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KXAN-TV

KXAN-TV (channel 36) is a television station in Austin, Texas, United States, affiliated with NBC. It is owned by Nexstar Media Group alongside Llano-licensed MyNetworkTV affiliate KBVO (channel 14); Nexstar also provides certain services to KNVA (channel 54), a de facto owned-and-operated station of The CW, under a local marketing agreement (LMA) with Vaughan Media. The three stations share studios on West Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in the Old West Austin section, just west of the University of Texas at Austin campus and just north of downtown; the studios and offices consist of a setup which includes the main studio and newsroom, and an unconnected auxiliary office building across the street. KXAN-TV's transmitter is located at the West Austin Antenna Farm north of West Lake Hills.

History
The station first signed on the air on February 12, 1965, as KHFI-TV, broadcasting on UHF channel 42. It was owned by the Kingsbury family, along with KHFI radio (970 AM, now KJFK at 1490; and 98.3 FM, now KVET-FM at 98.1). KHFI was the second television station in Austin, signing on a little more than twelve years after KTBC-TV (channel 7). Although Austin was big enough to support three television stations as early as the 1950s, KTBC was the only VHF license in the area. Until 1964, UHF stations could only be seen with an expensive converter, and even then picture quality left much to be desired. Additionally, UHF signals usually do not travel very far over long distances or over rugged terrain. This made several potential owners skittish about the prospects for UHF in a market that stretched from Mason in the west to La Grange in the east, and also included much of the Hill Country.

KHFI-TV logically should have signed on as Austin's NBC station, since up to that time all three networks had been shoehorned on KTBC, then a primary CBS affiliate. However, due to contractual obligations, it spent more than a year-and-a-half as an independent station before joining NBC in 1966. Unlike most affiliates with the network in then two-station markets, KHFI did not take on a secondary ABC affiliation (KTBC instead took on the secondary ABC affiliation, until a third station, KVUE signed on in 1971, taking on the ABC affiliation). The Kingsburys would later bring in Henry Tippie as a partner and on January 15, 1973, were granted permission from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to move KHFI-TV to channel 36.

With the channel change came a new set of call letters, KTVV. The station also boosted its transmitter power to five million watts, which more than doubled its coverage area, and for a time billed itself as the most powerful TV station in the Southwest with these changes. What was then known as LIN Broadcasting purchased the station in 1979. The call letters were changed to the current KXAN-TV on October 15, 1987, in reference to then-sister station and fellow NBC affiliate (now owned-and-operated station) KXAS-TV in Fort Worth. Even with the increased power, channel 36's signal was marginal in some parts of the Hill Country such as Fredericksburg. On September 6, 1991, LIN signed on KLNO in Llano to improve KXAN's reach in the Hill Country. It changed that station's call letters to KXAM-TV after about a month on the air and later to the current KBVO on August 3, 2009. This call sign, named after the University of Texas' mascot "Bevo", was formerly used on the current channel 42—which is now CBS affiliate KEYE-TV—from December 1983 to July 1995, and is shared with channel 14's repeater KBVO-CD.

KXAN is one of two stations in Austin (the other being KVUE, channel 24) to retain its original network affiliation in the wake of a network swap between KTBC and Fox station KBVO (now KEYE-TV, channel 42) in 1995, the result of Fox's affiliation deal with New World Communications due to that network acquiring rights to NFL games. On October 21, 2009, KBVO became a separate station after picking up the MyNetworkTV affiliation from KNVA. That station carried the network as a secondary affiliation (airing on KNVA on Monday through Saturday nights from 9 to 11 p.m.), known on-air as "MyNetworkTV on The CW Austin", from its launch on September 5, 2006. In mid-September 2009, that station moved MyNetworkTV programs an hour later from 10 p.m. to midnight to make room for a nightly 9 p.m. newscast to compete with KTBC's established prime time newscast. To date, KNVA was one of two stations in the United States to carry The CW and MyNetworkTV (the other being KWKB in Iowa City, Iowa, which until 2011 was the only station that carried the full schedules of both netlets/programming services).

KXAN's current tower was activated in 1996, replacing an older structure that had been built in 1964. Of the fifteen towers on the hill, the channel 36 tower is the tallest and the highest structure in Austin. In addition to its transmission antenna, the mast also incorporates a camera with views of downtown to the east and the hills to the west.

On March 21, 2014, it was announced that Media General would acquire LIN. The merger was completed on December 19, 2014, and KXAN joined the Media General station portfolio. Just over a year after that deal was completed, on January 27, 2016, Media General announced that it had entered into a definitive agreement to be acquired by Nexstar Broadcasting Group (which is based in Irving and already owns many other stations in Texas), in a deal valued at $17.14 per-share, valuing the company at $4.6 billion plus the assumption of $2.3 billion debt. The combined company would be known as Nexstar Media Group, and own 171 stations (including KXAN-TV), serving an estimated 39% of households. The merger also marked a re-entry into Austin for Nexstar, which had managed CBS affiliate KEYE-TV under a groupwide agreement with the Four Points Media Group before that company's stations were sold to Sinclair at the beginning of 2012. The deal was finalized on January 17, 2017.

News operation
KXAN-TV presently broadcasts 31 hours of locally produced newscasts each week (with five hours each weekday and three hours each on Saturdays and Sundays).

For most of its first 30 years on the air, KHFI/KTVV/KXAN was a distant runner-up to KTBC. Despite efforts to produce a newscast of major market quality (early newscasts deliberately copied the look of NBC's flagship owned-and-operated station WNBC in New York City), it was usually unable to make a dent in KTBC's ratings dominance. Another setback was as a UHF station, KTVV/KXAN had a hard time maintaining a local share as an NBC affiliate due to the presence of nearby NBC stations in the San Antonio and Temple/Waco markets. KXAN's first number one rated newscast was also Austin's first hour-long morning newscast, News 36 Firstcast, which went on the air in November 1990. All other local stations soon followed suit, but Firstcast built an audience that delivered KXAN the station's first sweeps victory in February 1993. After KTBC switched to its current Fox affiliation in 1995, KXAN's ratings slowly increased in other time periods. By the latter part of the 1990s, channel 36 had overtaken channel 7 for the lead. Since then, it has waged a spirited battle for first place in the market with KVUE.

On December 23, 2008, starting with the weekday noon newscast, KXAN became the third television station in the Austin market (and the second LIN owned station, behind WAVY-TV/WVBT in the Hampton Roads market) to begin broadcasting its local newscasts in high definition. On September 28, 2009, the station began producing a nightly 9 p.m. newscast on KNVA (currently titled KXAN News at 9) to compete with KTBC's longer-established and hour-long prime time newscast.

On September 3, 2013, KXAN began producing a two-hour extension of its weekday morning newscast for sister station KNVA. Known as KXAN News on The CW Austin, the expanded broadcast runs from 7 to 9 a.m. and competes against KTBC's long-dominant morning newscast Good Day Austin and the national morning programs on the market's other major network affiliates.

Subchannels
The station's signal is multiplexed:

On August 7, 2009, KXAN began offering Mobile TV service through BlackBerry.

Analog-to-digital conversion
KXAN-TV shut down its analog signal on June 12, 2009, as part of the FCC-mandated transition to digital television for full-power stations. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 21, using virtual channel 36.

Suddenlink Communications
KXAN and LIN TV were locked into a contract dispute with Suddenlink Communications, which serves portions of the Austin market, such as Pflugerville and Georgetown. The dispute centered around KXAN's failure to grant retransmission consent to Suddenlink. The station was removed from Suddenlink after the previous contract expired on December 31, 2007. KXAN claimed that it was seeking "fair value" for its programming. However, a press release from Suddenlink management indicated that the dispute included consideration for other stations owned by LIN TV outside of Texas.

On January 3, 2008, Suddenlink began transmitting the signal of Temple-based NBC affiliate KCEN-TV to restore the network's programming to the affected areas. This is allowed under FCC rules because KCEN is a "significantly viewed" station in Williamson County even though that county is located in the Austin market. On March 24, Suddenlink and KXAN's dispute was settled and the station was restored to Suddenlink's systems the following day. The terms of the settlement were not announced though it is widely believed that KXAN had lost thousands of viewers. Despite its cable carriage problems, the station surprised many observers by placing first in the 5–7 a.m. weekday time slot during the May 2008 sweeps period.

Time Warner Cable
KXAN and LIN TV were locked in another contract dispute with Time Warner Cable, which serves a very large majority of the Austin metropolitan area. LIN dropped its stations from Time Warner Cable systems nationwide at Midnight CDT on October 3, 2008. Over-the-air stations such as KXAN have long allowed cable companies to carry their signals for free. Cable networks are paid as much as ten cents per day per subscriber for their content and LIN TV wanted Time Warner to pay them less than one cent per subscriber per day. KXAN general manager Eric Lassberg stated that the cable company "does not have to pass that cost along to the viewers unless they want to". On October 3, Time Warner replaced KXAN with a continuous loop of instructions on how to hook up a television to a computer on Time Warner Cable. Some days later this was replaced by the premium channel Starz Kids and Family. KXAN returned to the Time Warner lineup during the early morning hours of October 29, 2008. No details were released on the deal though some have speculated that KXAN could not afford to be without over 67% of their previous viewers during the critical November ratings period.

title: KXAN-TV


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Timothy Treadwell

Timothy Treadwell (born Timothy William Dexter; April 29, 1957 – October 5, 2003) was an American bear enthusiast, environmentalist, documentary filmmaker, handyman, and founder of the bear-protection organization Grizzly People. He lived among coastal brown bears (Ursus arctos horribilis) in Katmai National Park, Alaska, for 13 summers.

On October 5, 2003, Treadwell and his girlfriend Amie Huguenard were killed and almost fully eaten by a 28-year-old male bear whose stomach was later found to contain human remains and clothing.

Treadwell's life, work, and death were the subject of Werner Herzog's critically acclaimed documentary film Grizzly Man (2005).

Early life and education
Treadwell was born in Mineola, Long Island, New York, one of five children of Val Dexter and Carol Ann (née Bartell). He attended Connetquot High School, where he was the swimming team's star diver. He was very fond of animals and kept a squirrel named Willie as a pet. In an interview in Grizzly Man (2005), his parents say he was an ordinary young man until he went away to college. He attended Bradley University on a swimming and diving scholarship. There, he claimed to be a British orphan and on other occasions claimed that he was from Australia. According to this account, his father said Timothy "spiraled down" and became an alcoholic after he lost the role of Woody Boyd to Woody Harrelson in the sitcom Cheers. In 1987, he legally changed his surname from Dexter to Treadwell, a name from his mother's family that he had used informally for some years.

Alaskan expeditions
A lover of animals since he was a child, Treadwell decided to travel to Alaska to watch bears after a close friend persuaded him to do so. He wrote that after his first encounter with a wild bear he knew he had found his calling in life and that now his destiny was entwined with those of the bears. Treadwell studied the bears during summer seasons for 13 years before being killed by one of them. According to his book, Among Grizzlies: Living with Wild Bears in Alaska, his mission to protect bears began in the late 1980s after he had survived a near-fatal heroin overdose. He claims in his book that his drug addiction grew from his alcoholism and attributed his recovery from drug and alcohol addictions entirely to his relationship with bears.

Treadwell spent the early part of each season camping on the 'Big Green', an open area of bear grass in Hallo Bay on the Katmai Coast. He called the area the "Grizzly Sanctuary". Treadwell was known for getting extremely close to the bears he observed, sometimes even touching them and playing with bear cubs. In his book, though, he claimed that he was always careful with the bears and actually developed a sense of mutual trust and respect with the animals. He habitually named the bears he encountered and consistently saw many of the same bears each summer and thus claimed to be building a standing relationship with them.

In contrast, Tom Smith, a research ecologist with the Alaska Science Center of the U.S. Geological Survey declared that Treadwell "...was breaking every park rule that there was, in terms of distance to the bears, harassing wildlife, and interfering with natural processes. Right off the bat, his personal mission was at odds with the park service. He had been warned repeatedly." Referring to Treadwell's death, Smith concluded, "It's a tragic thing, but it's not unpredictable."

During the latter part of each summer, he would move to Kaflia Bay and camp in an area of especially thick brush he called the "Grizzly Maze". Here, the chances of crossing paths with wild bears were much higher, since the location intersected bear trails. Treadwell recorded almost 100 hours of video footage (some of which was later used to create the documentary Grizzly Man) and produced a large collection of still photographs.

Treadwell claimed to be alone with the wildlife on several occasions in his videos. However his girlfriend, Amie, was with him during parts of the last three summers (the documentary says two summers) and at the time of their deaths. Other women Treadwell dated, who remain anonymous, also accompanied him on some expeditions.

By 2001 Treadwell became sufficiently notable to receive extensive media attention both on television and in environmental circles, and he made frequent public appearances as an environmental activist. He traveled throughout the United States to educate school children about bears and appeared on the Discovery Channel, the Late Show with David Letterman, and Dateline NBC to discuss his experiences.

He also cowrote Among Grizzlies: Living with Wild Bears in Alaska with Jewel Palovak (his coworker with whom he lived for 20 years), which describes Treadwell's adventures on the Alaska Peninsula. Treadwell and Palovak founded Grizzly People, an organization devoted to protecting bears and preserving their wilderness habitat.

Naturalist Charlie Russell, who studied bears, raised them, and lived with them in Kamchatka, Russia, for a decade, worked with Treadwell. Russell advised Treadwell to carry pepper spray and use electric fences. He originally refrained from commenting on Treadwell after he was killed, but after the Werner Herzog-movie Grizzly Man was released he wrote a lengthy critique of Treadwell's failure to follow basic safety precautions. In spite of his criticism of Treadwell, Russell praised him for his devotion to bears and his ability to remain alive for so long. He defended him against people who criticized his work, writing, "If Timothy had spent those 13 years killing bears and guiding others to do the same, eventually being killed by one, he would have been remembered in Alaska with great admiration." Russell was critical of Grizzly Man, saying it was unfair to Treadwell, and if Palovak "really was a protector of bears, she should have looked for a filmmaker who would have been sympathetic towards them."

Legacy
According to the organization Treadwell founded, Grizzly People, five bears were poached in the year following his death, while none had been poached while he was present in Katmai. According to court records as reported by the Anchorage Daily News, though, the guilty parties were charged with poaching wildlife along Funnel Creek in the preserve, an area open to hunting that borders the national park. According to several sources, including Nick Jans' book, The Grizzly Maze, Treadwell camped only near the Katmai Coast, mainly in areas around Hallo Bay and Kaflia Bay, and never in or near the preserve. The only effective way to patrol all 6000 sqmi of Katmai National Park is by airplane, the method used by authorities.

Conflicts with the National Park Service
Treadwell's years with the bears were not without disruption. Almost from the start, the National Park Service (NPS) expressed their worries about his behavior. The park's restrictions made him increasingly irate. According to the file kept on Treadwell by the NPS, rangers reported he had at least six violations from 1994 to 2003. Included among these violations were guiding tourists without a license, camping in the same area longer than the NPS's seven-day limit, improper food storage, wildlife harassment, and conflicts with visitors and their guides. Treadwell also frustrated authorities by refusing to install an electric fence around his camp and refusing to carry bear spray to use as a deterrent. In his 1997 book, Treadwell relayed a story where he resorted to using bear mace on one occasion, but added that he had felt terrible grief over the pain he perceived it had caused the bear and refused to use it on subsequent occasions.

Death
In October 2003, Treadwell and his girlfriend, physician assistant Amie Huguenard (born October 23, 1965, in Buffalo, New York), visited Katmai National Park, which is on the Alaska Peninsula across Shelikof Strait from Kodiak Island. In Grizzly Man, Werner Herzog states that according to Treadwell's diaries, Huguenard feared bears and felt very uncomfortable in their presence. Her final journal entries indicated that she wanted to be away from Katmai. Treadwell set his campsite near a salmon stream where wild bears commonly feed in autumn. Treadwell was in the park later in the year than normal, at a time when bears attempt to gain as much fat as possible before winter. Food was scarce that autumn, causing the bears to be even more aggressive than usual.

Treadwell and Huguenard were to leave the park at his usual time of year, and had actually returned to Kodiak on September 26 to store their gear for the season and catch a connecting flight to return to their home in California. After an argument with the airline ticketer over the price of altering his return ticket, Treadwell and Huguenard made the decision to return to their campsite on September 29 for an additional week. Treadwell also wanted to locate a favorite female brown bear about which he was concerned. He said he hated modern civilization and felt better in nature with the bears than he did in big cities around humans. The bears he had been used to during the summer had already gone into torpor, and bears that Treadwell did not know from other parts of the park were moving into the area. Some of the last footage taken by Treadwell, hours before his death, includes video of a bear diving into the river repeatedly for a piece of dead salmon. Treadwell mentioned in the footage that he did not feel entirely comfortable around that particular bear. In Grizzly Man, Herzog speculates on whether Treadwell filmed the very bear that killed him.

Around noon on Sunday, October 5, 2003, Treadwell spoke with an associate in Malibu, California, by satellite phone; Treadwell mentioned no problems with any bears. The next day, October 6, Willy Fulton, a Kodiak air taxi pilot, arrived at Treadwell and Huguenard's campsite to pick them up but found the area abandoned, except for a bear, and contacted the local park rangers. The couple's mangled remains were discovered quickly upon investigation. Treadwell's disfigured head, partial spine and right forearm and hand, with his wristwatch still on, were recovered a short distance from the camp. Huguenard's partial remains were found next to the torn and collapsed tents, partially buried in a mound of twigs and soil. A large male bear (tagged Bear 141) protecting the campsite was killed by park rangers during their attempt to retrieve the bodies. A second adolescent bear was also killed a short time later when it charged the park rangers. An on-site necropsy of Bear 141 revealed human body parts such as fingers and limbs. The younger bear was consumed by other animals before it could be necropsied. In the 85-year history of Katmai National Park, this was the first known incident of a person being killed by a bear.

A video camera recovered at the site proved to have been operating during the attack, but police said that the six-minute tape contained only voices and cries as a brown bear mauled Treadwell to death. The tape begins with Treadwell yelling that he is being attacked. "Come out here; I'm being killed out here," he screams. The fact that the tape contained only sound led troopers to believe the attack might have happened while the camera was stuffed in a duffel bag or during the dark of night. In Grizzly Man, filmmaker Herzog claims that the lens cap of the camera was left on, suggesting that Treadwell and Huguenard were in the process of setting up for another video sequence when the attack happened. The camera had been turned on just before the attack but recorded only six minutes of audio before running out of tape. This, however, was enough time to record the bear's initial attack on Treadwell and his agonized screams, its retreat after Huguenard tells Treadwell to play dead and when she attacked it, and its return to carry Treadwell off into the forest.

Media attention

 * Grizzly Man (2005), directed by Werner Herzog, is a documentary about Treadwell's work with wildlife in Alaska. Released theatrically by Lions Gate Films, it later was telecast on the Discovery Channel. Treadwell's own footage is featured, along with interviews with people who knew him. Although Herzog praises Treadwell's video footage, he disagrees with his view of nature as harmonious. Treadwell's anthropomorphic treatment of wild animals is apparent in the documentary.
 * The Grizzly Man Diaries is an eight-episode miniseries that premiered on August 29, 2008, on Animal Planet and is a spin-off of Grizzly Man. Produced by Creative Differences, the series chronicles the last decade of Treadwell's life with his diary entries, footage, and photographs he took during his expeditions.
 * Diary Of The Grizzly Man is a three-episode miniseries that premiered on August 21, 2008. It was produced by Jason Carey, Erik Nelson, and Jewel Palovak.  It uses primarily original footage taken by Treadwell, supplemented by his diary entries that are read by a narrator.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Timothy Treadwell


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Talk:Dionysius the Areopagite

Name Day: 10/03.

Untitled
This article is about Dionysius the Areopagite, the character in the book of Acts. Putting detailed descriptions here of the mystical writings incorrectly attributed to him will only confuse people. Please put any material about the writings in the article: Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite. --Blainster 21:51, 12 July 2005 (UTC)

I can't find any credible sources that substantiate the claim that Dionysius is, in fact, a patron saint "against demons," but it is definitely true that Hellboy claims that he is. Perhaps another confusion with Saint Denis, the patron saint of France? I'll be here all week. Hansonfan (talk) 23:24, 20 July 2008 (UTC)

Contradiction with Other Wiki Page
On the D. Bishop of Corinth page, it is reported that "Dionysius spoke of the recent martyrdom of their bishop, Publius (in the persecution of Marcus Aurelius), and says that Dionysius the Areopagite was the first Bishop of Athens." First, there. Second here (as well as the Wiki list of Bishops).

I hesitate to make any changes. Just FYI —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.48.231.155 (talk) 05:27, 4 October 2010 (UTC)

Confusing finishing paragraphs
The whole story of the eclipse confuses the reader -- what is the purpose of adding it to the article. What difference does it make if the author of the article, or notoriously anti-Christian Valla, or a German person writing  his introduction deem Dionysius' letter credible or not? The letter is actually stating that the eclipse was indeed happening out of its time. In lack of argument it might suffice to say that the letter's credibility is sometimes contested, might it not? 110.164.162.168 (talk) 01:28, 29 December 2010 (UTC)

Resolving the apparent contradiction
See Rudolf Steiner's lectures of October 08, 1905 (Foundations of Esotericism – Lecture 13), or June 02, 1921. Here the distinction between Dionysius and pseudo-Dionysius is explained from investigating the Akashic records.

Instruction about the Gods was first systematised by Dionysius the Areopagite, the pupil of the apostle Paul. It was however not written down until the 6th century. This is why scholars deny the existence of Dionysius the Areopagite and speak about the writings of the Pseudo-Dionysius, as though it was in the 6th century that old traditions were first put together. The truth of the matter can only be substantiated by reading in the Akashic Chronicle. The Akashic Chronicle does however teach that Dionysius actually lived in Athens, that he was initiated by Paul and was commissioned by him to lay the foundation of the teaching about the higher spiritual beings and to impart this knowledge to special initiates. At that time certain lofty teachings were never written down but only communicated as tradition by word of mouth. The teaching about the Gods was also given in this way by Dionysius to his pupils, who then passed it on further. These pupils in direct succession were intentionally called Dionysius, so that the last of these, who wrote down this teaching was one of those who was given this name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.178.54.84 (talk) 21:11, 14 December 2014 (UTC)

 * Very interesting. The article would greatly benefit, imho, from a summary like this with reference to Steiner's work. The question of things being published, written down, or transmitted orally is a large part of the history of esotericism, because esoteric writers are so often writing form a select rather than a general audience, and context is important to esoteric meanings. You "had to be there," in at least a metaphorical sense.

 * This is something that Wikipedia as a culture has difficulty with, and all too often instead they cap labels on sources and ban their mention. Your account makes perfect sense to me, for it explains the reason for the confusions that are manifest in this article and in the discussions of the two men of the name but in different centuries. In this case I would that oral tradition was supplemented with writings of various sorts brought together and codified by "pseudo" Dionysius.
 * 73.132.250.25 (talk) 15:20, 21 December 2020 (UTC)

 * Sorry to burst your bubble, but Akashic records are rank pseudohistory. Or "cult pseudoscience" as Dan Dugan has put it. tgeorgescu (talk) 07:25, 25 February 2023 (UTC)

Unsourced section relating the Virgin Mary
The section of biography relating to the Virgin Mary appears to be quoting from something, but it is not clear whether this is an ancient source (and, if so, which) or a much later, possibly modern fictional saint's life. If it is sourceable, the source needs quoting. Otherwise it should be deleted.Martin Turner (talk) 13:15, 12 August 2019 (UTC)

Infobox image is wrong
The image in the infobox is of St Denis of Paris (with Rusticus and Eleutherius). Wrong century. Wrong cause of death. St Denis's article acknowledges the two were once confused. Why is the image here? 2601:181:301:81A0:69DA:D50D:98EE:A558 (talk) 22:57, 2 September 2020 (UTC)

 * It looks like this has been fixed and the current image is correct. Spartacus007 (talk) 17:23, 26 September 2022 (UTC)

Anne Catherine Emmerich
If you want to WP:CITE her, then cite her under a section entitled Mysticism. But definitely not in a section about the Bible and definitely not in a section dealing with real-world history. Emmerich-Brentano did not write WP:SCHOLARSHIP, they wrote mysticism. As historiography and Bible scholarship it's just garbage. To put it otherwise, her writings are WP:RS for her own views only (and even that much has been challenged), but not for objective historical facts about the ancient history. tgeorgescu (talk) 00:59, 26 February 2023 (UTC)

title: Talk:Dionysius the Areopagite


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Talk:Star Map (Star Wars)

This has to be merged with something or put in the Star Wars Wiki...

Yes...
Should be "Star Map (Star Wars films)" at least.

I'm looking for a chart of the constellations...

title: Talk:Star Map (Star Wars)


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Fencing at the Summer Olympics

Fencing has been contested at every Summer Olympic Games since the birth of the modern Olympic movement at the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens. There are three forms of Olympic fencing:

 * Foil — a light thrusting weapon; the valid target is restricted to the torso; double touches are not allowed.
 * Épée — a heavy thrusting weapon; the valid target area covers the entire body; double touches are allowed.
 * Sabre — a light cutting and thrusting weapon; the valid target area includes almost everything above the waist (excluding the back of the head and the hands); double touches are not allowed.

Nations
Numbers indicate the number of fencers each nation sent to that Olympics.

Medal table
Source: Accurate as of the conclusion of the 2020 Summer Olympics

title: Fencing at the Summer Olympics


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Puerto Rican boa

The Puerto Rican boa (Chilabothrus inornatus) is a large species of boa endemic to Puerto Rico. It is a terrestrial snake with a dark brown coloration. It grows to 1.9 m in length. It feeds on small mammals such as rodents and bats, birds and sometimes anole lizards. Like most boas, it is viviparous (bearing live young) and kills its prey using constriction.

Taxonomy
It is extremely similar to the Jamaican boa (Chilabothrus subflavus) which was seen as conspecific for some fifty years until they were split in 1901 by Leonhard Hess Stejneger.

The taxon Piesigaster boettgeri was described from Mindanao in the Philippines, by the Spaniard es:Víctor López Seoane in 1881, but was identified as a synonym of this species by Stejneger. Seoane's brother was an officer in the Spanish Navy and thus the localities of the group of specimens Seoane had obtained were confused during their passage to Spain.

Although it has been known under the name E. inornatus for over a century, having been moved to the genus Epicrates (which had been created in 1830 by Johann Georg Wagler) by the Belgian zoologist George Albert Boulenger in 1893 when cataloguing the specimens in the Natural History Museum, London, a number of authors decided to it move to Chilabothrus inornatus in 2013. It had first been moved to Chilabothrus inornatus from the genus Boa in 1844 by either the French herpetologists André Marie Constant Duméril and Gabriel Bibron, or the Italian snake expert Giorgio Jan, only a year after it had been described in that genus by the Dane Johannes Theodor Reinhardt in 1843. Reinhardt had three snakes of this species to study for his description, these are the syntypes and are stored in Copenhagen. They were collected by a certain Dr. Ravn from Puerto Rico. It is often still known as Epicrates inornatus in many publications.

Etymology
The specific epithet inornatus is from the Latin negation of ornatus, meaning 'adorned', thus the boa is 'unadorned'.

Description
A characteristic of the species is the irregular parietal scales. It can grow to some 1.9 m, with 261 to 271 ventral scales and 67 to 75 caudal scales, according to Stejneger in 1904, who only knew of at least twelve specimens at the time. The colours of the three live specimens he knew of were variable; two he describes as "bistre" (deep, dark, grayish brown), the other as "chestnut" with a darker colour near the tail, the first had a darker ventral surface, the second he describes as "slate" coloured, and the last had a lighter slate-brown underside with the ventral scales having paler edges. The first was patterned with seventy to eighty indistinct dusky cross bars consisting of a row of spots, these cross bars increasing in width to the end of the snake; in the second these patterns were much more distinct, with the crossbars having pale centres but being outlined in blackish colour, the lateral spots being so aligned as to form a blackish line in the front third of its body, but in the last snake there was little evidence of patterning with only a few scattered and obscure darkish spots on its sides. The iris he describes as "silvery gray clouded with dusky".

It grows to 1.8 - 2.7 m in total length.

Similar species
It is the largest snake on the island; other sympatric snake species include Alsophis portoricensis, Arrhyton exiguum and very small blindsnakes of the genus Typhlops. The only other species of Epicrates in the area is Chilabothrus monensis, on Mona Island.

Distribution
The Puerto Rican boa is endemic to Puerto Rico.

Habitat
It is found in wooded and rocky places in the foothills. It is more common in the northwest and in the karst regions which are found along the northern coast of the island.

Diet
The boa feeds by seizing the prey in its jaws, wrapping several coils around it, and then constricting until the prey has suffocated. The prey is then swallowed headfirst. The feeding habits of the very young are unknown. However, locals claim they eat small lizards, other small vertebrates and some insects.

This species is a sit-and-wait predator as opposed to an active hunter of prey. It is a nocturnal, terrestrial hunter which is not found often in trees. The dissections of 72 snakes from the West Indies show that while young boas of the genus Epicrates feed primarily on anoles, mature boas (with the exception of Epicrates gracilis) feed for some 60% on mammals combined, which distinguishes them ecologically from the other three genera of snakes on the island. Birds constitute some 10% of the diet. The rest of the prey items are composed of Anolis lizards and a very small number of frogs. They also prey on much larger-sized prey than the other snakes. Half of the mammals are non-native species of mice (Mus) and rats (Rattus), it is suspected that the original prey was other small mammals such as Nesophontes, Brotomys and Isolobodon before the introduction of these species. Bats constitute the other half. Newborn snakes may possibly feed on geckos. It is thought that this species in particular feeds less on anoles and more on birds, rodents and bats.

Since the karst region where the Puerto Rican boa lives usually has many caves, the boa has the opportunity to feed on bats -a phenomenon which was previously seen in other Epicrates species. Observations in the 1980s revealed that boas capture the bats in flight by hanging at the opening of the cave, waiting until bats fly out of it. They then grab a bat with their jaws before killing it via constriction.

Reproduction
Pregnant females give birth to about 23-26 live boas.

Conservation
Historic records, some dating back to the 18th century, indicate that during the first few centuries of Spanish colonization in Puerto Rico the boa was relatively abundant, and oil produced from the snake's fat was utilized extensively as an export (see snake oil). Impacts to the boa resulting from the oil trade were undoubtedly heightened by a concurrent reduction of habitat. Deforestation of the island began during this period and continued until, by the early 20th century, very little natural forest remained. Predation by the mongoose, introduced into Puerto Rico in the 19th century, has been postulated as a further cause for the boa's present status, but there is no direct evidence to support this idea.

In 1904 Stejneger mentions that during his time the snake was rather rare, he himself, as well as a number of other collecting parties in the newly acquired territory, were unable to see one during their expeditions on the island, although a trail of one was seen. Other collecting parties were able to collect five specimens in 1900 and in those first few years the island became a possession of the United States, and bring these to the mainland, almost doubling the specimens known at the time. In the previous century only six other specimens had been secured, these were all in Europe -one in Milan (used by Jan), one in Paris (studied by Duméril and Bibron from Bayamón, there was also a second specimen from Haiti, but this one is now thought to have been misidentified), two or more somewhere in Spain (those of Seoane supposedly from Mindanao), and the three original syntypes used by Reinhardt in Copenhagen.

After the invasion and annexation of the territory by the United States a few years before Stejneger and numerous other Americans were able to collect on the island, there was a subsequent economic decline due to the loss of traditional agricultural markets for sugar, and much of the forests have regrown on the island. There is an indication that the boa has recovered somewhat in recent years, although not to the degree that protective measures can be dropped. To prevent its extinction, a few conservation efforts have been attempted, including a conservation area for it in San Patricio State Forest in Puerto Rico.

title: Puerto Rican boa