Yahoo! Green: NATURE

The state of wildlife in the midst of a mass extinction (now)

Dan Shapley — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 12:41:00 PST

Jeff Corwin is becoming the Everyman Indian Jones. Because he's not just an "animal guy" anymore. And while his first MSNBC documentary, Future Earth: 100 Heartbeats, may have enough cute fuzzy animal appeal to woo doe-eyed animal lovers, the brutal scenes familiar to the nature show lineup don't come from circling hyenas, but from us, whether we're poachers in the African bush or simply shoppers in a U.S. grocery store.

And that's the point, driven home with a series of profiles of species on the brink of extinction and those "conservation heroes" trying to preserve them: They're cute, they're fuzzy, they're important to the ecological functioning of the Earth ... and we humans are both their biggest enemies and their last chance at survival.

The education for the layman in the documentary is this: The Earth is in the midst of a mass extinction event, the likes of which has been seen before, but not during humanity's tenure on the planet, and never before caused by single species. Past extinction events are thought to have been triggered by meteor strikes, volcanic eruptions and climactic changes. This one is all our's.

Corwin's inspiration came from a conversation with his daughter about Panamanian golden frog, once Panama's national symbol and a frog he has showed in previous documentaries, he told the crowd gathered at a screening this week in New York. "She said, 'If we ever go to Panama, you have to show me that frog.' I said, 'I can't'." It's extinct. (And Panama has chosen a new national symbol.)

The depressing part of his new documentary -- and there are about two parts depressing to every part inspiration in this recipe -- is that the threats come in so many and varied forms. And the editing team was unflinching.

If this documentary is your first experience of a pangolin, you'll have the stomach-churning experience of seeing a pickled pangolin fetus awaiting sale at a Cambodian restaurant. If you've never witnessed shark finning -- slicing fins off live sharks and tossing them back in the ocean to sink slowly and drown -- then here's your chance.

For amphibians like the multicolored and charismatic frogs of Panama -- some of which Corwin searches out while wading knee-deep in a cave filled with bat guano -- the primary threat is a fungus that's been spreading for unexplained reasons, but probably aided and abetted by human trade and travel.

For rhinoceroses, sharks and the elephants, it's a poached-toward-extinction mix of inadequate policing, poverty, greed and strange folk medicine (if you think rhino horn powder improves your sex drive, try biting your nails, because it's the same stuff).

For orangutans, the orphaned young of which (one is tempted to write "of whom") deliver some of the film's unforgettable doses of cute as they cling to Corwin's neck and stare up wide-eyed at their first experience of untouched rainforest, the threat is in every grocery store product that contains palm oil; for companies and farmers in Borneo, it's far cheaper to clear-cut the orangutan's forests than to seed palm plantations on already cleared land.

The inspiring part of the documentary comes in passionate care the protectors take with their species. We see surrogate cheetah moms and deft condor surgeons. One man adopts the role of mother for an orphaned rhino, and the viewer is treated to touching scenes of him sleeping an arm's length away, and exercising the dancing behemoth (if you don't believe rhinos dance, you'll have to watch the documentary).

But there's often brutality even in the care shown to these creatures. The documentary opens with scenes of helicopters chasing down racing rhinos to dart them with tranquilizers, and rangers bloodying the animals to mark them and to take tissue samples, before wrestling them into crates and shipping them like freight ... to the safety of a national park many miles away.

The documentary footage, spanning four continents, distills hundreds of hours of footage into about 90 minutes (without commercials). It airs on MSNBC, and its release coincides with the publication of a book of the same title. The gimmick in the title is a good one: 100 heartbeats, for the species profiled, is about all it would take for them to slip into nothingness.

The argument that protecting these creatures is a moral imperative is persuasive, not only because we hold the fates of entire species in our hands, but because future generations will only experience them if we protect them now. Jeff Corwin, with the earnestness we're familiar with, is the perfect reporter to deliver this kind of hard-hitting message. America already trusts him with the world's wildlife, and he's already welcome in our living rooms.

If the documentary could have been stronger, it would have included more of a call-to-action: What can we do besides feel bad for that boiled sea turtle, or the finned shark? Don't eat shark fin soup, sure... but what else?

Some of the animals' protectors offer ideas at the close of the documentary: Avoid and ban the lead shot that poisons wildlife like the California Condor, make sustainability a priority in purchasing decisions and donate to those organizations that make wildlife conservation possible, like the Cheetah Conservation Fund, the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, the Panama Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Project and others profiled on screen and in print.

Here are 10 things you can do to stop extinctions, according to the Endangered Species Coalition.

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Reprinted with permission of Hearst Communications, Inc

Search for Loch Ness Monster nets 100,000 golf balls

Stephanie Rogers, Mother Nature Network — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 10:23:27 PST

Photo: Wikimedia Commons

Golf and the Loch Ness Monster: These two symbols of Scotland collided in an environmentally disastrous way this month when scientists searching for Nessie found 100,000 golf balls instead.

Footage from the expedition shows numerous golf balls illuminated against the dull brown of the lake bottom.

"From the moon to the bottom of Loch Ness, golf balls are humanity's signature litter in the most inaccessible locations,” U.K. lawmaker Patrick Harvie told CNN.

And though the golf balls left on the moon by astronauts back in 1971 would have dissolved a long time ago, here on Earth, golf balls take much longer to decompose — and they release a high quantity of heavy metals in the process.

The core of golf balls contain dangerous levels of zinc, which attaches itself to ground sediment and poisons surrounding plants and wildlife.

Torben Kastrup Petersen, course manager for the Danish Golf Union, says the full impact of golf ball pollution is unknown. About 300 million golf balls are lost or discarded every year in the United States alone.

“There has been very little research on the environmental impact of golf balls, but it's safe to say the indicators are not good. We are planning to collaborate with environmentalists in America to conduct more tests to fully explore the extent of the problem.”

Stephanie Rogers is a regular contributor to Mother Nature Network, where this post originally appeared.

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Tweet for the bees

Umbra Fisk, Grist.org — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 10:18:43 PST

Dearest readers,

OK, so bees might not be your primary concern these days, what with health care and jobs and foreclosures to worry about. But we depend on our buzzing buddies more than you might think: for one thing, they play a key role in producing a third of the food we eat.

So here’s an easy way to show your love for the bees this week: tweet!

Through a campaign called Help the Honey Bees (#HelpHoneyBees), Haagen-Dazs is raising funds and awareness. As part of the campaign, from now through November 11, the company will donate $1 per tweet with the proper hashtag, up to 500 per day.

The money will support honeybee research at UC Davis. Of course, they could just cough up the $3,500 and be done with it ... but that wouldn’t be viral and all that good stuff!

Show the world you’re as viral as colony collapse disorder ... tweet for the bees today.

And check out my bee hugs video, below. It’s one of my favorites. Spread the honey love!

BEE HUGS! @ Yahoo! Video

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Giant jellyfish sinks 10-ton Japanese ship

Stephanie Rogers, Mother Nature Network — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:47:43 PST

Photo: National Geographic

Centuries ago, sailors feared the Kraken – legendary sea monsters so large, they were capable of bringing down ships. Now, modern Japanese fishermen have a new tale to tell of such gargantuan sea creatures – even if it wasn’t powerful tentacles that caused their ship to capsize.

The 10-ton Diasan Shinsho-maru went down in the waters off Japan while trying to haul a net containing dozens of gigantic gelatinous Nomura’s jellyfish, which can reach up to 6 feet 7 inches in diameter and weigh up to 440 pounds.

The load of jellyfish was so heavy, it caused the fishing trawler to sink, throwing the three-man crew into the sea despite clear skies and calm waters. Another trawler rescued the flailing crew.

The Sea of Japan is packed with these oversized creatures, which clog up and damage fishermen’s nets, rendering the fish caught alongside them inedible with their toxic stings. They even get sucked into pumps at nuclear power plants along the shore along with sea water used to cool the reactors.

Scientists believe that some of the factors contributing to the ballooning Nomura’s jellyfish population may include warming sea waters and overfishing of other species.

Stephanie Rogers is a regular contributor to Mother Nature Network, where this post originally appeared.

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Stunning photos of birds filled with plastic

Lori Bongiorno — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:04:38 PDT

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch is often referred to as a huge floating island of trash in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Scientists don't know exactly how big it is, although many estimate that it's the size of the state of Texas or even twice that.

But for all the talk about the enormity of this floating trash island and its detrimental affect on marine life, it's not easy to visualize. You can't see the mounds of plastic debris with the naked eye or satellite photos because most of the plastic has broken down into tiny pieces that lie beneath the ocean's surface.

Photographer Chris Jordan, who has captured the essence of American mass consumption and tragedies such as Hurricane Katrina on film, has found a way to document the impact of the vast amounts of discarded plastic on marine life.

In the fall of 2009, Jordan visited the Midway Atoll in the Pacific Ocean and photographed the astounding evidence of human garbage found inside the bellies of albatross chicks. The baby birds are fed plastic debris by their parents who mistake it for food. As a result, hundreds of thousands of albatross babies are poisoned, choked, or suffer from deadly blockages every year.

Jordan says in his blog that his photographs portray the actual stomach contents of the baby birds and that the plastic was not "moved, placed, manipulated, arranged, or altered in any way."

You can see more of these photos, as well as larger versions, in Jordan's "Midway: Message from the Gyre" gallery on his website. All photos used here with permission.

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Ladybug invasion paints Colorado town red

Stephanie Rogers, Mother Nature Network — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 13:22:50 PDT

Photo: 9NEWS

When a reporter with a bug phobia ventured out to Jefferson County to cover a story about a ladybug invasion, he told himself repeatedly that the little red bugs were harmless and cute. They don’t bite. Kids like them.

So Chris Vanderveen of 9NEWS was okay with the whole situation when he arrived on scene and a four-year-old boy showed him a few dozen ladybugs convened on a drain spout outside his parents’ home. This wasn’t too scary, and it certainly wasn’t the ‘crazy’ number of ladybugs he had been told to expect.

Then he reached the infested house at the top of a mountain.

“There were dozens of them floating in the air. And then we saw the back of the house. That very well could have been the moment that I lost my you know what,” Vanderveen reported on the 9NEWS website.

“They were covering the man's house. There were thousands of them. They landed on my shirt. They crawled up my pants. A couple were clearly squished in the bottom of my shoe. And yes, one even flew into my mouth.”

Check out this video by Kids Talk Politics:

The town, which doesn’t want the media knowing its exact location for fear of an influx of tourists, has so many ladybugs buzzing about that some trees, homes and grassy areas are just a mass of red.

The insects are out in force in the Front Range region of Colorado thanks to increased rainfall during spring and early summer. The additional moisture has made their food supply plentiful so their numbers have increased by 15 to 20 percent.

For Chris Vanderveen, the ladybug invasion was a chance to get over his fear of flying insects – at least temporarily. As they crawled up his leg, dropped down his shirt, took up residence in his hair and continued to fly toward his mouth, Vanderveen realized that they’re just ladybugs after all – nothing to be afraid of. But that doesn’t mean his phobia is gone for good.

“As for those pesky moths, yep, I still hate 'em. And I'm pretty sure they don't taste like chicken either.”

Stephanie Rogers is a regular contributor to Mother Nature Network, where this post originally appeared.

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Seven species that won't survive global warming

Dan Shapley — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 11:52:00 PDT

Demonstrators around the world are making a plea to world leaders to recognize a single number: 350. That's the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, measured in parts per million, that some leading scientists say represents a safe level for life as we know it on Earth. The level today stands at 387 ppm, and time is running out to reduce emissions dramatically enough to stave off dramatic changes -- change that could include the extinction of hundreds of animals.

The Center for Biological Diversity, in recognition of 350.org's Day of Climate Action, has produced a sobering portrait of 350 U.S. wildlife species at risk if we humans fail to rein in our fossil fuel emissions. They're represented here in a stunning mosaic. (Larger image.)

That's right. Global warming is a threat to more than polar bears, penguins and walruses. Here, we're highlighting seven temperate species that could, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, have their last days on Earth if we don't tamp down pollution enough to reach that magical number of 350.

Sea Otter

Still recovering from an earlier century's crazed demand for fur, sea otters are facing a more insidious threat this century: Ocean acidification. While more acidic oceans -- made that way by the same thing fueling runaway global warming, carbon dioxide emissions -- won't affect otters directly, they will affect the food supply. Acidic oceans prevent the formation of carbonate shells, such as those needed by clams, urchins, abalone and other food staples of the otter diet. It's one of 69 mammals considered endangered by climate change, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

Photo: Bryant Austin / California Fish and Game

Jaguar

Once found throughout Central and South America and into the U.S. South, the jaguar is now relegated to isolated pockets in Florida, Central and South America. Because global warming is likely to create conditions that will shift the jaguar's range, barriers to migration -- like the border fence the U.S. is building along parts of the Mexican border -- could become increasingly threatening to the big cat's survival. The jaguar is one of 69 mammals considered endangered by climate change, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

Photo: Robin Silver

Arroyo Toad

Ranging from Southern California into Baja California, Mexico, the arroyo toad endures harsh conditions by burrowing into the sand along streams, where it seals itself in a layer of shed skin to maintain its moisture and body heat levels. Already down to 35% of its historic population numbers, this toad is threatened by global warming, which promises to increase the intensity and duration of droughts in the Southwestern United States. It is one of 21 amphibian species threatened by global warming, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

See The Daily Green's ninja frogs!

Photo: Jim Rorabaugh / USFWS

Elkhorn Coral

One of at least 46 corals and 85 invertebrates threatened by climate change, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, Elkhorn coral shares many of the same threats that other corals do: habitat destruction and harvesting for aquaria, but more than anything disease, bleaching and corrosion due to warmer water temperatures and ocean acidification.

Photo: NOAA

Karner Blue Butterfly

One of 85 invertebrates threatened by climate change, according to the Center for Biological Diversity, the Karner blue butterfly is a literary favorite, having been first identified and named (after Karner, N.Y., where he spotted it) by Vladimir Nabokov. Bu the state butterfly of New Hampshire (yes, they have one) has already disappeared from Canada, and is threatened in its U.S. range, too, by heat stress and loss of a key food, the blue lupine flower.

Photo: John and Karen Hollingsworth / USFWS

Sonoran Pronghorn Antelope

Native to southwest Arizona and Mexico, the Sonoran pronghorn antelope is the fastest land mammal in North America. It had to be: It once lived alongside cheetahs. Drought is catching up with the species though, damaging reproduction and the survivability of young. As climate change produces longer and more severe droughts, the prospects for this species dim. It's one of 69 mammals considered endangered by climate change, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

Photo: Robin Silver

Kemp's Ridley Sea Turtle

Kemp's ridley sea turtle is the smallest and rarest sea turtle, known to inhabit the Atlantic from New England to the Gulf of Mexico. How rare? Over 50 years, its numbers dropped from 89,000 to just 1,000 in the 1980s, primarily due to shrimp trawlers that snag the turtles by accident. Sea-level rise from climate change could land another critical blow, if the turtles lose nesting habitat. Surprisingly, higher sand temperatures could also play a role: Like many reptiles, this turtle's sex is determined by heat during incubation. It is one of 12 reptiles threatened by global warming, according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

See simple ocean conservation tips.

Photo: Bill Reaves / Texas Parks and Wildlife

See the unlucky 13 species endangered by global warming.

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Vegetarian spider loves leaves, not bugs

Stephanie Rogers, Mother Nature Network — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 11:27:52 PDT

For hunting spiders, catching prey is hard work -- and one species appears to have given up the chase in favor of a vegetarian diet. The rare Bagheera kiplingi of Central America is the world's first vegetarian spider, munching on 'Beltian bodies,' specialized leaf tips produced by the acacia shrub, instead of insects.

(Photo: Robert L. Curry)

This is really the first spider known to specifically 'hunt' plants; it is also the first known to go after plants as a primary food source," said study Christopher Meehan of Villanova University, who co-authored a study on the veggie spider along with Eric Olson of Brandeis University.

While other species have been seen drinking nectar before, B. kiplingi is the only species known to subsist entirely on plant matter, or even known to consume solid plant matter at all.

Meehan and Olson determined the spider's diet by analyzing the isotopes in its body tissue to identify the source of its food, finding that the ratios of isotopes were identical to those found in protein-rich Beltian bodies.

To get to the Beltian bodies, B. kiplingi spiders must get around the ants that act as ‘bodyguards' for the acacia shrub, protecting it from other herbivorous insects.

They normally accomplish this by targeting older leaves that are less patrolled by ants, but they occasionally go after the ants themselves, making jerky movements that mimic the ants' own in order to sneak up on them.

The spider appears to have been named after British author Rudyard Kipling and one of his characters, Bagheera the black panther of beloved novel The Jungle Book.

Stephanie Rogers is a regular contributor to Mother Nature Network, where this post originally appeared.

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Which U.S. volcanoes are likely to erupt next?

Russell McLendon, Mother Nature Network — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 15:32:08 PDT

Mount Rainier, Washington (Photo: USGS)

When the smell of rotten eggs began wafting through Alaska's Lake Clark National Park in late summer of 2008, scientists with the Alaska Volcano Observatory knew it meant trouble. And they weren't taking any chances with nearby Mount Redoubt, a 10,120-foot volcano that only gave 24 hours' notice the last time it erupted in 1989, its only previous eruption in recorded history.

The scientists were right to be concerned. Although Redoubt's buildup was slower this time around, it finally erupted on the night of March 22, sending a plume of ash 60,000 feet above sea level.

It's the latest reminder of the threats posed not only by Alaska's 50 historically active volcanoes, but also by more than 100 other active U.S. volcanoes in the Cascade and Hawaiian ranges, nearly all of which inhabit the Pacific Ring of Fire.

With increased seismic activity around the Pacific Rim in 2009, you may be wondering if a volcano is about to blow its top next. The Mother Nature Network scans the country for the volcanoes most likely to erupt in the near future.

Volcanic eruptions are notoriously difficult to predict in the long term, so this list isn't comprehensive. These six volcanoes are, however, considered to pose serious threats whenever they do eventually erupt again.

Mount Rainier, Washington

The highest peak in the Cascade Range is also a volcano loaded with the most glacier ice of any mountain in the contiguous United States, which will complicate things whenever it does erupt because erupting through ice tends to create lahars (volcanic mud flows that form when hot gas, rocks, and lava melt ice and churn up a superheated slurry).

The U.S. Geological Survey calls Mount Rainier "potentially the most dangerous" mainland U.S. volcano because in addition to all that ice, it looms over the Seattle-Tacoma metro area and its 3.2 million inhabitants.

Mount Rainier's potential volatility and its proximity to large cities helped make it one of two U.S. Decade Volcanoes, a group of 16 volcanoes worldwide that U.N. delegates deemed especially dangerous to human populations. It last erupted in the 1840s, and larger eruptions occurred as recently as 1,000 and 2,300 years ago. It's now considered active but dormant.

Still, it's one of the most intensely monitored volcanoes in the United States due to the havoc it could wreak.

Mauna Loa, Hawaii

The other U.S. Decade Volcano is also the largest volcano on the planet: Hawaii's Mauna Loa. Its last eruption was in 1984, when the lava flow reached to within four miles of Hilo, a city of more than 40,000.

It's an especially active volcano, having erupted 33 times in recorded history -- the two largest were in 1950 and 1859, and one in 1880-81 covered land now in Hilo's city limits. Like Mount Rainier, it's also closely monitored, and one theory suggests it's currently at the end of a 2,000-year cycle, with its summit lava flows poised to increase toward the northwest and southeast.

Mount Saint Helens, Washington

About 50 miles south of Mount Rainier sits the shell of Mount St. Helens, the scene of one of the worst volcanic eruptions in U.S. history, which took place on May 18, 1980. Fifty-seven people and thousands of animals were killed in all, and damages topped $1 billion.

Mount St. Helens reawakened in 2004, when four explosions blasted steam and ash 10,000 feet above the crater. Lava continued gurgling out and forming a dome on the crater floor until late January 2008.

Although it's calmed down now, this remains an "active and dangerous" volcano, according to the USGS, and history shows it's been relatively active since the Middle Ages, including a blast in 1480 that was five times stronger than the 1980 eruption.

Mount Baker, Washington

After Mount Rainier, Mount Baker is the most glaciated mountain in the Cascades, supporting more ice than all the range's other peaks combined, aside from Rainier. This means it presents many of the same mudslide dangers as Rainier, although 14,000 years of sediments show Baker to be less explosive and less active than some other Cascade mountains.

Baker gave locals a scare in 1975 when it began emitting large amounts of volcanic gases, and heat flows around the mountain increased tenfold, but the feared eruption never happened. The fumarolic activity still continues, but there's no evidence it's tied to the movement of magma, which signals an eruption may be imminent.

Lassen Peak, California

The southernmost active volcano in the Cascades, Lassen Peak has one of the most massive lava domes on earth, totaling half a cubic mile. It's the largest of more than 30 volcanic domes in Lassen Volcanic National Park that have erupted in the last 300,000 years, and it's part of a region that's been volcanically active for more than 3 million years.

Lassen Peak is now dormant but remains active, posing a distant threat to some nearby cities such as Redding and Chico.

Mount Hood, Oregon

At more than 500,000 years old, Mount Hood is a moody volcano, following centuries of frequent eruptions with quiet periods that have lasted a few centuries to more than 10,000 years. It last erupted in the 1790s, a few years before Lewis and Clark reached the Pacific Northwest.

Oregon's tallest peak has produced many debris avalanches of various sizes throughout its history, the largest of which removed the mountain's summit and big chunks of its flanks.

The USGS identifies two past eruptions at Mount Hood that offer perspective on future eruptions. Mount Hood dominates the Cascade skyline from Portland, OR, and while it's probably not close enough to douse Portland with a volcanic mudflow, it could dust it with tephra or ash, as Mount St. Helens did in 1980.

Russell McLendon is an associate editor at the Mother Nature Network, where a version of this post originally appeared.

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Nature makes us nicer, according to new study

Trystan L. Bass — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 10:40:44 PDT

Not only can a walk in the park be relaxing, looking at greenery can actually improve your relationships and make you more generous. That's what a University of Rochester research team discovered in a series of studies published on October 1, 2009.

Nearly 400 people looked at photos of either natural environments or man-made landscapes. Then these participants answered questions about the importance of personal relationships, community, wealth, and fame. In some of the studies, people were also given $5 to keep or pass along to another participant.

People who looked at pictures of nature in the study placed a high value on being connected to other people in their lives and community. These same people were more likely to share their money with others. The people who only looked at urban cityscapes didn't rate relationships or generosity as very important. They placed more emphasis on wealth and fame.

Study coauthor and professor of psychology, psychiatry, and education Richard Ryan said this shows how "stopping to experience our natural surroundings can have social as well as personal benefits."

Lead author Netta Weinstein agrees: "We are influenced by our environment in ways that we are not aware of." She suggests that this information points to the need for more green spaces in cities.

Professor Ryan discusses the study's findings in this video:

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