Greenhouse gases emitted by degrading plastic

By Marcie Grabowski 1 August 2018 (UH News) – Several greenhouse gases are emitted as common plastics degrade in the environment, according to researchers from the University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa School of Ocean and Earth Science and Technology (SOEST).Mass production of plastics started nearly 70 years ago, and the production rate is expected to […]

Elegy for Tahlequah’s Calf

By Paul Nelson    30 July 2018 (Cascadia Magazine) – (For David McCloskey)Tahlequah is daughter of Princess Angelinebrother of Moby, sister to Kiki, motherto Notch. Her second offspring was notborn but born still and still un-named &un-numbered. For five days Tahlequahpushed her still-born calf around theSalish Sea, perhaps a hope that she’dnot be a parent to […]

Orca whale continues grieving ritual for a sixth day – “You can’t help see it as a message”

By Lynda V. Mapes 30 July 2018 SAN JUAN ISLANDS (The Seattle Times) – She carries it delicately, carefully, by the fin, or on her head, so as not to make a mark on the tiny body of her calf that lived only half an hour. J35, a mother orca in the southern-resident clan, was […]

Seabirds are pooping out plastic – Study shows seabirds may be transporting ocean microplastics to land – “Almost all of the birds had plastics in their stomachs”

By Cheryl Katz 25 July 2018 (Hakai Magazine) – Plastics, those indestructible relics of our throwaway culture, are omnipresent in the oceans, making their way into everything from sea salt to seabirds. Now, a new study finds seabirds may be giving back, shuttling particles from ocean garbage gyres back to shore in their poop. Around […]

In southeastern U.S., industrial-scale logging drives loss of forest cover – “A highly degraded ecosystem of forests that just get continuously logged over and over again”

By Christina Hoover Moorehead 25 July 2018 (ChavoBart Digital Media) – The southeastern United States is losing trees fast. Between 2000 and 2012, trees in the region were cut up to four times faster than in South American rainforests. Smith: “In the southeastern U.S., what’s driving the loss of forest cover is industrial-scale logging.”That’s Danna […]

Study finds oxygen loss in the coastal Baltic Sea is “unprecedentedly severe” – Global warming delays recovery from 20th century pollution

5 July 2018 (EGU) – The Baltic Sea is home to some of the world’s largest dead zones, areas of oxygen-starved waters where most marine animals can’t survive. But while parts of this sea have long suffered from low oxygen levels, a new study by a team in Finland and Germany shows that oxygen loss […]

Mapping mountaintop coal mining’s yearly spread in Appalachia – “It takes more land to get the same amount of coal than it has in the past”

DURHAM, North Carolina, 25 July 2018 (Duke Today) – The coal industry may have declined in the last decade because of the rise of cheap natural gas, but a coal mining method called mountaintop removal is still taking place, particularly in central Appalachia. A new web-based mapping tool shows, in more detail than ever before, […]

Baby orca deaths could be linked to salmon farm virus – Canada Minister of Fisheries and Oceans refuses to screen farmed fish for deadly piscine orthoreovirus

Vancouver, BC, 2 June 2018 (Sea Shepherd Conservation Society) – On 23 June 2018, an orca born into the critically endangered Southern Resident orca population died within hours of birth. [And another died the same way on Tuesday, 24 July 2018. –Des] Despite the decline of Orcas due to the loss of Chinook salmon, their […]

More recycling won’t solve plastic pollution – It’s a lie that wasteful consumers cause the problem and that changing our individual habits can fix it

By Matt Wilkins 6 July 2018 (Scientific American) – The only thing worse than being lied to is not knowing you’re being lied to. It’s true that plastic pollution is a huge problem, of planetary proportions. And it’s true we could all do more to reduce our plastic footprint. The lie is that blame for […]

A mother grieves: Orca whale continues to carry her dead calf into a second day – “We don’t have five years to wait, we really don’t”

By Lynda V. Mapes 25 July 2018 (The Seattle Times) – For two days she has grieved, carrying her dead calf on her head, unwilling to let it go.J35, a member of the critically endangered southern resident family of orcas, gave birth to her calf Tuesday only to watch it die within half an hour. […]

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