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+17 +1
Just 19% of Earth’s land is still ‘wild,’ analysis suggests
Since the 1960s, conservationists have had a standard solution for saving biodiversity: Protect natural areas from human influence. But a new analysis of Earth’s land use going back 12,000 years suggests that even in the time of mammoths and giant sloths, just one-quarter of the planet was untouched by humans, compared with 19% today.
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+18 +1
Itching to discover a new species? Follow this map
Ecologists involved in mapping all life on Earth have now taken the next step: predicting where the life we don’t know about is waiting to be discovered. As a first pass, they have created an interactive map showing diversity hot spots with the richest potential for new mammal, bird, reptile, and amphibian species. They describe their results today in Nature Ecology & Evolution.
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+10 +1
Australian scientists warn urgent action needed to save 19 'collapsing' ecosystems
Leading scientists working across Australia and Antarctica have described 19 ecosystems that are collapsing due to the impact of humans and warned urgent action is required to prevent their complete loss.
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+19 +1
Monarch butterflies down 26% in Mexico wintering grounds
The number of monarch butterflies that showed up at their winter resting grounds in central Mexico decreased by about 26% this year, and four times as many trees were lost to illegal logging, drought and other causes, making 2020 a bad year for the butterflies.
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+10 +1
World's oldest DNA sequenced from a mammoth that lived more than 1 million years ago
A tooth from a mammoth that roamed the Siberian steppe more than a million years ago has yielded the world's oldest DNA sequence. It's the first time that DNA has been recovered from animal remains more than a million years old. Previously, the most ancient DNA sample was from a horse that lived between 560,000 and 780,000 years ago
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+4 +1
Sawfish populations halved as nations fail to enforce conservation laws
Sawfish have lost 59% of their historical distribution and are heading toward complete extinction due to overfishing, a new study says, posing a threat to ocean biodiversity and indicating that policies worldwide to protect the world's largest ray are not being enforced.
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+21 +1
Watch: 'Bug fight club' clarifies evolution of natural weapons
Scientists decked out bugs with body armor and watched them face off in wrestling matches. The experiments highlight the evolution of natural weapons.
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+11 +1
Extinction: 'Time is running out' to save sharks and rays
Scientists say sharks and rays are disappearing from the world's oceans at an "alarming" rate. The number of sharks found in the open oceans has plunged by 71% over half a century, mainly due to over-fishing, according to a new study. Three-quarters of the species studied are now threated with extinction.
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+14 +1
Death by 1,000 cuts: Are major insect losses imperiling life on Earth?
Chances are, the works of the world’s insects touch your lips every day. The coffee or tea you savor, both are insect pollinated. Apples, oranges, cabbages, cashews, cherries, carrots, broccoli, watermelon, garlic, cinnamon, basil, sunflower seeds, almonds, canola oil — all are insect pollinated. Honey, dyes, even some vaccines require insects to come to fruition.
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+10 +1
Chinese flower has evolved to be less visible to pickers
For thousands of years, the dainty Fritillaria delavayi has grown slowly on the rocky slopes of the Hengduan mountains in China, producing a bright green flower after its fifth year. But the conspicuous small plant has one deadly enemy: people, who harvest the flower for traditional Chinese medicine.
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+3 +1
How one man repopulated a rare butterfly species in his backyard
The California pipevine swallowtail butterfly is a wonder to behold. It begins its life as a tiny red egg, hatches into an enormous orange-speckled caterpillar, and then — after a gestation period of up to two years — emerges as an iridescent blue beauty. Brimming with oceanic tones, the creature’s wings are considered by collectors to be some of the most magnificent in North America.
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+15 +1
Prioritizing where to restore Earth’s ecosystems
Targets for ecosystem restoration are usually specified in terms of the total area to be restored. A global analysis reveals that the benefits and costs of achieving such targets depend greatly on where this restoration occurs.
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+14 +1
Humans Wiped Out Two-Thirds of the World’s Wildlife in 50 Years
Two major reports released this month paint a grim portrait of the future for our planet’s wildlife. First, the Living Planet Report from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), published last week, found that in half a century, human activity has decimated global wildlife populations by an average of 68 percent.
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+24 +1
Quarter of UK’s mammals at risk of extinction
One quarter of the UK’s native mammals are classified as being at “imminent risk of extinction” and conservationists are calling for urgent action to save them, as the first official Red List for British mammals has been published.
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+3 +1
The ‘lungs of the Earth’ are really its heart: an Indigenous cure to save the Amazon
A dying rainforest will release huge amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, but the Piaraçu Manifesto taps ancestral wisdom to preserve traditional lands.
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+4 +1
With His Species-Saving Mission Complete, Diego the Tortoise Returns Home
When the giant Galapagos tortoise faced extinction, Diego answered the call.
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+4 +1
Large heath butterflies return to Manchester after 150 years
Large heath butterflies are returning to peatlands in greater Manchester 150 years after they went locally extinct. The acidic peat bogs and mosslands around Manchester and Liverpool were home to the country’s biggest colonies of large heath butterflies – known as the “Manchester argus” – but numbers plummeted as land was drained for agricultural land and peat extraction.
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+20 +1
'Billions of years of evolutionary history' under threat
Scientists say more than 50 billion years of cumulative evolutionary history could be lost as humans push wildlife to the brink. "Weird and wonderful" animals unlike anything else on Earth are sliding silently toward extinction, they say. And regions home to the greatest amounts of unique biodiversity are facing unprecedented human pressures. They include the Caribbean, Western Ghats of India and large parts of Southeast Asia.
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+2 +1
First brown bear for 150 years seen in national park in northern Spain
A brown bear has been spotted traversing a rugged and sparsely populated area of north-west Spain for the first time in 150 years thanks to a set of camera traps and a bit of luck. Images of the animal were captured on cameras set up by a crew shooting the film Montaña ou Morte (Mountain or Death) in the Invernadeiro national park in Galicia’s Ourense province.
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+16 +1
New briefing paper warns Biodiversity Strategy is test of EU understanding of nature's role in successful Green Deal
As the coronavirus crisis continues to take a terrible toll on lives and livelihoods worldwide, the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL) has warned the EU's forthcoming Biodiversity Strategy will be an early test of whether Europe is taking nature, including biodiversity, seriously in its economic thinking.
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