A roundup if the week's news of birds and the environment:
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It is reported that President Biden plans to establish two new national monuments in California in coming days, honoring the wishes of several Native American tribes there.
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Residents of Papua New Guinea are being displaced by rising sea waters and thousands are moving to the mountaintops to escape.
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Yellowstone National Park exists atop a magma field that is part of one of the world's largest active volcanic systems; however, scientists say a full-scale eruption is unlikely.
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Changing tides have led to an increase in the numbers of beached marine life on Cape Cod.
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2024 capped a ten-year period of unprecedented deadly high temperatures. They represent the hottest decade on record.
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The next four years promise to be challenging for the science and conservation community. How can the damage be minimized?
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We tend to think of urban landscapes as being barren but in fact they often teem with wildlife.
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Margaret Renkl urges us to "green up" our news feed and offers a list of sources to help us do just that.
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The man whom the president-elect plans to nominate as the Secretary of Health and Human Services apparently believes that the chemtrails from airplanes are part of a nefarious government plot. (Sigh. It's going to be a long four years.)
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It isn't only human marriages that sometimes end in divorce; it happens with animals, too.
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Could the crucial Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation system of ocean currents collapse? Clam shells may be able to predict.
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Florida's manatees were scarcely present in the area before the seas began to get warmer in the late 1700s.
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Over the next four years, the Arbor Day Foundation has plans to plant millions of trees to replace those that have been destroyed by hurricanes.
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The biggest dinosaur trackway ever found in Britain has been unearthed in an Oxfordshire quarry.
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Dramatic social and technological changes may be necessary to prevent societal collapse.
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Finally, as we say goodbye to President Jimmy Carter, it is worth remembering that he established the Department of Energy and the Department of Education and he signed major environmental protection legislation that doubled the size of the national park system and tripled the size of the nation's wilderness areas. I believe history will look upon his presidency kindly and perhaps with regret that he didn't get the chance to do more.
Good morning, Dorothy. Thank you for the roundup. As you say, it is going to be a long four years. It is hard to even contemplate the damage that is going to be done to a climate that has already received multiple body blows. I read just yesterday that Trump is advising Britain to scrap its North Sea wind farms and start to use oil to generate electricity. You’d think he’d have enough to worry about in his own country, wouldn’t you? Perhaps Musk will take care of domestic affairs.
ReplyDeleteI was happy to see the Violet-tailed Sylph as the bird of the week. It brings back many happy memories of two visits to Ecuador. All the best - David
Ecuador and all of Central America are home to so many beautiful birds. Many, like the Sylph are positively fantastical!
DeleteJimmy Carter did so much in the years following his presidency It's humbling to realise that some people in positions of power can retain their humanity and live their lives according to their principles
ReplyDeleteThe Sylph is so beautiful
I wonder how many more populations will be forced to move to higher ground or abandon their homes completely in the next few decades and when planning committees will stop granting building permission in known flood areas
It always astonishes us when someone actually lives according to the principles of their professed faith as Jimmy Carter did rather than just giving lip service. As for the Sylph, human encroachment is the challenge facing so much of the world of Nature right around the planet, not only in Central America. It seems we will never be able to learn to live in harmony with that world.
DeleteThe animal divorce article is an interesting one. Birds seem more faithful than mammals. But the tortoises definitely had enough of one another for a lifetime!
ReplyDeleteA century definitely seemed long enough for those two!
DeleteI don't even know what to say about the political climate these days. People seem to want to keep us so busy refuting the stupidity that comes out of their mouths that no one will have time to do anything of importance. Sigh.
ReplyDeleteIt is depressing, to say the least.
DeleteAs you said, it is going to be a long four years, but it's been good to see that President Biden has been busy trying to do what he can to minimize the damage the next president can do.
ReplyDeleteI think history will look very kindly on President Biden.
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