World wildlife populations halved in 40 years – ‘The scale of biodiversity loss and damage to the very ecosystems that are essential to our existence is alarming’

By Roger Harrabin30 September 2014 (BBC News) – The global loss of species is even worse than previously thought, the London Zoological Society (ZSL) says in its new Living Planet Index [pdf]. The report suggests populations have halved in 40 years, as new methodology gives more alarming results than in a report two years ago. […]

A porpoise species ensnared by criminals and nets – ‘It’s definitely the last call for this species’

[UPDATE: Petition to save the vaquita from extinction] By ELISABETH MALKIN 14 September 2014 SAN FELIPE, Mexico (The New York Times) – It is a rare moment when scientists can point to an animal at the edge of extinction and predict when it might disappear forever. But it is happening here, under the golden waters […]

Stanford Biologist warns Earth’s 6th mass extinction in progress

18 September 2014 (The Mind Unleashed) – Those who keep taking our biodiversity for granted: dumping corporate waste, spraying copious amounts of herbicides and pesticides, contaminating our water with […] industrial chemicals while generally ignoring the environment at large, have another thing coming. According to a Stanford biology professor, Rodolfo Dirzo, the earth has begun […]

After 90 percent decline, Federal protection sought for monarch butterfly – ‘The widespread decline of monarchs is driven by the massive spraying of herbicides on genetically engineered crops’

Contact:  Tierra Curry, Center for Biological Diversity, (928) 522-3681Abigail Seiler, Center for Food Safety, (443) 854-4368 Lincoln Brower, Sweet Briar College, (434) 277-5065Sarina Jepsen, Xerces Society, (971) 244-3727 26 August 2014 WASHINGTON (CBD) – The Center for Biological Diversity and Center for Food Safety as co-lead petitioners joined by the Xerces Society and renowned monarch […]

Scientists name newly discovered endangered species after the company that will decide its fate

By Tanya Dimitrova 24 August 2014 (mongabay.com) – Scientists have discovered a new snail species on a limestone hill near a cement quarry in Malaysia, which as far as they know lives nowhere else in the world. The animal’s shell is only one tenth of an inch in size. “Narrow endemic species are a common […]

20 percent of Africa’s elephants killed in three years – ‘We are shredding the fabric of elephant society and exterminating populations across the continent’

By Jeremy Hance19 August 2014 (mongabay.com) – Around 100,000 elephants were killed by poachers for their ivory on the African continent in just three years, according to a new paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Between 2010 and 2012 an average of 6.8 percent of the elephant population was killed annually, […]

Walmart planned for endangered forest lands in South Florida – ‘You wonder how things end up being endangered? This is how.’

By Jenny Staletovich13 July 2014 (Miami Herald) – One of the world’s rarest forests, a section of Miami-Dade County’s last intact tracts of endangered pine rockland, is getting a new resident: a Walmart. About 88 acres of rockland, a globally imperiled habitat containing a menagerie of plants, animals and insects found no place else, was […]

Four rhinos killed in Kenya’s worst poaching attack in more than 25 years

By Drazen Jorgic12 July 2014 NAIROBI (Reuters) – Two armed gangs killed four rhinos for their horns in rural Kenya this week in possibly the worst rhino poaching incident in the country in more than 25 years, the spokesman for Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS) said on Friday. Poaching across sub-Saharan Africa is on the rise […]

Price of ivory triples in China – ‘Although half a world away, China holds the key to the future of the African elephant’

By Jeremy Hance7 July 2014 (mongabay.com) – In the last four years the price of ivory in China has tripled, according to new research from Save the Elephants. The news has worrying implications for governments and conservationists struggling to save elephants in Africa amidst a poaching epidemic, which has seen tens-of-thousands of elephants butchered for […]

Scientists zero in on cause of starfish die-offs – ‘It’s the largest mortality event for marine diseases we’ve seen. It’s been causing catastrophic mortality.’

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 […]

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