Citizen Science Volunteers find Wolverines

Posted on by

Citizen science wildlife monitoring project finds continued evidence of wolverines in Bitterroot National Forest.

Kylie Paul.–This spring, we wrapped up another exciting field season for our Wolverine Watchers! This data collection program, in partnership with the Bitterroot National Forest, set up monitoring stations for medium-sized carnivores of the Northern Rockies. We were particularly looking for wolverines and fishers, and hoped to also find Canada lynx.

Well, what a year! With more than 140 volunteers tallying well over 2,000 volunteer hours, we gathered more than 12,000 photos of wildlife in the mountains and creek bottoms of the Bitterroot National Forest, south of Missoula. We found 20 different species, including some of the ones we were most eager to see! We found black bear, bobcat, a variety of bird species, deer mouse, flying squirrel, marten, moose, mountain lion, red fox, red squirrel, snowshoe hare, western striped skunk, wolf and wolverine. Here are some great shots from the remote cameras:

Also, one of our volunteers is a photographer, so he set up a fancy camera set that has a trigger and flash system near one of our monitoring stations and got an AMAZING photo of one of our favorite individual wolverines!  Continue reading:  Citizen Science Volunteers find Wolverines

Save

Al Gore’s Revenge — Internal Combustion Engines Stink and This Ridiculously Powerful Electric Turbine Truck Proves It | robertscribbler

Posted on by

As of yesterday, Nikola Motors announced the performance specs and preorders for its new hybrid electric long-haul truck. It’s a ridiculously awesome design — one that boasts across the board superior performance when compared to internal combustion engine based trucks that are currently available. The company producing this amazing feat of electrical hybrid vehicle engineering calls its new vehicle the Nikola One. But we’re going to have some fun at the expense of climate change deniers and electric vehicle detractors both here and call this thing Al Gore’s Revenge.

If there’s ever been a name that climate change deniers tried to turn into a nasty joke, it’s Al Gore. Back in the late 1990s, Al Gore displayed amazing foresight and did the prescient, responsible thing by working to incentivize a transition to electrical vehicles. He rightfully attacked internal combustion engines for the inefficient, wasteful and fossil-fuel dependent beasts that they were. Calling them infernal internals, he was probably the first person of political standing to make the apt link, in reference, between climate change and hell on Earth.

For his good deeds and for his speaking truth to the political and economic powers of the day, Gore was largely demonized in the fossil fuels industry supported republican media. Pretty much anyone who defended Al Gore was attacked. And, for a while, despite a glaringly huge and growing scientific consensus, climate change deniers pretended that the notion of human caused climate change itself was the sole mental invention of this sensitive and thoughtful man.

Now, though, the joke is on the climate change deniers and on the fossil fuel industries, like Peabody Coal, who paid to support their demonization of climate leaders. For now even the fossil fuel haven that was long haul trucking is starting to fall due to the superior physical performance potentials of electric engines.  Continue reading:  Al Gore’s Revenge — Internal Combustion Engines Stink and This Ridiculously Powerful Electric Turbine Truck Proves It | robertscribbler

Save

U. S. Map | The Oil and Gas Threat Map

Posted on by

GR:  We already know that we must leave the oil and gas in the ground if our civilization is to survive global warming.  Toxicity threats to humans and wildlife gives us another reason.

Interactive map shows the millions of homes, schools and hospitals threatened by oil & gas air pollution. Find out if you’re one. See why we need to cut methane pollution.  Try the map:  Map | The Oil & Gas Threat Map

Save

Monster African Thunderstorm Hurls Enormous Haboob at Europe, 100 + Degree (F) Heat to Follow | robertscribbler

Posted on by

GR:  Humans cause desertification directly as livestock grazing, farming, and logging remove plants and expose soil to erosion.  They also cause desertification indirectly by burning fossil fuel, increasing global temperature, and increasing droughts and storms.  Of course, there are also the disturbing impacts of our toxic wastes and our footprints on the land.  And there’s more.  Folks, I think we’ve covered all the bases.

(Monster thunderstorm explodes over Northwestern Africa last night, hurling a huge dust storm or Haboob northward toward Europe. Image source: The Met Office.)

Robertscribbler.–“An expansion of the Sahara Desert northward into Europe. A scenario that has long been a concern raised by scientists modeling potential extreme weather and climate scenarios related to human-caused climate change. And this week, it appears that Southern and Eastern Europe are going to get a taste of Sahara Desert-type weather conditions. It’s just unfolding a bit more dramatically than scientists at first anticipated.

“Last night, a massive thunderstorm large enough to cover the England, Scotland and Ireland combined blew up over western Africa. The storm, larger than most hurricanes, drew in strong, hot winds from North Africa and the Sahara Desert. These winds bore upon them a great load of dust. Dust which the strong outflow of the storm then turned northward along a frontal boundary draped across the Mediterranean toward Europe.”  Continue reading:  Monster African Thunderstorm Hurls Enormous Haboob at Europe, 100 + Degree (F) Heat to Follow | robertscribbler

Save

Save

Petition: U. S. Congress, Fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund – Permanently!

Posted on by

The Land and Water Conservation Fund is one our nation’s most important conservation programs, protecting natural resources and providing recreation areas for all Americans. Since 1965, the LWCF has been one of the most effective conservation programs and has dramatically expanded the choice of close-to-home places for Americans to get outside and enjoy the outdoors. And it costs nothing to taxpayers, since it is funded by oil and gas revenue.

The LWCF expired for the first time in its 50 year history in September when the Congress failed to act in time to renew this vital initiative.

The Senate has approved permanent reauthorization, but now the bill faces opposition in the House of Representatives.We want Congress to permanently reauthorize this program at its full annual funding limit of $900 million a year.

Unfortunately, not all of our elected leaders feel as you and I do about conserving land, and we must pressure them to do the right thing. Take action today and send a message to your congressional representative, urging action to permanently and fully fund the LWCF.  Sign:  petition: Congress: Fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund – Permanently!

Save

Trophy hunting of grizzly bears to continue in British Columbia – The Globe and Mail

Posted on by

Justine Hunter, VICTORIA — The Globe and Mail

“British Columbia is cracking down on the use of sheep and goats as pack animals for big game hunters in its latest set of hunting and trapping regulations. But the contentious trophy hunting of grizzly bears will continue unchanged.

“The provincial ministry responsible for hunting produced updated regulations on Monday, and although it has rejected a proposal to increase the number of grizzly hunting permits for resident hunters in the Peace River region, environmentalists are disappointed that the status quo remains in place.

“The major changes include additional record-keeping requirements for butchers, and a new ban on bringing domesticated sheep or goats along on big game hunts to act as beasts of burden because of fears that the animals may pass on disease to wildlife. The report did not say whether this was a common practice. Steve Thomson, the Minister of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations, says in the report released Monday his major concern in wildlife management right now is around the declining moose population, and he promised a new BC Moose Tracker app that will allow people to record moose sightings.”  Continue reading: Trophy hunting of grizzly bears to continue in British Columbia – The Globe and Mail

Save

Ten Mile Wide Chunks of Arctic Sea Ice are Disintegrating North of Svalbard | robertscribbler

Posted on by

Robert Scribbler--“Over the past 10 days, the rate of sea ice extent loss in the Arctic has slowed down somewhat. And as a result sea ice extent measures, though maintaining in record low ranges, are much closer now to the 2012 line. Low pressure systems have come to dominate the Arctic Ocean zone. And the outwardly expanding counter-clockwise winds from these systems have tended to cause the ice to spread out and to thin. In the past, such events were seen as an ice preserving feature. But this year, there’s cause for a little doubt.

“The first cause comes in the form of record Arctic temperatures for all of 2016. As Zack Labe shows in the compelling graphic below, not only has the first half of 2016 been a record warm six months for the Arctic, it’s been a record warm half-year like no other.

(The first half of 2016 is about 1.5 C hotter in the Arctic than the previous record hot year. It’s a huge jump to new record warmth that should cause pretty much everyone to feel a deep sense of concern about this sensitive region. Image source: Zack Labe.)

“And if extra heat is guaranteed to do one thing — it’s melt frozen water. We can see that in the current near record low snow coverages for the Northern Hemisphere. We can see it in the fact that — despite what would be ‘bad melt’ weather conditions such as cloud cover and low pressure systems dominating the Arctic during the middle of June — Arctic sea ice extents are still in record low ranges and Arctic sea ice volume continues to track just below 2012’s record low trajectory. And we can certainly see it in the fact that despite the clouds that would normally promote cooler Arctic conditions during this time of year, surface temperatures have remained well above normal for the majority of June.

“Overall, these conditions are unprecedented for the Arctic. And, in microcosm, we can tell a little bit of this story of heat by tracking the life of a ten mile wide hunk of ice that was recently blown away from the ice pack and into the warming waters north of Svalbard.”  Continue reading:  Ten Mile Wide Chunks of Arctic Sea Ice are Disintegrating North of Svalbard | robertscribbler

Save

Climate Impacts From Farming Are Getting Worse | Climate Central

Posted on by

By John Upton.–  “As signs emerge that the global energy sector is beginning to rein in what once had been unbridled levels of climate-changing pollution, new United Nations figures show pollution from farming is continuing to get worse.

“Greenhouse gases released from the growing of crops and livestock directly increased by a little more than 1 percent in 2014, compared with a year prior, the newly updated data shows.

“Burning fossil fuels for energy grew by about half that amount during the same period, research published in December showed, with further reductions anticipated for 2015. That’s seen as a key first step toward achieving the vast pollution reductions needed to start to stabilize the climate.

“Historically, it’s been the opposite — fossil fuel emissions have grown exponentially and agricultural emissions have grown linearly,” said Francesco Tubiello, a team leader in the statistics division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, which compiles the data.

“The new U.N. figures do not include greenhouse gas impacts from deforestation or other clearing of land to make space for farms, which are slowly being reduced overall.”  Continue reading:  Climate Impacts From Farming Are Getting Worse | Climate Central

Save

Save

Too Flawed — “Too Few and Too Many: The Looming Population Crisis”

Posted on by

Joe Bish, Population Media Center:  “The following blog post, authored by the president of the World Policy Institute at Loyola Marymount University, Michael A. Genovese, is a curious mishmash. While recognizing the malign pressure a woefully over-sized human population is putting on the Earth system, Mr. Genovese is also stuck, unimaginatively, on the “aging population fear” treadmill at the national level.

“As such, adopting the mantra of “Too Many, Too Few”, Mr. Genovese predictably hatches plans for remedial migration to sustain the unsustainable economies of the western nations. As for the rapidly growing undeveloped nations of the world, he offers a one sentence endorsement of “increasing access to and education on birth control”. All in all, the essay can probably be categorized as well-intended, but I am guessing you will agree the final product is disappointing. (The author also seems to mis-characterize the TFR’s of India and the Philippines.)

“NOTE: When it comes to disappointing population related content, many of you may have seen the outrageously daft publication from The Guardian on Sunday, June 12, titled “The Eco Guide to Population Growth.” I decided that anymore than two sentences covering this spectacle would be a waste of time, but if you want to see how mass media can obfuscate and mislead on crucial issues, click here.”  [GR:  The link is for my post on the “Eco Guide.”  The article below covers the “aging workforce” justification for increasing population.  My post covered another of the homocentric justifications:  A growing population is more likely to pop out a genius who will solve all our problems.]

Continue reading: Too Flawed — “Too Few and Too Many: The Looming Population Crisis”