By Grace van Deelen , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: Pine Hollow Arboretum’s founder, John W. Abbuhl, began planting trees around his Albany, N.Y., home in the 1960s. He planted species native to surrounding ecosystems but also made ambitious choices—bald cypresses, magnolias, pawpaws, sweetgums—that were more climatically suited to the southeastern United States. Now, those very trees are thriving, said  Dave Plummer , a horticulturalist at Pine Hollow.  Other Pine Hollow trees, such as balsam firs native to New York, have struggled with this century’s warming winters. ...Pine Hollow Arboretum is one of many botanical gardens rethinking their planting strategies as the climate warms. These strategies range from testing out new, warmth-loving plants to putting more resources toward pest and invasive species management. Planting Zones Shift North. The U.S. Department of Agriculture recognizes 13  plant hardiness zones  based on a region’s coldest annual temperatures, av...

By Kimberly M. S. Cartier , Eos/AGU.  Excerpt: In a few weeks, Earth scientists will launch a satellite that will provide unprecedented, high-resolution coverage of some of the most remote and rapidly changing parts of the world. The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar ( NISAR ) satellite, a joint mission between NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), will scan nearly the entire globe twice every 12 days to measure changes in Earth’s ecosystems, cryosphere, and land surface....  Full article at https://eos.org/articles/transformational-satellite-will-monitor-earths-surface-changes . 

By The Guardian.  Excerpt: Built like a small bison, weighing as much as a grand piano and covered in thick, shaggy coat, the musk ox is one of the most distinctive species in the high Arctic. ...Musk oxen are relics of the ice age, adapted to thrive in pitch-black polar winters where temperatures can stay below -20C (-4F) for months. They give birth as the light returns for the brief Arctic summer, ready to take advantage of the 24-hour grazing days before the light disappears once again. Often boxed in by ice and geography in isolated populations, they are  among the world’s most inbred mammals . ...Officially,  musk oxen are classified  as a species of least concern on the IUCN red list of threatened species. But in a warming world, rising temperatures are posing new tests of their resilience, raising concern among scientists about the survival of many fragmented populations. Disease and parasites – turbocharged by the changing climate – are on the rise in much of...

By Catrin Einhorn , The New York Times.  Excerpt: As solar projects unfurl across the United States, sites like this one in Ramsey, Minn., stand out because they offer a way to fight climate change while also tackling another ecological crisis: a global biodiversity collapse, driven in large part by habitat loss. ...Solar farms could blanket millions of acres in the United States over the coming decades. So developers, operators, biologists and environmentalists are teaming up with an innovative strategy. “We have to address both challenges at the same exact time,” said Rebecca Hernandez, a professor of ecology at the University of California, Davis, whose research focuses on how to do just that. Insects, those small animals that play a mighty role in supporting life on Earth,  are facing alarming declines . Solar farms can offer them food and shelter by providing a diverse mix of native plants. Such plants can also decrease erosion, nourish the soil and store planet-warming c...

By Rodrigo Pérez Ortega , Science.  Excerpt: Increasingly common extreme temperatures are  a rising threat to many around the world , but humans are not the only ones imperiled. In a study out today in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B, researchers show heat waves may severely jeopardize bumble bees’ ability to smell the flowers they feed on. The finding could foretell how climate change may affect the pollinators’ populations—and human industries that rely on them. ...if these bees cannot find their food effectively, the impact on the crops they pollinate can be disastrous. ...We have bumble bees to thank for many of the vegetables, fruits, nuts, and legumes that show up on our tables; bees pollinate crops that make up about  one-third of our food supply . Yet bee populations have been declining for years, and most researchers think there are two main reasons: habitat loss and climate change. ...Researchers have correlated some effects of climate change wi...

By Erik Stokstad , Science.  Excerpt: Billions of snow crabs disappeared from the Bering Sea in 2021 after a marine heat wave cooked the area for several years. Alaskan fishing vessels returned to ports dismayed, and the next year state regulators closed down the lucrative fishery—which had regularly yielded an annual harvest worth $200 million or more—for the first time in history. Many hope the fishery will reopen in the coming years because the water has cooled and young crabs are becoming more plentiful. But the longer term outlook for the fishery is stormy, according to a  paper  published last week in Nature Climate Change. Snow crabs do worse in years when conditions more closely resemble a boreal, or subarctic, climate, rather than an arctic one. And those conditions are 200 times more likely to occur today than in the mid-1800s, the study indicates....  Full article at https://www.science.org/content/article/alaskan-snow-crab-fishery-walloped-climate-ch...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/sep/13/earth-well-outside-safe-operating-space-for-humanity-scientists-find By Damian Carrington , The Guardian.  Excerpt: ...planetary boundaries are the limits of key global systems – such as climate, water and wildlife diversity – beyond which their ability to maintain a healthy planet is in danger of failing. ...Six boundaries have been passed and two are judged to be close to being broken: air pollution and ocean acidification. The one boundary that is not threatened is atmospheric ozone, after action to phase out destructive chemicals in recent decades led to the ozone hole shrinking. ...The planetary boundaries are not irreversible tipping points.... Instead, they are points after which the risks of fundamental changes in the Earth’s physical, biological and chemical life support systems rise significantly. ...Prof Johan Rockström...said: “...But what worries us, even more, is the rising signs of dwindling planetary resilience.” ...

https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2023-06-27/solar-panels-could-save-california-but-they-hurt-the-desert By Sammy Roth, LA Times.  Excerpt: High above the Las Vegas Strip, solar panels blanketed the roof of Mandalay Bay Convention Center — 26,000 of them, rippling across an area larger than 20 football fields. ...“This is really an ideal location,” said Michael Gulich, vice president of sustainability at MGM Resorts International. ...There’s enormous opportunity to lower household utility bills and cut climate pollution — without damaging wildlife habitat or disrupting treasured landscapes. The same goes for the rest of Las Vegas and its sprawling suburbs. But that hasn’t stopped corporations from making plans to carpet the desert surrounding Las Vegas with dozens of giant solar fields — some of them designed to supply power to California. The Biden administration has fueled that growth, taking steps to  encourage  solar and wind energy development across vast str...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/apr/10/a-jail-for-wayward-polar-bears-you-must-be-in-churchill-canada By  Zed Nelson , The Guardian.  Excerpt: Perched on the southern edge of the  Arctic  on the shores of Hudson Bay, residents of the Canadian town of Churchill share their streets with the world’s largest land carnivore. Their regular encounters with polar bears have earned Churchill the nickname “Polar bear capital of the world”. ...The 900 or so residents are used to looking cautiously around corners and not walking after dark. But it’s the bears that could claim to have a grievance: the town was built on their annual migratory route. ...Living side by side with apex predators certainly poses challenges for the town’s residents, but it is the spectre of climate change that looms large over Churchill. The number of polar bears in western Hudson Bay has fallen by  27% in the past five years , according to a recent government survey that counted bears...

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jan/26/human-activity-and-drought-degrading-more-than-a-third-of-amazon-rainforest By Jonathan Watts , The Guardian.  Excerpt: Human activity and drought may have degraded more than a third of the  Amazon rainforest , double the previous estimate, according to a study that heightens concerns that the globally important ecosystem is slipping towards a point of no return. Fires, land conversion, logging and water shortages, have weakened the resilience of up to 2.5m sq km of the forest, .... This area is now drier, more flammable and more vulnerable than before, prompting the authors to warn of “megafires” in the future. Between 5.5% and 38% of what is left of the world’s biggest tropical forest is also less able to regulate the climate, generate rainfall, store carbon, provide a habitat to other species, offer a livelihood to local people, and sustain itself as a viable ecosystem, the paper observes. ...The findings, published  ...

https://ambr-recyclers.org/2022/08/ambr-release-chasing-arrows-the-truth-about-recycling/ By Alliance of Mission-Based Recyclers ( AMBR ).  Excerpt: Reduce, reuse,  then  recycle: In the 1970s, this was the structure under which advocates built America’s recycling industry. Unfortunately, the petrochemical and packaging industries have exploited this fundamental premise and used recycling as a cover to increase plastic production exponentially.  AMBR’s new short film, “ Chasing Arrows: The Truth About Recycling ,” outlines how the plastics industry is trashing recycling with non-recyclable plastics. It exposes the recycling myths industry promotes, such as blaming the recycling system and consumers for plastic pollution. The real problem is one they created and are expanding: They are simply making  too much  plastic, most of which cannot be recycled. Recycling is not a strategy for making waste “go away.” It was designed to create feedstock for manufacturi...