EPA Nanotechnology Press Release

I received this EPA Press Release today…and noted the Duke University effort to “develop 32 tightly controlled and monitored ecosystems in Duke Forest in Durham, N.C. Known as “mesocosms,” these living laboratories provide areas where researchers can add nanoparticles and study the resulting interactions and effects on plants, fish, bacteria and other [...]

Hurricanes and Birds

I’ve wondered about bird populations and hurricanes….most of the storms occur at the same time as bird migrations. The storms also disrupt feeding grounds. If I were a bird, I’d find it pretty disturbing.
Here is an interesting enature article:
http://enature.com/articles/detail.asp?storyID=580

Endangered Species Act

From an AP article:
Parts of the Endangered Species Act may soon be extinct. The Bush administration wants federal agencies to decide for themselves whether highways, dams, mines and other construction projects might harm endangered animals and plants.
New regulations, which don’t require the approval of Congress, would reduce the mandatory, independent reviews government scientists have been [...]

Vegetarianism and Water

I am not a vegetarian…but eat almost no meat and, perhaps stupidly, have not thought much about the environmental impacts of meat production. I just received an email pointing out the following post:
I’ve been vegetarian since 1982. I attended my first anti-vivisection protest in the spring of 1985 at UC San Diego, when anti-apartheid demonstrations were taking [...]

Update from John Phipps on corn and beans

Notes from John Phipps’ Blog on his observations on corn and bean crops:

We finished (or at least stopped) Friday night. I decided against spotting in corn wetholes – too much damage, too little gain.
We replanted about 130 acres of 800 of soybeans. Around here, no-till for beans was a difficult mission this year. The replanting [...]

Heard on the ecostreet…and we aren’t in Kansas anymore

I just heard a brief NPR report concerning Barack Obama’s new media campaign to reintroduce himself to the American public. They played an excerpt commenting on his upbringing in Kansas. I found myself reflecting on my childhood in Kentucky…playing by woods and fields, splashing in creeks and streams (while avoiding the feared copperheads), and running [...]

Beavers as Ecosystem Engineers

ecological_impact-beavers
A paper on the ecological impacts of beavers