Temporal distribution of insect biomass at selected locations in nature protection areas in Germany, 1989-2016. (A) Daily biomass (mean ±1 se) across 26 locations sampled in multiple years (see S4 Fig for seasonal distributions). (B) Distribution of mean annual rate of decline as estimated based on plot specific log-linear models (annual trend coefficient = −0.053, sd = 0.002, i.e. 5.2% annual decline). Graphic: Hallmann, et al., 2017 / PLOS ONE

Three-quarters of the total insect population lost in protected nature reserves – “Whatever the causal factors responsible for the decline, they have a far more devastating effect on total insect biomass than has been appreciated previously”

18 October 2017 (IWWR) – Since 1989, in 63 nature reserves in Germany the total biomass of flying insects has decreased by more than 75 percent. This decrease has long been suspected but has turned out to be more severe than previously thought. Ecologists from Radboud University together with German and English colleagues published these […]

Typhoon Lan rapidly intensifies in Pacific on its path toward Japan

By Angela Fritz 20 October 2017 (The Washington Post) – Typhoon Lan is growing more powerful in the very warm waters of the tropical Pacific. It has more than enough energy to draw from over the next 48 hours, and will in all likelihood reach Category-4 strength on Friday or Saturday. The storm is tracking […]

New UN-led partnership to help curb unsustainable wildlife hunting, protect biodiversity – 4.6 million metric tons of wildmeat are consumed annually in the Congo Basin

10 October 2017 (UN News) – To help African, Caribbean, and Pacific countries stop unsustainable wildlife hunting, conserve natural heritage and strengthen people’s livelihoods and food security, the United Nations agriculture agency launched on Tuesday a €45 million multi-partner initiative.Funded by the European Commission, the seven-year Sustainable Wildlife Management programme will be led by the […]

Trump’s Puerto Rico poll numbers are worse than Bush’s after Hurricane Katrina

By Aaron Blake 12 October 2017 (The Washington Post) – President Trump seemed to hint early Thursday that the federal government could pull out of helping Puerto Rico before the recovery is finished. And just hours later, a new poll showed what a bad idea that was.Quinnipiac University is providing some of the first full-scale […]

Graph of the Day: Heroin and fentanyl deaths in New Jersey, 2004-2016

By Stephen Stirling and Luke Nozicka 4 October 2017 NEWARK (NJ Advance Media) – Four programs in New Jersey have been awarded federal grants to fight the state’s opioid epidemic, a crisis that has claimed the lives of more than 7,000 people since 2012. NJ Advance Media has learned that the State Parole Board will […]

New insights from NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 satellite showcased in Science magazine

  By Carol Rasmussen 12 October 2017 (JPL) – High-resolution satellite data from NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 are revealing the subtle ways that carbon links everything on Earth – the ocean, land, atmosphere, terrestrial ecosystems and human activities. Scientists using the first 2 1/2 years of OCO-2 data have published a special collection of five […]

Sudden onset disasters to make 14 million people homeless every year – Numbers of internally displaced people, refugees, and migrants are at an all-time high

13 October 2017 (United Nations) – Sudden onset disasters, such as earthquakes, tsunamis, floods and tropical cyclones, are likely to displace nearly 14 million people worldwide each year, warns a United Nations-backed study released Friday – International Day for Disaster Reduction.“This is an important baseline against which we can measure progress in reducing disaster risk. […]

Tenfold increase in childhood and adolescent obesity in four decades – World will have more obese children and adolescents than underweight by 2022

LONDON, 11 October 2017 (WHO) – The number of obese children and adolescents (aged five to 19 years) worldwide has risen tenfold in the past four decades. If current trends continue, more children and adolescents will be obese than moderately or severely underweight by 2022, according to a new study led by Imperial College London […]

Latin America and Caribbean falling off “zero hunger” path toward 2030 – “The region faces a double burden of malnutrition”

12 October 2017 (United Nations) – The total number of persons that suffer from hunger in Latin America and the Caribbean has increased, reversing decades of progress, even as overweight and obesity emerged as a major problem in all countries in the region of the Americas, a United Nations-backed report shows.“The region has taken a […]

Record Amazon fires stun scientists; sign of sick, degraded forests – “The dry seasons in Brazil seem to be becoming drier and more frequent”

By Sue Branford and Maurício Torres 11 October 2017 (Mongabay) – Figures from the Brazilian government’s INPE (National Institute of Space Research) show that 2017 is shaping up to be the worst year on record for forest fires: 208,278 were detected by 5 October 2017. Alberto Setzer, who runs INPE’s fire monitoring department, told Mongabay […]

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