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Next@CNN
Critters in Conflict
Aired September 28, 2002 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: Today, on a special edition of NEXT@CNN: Critters in Conflict. From bears to beetles, from snakeheads to snakes. When animals and people clash, it can be bad for both sides.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really, people don't understand what this animal is capable of doing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: We'll look at the cost in lives, and in billions of dollars.
Also, new ways to take your music with you, and your movies, and your games.
And a linguist looks at "like."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was awesome. Like, he's amazing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: The verdict is, it actually means something. We'll tell you what. All that and more on NEXT.
JAMES HATTORI, HOST: Welcome to NEXT@CNN, this week from San Francisco's Pier 39. Hi, everybody, I'm James Hattori.
This is an appropriate place to begin our special look at critters in conflict, how people and animals sometimes clash instead of coexist.
These boisterous sea lions have been a fixture at this dock for more than a decade. San Francisco Bay not only provides them an abundant food supply, but safety from the predatory great white sharks of the Pacific. But while the sea lions are a big hit with tourists, they can be a nuisance to fishermen, at times eating their catch and getting tangled up in their fishing lines. The situation has gotten so bad in places along the California coast, some fishermen have actually killed sea lions to protect their catch.
The trouble started with the sea lions' voracious appetite, something they share with an alien species of fish that's turned up in Maryland this summer and quickly won the nickname "Frankenfish." Wildlife officials warn it could devastate the eco system. Kathleen Koch updates us on efforts to keep America safe from the northern snakehead.
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KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was billed as a menacing monster from faraway China, a fish with a price on its head. Two northern snakeheads tossed by their owner into this Maryland pond, where they had reproduced with abandon. Problem is, the air-breathing, land-walking predator also ate with abandon, endangering native fish that made it into the nearby waterways.
BOB BOCK, NORTH AMERICAN NATIVE FISHES ASSOCIATION: The snakehead has the potential to preside over mass extinctions throughout the East Coast if it gets out of this pond.
KOCH: So the U.S. Interior Department proposed a nationwide import ban on live snakeheads, and Maryland wildlife officials insisted they have no choice but to pump gallons of poison into the nine-acre pond.
ERIC SCHWAAB, MARYLAND DEPT. OF NATURAL RESOURCES: We're not happy about it. We're going to see a lot of dead fish here today.
KOCH: Thousands of fish died, including the voracious snakehead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So we think at this point that we've now captured the original breeding pair.
KOCH (on camera): But killing all the snakeheads in this pond and slapping a federal ban on importing the fish doesn't guarantee the threat is over.
(voice-over): Snakeheads have been spotted in six states besides Maryland.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was in between two (UNINTELLIGIBLE), and I said, that's a snakehead.
KOCH: The day after the pond poisoning, one turned up in the Baltimore Harbor.
At least 17,000 have been imported live by Asian fish markets and pet stores since 1997.
PATRICK DONSTON, OWNER, ABSOLUTELY FISH: They are one of the ones that gets large. They're known to get 100 centimeters plus, which amounts to over three feet.
KOCH: And federal inspectors can't check every crate in every port, so some snakeheads will likely slip through.
Controlling invasive species like the snakehead and repairing the damage they do costs the U.S. an estimated $10 billion a year. Still, federal officials admit, as more become established, they can't always afford to stop them.
JOE STARINCHAK, U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE: There are people who question whether we should even be concerned about, you know, trying to prevent or control them, and just embrace them.
KOCH (on camera): So embrace the snakehead, embrace the (UNINTELLIGIBLE)?
STARINCHAK: Well, those are some of the strategies we're considering, because, again, we don't have the manpower.
KOCH (voice-over): A costly but some say inevitable compromise.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: A critter you wouldn't want to compromise with is the brown tree snake. Native to New Guinea, they spread to Guam, where they are wiping out other species and sometimes threatening people. Now, the concern is they might spread even further. Gary Strieker has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY STRIEKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The invaders are silent and secretive, but on the island of Guam, they're not hard to find.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They will travel across the ground, and they have a certain attraction to fences.
Yeah, that's just a young one.
STRIEKER: Brown tree snakes are not native to Guam, but experts believe at least a million of them are now crawling on this island.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This snake is about your normal, average sized brown tree snake on Guam. The largest one was 10.5 feet.
STRIEKER: All of these snakes, according to DNA studies, descended from one female, apparently a stowaway in a shipment of military cargo from New Guinea after the Second World War.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See, they have very prominent eyes. Helps them see at night.
STRIEKER: Because the snakes are nocturnal, most people here, including tourists on the island, have never seen them. But they cause frequent power failures by climbing utility polls. And many find these venomous snakes in their homes, lurking in their toilets, sometimes trying to eat sleeping children.
ERNIE MATSON, FATHER: Looked at his crib, and he had snake's tail wrapped around his neck and the snake's head wrapped around his leg, and he was busy, 10-month-old holding onto the crib, busy trying to pull the snake off of him. STRIEKER: But the snakes usually avoid humans. By feeding on wildlife, they've turned Guam's forests into silent landscapes, wiping out 10 species of birds, including the Guam rail (ph), a flightless bird unique to this island.
Even tough survivors like fruit bats are almost gone, but scientists say this could be just the beginning of the snakes' invasion.
MIKE PITZLER, WILDLIFE SERVICE: Really people don't understand what this animal is capable of doing.
STRIEKER: The biggest worry now is that the snakes could escape from Guam, hiding in shipments of cargo, leaving the island by air or sea. They could destroy bird populations in Hawaii, and even many areas of the U.S. mainland.
MICHAEL KUHLMAN, FORMER DIRECTOR, GUAM DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE: Anywhere around the Gulf Coast, or the Carolinas, Alabama -- they'd be quite happy, and you'd never get them out of there.
STRIEKER: A U.S. government program is focused on preventing the snakes from leaving Guam, using inspection teams with snake-sniffing dogs, specially designed fences to keep them out of air fields and ports, and thousands of traps across the island.
Few people expect it will ever be possible to exterminate brown tree snakes on Guam. Authorities say they've reduced the numbers of snakes in high-risk areas, but that hasn't stopped some snakes from reaching airports in Hawaii, Alaska, Texas and Spain -- all of them reportedly captured. And authorities admit the snakes have now apparently colonized at least two other islands not far from Guam.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE BURKHARDT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): It seems like the South wouldn't be the South without kudzu. But, in fact, the plant is relatively new. It started back in the 1930s when highway departments in the South came up with what they thought was the ideal way to control erosion -- an Asian ornamental plant called kudzu. It was called the miracle vine, in part because of how fast it grows, up to a foot a year. In fact, legend has it that if you stay in the same place for too long, it will flat out cover you up.
I don't put much stock in legend, though. Suffice to say that kudzu can take control in no time at all.
(voice-over): Even some military bases have surrendered, changing their training patterns to avoid getting foot soldiers and vehicles snagged by the kudzu invasion.
Today, kudzu covers roadsides, farm fields, and smothers growing trees all over the South. There are even kudzu patches as far north as New York and Pennsylvania. (END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Coming up, alligators and wolves may scare you, but statistically, they're in much more danger from an animal you've probably touched dozens of times.
And later in the show, if you like to watch shuttle launches, you'll love what NASA has in store for you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: The front end of a nutria looks like a beaver, but with big orange teeth. The back end looks like a rat. In the 1930s, farmers in Louisiana and Maryland imported the South American natives in an effort to start a nutria fur industry. When a few dozen nutria got loose, they became the advance wave of a rodent invasion, often inflicting serious harm to plants in coastal wetlands. Today they're established in 40 states. From the Chesapeake Bay to the Mexican border, nutria are a major threat. Efforts to control them include a campaign to make them a major food group -- so far, unsuccessful.
HATTORI: As sprawling sub-divisions consume what used to be wide-open country, it's hard to avoid clashes between people and the wild animals they're pushing out. Maria Hinojosa takes a look at how some officials in New York and New Jersey are trying to ease the conflict.
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MARIA HINOJOSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There are a lot of people who are scared of bears. Susan Kehoe of New Jersey isn't one of them. Several times a week, one, two, or three bears show up at her back yard, climbing trees, frolicking, quenching their thirst.
(on camera): From your perspective, there are bears who like to live around human beings.
SUSAN KEHOE, NEW JERSEY RESIDENT: No, the bears really don't want anything to do with human beings. It's the food that's attracting them. They'd rather stay in the woods and eat in the woods. But it's like a mother going to McDonald's, it's a much easier meal for her to take the kids to McDonald's than to stay home and cook it.
HINOJOSA: Forty minutes away in another New Jersey town, Paul Clemack (ph) has had enough of bears and their penchant for trash.
PAUL CLEMACK, NEW JERSEY RESIDENT: It was about 4:00 in the afternoon, and a bear came over, and it just ripped the door off to get at one little bag of garbage.
HINOJOSA: And a few steps away, even more evidence of bears.
CLEMACK: Two o'clock in the morning that the bear came here, and it was just -- because it's latched, it was just pulling on this and making it go like that, so it woke up everybody. And then it ripped -- you know, wound up ripping the board off the door.
HINOJOSA (on camera): So what do you think the state of New Jersey should do about this?
CLEMACK: There should be a limited hunt.
HINOJOSA (voice-over): New Jersey hasn't had a legal bear hunt since 1971, and some say that's the problem. According to some state estimates, the bear population has tripled in as many years, so the pressure is on to reconsider the hunt.
BRADLEY CAMPBELL, NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION: There are many who are very concerned about the welfare of bears who have recognized that a hunt may be appropriate and a more humane approach to controlling the population than merely allowing habitat and food limitations to strike the balance.
HINOJOSA: But animal rights activists say that methods just won't be effective.
MICHAEL MARKARIAN, THE FUND FOR ANIMALS: Hunting animals at random for fun does not target individual problem bears, it does not eliminate the food sources the bears are attracted to. And what we need is a better and more humane plan. Hunting is not going to work.
HINOJOSA: What they want is more targeted education to teach people to not feed the bears and to buy bear-proof garbage cans.
KEHOE: We're all set.
HINOJOSA: It's a growing national dialogue, because as suburban sprawl in the East Coast reaches into more virgin forest, there are areas populated with beautiful deer. And on the West Coast there are mountain lions showing up in back yards, and the bears in New Jersey.
But exactly who is encroaching on whom? It depends on who you ask.
KEHOE: If you don't like wildlife, if you don't like deer eating your plants, if you don't like bear in your back yard, stay in the city.
CLEMACK: We've been here for 24 years. We never had a bear problem until about two or three years ago. So we were here first.
HINOJOSA: Perhaps. But the bears seem to believe they're welcome everywhere, no matter who got there first.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: So, what would you guess is the most deadly animal? Ann Kellan has the answer, and it's a classic case of less is more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANN KELLAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): If you live in the U.S., these big cats shouldn't worry you. You have a better chance getting struck by lightning than being killed by a mountain lion. Even the mighty shark, with three deadly attacks in 2001 and a starring role in numerous "Jaws" sequels, is less a threat to humans than other creatures.
Can you guess the animal that kills more humans than any other? Here's a hint. Think small.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lion.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tiger.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A bear.
KELLAN: Oh, my. Not those. Think smaller. Not a penguin. They've never killed anyone. Smaller.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A wolf.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A dog.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Alligator maybe?
KELLAN: Despite their mean and threatening looks, alligators and crocodiles in the U.S. have killed, on average, one person a year for the past 30 years, says the University of Florida. And who's afraid of the big, bad wolf? Fairy tales like "Little Red Riding Hood" would have us running for cover while the defenders of wildlife say they don't know of any incidents of a wolf killing a human in the U.S.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good boy.
KELLAN: As for man's best friend, the most dangerous canines, according to the Humane Society, are ones humans train as killers for sport. Pit bulls and Rotweilers are responsible for 60 percent of human deaths caused by dogs, which total between 10 and 20 deaths a year, mostly children.
Not as many as the number of people killed by deer. The U.S. Department of Transportation says these timid beasts along with other clueless creatures wandered onto roads, killing 83 people in car accidents in 2000.
It turns out the biggest killers are not big at all, but small insects. The CDC says stinging insects, from killer bees to fire ants, claim between 40 to 60 lives every year in the U.S. But insects carrying diseases kill more than any other creature and mostly outside the U.S. according to the World Health Organization, the tsetse fly spreading sleeping sickness claims about 66,000 lives every year.
Yet it's the mosquito that is the deadliest of them all. The U.S. is feeling its bite with more than 70 deaths from West Nile disease this year. And that's just a fraction of its toll. Throughout the world, the mosquito can also carry encephalitis or malaria, making it responsible for more than two million deaths per year worldwide. (END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Our colleagues at the CNN Web site have put together a special section on critters in conflict. To get there, click on our page, cnn.com/next.
ANNOUNCER: Up next, the billion-dollar bug. There's only one cure for pine beetle infestation, and it doesn't make tree-lovers very happy.
And later in the show, the next generation of weapons borrows a page from science fiction.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BURKHARDT (voice-over): What's the next big nuisance animal? A caterpillar that could turn the desert into -- well, a little more of a desert. The South American cactus moth was brought to the Caribbean to control the runaway growth of prickly pear cactus, the plant that's a staple in North American deserts and quite a few backyards. The moths were discovered in the Florida Keys a dozen years ago, and it's spread north and west to the Florida Panhandle, and so far, it's done its job of controlling cactus a little too well.
The moths lay eggs on the cactus, and the larvae eat the plants from inside out. Biologists at the nature conservancy fear that if the moths spreads further to the Western United States, it could endanger a multi-million dollar ornamental cactus market, and significantly impact wildlife that rely on the plants.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: A critter that's almost too small to see has chewed a path of devastation across the Southeastern U.S. and beyond. The southern pine beetle has already cost us more than $1 billion, and as Charles Molineaux reports, it's still going strong.
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CHARLES MOLINEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ed Taylor's woodsy front yard in north Georgia is losing most of its woods. X marks the spot where his pine trees are being devoured by a monster smaller than a grain of rice, the southern pine beetle. He's among a growing number of homeowners forced to pay thousands of dollars to clear out dead and dying trees.
ED TAYLOR, HOMEOWNER: These trees right in front of us here were green two weeks ago and now they're not. And you can see sitting on the ground there is one that was green maybe a month ago. So...
MOLINEAUX (on camera): It's that fast?
TAYLOR: It's that fast.
WEST NETTLETON (ph): There hasn't been much typical about this latest outbreak we've been experiencing.
MOLINEAUX (voice-over): U.S. Forest Service scientist West Nettleton says he's never seen anything like it, the worst pine beetle outbreak on record, now in its fourth year. The beetles are native to the Southeast, but a long drought has weakened the trees' natural defenses against them. The bugs descend upon a pine by the thousands, turning its bark into Swiss cheese. They breed an army of hungry grubs that dig a maze of tunnels essentially blocking the tree's bloodstream and choking it to death. Like a slow moving forest fire, they've munched their way across the south, devastating an estimated 700,000 acres, including areas way out of their normal territory, into Central Florida and all the way north into the pine barrens of New Jersey.
NETTLETON: There's basically four ways of controlling southern pine beetle spots. They're basically cut, cut, cut and cut.
MOLINEAUX: And the pines are all gone?
TAYLOR: The pines are gone. They were killed by the beetle.
MOLINEAUX (voice-over): Which leaves ragged gaps in national forests, parks, campgrounds and timber plantations. Since this infestation started, the bugs have done over a billion dollars in damage.
(on camera): So when does it end? Scientists figure a few days of 100 degree plus temperatures or a severe winter cold snap would knock the beetles down, and, of course, an end to the drought would better fortify the trees. Otherwise, it's up to the bugs' natural enemies, like other beetles, wasps or woodpeckers, meaning this infestation will just have to run its course.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Up next, who are you going to call to grab a gator or snag a snake? Meet a man whose business is called Pesky Critters.
Also ahead in our next half-hour, the real meaning of "like."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely descriptive in, like, a nondescript way. See, I just used it right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: First, we'll take a break, and then get the latest headlines from the CNN newsroom. Don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: The late John Belushi on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE made light of the widespread fear that aggressive killer bees would swarm north from Mexico all the way to the Canadian border. While this 1970 scare never quite materialized, there's not much comedy left in killer bees either. There have been a dozen fatal attacks from killer bees since they really did cross the border in the 1990s.
They are established in southern Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada and southern California. Their march northward is going very slowly, probably due to winter weather. They're also a threat to the beekeeping industry. European bees are far easier to manage, and they make five times as much honey as the Africanized killer bees.
HATTORI: If you get upset over squirrels in the attic or rabbits in the vegetable patch, you should try living to South Florida. So what do people do when they find a gator in a garden?
Our Bruce Burkhardt introduces us to a man who's calling in life centers on critters in conflict.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BURKHARDT (voice-over): Long before hanging chads, Florida had always been known for a couple of other things: Gators and tourists. Florida doesn't lack for attractions that bring those two species together.
But if gators and people find some awkward form of peaceful coexistence here, they do not fear. The gator is hooked but he's not giving up without a fight. Todd Hardwick is used to that.
TODD HARDWICK, PESKY CRITTERS COMPANY OWNER: How does it feel to be an alligator trapper?
BURKHARDT: Uneasy.
HARDWICK: All right, guys. Bring in this one.
BURKHARDT: He's been doing this for years, answering the call when a gator complaint comes in.
More of those complaints are coming in every year: 17,000 last year throughout Florida. It was a record, and three deaths, also a record.
HARDWICK: This was a wetland for many years and in the last two years, there's probably been 300 to 400 houses built in this area. They're literally digging lakes and filling in the wetland. They're overflowing the alligators, the perimeter canal system.
And we've got two schools on this road, and the parents have been complaining because if the kids walk down this sidewalk to go to school, they've been seeing what they called a 10- to 12-foot alligator.
BURKHARDT: Well, parents can rest easy again, at least for now, till another gator takes this one's place. This was bigger than most, almost 11 feet. HARDWICK: We have an alligator population going that's up every year. We have a human population that's going up every year, but most importantly, you have alligator habitat shrinking.
BURKHARDT: This is one major reason why it's shrinking: new developments popping up in former wetlands. This one just a half mile from where we caught the 11-footer, which came as a bit of a surprise to this woman, a recent transplant from Virginia.
Look at your new neighbor.
HARDWICK: Did they tell you there's alligators down here?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No. Oh, shoot! [screams]
BURKHARDT: There is an invader species here, but it's not the alligator.
HARDWICK: The first thing that I have to explain to them is that it's not the alligator that moved into their neighborhood, that it's they who have moved into the alligator's neighborhood.
BURKHARDT: Still, aside from humans, there are other invader species that Todd deals with.
HARDWICK: That's a albino Burmese python. We probably catch a python or boa once or twice a month.
BURKHARDT: Todd and his company, Pesky Critters, are called upon to remove all sorts of unwanted critters, his backyard filled with animals that escape or are set free by owners that tire of them. Emus, Moroccan Cockatiels, water monitors, even iguanas, a microcosm of the area's exotic pet trade.
The newly liberated animals find South Florida's tropical climate downright hospitable.
HARDWICK: We have so many of those now in South Florida that are breeding, that I would say easily in South Florida we have over 10,000 green iguanas like these guys right over here.
BURKHARDT: Todd is paid by private individuals to remove the occasional python or iguana, but when it comes to gators, the state of Florida picks up the tab.
Under state law, anything over four feet ends up here, at a private plant where gators are processed into meat, Harley Davidson seats, and shoes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have this piece here, which is the front of the alligator.
BURKHARDT: But under four feet, then the future is slightly brighter.
HARDWICK: Even though we've got him out here away from town, he'll end up in someone's backyard and he'll probably eventually be captured. So we'll see him again one day, I'm afraid. But for now, he gets a second chance.
See you later, alligator.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: There was nobody like Todd Hardwick around to help a man in western Canada in his struggle to cope with beavers. But he came up with a solution that sounded good to him and bad to the beavers.
Jason Matity of Canada's CTV has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TOM HARPER: Those pesky rascals.
JASON MATITY, CTV REPORTER (voice-over): Tom Harper's embroiled in a bitter battle with beavers.
HARPER Well, it was just nature in all its ability, and I was building (ph). That's the nicest way to describe it.
MATITY: For more than a month, Harper pulled sticks from this water pipe in an effort to keep his nearby home high and dry.
HARPER: Every night there was a plug in it, and every morning I was digging it out.
MATITY: Growing frustrated with the pesky critters, Harper called the local conservation officer, asking him to come and capture the beavers and release them at another location.
When the conservation officer said that was too expensive, it left Harper to take nature into his own hands.
HARPER: I sat down in the bunker and shot the two that I did destroy, and was heartbroken over that.
MATITY: Then Harper noticed how spooked the beavers got when they heard his voice. He brought out his radio, powered it up and let it echo through the valley night after night.
RADIO: Our top story this hour...
HARPER: I picked up the CBC station, the closest one to me, and rattled their ears with that, and there was no more beaver problem.
MATITY: It only took about two weeks of CBC Radio to scare the beavers off.
BILL GERALD, CBC SASKATCHEWAN: We serve in many ways...
MATITY: But the director of radio and television for CBC Saskatchewan isn't so sure that beavers hate CBC. GERALD: There's an eclectic mix of diversity of radio programming at that time of the hour and it may have appealed to beavers in some way and they went off searching for more.
HARPER: It sure got them wretches away from my culvert.
MATITY: For now, the beavers appear to have moved downstream from Harper's home, where they've started to build another dam. That's fine with Tom Harper, who won't hesitate to turn on CBC if the beavers show up again.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Not very high tech, but still a good way to get us to our gadget segment. When we come back, two new variations on a portable media player. We'll show you what they can do. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: Remember when the Sony Walkman popularized music on the go? Wasn't that long ago? Now, there are hundreds of options for portable music players and some of them play more than just tunes.
Ann Kellan looks at two new contenders in this week's "Technofile."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KELLAN (voice-over): Load it, snap it, play it. Creative Labs makes it that easy to start listening to music on their tiny Nomad MUVO MP3 storage device.
With Windows ME, 2000, or XP you don't need cables or software. Just slide the Nomad MUVO memory apart from the battery pack. Plug the memory into the computer's USB port, your PC reads it as a removable storable device. Drag and drop your files directly onto the MUVO, then reconnect it with the battery pack. Plug in your speakers or the included headphones, and you're ready to play your MP3s.
The 64MB MUVO can hold 44 floppy disks worth of data files, or about 15 music tracks. Double those numbers if you go for the 128MB version. One AAA battery powers up to 12 hours of music. Six buttons navigate you through the files. The unit weighs only one ounce.
The MUVO, short for "music voyage," starts at $130. This may be a good MP3 choice for those who don't want to tangle with cables or software.
Now, if you want to step up from an MP3 player, pick up the Flipster personal multi-media player. Designed to look like a cell phone, this device stores and plays your MP3 audio files, organizes an address book, plays your favorite games and full motion video.
Equipped with Windows Media Player, downloadable video clips are crisp and colorful on a tiny LCD screen. All files are downloadable through a USB connection.
You can also record and play voice messages and store your favorite JPEG picture files to share with friends.
With only 64 to 128MB internal memory, the Flipster has a memory expansion slot to support additional files.
It costs about $400 and you can check one out at PogoProducts.com.
I'm Ann Kellan, and that's "Technofile."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: You can find more on the MUVO and the Flipster on our Web site, CNN.com/Next.
ANNOUNCER: Just ahead, laser weapons are on the horizon. Find out what they can do that today's weapons can't.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: The space shuttle launch is always a spectacular sight, but the next time it heads into orbit, you will see the launch from a new angle.
NASA has mounted a color video camera on the external tank to give a shuttle's eye view. Here's what it sees now with Atlantis sitting on the pad. When the shuttle takes off, the camera is supposed to keep sending video back, until the orbiter is 56 miles above Earth.
Of course, the idea isn't just to make good TV; the pictures will help NASA monitor the launch, which is scheduled, by the way, for next week.
Up in space, at least in the movies, laser weapons has been pretty standard equipment. Now they could be on real fighter planes by the end of the decade.
Bruce Francis reports on the technology that will give U.S. forces a new class of lightweight weaponry.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE FRANCIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It looks like the latest for Sony's Playstation II, but the goal is far more deadly. This simulator is helping trained pilots to fire the first generation of laser weapons.
COL. MARK NEICE, USAF KIRTLAND AFB: This technology has been in the lab and in the research environment for the past 20, 25 years. And we feel it's now mature enough to transition it from a lab environment.
FRANCIS: Gravion (ph) and Lockheed Martin are working with the Air Force at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico and other locations. The first laser weapons are scheduled to be tested onboard a 747 in two years.
If all goes well, they could be on joint strike fighter planes by the end of the decade, according to Colonel Neice. Laser weapons would first be used as far as an air base missile defense, then versus other aircraft, and eventually against targets on the ground.
NICK COOK, MNE'S DEFENSE WEEKLY: Cost estimates must vary, but you can be assured that the development costs of a weapon like this would not come in much under several million dollars.
FRANCIS: But once developed, laser weapons have huge cost advantages over conventional weapons.
For example, a satellite-guided bomb can cost $10,000 to $20,000 each, whereas a single laser shot can cost hundreds of dollars.
And laser weapons are potentially more covert, frying the circuitry of a key telecom center but not blowing it up. They could even be used to blind, maim or kill troops on the ground.
There are drawbacks. Unlike traditional weapons, a misfired laser can, in theory, go on indefinitely until it hits something, increasing the chances for damage by friendly fire or to civilians.
But within the decade, the United States is betting that its enemies will never see the light that hits them.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: When teenagers talk, one professor listened. She'll explain the meaning of "like" when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: You know, people used to complain about the phrase "you know," but now they're, like, "What's up with this word 'like?'" If you think "like" is just meaningless filler in teenagers' sentences, a linguistics professor has news for you.
Here's Jeanne Moos.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It is a four-letter word used by a lot of "like"-minded people.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would give it like a six.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She is, like, total soft and nice.
MOOS: It inspires repeat offenders.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was awesome. He's amazing. His voice stays great, like... MOOS: It was even the title of a sit com.
TITLE: It's like, you know...
MOOS: But some can't sit calmly and hear it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're talking to someone and every other word is like...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... you just want to slap them.
MOOS: Leave it to a linguist to find a lot to like about "like" and publish a 31-page paper on it in the "Journal of Semantics," complete with graphs and formulas.
Are you anti-"like" or pro-"like"?
PROF. MUFFY SIEGEL TEMPLE UNIVERSITY: I am -- the linguist in me is pro-"like;" it's useful.
MOOS: Did she say useful?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a filler. When you don't know what you're going to say next.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it is to make up for people's stupidity.
MOOS: But Professor Muffy Siegel learned to appreciate the discourse particle "like" after hearing her teenage daughters always using it.
SIEGEL: I said, "I don't see any books." And she said, "Yeah, they're there. There's, like, every book under the bed." To a linguist, that is an astounding sentence. My daughter had used her word "like" to weaken a strong noun phrase.
MOOS: Professor Siegel says "like" is often used as a hedge word to weaken, making it more meaningful than, say, "um," "oh," or "well."
For instance, the sentence "He has, like, six brothers," implies "give or take a brother, don't hold me to six."
Professor Siegel is known for using a ventriloquist puppet named Gregory Grackle (ph) in her classes at Temple University.
SIEGEL: [speaking as puppet] I am, like, an assistant associate professor.
MOOS: Even Gregory (ph) uses "like." It crept into our conversations with students.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely descriptive in, like, a nondescript way. See, I just used it right now. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like, if you're trying to teach somebody something, you don't want to use it.
MOOS: You just used it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I just did it.
MOOS: Back when Valley Girl-isms flourished in the Eighties...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Man, he's just, like, trip-endicular, you know?
MOOS: ... linguists thought "like" would die out. but instead, it spread.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALICIA SILVERSTONE: People came that did not, like RSVP, so I was, like, totally bugging.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOOS: Professor Siegel says more young women use it than men.
SIEGEL: "Like" is used as kind of an emblem, a feeling of closeness.
MOOS: Her research resulted in articles and editorials, even a few angry e-mails.
SIEGEL: "The study is nothing more than an apologia for the inarticulate, under-educated..."
MOOS: Another sarcastically asked what the professor would make of this sentence:
SIEGEL: "I'm, like, pregnant."
MOOS: Or how about this one?
SIEGEL: Professor Siegel's first name says just about, like, everything, you, like, need to know.
MOOS: What's your first name?
SIEGEL: My name is Muffy.
MOOS: Muffy could tell him where to put his discourse particle.
SIEGEL: [as puppet] There are, like, prejudices against me. I think it's because I'm corduroy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: I thought he was made of velvet. You know, we're, like, out of time. But before we go, here's a look at what's coming up next week.
We'll take you to a LAN party that gives a whole new meaning to social networking; and check out some souped up hot rod computers. Plus, windmills provide endless energy without pollution. So why is a proposed windmill farm off Cape Cod drawing opposition from some famous environmentalists?
That and a lot more coming up on NEXT. Until then, let us know how we're doing. Drop us an e-mail. Our address is next@cnn.com.
Thanks so much for joining us this week, and thanks to our friends here at Pier 39, including all the perky (UNINTELLIGIBLE). For all of us on the sci-tech beat, I'm James Hattori. We'll see you next time.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired September 28, 2002 - 13:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
ANNOUNCER: Today, on a special edition of NEXT@CNN: Critters in Conflict. From bears to beetles, from snakeheads to snakes. When animals and people clash, it can be bad for both sides.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Really, people don't understand what this animal is capable of doing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: We'll look at the cost in lives, and in billions of dollars.
Also, new ways to take your music with you, and your movies, and your games.
And a linguist looks at "like."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was awesome. Like, he's amazing.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: The verdict is, it actually means something. We'll tell you what. All that and more on NEXT.
JAMES HATTORI, HOST: Welcome to NEXT@CNN, this week from San Francisco's Pier 39. Hi, everybody, I'm James Hattori.
This is an appropriate place to begin our special look at critters in conflict, how people and animals sometimes clash instead of coexist.
These boisterous sea lions have been a fixture at this dock for more than a decade. San Francisco Bay not only provides them an abundant food supply, but safety from the predatory great white sharks of the Pacific. But while the sea lions are a big hit with tourists, they can be a nuisance to fishermen, at times eating their catch and getting tangled up in their fishing lines. The situation has gotten so bad in places along the California coast, some fishermen have actually killed sea lions to protect their catch.
The trouble started with the sea lions' voracious appetite, something they share with an alien species of fish that's turned up in Maryland this summer and quickly won the nickname "Frankenfish." Wildlife officials warn it could devastate the eco system. Kathleen Koch updates us on efforts to keep America safe from the northern snakehead.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KATHLEEN KOCH, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It was billed as a menacing monster from faraway China, a fish with a price on its head. Two northern snakeheads tossed by their owner into this Maryland pond, where they had reproduced with abandon. Problem is, the air-breathing, land-walking predator also ate with abandon, endangering native fish that made it into the nearby waterways.
BOB BOCK, NORTH AMERICAN NATIVE FISHES ASSOCIATION: The snakehead has the potential to preside over mass extinctions throughout the East Coast if it gets out of this pond.
KOCH: So the U.S. Interior Department proposed a nationwide import ban on live snakeheads, and Maryland wildlife officials insisted they have no choice but to pump gallons of poison into the nine-acre pond.
ERIC SCHWAAB, MARYLAND DEPT. OF NATURAL RESOURCES: We're not happy about it. We're going to see a lot of dead fish here today.
KOCH: Thousands of fish died, including the voracious snakehead.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So we think at this point that we've now captured the original breeding pair.
KOCH (on camera): But killing all the snakeheads in this pond and slapping a federal ban on importing the fish doesn't guarantee the threat is over.
(voice-over): Snakeheads have been spotted in six states besides Maryland.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It was in between two (UNINTELLIGIBLE), and I said, that's a snakehead.
KOCH: The day after the pond poisoning, one turned up in the Baltimore Harbor.
At least 17,000 have been imported live by Asian fish markets and pet stores since 1997.
PATRICK DONSTON, OWNER, ABSOLUTELY FISH: They are one of the ones that gets large. They're known to get 100 centimeters plus, which amounts to over three feet.
KOCH: And federal inspectors can't check every crate in every port, so some snakeheads will likely slip through.
Controlling invasive species like the snakehead and repairing the damage they do costs the U.S. an estimated $10 billion a year. Still, federal officials admit, as more become established, they can't always afford to stop them.
JOE STARINCHAK, U.S. FISH & WILDLIFE SERVICE: There are people who question whether we should even be concerned about, you know, trying to prevent or control them, and just embrace them.
KOCH (on camera): So embrace the snakehead, embrace the (UNINTELLIGIBLE)?
STARINCHAK: Well, those are some of the strategies we're considering, because, again, we don't have the manpower.
KOCH (voice-over): A costly but some say inevitable compromise.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: A critter you wouldn't want to compromise with is the brown tree snake. Native to New Guinea, they spread to Guam, where they are wiping out other species and sometimes threatening people. Now, the concern is they might spread even further. Gary Strieker has that story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
GARY STRIEKER, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The invaders are silent and secretive, but on the island of Guam, they're not hard to find.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They will travel across the ground, and they have a certain attraction to fences.
Yeah, that's just a young one.
STRIEKER: Brown tree snakes are not native to Guam, but experts believe at least a million of them are now crawling on this island.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This snake is about your normal, average sized brown tree snake on Guam. The largest one was 10.5 feet.
STRIEKER: All of these snakes, according to DNA studies, descended from one female, apparently a stowaway in a shipment of military cargo from New Guinea after the Second World War.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: See, they have very prominent eyes. Helps them see at night.
STRIEKER: Because the snakes are nocturnal, most people here, including tourists on the island, have never seen them. But they cause frequent power failures by climbing utility polls. And many find these venomous snakes in their homes, lurking in their toilets, sometimes trying to eat sleeping children.
ERNIE MATSON, FATHER: Looked at his crib, and he had snake's tail wrapped around his neck and the snake's head wrapped around his leg, and he was busy, 10-month-old holding onto the crib, busy trying to pull the snake off of him. STRIEKER: But the snakes usually avoid humans. By feeding on wildlife, they've turned Guam's forests into silent landscapes, wiping out 10 species of birds, including the Guam rail (ph), a flightless bird unique to this island.
Even tough survivors like fruit bats are almost gone, but scientists say this could be just the beginning of the snakes' invasion.
MIKE PITZLER, WILDLIFE SERVICE: Really people don't understand what this animal is capable of doing.
STRIEKER: The biggest worry now is that the snakes could escape from Guam, hiding in shipments of cargo, leaving the island by air or sea. They could destroy bird populations in Hawaii, and even many areas of the U.S. mainland.
MICHAEL KUHLMAN, FORMER DIRECTOR, GUAM DEPT. OF AGRICULTURE: Anywhere around the Gulf Coast, or the Carolinas, Alabama -- they'd be quite happy, and you'd never get them out of there.
STRIEKER: A U.S. government program is focused on preventing the snakes from leaving Guam, using inspection teams with snake-sniffing dogs, specially designed fences to keep them out of air fields and ports, and thousands of traps across the island.
Few people expect it will ever be possible to exterminate brown tree snakes on Guam. Authorities say they've reduced the numbers of snakes in high-risk areas, but that hasn't stopped some snakes from reaching airports in Hawaii, Alaska, Texas and Spain -- all of them reportedly captured. And authorities admit the snakes have now apparently colonized at least two other islands not far from Guam.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE BURKHARDT, CNN CORRESPONDENT (on camera): It seems like the South wouldn't be the South without kudzu. But, in fact, the plant is relatively new. It started back in the 1930s when highway departments in the South came up with what they thought was the ideal way to control erosion -- an Asian ornamental plant called kudzu. It was called the miracle vine, in part because of how fast it grows, up to a foot a year. In fact, legend has it that if you stay in the same place for too long, it will flat out cover you up.
I don't put much stock in legend, though. Suffice to say that kudzu can take control in no time at all.
(voice-over): Even some military bases have surrendered, changing their training patterns to avoid getting foot soldiers and vehicles snagged by the kudzu invasion.
Today, kudzu covers roadsides, farm fields, and smothers growing trees all over the South. There are even kudzu patches as far north as New York and Pennsylvania. (END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Coming up, alligators and wolves may scare you, but statistically, they're in much more danger from an animal you've probably touched dozens of times.
And later in the show, if you like to watch shuttle launches, you'll love what NASA has in store for you.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: The front end of a nutria looks like a beaver, but with big orange teeth. The back end looks like a rat. In the 1930s, farmers in Louisiana and Maryland imported the South American natives in an effort to start a nutria fur industry. When a few dozen nutria got loose, they became the advance wave of a rodent invasion, often inflicting serious harm to plants in coastal wetlands. Today they're established in 40 states. From the Chesapeake Bay to the Mexican border, nutria are a major threat. Efforts to control them include a campaign to make them a major food group -- so far, unsuccessful.
HATTORI: As sprawling sub-divisions consume what used to be wide-open country, it's hard to avoid clashes between people and the wild animals they're pushing out. Maria Hinojosa takes a look at how some officials in New York and New Jersey are trying to ease the conflict.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARIA HINOJOSA, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): There are a lot of people who are scared of bears. Susan Kehoe of New Jersey isn't one of them. Several times a week, one, two, or three bears show up at her back yard, climbing trees, frolicking, quenching their thirst.
(on camera): From your perspective, there are bears who like to live around human beings.
SUSAN KEHOE, NEW JERSEY RESIDENT: No, the bears really don't want anything to do with human beings. It's the food that's attracting them. They'd rather stay in the woods and eat in the woods. But it's like a mother going to McDonald's, it's a much easier meal for her to take the kids to McDonald's than to stay home and cook it.
HINOJOSA: Forty minutes away in another New Jersey town, Paul Clemack (ph) has had enough of bears and their penchant for trash.
PAUL CLEMACK, NEW JERSEY RESIDENT: It was about 4:00 in the afternoon, and a bear came over, and it just ripped the door off to get at one little bag of garbage.
HINOJOSA: And a few steps away, even more evidence of bears.
CLEMACK: Two o'clock in the morning that the bear came here, and it was just -- because it's latched, it was just pulling on this and making it go like that, so it woke up everybody. And then it ripped -- you know, wound up ripping the board off the door.
HINOJOSA (on camera): So what do you think the state of New Jersey should do about this?
CLEMACK: There should be a limited hunt.
HINOJOSA (voice-over): New Jersey hasn't had a legal bear hunt since 1971, and some say that's the problem. According to some state estimates, the bear population has tripled in as many years, so the pressure is on to reconsider the hunt.
BRADLEY CAMPBELL, NEW JERSEY DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION: There are many who are very concerned about the welfare of bears who have recognized that a hunt may be appropriate and a more humane approach to controlling the population than merely allowing habitat and food limitations to strike the balance.
HINOJOSA: But animal rights activists say that methods just won't be effective.
MICHAEL MARKARIAN, THE FUND FOR ANIMALS: Hunting animals at random for fun does not target individual problem bears, it does not eliminate the food sources the bears are attracted to. And what we need is a better and more humane plan. Hunting is not going to work.
HINOJOSA: What they want is more targeted education to teach people to not feed the bears and to buy bear-proof garbage cans.
KEHOE: We're all set.
HINOJOSA: It's a growing national dialogue, because as suburban sprawl in the East Coast reaches into more virgin forest, there are areas populated with beautiful deer. And on the West Coast there are mountain lions showing up in back yards, and the bears in New Jersey.
But exactly who is encroaching on whom? It depends on who you ask.
KEHOE: If you don't like wildlife, if you don't like deer eating your plants, if you don't like bear in your back yard, stay in the city.
CLEMACK: We've been here for 24 years. We never had a bear problem until about two or three years ago. So we were here first.
HINOJOSA: Perhaps. But the bears seem to believe they're welcome everywhere, no matter who got there first.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: So, what would you guess is the most deadly animal? Ann Kellan has the answer, and it's a classic case of less is more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ANN KELLAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): If you live in the U.S., these big cats shouldn't worry you. You have a better chance getting struck by lightning than being killed by a mountain lion. Even the mighty shark, with three deadly attacks in 2001 and a starring role in numerous "Jaws" sequels, is less a threat to humans than other creatures.
Can you guess the animal that kills more humans than any other? Here's a hint. Think small.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A lion.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Tiger.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A bear.
KELLAN: Oh, my. Not those. Think smaller. Not a penguin. They've never killed anyone. Smaller.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A wolf.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A dog.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Alligator maybe?
KELLAN: Despite their mean and threatening looks, alligators and crocodiles in the U.S. have killed, on average, one person a year for the past 30 years, says the University of Florida. And who's afraid of the big, bad wolf? Fairy tales like "Little Red Riding Hood" would have us running for cover while the defenders of wildlife say they don't know of any incidents of a wolf killing a human in the U.S.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Good boy.
KELLAN: As for man's best friend, the most dangerous canines, according to the Humane Society, are ones humans train as killers for sport. Pit bulls and Rotweilers are responsible for 60 percent of human deaths caused by dogs, which total between 10 and 20 deaths a year, mostly children.
Not as many as the number of people killed by deer. The U.S. Department of Transportation says these timid beasts along with other clueless creatures wandered onto roads, killing 83 people in car accidents in 2000.
It turns out the biggest killers are not big at all, but small insects. The CDC says stinging insects, from killer bees to fire ants, claim between 40 to 60 lives every year in the U.S. But insects carrying diseases kill more than any other creature and mostly outside the U.S. according to the World Health Organization, the tsetse fly spreading sleeping sickness claims about 66,000 lives every year.
Yet it's the mosquito that is the deadliest of them all. The U.S. is feeling its bite with more than 70 deaths from West Nile disease this year. And that's just a fraction of its toll. Throughout the world, the mosquito can also carry encephalitis or malaria, making it responsible for more than two million deaths per year worldwide. (END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Our colleagues at the CNN Web site have put together a special section on critters in conflict. To get there, click on our page, cnn.com/next.
ANNOUNCER: Up next, the billion-dollar bug. There's only one cure for pine beetle infestation, and it doesn't make tree-lovers very happy.
And later in the show, the next generation of weapons borrows a page from science fiction.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BURKHARDT (voice-over): What's the next big nuisance animal? A caterpillar that could turn the desert into -- well, a little more of a desert. The South American cactus moth was brought to the Caribbean to control the runaway growth of prickly pear cactus, the plant that's a staple in North American deserts and quite a few backyards. The moths were discovered in the Florida Keys a dozen years ago, and it's spread north and west to the Florida Panhandle, and so far, it's done its job of controlling cactus a little too well.
The moths lay eggs on the cactus, and the larvae eat the plants from inside out. Biologists at the nature conservancy fear that if the moths spreads further to the Western United States, it could endanger a multi-million dollar ornamental cactus market, and significantly impact wildlife that rely on the plants.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: A critter that's almost too small to see has chewed a path of devastation across the Southeastern U.S. and beyond. The southern pine beetle has already cost us more than $1 billion, and as Charles Molineaux reports, it's still going strong.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHARLES MOLINEAUX, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Ed Taylor's woodsy front yard in north Georgia is losing most of its woods. X marks the spot where his pine trees are being devoured by a monster smaller than a grain of rice, the southern pine beetle. He's among a growing number of homeowners forced to pay thousands of dollars to clear out dead and dying trees.
ED TAYLOR, HOMEOWNER: These trees right in front of us here were green two weeks ago and now they're not. And you can see sitting on the ground there is one that was green maybe a month ago. So...
MOLINEAUX (on camera): It's that fast?
TAYLOR: It's that fast.
WEST NETTLETON (ph): There hasn't been much typical about this latest outbreak we've been experiencing.
MOLINEAUX (voice-over): U.S. Forest Service scientist West Nettleton says he's never seen anything like it, the worst pine beetle outbreak on record, now in its fourth year. The beetles are native to the Southeast, but a long drought has weakened the trees' natural defenses against them. The bugs descend upon a pine by the thousands, turning its bark into Swiss cheese. They breed an army of hungry grubs that dig a maze of tunnels essentially blocking the tree's bloodstream and choking it to death. Like a slow moving forest fire, they've munched their way across the south, devastating an estimated 700,000 acres, including areas way out of their normal territory, into Central Florida and all the way north into the pine barrens of New Jersey.
NETTLETON: There's basically four ways of controlling southern pine beetle spots. They're basically cut, cut, cut and cut.
MOLINEAUX: And the pines are all gone?
TAYLOR: The pines are gone. They were killed by the beetle.
MOLINEAUX (voice-over): Which leaves ragged gaps in national forests, parks, campgrounds and timber plantations. Since this infestation started, the bugs have done over a billion dollars in damage.
(on camera): So when does it end? Scientists figure a few days of 100 degree plus temperatures or a severe winter cold snap would knock the beetles down, and, of course, an end to the drought would better fortify the trees. Otherwise, it's up to the bugs' natural enemies, like other beetles, wasps or woodpeckers, meaning this infestation will just have to run its course.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: Up next, who are you going to call to grab a gator or snag a snake? Meet a man whose business is called Pesky Critters.
Also ahead in our next half-hour, the real meaning of "like."
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely descriptive in, like, a nondescript way. See, I just used it right now.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
ANNOUNCER: First, we'll take a break, and then get the latest headlines from the CNN newsroom. Don't go away.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
ANNOUNCER: The late John Belushi on SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE made light of the widespread fear that aggressive killer bees would swarm north from Mexico all the way to the Canadian border. While this 1970 scare never quite materialized, there's not much comedy left in killer bees either. There have been a dozen fatal attacks from killer bees since they really did cross the border in the 1990s.
They are established in southern Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada and southern California. Their march northward is going very slowly, probably due to winter weather. They're also a threat to the beekeeping industry. European bees are far easier to manage, and they make five times as much honey as the Africanized killer bees.
HATTORI: If you get upset over squirrels in the attic or rabbits in the vegetable patch, you should try living to South Florida. So what do people do when they find a gator in a garden?
Our Bruce Burkhardt introduces us to a man who's calling in life centers on critters in conflict.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BURKHARDT (voice-over): Long before hanging chads, Florida had always been known for a couple of other things: Gators and tourists. Florida doesn't lack for attractions that bring those two species together.
But if gators and people find some awkward form of peaceful coexistence here, they do not fear. The gator is hooked but he's not giving up without a fight. Todd Hardwick is used to that.
TODD HARDWICK, PESKY CRITTERS COMPANY OWNER: How does it feel to be an alligator trapper?
BURKHARDT: Uneasy.
HARDWICK: All right, guys. Bring in this one.
BURKHARDT: He's been doing this for years, answering the call when a gator complaint comes in.
More of those complaints are coming in every year: 17,000 last year throughout Florida. It was a record, and three deaths, also a record.
HARDWICK: This was a wetland for many years and in the last two years, there's probably been 300 to 400 houses built in this area. They're literally digging lakes and filling in the wetland. They're overflowing the alligators, the perimeter canal system.
And we've got two schools on this road, and the parents have been complaining because if the kids walk down this sidewalk to go to school, they've been seeing what they called a 10- to 12-foot alligator.
BURKHARDT: Well, parents can rest easy again, at least for now, till another gator takes this one's place. This was bigger than most, almost 11 feet. HARDWICK: We have an alligator population going that's up every year. We have a human population that's going up every year, but most importantly, you have alligator habitat shrinking.
BURKHARDT: This is one major reason why it's shrinking: new developments popping up in former wetlands. This one just a half mile from where we caught the 11-footer, which came as a bit of a surprise to this woman, a recent transplant from Virginia.
Look at your new neighbor.
HARDWICK: Did they tell you there's alligators down here?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: No. Oh, shoot! [screams]
BURKHARDT: There is an invader species here, but it's not the alligator.
HARDWICK: The first thing that I have to explain to them is that it's not the alligator that moved into their neighborhood, that it's they who have moved into the alligator's neighborhood.
BURKHARDT: Still, aside from humans, there are other invader species that Todd deals with.
HARDWICK: That's a albino Burmese python. We probably catch a python or boa once or twice a month.
BURKHARDT: Todd and his company, Pesky Critters, are called upon to remove all sorts of unwanted critters, his backyard filled with animals that escape or are set free by owners that tire of them. Emus, Moroccan Cockatiels, water monitors, even iguanas, a microcosm of the area's exotic pet trade.
The newly liberated animals find South Florida's tropical climate downright hospitable.
HARDWICK: We have so many of those now in South Florida that are breeding, that I would say easily in South Florida we have over 10,000 green iguanas like these guys right over here.
BURKHARDT: Todd is paid by private individuals to remove the occasional python or iguana, but when it comes to gators, the state of Florida picks up the tab.
Under state law, anything over four feet ends up here, at a private plant where gators are processed into meat, Harley Davidson seats, and shoes.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: You have this piece here, which is the front of the alligator.
BURKHARDT: But under four feet, then the future is slightly brighter.
HARDWICK: Even though we've got him out here away from town, he'll end up in someone's backyard and he'll probably eventually be captured. So we'll see him again one day, I'm afraid. But for now, he gets a second chance.
See you later, alligator.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: There was nobody like Todd Hardwick around to help a man in western Canada in his struggle to cope with beavers. But he came up with a solution that sounded good to him and bad to the beavers.
Jason Matity of Canada's CTV has the story.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TOM HARPER: Those pesky rascals.
JASON MATITY, CTV REPORTER (voice-over): Tom Harper's embroiled in a bitter battle with beavers.
HARPER Well, it was just nature in all its ability, and I was building (ph). That's the nicest way to describe it.
MATITY: For more than a month, Harper pulled sticks from this water pipe in an effort to keep his nearby home high and dry.
HARPER: Every night there was a plug in it, and every morning I was digging it out.
MATITY: Growing frustrated with the pesky critters, Harper called the local conservation officer, asking him to come and capture the beavers and release them at another location.
When the conservation officer said that was too expensive, it left Harper to take nature into his own hands.
HARPER: I sat down in the bunker and shot the two that I did destroy, and was heartbroken over that.
MATITY: Then Harper noticed how spooked the beavers got when they heard his voice. He brought out his radio, powered it up and let it echo through the valley night after night.
RADIO: Our top story this hour...
HARPER: I picked up the CBC station, the closest one to me, and rattled their ears with that, and there was no more beaver problem.
MATITY: It only took about two weeks of CBC Radio to scare the beavers off.
BILL GERALD, CBC SASKATCHEWAN: We serve in many ways...
MATITY: But the director of radio and television for CBC Saskatchewan isn't so sure that beavers hate CBC. GERALD: There's an eclectic mix of diversity of radio programming at that time of the hour and it may have appealed to beavers in some way and they went off searching for more.
HARPER: It sure got them wretches away from my culvert.
MATITY: For now, the beavers appear to have moved downstream from Harper's home, where they've started to build another dam. That's fine with Tom Harper, who won't hesitate to turn on CBC if the beavers show up again.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: Not very high tech, but still a good way to get us to our gadget segment. When we come back, two new variations on a portable media player. We'll show you what they can do. Stay with us.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: Remember when the Sony Walkman popularized music on the go? Wasn't that long ago? Now, there are hundreds of options for portable music players and some of them play more than just tunes.
Ann Kellan looks at two new contenders in this week's "Technofile."
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
KELLAN (voice-over): Load it, snap it, play it. Creative Labs makes it that easy to start listening to music on their tiny Nomad MUVO MP3 storage device.
With Windows ME, 2000, or XP you don't need cables or software. Just slide the Nomad MUVO memory apart from the battery pack. Plug the memory into the computer's USB port, your PC reads it as a removable storable device. Drag and drop your files directly onto the MUVO, then reconnect it with the battery pack. Plug in your speakers or the included headphones, and you're ready to play your MP3s.
The 64MB MUVO can hold 44 floppy disks worth of data files, or about 15 music tracks. Double those numbers if you go for the 128MB version. One AAA battery powers up to 12 hours of music. Six buttons navigate you through the files. The unit weighs only one ounce.
The MUVO, short for "music voyage," starts at $130. This may be a good MP3 choice for those who don't want to tangle with cables or software.
Now, if you want to step up from an MP3 player, pick up the Flipster personal multi-media player. Designed to look like a cell phone, this device stores and plays your MP3 audio files, organizes an address book, plays your favorite games and full motion video.
Equipped with Windows Media Player, downloadable video clips are crisp and colorful on a tiny LCD screen. All files are downloadable through a USB connection.
You can also record and play voice messages and store your favorite JPEG picture files to share with friends.
With only 64 to 128MB internal memory, the Flipster has a memory expansion slot to support additional files.
It costs about $400 and you can check one out at PogoProducts.com.
I'm Ann Kellan, and that's "Technofile."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: You can find more on the MUVO and the Flipster on our Web site, CNN.com/Next.
ANNOUNCER: Just ahead, laser weapons are on the horizon. Find out what they can do that today's weapons can't.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: The space shuttle launch is always a spectacular sight, but the next time it heads into orbit, you will see the launch from a new angle.
NASA has mounted a color video camera on the external tank to give a shuttle's eye view. Here's what it sees now with Atlantis sitting on the pad. When the shuttle takes off, the camera is supposed to keep sending video back, until the orbiter is 56 miles above Earth.
Of course, the idea isn't just to make good TV; the pictures will help NASA monitor the launch, which is scheduled, by the way, for next week.
Up in space, at least in the movies, laser weapons has been pretty standard equipment. Now they could be on real fighter planes by the end of the decade.
Bruce Francis reports on the technology that will give U.S. forces a new class of lightweight weaponry.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE FRANCIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It looks like the latest for Sony's Playstation II, but the goal is far more deadly. This simulator is helping trained pilots to fire the first generation of laser weapons.
COL. MARK NEICE, USAF KIRTLAND AFB: This technology has been in the lab and in the research environment for the past 20, 25 years. And we feel it's now mature enough to transition it from a lab environment.
FRANCIS: Gravion (ph) and Lockheed Martin are working with the Air Force at Kirtland Air Force Base in New Mexico and other locations. The first laser weapons are scheduled to be tested onboard a 747 in two years.
If all goes well, they could be on joint strike fighter planes by the end of the decade, according to Colonel Neice. Laser weapons would first be used as far as an air base missile defense, then versus other aircraft, and eventually against targets on the ground.
NICK COOK, MNE'S DEFENSE WEEKLY: Cost estimates must vary, but you can be assured that the development costs of a weapon like this would not come in much under several million dollars.
FRANCIS: But once developed, laser weapons have huge cost advantages over conventional weapons.
For example, a satellite-guided bomb can cost $10,000 to $20,000 each, whereas a single laser shot can cost hundreds of dollars.
And laser weapons are potentially more covert, frying the circuitry of a key telecom center but not blowing it up. They could even be used to blind, maim or kill troops on the ground.
There are drawbacks. Unlike traditional weapons, a misfired laser can, in theory, go on indefinitely until it hits something, increasing the chances for damage by friendly fire or to civilians.
But within the decade, the United States is betting that its enemies will never see the light that hits them.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ANNOUNCER: When teenagers talk, one professor listened. She'll explain the meaning of "like" when we come back.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
HATTORI: You know, people used to complain about the phrase "you know," but now they're, like, "What's up with this word 'like?'" If you think "like" is just meaningless filler in teenagers' sentences, a linguistics professor has news for you.
Here's Jeanne Moos.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
JEANNE MOOS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): It is a four-letter word used by a lot of "like"-minded people.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I would give it like a six.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She is, like, total soft and nice.
MOOS: It inspires repeat offenders.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It was awesome. He's amazing. His voice stays great, like... MOOS: It was even the title of a sit com.
TITLE: It's like, you know...
MOOS: But some can't sit calmly and hear it.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You're talking to someone and every other word is like...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Right.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: ... you just want to slap them.
MOOS: Leave it to a linguist to find a lot to like about "like" and publish a 31-page paper on it in the "Journal of Semantics," complete with graphs and formulas.
Are you anti-"like" or pro-"like"?
PROF. MUFFY SIEGEL TEMPLE UNIVERSITY: I am -- the linguist in me is pro-"like;" it's useful.
MOOS: Did she say useful?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a filler. When you don't know what you're going to say next.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: I think it is to make up for people's stupidity.
MOOS: But Professor Muffy Siegel learned to appreciate the discourse particle "like" after hearing her teenage daughters always using it.
SIEGEL: I said, "I don't see any books." And she said, "Yeah, they're there. There's, like, every book under the bed." To a linguist, that is an astounding sentence. My daughter had used her word "like" to weaken a strong noun phrase.
MOOS: Professor Siegel says "like" is often used as a hedge word to weaken, making it more meaningful than, say, "um," "oh," or "well."
For instance, the sentence "He has, like, six brothers," implies "give or take a brother, don't hold me to six."
Professor Siegel is known for using a ventriloquist puppet named Gregory Grackle (ph) in her classes at Temple University.
SIEGEL: [speaking as puppet] I am, like, an assistant associate professor.
MOOS: Even Gregory (ph) uses "like." It crept into our conversations with students.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: It's definitely descriptive in, like, a nondescript way. See, I just used it right now. UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Like, if you're trying to teach somebody something, you don't want to use it.
MOOS: You just used it.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And I just did it.
MOOS: Back when Valley Girl-isms flourished in the Eighties...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Man, he's just, like, trip-endicular, you know?
MOOS: ... linguists thought "like" would die out. but instead, it spread.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ALICIA SILVERSTONE: People came that did not, like RSVP, so I was, like, totally bugging.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
MOOS: Professor Siegel says more young women use it than men.
SIEGEL: "Like" is used as kind of an emblem, a feeling of closeness.
MOOS: Her research resulted in articles and editorials, even a few angry e-mails.
SIEGEL: "The study is nothing more than an apologia for the inarticulate, under-educated..."
MOOS: Another sarcastically asked what the professor would make of this sentence:
SIEGEL: "I'm, like, pregnant."
MOOS: Or how about this one?
SIEGEL: Professor Siegel's first name says just about, like, everything, you, like, need to know.
MOOS: What's your first name?
SIEGEL: My name is Muffy.
MOOS: Muffy could tell him where to put his discourse particle.
SIEGEL: [as puppet] There are, like, prejudices against me. I think it's because I'm corduroy.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
HATTORI: I thought he was made of velvet. You know, we're, like, out of time. But before we go, here's a look at what's coming up next week.
We'll take you to a LAN party that gives a whole new meaning to social networking; and check out some souped up hot rod computers. Plus, windmills provide endless energy without pollution. So why is a proposed windmill farm off Cape Cod drawing opposition from some famous environmentalists?
That and a lot more coming up on NEXT. Until then, let us know how we're doing. Drop us an e-mail. Our address is next@cnn.com.
Thanks so much for joining us this week, and thanks to our friends here at Pier 39, including all the perky (UNINTELLIGIBLE). For all of us on the sci-tech beat, I'm James Hattori. We'll see you next time.
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