Wildlife and Habitat
A New Labeling Initiative
Hydraulic fracturing – or fracking – is a well-stimulation technique in which rock is fractured by a pressurized liquid to free otherwise trapped natural gas or oil.
Nature: A Natural Stress-Buster
If you’ve ever taken a walk outside to “clear your head,” it turns out you were onto something. Scientists, doctors, and the average person have long known that time spent in nature can have de-stressing, mood-boosting effects. They just haven’t been exactly sure why.
Street Trees Are Good For Us
Want to feel younger? Live on a street with more trees. That’s the finding of University of Chicago researchers who studied the impact of street trees on the real and perceived health of residents of Toronto, Canada.
Meat Consumption & Biodiversity
Several studies warn that the current loss and decline of species is contributing to what appears to be the beginning of earth’s sixth mass extinction. More than 400 species have gone extinct in the last 100 years. And scientists suggest up to 37 percent of the world’s species could go extinct within the next 35 years.
El Niño On The Way
There are starting to be a lot of news reports about a strong El Niño being on the way later this year. El Niño is a weather phenomenon that occurs in the eastern tropical Pacific every two to seven years. East-to-west trade winds weaken and ocean surface temperatures go up. The result impacts the weather throughout the Pacific region.
The Really Big One
Most people have heard of the San Andreas fault line. It runs the length of California, and is perpetually rumored to be to be on the verge of unleashing a big earthquake. But there’s a much lesser known fault line located just north of the San Andreas that’s predicted to trigger an even larger quake.
We Need More Free-Range Kids
Once-upon-a-time, kids were expected to amuse themselves outdoors. Today, fears of shady neighbors and bodily harm have led to a nation of parents who appear content to keep their kids inside, playing computer games, surfing the web, texting, and watching TV.
Bumblebees And The Climate Squeeze
Bumblebees face their share of hazards – habitat loss, disease, and harmful pesticides among them. New research shows that climate change is also a significant threat to bumblebee populations in Europe and North America. In fact, University of Ottawa scientists suggest that, for these bumblebees, climate change may be the biggest threat of all.
Climate Change And Lobster
It’s no secret that ocean waters are warming, especially in New England. The waters in the Gulf of Maine are warming 99% faster than the rest of the world’s oceans. What’s the problem? Well, lobsters like cold water, and as a result, they’re heading north.
A Giant Red Tide
Red tide is the common name for algal blooms in the ocean. These are typically cyclical events that occur along our coasts and generally last a few weeks.
The Heat From Global Warming
The average surface temperature around the world has gone up over a degree over the past 40 years but some people argue that if the greenhouse effect was really at fault, the temperature rise would be much larger.
The Complicated Case Of Cecil The Lion
The recent killing of Zimbabwe’s Cecil the Lion sparked a world-wide reaction and has focused a great deal of attention on the ethics of trophy hunting. There is no question that trophy hunting is an extremely polarizing issue and there are demands around the world to curtail the practice.
Biodiversity Is Good For Us
There are many reasons to protect Earth’s biodiversity. One of the more underrated is that disease incidence is lower when ecosystems support a variety of plants and animals.
Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria In The Hudson
Combined sewer systems are designed to collect rainwater runoff, sewage, and industrial wastewater in the same pipe, and then transport the wastewater to a sewage treatment plant. But during heavy rainfall events, wastewater treatment plants can get overwhelmed, forcing them to discharge untreated water into nearby water bodies. This intentional discharge of dirty water is known as C-S-Os – or combined sewer overflows.
[Read more…] about Antibiotic Resistant Bacteria In The Hudson
Tech Advances Provide Window Into Wildlife
Since the evolution of our earliest ancestors, people have looked to clues – such as footprints in the mud or rubs on trees – to gain insight into wildlife behavior.
[Read more…] about Tech Advances Provide Window Into Wildlife
Shopping Bags
Paper or plastic? It’s a quandary we have faced in the grocery store for decades. Plastic is non-biodegradable and usually ends up in landfills or worse, in waterways or in the ocean. On the other hand, manufacturing paper is water intensive and produces pollution.
Trash At National Parks
Our national parks are shining examples of the American wilderness whose natural wonders attract millions of visitors from around the world. This popularity has a cost: national park visitors generate more than 100 million pounds of garbage each year, most of which ends up in landfills.
Is Pollution Good for Trees?
In recent decades, the so-called hygiene hypothesis has been proposed to explain the rapid rise in allergic diseases during the 20th century and has even been linked to a broader range of chronic illnesses. The basic idea is that that when exposure to parasites, bacteria, and viruses is limited early in life, children face a greater chance of having allergies, asthma, and other autoimmune diseases during adulthood.
Missing Monarchs
