Fish fear divers and snorkelers who try to count them for census

October 1st, 2009 Halt to gov't raids not an option to boost censusWASHINGTON — With the 2010 census six months away, the Commerce Department said Thursday it won't seek a halt to immigration raids as it did in the previous census in hopes of improving participation in hard-to-count communities. In a statement, the department said it is committed to an accurate count of U.S.

September 24th, 2009 Census workers trained to deal with hostile peopleWASHINGTON — Violence against census employees is rare, the Census Bureau said Thursday, but it nevertheless trains its canvassers in how to deal with angry or hostile citizens. On Sept. 12, Bill Sparkman, a 51-year-old census canvasser, was found hanged from a tree in rural Clay County, Ky.

September 22nd, 2009 Groves urges public campaign to boost 2010 censusWASHINGTON — The head of the Census Bureau says he's worried the poor economy and tensions over immigration will deter people from participating in next year's high-stakes count. Robert Groves appeared before Congress on Tuesday for the first time since he was confirmed in July.

September 21st, 2009 Census: 150,000 gay couples report they're marriedWASHINGTON — Nearly 150,000 same-sex couples reported being in marriage relationships last year, many more than the number of actual weddings and civil unions, according to the first U.S. census figures released on same-sex marriages.

September 11th, 2009 Census Bureau severs ties with ACORN in 2010 countWASHINGTON — The Census Bureau on Friday severed its ties with ACORN, a community organization that has been hit with Republican accusations of voter-registration fraud. "We do not come to this decision lightly," Census director Robert Groves wrote in a letter to ACORN, which was obtained by The Associated Press.

September 8th, 2009 Hawaii researchers explore previously unseen coralHONOLULU — Scientists over the past month explored coral reefs in the remote Northwestern Hawaiian Islands that until recently were considered too deep for scuba divers to reach. Divers swam among previously unseen reefs as deep as 250 feet during a monthlong research trip to the islands by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration vessel Hiialakai.

July 7th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A new study by an international team of researchers has suggested that fish may have become an important part of the year-round diet for early humans in China as far back as 40,000 years ago. Freshwater fish are an important part of the diet of many peoples around the world, but it has been unclear when fish became an important part of the year-round diet for early humans.

June 30th, 2009 Locke hires 3 experts to help with 2010 censusWASHINGTON — With the 2010 census months away, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke on Tuesday hired three experts to assess potential problems as the government waits for confirmation of President Barack Obama's nominee to lead the high-stakes count. The experts, former officials with the Census Bureau, will help provide "an up-to-date assessment of the state of readiness and potential vulnerabilities" in the headcount in the areas of operations, overall management and field operations, he said.

June 24th, 2009 Locke urges end to GOP block on census nomineeWASHINGTON — Commerce Secretary Gary Locke on Wednesday urged Congress to immediately end a GOP block on President Barack Obama's nominee to lead the 2010 census, saying continued delays are putting the high-stakes head count at risk. Robert Groves, a veteran survey researcher with the University of Michigan, was easily approved by a Senate committee last month.

June 19th, 2009 White House: Census to better count gay couplesSAN FRANCISCO — U.S. Census Bureau officials said Friday that married same-sex couples will be counted as such in the 2010 national tally, reversing an earlier decision made under the Bush administration.

June 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Farmed fish, if fed by-products rendered from cows, could transmit Creutzfeldt Jakob disease-commonly known as mad cow disease. Questioning the safety of eating farmed fish, Dr.

May 29th, 2009 SYDNEY - A researcher has developed the first robo-fish Wanda that moves like its natural counterparts and navigates underwater, conducting inspections within confined spaces. Researcher Scott McGovern of the University of Wollongong created Wanda (wireless aquatic navigator for detection and analysis) seeking out targeted objects.

May 25th, 2009 WASHINGTON - One of several astonishing reconstructions of ocean life in olden days suggests that about the ocean around New Zealand teemed with about 27,000 southern right whales, about 30 times as many as today, before oil hunters started to whaling in the early 1800s. The researchers set to make a presentation on the reconstruction at a Census of Marine Life conference, which runs from May 26 to 28, say that at about the same time, large pods of blue whales and orcas, blue sharks and thresher sharks darkened the waters off Cornwall, England, herds of harbour porpoise pursued fish upriver, and dolphins regularly played in waters inshore.

March 27th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Engineers at MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology), for the first time, have observed the initiation of a mass gathering and subsequent migration of hundreds of millions of fish. The work, conducted using a novel imaging technique, "provides information essential to the conservation of marine ecosystems that vast oceanic fish shoals inhabit," according to the research team.

February 25th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Psychedelica aptly describes a species of fish that is a wild swirl of tan and peach zebra stripes and behaves in ways contrary to its brethren. Members of H.