Desdemona Despair

Blogging the End of the World™

Japan won't comply with bluefin tuna ban

  Reporting by Yoko Nishikawa; Editing by Paul Tait Thu Mar 4, 2010 8:39am EST TOKYO (Reuters) – Japan will not comply if a total ban on international trade in Atlantic bluefin tuna is imposed, a government official was quoted as saying on Thursday, as support grows for the unprecedented trade halt. Bluefin tuna is […]

Common weedkiller turns male frogs into females

  By Maggie Fox, Health and Science EditorWASHINGTONWed Mar 3, 2010 3:36pm EST WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Atrazine, one of the most commonly used and controversial weedkillers, can turn male frogs into females, researchers reported on Monday. The experiment is the first to show such complete effects of atrazine, which had been known to disrupt hormones […]

Rare tiger cub found in China dies of malnutrition

By CARA ANNA (AP) BEIJING — A rare Siberian tiger discovered near the Russian border seemed an auspicious beginning to China’s Year of the Tiger, but within days, the emaciated cub had died of malnutrition. The cub, believed to be about 1 year old, was already in poor shape just after it was found on […]

The Crude in Syncrude: ugliness at the tar sands duck trial

  By Josh MogermanSenior Media Associate, Chicago Posted March 3, 2010 You want to know just how tone-deaf the tar sands industry and their Big Oil backers are? Yesterday, in a trial over the death of 1600+ ducks that had landed in a toxic mining runoff lake, lawyers for the Canadian tar sands company Syncrude […]

The dark side of nitrogen

By Stephanie Ogburn, 4 Feb 2010 2:00 PM …To see nitrogen’s ill effects up close head to the mid-Atlantic coast and visit the Chesapeake Bay, the nation’s largest estuary. Once the site of a highly productive fishery and renowned for its oysters, crabs, and clams, today the bay is most famous for its ecological ruin. […]

Road salt and cars produce extreme water contamination in Frenchman's Bay

Contact: Eleni Kanavasekanavas@utsc.utoronto.ca416-208-5103University of Toronto (University of Toronto) The levels of contamination to water and sediment in Frenchman’s Bay in Pickering, Ontario, greatly exceed provincial water quality standards, in some cases by as much as 250 per cent, according to a new study by researchers at the University of Toronto, Scarborough. This is largely due […]

Taiwan fears increased typhoon danger with global warming

By Staff WritersTaipei (AFP) March 1, 2010 Global warming is raising the danger from typhoons, Taiwan experts warned Monday, saying the island may be hit in a year or two by a powerful storm like the one which killed more than 700 last August. Typhoon Morakot dumped a record 3,000 millimetres (120 inches) of rainfall […]

Image of the Day: Will polar bears make it back to shore?

By Louise Gray, Environment CorrespondentPublished: 12:40PM GMT 02 Mar 2010 The future looks bleak for this polar bear and her cub huddled on a rapidly shrinking iceberg 12 miles out to sea. The pair became stranded after climbing onto the chunk of ice during a expedition to hunt seals. Soon the ice floe shrank down […]

Graph of the Day: Trends in Historic European Droughts, 1962-2004

Trends in drought: Is drought becoming more extreme? Meteorological drought (Temperature, Precipitation including snow) Hydrological drought (groundwater, river flow) Timing of minimum flow (earlier, later…)About 600 small, undisturbed basins Period: 1962-2004Significant negative trends: 8.7%Significant positive trends: 0.4% Lanen, H.A.J. van; Mysiak, J.; Harding, R., Drought: Key Achievements and Challenges, Brussels, Belgium : 2009 Invited presentation […]

Ocean near Newfoundland and Labrador devoid of pack ice, condition not seen in 40 years — seal population at risk

Lack of ice could hurt seal population Last Updated: Monday, March 1, 2010 | 4:59 PM NT CBC News A Canadian Coast Guard official said Monday that many parts of the ocean near Newfoundland and Labrador are devoid of pack ice — a condition that hasn’t been seen in at least 40 years. “It’s been […]

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