Back from the dead

A bug was spotted in Spain in 2010, some 160 years after it was thought to have gone extinct. The reason why the little insect is grabbing headlines is that – like the phorid fly – the bone-skipper feasts on decaying flesh, including that of humans. One species of bone-skipper, referred to as the "dog fly" because of the carcass it was eating, was discovered in Germany in 1798. Another species was described in 1830 by a scientist who had observed the insects destroying dissected preparations at the Paris School of Medicine 9 years earlier. More recently, bone-skippers have been spotted by amateurs and photographed or videotaped, but actual specimens have not been collected. "If you have no good specimens, you have no good taxonomy," says Pierfilippo Cerretti of the Sapienza University of Rome, who has finally established a type specimen (Centrophlebomyia anthropophaga) in the scientific literature.

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Scavenge, savage, scavenge

Ever since the griffon vulture (Gyps fulvus) became a protected species in France in the mid-1970s, farmers have complained that conservationists have upset the balance of nature. From 20 pairs, their numbers have increased to 500 pairs, and rather than scavenging carrion they have begun to attack live sheep, cows, and horses. Especially vulnerable are animals giving birth, since the birds – whose wingspans can reach 9.2' (2.8 m) – go after newborn and placenta. Farmers are prevented from shooting them and forced by EU regulations to burn the carcasses of any dead animals, so the vultures do not have enough to feed on. The controversy about the protection of the birds has reignited this month, due to an unfortunate incident that has gained international attention. A 52-year-old woman was hiking in the Pyrenees Mountains with 2 friends when she fell to her death from a 1,000' (300 m) cliff. By the time her body was recovered less than an hour later, she had been reduced to a skeleton by the vultures. "There were only bones, clothes and shoes left on the ground," reports Major Didier Pericou of the gendarmerie. Under stress because of the lack of food, the vultures have fanned out across Europe and become decidedly more aggressive, although the conservationists still insist that it is the birds that are under threat and not livestock. Frenchman M. Fourtine concludes, "Vultures are like ecologists. You need a few but not too many."

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Bloated croaker

I was unaware (until long time reader Chase turned me onto this blog) – and maybe you are, too – that 17th-century Dutch painters sometimes turned their talents to more morbid subjects than fruit and flowers. There are the still lifes that contain dead game animals (like this rabbit attributed to Jan Fyt) and memento mori paintings that include human skulls. But Ambrosius Bosschaert the Younger, who usually followed in the style of his father (SLIDESHOW HERE) chose c. 1630 to portray in great detail, using oils on copper, the decomposing body of a frog. What's more, the image has now been brought to life, so to speak, by contemporary artists Rob and Nick Carter. Starting with a high-resolution photograph of Bosschaert the Younger's "Dead Frog with Flies," they have created a silent 3-hour looped film and display it on a computer concealed behind an original Old Master frame. With their "digital still lifes," they hope to carry into the modern age the tradition perfected by the Dutch so many centuries ago. Nick explains, “They tried very hard to create something that feels so tangible that you could almost touch it. Hopefully we’ve continued with something that they worked hard to start."

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