Down To Earth brings you the top happenings in the world of global ecology
Iceland will not be hunting any whales in 2020. Two of the country’s major whaling companies have decided to cancel their summer whaling season, according to a media report.
While the IP-Utgerd company will be quitting whaling altogether, Iceland’s largest whaling company, Hvalur hf, has put its whaling operations on hold for the second year running.
The development seems to have been triggered due to economic pressures due to the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) lockdown as well as the fact that Japan, which also hunts whales, subsidises its whale products.
Iceland, alongside Norway and Japan, has frequently broken the International Whaling Commission’s 1986 worldwide moratorium, which indefinitely “paused” commercial whaling.
Lizard photographed swallowing snake in rare instance
In a rare incident, an oriental garden lizard was photographed in Uran near Navi Mumbai to be pouncing on and swallowing a small checkered keelback snake head first, according to a media report.
The incident took place at Kalumbusare village in Uran taluka.
The incident is rare since usually it has been observed that snake species predate on lizards rather than the opposite as it was in this case.
The snake was a juvenile and about 9 inches long.
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