Rare frog breeds in Deep Sea World in North Queensferry

            A species of frogs found only in the forests of Eastern Madagascar that are critically endangered have been successfully bred in an aquarium for the first time. The golden mantella frog has been listed as critically endangered after its population has decreased be about 80 percent in the last three generations. They are endangered because their habitat is surrounded by human settlements and is being fragmented by logging of the forests. After looking after a group of seven adult frogs for four years, the Deep Sea World aquarium in Scotland now has fifty golden mantella tadpoles. This is the first time that they have ever been bred in captivity. People are now thinking of starting captive breeding programs around the world to increase the population as much as possible.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-16267292

Eroding taboos see lemurs end up on dinner tables

            A recent study shows that the population of lemur in Madagascar has been decreasing very quickly. This is due to the hunting of the lemurs for bushmeat. Originally, natives believe that they were family ancestors and protected. However, outside influences have caused these ideas to deteriorate. Because of this increase in demand for meat and the decrease in traditional beliefs, this protected species have been being illegally hunted. Some people believe that their cultural ideas didn’t degrade, it is just the only meat available to them. Many families in that area are too poor to afford meat. A survey of 1,154 households showed that most of the meals eaten over the three day period did not even contain meat. The meats that were consumed were usually fish of domestic animals. But because lemurs have a slow reproduction rate, this has a large impact on their population.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16138206

Butterflies: 72% of UK species in decline

            According to a recent study done by the Butterfly Conservation and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, many of species of butterfly have been in decline in the UK. The study showed that about 72 percent of the species living there have shown a decline in population. The most probable reason for this decrease is the loss of suitable habitats for them to live in. Because of some conservation efforts, some of these species have shown some increase recently. One of the most important reasons they have been increasing is because the caterpillars have been being studied and found out that they dependant on a certain species of ant. One of these species is the Large Blue, which was extinct in the UK but re-introduced in the 1980s. This population has shown as increase over the years. Understanding and studying these species is key to saving them.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16054895

Court Curbs Endangered Species Act Authority

            On the day before Thanksgiving, the district court in Arizona reversed its new laws about consultation requirements in the Endangered Species Act. It was reversed after the court said that the ESA did not have that kind of power. Under the ESA, it is required that any discovery or possible trials must be consulted with two other federal agencies of endangered species. These federal agencies include the Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fisheries Service. Some environmental groups claim the EPA is failing to consult these two agencies. These groups have been using the ESA instead to help clean up pesticides by giving the impacts they have on endangered species. Many environmentalists call for the EPA to review their re-registration decisions to prevent the use of pesticides that may be affecting endangered species. The court decided that FIFRA trumps both of these organizations. FIFRA has the power to challenge EPA registration reviews if they feel the pesticides are harming the environment.

http://farmfutures.com/blogs.aspx?fcb=23&fcbp=2831&fcbpc=0&s=10/28/2011&e=12/28/2011

Dairy food safety is primary concern

            Chairman of the Dairy Food Safety Victoria (DFSV) in Australia Shirley Harlock  and chief executive Catherine Hollywell said that after the annual general meeting, research into the food safety industry could help prevent disease outbreaks due to contaminated food. One disease that is trying to be prevented in the H1N1 virus which was recently found in contaminated vegetables in Europe. Coming up with the technology to detect these diseases early would be a great benefit to the dairy industry. This technology would help reduce the numbers of disease outbreaks due to contaminated dairy. This would also help create food standard on dairy throughout Australia. DFSV is also trying to create control points for these standards which will create an equivalent of raw milk to pasteurized milk.

http://www.weeklytimesnow.com.au/article/2011/11/17/406951_dairy.html

For a planet of 7 billion, controlling population growth critical

            The need to control population growth has become even greater because we have reached seven billion people. Because the world is so overpopulated, hunger and poverty has been becoming more prevalent in today’s society. There are two possible solutions that could help solve this problem. The first solution is technological. This would be to create resource-saving technologies that would provide enough resources for everyone. The Earth easily has enough resources for everyone, but are not being used wisely. The US alone can provide enough food for the entire planet, however, the majority of it is fed to livestock which only passes 10% of its consumed energy to humans. The other solution would be to slow down population growth by preventing it in the first place. This involves reducing birth rates and protecting human rights, such as the status of women in a society. Also proper education and family planning could help stabilize the world’s population. This will make it so that every child can be well-fed and educated.

http://www.utulsa.edu/collegian/article.asp?article=5192

Clever Eurasian jays plan for the future

            Recent experiments show that Eurasian store food that will later be unavailable to them in the future. Although they are not the first birds to be seen doing this, this is the first definitive proof of it happening. Animals planning for future events are called “mental time travel.” Previous experiments showed that the jays would store the food away after being fed so much of it that they became sick of it. However, the birds may have just figured out which foods store better than others. This new experiment was designed to get rid of that possibility. On the first day of the experiment, the birds were given two boxes to hide food, which is the mixed pile of raisins and peanuts. On day two, they were only given one box and were only given raisins and on day three were only given the other box and peanuts. On the final day, they were fed a pile of peanuts until they were sick of them and then allowed to go store food. Instead of completely ignoring the peanuts, they stored both foods in separate boxes because they planned ahead. This shows how the jays thought that the food may be unavailable in the future and since they will not eat it now, they will be better off storing it.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/15536611

Javan rhino 'now extinct in Vietnam'

            The Javan Rhino is now extinct in Vietnam according to a conservation group. Genetic analysis of rhino droppings from the last two years have all been from one rhino. This last known rhino was recently found in Vietnam killed with its horn removed by poachers. The desire for rhino horns has greatly increased in the last decade which led to a dramatic decrease in population of many species of rhino. There were originally three species of rhino found in Java. Out of the three, the Javan Rhino is now the last surviving species of rhino in the area. The other two have become extinct do to poaching. They are currently listed as critically endangered because there are fewer than fifty individuals left in the species. The majority of these rhinos are in the Ujung Kulon National Park on Java. However, there habitat is being degraded by an invasive species of palm trees. The survival of this species is now dependant on the control of this invasive palm tree.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15430787

Climate change 'grave threat' to security and health

            According to an expert conference in London, climate change is most likely going to cause many problems to arise. These conflicts are expected to affect poor countries in the tropics much more because they are important areas to trades with. Large countries such as the US and China are dependent on many resources from these areas also. The cost of fuel and energy will go up greatly. Without fuel, food shortages will begin to happen and lead to mass migration and civil wars over resources. In the article, it even says that large companies such as Starbucks are worried that climate change will ruin their business. Starbucks said last week that climate change could threaten the world’s coffee supply in 20-30 years. These conflicts will be brought up in the annual UN climate conference in about 6 weeks.

            Climate change may also cause many health problems. Mostly in developing countries, hunger and malnutrition would probably increase. This would also cause an increase in infectious diseases in these areas. Reducing carbon emissions would bring about many health benefits however. For example, in would greatly improve air quality. It would also decrease the amounts of preventable deaths.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15342682

Antarctic lake mission targets life and climate signs

            British scientists plan to drill through 3 km of ice to take samples from Lake Ellsworth which is in the Antarctic Circle. They will use a hot water drill to reach the lake which has been isolated for about 125,000 years. One goal of this project is to find unknown life in the lake and discover new species. Even if no life is found, it will still provide information about the conditions in which life can not exist. Another goal is to find clues of how future climate conditions may impact the ice sheet. This is important because this ice sheet has enough ice to raise global sea levels by at least 10 feet. Scientists can determine how much the ice has melted in the past during certain climate conditions to predict the effects on it in the future. Lastly, the final goal is to design a mission to use to find life on other planets with similar conditions. On Jupiter's moon Europa, there is a thick layer of ice which is believed to be on top of a liquid ocean.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15245594

Arctic ozone loss at record level

            The ozone layer in the Arctic has hit a record loss. Scientists say that at 20km above the surface, 80% of the ozone has been lost. The cause of this is the unusually long cold weather conditions. The Arctic was cold from December to April which has never happened before. When it is cold the chemicals that eat away at the ozone tend to be most active. These chemicals are from the use of CFC’s. Although they have been banned since 1987, they have remained in the atmosphere for decades and are degrading very slowly. Scientists say that it is unknown why the weather was cold for so long and that it will take a lot of research to figure out. The decrease in ozone could increase the risk of skin cancer because of the increased UVB rays reaching Earth’s surface. I believe that this is another effect of climate change. People are continuously contributing to climate change and possibly making it colder. This may be causing the increase ozone depletion.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15105747

Esa-Nasa Mars missions' race against clock

        http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14979267  

            Esa and Nasa are planning to launch a satellite called the Exomars in 2016 to orbit around but Mars. However, they may not have enough funds to launch it. The Exomars is a satellite that is supposed to relay pictures from a rover that is supposed to launch in 2018. Because of the different orbits of Earth and Mars, the only chance they have to launch is every 26 months. If funds are not raised by then, it would have to be put off for over two years. One option that is being discussed is getting outside financing and one or two of the rockets from Russia. If this doesn’t happen then the plans will have to be put off for two more years. One of the main reasons for this mission is to put a rover on Mars to drill into the sub-surface and collect samples for analysis of life-bearing evidence. This would be useful in that it would help make it easier to someday put a human on Mars because it would give us a better understanding of what is on Mars.

Current Event #1

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14916451

I was very surprised by this article. I didn't think it was possible to control the climate of Earth. I think that people should try fixing the problems that we are already dealing with instead of using a new technology that has the potential to cause other unintended environmental effects. Some people believe it is a solution to global warming which could lead to increased CO2 emissions because they no longer have to worry about global warming. However, it doesn’t remove any of the carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. It only reflects some of the sun’s radiation which won’t do much if we keep adding more carbon dioxide to the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels. Instead of this, I believe that people should cut down on the use of fossil fuels and begin to use alternative fuels. This would decrease the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and potentially stop global warming.