I’ve Stayed Silent for Too Long: Opossums Deserve Our Love
How cute is this little angel?Shutterstock In the marsupial family, the opossum really got the short end of the stick: While their Australian cousins, including kangaroos, koalas, and wombats, are adored by the masses, opossums are outcasts. They’re the United States’ only native marsupial, but they’re virtually nobody’s favorite animal. They aren’t the star exhibit…
Trump Stings Honeybees While They’re Down
DanielPrudek/iStock/Getty Bees are in a world of trouble right now. A few years ago, the US Environmental Protection Agency took some steps to protect the insects by limiting the use of an insecticide called sulfoxaflor. Made by Corteva, the agricultural arm of DowDupont, sulfoxaflor is “highly toxic to bees and other pollinating insects,” and it also…
How Plastics Are Clogging the Ocean, Even Before You Toss that Bottle Away
“Pellets have been around and have been lost since plastic started to be produced,” says Madeleine Berg, a project manager for Fidra, which is working to reduce plastic waste and chemical pollution. And as plastic production continues to rise, researchers worry that the threat to beaches and coastal regions is growing worse. The Gulf Coast of…
Why “Jaws” Was So Terrifying, According to the Guy Who Co-Wrote It
Zanuck/Entertainment Pictures/ZUMA When Steven Spielberg’s Jaws premiered on this date 44 years ago, on June 20, 1975, it was a booming success: In the first weekend, it grossed $7 million—adjusted for inflation, that’s a whopping $33 million. The film would go on to inspire a wealth of pop culture moments: a Saturday Night Live skit…
NOAA Is Looking for Beaches to Hold 70 Rotting Whale Caracasses. Any Volunteers?
This story was originally published by HuffPost and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Local organizations have struggled to dispose of 70 dead gray whales that have washed up along America’s West Coast. Now, a federal agency is turning to private property owners for help. The tragic die-off is the highest in 20 years. Scientists believe most…
There’s So Much Plastic in the Environment That Bees Are Making Nests Out of It
Sean Gallup/Getty This story was originally published by Atlas Obscura and appears here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. Last summer, scientists in South America were studying the impact agricultural practices have on the surrounding ecosystems, and specifically how natural areas and fields are pollinated as a result of their proximity to one another. In the midst…