Source: The Guardian

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is currently starting its investigation into eco-sabotage in the state of Washington. It has been reported that are over 40 cases of environmental crimes committed largely by people to damage oil and transportation companies—eco sabotage occurs by outside parties on railways and rail lines connected to oil production.

The most serious allegation occurred on December 22, 2020, when a train got derailed and caused a spill of 29 000 gallons of oil, leading to the evacuation of 120 people nearby. This incident was thought to be caused by activists sabotaging railways to show their solidarity with indigenous communities nearby.

Similar incidents occurred around the same time, the most notable one being on November 28, 2020; two women were arrested for placing a shunt (a wire that when placed across a track to stop a train by a series of electrical signals). Both women face up to 20 years in prison for acts of eco-terrorism and violating Title 18 of the US Code. It is thought that these two women were also “acting on behalf” (even though the following Indigenous community did not urge or promote such behaviour) of the Indigenous people in the Wet’suwet’en territory.

This group is located largely in northern British Columbia, where a new pipeline (Coastal Gaslink) is being created. In order to stop this construction, protestors have taken to acts of eco-sabotage, however, have failed to see that more environmental damage has been caused in due process. It is not to suggest that such developments (pipelines) do not deserve fair protest, as it does lead to societal harm by infringing on indigenous rights and environmental harm. Although, violence is likely not the route to take as it radicalizes an issue that can be diplomatically handled. That issue is:

Building a pipeline across the land owned by the most important people in your country. How is that respectful at all?

Snap Election?

Source: Green Party

Our friends at GreenPac, the environmental non-partisan, nonprofit that works year-round to identify, elect, and support environmental leaders, (and provides parliamentary internship opportunities for young Canadian environmental students – a great program!), has their fingers on the pulse of Parliament Hill and thus we paid attention when we received their most recent dispatch:

It looks like a federal election call may be right around the corner.

In the face of wildfire and heat domes, this is an election where climate and the environment – and their intersection to health, economy, and justice – need to be front and centre. That’s where GreenPAC comes in! Elections are all about platforms and promises. But, at GreenPAC, we work to activate and inspire environmental leadership, action, and accountability in politics.

In terms of ‘moving the needle’ on environmental issues, federal legislative changes hold the potential to provide the national mandates to hit the fast-forward button on many key environmental fronts. Making that legislative change happen comes by electing ‘environmental leaders from all political stripes. And that’s where GreenPac helps out, by endorsing candidates with strong environmental bona fides and by working with local organizers to host ALL CANDIDATES DEBATES. 

Specifically, GreenPac has launched a campaign in anticipation of the writ’s drop called 100 DEBATES ON THE ENVIRONMENT:

The mission is simple: Ensure Canadian politicians across the country know they need an ambitious and actionable climate plan in order to win votes in the 2021 Election. How? By organizing 100 Debates on the Environment. We did it in 2019 and we’re doing it again! We already have 45+ organizers coming on board to organize a debate in their ridings. What are you waiting for? Become an organizer now! We’ll give you all the tools & support you need to make it a breeze.

Sounds like an interesting idea and something that we at A\J will be following closely in the weeks and months ahead.

Here and Now

Source: IIED

A new report released this week by the UK’s Meteorological Office entitled State of the UK Climate 2020 makes it abundantly clear that the impacts of the climate crisis are already changing the localized climates for our communities. The report, the ninth in a series of exhaustively researched and reviewed, provides unequivocal evidence in its Executive Summary:

• The UK’s climate is changing. Recent decades have been warmer, wetter, and sunnier than the 20th century.

• The year 2020 was the third warmest, fifth wettest, and eighth sunniest on record for the UK. No other year has fallen in the top-10 for all three variables for the UK.
• The UK has warmed at a broadly consistent but slightly higher rate than the observed change in global mean temperature.

As the report’s lead author, Mike Kendon, a climate information scientist at the UK Met Office, shared with the BBC:

“A lot of people think climate change is in the future – but this proves the climate is already changing here in the UK. “As it continues to warm we are going to see more and more extreme weather such as heatwaves and floods.”

So what does that mean in terms of real-world, right-now impacts? Again, from the BBC:

Liz Bentley, head of the Royal Meteorological Society, said that even if governments could achieve the challenging outcome of limiting the global temperature rise to 1.5C – which looks very unlikely – that would still lead to a 10% increase in the amount of water the air can hold.

“In the UK,” she said, “we are likely to see temperatures of 40C. As we get 1.5C warming, that’ll be something we see on a regular basis.

“People don’t realise that even a small temperature rise of 0.1 or 0.2 degrees overall can make a huge difference – especially in the frequency and intensity of extreme events.

“We had roads melting last year, rails start to buckle, electric cabling starts to buckle. It often takes a massive high-impact event to change attitudes to the climate – so let’s hope what’s been happening recently with extreme weather will raise the will to tackle the problem.”

And hopefully, the leaders of our communities pay heed to researchers like Dr. Bentley and summon their own will to enact policies and promote projects that align our actions with the facts as they’re unfurling in front of our eyes.

Mangrove Forests Are Disappearing, The Answer Lies in its Invertebrates

Source: Oceana

A journal article published this week suggests that mangrove forests (forests located by the coast of many tropical countries) might be threatened by the reduced diversity of invertebrates in them. Mangrove ecosystems are important in many countries as they prevent flooding into inland areas and provide many other ecological benefits. Unfortunately, they are also threatened by deforestation and other anthropocentric activities).

It is thought that this deforestation has also impacted the diversity of invertebrates (largely aquatic) in the area and has reduced the appearance of less common species. This is quite terrible news, as the main ecological functioning in mangrove forests relies on mutual relationships with a healthy and diverse group of invertebrates—these small organisms sustain both flora and fauna in this ecosystem.

Researchers found that mangrove ecosystems have “low functional redundancy”. This means that it does not have that great of ecological insurance. For example, in ecosystems with high functional redundancy if one species were to disappear another would likely be able to fulfill its function in the ecosystem. In mangrove ecosystems and others with low functional redundancy, if a species were to disappear there would be no replacement and that would likely lead to its ultimate downfall.

It is now crucial to address the functional diversity in mangrove ecosystems, lest we see them gone forever in the next decade.

The post The WTF: The Week This Friday Vol. 59 appeared first on A\J.

We can’t tell you much about what happened that fateful summer in 1971, we will leave that story for later in the series told by a founding member himself, however, we can credit our success to that first issue. Our very first mark in the environmental reporting space. Most importantly, it created a space for new enthusiastic writers to share their knowledge and stories about nature–we have carried that space over in our work in the present.

Join us in this series as we discuss the first issue and look at what has changed in the last fifty years. We can absolutely guarantee it is not just our logo, even though we immensely appreciate the groovy style of “Alternatives” in the pilot copy.

Our first article will delve into a topic from the pilot issue and what has changed since its first debut in 1971. Hint, it has very much to do with the gavel of environmental justice.

We hope you like our featured image for this series. You know what they say: blacklight posters never go out of style!

Our first post is published and can be found here.

The post NEW SERIES: A/J’s Pilot Issue Revisited! appeared first on A\J.

Source: CTV News

In the species conservation community, the ‘bad news’ tends to outweigh the ‘good news, and seemingly by a large margin. But, as team A\J works on an issue dedicated to exploring the work of species conservation, we keep bumping into ‘good news stories. Stories that engender hope that perhaps we’re not too late and our right-now efforts (let alone our historic efforts) have not been in vain. 

So you can imagine our delight in reading a recent news report about the ‘humpback comeback’ to the BC waters that researchers have recently discovered. Researchers from the Pacific Whale Watch Association explain that the number of humpback whales in the Salish Sea has “increased exponentially since a single whale was spotted in the region over 20 years ago.” In a statement released Tuesday of this week, the Association noted that the number of humpback whales migrating each summer to feed in the nutrient-rich Salish Sea now number in the hundreds.

While no conclusions were drawn as to the cause of the humpback whales’ resurgence in these particular waters, the researchers will now continue to be able to conduct studies that will continue to inform the broader community’s work in facilitating better management solutions for preserving at-risk aquatic populations.

Cambodia Charges Environmental Activists for Recording Pollution

Source: Mother Nature Cambodia

A court in Cambodia is charging three environmental activists for treason and insulting the king after they reported on a waste run-off system that was polluting a local river. It is important to note that the documentation of this pollution was not explicitly placing blame on the Cambodian monarchy, but rather disparaging the country’s management of its natural systems.

The three that have been charged are from an environmental activist group known as Mother Nature Cambodia. This group has decided to report on all environmental issues in the country, even though many activist reporters are often silenced by the government for doing so. They hope that garnering attention to these issues causes an action to be taken to protect the Cambodian environment. It seems that this group is used to such backlash from their government, as they have stated,

“Our brave campaign activist reporters refuse to be silenced. They have endured harassment, oppression, and even imprisonment.”

The activists that have been charged for this event are facing a maximum sentence of 10 years in prison, however, the court has not justified the arrest other than stating that “evidence” points to their reporting being an “insult to the king”. This action by law is unethical, as it limits freedom of speech and criminalizes those fighting (peacefully) for nature.

Embassies in Cambodia, such as the United States and Sweden, have been critical of these charges and have condemned such actions. It now lies with the defendants seeking proper counsel and hopefully changes within the Cambodian legal system to release the unguilty defenders. 

Examining the Ecological Consequences of Sunscreens

Source: Vancouver is Awesome

A recent CBC News article highlights the work being done to better understand the true impacts of the chemicals in our sunscreen products on the aquatic ecosystem. While it is generally understood by most of us that the chemicals on our bodies that get exposed to our lakes, rivers, and oceans do ‘wash off’, there’s been a lack of in-depth research that aims to quantify the danger.

“The sunscreens that you put on, the pharmaceuticals that you take, you know a portion of these are getting back into the environment,” said Brett Sallach, an assistant professor in environmental chemistry at the University of York in the U.K, one of the participating academic institutions involved in the study. “And that’s really where our research focuses to try to understand how much is being released and then what effects that might have.”

For sunscreen products, the main concern relates to two UV-filtering chemicals, oxybenzone, and octinoxate. Both of these chemicals have been identified as possibly causing harm to both coral reefs and freshwater fish. And while researchers would obviously like to eliminate any possibility of harm to the broader aquatic ecosystem, they are also fully aware that these chemicals also currently play a vital role in human health protection vis-a-vis the harmful effects of UVA and UVB rays. 

“This isn’t a vanity issue. These are compounds that are really important for human health protection. So we want to make sure we have a really good environmental risk assessment before we make draconian changes to the products that are available,” said Sallach.

Much of the freshwater fish research is being conducted by environmental toxicology professor Kyungho Choi at Seoul National University in South Korea. After eight years of study, Dr. Choi advises that “(w)e have found that these compounds damage reproduction in fish and also hormonal balances,” he said. “In addition, we found these compounds could damage kidney function and neurological behavioral function.”

Dr. Choi reminds us that the more we know – and the sooner – the better we will be able to make the appropriate decisions. “(W)e cannot simply ignore the possibility of ecological consequences based on this experimental data,” said Choi.

Helium Balloons Killing the Great Lakes Ecosystem

Source: The Weather Network

A recent news article suggests that a few hundred thousand helium balloons are washing up on the shores of Great Lakes all across Canada. In one beach near Lake Eerie alone, which spanned only 7km in length, 380 helium balloons were found. This number is likely incredibly higher in other shorelines with larger lengths.

The sheer amount of these balloons ending up in our lakes likely has to do with the release of these items in events or holidays in Canada. This accumulation is to do with current celebrations and has been a gradual debris increase throughout decades of traditional North American events.

The environmental problem lies in the life-cycle of these balloons. Even if a balloon were to degrade over time, it leaves behind small plastic litter that is spread over multiple natural ecosystems. Animals that ingest these particles can die from having them block their intestinal tracks or even starve to death, as it provides no nutritional value but can mimic a full stomach. Moreover, animals can die from being strangled by the strings of the balloons or can drown from the weight of the item pulling them down into the water.

An alternative to celebratory balloons is having events with recyclable scrap confetti, planting a tree for someone, or simply having a balloon-less party. After all, one less balloon means one better lake and many saved animals. 

Ancient Soils are The Saving Grace in Conservation Work

Source: MBS International

The world’s richest ecosystem is currently located in the ancient soils across the world. This was discovered by researchers at the University of Western Australia, who have concluded that the most diverse ecosystems grow in ancient infertile soils.

They conducted their study in over 100 international sites, such as Australia, Brazil, California, and many more. In doing so, they concluded that soils across the globe had a pattern in being rich and ecologically important, based on their maturity. For example, on the southern coast of Western Australia, the landscape contains many rare and endangered fauna and flora due to its soil composition.

These “hotspots” in biodiversity have many characteristics in common. The soil contents of these areas are old, have little to no disturbance, have very low fertility, and therefore only usable by certain flora. However, not much is known about the evolution of these landscapes and how this similar property could be replicated in other conservation work.

It is surely important that the soil is undisturbed and, even if it has low fertility, its lack of alternation by human development has likely contributed to its overall biological and ecological success. Moreover, this will shift the focus of soil research to upland places (such as outcrops or plains) rather than wetlands or coastal communities, in the hope to conserve biodiversity. 

The post The WTF: The Week This Friday Vol. 54 appeared first on A\J.

Soundscape ecology is defined as the study of sounds within a landscape for some research purpose. This surveying method is not strictly used for ecological purposes, it can also be used to understand the dynamics and relationship society has with their surroundings. Although, this is most often used to understand the partnership of people and nature and, significantly, the strength and resilience of species in natural areas.

This type of technique is not new and you probably have done it before without realizing it. For example, say you were to pause in a forest and notice that you heard the sound of coyotes in the distance, well you would be recognizing their presence within the ecosystem. If you were an ecologist, you might even write it down and note its importance of such a species in any given area. This would be an efficient way to collect wildlife data, especially for species that are difficult to find through tracking or eye-sight alone. Although, if you do hear coyotes near you, I urge you to walk away (softly and swiftly) towards a safer area—even ecologists know when to call it quits!

The best example of this is seen in ornithological studies (the study of birds). Surveys focused on bird species, often rely on bioacoustics (wildlife acoustic data) to study a bird’s vocal behaviour and habitat use. This has been recently used to study the survivorship of Barred Owls, Boreal Owls, and Great Horned Owls; all of which are endangered species. Similar acoustic studies are also conducted for endangered bat species in conservation.

You can also participate in your acoustic surveys to listen to rare species of birds. Of course, it takes some practice to identify a bird from its call alone, but there are many apps that you can use to help you with this process—I use Smart Bird ID! Moreover, you can practice listening to these calls the old-fashioned way, by listening to them over and over! For North American bird species alone, Nature Conservancy Canada or Bird-Sounds.net are good tools for practice. 

Why go through this task of listening to the calls of wildlife? Well, there are many reasons people go out of their way to use their ears in natural spaces, some of which are: to have a cool trick on hikes, to understand an ecological system’s properties, to add an important skill set to the resume (especially if you are looking for an environmental science career). However, the most important reason any person should implore to use their ears in wild spaces is that it will make you appreciate nature more if you can understand the source of its sound and its significance. 

I suppose I will be doing the same thing, listening to the sounds of nature to discern some meaning from it. If only to appreciate the complex ecosystem these sounds arise from.

Although, my reason for this is because I know that if it were me calling out to my peers, in the great expanse of the woods, I would want someone to listen and understand me. And maybe even miss me, when they can’t hear my calls anymore. 

The post I Missed the Sound of Birds – How to Use Your Ears in Natural Spaces appeared first on A\J.