There are many examples of animal evolution in which wild creatures adapt to take advantage of urban or industrial environments. A recent paper describes some details of urban fox evolution. As with many such findings, the story began with a researcher, Kevin Parsons, asking some...
In the late 1970s, North Korea developed a “technology” for obtaining (“milking”) bile from live bears, and the “farming” of bears for their bile began in earnest in Asia over the following decade. At the time, it was argued that bear bile farms would also...
It is February in Costa Rica, and Maria, a spunky Ruby-throated hummingbird (Archilochus colubris), is just waking up from her deep state of sleep (torpor). It was colder last night, and she needed to conserve her energy. The average hummingbird is approximately 7.1 to 8.9...
At the 87th Session of the UN Committee of the Rights of the Child held at the end of May 2021, Tunisia’s programs to address child protection were examined. The printed report of the session, issued on June 7, 2021, was fifty-five paragraphs long and...
South Africa occupies an ecologically strategic position in the world. Like China, it has rich biodiversity and has been building its reputation as a favorite wildlife tourist destination. But it has also attracted its share of wildlife traders, poachers, and trophy hunters[1]. South Africa’s own...
How important is global biodiversity and the interactions and interdependencies of all life for the well-being of people, animals and the environment? Do these interdependencies among all life forms lead to the logical conclusion that “biodiversity” is important (or even essential) to understand and protect?...
After 15 months of looking at the four walls of our house and now fully vaccinated, we were eager to be anywhere but there. So, for our first foray, we travelled 2 hours to Slaughter Beach, a small Delaware community on the shores of the...
This video is worth watching simply to feast on the photographs and video images from around the world. The images are stunning, but they are freighted with warnings and eventually with an outline of specific goals that the video argues could help humans change the...
The lead photographs for this story show Brianna, 7 years old, with the family’s new dog, Lulu, adopted from the local shelter, Asociacion Humanitaria Para la Proteccion Animal de Costa Rica (AHPPA). According to Brianna’s mother, “Brianna is the faithful lover and defender of animals...
Around 20-25,000 years ago, the earth was in the grip of an Ice Age. The sea level was around 400 foot lower than it is today, global rainfall was lower and approximately a quarter of the earth’s surface was covered in ice. The earth then...
