By Steve Cole, NASA Headquarters, WashingtonAug. 19, 2010 WASHINGTON — Global plant productivity that once was on the rise with warming temperatures and a lengthened growing season is now on the decline because of regional drought according to a new study of NASA satellite data. Plant productivity is a measure of the rate of the […]
(Washington University in St. Louis) At Point Reyes National Seashore in Marin County, Calif., a fierce battle is taking place under the oblivious, peeling noses of beachgoers. It’s a battle between an invasive plant and a native plant, but with a new twist. The two plants, European beachgrass and Tidestrom’s lupine, are not in […]
The Macquarie Marshes – a vast, tangled sprawl of creeks and swamps between Nyngan and Walgett in the state’s northwest – has declined by about half since the 1960s because of the drought and the diversion of water for irrigation. … ”About 50 per cent of the wetland area is gone and more has been […]
By David A. FahrentholdWashington Post / August 2, 2010 ON TAMBOUR BAY, La. — In the next act of the drama of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, two of the most important heroes don’t look like heroes. They are just thin green stalks, sticking out of blackened patches of grass. They are cordgrass and […]
Press AssociationFriday, 30 July 2010 Scientists are on the lookout for an Asian beetle that could ravage British trees after one was found last week, the Food and Environment Research Agency (Fera) said today. The Citrus Longhorn Beetle was found at a school in Langham, near Oakham, Rutland, Leicestershire, last week. The beetle, occasionally […]
ScienceDaily (July 28, 2010) — A new article published in the 29 July issue of the journal Nature reveals for the first time that microscopic marine algae known as “phytoplankton” have been declining globally over the 20th century. Phytoplankton forms the basis of the marine food chain and sustains diverse assemblages of species ranging from […]
By John PlattJul 20, 2010 05:30 PM Illegal trade in endangered species continues to grow around the world. How big is the problem? Here are 10 major cases that have hit the media in just the past week: Six pallets containing 765 kilograms of elephant tusks worth an estimated $1.2 million were seized in Thailand […]
By Michael McCarthy, Environment EditorWednesday, 21 July 2010 It is the emblematic bird of sexual fidelity – and just like sexual fidelity itself, it is rapidly on the wane. The turtle dove, famed in folklore and literature as the creature which is always constant to its mate, seems to be on the high road […]
By Jeremy Hance, www.mongabay.com July 18, 2010 A new report by the United Nation Environment Program (UNEP) and the Nature Conservancy has found that mangrove forests are being lost at staggering rates worldwide: since 1980 one fifth of the world’s mangroves have been felled. Mangroves, which grow in saline coastal habitats, are disappearing four times […]
ScienceDaily (July 7, 2010) — Faced with threats such as habitat loss and climate change, thousands of rare flowering plant species worldwide may become extinct before scientists can even discover them, according to a paper published today by a trio of American and British researchers in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B. “Scientists […]
