Climate ‘weirdness’ throws ecosystems ‘out of kilter’

Dave Davies interviews Science journalist Michael Lemonick 14 August 2012 Science journalist Michael Lemonick doesn’t want to be a doomsday prophet, but he does want to be realistic about the threat of climate change. “Since I started writing about climate change all the way back in 1987, we’ve known what the cause is, we’ve known […]

In fragmented Brazil forest, few species survive – ‘The results are actually pretty gloomy’

By KELLY SLIVKA14 August 2012 The Atlantic Forest in Brazil, which runs along the country’s southeastern shore near Rio de Janeiro, has been fragmented by centuries of human habitation. While the rain forest originally spanned over half a million square miles – an area comparable to the size of South Africa – almost 90 percent […]

Giant Asian tiger prawn invade Gulf of Mexico waters

By Mark Strassmann13 August 2012 DULAC, Louisiana – Shrimping season opened Monday off Louisiana and fishermen can’t get over what they’re now finding in their nets. Some say the coastline is under invasion. The giant invaders are valuable, but may be destroying the Gulf ecosystem. From Texas to North Carolina, fishermen have been catching giant […]

‘Severe abnormalities’ found in Fukushima butterflies

By Nick Crumpton, BBC News13 August 2012 Exposure to radioactive material released into the environment has caused mutations in butterflies found in Japan, a study suggests. Scientists found an increase in leg, antennae, and wing shape mutations among butterflies collected following the 2011 Fukushima accident. The link between the mutations and the radioactive material was […]

Graph of the Day: Spread of Colorado Mountain Pine Beetle, 1996-2011

Mountain pine beetle (MPB) is an insect native to the forests of western North America and is also known as the Black Hills beetle or the Rocky Mountain pine beetle. MPB primarily develop in pines such as lodgepole, ponderosa, Scotch and limber pines, and less commonly affect bristlecone and piñon pines. Symptoms of Infestation Popcorn-shaped […]

Rate of Arctic summer sea ice loss is 50 percent higher than predicted

By Robin McKie, science editor, www.guardian.co.uk11 August 2012 Sea ice in the Arctic is disappearing at a far greater rate than previously expected, according to data from the first purpose-built satellite launched to study the thickness of the Earth’s polar caps. Preliminary results from the European Space Agency’s CryoSat-2 probe indicate that 900 cubic kilometres […]

Okanagan Valley smoked out by Siberia forest fires – 94 forest fires rage on 12,588 hectares

[12,588 hectares = 48.6 square miles. This afternoon, the sky in Seattle is an eerie, hazy yellow from Siberia smoke carried on the jet stream, the incinerated remains of trees and animals.  This may be the most under-reported story of 2012.] By Jennifer Zielinski 13 August 2012 It may be forest fire season but the […]

Siberia forest fires leave ‘green deserts’ – Cities blanketed in smoke

MOSCOW, 3 August 2012 (RIA Novosti) – Fires are spreading across vast Siberian forests in a flashback to the summer of 2010, when the worst drought on record sparked fires that killed dozens of Russians. The total area of forests gripped by fire in Russia has increased to 11 million-12 million hectares, Grigory Kuksin, head […]

The sound of a damaged habitat

By BERNIE KRAUSE28 July 2012 Glen Ellen, California. YEARS ago, when selective logging was first introduced, a community near an old-growth forest in the Sierra Nevada was assured that the removal of a few trees here and there would have no impact on the area’s wildlife. Based on the logging company’s guarantees, the local residents […]

Image of the Day: Satellite view of deforestation in Rondônia, Brazil, 1975 and 2012

Caption by Aries Keck8 August 2012 Deforestation in the Amazon Rainforest takes on many different patterns. In Rondônia, a state in Western Brazil, deforestation took on the fishbone pattern revealed in these Landsat images from 1975 and 2012. Access to this remote region began with the building of a major road stretching from north to […]

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