Caption by Rebecca Lindsey Below the densely forested slopes of southern West Virginia’s Appalachian Mountains is a layer cake of thin coal seams. To uncover this coal profitably, mining companies engineer large—sometimes very large—surface mines. This pair of images shows the growth of one of the largest surface mines in West Virginia during the past […]
Human-size jumbo squid are growing thick along the U.S. west coast. Is climate change aiding their expansion? By Katherine Harmon April 8, 2010 Although many of the Pacific Ocean’s big species are floundering, one large creature of the deep seems to be flourishing. The Humboldt squid (Dosidicus gigas, also known as jumbo squid, owing to […]
April 7, 2010 A leading bat expert with the USDA Forest Service’s Southern Research Station today identified nine bat species in Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina and Tennessee that she believes are most threatened by white-nose syndrome (WNS), a fungus that kills bats and appears to be rapidly spreading south from the northeastern United […]
By Jeanna Bryner, LiveScience Managing Editor posted: 07 April 2010 08:10 am ET Like scenes out of Gary Larson’s “Far Side” comic strip, scientists have discovered a tragicomedy playing out in deaths of Arctic seabirds. Some crash into each other in heavy fog. Others perish when heavy winds slam them into cliffs. Still others simply […]
By MATTHEW BROWN, Associated Press Writer BILLINGS, Mont. – Glacier National Park has lost two more of its namesake moving icefields to climate change, which is shrinking the rivers of ice until they grind to a halt, a government researcher said Wednesday. Warmer temperatures have reduced the number of named glaciers in the northwestern Montana […]
(Oregon State University) The Swiss needle cast epidemic in Douglas-fir forests of the coastal Pacific Northwest is continuing to intensify, appears to be unprecedented over at least the past 100 years, and is probably linked to the extensive planting of Douglas-fir along the coast and a warmer climate, new research concludes. Scientists in the College […]
After increasing during much of the 20th century, forest cover in the eastern United States in recent decades has resumed its previous decline, according to an exhaustive new analysis published in the April 2010 issue of BioScience. The work is described in an article by Mark A. Drummond and Thomas R. Loveland of the US […]
Reporting by Timothy Gardner; Editing by Lisa ShumakerWASHINGTONTue Apr 6, 2010 11:20am EDT (Reuters) – For the first time in 10 years Americans are more likely to say the United States should give more priority to developing oil, natural gas and coal than to protecting the environment, according to a poll on Tuesday. The poll […]
Solomons, Md. (April 6, 2010) – New research by a team of ecologists and hydrologists shows that water temperatures are increasing in many streams and rivers throughout the United States. The research, published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, documents that 20 major U.S. streams and rivers – including such prominent rivers […]
CITYWATCHBy Ken Draper “The question I have been asked most often during the budget crisis,” says LA Controller Wendy Greuel, “is when the City will run out of money?” “Unfortunately,” she tells the Council and the Mayor, “we finally have that answer … the City’s General Fund will be out of money … in fact […]
