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Obama administration rushes to protect public lands before Trump takes office
Environmental groups hope Utah, Nevada and Grand Canyon will be included in rapid conservation efforts as Trump plans to expand fossil fuel extraction
Barack Obama’s administration is rushing through conservation safeguards for large areas of public land ahead of Donald Trump’s arrival in the White House, presenting a conundrum for the new president’s goal of opening up more places for oil and gas drilling.
Continue reading...Bumper load of new viruses identified
360 video: Inside the horrors of human trafficking in Mexico
Tesco to phase out microbeads from its products by end of 2016
All of the supermarket’s own-brand cosmetics and cleaning products will be free from the tiny plastic pieces within a month
Tesco will have phased out microbeads from all its own brand cosmetics and household cleaning products within a month, it was announced on Thursday.
While UK ministers recently said personal care products containing these tiny pieces of plastic will be banned from sale by the end of 2017, it is not clear yet whether the ban will extend to other types of products that rely on their abrasive properties.
Continue reading...Vote for your favourite wildlife image of the year – in pictures
The Natural History Museum has chosen 25 of the year’s best images from its Wildlife Photographer of the Year 2016 shortlist. Voting is open until 10 January to find the people’s choice winning photo of the year
• Wildlife Photographer of the Year is developed and produced by the Natural History Museum, London
Continue reading...Protected forests in Europe felled to meet EU renewable targets – report
Europe’s bioenergy plants are burning trees felled from protected conservation areas rather than using forest waste, new report shows
Protected forests are being indiscriminately felled across Europe to meet the EU’s renewable energy targets, according to an investigation by the conservation group Birdlife.
Up to 65% of Europe’s renewable output currently comes from bioenergy, involving fuels such as wood pellets and chips, rather than wind and solar power.
Continue reading...Bletchley Park: 'Codebreakers school' planned for site
Egypt ancient city unearthed by archaeologists
Meet the crab with the mightiest claw
'Heroic' Antarctic explorers left sea-ice clues
Peru declares state of emergency over deadly forest fires
- Blazes have burnt 12,000 hectares, including five protected natural areas
- Endangered species under threat from fires that ‘took us by surprise’
Peru has declared a state of emergency in seven districts in the north of the country where forest fires have killed two, injured four and burnt nearly 12,000 hectares (30,000 acres) of land, including five protected natural areas.
Wildfires have spread to 11 regions across the country, according to Peru’s civil defence institute, in what scientists say may be the worst drought in more than a decade.
Cases of thunderstorm asthma likely to increase
Perth zoo to release numbats into predator-free wild
Release of captive-bred marsupials into 7,800ha Mt Gibson wildlife sanctuary part of ongoing attempt to save critically endangered species in Western Australia
Fourteen numbats will be released into a predator-free wildlife sanctuary 350km north of Perth in an ongoing attempt to save the critically endangered species.
It is the first release of captive-bred numbats into the 7,800ha Mt Gibson sanctuary, which has been declared free of feral cats and foxes following an extensive baiting program.
Continue reading...Direct Action carbon reduction policy running out of steam
With 83% of the fund spent, the government’s central climate policy is almost exhausted, with no further funding committed
The federal government’s Direct Action carbon reduction policy appears to be running out of steam, with participation from industry dropping, the cost of the program rising and the budget for emissions reduction nearly exhausted.
The Clean Energy Regulator announced on Thursday it would pay a further $367m to polluting industries, in return for a commitment for them to reduce carbon emissions by 34.4m tonnes.
Continue reading...Leaves nearing their end still fly the flag
Sandy Bedfordshire The sycamore’s leaves, free to swing in the gappy canopy, seem to dance in a soundless jig
In the past fortnight, winter has descended into the branches of a big sycamore tree. As if they were the hangers-on at a party, a scattering of leaves are still flying the flag, wearing ready-to-drop yellow. Liberated from the constrictions and crowding of their erstwhile neighbours, they are free to swing in the gappy canopy. As the breeze lifts, they are raised up as one into a rocksteady beat.
Never have the leaves looked so alive as when so close to death. The great pointy-edged plates are picked up wonderfully by the wind as with no other tree around, and seem to dance in a soundless jig.
Continue reading...Bright city lights are keeping ocean predators awake and hungry
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Light pollution is changing the day-night cycle of some fish, dramatically affecting their feeding behaviour, according to our recently published study.
In one of the first studies of its kind, we found that increased light levels in marine habitats, associated with large coastal cities, can significantly change predator-prey dynamics.
We used a combination of underwater video and sonar to spy on these communities and record how their behaviour changed. Like us, the animals in our study slowed down at night. Predatory fish became sluggish and had little appetite.
But when the lights went on some of these same predators disappeared, while others feasted on the well-lit underwater buffet. Overall, there was much greater predation on seafloor-dwelling communities when the night waters were lit.
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The dark blanket of night might once have heralded time to rest, but the great pace of human activity has required that nights get shorter and days become artificially longer.
As the sun sets, streetlights flicker to life, generators go into overdrive and the landscape becomes dotted with artificial light, producing some of the most spectacular images from space. The sky glow from major urban centres can be seen more than 300km away.
While this may have enhanced productivity, we are starting to realise that the ecological effects on animals that have evolved under natural day–night cycles are significant.
Artificial lighting of outdoor areas began in earnest in the late 1700s. We have been manipulating lighting regimes for centuries for purposes that include increased egg production in hens and to encourage birds to sing during winter.
However, we have only recently begun to investigate the damaging ecological consequences. We now know that lighting used on offshore energy installations causes increased deaths of migratory birds and beach lighting can cause turtle hatchlings to become disoriented and reduce the chances of a safe journey from nest to sea.
But these are the more obvious impacts of a disrupted day length. More subtle changes in animal behaviours caused by artificial lighting have yet to be illuminated (pun intended!).
Lights, camera, predationUsing LED spotlights, we manipulated the light patterns underneath a wharf in Sydney Harbour, illuminating sessile (attached to the seafloor and wharf) invertebrate prey communities to fish predators. We recorded fish numbers and behaviour under different lighting scenarios (day, night and artificially lit night), and the prey communities were either protected or exposed to predators.
Despite different changes in different species, overall we found that more animals were getting eaten. The main predators were yellowfin bream (Acanthopagrus australis) and leatherjackets (Monocanthidae). The prey being consumed included barnacles, bryozoans (encrusting and arborescent), ascidians (solitary and colonial), sponges and bivalves.
Large predators are very important in ecosystems and play a major role in the structure of the whole food chain. If these predators are removed from the system, there are cascading effects and sometimes entire ecosystems collapse.
So we should expect that changes to the behaviour of predators will have major consequences for prey communities. When we turned on the lights, we found prey communities changed to more closely resemble communities exposed to predation during the day. This increase in predation pressure highlights the effect prey communities face under a brightening future, possibly leading to shifts in prey structure with flow-on effects to ecosystem functioning.
A bright futureAbout 70% of the world’s largest cities are situated on the coast, and there has been a corresponding increase in urban lighting that also illuminates the underwater world.
When coupled with the chemical pollution and increasing noise that our urban activities are introducing into waterways, the outlook is harsh for our marine life.
We are beginning to understand the effects of artificial light on the natural world around us, but there is still a long way to go – especially in the underwater realm. World populations continue to grow and increasing pressure is placed on our coastal fringes to support this growth, so we need to find solutions to reduce our impact wherever we can.
One solution for light pollution is to control the wavelength of light used depending on the location of the lights. LEDs are increasingly being used because they are effective and cheap to run, but they emit a broad spectrum with peaks in blue and green wavelengths, which penetrate to great depths underwater. Moving towards other spectra, such as red which doesn’t penetrate as far, could reduce the problem.
Ultimately, while our requirement for artificial light at night is unlikely to diminish, darkness remains a necessary component of many animal’s lives. We must do our best to bring back their night.
![The Conversation](https://counter.theconversation.edu.au/content/68965/count.gif)
Damon Bolton receives funding from UNSW.
Alistair Becker receives funding from the NSW Recreational Fishing Trust
Emma Johnston receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Graeme Clark receives funding from UNSW, SCAR.
Katherine Dafforn receives funding from the Australian Research Council. She is affiliated with the Sydney Institute of Marine Science.
Mariana Mayer-Pinto receives funding from UNSW.