Posts
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| Blue Jay / Photo by J. Meyers/USFWS |
- A study of Black-throated Blue Warblers using data from bird banding stations found that they have been migrating about one day earlier per decade over the past fifty years.
- A model suggests that birds migrated during glacial periods and that patterns of migration changed with the climate.
- The replacement with grass or soil surfaces with artificial turf or concrete in urban parks contributes to the decline of sparrows.
- A genetic study of island-dwelling birds from 110 archipelagos confirmed key predictions of island biogeography.
- Restoration of habitat for the Northern Bobwhite in Maryland also helps the Chesapeake Bay watershed by reducing agricultural runoff.
- An experiment found that North Island Robins have long-term memories.
- Conservationists are pushing for protection of the Bengal Florican so that it can be a flagship species for riparian grasslands in South and Southeast Asia.
- A frozen bird that emerged from the permafrost in Siberia turned out to be a Horned Lark from 46,000 years ago.
- The Meadowlands Nature Blog: Don Torino's Life in the Meadowlands: The Eagle Has Returned But for How Long?
- Avian Hybrids: Choosing between Cerrado and Chaco: Which corridor connected the Andean and Atlantic forest populations of the Buff-browed Foliage Gleaner?
- Arachnofiles: Arachnews: February 17, 2020
- Backyard and Beyond: I’m Easy Lichen Sunday Morning…
- Linda Murdock Photography: Great Blue Herons are Ready for Spring
- Pangolins have been suggested as potential sources of the recent coronavirus outbreak since they are so highly trafficked. In addition to trafficking, habitat destruction contributes to the spread of disease from wildlife to humans by pushing wildlife into smaller patches of habitat and bringing them into closer contact with people and their pets and livestock. The epidemic and its likely origin should also not be an excuse for bigotry.
- A heat wave in New Zealand cooked thousands of mussels to death.
- Ethical wildlife photography requires minimizing harm to wildlife and honesty about how photos were taken.
- A DNA barcoding study found that there may be more bat species in the Philippines than thought. As a consequence some bat species may be more endangered than they are currently classified.
- Road salt is harmful to amphibians when it washes into nearby wetlands.
- A population of hybrid poison frogs is the result of natural interbreeding rather than trafficking.
- Reintroduction of beavers in England has caused some local problems but overall has benefits for both people and wildlife.
- Freshwater insects and plants have improved since hitting lows in the 1970s.
- Winters have been warming faster than summers (much like colder places are warming faster than hotter places) and warmer winters have a host of cascading effects, from reducing the snowpack in the West to increasing the number of disease-carrying and invasive insects in the East.
- The Trump administration's weakening of federal protections for waterways will have the worst effects in states without strong local protections. The rule also has the potential to undo progress in the Chesapeake region, where some states have made more of an effort than others to clean up the watershed.
- The Trump administration is pushing ahead with weakening standards for mercury emissions despite opposition from the electric industry. Coal companies want the rollback, however.
- A new study suggests that methane emissions from fossil fuel operations are much higher than previous estimates.
- Because of the prevailing winds, coal-fired power plants in the Midwest contribute to air pollution on the East Coast, and the EPA seems disinclined to take action.
- Indigenous activists have been fighting the construction of the Coastal GasLink pipeline across their territory in British Columbia.
- Climate change has been rising as a priority for voters, but there is still a large divide between Republican and Democratic voters on the issue.
- Here is a primer on why single-use plastics are a problem and how to reduce their usage.
- A federal study is assessing pollution from the Diamond Alkali Superfund site to inform cleanup of the site and the Passaic River.
