By Florida International University 4/27/2019 Large numbers of dugongs, sea snakes and other marine animals disappeared from the UNESCO World Heritage Site Shark Bay, Western Australia, after a heat wave devastated seagrass meadows, according to recently released research. The reasons for the population losses, however, differed among species, according to Rob Nowicki, an FIU alumnus and postdoctoral research fellow at…
By Duke University 4/23/2019 DURHAM, N.C. — The discovery of dozens of pregnant giant devil rays accidentally caught in fishing nets in a village along Mexico’s northern Gulf of California could mean the endangered species has a previously unknown birthing zone in nearby waters, a new Duke University study suggests. If further research confirms the possibility, authorities and local fishers…
By University of Essex 4/1/2019 Mid-teenagers feel less connected to nature than any other age group, according to new research from the RSPB and the University of Essex. At a time when there are growing concerns over the mental health of today’s youngsters it is important to highlight the positive wellbeing benefits of enjoying the natural environment and the worrying…
By Stockholm Resilience Centre 4/17/2019 Centre researchers Oonsie Biggs, Timon McPhearson, Albert Norström, Per Olsson, Garry Peterson and Victor Galaz are part of the team that won the 2019 ESA Innovation in Sustainability Science Award for their 2016 study Bright spots: seeds of a good Anthropocene which was published in 2016 in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. The Innovation…
By FIU 4/3/2019 Larger plants may be the first sign sea levels are rising in the Everglades, according to an FIU study. Beneath the surface, however, the roots of these now larger, moderately salt-tolerant plants like sawgrasses will begin to wither and die if the water gets too salty. If there’s no time for mangroves or other plants to take…
By UMass Amherst 4/1/2019 UMass Amherst, Smithsonian, Florida research reports wider ecological benefits In a new analysis of the effectiveness of marine protected areas worldwide, University of Massachusetts Amherst marine ecologist Brian Cheng and colleagues report that reserves not only replenish target fish populations, they also restore ecological functioning. However, not all reserves performed equally well. Ecological functioning is a…
By UW School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences 4/4/2019 Tracking changes in diseases over time is an increasingly important topic given changes in global temperature. Put simply, is a warmer world a sicker world? Reported rates of disease may increase over time but it is difficult to distinguish between better reporting of disease, and true increases in disease prevalence. A new…
By The Cornell Lab of Ornithology 4/1/2019 An estimated 600 million birds die from building collisions every year in the United States. Scientists at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology have published new research highlighting artificial light at night as a contributing factor. They’ve ranked metropolitan areas where, due to a combination of light pollution and geography, birds are at the greatest…
By University of Alberta 3/26/2019 Tracking animals using DNA signatures are ideally suited to answer the pressing questions required to conserve the world’s wildlife, providing benefits over invasive methods such as ear tags and collars, according to a new study by University of Alberta biologists. Genetic tagging, or the identification and tracking of individual animals using DNA, is a non-invasive…
By Center for Biological Diversity 3/20/2019 Big Cats’ Habitat Fragmentation Highlights Need for Wildlife Crossings LOS ANGELES— Mountain lions in California’s Santa Monica and Santa Ana mountains are heading rapidly toward extinction, a new study in Ecological Applications finds. Researchers with UCLA, UC Davis and the National Park Service found that habitat loss and fragmentation have driven the populations to dangerously low levels of…
By UC Davis 3/20/2019 Two isolated mountain lion populations in Southern California’s Santa Ana and Santa Monica Mountains are at risk of local extinction, perhaps as soon as within 50 years, according to a study published in the journal Ecological Applications. The study showed the extinction risk is due to low genetic diversity and mortality that affects the stability of the…
By UMass Amherst 3/19/2019 UMass Amherst, Canadian researchers identify blackpoll warbler migration routes Blackpoll warblers that breed in western North America may migrate up to 12,400 miles roundtrip each year, some crossing the entire North American continent before making a nonstop trans-ocean flight of up to four days to South America. Now a new study led by first author Bill…
By University of Guelph 3/19/2019 It’s an epic journey for a tiny bird. For the first time, University of Guelph biologists have tracked an annual migration of up to 20,000 kilometres made by the 12-gram blackpoll warbler, one of the fastest declining songbirds in North America. The bird’s trek between its breeding grounds in the central and western boreal forest…
By McGill University 3/14/2019 New research from McGill University reveals an overlooked impact that the widely used herbicide glyphosate may be having on the environment. First commercialized by Monsanto under the name Roundup, glyphosate has come under scrutiny in the past, mostly in relation to its potential toxicity. This new research, published recently in the Ecological Society of America’s Frontiers…
By Montana State University 3/13/2019 As a college freshman, Alex Washburne already had his dream job: capturing lizards in the arid grasslands of New Mexico. He later went on to study snails, analyze stock prices for a hedge fund and collect scat for a major elk study around the Rockies. But it wasn’t until he crashed his rear-wheel drive truck…
By University of Wyoming 3/13/2019 Driven by the need for food, moose in western Wyoming are less likely to change their behavior to avoid wolves as winter progresses, according to new research by University of Wyoming scientists. The findings, published today (March 13) in the journal Ecology, provide new insights into the interactions of the region’s apex predators and their prey….
By San Diego State University 3/14/2019 California sheephead and spiny lobsters may be helping control sea urchin populations in Southern California kelp forests, where sea otters — a top urchin predator — have long been missing, according to a new San Diego State University (SDSU) study published in the journal Ecology. The research provides new insight into the complex predator-prey relationships…
By University of Freiburg 3/12/2019 The little owl, Athene noctua, is a small nocturnal owl and is classified as an endangered species on the German Red List. In recent years the existing population of little owls has successfully been stabilized in the south-west of Germany, and in some places numbers are even rising. In neighboring northern Switzerland on the other…
By Notre Dame 3/5/2019 In the United States, the Great Salt Lake in Utah is home to a multimillion dollar brine shrimp industry, which collects and sells the brine shrimp cysts, or eggs, as a food source for prawn farming around the world. However, the GSL and brine shrimp are also a key resource for waterbirds during migration and nesting….
Two Canadian biologists, including Dr. Troy McMullin of the Canadian Museum of Nature, are proposing a better way to assess the conservation value of old-growth forests in North America—using lichens, sensitive bioindicators of environmental change.