High Arctic biodiversity down 26 percent since 1970

By John Platt Mammals, birds and fish living in the High Arctic experienced an average 26 percent drop in their populations between 1970 and 2004 due to the loss of sea ice, according to a new report from The Arctic Species Trend Index (ASTI), Tracking Trends in Arctic Wildlife [pdf]. The 2010 report, commissioned and […]

Graph of the Day: Arctic Ocean Aragonite Saturation, 1997 and 2008

(A) Surface distributions of Ω aragonite, S, fraction of sea ice meltwater (f SIM), and TA in surface water observed between depths of 0 and 20 m. f SIM was estimated by using 18O and S measurements (12, 13). Gray contour lines indicate isobaths of 1000, 2000, and 3000 m. (B) Relationship between Ω aragonite […]

Alaska lawmakers line up against whale habitat as beluga population plummets

By Erika Bolstad | McClatchy Newspapers WASHINGTON — If there’s one thing Alaska’s congressional delegation can agree on, it’s a distrust of the Endangered Species Act and a belief it could ruin the state’s economy. Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Democrat Sen. Mark Begich and Republican Rep. Don Young met Friday to express their concerns with […]

Canada winter warmest and driest on record: ‘It's like winter was cancelled in this country’

By Margaret Munro, Canwest News ServiceMarch 9, 2010 From the balmy Arctic, to the open water of the St. Lawrence and snowless western fields, this winter has been the warmest and driest in Canadian record books. Environment Canada scientists report that winter 2009/10 was 4C above normal, making it the warmest since nationwide records were […]

Seal pups beached in ice-free Gulf of St. Lawrence

Pups seen on Quebec shores, as far north as Newfoundland’s Northern Peninsula Last Updated: Wednesday, March 10, 2010 | 1:24 PM ET The Canadian Press An exceptional lack of sea ice on the Gulf of St. Lawrence this winter has left seal mothers with few places to bear their young or to feed their pups. […]

‘Doomsday’ seed vault sets record, over 500,000 samples

By Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent; Editing by Robin PomeroyWed Mar 10, 2010 7:12pm EST OSLO (Reuters) – A “doomsday” vault storing crop seeds in an Arctic deep freeze is surpassing 500,000 samples to become the most diverse collection of food seeds in history, managers said on Thursday. Set up on the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard […]

Arctic melt to cost up to $24 trillion by 2050: report

Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by Eric WalshWASHINGTONFri Feb 5, 2010 6:08pm EST (Reuters) – Arctic ice melting could cost global agriculture, real estate and insurance anywhere from $2.4 trillion to $24 trillion by 2050 in damage from rising sea levels, floods and heat waves, according to a report released on Friday. “Everybody around the […]

Graph of the Day: Methane Fluxes Venting to the Atmosphere from the East Siberian Arctic Shelf

Summertime observations of dissolved CH4 in the East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) (21). … (D) Fluxes of CH4 venting to the atmosphere over the ESAS. Remobilization to the atmosphere of only a small fraction of the methane held in East Siberian Arctic Shelf (ESAS) sediments could trigger abrupt climate warming, yet it is believed that […]

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 […]

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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