Stemonitis axifera is a species of slime mold. It fruits in clusters on dead wood, and has distinctive tall reddish-brown sporangia, supported on slender stalks.

Taxonomy
The species was first described as Trichia axifera by Jean Baptiste François Pierre Bulliard in 1791. Thomas Huston MacBride transferred it to the genus Stemonitis in 1889. Stemonitis fasciculata and Stemonitis smithii are synonyms.

Description
The erect, stalked cylindrical sporangia are arranged into bundles or clusters that are  tall. Each sporangium is supported by a thin, shining, black stalk that is  long. The bright rusty brown color of mature sporangia lightens to a pale brown after the spores have been dispersed. Spores measure 5 by 7 μm and have a smooth to minutely punctate surface texture.

Development
Stemonitis axifera requires about 20 hours to finish making its fruit bodies. Of this, eight hours are needed for induction of the sporangia and the development of the stalk and the columella, six hours more for the sporocarps to produce pigment and mature, and an additional six until the spores are discharged.

Ecology
The slime mold grows on decaying wood. When the fruit bodies consist of milky white sporangia, they are a favoured food source for Philomycus slugs (mantleslugs), such as P. carolinianus and P. flexuolaris. The slugs emerge at night from under flaps of bark and migrate to more exposed areas at the top of wet logs, bypassing more mature, pigmented fruit bodies for the younger white ones. The slugs eat the sporangia stalks from the top down. The feeding preference of Philomycus slugs for immature white sporangia is not seen in other slug species.

References

External links

Myxogastria
Species described in 1791
Taxa named by Jean Baptiste François Pierre Bulliard

Stemonitis axifera


Microcotyle arripis is a species of monogenean, parasitic on the gills of a marine fish. It belongs to the family Microcotylidae.

Systematics
Microcotyle arripis was first described by Sandars in 1945 based on 51 specimens from the gills of the Australian herring Arripis georgianus (Arripidae) off Western Australia. It was redescribed and illustrated from the type host and locality,. All authors noted minor differences in their redescriptions.

A sequence of the species' 28S rRNA gene has been published.

Description
Microcotyle arripis has the general morphology of all species of Microcotyle, with a symmetrical elongated body tapered posteriorly and anteriorly, comprising an anterior part which contains most organs and a posterior part called the haptor. The haptor is symmetrical, not well delimited from body proper and bears 35 pairs of clamps, arranged as two rows, one on each side. The clamps of the haptor attach the animal to the gill of the fish. There are also two buccal suckers at the anterior extremity. The digestive organs include an anterior, terminal mouth, a circular muscular pharynx situated very close to the oral suckers, an oesophagus bifurcating a little distance behind the genital atrium and a posterior intestine with two lateral branches that penetrates the haptor and are provided with numerous secondary branches. Each adult contains male and female reproductive organs. The reproductive organs include an anterior  genital atrium opening a little distance behind the pharynx, armed with numerous conical spines, a medio-dorsal vagina, a single S-shaped ovary and 23 testes posterior to the ovary, of irregular shape and fit closely against one another.

Diagnosis
According to Sandars (1945), Microcotyle arripis most closely resembles Microcotyle caudata, Microcotyle truncata, Microcotyle fusiformis, and Microcotyle sebastis. It can be distinguished from these species by different measurements.

Hosts and localities

The type-host is the Australian herring Arripis georgianus (Arripidae). The type-locality is off Western Australia.
There are other records.

References

Microcotylidae
Animals described in 1945
Parasites of fish
Platyhelminthes of Australia

Microcotyle arripis


Margaret Becker (born July 17, 1959) is an American Christian rock singer, guitarist, and songwriter. She has had twenty-one No. 1 Christian radio hits, won four Dove Awards, and been nominated for four Grammy Awards.

Biography
Becker was born in Bay Shore, New York, United States, raised in East Islip, New York, and began playing in coffeehouses while teaching music and taking opera lessons. Having graduated from James Madison University with a degree in communication, she moved to Nashville, Tennessee in 1985, and signed to Sparrow Records as a songwriter; soon after she toured with Rick Cua as a backup singer and sang on Steve Camp's 1986 album One on One. The next year she landed a contract as a solo artist, and released her debut album, Never for Nothing. The single "Fight for God" was her first hit, and her second LP, The Reckoning, followed with two more hits, "Light in the Darkness" and "Find Me".

Becker began working with producer Charlie Peacock starting with 1989's Immigrant's Daughter, and a string of successful albums followed, including a Spanish language LP. She won two Dove Awards in 1992, for Rock Album (Simple House) and Rock Song ("Simple House"). However, in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Becker occasionally encountered controversy in the world of Contemporary Christian music because she is a Roman Catholic; some Christian stores refused to carry her album, and her concert appearances were sometimes picketed. Although she was raised in Catholicism, Margaret currently attends a non-denominational church in Nashville, Tennessee.  After 1995's Grace, Becker decided to take a sabbatical from the music industry; during this time she wrote a book entitled With New Eyes and wrote editorials for Campus Life magazine.

She left Sparrow Records in 2002 but has continued to record since then, both her own albums and for compilation albums. She appears on the albums Sisters (Warner Bros. Records, 1994), Listen to Our Hearts (Sparrow, 1998), Heaven and Earth (Sparrow, 1999), and the New Irish Hymns series (Kingsway Music), and is one of the members of the 1994 collaboration Along the Road along with Susan Ashton and Christine Denté. She co-wrote Bob Carlisle's "Bridge Between Two Hearts". Her second book, Growing Up Together, appeared in 2000; her third, With New Eyes, came out in 2004, and a fourth, Coming Up for Air, was published in 2006. In late 2007, Becker's latest album, Air, was released.

Becker gives teaching seminars across the United States. She also produces records for other singers, and in 2006 she wrote a series of columns for CCM Magazine. Becker has also been active in supporting charities such as Habitat for Humanity, Compassion International, and World Vision.

Becker lives in Nashville, Tennessee.

Discography
Never for Nothing (Sparrow, 1987)
The Reckoning (Sparrow, 1988)
Immigrant's Daughter (Sparrow, 1989)
Simple House (Sparrow, 1991)
Soul (Sparrow, 1993)
Fiel a Ti (in Spanish) (Sparrow, 1995)
Grace (Sparrow, 1995)
Falling Forward (Sparrow, 1998)
What Kind of Love (Sparrow, 1999)
My Refuge (Margaret Becker Productions, 2002)
Just Come In (Cross Driven, 2003)   (re-release of My Refuge)
Faithfully Yours (Provident, 2004)
Air (Go Global, 2007)

Collaborative works
Along the Road (with Susan Ashton and Christine Denté) (Sparrow, 1994)
New Irish Hymns (with Máire Brennan and Joanne Hogg) (released as In Christ Alone: New Hymns for Prayer and Worship in the US) (Kingsway Music, 2001)
New Irish Hymns 2: Father, Son & Holy Spirit (with Joanne Hogg and Kristyn Lennox (Getty)) (Kingsway Music, 2003)
New Irish Hymns 3: Incarnation (with Joanne Hogg and Kristyn Getty) (Kingsway Music, 2004)
New Irish Hymns 4: Hymns For the Life of the Church (with Joanne Hogg and Kristyn Getty) (Kingsway Music, 2005)
 Hymns of Christmas (with Jennifer Knapp) (CD Baby, 2012)

Compilations
Steps of Faith: 1987–1991 (Sparrow, 1992)
Early Years (Chordant, 1996)
Very Best of Margaret Becker (Sparrow, 2006)

References

External links

[ Margaret Becker] at AllMusic
Interview with Margaret Becker

American performers of Christian music
Singers from New York (state)
1959 births
Living people
People from Bay Shore, New York
Singers from Nashville, Tennessee
James Madison University alumni
People from East Islip, New York
21st-century American women singers
21st-century American singers

Margaret Becker


Seabirds (also known as marine birds) are birds that are adapted to life within the marine environment. While seabirds vary greatly in lifestyle, behaviour and physiology, they often exhibit striking convergent evolution, as the same environmental problems and feeding niches have resulted in similar adaptations. The first seabirds evolved in the Cretaceous period, and modern seabird families emerged in the Paleogene.

Seabirds generally live longer, breed later and have fewer young than other birds, but they invest a great deal of time in their young. Most species nest in colonies, varying in size from a few dozen birds to millions. Many species are famous for undertaking long annual migrations, crossing the equator or circumnavigating the Earth in some cases. They feed both at the ocean's surface and below it, and even on each other. Seabirds can be highly pelagic, coastal, or in some cases spend a part of the year away from the sea entirely.

Seabirds and humans have a long history together: They have provided food to hunters, guided fishermen to fishing stocks, and led sailors to land. Many species are currently threatened by human activities such oil spills, nets, and climate change and severe weather. Conservation efforts include the establishment of wildlife refuges and adjustments to fishing techniques.

Classification
There exists no single definition of which groups, families and species are seabirds, and most definitions are in some way arbitrary. Elizabeth Shreiber and Joanna Burger, two seabird scientists, said, "The one common characteristic that all seabirds share is that they feed in saltwater; but, as seems to be true with any statement in biology, some do not." However, by convention all of the Sphenisciformes (penguins) and Procellariiformes (albatrosses and petrels), all of the Suliformes (gannets and cormorants) except the darters, and some of the Charadriiformes (the gulls, skuas, terns, auks and skimmers) are classified as seabirds. The phalaropes are usually included as well, since although they are waders ("shorebirds" in North America), two of the three species (Red and Red-necked) are oceanic for nine months of the year, crossing the equator to feed pelagically.

Loons and grebes, which nest on lakes but winter at sea, are usually categorized as water birds, not seabirds. Although there are a number of sea ducks in the family Anatidae that are truly marine in the winter, by convention they are usually excluded from the seabird grouping. Many waders (or shorebirds) and herons are also highly marine, living on the sea's edge (coast), but are also not treated as seabirds. Sea eagles and other fish-eating birds of prey are also typically excluded, however tied to marine environments they may be.

German paleontologist Gerald Mayr defined the "core waterbird" clade Aequornithes in 2010. This lineage gives rise to the Gaviiformes, Sphenisciformes, Procellariiformes, Ciconiiformes, Suliformes and Pelecaniformes. The tropicbirds are part of a lineage—Eurypygimorphae—that is a sister group to the Aequornithes.

Evolution and fossil record
Seabirds, by virtue of living in a geologically depositional environment (that is, in the sea where sediments are readily laid down), are well represented in the fossil record. They are first known to occur in the Cretaceous period, the earliest being the Hesperornithiformes, like Hesperornis regalis, a flightless loon-like seabird that could dive in a fashion similar to grebes and loons (using its feet to move underwater) but had a beak filled with sharp teeth. Flying Cretaceous seabirds do not exceed wingspans of two meters; any sizes were taken by piscivorous pterosaurs.

While Hesperornis is not thought to have left descendants, the earliest modern seabirds also occurred in the Cretaceous, with a species called Tytthostonyx glauconiticus, which has features suggestive of Procellariiformes and Fregatidae. As a clade, the Aequornithes either became seabirds in a single transition in the Cretaceous or some lineages such as pelicans and frigatebirds adapted to sea living independently from freshwater-dwelling ancestors. In the Paleogene both pterosaurs and marine reptiles became extinct, allowing seabirds to expand ecologically. These post-extinction seas were dominated by early Procellariidae, giant penguins and two extinct families, the Pelagornithidae and the Plotopteridae (a group of large seabirds that looked like the penguins). Modern genera began their wide radiation in the Miocene, although the genus Puffinus (which includes today's Manx shearwater and sooty shearwater) might date back to the Oligocene. Within the Charadriiformes, the gulls and allies (Lari) became seabirds in the late Eocene, and then waders in the middle Miocene (Langhian). The highest diversity of seabirds apparently existed during the Late Miocene and the Pliocene. At the end of the latter, the oceanic food web had undergone a period of upheaval due to extinction of considerable numbers of marine species; subsequently, the spread of marine mammals seems to have prevented seabirds from reaching their erstwhile diversity.

Characteristics

Adaptations to life at sea
Seabirds have made numerous adaptations to living on and feeding in the sea. Wing morphology has been shaped by the niche an individual species or family has evolved, so that looking at a wing's shape and loading can tell a scientist about its life feeding behaviour. Longer wings and low wing loading are typical of more pelagic species, while diving species have shorter wings. Species such as the wandering albatross, which forage over huge areas of sea, have a reduced capacity for powered flight and are dependent on a type of gliding called dynamic soaring (where the wind deflected by waves provides lift) as well as slope soaring. Seabirds also almost always have webbed feet, to aid movement on the surface as well as assisting diving in some species. The Procellariiformes are unusual among birds in having a strong sense of smell, which is used to find widely distributed food in a vast ocean, and help distinguish familiar nest odours from unfamiliar ones.

Salt glands are used by seabirds to deal with the salt they ingest by drinking and feeding (particularly on crustaceans), and to help them osmoregulate. The excretions from these glands (which are positioned in the head of the birds, emerging from the nasal cavity) are almost pure sodium chloride.

With the exception of the cormorants and some terns, and in common with most other birds, all seabirds have waterproof plumage. However, compared to land birds, they have far more feathers protecting their bodies. This dense plumage is better able to protect the bird from getting wet, and cold is kept out by a dense layer of down feathers. The cormorants possess a layer of unique feathers that retain a smaller layer of air (compared to other diving birds) but otherwise soak up water. This allows them to swim without fighting the buoyancy that retaining air in the feathers causes, yet retain enough air to prevent the bird losing excessive heat through contact with water.

The plumage of most seabirds is less colourful than that of land birds, restricted in the main to variations of black, white or grey. A few species sport colourful plumes (such as the tropicbirds and some penguins), but most of the colour in seabirds appears in the bills and legs. The plumage of seabirds is thought in many cases to be for camouflage, both defensive (the colour of US Navy battleships is the same as that of Antarctic prions, and in both cases it reduces visibility at sea) and aggressive (the white underside possessed by many seabirds helps hide them from prey below). The usually black wing tips help prevent wear, as they contain melanins to make them black that helps the feathers resist abrasion.

Diet and feeding
Seabirds evolved to exploit different food resources in the world's seas and oceans, and to a great extent, their physiology and behaviour have been shaped by their diet. These evolutionary forces have often caused species in different families and even orders to evolve similar strategies and adaptations to the same problems, leading to remarkable convergent evolution, such as that between auks and penguins. There are four basic feeding strategies, or ecological guilds, for feeding at sea: surface feeding, pursuit diving, plunge-diving, and predation of higher vertebrates; within these guilds, there are multiple variations on the theme.

Surface feeding
Many seabirds feed on the ocean's surface, as the action of marine currents often concentrates food such as krill, forage fish, squid, or other prey items within reach of a dipped head.

Surface feeding itself can be broken up into two different approaches, surface feeding while flying (for example as practiced by gadfly petrels, frigatebirds, and storm petrels), and surface feeding while swimming (examples of which are practiced by gulls, fulmars, many of the shearwaters and gadfly petrels). Surface feeders in flight include some of the most acrobatic of seabirds, which either snatch morsels from the water (as do frigate-birds and some terns), or "walk", pattering and hovering on the water's surface, as some of the storm-petrels do. Many of these do not ever land in the water, and some, such as the frigatebirds, have difficulty getting airborne again should they do so. Another seabird family that does not land while feeding is the skimmer, which has a unique fishing method: flying along the surface with the lower mandible in the water—this shuts automatically when the bill touches something in the water. The skimmer's bill reflects its unusual lifestyle, with the lower mandible uniquely being longer than the upper one.

Surface feeders that swim often have unique bills as well, adapted for their specific prey. Prions have special bills with filters called lamellae to filter out plankton from mouthfuls of water, and many albatrosses and petrels have hooked bills to snatch fast-moving prey. On the other hand, most gulls are versatile and opportunistic feeders who will eat a wide variety of prey, both at sea and on land.

Pursuit diving

Pursuit diving exerts greater pressures (both evolutionary and physiological) on seabirds, but the reward is a greater area in which to feed than is available to surface feeders. Underwater propulsion is provided by wings (as used by penguins, auks, diving petrels and some other species of petrel) or feet (as used by cormorants, grebes, loons and several types of fish-eating ducks). Wing-propelled divers are generally faster than foot-propelled divers. The use of wings or feet for diving has limited their utility in other situations: loons and grebes walk with extreme difficulty (if at all), penguins cannot fly, and auks have sacrificed flight efficiency in favour of diving. For example, the razorbill (an Atlantic auk) requires 64% more energy to fly than a petrel of equivalent size. Many shearwaters are intermediate between the two, having longer wings than typical wing-propelled divers but heavier wing loadings than the other surface-feeding procellariids, leaving them capable of diving to considerable depths while still being efficient long-distance travellers. The short-tailed shearwater is the deepest diver of the shearwaters, having been recorded diving below .

Some albatross species are also capable of limited diving, with light-mantled sooty albatrosses holding the record at . Of all the wing-propelled pursuit divers, the most efficient in the air are the albatrosses, and they are also the poorest divers. This is the dominant guild in polar and subpolar environments, but it is energetically inefficient in warmer waters. With their poor flying ability, many wing-propelled pursuit divers are more limited in their foraging range than other guilds.

Plunge diving
Gannets, boobies, tropicbirds, some terns, and brown pelicans all engage in plunge diving, taking fast-moving prey by diving into the water from the flight. Plunge diving allows birds to use the energy from the momentum of the dive to combat natural buoyancy (caused by air trapped in plumage), and thus uses less energy than the dedicated pursuit divers, allowing them to utilise more widely distributed food resources, for example, in impoverished tropical seas. In general, this is the most specialised method of hunting employed by seabirds; other non-specialists (such as gulls and skuas) may employ it but do so with less skill and from lower heights. In brown pelicans the skills of plunge-diving take several years to fully develop—once mature, they can dive from 20 m (70 ft) above the water's surface, shifting the body before impact to avoid injury.

It may be that plunge divers are restricted in their hunting grounds to clear waters that afford a view of their prey from the air. While they are the dominant guild in the tropics, the link between plunge diving and water clarity is inconclusive. Some plunge divers (as well as some surface feeders) are dependent on dolphins and tuna to push shoaling fish up towards the surface.

Kleptoparasitism, scavenging and predation
This catch-all category refers to other seabird strategies that involve the next trophic level up. Kleptoparasites are seabirds that make a part of their living stealing food of other seabirds. Most famously, frigatebirds and skuas engage in this behaviour, although gulls, terns and other species will steal food opportunistically. The nocturnal nesting behaviour of some seabirds has been interpreted as arising due to pressure from this aerial piracy. Kleptoparasitism is not thought to play a significant part of the diet of any species, and is instead a supplement to food obtained by hunting. A study of great frigatebirds stealing from masked boobies estimated that the frigatebirds could at most obtain 40% of the food they needed, and on average obtained only 5%. Many species of gull will feed on seabird and sea mammal carrion when the opportunity arises, as will giant petrels. Some species of albatross also engage in scavenging: an analysis of regurgitated squid beaks has shown that many of the squid eaten are too large to have been caught alive, and include mid-water species likely to be beyond the reach of albatrosses. Some species will also feed on other seabirds; for example, gulls, skuas and pelicans will often take eggs, chicks and even small adult seabirds from nesting colonies, while the giant petrels can kill prey up to the size of small penguins and seal pups.

Life history
Seabirds' life histories are dramatically different from those of land birds. In general, they are K-selected, live much longer (anywhere between twenty and sixty years), delay breeding for longer (for up to ten years), and invest more effort into fewer young. Most species will only have one clutch a year, unless they lose the first (with a few exceptions, like the Cassin's auklet), and many species (like the tubenoses and sulids) will only lay one egg a year.

Care of young is protracted, extending for as long as six months, among the longest for birds. For example, once common guillemot chicks fledge, they remain with the male parent for several months at sea. The frigatebirds have the longest period of parental care of any bird except a few raptors and the southern ground hornbill, with each chick fledging after four to six months and continued assistance after that for up to fourteen months. Due to the extended period of care, breeding occurs every two years rather than annually for some species. This life-history strategy has probably evolved both in response to the challenges of living at sea (collecting widely scattered prey items), the frequency of breeding failures due to unfavourable marine conditions, and the relative lack of predation compared to that of land-living birds.

Because of the greater investment in raising the young and because foraging for food may occur far from the nest site, in all seabird species except the phalaropes, both parents participate in caring for the young, and pairs are typically at least seasonally monogamous. Many species, such as gulls, auks and penguins, retain the same mate for several seasons, and many petrel species mate for life. Albatrosses and procellariids, which mate for life, take many years to form a pair bond before they breed, and the albatrosses have an elaborate breeding dance that is part of pair-bond formation.

Breeding and colonies

Ninety-five percent of seabirds are colonial, and seabird colonies are among the largest bird colonies in the world, providing one of Earth's great wildlife spectacles. Colonies of over a million birds have been recorded, both in the tropics (such as Kiritimati in the Pacific) and in the polar latitudes (as in Antarctica). Seabird colonies occur exclusively for the purpose of breeding; non-breeding birds will only collect together outside the breeding season in areas where prey species are densely aggregated.

Seabird colonies are highly variable. Individual nesting sites can be widely spaced, as in an albatross colony, or densely packed as with a murre colony. In most seabird colonies, several different species will nest on the same colony, often exhibiting some niche separation. Seabirds can nest in trees (if any are available), on the ground (with or without nests), on cliffs, in burrows under the ground and in rocky crevices. Competition can be strong both within species and between species, with aggressive species such as sooty terns pushing less dominant species out of the most desirable nesting spaces. The tropical Bonin petrel nests during the winter to avoid competition with the more aggressive wedge-tailed shearwater. When the seasons overlap, the wedge-tailed shearwaters will kill young Bonin petrels in order to use their burrows.

Many seabirds show remarkable site fidelity, returning to the same burrow, nest or site for many years, and they will defend that site from rivals with great vigour. This increases breeding success, provides a place for returning mates to reunite, and reduces the costs of prospecting for a new site. Young adults breeding for the first time usually return to their natal colony, and often nest close to where they hatched. This tendency, known as philopatry, is so strong that a study of Laysan albatrosses found that the average distance between hatching site and the site where a bird established its own territory was ; another study, this time on Cory's shearwaters nesting near Corsica, found that of nine out of 61 male chicks that returned to breed at their natal colony bred in the burrow they were raised in, and two actually bred with their own mother.

Colonies are usually situated on islands, cliffs or headlands, which land mammals have difficulty accessing. This is thought to provide protection to seabirds, which are often very clumsy on land. Coloniality often arises in types of bird that do not defend feeding territories (such as swifts, which have a very variable prey source); this may be a reason why it arises more frequently in seabirds. There are other possible advantages: colonies may act as information centres, where seabirds returning to the sea to forage can find out where prey is by studying returning individuals of the same species. There are disadvantages to colonial life, particularly the spread of disease. Colonies also attract the attention of predators, principally other birds, and many species attend their colonies nocturnally to avoid predation. Birds from different colonies often forage in different areas to avoid competition.

Migration

Like many birds, seabirds often migrate after the breeding season. Of these, the trip taken by the Arctic tern is the farthest of any bird, crossing the equator in order to spend the Austral summer in Antarctica. Other species also undertake trans-equatorial trips, both from the north to the south, and from south to north. The population of elegant terns, which nest off Baja California, splits after the breeding season with some birds travelling north to the Central Coast of California and some travelling as far south as Peru and Chile to feed in the Humboldt Current. The sooty shearwater undertakes an annual migration cycle that rivals that of the Arctic tern; birds that nest in New Zealand and Chile and spend the northern summer feeding in the North Pacific off Japan, Alaska and California, an annual round trip of .

Other species also migrate shorter distances away from the breeding sites, their distribution at sea determined by the availability of food. If oceanic conditions are unsuitable, seabirds will emigrate to more productive areas, sometimes permanently if the bird is young. After fledging, juvenile birds often disperse further than adults, and to different areas, so are commonly sighted far from a species' normal range. Some species, such as the auks, do not have a concerted migration effort, but drift southwards as the winter approaches. Other species, such as some of the storm petrels, diving petrels and cormorants, never disperse at all, staying near their breeding colonies year round.

Away from the sea
While the definition of seabirds suggests that the birds in question spend their lives on the ocean, many seabird families have many species that spend some or even most of their lives inland away from the sea. Most strikingly, many species breed tens, hundreds or even thousands of miles inland. Some of these species still return to the ocean to feed; for example, the snow petrel, the nests of which have been found  inland on the Antarctic mainland, are unlikely to find anything to eat around their breeding sites. The marbled murrelet nests inland in old growth forest, seeking huge conifers with large branches to nest on. Other species, such as the California gull, nest and feed inland on lakes, and then move to the coasts in the winter. Some cormorant, pelican, gull and tern species have individuals that never visit the sea at all, spending their lives on lakes, rivers, swamps and, in the case of some of the gulls, cities and agricultural land. In these cases it is thought that these terrestrial or freshwater birds evolved from marine ancestors. Some seabirds, principally those that nest in tundra, as skuas and phalaropes do, will migrate over land as well.

The more marine species, such as petrels, auks and gannets, are more restricted in their habits, but are occasionally seen inland as vagrants. This most commonly happens to young inexperienced birds, but can happen in great numbers to exhausted adults after large storms, an event known as a wreck.

Relationship with humans

Seabirds and fisheries
Seabirds have had a long association with both fisheries and sailors, and both have drawn benefits and disadvantages from the relationship.

Fishermen have traditionally used seabirds as indicators of both fish shoals, underwater banks that might indicate fish stocks, and of potential landfall. In fact, the known association of seabirds with land was instrumental in allowing the Polynesians to locate tiny landmasses in the Pacific. Seabirds have provided food for fishermen away from home, as well as bait. Famously, tethered cormorants have been used to catch fish directly. Indirectly, fisheries have also benefited from guano from colonies of seabirds acting as fertilizer for the surrounding seas.

Negative effects on fisheries are mostly restricted to raiding by birds on aquaculture, although long-lining fisheries also have to deal with bait stealing. There have been claims of prey depletion by seabirds of fishery stocks, and while there is some evidence of this, the effects of seabirds are considered smaller than that of marine mammals and predatory fish (like tuna).

Some seabird species have benefited from fisheries, particularly from discarded fish and offal. These discards compose 30% of the food of seabirds in the North Sea, for example, and compose up to 70% of the total food of some seabird populations. This can have other impacts; for example, the spread of the northern fulmar through the United Kingdom is attributed in part to the availability of discards. Discards generally benefit surface feeders, such as gannets and petrels, to the detriment of pursuit divers like penguins and guillemots, which can get entangled in the nets.

Fisheries also have negative effects on seabirds, and these effects, particularly on the long-lived and slow-breeding albatrosses, are a source of increasing concern to conservationists. The bycatch of seabirds entangled in nets or hooked on fishing lines has had a big impact on seabird numbers; for example, an estimated 100,000 albatrosses are hooked and drown each year on tuna lines set out by long-line fisheries. Overall, many hundreds of thousands of birds are trapped and killed each year, a source of concern for some of the rarest species (for example, only about 2,000 short-tailed albatrosses are known to still exist). Seabirds are also thought to suffer when overfishing occurs. Changes to the marine ecosystems caused by dredging, which alters the biodiversity of the seafloor, can also have a negative impact.

Exploitation
The hunting of seabirds and the collecting of seabird eggs have contributed to the declines of many species, and the extinction of several, including the great auk and the spectacled cormorant. Seabirds have been hunted for food by coastal peoples throughout history—one of the earliest instances known is in southern Chile, where archaeological excavations in middens has shown hunting of albatrosses, cormorants and shearwaters from 5000 BP. This pressure has led to some species becoming extinct in many places; in particular, at least 20 species of an original 29 no longer breed on Easter Island. In the 19th century, the hunting of seabirds for fat deposits and feathers for the millinery trade reached industrial levels. Muttonbirding (harvesting shearwater chicks) developed as important industries in both New Zealand and Tasmania, and the name of one species, the providence petrel, is derived from its seemingly miraculous arrival on Norfolk Island where it provided a windfall for starving European settlers. In the Falkland Islands, hundreds of thousands of penguins were harvested for their oil each year. Seabird eggs have also long been an important source of food for sailors undertaking long sea voyages, as well as being taken when settlements grow in areas near a colony. Eggers from San Francisco took almost half a million eggs a year from the Farallon Islands in the mid-19th century, a period in the islands' history from which the seabird species are still recovering.

Both hunting and egging continue today, although not at the levels that occurred in the past, and generally in a more controlled manner. For example, the Māori of Stewart Island/Rakiura continue to harvest the chicks of the sooty shearwater as they have done for centuries, using traditional stewardship, kaitiakitanga, to manage the harvest, but now also work with the University of Otago in studying the populations. In Greenland, however, uncontrolled hunting is pushing many species into steep decline.

Other threats

Other human factors have led to declines and even extinctions in seabird populations and species. Of these, perhaps the most serious are introduced species. Seabirds, breeding predominantly on small isolated islands, are vulnerable to predators because they have lost many behaviours associated with defence from predators. Feral cats can take seabirds as large as albatrosses, and many introduced rodents, such as the Pacific rat, take eggs hidden in burrows. Introduced goats, cattle, rabbits and other herbivores can create problems, particularly when species need vegetation to protect or shade their young. The disturbance of breeding colonies by humans is often a problem as well—visitors, even well-meaning tourists, can flush brooding adults off a colony, leaving chicks and eggs vulnerable to predators.

The build-up of toxins and pollutants in seabirds is also a concern. Seabirds, being apex predators, suffered from the ravages of the insecticide DDT until it was banned; DDT was implicated, for example, in embryo development problems and the skewed sex ratio of western gulls in southern California. Oil spills are also a threat to seabirds: the oil is toxic, and bird feathers become saturated by the oil, causing them to lose their waterproofing. Oil pollution in particular threatens species with restricted ranges or already depressed populations.

Climate change mainly affect seabirds via changes to their habitat: various processes in the ocean lead to decreased availability of food and colonies are more often flooded as a consequence of sea level rise and extreme rainfall events. Heat stress from extreme temperatures is an additional threat. Some seabirds have used changing wind patterns to forage further and more efficiently.

In 2023, plasticosis, a new disease caused solely by plastics, was discovered in seabirds.
The birds identified as having the disease have scarred digestive tracts from ingesting plastic waste.  "When birds ingest small pieces of plastic, they found, it inflames the digestive tract. Over time, the persistent inflammation causes tissues to become scarred and disfigured, affecting digestion, growth and survival."

Conservation
The threats faced by seabirds have not gone unnoticed by scientists or the conservation movement. As early as 1903, U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt was convinced of the need to declare Pelican Island in Florida a National Wildlife Refuge to protect the bird colonies (including the nesting brown pelicans), and in 1909 he protected the Farallon Islands. Today many important seabird colonies are given some measure of protection, from Heron Island in Australia to Triangle Island in British Columbia.

Island restoration techniques, pioneered by New Zealand, enable the removal of exotic invaders from increasingly large islands. Feral cats have been removed from Ascension Island, Arctic foxes from many islands in the Aleutian Islands, and rats from Campbell Island. The removal of these introduced species has led to increases in numbers of species under pressure and even the return of extirpated ones. After the removal of cats from Ascension Island, seabirds began to nest there again for the first time in over a hundred years.

Seabird mortality caused by long-line fisheries can be greatly reduced by techniques such as setting long-line bait at night, dying the bait blue, setting the bait underwater, increasing the amount of weight on lines and by using bird scarers, and their deployment is increasingly required by many national fishing fleets.

One of the Millennium Projects in the UK was the Scottish Seabird Centre, near the important bird sanctuaries on Bass Rock, Fidra and the surrounding islands. The area is home to huge colonies of gannets, puffins, skuas and other seabirds. The centre allows visitors to watch live video from the islands as well as learn about the threats the birds face and how we can protect them, and has helped to significantly raise the profile of seabird conservation in the UK. Seabird tourism can provide income for coastal communities as well as raise the profile of seabird conservation, although it needs to be managed to ensure it does not harm the colonies and nesting birds. For example, the northern royal albatross colony at Taiaroa Head in New Zealand attracts 40,000 visitors a year.

The plight of albatross and large seabirds, as well as other marine creatures, being taken as bycatch by long-line fisheries, has been addressed by a large number of non-governmental organizations (including BirdLife International, the American Bird Conservancy and the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds). This led to the Agreement on the Conservation of Albatrosses and Petrels, a legally binding treaty designed to protect these threatened species, which has been ratified by thirteen countries as of 2021 (Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Chile, Ecuador, France, New Zealand, Norway, Peru, South Africa, Spain, Uruguay, United Kingdom).

Role in culture

Many seabirds are little studied and poorly known because they live far out at sea and breed in isolated colonies. Some seabirds, particularly the albatrosses and gulls, are more well known to humans. The albatross has been described as "the most legendary of birds", and have a variety of myths and legends associated with them. While it is widely considered unlucky to harm them, the notion that sailors believed that is a myth that derives from Samuel Taylor Coleridge's famous poem, "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner", in which a sailor is punished for killing an albatross by having to wear its corpse around his neck. Sailors did, however, consider it unlucky to touch a storm petrel, especially one that landed on the ship.

Gulls are one of the most commonly seen seabirds because they frequent human-made habitats (such as cities and dumps) and often show a fearless nature. Gulls have been used as metaphors, as in Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach, or to denote a closeness to the sea; in The Lord of the Rings, they appear in the insignia of Gondor and therefore Númenor (used in the design of the films), and they call Legolas to (and across) the sea. Pelicans have long been associated with mercy and altruism because of an early Christian myth that they split open their breast to feed their starving chicks.

Seabird families
The following are the groups of birds normally classed as seabirds.

Sphenisciformes (Antarctic and southern waters; 16 species)
 Spheniscidae penguins

Procellariiformes (Tubenoses: pan-oceanic and pelagic; 93 species)
 Diomedeidae albatrosses
 Procellariidae fulmars, prions, shearwaters, gadfly and other petrels
 Pelacanoididae diving petrels
 Hydrobatidae storm petrels

Pelecaniformes (Worldwide; 8 species)
 Pelecanidae pelicans

Suliformes (Worldwide; about 56 species)
 Sulidae gannets and boobies
 Phalacrocoracidae cormorants
 Fregatidae frigatebirds

Phaethontiformes (Worldwide tropical seas; 3 species)
 Phaethontidae tropicbirds

Charadriiformes (Worldwide; 305 species, but only the families listed are classed as seabirds.)
 Stercorariidae skuas
 Laridae gulls
 Sternidae terns
 Rhynchopidae skimmers
 Alcidae auks

For an alternative taxonomy of these groups, see also Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy.

References

Further reading

External links

Seabirds.net: A data portal for global seabird databases and information outlet for the World Seabird Union
BirdLife International; Save the Albatross Campaign
Marine Ornithology, the Journal of Seabird Science and Conservation

Seabird


Obdulio Morales Ríos (April 7, 1910 – January 9, 1981) was a Cuban pianist, conductor, composer and ethnomusicologist, an important figure in the late afrocubanismo movement. He championed Afro-Cuban music traditions and sponsored artists such as Merceditas Valdés.

Career

Early life and career
Obdulio Morales Ríos was born in Havana on April 7, 1910. He learned piano from an American teacher and furthered his studies at the conservatory. At age 12 he began to play piano at the silent cinema, and a year later he was playing in private dance parties as a reserve pianist. Around the same time, while working as an apprentice for his father, who was a tailor, he began to attend black societies such as the Club Bohemio. In 1924 he joined the first lineup of Los Hermanos Martínez orchestra.

1930s

Morales worked for the radio since 1928, specializing in Afro-Cuban music. In 1938 he premiered Batamú in collaboration with musician Julio Chappottín (father of Félix Chappottín) and choreographer Armando Borroto. This show featured famous conguero Chano Pozo and managed to sell out the Teatro Martí. In 1938 he also founded the Grupo Coral Folklórico de Cuba, an ensemble including a symphonic orchestra, Afro-Cuban drums and güiros. The ensemble featured batá master Trinidad Torregrosa, flautist Roberto Ondina and singers such as Candita Batista, Merceditas Valdés and Alfredo León Jr. At the same time, Morales was part of several successful big bands such as the eleven-piece Los Melódicos, an orchestra that he directed by 1939 and also featured Chano Pozo on quinto. He also played in Habana Jazz band and in 1931 Orquesta Elegante, the backing band of danzonete singer Paulina Álvarez.

1940s and 1950s
In 1942 the Grupo Coral Folklórico de Cuba became the Conjunto Coral Sinfónico Folklórico de Cuba, and together with Fernando Ortiz he began to give lectures about Afro-Cuban music at the Hispano-Cuban Culture Society and the Society for Afro-Cuban studies. Beginning in 1943, Morales conducted Afro-Cuban music performances on Sundays which were broadcast by Radio Cadena Suaritos.

In the 1950s Morales was responsible for the score of several films including Rincón criollo (1950), Una gitana de La Habana (1950), Sandra, la mujer de fuego (1954) and Yambaó (1957). In 1955, Morales was the conductor in Ñáñigo, an LP by Puerto Rican singer Ruth Fernández with a repertoire of classics by Moisés Simons, Ernesto Lecuona, Eliseo Grenet and Gilberto Valdés.

Late career and death
During the 1960s, Morales conducted a late night program at Radio Rebelde featuring vocalist Gina Martín. He also became the director and arranger of Antobal's Cuban All-Stars. In 1972 he became the director of Conjunto Folklórico Nacional de Cuba's orchestra, with which he toured Europe. He continued his research into Afro-Cuban culture, giving talks and collaborating with Zoila Lapique Becali on a study on Cuban music publishing between 1829 and 1902. In 1980, while retired and ill, he founded Afrofónico, another Afro-Cuban music group.

Obdulio Morales died in Havana on January 9, 1981.

References

1910 births
1981 deaths
Cuban pianists
Cuban bandleaders
Cuban composers
Male composers
Cuban ethnomusicologists
20th-century composers
20th-century pianists
20th-century musicologists
Cuban male musicians

Obdulio Morales


Melvin Russell Riebe (July 12, 1916 – July 25, 1977) was an American professional basketball player.

A 5'11" guard-forward who also played minor league baseball in the Cleveland Indians' organization, Riebe played professionally in both the National Basketball League (1943–1945) and the Basketball Association of America (1946–1949), finishing his career with two seasons with the Boston Celtics. He led the NBL in scoring twice, averaging 17.9 points per game during the 1943–44 season and 20.2 points per game the following year as a member of the Cleveland Chase Brassmen and the Cleveland Allmen Transfers.

From 1950 to 1954 he attended the College of Wooster, where he was ineligible to play basketball or baseball due to his professional experience but played on the golf team.  He spent the rest of his life as a football and basketball coach, athletic director, and physical education teacher at Waynedale High School in Apple Creek, Ohio.

Riebe's brother, Hank Riebe, was a catcher in Major League Baseball from 1942 to 1949.

BAA career statistics

Regular season

Playoffs

References

External links

1916 births
1977 deaths
American men's basketball players
Basketball coaches from Ohio
Basketball players from Cleveland
Boston Celtics players
Cleveland Allmen Transfers players
Cleveland Chase Brassmen players
Cleveland Rebels players
College of Wooster alumni
Forwards (basketball)
Guards (basketball)
High school basketball coaches in Ohio
High school football coaches in Ohio
Providence Steamrollers players
Sportspeople from Cleveland

Mel Riebe


Education in Malawi stresses academic preparation leading to access to secondary school and universities. However, few students go on to high school or university. The dropout rate is also very high particularly among primary school pupils.

Primary education
Primarily schools are mostly in two categories of assisted (public) and unassisted (private) schools. Villages and hamlets throughout the country have such schools. By 1970, there were approximately 2,000 primary schools for 35 percent of primary school aged youth. About 12 percent of all primary school students attended private, predominantly church run schools.

Secondary school education
Secondary education developed late in Malawi, because of little effort or neglect in secondary education during the colonial era. Malawi has five types of secondary schools. These include aided boarding schools, aided day schools, government boarding-secondary schools, government day secondary schools, and private secondary schools. Most secondary teachers are qualified and hold either degrees or diplomas.

In the curriculum, Agriculture is a compulsory subject for all students. Wood working, metal work, and technical drawing are encouraged for boys, and home economics is encouraged for girls. One of the biggest criticisms of secondary schools in Malawi is that they are too university-oriented and needs more technical skills taught. Most students immediately enter the workforce and need a different orientation. Therefore, Secondary schools do not produce as many graduates as the labor market demands. In fact, only one-fourth of Malawi's youth end up attending secondary school.

Public school system
The government established free primary education for all children in 1994, which increased attendance rates, according to UNICEF.  In 1994, the gross primary enrollment rate was 133.9 percent, and the net primary enrollment rate was 102.6 percent. In 1995, 62 percent of students entering primary school reached grade two, and 34 percent reached grade five. The dropout rate is higher among girls than boys.

Private school system
Private schools have risen in Malawi and offer an alternative to public schools. Private schools include school like tukombo private girls secondary school, Bedir IS, Phungu, Lilongwe Girls, Hossana private School and Sunnyside School. Some consolidates private schools are run by the Designated Schools Board.

Tukombo private girls secondary school established in 1998, run NY nkhatabay development trust.

The Bedir Foundation, founded in 2000, owns two schools: Bedir Star International school, Lilongwe and Bedir International school, Blantyre. Both use Cambridge International Examinations syllabus, as well as MANEB.

Charitable Foundation schools
Many independent schools have been set up as charitable foundations in Malawi with a specific targeted pupil:

 The Jacaranda Foundation, founded by nanny Marie Da Silva, maintains the Jacaranda School. It is Malawi's only entirely free school for primary and secondary students. The vast majority of students of the Jacaranda School are orphaned by the HIV/AIDS pandemic, as featured on 2008 CNN Heroes.
 St Patricks academy & primary
 The Joyce Banda Foundation is a foundation that runs schools for primary and secondary schools in Malawi.
 The Raising Malawi foundation is in the process of building a school aimed at female education in Malawi.
 The Legson Kayira Primary School and Community Center
 The Youth of Malawi foundation has built a solar-powered, rainwater harvesting primary school in the village of Chimphamba, in the Mchinji district of rural Malawi.
 The El Shaddai School (part of the Martin Academy) in Chiwembe village near Limbe. The school has been built using charitable donations by the UK Charity Alcohelp (No 1104811) The school welcomes children from the village into nursery, reception and standard 1-6  The Martin Academy funds a sponsor-me scheme for less advantaged children.
 The Imago Foundation is a newly registered charity that is going to build a nursery and primary school in Mangochi district (which has some of the worst measures of education levels out of every district in Malawi). The charity has the additional aims of improving nutrition and protecting the natural environment by using permaculture methods. It is also supported by the UK charity, Imago Malawi.

University system

The university sector in Malawi is composed of four public universities and several private universities. No university in Malawi is included in either the Times Higher or QS World University Rankings. Malawi has among the lowest rates of participation in university education in the world, with less than 1% of college age people attending university in the country. There are some efforts to improve access to higher education, particularly for women, who are typically under-represented in Malawian institutions.

The public universities are (in order of founding):

University of Malawi

Malawi's first and largest tertiary educational institution is the University of Malawi. It was founded in 1964 and operates on several campuses.

Mzuzu University

Mzuzu University was founded in 1997 and is one of the principal universities of Malawi. The school is located in Mzuzu city in the northern region of the country.
Northern Malawi is a very poor place with kids all around playing and adults farming. Some kids help the adults with farming but most goes to school.

Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources

Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources is a university outside Lilongwe, Malawi. It was formed in 2011 by a merger between Bunda College of Agriculture of the University of Malawi and Natural Resources College (NRC).

The Malawi University of Science and Technology

The Malawi University of Science and Technology (MUST), sometimes referred to as the University of Southern Malawi, was established on 17 December 2012 by the Malawi University of Science and Technology Act No. 31 of 2012 as the fourth Public University in Malawi. It was officially opened in 2014 by Professor Peter Mutharika, LL.B(Hons), J.D.S.  It's situated in the prestigious shire highlands in Thyolo, Malawi. This institution is occupying a total plot area of  and has total building area of . The seating capacity of this university is 3000 but can accommodate about twice that seating capacity. Evidently, this University will hugely contribute to the government of Malawi's efforts to widening access to higher education.

Once fully operational, the University will have the Malawi Institute of Technology, Ndata School of Climate & Earth Sciences, Academy of Medical Sciences and the Bingu School of Culture and Heritage. The Malawi Industrial Research and Technology Development Centre will be part of the MIT.

Private universities in Malawi include the following:

Central Christian University

Central Christian University (CCU) CCU is Research-Based Private-Not-Profit University dedicated to provide Open and Distance Learning programmes in Malawi

Catholic University of Malawi

The university is located in Montfort campus in Chiladzulu District in Malawi.  It was established in 2004 and opened in 2006, with faculties of social science and education. It now additionally offers economics, marketing, business administration, and accounting.

University fees recently increased sixfold to about £380 per year, more than double Malawi's legal minimum wage.

Teaching and education profession
The Ministry of Education develops the curricula used in Malawi's schools and oversee teacher training. Teachers take both pedagogical and academic courses. Supervised practical teaching is expected before teaching independently. Most teachers begin as primary school teachers in a demonstration school adjacent to teacher training facilities. Later, block teaching is tried during which the teacher trainee tries teaching a class on their own for six weeks. Three types of lecturers educate potential teachers. Graduate teacher educators chair most departments, aided by diplomate and non-diplomate assistants.

Primary teachers
Malawi has four professional teaching Grades (PT) of primary school teachers. The PT4 teacher holds a Malawi School Certificate of Education (MSCE) which is four years of secondary school education, and a two-year Teachers Certificate. PT3 is obtained after going through interviews after serving for fours at PT4 Grade. PT2 and PT1 they are also obtained through interviews. However, PT2 is an administrative grade (Deputy Head teacher) while PT1 is reserved for the head teacher, primary education advisors and field supervisors.

Secondary teachers
Secondary school teachers are trained at the School of Education. This school awards three types of professional qualifications, which are: Diploma of Education, Bachelor of Education and the University Certificate of Education.

University  lecturers
Malawi citizens who serve as professors constitute 30 percent of the university's faculty. In 1977, a total of 87 of the 199 working faculty or 87 percent were expatriates. While 27 percent of the professoriat were from Malawi and a further 48 percent were pursuing advanced degrees abroad. There is a need both to upgrade or develop personnel currently serving as professors and to train many more Malawians to fill these posts.

Non-governmental organisations

Wungwero Book Foundation trains teacher librarians at the DAPP teacher training college. AYISE, a large non-governmental organization based in Blantyre, Malawi, provides education at its youth center and works with local schools.

Notable Malawian educators
 Joyce Banda - former President of Malawi, founder of the Joyce Banda Foundation
 Frank Chipasula - author, poet and educator
 Peter Mutharika - former President of Malawi, professor of law, international law advisor
 Anjimile Oponyo - educator

Notable Malawian scholars
 Frank Chipasula - author, poet and educator
 William Kamkwamba - Malawian student who gained fame after building a windmill from spare parts

References

External links
 Ministry of Education of Malawi
 Education Statistics and Quality of Education in Malawi, Southern and Eastern Africa Consortium for Monitoring Educational Quality (SACMEQ)
 Malawi Education Foundation

Malawi

Education in Malawi


James Louis O'Donel (1737, Knocklofty, County Tipperary, Ireland – April 1, 1811, Waterford, Ireland) was the first Roman Catholic bishop of St. John's, Newfoundland.

Life
O'Donel was born into a prosperous family and received a classical education before entering the Franciscan order. After the Penal Laws ceased to be rigorously enforced, he travelled to Rome to study for the priesthood, becoming ordained in 1770. He later taught philosophy and theology in Prague, and in 1777 became the Franciscan Prior in Waterford.

Following developments in England, Catholics in Newfoundland gradually gained religious liberty, made explicit by a public declaration by the Governor in 1784. After a request from Irish merchants there to Bishop William Egan, O'Donel was sent to St. John's as Prefect Apostolic the same year, largely to deal with the presence of "unlicensed" and "unruly" priests on the island. In addition to his personal popularity, one of his qualifications for the position was an ability to preach in Irish language in Newfoundland.

O'Donel found that insubordinate priests were fighting Irish battles, and set about reorganizing the Catholic Church in Newfoundland. He built a chapel in St. John's, established parishes outside the capital, and gradually brought priests under his authority. During his first few years in post, O'Donel also found that Catholic liberty was less than absolute, and in 1786 he was physically assaulted by Prince William Henry, later King William IV. In 1796, O'Donel became a bishop, consecrated as titular bishop of Thyatira at Quebec on 21 September.

O'Donel's ministry in Newfoundland was largely characterized by trying to maintain peace, both between fellow Catholics and with the British. In 1800, an incipient Irish uprising involving soldiers in the St. John's garrison was forestalled when O'Donel, upon hearing of the plans, alerted the authorities. The 19th-century historian Charles Pedley alleged that O'Donel received his information via the confessional, but credible evidence for this claim is absent.

O'Donel's health deteriorated in the early 19th century, and he resigned his position in 1807 and returned to Ireland. He died of shock in 1811 after suffering minor injuries in a fire.

Views
Theologically, O'Donel subscribed to the Augustinian position that religion imposes a "reverential fear" on mankind's "naturally licentious" nature. This, and his belief in the essential mystery of the divine nature gave rise to his support for religious tolerance, since God's inscrutability would inevitably lead to theological disagreement, but furthermore, as he wrote to his contemporary John Jones, "an observant [C]hristian of any denomination is...a better man".

See also
United Irish Uprising
 Thomas Nash (Newfoundland) Irish fisherman, settled in Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. Founder of Branch, Newfoundland and Labrador

References

External links
FitzGerald, John Edward, Bishop James Louis O'Donel
Rollmann, Hans, John Jones, James O'Donel, and the Question of Religious Tolerance in Eighteenth-Century Newfoundland: A Correspondence
Rollmann, Hans, Prince William Henry in Newfoundland
Shortt, Seamus and Gannon, Joseph E., United Irish Rising in Newfoundland

1737 births
1811 deaths
18th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Canada
19th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Canada
Apostolic prefects
Irish emigrants to Canada
18th-century Irish Roman Catholic priests
Roman Catholic bishops of St. John's, Newfoundland
Christian clergy from County Tipperary
Irish Franciscans
Franciscan bishops

James Louis O'Donel


The Coteau des Prairies is a plateau approximately 200 miles in length and 100 miles in width (320 by 160 km), rising from the prairie flatlands in eastern South Dakota, southwestern Minnesota, and northwestern Iowa in the United States.  The southeast portion of the Coteau comprises one of the distinct regions of Minnesota, known as Buffalo Ridge.

The flatiron-shaped plateau was named by early French explorers from New France (Quebec), coteau meaning "hill" in French; the general term coteau has since been used in English to describe any upland dividing ridge.

The plateau is composed of thick glacial deposits, the remnants of many repeated glaciations, reaching a composite thickness of approximately 900 feet (275 m). They are underlain by a small ridge of resistant Cretaceous shale. During the last (Pleistocene) Ice Age, two lobes of the Laurentide glacier, the James lobe on the west and the Des Moines lobe on the east, appear to have parted around the pre-existing plateau and further deepened the lowlands flanking the plateau.

The plateau has numerous small glacial lakes and is drained by the Big Sioux River in South Dakota and the Cottonwood River in Minnesota. Pipestone deposits on the plateau have been quarried for hundreds of years by Native Americans, who use the prized, brownish-red mineral to make their sacred ceremonial pipes. The quarries are located at Pipestone National Monument in the southwest corner of Minnesota and in adjacent Minnehaha County, South Dakota.

Numerous wind farms have been built on the area's surface to take advantage of the high average wind speeds.

Photos from North Dakota

References

External links

USGS Site on the Coteau des Prairies
Glacial History of Coteau des Prairies (University of South Dakota).

Great Plains
Plateaus of the United States
Landforms of Iowa
Landforms of Minnesota
Landforms of South Dakota
Ecoregions of Minnesota
Regions of South Dakota

Coteau des Prairies


Celia Anne Barlow (born 28 September 1955) is a British Labour Party politician who was the Member of Parliament (MP) for Hove from 2005 to 2010. She also worked as home news editor at the BBC.

Early life
Barlow was born in Cardiff, Wales, and attended King Edward High School for Girls in Birmingham. She read Archaeology and Anthropology at Cambridge then studied for a postgraduate diploma in journalism at Cardiff University. She began her career as a reporter on the Bradford Telegraph and Argus in 1979. She was appointed assistant editor at Asia Television in Hong Kong in 1982. She returned to Britain in 1983 to become home news editor at the BBC. She left the BBC in 1995. She became a freelance video producer in 1998 before lecturing in video production at the Chichester College of Art and Design from 2000.

Parliamentary career
She was elected secretary of the Chelsea Constituency Labour Party in 1993, and became the chairman of the Chichester Constituency Labour Party in 1998. In 2000, she was selected to contest the safe Conservative seat of Chichester at the 2001 General Election and finished third, behind the winner Andrew Tyrie.

In November 2004 Ivor Caplin, the Labour MP for the very marginal Hove constituency, announced his retirement at the next election and Celia Barlow was chosen to fight the seat through a controversial All-Women Shortlist. It was widely assumed that she would be defeated by Nicholas Boles, considered a rising star of the Conservative Party, but she was elected at the 2005 General Election with a majority of just 420 votes. She became the first of the new MPs elected in 2005 to make their maiden speech in the House of Commons.

Barlow was a member of the Procedure Committee and previously served on the Environmental Audit Select Committee.

After May 2006 she served as the Parliamentary Private Secretary to Ian Pearson, Economic Secretary in HM Treasury and Parliamentary Under-Secretary in the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. She is a member of parliamentary group EURIM.

Barlow was defeated at the 2010 General Election by Conservative candidate Mike Weatherley.

2009 Parliamentary expenses scandal
She was one of many UK MPs to be implicated in the 2009 Expenses Scandal, claiming more than £28,000 in expenses on her second home, then 'flipping' it and using it as her main residence. The expense claims included the cost of a whirlpool bath and a high lustre silver shower screen Barlow later made political capital out of the fact she failed to claim for a second home in London.

She was also forced to repay £635 for a mortgage valuation on her main home; a breach of the expenses rules. She later offered to apologise for her expense claims.

Personal life
Barlow married the former BBC North America foreign correspondent and University of Hull-educated Sam Jaffa in August 1988 in Bromsgrove. Her husband stood for the Eastleigh seat in 2001 as a Labour candidate coming third. They have two sons and one daughter together. They divorced in 2011.

References

External links
 Celia Barlow official website
 Celia Barlow MySpace
 Brighton & Hove Labour Party
 Guardian Unlimited Politics - Ask Aristotle: Celia Barlow MP
 TheyWorkForYou.com - Celia Barlow MP
 The Public Whip - Celia Barlow MP - Voting record
 BBC Politics page

1955 births
Living people
Alumni of Cardiff University
Female members of the Parliament of the United Kingdom for English constituencies
Labour Party (UK) MPs for English constituencies
Male actors from Cardiff
UK MPs 2005–2010
BBC newsreaders and journalists
People educated at King Edward VI High School for Girls, Birmingham
21st-century British women politicians
British women television journalists
British women radio presenters
British women television presenters
Politicians from Brighton and Hove
21st-century English women
21st-century English people

Celia Barlow


Lactaldehyde is an intermediate in the methylglyoxal metabolic pathway. Methylglyoxal is converted to D-lactaldehyde by glycerol dehydrogenase (gldA).  Lactaldehyde is then oxidized to lactic acid by aldehyde dehydrogenase.

Structure
Lactaldehyde is a three-carbon atom species with a carbonyl group on the first carbon atom (making it an aldehyde), and a hydroxy group on the second carbon atom, making it a secondary alcohol.  The molecule is chiral, its stereocenter being located on the second carbon atom.

Lactaldehyde exists in several forms: in open-chain form and as cyclic hemiacetal; in solution and in crystal forms; as monomer and as dimer.  In crystal form, three conformers occur as hemiacetal dimers with a 1,4-dioxane ring skeleton:

In equilibrium solution, negligibly small amounts of the monomer and at least one five-membered ring dimer exist.

References

Hydroxy aldehydes
Secondary alcohols

Lactaldehyde


On the Buses is a British television sitcom that was broadcast on ITV from 1969 to 1973. It was created by Ronald Chesney and Ronald Wolfe, who wrote most of the episodes. It spawned three spin-off feature films and a stage version. Despite the writers' previous successes with The Rag Trade and Meet the Wife with the BBC, the corporation rejected On the Buses, not seeing much comedy potential in a bus depot as a setting. The comedy partnership turned to Frank Muir, Head of Entertainment at London Weekend Television (LWT), who loved the idea; the show was accepted, and despite a poor critical reception became a hit with viewers.

The series is centred on the working-class life of Stan Butler and Jack Harper, who are the crew of the Number 11 bus at the Luxton and District Motor Traction Company. The action mostly takes place at the Butler home and at the bus depot. Network On Air describes the show as having a "bawdy, comic postcard humour and resolutely working-class outlook", and notes the series became "one of the most popular British comedy series of its era, if not all time."

Episodes

Cast and characters

Main characters

Reg Varney as Stanley "Stan" Butler – a bus driver who works for the Luxton and District Traction Company along with Jack and Blakey. He lives with his mother Mabel, sister Olive and brother-in-law Arthur. Stan frequently chats up the clippies at the bus depot and his antics often include concocting schemes to bunk off work, gain favour from girls or solve predicaments caused by his family. Though he is rarely serious, has a disregard for authority and is rude to women he deems unattractive, Stan is ultimately good-natured at heart and tries to help those he cares for. While he loves his family, he frequently subjects sister Olive and brother-in-law Arthur to jokes at their expense, and is frequently irritated by his mother's traditional morals and rules. Due to his playboy attitude towards girls and carefree approach to life, he is oftentimes blind or ignorant of his own issues such as his health, appearance and success. He mostly triumphs over his rival Inspector Blake, but on occasion has fallen foul of the inspector's wrath.
Cicely Courtneidge (series 1) and Doris Hare (series 2–7 & films) as Mabel Butler ("Mum"), Stan's mother. She is a maiden in distress when it comes to money. The Butler household is forever losing money and regularly getting the electricity cut off. Mabel is frequently caught up in arguments between Arthur, Olive and Stan but manages to retain a sense of maternal order over them. She is moral, believing in the sanctity of marriage and family, as well as criticising licentious behaviour in women. Despite her strong moral compass however, she sometimes turns a blind eye to Stan's equally sultry ways and near-criminal high jinks at his job.
Anna Karen as Olive Rudge, Stan's sister. Olive is always being criticised by her husband Arthur, even though she helps her mum with household jobs and frequently helps Stan with the decorating. Olive has twice been a clippie at the bus depot, both times being unsuccessful. She is always wanting "an early night" with Arthur, much to his displeasure.
Michael Robbins as Arthur Rudge, Stan's brother-in-law. Somewhat aloof and stuck-up, he frequently resists Olive's intimate advances. His hospital operation is a frequent source of ridicule from Stan and Jack. Although the nature of the procedure is never disclosed, it is implied to have been a vasectomy or a hernia. Arthur is always tampering with his motorbike, which usually falls apart. Arthur has a mother (played by Gillian Lind) and a younger sister called Linda (played by Helen Fraser) who both appeared in the episode "Boxing Day Social".
Bob Grant as Jack Harper, Stan's scheming, workshy conductor and best friend, who also happens to be his next-door neighbour (although throughout the series he regularly attempts to discredit Stan by underhanded means, such as innuendo, accusation or the like, and steals Stan's girlfriends on several occasions). He and Stan are always getting into trouble and getting reprimanded by Inspector Blake. Whether it is tampering with radio controls, putting "diversion" road signs in the wrong places or going on dates with the buxom clippies, they are always getting into scrapes. Jack is also the shop steward of the bus depot, and frequently abuses his position to thwart Blakey's schemes, usually with the catchphrase "As shop steward I am here to tell you.....".
Stephen Lewis as Cyril "Blakey" Blake – the inspector at the bus depot. Whenever there is a "brilliant idea" at the bus depot, it is usually Blakey's. These are usually elaborate schemes to temper Stan's and Jack's frequent insubordination, or to entrap them in their misadventures in a bid to get them fired. However, Blakey's schemes typically backfire with hilarious consequences, and land him either in trouble with the general manager or in hospital.  On occasion, Blakey sometimes scores a minor victory over Stan and Jack, outsmarting their attempts to deceive or bunk off work, but these are usually short-lived and the pair gain the upper hand in the end.

Recurring characters
 Michael Sheard as the general manager of the bus depot who is seen frequently throughout the seventh and final series. He often argues with Blakey about something that the latter has done. He was also the judge at the gardening competition in the episode "Gardening Time". Sheard also played the general manager in the Holiday On The Buses film.
 Madeleine Mills and Sandra Miller as the inspector's niece. She was played twice by Mills and twice by Miller. In her first two appearances, she and Stan are in a relationship; in the second they are engaged, but split up after a tea party at Stan's house. In her third appearance she married Bill, a bus driver at the depot. She also appeared in the episode "The New Nurse".
Sandra Bryant as Sandra, a clippie at the bus depot. Her character is seen frequently throughout the seventh and final series. In the first episode of the seventh series, she goes on a date with Stan to the cinema, until Olive comes along too.
  Terry Duggan and Norman Mitchell as Nobby – one of the bus depot's mechanics. (Duggan also made an appearance as a passenger in some episodes of the TV series, and reprised the role of Nobby in the first On The Buses film). He often assists Stan and Jack in their typical schemes and misadventures. In real-life Duggan was married to Anna Karen (Olive).

Series production
A total of 74 episodes of On the Buses were broadcast over seven series. Three spin-off films were also released.

All episodes and films of On The Buses were set in the fictional town of Luxton.

At the beginning of the seventh series Arthur, who is not seen, has left Olive and they are divorced. Olive again gets a job as a clippie on the buses as they are short of money. Stan takes a job in the north of England in a car factory in the "Goodbye Stan" episode, and the inspector takes Stan's old room as a lodger.

In addition, two five-minute Christmas specials were made by LWT as part of an All Star Comedy Carnival in 1969 and 1972, ITV's answer to the BBC's Christmas Night with the Stars programme. The 1969 edition has been lost, but the 1972 edition – featuring a goose that the cast are chasing for Christmas dinner – exists in the Thames Television archive, which is now owned by FremantleMedia.

Reg Varney undertook a PCV driving test in order to be filmed driving the bus for the exterior scenes.

The earlier series were recorded at London Weekend Television's original studios in Wembley (later Fountain Studios). In late 1972, LWT relocated to new studios on the South Bank of the River Thames; here the outside doors to the main and secondary studios were too small to accommodate the double-decker buses used in the series. Therefore, single decker buses were used and a plywood mock-up of an upper deck was lowered from a lighting rig.

Filmed external shots were part of the series. LWT arranged with the now defunct Eastern National Omnibus Company to use its buses at Wood Green bus garage in North London. They were shown as belonging to Luxton and District. Luxton is supposed to be in Essex, and actual Essex towns including Southend-on-Sea, Basildon, Braintree and Tilbury are all mentioned. One of the bus route termini was "Cemetery Gates", for which LWT used the entrance to Lavender Hill Cemetery. A different Lavender Hill in Battersea also features in the last episode of the last series, featuring the town hall (now the Battersea Arts Centre).

The fourth series was affected by the ITV Colour Strike, with seven of the 13 episodes being made in black and white.

Characters from On The Buses appeared in two other series. A spin-off, Don't Drink the Water (1974–75), ran for thirteen episodes, featuring Blake retiring to Spain with his sister Dorothy (Pat Coombs - who also played one of the female bus drivers in the first On The Buses film). Anna Karen reprised her role as Olive in LWT's revival of The Rag Trade, which ran for two series in 1977–78.

Theme music
The theme music for the series, entitled "Happy Harry", was written by Tony Russell.

Featured buses
The red Town & District buses were Bristol KSWs with Eastern Coach Works bodies. These were former Eastern National. Stan's and Jack's "regular" bus appeared to be VNO 857.

The green Luxton & District buses were Bristol Lodekkas with bodywork by Eastern Coach Works of Lowestoft. In reality these were Eastern National buses (in some episodes buses could be seen with Eastern National on the side), although as mentioned earlier, the later interior depot shots were in fact 'dummy' buses. Some 'dummy' buses were real single-deck buses with a wooden frame on top, such as in the Series 3 episode "Radio Control", when the bus has crashed into the bridge. The most commonly used bus in the series was AVW 399F. In later episodes the ENB symbol appears next to Luxton & District.

Stan's usual buses, AVW 399F and AEV 811F, are both still extant; one is in Lille, France, the other in Los Angeles, California.

In the first episode of series 6, former London Transport bus Leyland Titan PD2 RTL1557 (OLD 666) is featured and burnt out.

Broadcast and repeats
The original series was repeated on Granada Plus in 1996 and until the channel closed in 2004, and was later repeated on UK Gold and then from 2004 onward on ITV3, where it was still seen as of January 2022. Fox Classics on the Australian Fox cable network and New Zealand's Jones channel on Sky regularly show the series. As of August 2018, the series is broadcast by Dutch 'oldies' cable channel ONS.

Home media

Region 1
Visual Entertainment released On the Buses: The Ultimate Collection, an 11-disc box set featuring the complete series on DVD on 12 September 2006.

Region 2
Network released On the Buses: The Complete Series box set on DVD on 13 November 2006 for the first time, then again on 25 May 2008 in a new repackaged version. It has also released each series individually.

Region 4
Beyond Home Entertainment released the entire series on DVD in seven series sets between 2 July 2007 and 8 April 2009. Between 2008 and 2009 Series 1 to Series 5 were repacked into standard DVD cases as original releases were in gatefold digipaks with a slip box. In 2010 they released The Complete Series 11-DVD box set. In 2010, the individual series were re-released through ITV Studios. Season 1 and Season 2 were released separately (previously released together) on 5 September 2012, and Seasons 4 and Season 5 on 6 February 2013; it is unknown whether remaining seasons will be issued. The complete Series was repackaged and re-released on 7 August 2013. On 21 November 2018, On The Buses: The Complete Collection was reissued and distributed by Shock Entertainment.

Critical reception
Despite the popularity of On the Buses with sections of the public, TV reviewers and historians have generally held the show in lower regard. In its section on situation comedies, The Guinness Book of Classic British TV describes On the Buses as ITV's "longest running and most self-consciously unfunny series". TV reviewer Victor Lewis-Smith later criticised the then head of London Weekend Television, Frank Muir, for green-lighting the programme, which Lewis-Smith called "the wretched On the Buses". The Daily Telegraph journalist Max Davidson, discussing 1970s British comedy, listed On the Buses as one of the "unfunny sitcoms of the time", while The Guardians David Stubbs referred to On the Buses as "a byword for 70s sitcom mediocrity".

On The Buses is sometimes used as an example of the sort of sexism that was rife in society in the 1960s and 1970s, occurring after the freedoms of sexual liberation, but before the rise of feminism; in particular, the derision towards one of the main female characters (Olive Rudge) for being unattractive, and the fact that younger attractive bus staff would be regularly looking to have sex with the two main middle-aged male characters (Varney and Grant, who by the time of the release of the first film in 1971, were 55 and 39 respectively). Some episodes of the show also featured a black character referred to as Chalky, which might be construed as racist by modern standards.

Films

The three spin-off films were produced by Hammer Film Productions. They are On the Buses (1971), Mutiny on the Buses (1972), and Holiday on the Buses (1973), set in a holiday camp. On the Buses became Britain's top box office film of 1971.

The films were set in a different canon to the series – in the films, Arthur and Olive manage to have a child despite their apparently sexless marriage and Arthur's 'operation' – the exact nature of which was never explicitly revealed. Arthur's operation is mentioned in the first film, but later Olive gives birth to their baby son. The three films follow a loose story arc which shows their son (Little Arthur) growing up. Olive is pregnant with a second child at the end of Mutiny, but no mention of this was made in the third film, Holiday, set mainly in a holiday camp. The bus depot becomes that of The Town & District Bus Company instead of The Luxton & District Traction Company. The buses in the films are mostly red ones, with one green one (not including the Windsor Safari Park tour bus in Mutiny On The Buses).

American adaptation
The format of On the Buses was sold to America, where it was remade by NBC as Lotsa Luck, starring Dom DeLuise as Stanley Belmont with Kathleen Freeman as Iris Belmont, his mum, Wynn Irwin as Arthur Swann, Beverly Sanders as Olive Swann and Jack Knight as Bummy Pfitzer, his best friend. Episodes based on the original On The Buses scripts were adapted by such American writers as Carl Reiner, Bill Persky and Sam Denoff. Inspector Blake did not have a counterpart in the American version; and, in another significant change to the storyline, Stan worked at the lost property office at the bus depot rather than being a driver. After a pilot was made, the sitcom ran for one series of 22 episodes in 1973–74. It was not a success, and has never been screened in Britain.

Planned sequel
In 1990 there were plans to revive the series as Back on the Buses, and the original cast appeared on Wogan to promote the new series. Reg Varney also discussed plans for the pilot episode on This Morning. However, although the pilot script was written, it was not made. The premise was to be that Stan Butler, having run his own business for some years and made some money, was now starting his own bus company in the newly deregulated market, and hiring Jack to work with him. As they attempt to get the company off the ground, they discover a rival company has set up in the town, owned by Blakey. The comedy would have come from the conflict between the two businesses, as Stan and Jack attempt to battle Blakey's bigger and more professional company.

In popular culture

Look-in, a UK children's magazine, serialised On the Buses in comic strips between August 1971–May 1974. They were drawn by cartoonist Harry North and the TV series' often bawdy humour was diluted for a younger audience.

A board game of On the Buses was released by Denys Fisher games in 1973.

Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse did several sketches using the characters of On the Buses to lampoon the humour of the show.

References

Further reading

External links

Official On the Buses Fanclub
Official On the Buses page on Facebook
Official On the Buses account on Twitter

1969 British television series debuts
1973 British television series endings
1960s British sitcoms
1960s British workplace comedy television series
1970s British sitcoms
1970s British workplace comedy television series
Buses in fiction
English-language television shows
ITV sitcoms
London Weekend Television shows
Television shows adapted into films
Television shows adapted into plays
Television series about siblings
Television series by ITV Studios
Television shows set in Essex

On the Buses


Manisa Province  is a province in the Aegean Region of western Turkey. It is next to İzmir to the west, Aydın to the south, Denizli to the southeast, Uşak to the east, Kütahya to the northeast, and Balıkesir to the north. The city of Manisa is the seat and capital of the province.

Manisa Province


The Last Exorcism Part II is a 2013 American supernatural horror film co-written and directed by Ed Gass-Donnelly. It stars Ashley Bell, Julia Garner, Spencer Treat Clark, and Louis Herthum. It is a sequel to The Last Exorcism, and was released on March 1, 2013. The film follows Nell Sweetzer as she attempts to recover from her past experiences and start her life anew. Nell then starts to realize that the demon that previously possessed her has come back for her. Unlike its predecessor, it is not presented in a found footage format.

The film received generally negative reviews and grossed $25 million worldwide against a $5 million budget.

Plot
A couple, Jared and Lily, finds a demonic-looking Nell Sweetzer squatting next to their refrigerator. She soon is taken to a hospital, where she appears to be catatonic. After spending a few months at the insightful and caring therapist Frank's home for girls in New Orleans and settling in as a chambermaid at a hotel under the supervision of her boss Beverly, Nell's condition seems to have improved and she no longer has "bad dreams". Nell and her group of friends Gwen, Daphne, and Monique attend a Mardi Gras parade; Nell witnesses many strange happenings there, including masked men watching her. Her personality changes as things get darker. She begins to get hints that the demon Abalam is back.

When Stephanie, one of the girls at the house, dies of an unnatural seizure, Cecile, Nell's former nurse, informs her of the Order of the Right Hand, a secret society which has been monitoring Nell. Nell's friends Gwen, Daphne, Monique, and Michelle discover a video on YouTube which depicts the events from the previous film revealing that the lost footage has been discovered; this frightens and angers Nell as she becomes a reluctant internet celebrity because of the video. Chris, another worker at the hotel who likes Nell, slits his own throat after viewing a clip from the same footage which depicts Nell lying about how she got pregnant. Cecile seeks help from the Order of the Right Hand, and Nell is introduced to Calder and Jeffrey. They attempt to rid the demon which is "in love" with Nell by transferring it into the body of a sacrificed chicken. The supernatural force in Nell proves to be too powerful, and Calder is forced to kill her by injecting her with a lethal dose of morphine.

The demon appears in front of Nell, taking her appearance as a doppelganger, her father, and Chris, and begs her to accept its hand. Nell's pulse stops temporarily and leads Calder, Jeffrey, and Cecile, to believe that she has died. She finally gives in and grabs the demon's hand; the house is left to burn with the three secret society members being killed. Nell murders Frank and burns the home for girls, leaving her friends to die. Nell gets inside a car and the prophecy of the end of times is proven to be correct as she sets multiple buildings and vehicles aflame while driving past them.

Cast

Production

Development
On August 23, 2011, The Hollywood Reporter announced that a sequel was in development. On April 20, 2012, an audition sheet revealed the film's original title was supposed to be Beginning of the End: The Last Exorcism II. This was shortened to the final title shown on the poster for the theatrical release. Ed Gass-Donnelly was announced to be helming the film as director, with Damien Chazelle (Guy and Madeline on a Park Bench) providing the screenplay. Ashley Bell was later announced to be reprising her role as Nell. On January 2, 2013, the official poster for the film was released, revealing the final title to be The Last Exorcism Part II. The film was also produced by Eli Roth.

Filming
Production and filming began March 19, 2012 and ended on April 21, 2012. Principal photography mostly took place in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Release
The film received its premiere in Russia on February 28, 2013. The film was released on March 1, 2013 in its U.S. premiere. The film was not released theatrically in Sweden or Australia; the film was released direct-to-video on July 3, 2013 in Sweden and July 31, 2013 in Australia. The film was originally given an R rating by the MPAA but cuts were made to the finished product to receive a neutered PG-13 rating (all deleted footage was restored in the unrated edition of the film).

Home media
The film was released on DVD and Blu-ray on June 18, 2013. The Blu-ray disc only contains the unrated cut of the film. The unrated version restored approximately 1 minute of footage deleted from the final cut which extended the length of certain scenes by a few seconds and depicted a more graphic version of Chris's suicide.

Reception

Box office
In its opening weekend The Last Exorcism Part II grossed $7,728,354. Domestically the film grossed $15,161,327 and $9,872,563 internationally grossing a total of $25,051,865 and surpassing its budget by over 20 million, but being a box office failure compared to the previous film's $67,738,090 gross to a $1.8 million budget.

Critical reception
The film was not screened in advance for critics. The film was widely panned by critics and audiences. Review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a score of 15% based on reviews from 71 critics, with an average score of 3.58/10. The critic consensus states: "The Last Exorcism Part II ditches the found footage format for relatively earnest but deadly tedious psychological terror that devolves into hokum anyways." Metacritic, which assigns a rating of 0 to 100, gave The Last Exorcism Part 2 a 35 indicating generally unfavorable reviews.

Frank Scheck of The Hollywood Reporter wrote that The Last Exorcism Part II was an "unimpressive follow-up [to The Last Exorcism]", though praising Ashley Bell's "[...] memorable, unsettling performance that easily can be compared to Sissy Spacek's Carrie". Christopher Runyon of Movie Mezzanine also gave a negative review stating "Not a single aspect of this film suggests that anyone involved in the production cared".

Not all reviews for the film were negative though; Mark Olsen of the Los Angeles Times gave a positive review stating "The Last Exorcism Part II is an effectively unnerving, slow-burn supernatural horror tale".

Cancelled sequel
In light of the film's box office success, a third film had been planned, with Ashley Bell set to reprise her role. In an interview with Bloody Disgusting, she said: "There's a wait and see approach, but yeah there have been [discussions]. There's a twist at the end [of Part 2] that is literally so shocking! I would love to step back into my Doc Martens for a third time."

Though this film had left room for a potential third film, it never materialized.

References

External links

2013 films
2013 horror films
2010s supernatural horror films
American sequel films
American supernatural horror films
Films about exorcism
Films produced by Eli Roth
Films produced by Marc Abraham
Films scored by Michael Wandmacher
Films set in New Orleans
Films with screenplays by Damien Chazelle
StudioCanal films
2010s English-language films
Films directed by Ed Gass-Donnelly
2010s American films

The Last Exorcism Part II


Croat People's Union (, ; Croatian abbreviation: HNZ) was a Bosnian Croat political party in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Party was founded by Ivo Pilar in 1910 with goal to represent interests of Croats in the Condominium of Bosnia and Herzegovina. With creation of Kingdom of Yugoslavia, HNZ become inactive and was refounded in 1992 by Milenko Brkić and in 2010 it was incorporated into the Croatian Party of Rights of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

History

Austria-Hungary
Austrian-Hungarian authorities found foundation of the Ante Starčević's Party of Rights (Stranka prava) in the Condominium of Bosnia and Herzegovina undesirable. The group of Croat intellectuals thus founded Croat People's Union with goal to establish Starčević's party ideology. HNZ was mostly supported by peasantry, tradesmen and franciscans. Party's leader was Nikola Mandić, while other prominent members of the party were Ivo Pilar, Safvet-beg Bašagić, Hamid Ekrem Sahinović and Jozo Sunarić.
Other party which used elements of Starčević's policy was Croat Catholic Association (Hrvatska katolička udruga, HKU), which was not secular party as HNZ was. Its leader was Roman Catholic bishop, Josip Stadler. HKU made good relations with Pure Party of Rights in Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia and especially in Kingdom of Dalmatia and also Catholic-Social Party in Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia. Party advocated political Catholicism and unification of Bosnia and Herzegovina with Croat lands.

Pilar and his associates stopped to cooperate with Catholic Association because of their political ideology, even though before that, they were in good relations to Stadler. Second reason for freezing of relations was effort of HKU to unite Bosnia and Herzegovina with Croat lands, which Bosnian Muslims and Serbs didn't approve. Since both, HNZ and HKU were part of Pan-Pravaštvo organization, both parties continued to cooperate in 1911 until the end of the World War I.
On the election for Bosnian legislature in 1910, HNZ won 12 out of 16 seats reserved for Catholic representatives. After the end of World War I, and with creation of Kingdom of Yugoslavia, HNZ ceased to exist.

Reestablishment and incorporation
HNZ was refounded in 1992 and its first president was Milenko Brkić. At first, HNZ opposed to policy of the Croatian Democratic Union of Bosnia and Herzegovina (HDZ BiH). However, at the election in 2002 and election in 2006, HNZ was in a coalition with the HDZ BiH. HNZ also called Bosnian Croats not to vote at the elections in the Republic of Croatia.

In February 2010, president of the HSP BiH, Zvonko Jurišić, president of the Croat Union of Herzeg-Bosnia, Petar Milić and Brkić met and agreed to act under a single name, Croatian Party of Rights of Bosnia and Herzegovina. At the 2010 election, HSP BiH entered into a Croatian Coalition along with Croatian Democratic Union 1990. By this act, HNZ once again opposed HDZ BiH.

References

Croat political parties in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Croatian nationalist parties
Defunct political parties in Bosnia and Herzegovina
History of the Croats of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Croat People's Union


Provincial cities (), sometimes translated provincial municipalities, are cities lesser in rank than special municipalities of the Republic of China (Taiwan). They are directly governed by provinces and are one level above the most basic county-controlled cities. In the early 20th century a provincial municipality was described as one having a population of over 200,000. However, if the city was important in politics, economics or culture it had to be over 100,000.

After relocating the government to Taiwan the Republic of China government raised the limit to 500,000 in 1981. It was later raised again to 600,000. Currently, the Local Government Act of the Ministry of the Interior applies for the creation of a provincial city. In this case a city needs to have a population between 500,000 and 1,250,000. It must also have major political, economical and cultural roles.

References

Provincial city