By Anthony LeRoy Westerling23 May 2016 (The Conversation) – Dramatic images of out-of-control wildfires in western North American forests have appeared on our television and computer screens with increasing regularity in recent decades, while costs of fire suppression have soared. In 2015, federal spending on suppression exceeded US$2 billion, just 15 years after first exceeding […]
By Bob Henson 20 May 2016 (wunderground.com) – The sea ice that coats the Arctic Ocean each winter and erodes each summer is going through its most depleted spring since modern observing began. The Danish Meteorological Institute reported the lowest sea ice extent of any April in the Arctic’s 38-year-long satellite record. As luck would […]
By Arthur Neslen18 May 2016 Białowieża, Poland (The Guardian) – Europe’s last primeval forest is facing what campaigners call its last stand as loggers prepare to start clear-cutting trees, following the dismissal of dozens of scientists and conservation experts opposed to the plan. Poland’s new far right government says logging is needed because more than […]
By Michael Snyder9 May 2016 (Activist Post) – Why are millions upon millions of dead sea creatures suddenly washing up on beaches all over the world? It is certainly not unusual for fish and other inhabitants of our oceans to die. This happens all the time. But over the past month we have seen a […]
By Merrit Kennedy14 May 2016 (NPR) – The massive bleaching hitting the Great Barrier Reef off the coast of Australia is likely that country’s “biggest ever environmental disaster,” says Dr. Justin Marshall, who has studied the reef for three decades. Only 7 percent of the reef has escaped bleaching, according to researchers at the ARC […]
By David Sigston10 May 2016 (AAP) – Scientists are worried about an “unprecedented” dieback of mangroves in northern Australia and the link with large-scale coral bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef. The widespread damage to mangroves around the Gulf of Carpentaria has been highlighted at an international wetland conference held this week in Darwin. While […]
By Shreya Dasgupta11 May 2016 (mongabay.com) – Coral reefs around the world are in deep trouble. Last month, scientists reported that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef corals were experiencing “the worst mass bleaching event in its history”. Of the 500 coral reefs they observed while flying over 4,000 kilometers (~2,485 miles) of the Great Barrier Reef, […]
10 May 2016 (UMD) – Beekeepers across the United States lost 44 percent of their honey bee colonies during the year spanning April 2015 to April 2016, according to the latest preliminary results of an annual nationwide survey. Rates of both winter loss and summer loss—and consequently, total annual losses—worsened compared with last year. This […]
[Follow #SOTWP on Twitter for live updates during the State of the World’s Plants Symposium (11-12 May 2016).] By Damian Carrington9 May 2016 (The Guardian) – One in five of the world’s plant species is threatened with extinction, according to the first global assessment of flora, putting supplies of food and medicines at risk. But […]
10 May 2016 (UN) – Millions of migratory birds are being lost each year as a result of illegal killing, taking and trade, United Nations officials warned on World Migratory Bird Day, calling for concerted action to end the threats to migratory birds and urging everyone to step outside and “listen to the birds chirping,” […]
