12 June 2014 (NOAA) – Parts of the West, especially the southern portions, have been in drought for the last several years, with the PHDI reaching record or near-record low values at times. Time series of precipitation departure show the variation over time (New Mexico, California), while maps of the SPEI show the spatial extent […]
By Ashley Ahearn and Katie Campbell, Earthfix 17 June 2014 ORCAS ISLAND, Washington (PBS) – Drew Harvell peers into the nooks and crannies along the rocky shoreline of Eastsound on Orcas Island. Purple and orange starfish clutch the rocks, as if hanging on for dear life. In fact, they are. “It’s a lot worse than […]
By Haya El Nasser5 June 2014 LOS ANGELES (Al Jazeera) – A bear wandered into a public park in San Luis Obispo County and sent Little Leaguers scampering for shelter. Who’s to blame? The drought, of course. Mountain lions are jumping fences in northern California and killing goats. Whose fault? The drought again. In California, […]
By Martha Baskin and Mary Bruno16 June 2014 (Crosscut) – What happens when phytoplankton, the (mostly) single-celled organisms that constitute the very foundation of the marine food web, turn toxic? Their toxins often concentrate in the shellfish and many other marine species (from zooplankton to baleen whales) that feed on phytoplankton. Recent trailblazing research by […]
7 June 2014 (CBS News) – Southern California is already plagued by a crippling drought and wildfires. Now you can add a legion of seemingly unstoppable beetles to the list of threats facing the region’s forests. They’ve already invaded hundreds of tree species, and they are showing no signs of slowing down. “We have lost […]
By Diana Marcum30 May 2014 HURON, California (Los Angeles Times) – The two fieldworkers scraped hoes over weeds that weren’t there. “Let us pretend we see many weeds,” Francisco Galvez told his friend Rafael. That way, maybe they’d get a full week’s work. They always tried to get jobs together. Rafael, the older man, had […]
By Jim Carlton 6 June 2014 SAUSALITO, California – Record numbers of distressed sea lions have washed ashore in California for a second straight year, the latest example of a marine mammal facing severe problems amid what biologists say is overfishing and other human-caused strains on the world’s oceans. From January through May, a record […]
By Chris Martenson21 May 2014 (PeakProsperity.com) – The US shale oil “miracle” has about as much believability left as Jimmy Swaggart. Just today, we learned that the EIA has placed a hefty downward revision on its estimate of the amount of recoverable oil in the #1 shale reserve in the US, the Monterey in California. […]
By Louis Sahagun19 May 2014 (Los Angeles Times) – The Central Valley’s 7 million acres of irrigated farmland are best known as the richest food-producing region in the world. But a new study by UC Davis researchers forecasts severe socioeconomic impacts ahead in the area where many of the nation’s fresh fruits, nuts and vegetables […]
20 May 2014 (UCS) – The growing consequences of climate change are putting many of the country’s most iconic and historic sites at risk. From Ellis Island to the Everglades, Cape Canaveral to California’s César Chávez National Monument, these sites symbolize values that unite all Americans — patriotism, freedom, democracy, and more — and together […]
