‘Last year was bad enough, this is a disaster,’ says one expert as Australia Research Council finds fresh damage across 8,000km.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by geoleo

Two orcas harpooned in front of a group of whale watchers puts a spotlight on St. Vincent's controversial whaling practice. Moments before it happened, Ken Isaacs, a crew member on a whale-watching vessel, realized the tourists on his boat were about to witness something terrible. While touring open water around the small Caribbean island of St. Vincent, the crew spotted a pod of four orcas, also known as killer whales, breach the water's surface. As the tourists delighted at seeing orcas in the wild, Isaacs frantically shouted at three fisherman who were approaching in a small craft.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by larylin

Most potential new drugs fail when they're tested in people. These failures are not only a major disappointment – they sharply drive up the cost of developing new drugs. A major reason for these failures is that most new drugs are first tested out in mice, rats or other animals. Often those animal studies show great promise. But mice aren't simply furry little people, so these studies often lead science astray. Some scientists are now rethinking animal studies to make them more effective for human health.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by gladsdotter with 2 comments

A new study of the relationship between climate change and clashes among the Classic Maya explicitly links temperature increases with growing conflicts. By Rossella Lorenzi.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by AdelleChattre

Trees are willing subjects but don't be fooled—to create a compelling photograph, you need to take time to get to know them. Photographs by Diane Cook and Len Jenshel.

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Submitted on April 8th 2017 by gladsdotter with 1 comments

"Yeah, they're out there havin' fun, In the warm California sun," sang The Rivieras in their 1964 hit. And it could not be more apt today as the sun in the state was so strong – and the number of solar farms so large – that electricity prices in the state have begun turning negative on the main power exchange, the US Energy Information Administration (EIA) has revealed.

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Submitted on April 12th 2017 by Chubros

A new book argues that spending time outside can serve as a welcome reprieve from the constant stimuli of modern life.

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Submitted on April 12th 2017 by gladsdotter

While pursuing prey in complete darkness, horseshoe bats can zip through dense vegetation guided solely by sound. Their only protection from the raging headache—or worse—of a headlong collision is the sound waves entering their two pointy ears.

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Submitted on April 8th 2017 by CatLady

Born to the director of the Berlin Zoo, Lutz Heck seemed destined for the world of wildlife. But instead of simply protecting animals, Heck had a darker relationship with them: he hunted and experimented with them. In the new movie The Zookeeper’s Wife (based on a nonfiction book of the same title by Diane Ackerman), Heck is the nemesis of Warsaw zookeepers Antonina and Jan Zabinski, who risk their lives to hide Jews in cages that once held animals. All told, the couple smuggled around 300 Jewish people through their zoo.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by wetwilly87

A 2,300-year-old aqueduct uncovered by workers on Rome's new Metro line has been hailed as a sensational discovery of enormous importance by the city's Superintendency for Archaeology.

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Submitted on April 7th 2017 by CatLady

At the end of the last Ice Age, most large animals in North America were wiped out, and others transformed themselves. Yet one has survived virtually unchanged to the present day. Where cars now drive along congested roads in the heart of modern Los Angeles, sabre-toothed cats once roamed. They stalked prey that ranged from hoofed mammals to creatures resembling elephants. The ferocious cats competed with dire wolves, American lions and short-faced bears.

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Submitted on April 7th 2017 by hiihii

The framework shows how multiple stresses can interact within a single social-ecological system to cause a shift in that system’s behavior, how simultaneous shifts of this kind in several largely discrete social-ecological systems can interact to cause a far larger intersystemic crisis, and how such a larger crisis can then rapidly propagate across multiple system boundaries to the global scale.

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Submitted on April 7th 2017 by kxh

Scientists are just learning to decode the sounds of icebergs. By Sarah Laskow

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by AdelleChattre

With its operation IceBridge, NASA is currently conducting research flights over the Arctic to monitor ice loss. The photos are spectacular - and worrisome.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by Chubros

Diesel-powered ferries are big polluters, so could electric engines be a cleaner option?

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Submitted on April 6th 2017 by estherschindler

Birds were spiritual emblems in pueblos of the southwestern United States and northern Mexico.

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Submitted on April 11th 2017 by CatLady

Elephants have passed a test of intelligence which scientists say has “profound” implications for our understanding of their mental capabilities. They were found to be capable of performing a task that showed they have a level of self-understanding that is rare in the animal world and defeats humans until they are about two years old. Elephants have already shown they can recognise themselves in a mirror, something that is thought to be relatively rare among animals.

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Submitted on April 12th 2017 by cone

Cubans face a daily battle for drinking water as the country experiences one of its worst droughts in 100 years.

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Submitted on April 11th 2017 by CatLady

Imagine millions of these slithering out from the mud? The eggs of this alien desert crustacean remain dormant for years, waiting for a bout of rain to hatch.

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Submitted on April 9th 2017 by Appaloosa

Not always for the better.

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Submitted on April 10th 2017 by gladsdotter