Word: barkness
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...designers who made it big with miniskirts now seem to be straining for fresh sensations. London's latest sartorial smash is a camel's hair maxicoat for dogs. But when the new fashion was promoted in stores and newspapers last week, all of Britain seemed to bark back. Animal psychologists protested that dogs "object to being dressed up." The man at Harrods pet department rejected the coats as downright "impractical." The final word came from the venerable Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which sometimes seems to rival Parliament and Crown as a defender...
Hansel was not the first to mount a scientific assault on elm disease. Experts have long known that it is caused by a fungus, carried by the elm-bark beetle, that clogs the tree's circulatory system. But ever since the disease hit the U.S. in the early 1930s, every cure has failed. DDT may kill birds as well as the beetles; another pesticide named Bidrin sometimes destroys the trees. Frantic elm owners have resorted to such quack remedies as turpentine injections or driving galvanized nails into the trunks (in hopes that the zinc oxide will deter the fungus...
Hardy Siberians. Now there is new hope for elm lovers. Funded with a $30,000 grant from Hansel's institute, Entomologist Dale Norris of the University of Wisconsin recently discovered a subtle chemical reaction that occurs when beetles attack elms. It is the quinol compounds in elm bark, he found, that make the tree delectable to beetles. Paradoxically, when the insects begin to munch, oxidation changes the tasty quinols into quinones that repel the beetles. By this time, unfortunately, the beetles have already infected the tree with deadly fungus. To ward off the beetles, Norris is now working...
...least 20,000 of the fist-size mollusks infest a 50-acre residential section of North Miami; more have been spotted in Hollywood ten miles to the north. Tough, ravenous creatures, whose original home is East Africa, they have chewed up large stretches of grass, stripped the bark off trees, feasted on citrus plants and even devoured paint off buildings-a handy source of calcium for snails' shells...
...small but rabid band of Welsh nationalists has been sounding off angrily ever since the announcement that Britain's Prince Charles would be formally named Prince of Wales this July 1. But the protests all seemed more bark than bite. Now nine Welshmen are on trial for organizing a paramilitary outfit called the Free Wales Army, and last week the court was told of a document found in the home of one defendant detailing plans to murder young Charles "if necessary" to prevent his investiture at Caernarvon Castle. Unmoved, Charles maintained his royal composure and went about his studies...