EcocentricWildlife
As we wrote yesterday, the meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Nagoya has a long agenda. That’s what happens when you convene a global meeting to save wildlife on the planet Earth. But beyond the dire warnings about disappearing animals and emptying seas—and the grand, if fuzzy promises governments will …
EcocentricWildlife
The story of non-human life on the planet Earth over the past few decades is a simple one: loss. While there are always a few bright spots—including the recovery of threatened animals like the brown pelican, thanks to the quietly revolutionary Endangered Species Act—on a planetary scale biodiversity is steadily marching …
EcocentricWildlife
It’s an undeniable fact—the most complete rainforests and the richest biodiversity on the planet tends to be concentrated in some of the poorest countries. Madagascar, Suriname, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Micronesia, Belize, Costa Rica—all tropical nations that are gifted with astounding natural beauty, but which also …
EcocentricWildlife
Life always surprises. That’s the lesson that should be taken from the discovery of 200 new plants and animals in the forest-covered mountain of Papua New Guinea. Today the environmental group Conservation International (CI) announced that it had discovered never before seen plants, frogs, mammals, insects and spiders—including …
EcocentricOceans
“Only the sea knows the depth of the sea.” So goes a line from Hindu scriptures, one that well describes the mystery of the ocean depths—and our ongoing ignorance about life beneath the waves. For thousands of years, our knowledge of the seas was limited to surface currents and the fish that we could catch, close to the coast. …
EcocentricEcocentric
Positive feedback cycles—they’re what keeps climatologists up at night. The term describes the way that certain ecological responses to a warming climate can further accelerate warming, creating a feedback cycle that can spiral out of control. Take the billions and billions of tons of methane buried beneath the Arctic permafrost. …
EcocentricEcocentric
Burn carbon—it’s good for the marmots. Not a slogan you’re likely to see at the next climate change rally, but according to a new study published in the July 21 Nature, it might just be true—at least for a little while.
Scientists led by Arpat Ozgul, an ecologist at University Imperial College London, examined more than three …
