from
United Press International: Yellowstone mystery: Where are the rabbits "The U.S. Wildlife Conservation Society is trying to figure out why jack rabbits have vanished from Yellowstone National Park. The report, published in the journal Oryx, said there have been no confirmed jack rabbit sightings in Yellowstone since 1991 and only three in Grand Teton National Park since 1978. Historical records indicate that white-tailed jack rabbits were once abundant in Greater Yellowstone, a 23,166-square-mile ecosystem that contains the Grand Teton and Yellowstone national parks, the group said Thursday in a release."
2008-02-09 16:48:06
from
National Geographic: Warming Creating Extinction Risks for Hibernators "When researchers at the Rocky Mountain Biological Lab in Crested Butte, Colorado, started documenting marmot hibernation patterns in the 1970s, the animals rarely awoke before the third week of May...These abbreviated hibernations are part of a growing body of evidence suggesting that hibernating animals are waking up earlier—or not going to sleep at all—due to rising temperatures from global warming. From chipmunks and squirrels in the Rocky Mountains to brown bears in Spain, these altered slumber patterns are putting animals at risk both of starvation and increased predation, researchers say—which could bring many species to the brink of extinction."
2008-01-29 13:00:17
from
National Geographic News: Flame Retardants Found in Rare Tasmanian Devils "Flame retardants that are suspected carcinogens have been found in some of Australia's Tasmanian devils, researchers announced last week. The find triggered local media reports suggesting that the chemicals might be linked to the mysterious cancer that has been killing the rare marsupials for more than a decade. A study conducted by the Australian government's National Measurement Institute ... found "high" levels of hexabromobiphenyl ether and "reasonably high" levels of decabromobiphenyl ether—chemicals used to treat electronics, textiles, and furniture."
2008-01-22 20:44:32
from
Marianas Variety (Micronesia): 2008 is International Year of the Coral Reef "DIFFERENT environmental groups and government agencies gathered on Friday at the SandCastle of the Hyatt Regency Hotel Saipan to declare 2008 as the International Year of the Coral Reef.... The symposium also recognized the medicinal value of reef organisms, and the different threats to coral reefs such as improper watershed development, sedimentation, marine debris, over-fishing, global warming, among other problems."
2008-01-16 19:26:36
from
Christian Science Monitor: On emptying seas, a vanishing way of life "Cabras, Italy - Seven hours after setting out into the inky 3 a.m. blackness, the Crazy Horse's two-man crew pulls back into port with the fruits of their morning's labor: just a few small buckets of fish, worth maybe $60. "That's the average now," sighs Gianni Pisanu, whose boat is docked nearby, as he helps his neighbors tie up. "The sea is impoverished now." For more than 50 years, the nearly two dozen countries bordering the Mediterranean have struggled to jointly manage the shared bounty of the sea, whose uniqueness makes managing this crisis both unusually difficult and extremely important."
2008-01-15 20:30:14
from
University of Southern California: Greenhouse Ocean May Downsize Fish, Risking One Of World "The last fish you ate probably came from the Bering Sea. But during this century, the sea's rich food web--stretching from Alaska to Russia--could fray as algae adapt to greenhouse conditions. "All the fish that ends up in McDonald's, fish sandwiches--that's all Bering Sea fish," said USC marine ecologist Dave Hutchins, whose former student at the University of Delaware, Clinton Hare, led research published Dec. 20 in Marine Ecology Progress Series.
At present, the Bering Sea provides roughly half the fish caught in U.S. waters each year and nearly a third caught worldwide."
2008-01-14 22:18:40
from
Associated Press: Beetles may wipe out Colo. lodgepoles "DENVER - Strands of distressed, red pine trees across northern Colorado and the Front Range are a visible testament to the bark beetle infestation that officials said will kill most of the state's lodgepole pine trees within 5 years. The infestation that was first detected in 1996 grew by half-million acres last year, bringing the total number of acres attacked by bark beetles to 1.5 million, state and federal forestry officials said Monday.
"This is an unprecedented event," said Rick Cables, Rocky Mountain regional forester for the U.S. Forest Service."
2008-01-13 21:09:36
from
UPI: Invasive beetle attacks redbay trees "Tallahassee, Fla. A beetle imported from Asia is spreading around the southeast United States, leaving dead and dying redbay trees in its wake. The redbay ambrosia beetle is believed to have entered the country through Savannah, Ga., in 2002, probably in a wood pallet or packing case. It has spread into the Carolinas and south to Florida, where it was spotted for the first time last summer in Brevard County in central Florida, Florida Today reports. The beetle produces a fungus that spreads throughout a tree, eventually killing it. The fungus nourishes more generations of beetles."
2008-01-13 15:49:32
from
The Canadian: Catastrophic Bee de-populations "It is particularly worrisome, she said, that the bees' death is accompanied by a set of symptoms, "which does not seem to match anything in the literature."
In many cases, scientists have found evidence of almost all known bee viruses in the few surviving bees found in the hives after most have disappeared. Some had five or six infections at the same time and were infested with fungi -- a sign, experts say, that the insects' immune system may have collapsed."
2008-01-13 15:35:31
from
The New York Times: In Life's Web, Aiding Trees can Kill Them "Their findings, reported in Friday's issue of the journal Science, add to the mounting evidence that relationships between plant and animal species can be far more complex than had been thought and that even seemingly benign interference can have devastating effects."
2008-01-12 15:21:01
from
Washington Post: The Sixth Extinction "More than a decade ago, many scientists claimed that humans were demonstrating a capacity to force a major global catastrophe that would lead to a traumatic shift in climate, an intolerable level of destruction of natural habitats, and an extinction event that could eliminate 30 to 50 percent of all living species by the middle of the 21st century. Now those predictions are coming true. The evidence shows that species loss today is accelerating. We find ourselves uncomfortably privileged to be witnessing a mass extinction event as it's taking place, in real time."
2008-01-11 19:09:29
from
Sacramento Bee (US): Fish: Delta drop sparks fears of ecological shift "Five Delta fish species continue marching toward extinction, according to new data released Wednesday, a result that some observers warn may signify a major ecological shift in the West Coast's largest estuary.... record-low numbers for three species: longfin smelt, Sacramento splittail and American shad. Two others, Delta smelt and striped bass, posted near-record lows."
2008-01-11 23:03:41
from
ScienceDaily: Humans Have Caused Profound Changes In Caribbean Coral Reefs "Coral reefs in the Caribbean have suffered significant changes due to the proximal effects of a growing human population, reports a new study. "It is well acknowledged that coral reefs are declining worldwide but the driving forces remain hotly debated," said author Camilo Mora at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada...The study showed clearly that the number of people living in close proximity to coral reefs is the main driver of the mortality of corals, loss of fish biomass and increases in macroalgae abundance. "The continuing degradation of coral reefs may be soon beyond repair, if threats are not identified and rapidly controlled," Mora said."
2008-01-07 15:20:19
from
Times-Picayune (New Orleans): Study suggests big risks with fish farms "The study from Canadian researchers finds that parasites spread from farmed salmon along Canada's Pacific coast could lead to a species collapse for the area's wild salmon within four years. Previous studies have pointed to sea lice from fish farms as a threat to wild salmon populations, but this is the first to suggest effects on the entire species population."
2008-01-03 14:50:51
from
Newsday (US): Hundreds of crows killed by virus in NY
Hundreds have died this winter from infection with a strain of avian reovirus that attacks their intestinal systems. The birds have been found in Albany, Dutchess, Jefferson, Montgomery, Orange and Steuben counties. The largest die-off was a group of 100 in Poughkeepsie.
2007-12-29 12:58:19
from
Current Biology (Cell Press): Deep-sea Species' Loss Could Lead To Oceans' Collapse, Study Suggests "In a global-scale study, the researchers found some of the first evidence that the health of the deep sea, as measured by the rate of critical ecosystem processes, increases exponentially with the diversity of species living there."
2007-12-29 13:00:48
from
ScienceDaily: Scientist On Quest For Disappearing Eel "Biology professor Peter Hodson and his team of toxicologists and chemists have received a grant from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC) to solve the mystery of Lake Ontario's disappearing eel population.
Declared a "species of concern" under Canada's new Species at Risk Act, American eels have until recently supported a multi-million-dollar historic fishery in Ontario and an even larger industry in Quebec. But with rapidly decreasing numbers of eels, the Ontario fishery has been closed and the Quebec fishery is in serious decline."
2007-12-29 13:01:30
from
Associated Press: Loss of sea ice could harm walrus "Federal marine mammal experts in Alaska studying the effects of global warming on walrus, polar bears and ice seals warn there are limit [sic] to the protections they can provide. They can restrict hunters, ship traffic and offshore petroleum activity, but that may not be enough if the animals' basic habitat "sea ice" disappears every summer."
2007-12-14 16:24:05
from
Science Daily (US): Carbon Crisis lethal for coral reefs "If world leaders do not immediately engage in a race against time to save the Earth's coral reefs, these vital ecosystems will not survive the global warming and acidification predicted for later this century. That is the conclusion of a group of marine scientists from around the world in a major new study published in the journal Science on Dec. 13.... "This crisis is on our doorstep, not decades away. We have little time in which to respond, but respond, we must!" says Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, lead author of the Science paper, The Carbon Crisis: Coral Reefs under Rapid Climate Change and Ocean Acidification."
2007-12-11 18:12:57
from
The Washington Post (2005, US): Wave of Marine Species Extinctions Feared "Sitting in a small motorboat a few hundred yards offshore on a mid-July afternoon, Samuel H. Gruber -- a University of Miami professor who has devoted more than two decades to studying the lemon sharks that breed here -- plunged into despondency. The mangroves being ripped up to build a new resort provide food and protection that the sharks can't get in the open ocean, and Gruber fears the worst." ... "It's been a slow-motion disaster," said Boris Worm, a professor at Canada's Dalhousie University, whose 2003 study that found that 90 percent of the top predator fish have vanished from the oceans. "It's silent and invisible. People don't imagine this. It hasn't captured our imagination, like the rain forest."
2007-12-11 16:27:38
from
Journal of Carbon Balance and Management: Projected climate change impact on oceanic acidification "Future projections of ocean acidification will therefore mainly be dependent on the future level of atmospheric CO2. The consequences of a small but sustained decrease in oceanic pH on marine phytoplankton are virtually unknown. It will be important for marine ecologists in the future to better understand the sensitivities of phytoplankton growth to pH in particular, so as to better quantify the likely future biological changes at the regional and global scale."
2008-01-09 23:02:35
from
The Telegraph (UK): One in three bird species faces extinction An increase of 1°C from present temperatures is likely to trigger roughly 100 bird extinctions. But if the global average temperature were to rise 5°C, from that point on an additional degree of warming, to 6°C, would probably cause 300 to 500 more bird extinctions.
2007-12-09 10:15:15
from
Xinhua (China): Scientists: More than 20 species alien to China invaded country in last decade "Wan Fanghao, an official with the ministry of agriculture, said some alien species have already caused disasters in the country.
The American White Moth, native to North America and first detected in Northeast China's Liaoning Province in 1979, is threatening forests and crops in 116 counties of six provinces and municipalities in China including Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei and Liaoning, according to the State Forestry Administration (SFA).
The moth denude a tree, and consume vegetables and crops in days. It boasts a strong reproduction ability. A female moth can lay some 2,000 eggs in one go, and can breed 30 million to 200 million descendants a year, according to biologists."
2007-12-08 11:49:00
from
BBC: Global Systems may "face collapse" "Current global consumption levels could result in a large-scale ecosystem collapse by the middle of the century, environmental group WWF has warned."
