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Wood Duck / Photo by Tiffany Kersten (USFWS) |
Birds and birding
Science and nature blogging
Environment and biodiversity
- The Trust for Public Land released its 2013 city park system rankings. Minneapolis took the top ranking, with New York City, San Francisco, Sacramento, and Boston close behind.
- The neighborhood where ExxonMobil's Pegasus pipeline spilled is still seriously contaminated.
- Meanwhile, several oil wells in the Gulf of Mexico have been leaking oil since Hurricane Ivan in 2004.
- Natural gas is often promoted as a cleaner alternative to coal, with lower carbon emissions. While that is true, the effect is balanced by methane leaks at natural gas wells.
- An "extinct" frog was rediscovered in Israel, and it turned out to be the sole surviving member of its genus.
- The Wildlife Conservation Society is hoping that Instagram users will photograph Brood II cicadas and tag the photos with #cicadasinmyhood.
- While periodical cicadas are numerous and widespread, their emergences can be quite localized, so that places not far from each other see vastly different numbers of cicadas.
- People who reject climate science are also likely to believe in other conspiracy theories.
- Here's another way that deer overpopulation changes forests: too much deer urine prevents young hemlocks from growing since they prefer low-nitrogen soil.
- Reindeer can reduce the amount of solar energy absorbed by the tundra by grazing on dark-colored plants, but if they overgraze reindeer lichen, that effect is negated.
- An environmentalist in Costa Rica was murdered for defending sea turtle nests.
- Here is a short piece on the environmentalist roots of the protests in Turkey. See also this longer article about the environmental movement in Turkey.