【推荐2】For years, David James, who studies insects at Washington State University, had wanted to examine the migration (迁徙)patterns of West Coast monarch butterflies (黑脉金斑蝶). The route the butterflies travel has been hardly known because the populations are too small to follow. For every 200 monarchs tagged (打标签)by a researcher, only one is usually recovered at the end of its trip, James says, and finding even 200 in the wild to tag is unlikely. Knowing the route is vital to conservation efforts, but James had no way to figure it out- until he got a phone call from Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla.

The prison was looking for new activities to improve the mental health of those serving long-term sentences. So James began working with prisoners to raise monarchs through the whole process of their transformation. The adult insects were then tagged and released from the prison. Over five years, nearly 10, 000 monarchs flew from the facility. Elsewhere in Washington, Oregon and Idaho, researchers released another few thousand.

The tags included email addresses, and soon after the first butterflies took off, James started receiving messages from people who had spotted them. The butterflies, the reports confirmed, wintered in coastal California. Twelve of them landed at Lighthouse Field State Beach in Santa Cruz. Several more headed to Bolinas and Morro Bay.

The work helps researchers identify ideal places to plant milkweed and other vegetation that are important to the life cycle of West Coast monarch butterflies. It also brought out the gentler side of some of the prisoners. “They were very worried that they were going to harm the butterflies, ”James says. Watching the monarch change their form also touched the men. “This butterfly changed, ” James recalls prisoners telling him, “and maybe we can too. ”

【推荐3】In early September, Sally and Jon Watkinson found something unusual on their dog’s back. A baby possum (负鼠) held on to the coat of their dog, Kato. “Kato seemed to barely notice it was there,” Sally posted on Facebook. “It’s most surprising that Kato was not barking madly at it.”

The couple spent the day searching for a safe place to drop off the possum. After looking for wildlife rescue organizations, they eventually brought their dog into the vet with the animal still attached. The vet staff removed the baby, which they determined to be a little girl, to a wildlife career. Although wildlife rescuers are trying to locate the baby’s mother, they have been unsuccessful so far.

Only a day later, it happened again — on the same dog. “UPDATE!!! It happened again!!!” Sally updated on Facebook. “Today I found Kato again with another baby possum, this time on his actual back.” According to Sally, this possum seemed to be digging into Kato more, but again the dog didn’t seem to mind. “This time, the vet nurse nearly fell off her chair when we turned up,” Sally said.

In her post, Sally added that the initial possum was doing well. The second possum was a boy who was also sent to a wildlife shelter. According to the nurse, possums usually deliver babies of two or three, so the Watkinsons need to keep their eyes open for a third possum rider.

In the comments, Sally said that she thinks the possum will be okay. “He’s probably not quite weaned (断奶) yet but seemed well enough and was struggling on for dear life,” she wrote. “I think he found the right dog for that.”

Commenters added that this isn’t the first time a dog adopted a possum. Dog owners told stories of possums “riding” their dogs and following their dogs around. If you own a dog, check its fur for possible riders.

【推荐2】A young US sailor survived for nearly two days alone in the Arabian Sea, thanks to a pair of regulation overalls, according to the latest press release from the Pentagon.

Lt Zachary Mayo, a 20-year-old lance corporal(一等兵)in the US Navy, woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep. His cabin was too hot and stuffy. He got off his bunk(铺位)quietly so as not to wake his shipmates. He put his blue overalls over his shorts and T-shirt he had been sleeping in, and left the cabin.

Zachary Mayo went up onto the deck of the USS America, a huge aircraft carrier. It was two o’clock on a Friday morning. He breathed in the fresh air and looked up at the stars in the clear night sky. And then, without thinking, he leaned out too far and lost his footing. Before he knew it, he was in the water, watching the huge ship disappearing into the night. Nobody had seen him fall, and for nearly two days not one of the 4,700 crew realized he had gone.

Mayo survived because at training camp two years before, he had been taught how to make clothes into life jackets. He took off his overalls and tied the arms and legs. Then he waved his ‘life jackets’ over his head and filled it with air so he could stay afloat. He did this many times during his ordeal.

After 34 hours, Mayo was sure he would die. He hadn’t seen any search planes, and twice he had seen sharks swimming around him. Both nights that he was in the water he was attacked by smaller fish and he was slowly dying of thirst. Finally he fell asleep. When he woke up his overalls were floating away from him. In a fit of madness he tore off his T-shirt and shorts and prepared to die. And then, half an hour later, just before he lost consciousness, he saw a small boat.

A Pakistani fisherman, Abdul Aziz, was out in his boat that day. He couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw Mayo’s naked boy, floating in the Arabian Sea, 100 miles from land. ‘I thought it was a ghost!’ he told reporters. But it was not a ghost. It was Zachary Mayo, and he was alive! But only just.

【推荐3】The US Ambassador to the UK officially launched a ship named Mayflower on Wednesday, 400 years to the day after a wooden ship with that name sailed from an English port and changed the history of two continents.

Unlike the merchant ship that carried a group of European settlers to a new life across the Atlantic Ocean in 1620, the new Mayflower named by U S Ambassador Robert Wood Johnson has no crew or passengers. It will cross the sea powered by sun and wind, and controlled by artificial intelligence (AI).

Johnson said the high-tech ship, developed jointly by British-based research organization ProMare and US tech giant IBM, showed that “the pioneering spirit of the Mayflower really lives on”. “We’re heading out with the same spirit of adventure and determination and hope for the future as the original colonists (殖民者),” said Johnson.

Like the Mayflower in 1620, the new ship will travel from Plymouth, England, to Plymouth, Massachusetts. The ship’s launch in Plymouth is one of several Mayflower commemorations. They involve British, Americans and Dutch institutions — many of the 17th-century colonists had left England for Holland before the voyage — and the Wampanoag people, who had lived for thousands of years in what is now New England. In 1620, the Wampanoag helped the exhausted Mayflower settlers survive their first winter. But soon colonial expansion and new diseases were having a big impact on North America’s Native Indians. Wampanoag stories have been marginalized (使边缘化) on past Mayflower anniversaries (周年纪念), but they are playing a big part in events and exhibitions this time around. “The story of the Mayflower is one that really can’t be told without telling also the story of the Wampanoag,” said Paula Peters, a Wampanoag writer.

The Mayflower Autonomous Ship is intended to explore parts of oceans too difficult or dangerous for people to reach. Andy Stanford-Clark, Chief Technology Officer for IBM in the UK and Ireland, said the ship’s launch “is a very exciting stage of the journey toward crewless shipping” that could pave the way for AI-driven commercial ships and research ships.

The 50-foot ship will go through six months of sea trials and make short trips before setting out on its trans-Atlantic trip to measure ocean health: assessing the impact of climate change, measuring micro-plastic pollution and studying populations of whales and dolphins.