The U.S Navy said it will soon use specially trained dolphins and sea lions to protect a Trident submarine base in Kitsap County, Wash.

The Navy announced Wednesday the trained animals will be used to stop divers and swimmers from breaching the security of the Naval Base Kitsap-Bangor starting in 2010, the Kitsap (Wash.) Sun reported.

Other naval bases currently use marine mammals to discover possible intruders, the Sun said. The Navy said.

The bottlenose dolphins and California sea lions to be used are capable of locating such intruders and represent the best way to enhance base security under current security requirements.

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Johari, a 13-year-old male giraffe, was euthanized Tuesday at Woodland Park Zoo after more than a decade of chronic illness. When the reticulated giraffe arrived at the zoo in 1998 he was suffering from chronic joint problems caused by abnormal hooves.

"Over time, these hoof abnormalities progressed to an abnormal gait, stiffness and pain," Woodland Park Zoo associate veterinarian Dr. Kelly Helmick said in a news release. "Additionally, X-rays revealed evidence of arthritis."

Johari's condition had deteriorated recently, leading to the decision to euthanize. The giraffe is the first large mammal at the zoo to be euthanized sine 2007, when a 25-year-old female giraffe was euthanized because of age-related maladies, a zoo spokeswoman said.

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A Sumatran orangutan, born on October 2, made her official public debut today at the Philadelphia Zoo. The red-haired baby, a female, can be seen clinging tightly to mom in their exhibit at PECO Primate Reserve.

The orangutan was born to 17 year old female Tua, who came to the Philadelphia Zoo from Zoo Atlanta, and male Sugi, 13, who was born at the Saint Louis Zoo. Adult orangutans can weigh as much as 250 pounds (males), but weigh just 3-4 pounds at birth.

The newborn is the first orangutan born in PECO Primate Reserve, but continues the Zoo’s long and successful history, which dates back to the 1920’s when the Zoo was the first in the U.S. to breed orangutans.

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The destruction that mankind is inflicting on the natural world is continuing at an ever-increasing rate, a new survey has shown. According to the “red list” compiled annually by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, a fifth of the world’s known mammals, more than a quarter of amphibians and reptiles and a staggering 70 per cent of identified plants are now under threat of extinction.

The report also says that 12 per cent of all known birds, 37 per cent of freshwater fish and more than a third of invertebrates assessed so far are under threat. “The scientific evidence of a serious extinction crisis is mounting,” says Jane Smart, director of IUCN’s biodiversity conservation group.

“The latest analysis of the IUCN red list shows the 2010 target to reduce biodiversity loss will not be met. It’s time for governments to start getting serious about saving species and make sure it’s high on their agendas for next year, as we’re rapidly running out of time.”

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The National Zoo's oldest male sloth bear, Merlin, died Wednesday after surgery to repair a partially twisted spleen.

It was the zoo's third animal death in a month.  Zoo officials said Merlin had a history of gastric volvulus, or a twisted stomach.

He had surgery after a routine physical Monday and initially seemed fine, officials said. But he had difficulty recovering from the anesthesia and began vomiting blood-tinged fluid that afternoon.

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Israel's zoo has had a baby boom in the hippo department.  A high birthrate has boosted the hippo population to 40 - far more than the average zoo could handle.  Zookeepers say they reached a point where they could find nothing to do with so many of them.

So in recent months, 14 hippos have been shipped by air or sea to zoos in Russia, Turkey, Vietnam, even Kazakhstan.  They say Israel is suddenly the world's top exporter of hippopotamuses. Many more zoos have placed orders.

The National Zoo says two older Scimitar-horned oryx, which are extinct in the wild, have died. A 17-year-old female oryx died at the zoo's main campus on Oct. 24.

The animal had been anesthetized two days earlier for a routine health assessment, but during her recovery she became agitated.

She died while being anesthetized again for an emergency follow-up exam.

A 16-year-old male oryx died at the zoo's Conservation and Research Center in Front Royal, Va., on Oct. 14.

 He died while also being anesthetized for a routine reproductive assessment.

Zoo spokesman Pamela Baker-Masson says it's always risky to anesthetize animals. Scimitar-horned oryx once lived in northern Africa.

The zoo now has one remaining on exhibit and a herd of 13 surviving at its research center.

Paleontologists in the U.S. and China have discovered a new species of mammal that lived 123 million years ago in what is now the Liaoning Province in China.

The newly discovered chipmunk-sized animal, named Maotherium asiaticus, was found in the famous fossil-rich beds of the Yixian Formation in China.

The fossil mammal, reported in this week's issue of the journal Science, offers an important clue to how the mammalian middle ear evolved. It represents an intermediate stage in the evolutionary process of how modern mammals acquired a middle ear structure.

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Halloween came early for some residents of the Brookfield Zoo, who were given pumpkins Wednesday as part of a zoo-wide behavioral enrichment program.

The animals -- which included lions, tigers and bears, oh my -- were not able to carve the jack-o'-lanterns but did roll, maul and gnaw them.

The fate of a Florida manatee that has wandered into northern New Jersey waters remained unclear Saturday night.

The wayward male - known as Ilya - has been stuck near a Linden oil refinery, and officials say plunging temperatures and a lack of food were endangering its life.

And while the gentle sea cow appears to be in good health, it had been huddling near an outfall pipe at an oil refinery - the only place it could find warm water.

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