Feeding ecology of Konik horses and donkeys in Belgian coastal dunes and its implications for nature management

Foraging behaviour and diet selection of Koniks and donkeys were studied in order to estimate their possible impact on vegetation development and hence their appropriateness as nature management tools.Koniks show a larger intake rate and quantity than do donkeys. Koniks do not show significant seasonal differences in biomass intake, whereas donkeys consume significantly more in winter.Both animal species feed mainly on graminoids. The Konik diet is composed of 86 % of graminoids with an additional12 % of herbs. The donkey diet consists of 69 % of graminoids, which are mainly supplemented with browsing (18 %), e.g. twigs and leaves of Ligustrum vulgare and Rubus caesius. Calamagrostis epigejos, Rosa pimpinellifolia (fruits), Carex arenaria and Arrhenatherum elatius are the most important plant species eaten by donkeys (based on number of bites and biomass). Koniks eat Calamagrostis epigejos significantly more, qualitatively (number of bites) as well as quantitatively (biomass intake), than any other plant species, but Cirsium arvense, Calamagrostis canescens, Juncus subnodulosus, Holcus lanatus and Claytonia perfoliata are also frequently consumed.Koniks as well as donkeys do eat plant species that nature managers would like to see decline in dominance, e.g. Calamagrostis epigejos, but browsing on scrub species is insufficient to decrease the area occupied by shrubs

The implementation of businesslike reporting in subsidized nonprofit arts organizations: an empirical evaluation

Nonprofit arts organizations in continental Europe are generally to a large extent dependent on governments for their funding. Based on the new institutional theory, coercive pressures exerted by these funding governments are expected to drive the implementation of institutional models and, as such, enhance institutional isomorphism. However, in case of competing logics, institutionalized models are said to be implemented only to a moderate extent and to drive practice variation. This paper attempts to test these contrary assertions on the implementation of institutionalized models by analyzing the implementation of businesslike reporting in Flemish subsidized nonprofit arts organizations. The construction of a compliance index, based on a random sample of 100 organizations, allows for a quantitative picture of this implementation and enables descriptive statistics and univariate tests to validate the hypotheses. Elaborating on the results, partially confirming the stated hypotheses, the discussion formulates some topics for future research.new institutional theory, competing logics, reporting, nonprofit arts organizations, funding

Persistence of the efficacy of pour-on and injectable moxidectin against Ostertagia ostertagi and Dictyocaulus viviparus in experimentally infected cattle

The persistence of the efficacy of moxidectin 0.5 per cent pour-on and moxidectin I per cent injectable against Ostertagia ostertagi and Dictyocaulus viviparus in calves was studied in two experimental trials, In the first trial two groups of seven calves were treated with either the pour-on or the injectable formulation, while a third group remained untreated, All the animals were infected daily from Monday to Friday with infective stages of O ostertagi and D viviparus between the day of treatment (day 0) and day 33, and were necropsied for worm counts three days later. The experimental design of the second trial was similar to that of the first but the period of infection was from 28 to 45 days after the treatment, and the necropsy was five days after the last infection, In both trials both moxidectin formulations had very high efficacies (99.6 per cent) against adult and developing stages of O ostertagi and D viviparus. The higher efficacy of the moxidectin pour-on preparation against early fourth stage larvae in both trials suggested that its effect was more persistent, It was calculated that the efficacy of moxidectin against O ostertagi persisted for at least five weeks for the injectable formulation and six weeks for the pour on. The efficacy of moxidectin against D viviparus lasted for at least six weeks far both formulations

Optimal counterweight balancing of spatial mechanisms using

voxel-based discretization