The bird world’s long-distance champion is probably savvy enough to cope with climate change, researchers believe. The bar-tailed godwit makes the biggest no-stop migration, flying 11,000km from Alaska to New Zealand every autumn. It relies on the right type of winds to make this epic journey – winds that computer models indicate could become less […]
Tag: climate change
Polar bear attacks: scientists warn of fresh dangers in warming Arctic
A polar bear attack in Canada that left two people injured has brought new warnings from scientists of a dangerous rise in human-bear encounters in a warming Arctic. The friends had just walked out of the door in the pre-dawn hours after a party when the young polar bear crept up behind them, unheard and […]
Koalas face ‘huge’ fall in numbers as climate change bites, study warns
Koalas could suffer a “huge reduction” in numbers unless Australia changes its land management practices to help mitigate the impact of climate change, a study has found. The research, led by the University of Sydney, involved the tracking of 40 koalas via GPS over three years on farmland around Gunnedah, in north-west NSW. The results […]
Marine Life Responding Faster than Land Animals to Climate Change
Marine life is on the move. A groundbreaking study shows that over the last several decades as a result of warming ocean temperatures, many marine species are shifting closer and closer to the poles. Some types of fish and plankton are moving at a rate of 45 miles per decade. This is 12 times faster […]
Plan to preserve the world’s ‘last ocean’ killed by Russia
As the most pristine marine ecosystem on the planet, Antarctica’s Ross Sea has become dubbed the world’s “last ocean.” Home to an abundance of penguins, whales, orcas, seals, and massive fish, the Ross Sea has so far largely avoided the degradation that has impacted much of the world’s other marine waters. However, a landmark proposal […]
A More Acidic Ocean May Wipe Out Antarctic Krill
A new study published Sunday in Nature Climate Change finds that ocean acidification could cause the Southern Ocean Antarctic krill population to crash by 2300, meaning dire consequences for whales, seals, penguins, and the entire ecosystem it supports. In addition to devastating ecosystem effects, a collapse in krill populations could have serious economic implications, as […]
Let’s not martyr the white-throated needletail to the anti-wind cause
This week an extraordinary animal paid a visit to our shores. The elegant and lightning-fast white-throated needletail breeds mostly in China and migrates to Australia, so it was unusual sight dancing around the Isle of Harris in Scotland. The spectacle attracted birders from across the country and created a flurry of activity online as the […]
Poisonous jellyfish on the rise in the Mediterranean
Scientists across the Mediterranean say a surge in the number of jellyfish this year threatens not just the biodiversity of one of the world’s most overfished seas but also the health of tens of thousands of summer tourists. “I flew along a 300km stretch of coastline on 21 April and saw millions of jellyfish,” said […]