these groups are Jehovah's Witnesess, Mormons, the Unification Church, Unitarians, Spritualists, Scientologists, and others," the site continued.

No longer. On Tuesday, the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association confirmed that page has recently been removed from the site.

“Our primary focus at the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association has always been promoting the Gospel of Jesus Christ," Ken Barun, chief of staff for the association, told CNN in a statement. "We removed the information from the website because we do not wish to participate in a theological debate about something that has become politicized during this campaign."

Follow the CNN Belief Blog on Twitter

Romney is a lifelong member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, members of which are known as Mormons.

The information about cults can be found on cached sections of the website on Archive.org from June 5, 2010.

The theological question of where Mormons fit on the religious spectrum has drawn more attention because of Romney's candidacy. Mormons consider themselves to be strong Christians. Many traditional Christian denominations disagree, though rank-and-file members have their own views on the matter.

The removal of the post from the Graham group's website was first noted by the New Civil Rights Movement website and then later by the Asheville Citizen-Times, which reported that the information on cults was accessed as recently as Thursday afternoon.

Last week's meeting between Romney and Graham was their first.

After the 30 minute sit-down in Montreat, North Carolina, just outside Asheville, Romney campaign spokesman Rick Gorka told reporters that Billy Graham led a prayer for the Romneys, saying "I'll do all I can to help you. And you can quote me on that."

Read more -
http://religion.blogs.cnn.com/2012/10/16/billy-grahams-group-removes-mormon-cult-reference-from-website-after-romney-meeting/?hpt=hp_t1

Bra Detects Breast Cancer Uses Sensors To Detect Tumors -

Bra Detects Breast Cancer Uses Sensors To Detect Tumors - 



Imagine being able to detect the first signs of breast cancer simply by putting on a bra.

For the past 20 years, Lifeline Biotechnologies has been developing and testing a "smart bra" called First Warning Systems, that it claims provides accurate screening for breast tissue abnormalities.

First Warning Systems says that three trials have shown the bra can detect abnormalities with a 90% and higher accuracy rating in women of all ages. According to SmartPlanet.com, if the bra sees more success in the trial stage, the company will be ready to sell it in Europe next year and the U.S. in 2014. The website said the retail price would be around $1,000.

First Warning Systems claims this new technology will reduce false positives, which are currently between 50-60% using other detection methods.

One in eight women, just under 12% of the U.S. population, will develop invasive breast cancer in her lifetime. Last year alone, 230,480 new invasive breast cancer cases were diagnosed in women.

According to Lifeline, sports bra-like material is encased with sensitive sensors that can detect small changes in temperature in breast tissue. The self-exam bra is worn close to the body for the testing period, at the end of which the sensors are capable of sending collected data to the Internet to be analyzed by "sophisticated algorithms," results of which are then sent to the user's personal device.

"As tissues transition from normal to hyperplasia, to atypical hyperplasia, to cancer in-situ to, to invasive cancer they develop their own distinct thermal finger print and can be compared with normal tissue temperature," according to the company's website.

Read more - 
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/16/bra-detects-breast-cancer-lifeline_n_1970096.html

Woman Arrested for DUI After Drinking Half Bottle of Hand Sanitizer... -

Woman Arrested for DUI After Drinking Half Bottle of Hand Sanitizer... - 



A Middletown woman is accused of driving drunk after drinking a half a bottle of hand sanitizer.

According to The Middletown Press, police say 36-year-old Jennifer Wilcox lost control of her car on Oct. 5, almost crashing into another vehicle.

Officers arrested her after she failed a field sobriety test, blowing a blood alcohol level of .17. Wilcox “admitted to drinking one half of a bottle of hand sanitizer,” police told the Press.

Wilcox told WTNH-TV that she drank the bottle of hand sanitizer on her own merit.

“I just saw it there so I drank it,” Wilcox told the station.

WTNH reports that Wilcox drank the equivalent of 32 shots of vodka.

“It’s the same alcohol in beer, in wine and Jack Daniels, however, it is more concentrated,” Dr. Danyal Ibrahim said of St. Francis Hospital told the station.

Wilcox was charged with driving under the influence and was released on $500 bond.

Read more - 
http://connecticut.cbslocal.com/2012/10/16/woman-accused-of-driving-drunk-after-drinking-half-a-bottle-of-hand-sanitizer/

Government Study Confirms 'GAYDAR' EXISTS, 60% ACCURATE... -

Government Study Confirms 'GAYDAR' EXISTS, 60% ACCURATE... - 


The National Science Foundation spent $30,000 to fund a study done by the University of Washington and Cornell University's to measure "gaydar" - the ability of people to identify sexual orientation merely by appearance. The researchers confirmed that "gaydar" exists, writing that participants were about 60% accurate when attempting to identify sexual orientation by appearance.


Senator Tom Coburn released the Wastebook 2012 today detailing the 100 most egregious wastes of taxpayer money. The two hundred page report details waste in all manner of federal spending - from multi-billion dollar programs all the way down to a $300 grant to a small-town library for a Star Wars-themed event. It's emblematic of the waste found everywhere in the federal budget.
Coburn details a $27 million U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) program for pottery classes in Morocco. The program, which has a questionable premise in the first place, was doomed due to incompetence and mismanagement. Translators with a questionable grasp of English were hired and used materials unavailable to Moroccans. The Inspector General concluded that the program was "ineffective and poorly implemented."

No sacred cow is spared in the report. Coburn notes that producing pennies has become too expensive for the government to justify. "The cost to produce a penny in 2012 is more than two times its actual value." Noting that other developed countries have discontinued their smallest forms of currency, he writes, "the United States should follow suit and stop producing it."

While the viral video of an Obama supporter claiming to have received a free phone may stretch credibility, the truth is more real than you think. There is in fact a federal program aimed at providing "free or reduced-price cell phone service," as detailed in Wastebook. The federal government is empowered to provide universal telecommunications service to Americans, and have started using cell phones rather than landlines as a means of accomplishing that.

Read more - 
http://townhall.com/columnists/kevinglass/2012/10/16/moroccan_pottery_obamaphones_and_gaydar_how_the_government_wasted_your_money_this_year/page/full/

AMTRAK snack bars lost $84.5 Million last year; $833 Million in 10 years... -

AMTRAK snack bars lost $84.5 Million last year; $833 Million in 10 years... - 


Federal spending over the past 20 years has surged 71 percent faster than inflation, much of it on bloated and wasteful programs and services, including Vice President Joe Biden's favorite mode of travel: Amtrak.

According to the newly revised Heritage Foundation report, "Federal Spending by the Numbers," the rail service lost $84.5 million alone on its food and beverage services in 2011, and $833.8 million over the past 10 years. "It has never broken even on these services," said Heritage.

The regularly revised analysis found that federal spending spiked this year to $3.6 trillion, which is nearly 23 percent of the U.S. economy. And to illustrate why the federal deficit has reached $1 trillion each year of the Obama presidency, Heritage determined that for every $6.80 Washington collects in taxes, it spends $10, meaning that the Treasury has to borrow the remaining $3.20.

Debt and federal spending is a major issue in the presidential election, with President Obama pledging to keep an eye on it and Mitt Romney promising deep cuts. Heritage warned, however, that if spending is allowed to continue at the current pace, federal spending will reach $5.5 trillion in a decade.

Not surprisingly, entitlement programs such as Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, are driving growth. But anti-poverty programs have also surged by 49 percent in just the past decade. And spending on another politically touchy issue, food stamps, has more than tripled since 2002.

Heritage noted that the current spending crisis doesn't include the oncoming program and spending changes required by Obamacare, which will spend $1.7 trillion over 10 years. The group explained that Obamacare will increase federal health spending by 15 percent, bringing it to 44 percent of all mandatory spending.

What's more, "Obamacare's 18 new or increased taxes and penalties raise $836 billion in new taxes between 2013 and 2022."

Heritage offered a few examples of waste worthy of cutting or consolidating:

-- In fiscal year 2010, the federal government spent nearly $1.7 billion to maintain 77,700 underused or unused buildings.

-- Eliminating both the New Starts and Small Starts transit grants programs would save taxpayers $5.6 billion over the next five years and $16.3 billion over 10 years. It would get the federal government out of the business of subsidizing high-cost, low-value local transit projects, such as $900 million for a 10-mile extension of the Bay Area rail system in San Jose and a $1.6 billion grant to construct a Honolulu rail line.

-- The Department of Agriculture's Office of the Chief Information Officer funded a $2 million intern program. Only one intern was hired full time as a result.

-- The U.S. Navy bought 450,000 gallons of biofuels for $12 million, or almost $27 per gallon, to conduct exercises to showcase the fuel and bring it closer toward commercialization. It is the largest biofuel purchase ever made by the government.

-- The Internal Revenue Service stored 22,486 items of unused furniture in a warehouse at an annual cost of $862,000.

-- The State Department began a Diplomatic Culinary Partnership program in 2012. Over 80 American chefs have been inducted into the American Chefs Corps and will support the State Department by preparing food for visiting officials and traveling around the world to engage in "culinary diplomacy."

-- The Department of Agriculture's Market Access Program spends $200 million a year to help U.S. agricultural trade associations and cooperatives advertise their products in foreign markets. In 2011, it funded a reality TV show in India that advertised U.S. cotton.

-- The Conservation Reserve Program pays farmers $2.1 billion annually not to farm their land for a period of at least ten years.

Read more - 
http://washingtonexaminer.com/amtrak-snack-bars-lost-84.5-million-last-year-833-million-in-10-years/article/2510864#.UH2GLJgqae3