What concerns me, and many other birders, is the loss of habitat on the long term scale.

Many of these birds raise their young in rookeries. These rookeries often have been used for years and are vital to a species survival. If those places are contaminated, a species population could take over fifty years to rebound in that particular area. And that's in some ways a best case scenario. If the rookery is abandoned because of the contamination, where will the birds go? Many rookeries are last havens for these birds. Much of their habitat has been either developed by humans or is so fragmented that it can not support a rookery population. Where are these birds supposed to go to avoid the oil? Where are they supposed to dive for fish? Rest on the water?

This, of course, does not even consider the plight of migratory birds which head south to the Gulf of Mexico in the winter. Although currently they have likely all returned to their normal northern ranges, come fall they will wind their ancient ways back to the warm waters of the Gulf and the forests of South America. Here in Minnesota, our beloved state bird, the Common Loon, will take to the wing in the fall. It will fly south in it's boring nondescript non-breeding plumage and will occasionally get themselves stranded on wet parking lots, mistaking them for the large bodies of water they like. Once rescued from such embarrassing mistakes (as they can not take off from land), they will continue on to their winter home, the Gulf Coast. There they will stay until the next spring, when they return to make their distinctive chilling yodel upon our lakes. How will they and hundreds of other migratory species be affected?

In the end, the individuals in some ways don't really matter. If their habitat at large is not saved, the damage will be irrevocable and long term. Generations upon generations of birds will be affected.

I'd certainly go for the video being real. Black bears are wonders of ingenuity and do walk upright in the wild even with all four legs.

I'm just surprised that it appears to be a mother bear! A cub that young wouldn't likely be around any adult bear other than it's mother. Go Mama Bear! She must be a really good mom. I bet standing up helps her look bigger and scan the area for danger/her errant cub more easily.

Hummingbirds are pretty daring for their size. They will hand feed (from a saucer) without much tempting. Same thing with chickadees.

Interesting how there were places in that video where the camera was too slow to catch the flurry of wing-beats so you only saw one or two flaps.

I'm an art major, so I don't usually get to learn about fun science stuff like this. Even I did take a biology class, the textbook would be so boring/verbose that I would probably want to stab it. Or be to busy being frustrated with how ugly it was.

This is a subject that I'd love to learn more about but is pretty hard to self educate yourself in without getting hopeless lost in techno babble. So I'm totally for this version of slightly silly science if it taught me anything about molecular biology. I mean, who doesn't love proteins?

This was at the Russian Museum here in Minneapolis (yes, we have a Russian museum! In a beautiful old Spanish church no less) last year or two ago. They showed the photos in the three layers stacked together and back lit. Very very cool.