India is to declare tea as its national drink to celebrate the life of a pioneering tea-planter who was hanged by British colonial rulers for taking part in the rebellion of 1857.

Planning Commission deputy chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Saturday announced the decision while on a visit to Assam, the tea-producing northeastern state that borders on Bhutan and Bangladesh.

It took a few months to treat a blind sea lion found injured on a Southern California Beach. It took two years to find the Big Guy a home.

The 700-plus-pound (317.5-kilogram-plus) sea lion will be flown FedEx from Los Angeles to Hogle Zoo in Utah on May 3.

South Africa's power utility has moved cables in a wildlife sanctuary after several giraffes were electrocuted when they walked into the low-hanging wires, a conservation official said Friday.

At least four giraffes have died since June 2011 in Marloth Park holiday town nestled against the legendary Kruger Park after power utility Eskom installed electricity poles that were too short.

A 49-year old Russian with a big spoon in hand swallowed a pound (500 grams) of caviar in about 90 seconds to win what was billed as the world's first eating contest featuring the pricey fish roe.

"In Texas, people organize hot dog and hamburger eating championships and contests," the swanky Apartment restaurant said in a press release for the event.

U.S. Vice President Joe Biden's Air Force Two plane suffered a bird strike as it came into land in California on Thursday night and had to be grounded, a U.S. official said.

The plane, a Boeing C-32 modeled on the 757, in blue and white air force livery, was hit by birds as it came into land in Santa Barbara, California, after a flight from Los Angeles where Biden attended a campaign event.

The 9-year-old patient sits still, munching on popcorn and sipping grape juice while he gets an ultrasound of his heart.

Every so often, he wiggles free long enough to swing from the ceiling or stick out his tongue before resuming a statue-like pose. Orangutans aren't known for their patience, but this one, named Satu, has been trained to let researchers at Zoo Atlanta perform echocardiograms on him while he's awake.

Robert Chauke had to buy a 22-seat bus to carry his enormous family, but it's still not big enough for his six wives and 26 children.

All of them, from his 10-week-old baby to his 28-year-old son, live together in a small compound outside Johannesburg.

A hen produced a live chick in a freak birth at a poultry farm in central Sri Lanka, a veterinary surgeon said Friday.

The vet in charge of the town of Welimada, P. R. Yapa, said the egg appeared to have incubated inside the hen for 21 days and the hen died when it gave birth to the chick.

An eight-year-old Indonesian boy who smoked more than a pack a day from age four has kicked the habit, a child-welfare commission said Thursday.

The boy, Ilham, has put on two kilograms (4.4 pounds), since going into treatment with the independent Child Protection Commission a month ago, said its chairman, Arist Merdeka Sirait.

A U.S. promoter hopes to break a world record by parading at least 700 costumed dogs, mostly Chihuahuas, down a city street on the Cinco de Mayo holiday.

Mark Valentine says the Kansas City parade will introduce Chihuahuas to their cultural heritage while helping a no-kill shelter.