Environmental Groups Just Sued the Trump Administration Over Its Endangered Species Act Rollback
Lance King/Getty Environmental and animal rights groups are taking the Trump administration to court over rules finalized last week by the departments of Commerce and Interior weakening the Endangered Species Act’s protections. The lawsuit, filed Wednesday by Earthjustice on behalf of seven groups including the Sierra Club, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and Defenders of…
The Key to Saving Starving Koalas Might Be…Their Poop
manonvanos/Getty A few years ago, koalas were literally dropping dead off tree branches in Cape Otway, Australia. “The trees just started dying and there was a big crash in koala numbers—I was burying them everywhere because they were stinking, it smelled so bad,” Frank Fotinas, who manages a campground in Cape Otway, told the Guardian…
Behold the Return of the Amazing New Zealand “Owl Parrot.” Look at It Dance!
Kākāpō Recovery/New Zealand Government It’s Sunday, and before we begin another long week, we wanted to take a moment to celebrate some good news we discovered after going down a fascinating recent Twitter hole: the kākāpō, the world’s fattest parrot, long on the verge of extinction, is making a glorious comeback. Fluffy and flightless, these…
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…