Below are links to articles, websites, and news related to Climate & Nature.
March 2022
Omicron has been found in White Tailed Deer
The magic of the James Webb telescope
Mountain snow and ice decreasing faster than was thought
Extreme heat is the “new normal” for the oceans
Chimpanzees use insects to treat wounds
Plants in the UK are blossoming 1 month early, due to climate change
Crows leave home-made gifts for a man who helped them
Song Sparrow’s song is as complex as human speech
Remains of impact that created the Moon may have been found deep inside the Earth
Gas stoves are bad for climate and health
Australian scientists find a spooky spinning object in the Milky Way
A particle from “the dawn of time” detected in the Hadron collider
Monarch butterfly numbers soared in CA this year – but numbers still historically low
Climate crisis drives Mediterranean corals to collapse
A pristine coral reef discovered off Tahiti
The mutation that gave us tiny dogs appeared pre-domestication
February 2022
Old growth forests protect us from climate change
Wild bison to be re-introduced to Britain this year
Black wolves were the earliest Native American dogs
January 2022
A fight for the Tongass National Forest in Alaska, to combat climate change
Monarch numbers soar 4900% since last year!
Fully intact dinosaur embryo found in its shell
JWST, the Successor to Hubble has launched
Himalayan Glaciers Melting At ‘Exceptional Rate’
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2021/12/himalayan-glaciers-melting-at.html
Coral IVF babies produce offspring on the Great Barrier Reef
Tardigrade Might Be First Animal To Be Quantum Entangled – And Live
Magnetic north is shifting faster
A vast area of hidden water found on Mars
Scientists watch giant ‘doomsday’ glacier in Antarctica with concern
Q Lunacy: Fact check: Is Adrenochrome Being Harvested From Children? (We Can’t Believe We Have To Answer This)
Spacecraft “touches” the Sun for the first time
United Nations Confirms Hottest Temperature Ever Recorded in the Arctic
Plastic-Degrading Enzymes May Be Increasing in Response to Pollution
Seven reasons to be optimistic about the world’s oceans
Virtual tree of all known life revealed
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2021/12/visually-stunning-tree-of-all-known.html
Quantum Coherence Underlying Magnetoreception in Avian Species Confirmed (how birds can see magnetic fields)
Stanford Professor Says He Has Analyzed UFO Materials That Are Not “Playing By Our Rules”
Almost Two-Thirds Of Species At Deep-Sea Hydrothermal Vents Are At Risk Of Extinction
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2021/12/almost-two-thirds-of-species-at-deep.html
“Black Box” Set To Record Earth’s Environmental Collapse For Any Future Survivors
Watch a giant sunfish swim with paddleboarders
Weird cube found on the far side of the Moon (cue the conspiracy theories now!)
The Sun is a likely source of much of Earth’s water
https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2021/11/study-suggests-sun-is-likely.html
The great Pacific garbage patch harbors life but endangers species
The USA is the world’s #1 plastic polluter
The Arctic could be dominated by rain, not snow, in just a few decades
October 2021
- Study: 4 month old ravens are as smart as adult apes
- More evidence that clouds on Venus could support photosynthesis and life
- So much ice is now melting that its warping the Earth’s crust
- The ozone hole over Antarctica is bigger this year
- Mars Rocks Collected By Perseverance Boost Case For Ancient Life
- Earth has lost half of coral reefs since 1950
- Ivory-billed woodpecker, 22 other species are now extinct, U.S. says
- Animals Died In ‘Toxic Soup’ During Earth’s Worst Mass Extinction: A Warning For Today
- Microscopic details revealed in nature photos
- Potty training cows could reduce greenhouse gasses
- The ever present threat of catastrophic super volcanoes
- Scientists are working to resurrect Woolly Mammoths
- Newly colorized footage of the last Tasmanian Tiger in existence
- Squirrels have different personalities, study finds.
- A woman and a bee become best friends (video)
September 2021
- How Tardigrades walk
- Female octopuses throw things at males that are harassing them
- Madagascar Is Experiencing The World’s First Famine Caused Entirely By Climate Change
- Murder Hornet nest found and destroyed in WA state
- Blue whales return to Spain’s Atlantic coast for the first time in 40 years
- NASA releases new Mars pictures
- Countless animals threatened by wildfires in Europe
- Wild Lake trout found in Lake Erie – first time in 60 years!
- Planting Forests May Cool The Planet More Than Thought
- It rained at the summit of the Greenland ice sheet. That’s never happened before.
- A major nuclear fusion breakthrough achieved in the US
- World’s worst invasive plant is being sold in many US garden centers
- The unexpected benefits of mosquitos
- Murder hornets are back in the western US. Oh joy.
- July 2021 was the hottest month ever recorded
- Asteroid Bennu’s chance of hitting Earth has been refined
- Sicily hit 120 degrees on August 11 – possibly setting a new European record for heat
- Smoke from Siberian wildfires has reached the North Pole
- 10 million acres now burning in Siberia
- Reasons to be optimistic about our world’s oceans
- Landmark UN Climate report issues a dire warning
- Polar bears found to kill walruses by hurling rocks and ice (i.e. they use tools)
- Irish Baron rewilds his estate
- Greenhouse Gas Caused Global Cooling 34 Million Years Ago, Study Finds
- What if ocean conveyor belt came to a halt? A major Atlantic current system is slowing down.
More… - Chipmunks Test Positive for the Bubonic Plague in Several South Lake Tahoe Locations
- Permafrost Thaw in Siberia Creates a Ticking ‘Methane Bomb’ of Greenhouse Gases, Scientists Warn
- Corona virus antibodies have been detected in white tailed deer
- Emperor penguins on verge of extinction due to climate change
- Just 5 Percent of Power Plants Release 73 Percent of Global Electricity Production Emissions
August 2021
- How bees and butterflies see flowers
- Hunted to the brink of extinction, the return of North Pacific Right whales to B.C. waters brings hope
- Crane chicks born in Ireland for the first time in 300 years
- The first USA insect to go extinct because of humans?
- Climate change is decimating Monarch butterfly populations
- Inside a monarch butterfly swarm (video)
- How Indigenous Ecological Knowledge Offers Solutions to California’s Wildfires
- Heat dome descends on central US
- Madrid to plant a huge urban forest in a ring around the city
- Saturn will be easily visible for most of August
- 60 years ago scientists let farmland go wild – here is what happened
- Rewilding land in Europe brings back bears, wolves, trees
- Epicenter Of Major Amazon Droughts And Fires Saw 2.5 Billion Trees And Vines Killed
- New names for ant and moth species
- Record rainfall in Germany causes deaths, flooding
- Science has failed to predict flood and heat intensity
- Iceland is growing new forests (video)
- Bird killing illness still spreading across the mid -Atlantic
- A “bevy” of black holes found in our galaxy
- Death Valley records highest average temperature over 24 hours
- EU bans the sale of single use plastic (which is made from fossil fuels)
- A billion Pacific northwest sea creatures cooked to death in record heat
- Glacier melt in high mountain Asia is accelerating
- Climate may be at tipping point already
- Trout are becoming addicted to Meth in our waterways
- Methane detected in one of Saturn’s Moons could be a sign of life
- Take down your bird feeders and bird baths – a new disease is spreading
- Scientists Call Northwest Heatwave the ‘Most Extreme in World Weather Records’
More: Massive heat dome caused deaths, fire in the US and Canada in June - Elephants the size of ponies once roamed in Sicily
- Help scientists understand what is causing massive bird deaths in the mid-Atlantic region
- Goats are being used for fire prevention (video)
- No Water No Life (video)
July 2021
- Chinese mountain cats are not ancestors of domestic cats, study finds
- What happens when a city hits 120 degrees F?
- The Earth has a geological pulse
- Pentagon report on UFOs – they don’t have a clue either
- 410 million people now at risk due to sea level rise
- If Aliens Exist in These 1,700 Solar Systems, They Can Probably See Earth
- A mega comet will fly by in 2031. Mark your calendar now.
More… - Indigenous people have always protected forests
- A dead murder hornet was found north of Seattle
- Heat in the west is breaking records going back 100-150 years
- Record heat in the Northwest persists
- Water has memory
- World’s fifth ocean officially on the map
- Grey wolf pups seen in Colorado for the first time in 80 years
- Half the trees in two UK woodlands were planted by jays, study finds
- An exoplanet that may have water clouds
- Is Dark Matter real or have we misunderstood gravity
- Scientists discover a new plant organ
- Unchecked climate change will cause the Amazon forest to dry
- A (Small) Pre-Emptive Strike Against the Doomsday Asteroid
- A mission to Alpha Centauri within a human lifetime using lasers
- Peruvians looking to ancestral ways to conserve and manage water
- Arctic sea ice is even thinner than was thought
- Restoring the buffalo could restore plains ecology
- NASA will return to Venus by 2030
- 10% of world’s remaining Sequoia trees may have been killed by California fires
- NASA flies by largest Moon in the solar system
- A small herd of elephants is moving north across China and nobody knows why
- Microscopic animal brought to life after 24,000 years frozen in permafrost (what could possibly go wrong?)
- An underwater Cypress forest offers clues about the past
- 5 million years of climate change in one place
- The new normal in the Arctic – brought by climate change
- Florida’s manatees are dying of starvation
June 2021
- Meet a close relative of the dinosaurs
- Congress is about to release its UFO data report – the truth is out there
- NOAA predicts a very active hurricane season
- California should cover its water canals with solar panels (India is already doing this)
- Madagascar May Be Stronghold for Ancient Fish With 420-Million-Year History
- New evidence for what happened in the first microsecond of the Big Bang
- Mapping the cosmic web and new insights about dark matter
- The UK pioneers 5 large scale carbon removal strategies
- Can humans and trees communicate?
- UN report: climate change is accelerating
- How Covid has affected nature
- Climate Change Might Drive Even Widespread Mammal Species To Extinction
- Biodiversity devastation: Human-driven decline requires millions of years of recovery
- Did Tardigrades come here from outer space?
More… - Antarctic ice sheet retreat could trigger a chain reaction
- New images of Jupiter
- Chicago releases 1000 feral cats to deal with their rat problem
- Lakes and streams have rights and now they are suing a Florida developer
- Groups call for reintroduction of jaguars to the US southwest
- Cranes return to Ireland after a 300 year absence
- 1/5 of the planet has been transformed by humans since 1960
- Molecular patterns that may help identify extra-terrestrial life
- Some good news about forest regeneration
- Chinese rover has landed on Mars
- Genetically modified mosquitos released in Florida
- Experiment shows cats like to sit on squares, illusory boxes
- Dog that was taught to talk may be showing signs of existential awareness
- Evidence that octopi experience both physical and emotional pain (well, duh)
- Critically endangered condors trash a woman’s deck
- Good news for the California Condor – its genetic diversity may just save it
- South Africa to end captive lion breeding
- Secrets of dead wood – how old oaks hold the key to new life
- We are hurtling towards planet suicide
- Middle East And North Africa: Heatwaves Of Up To 56 Degrees Celsius Without Climate Action
- Surprising shifts in permafrost in the last 400,000 years
May 2021
- Glaciers are melting faster than ever
- Ancient Indigenous Forest Gardens Promote A Healthy Ecosystem
- Climate has shifted the axis of the Earth
- Dame Judi Dench ‘My Passion for Trees” (video)
- The ethics of gathering wild eggs
- A new biodegradable plastic that will break down in your compost
- Research suggests the Gulf Stream is weakening
- Monarch butterflies face even more threats
- Keep an eye out for invasive jumping worms
- Alaskan forest fires may be producing new growth forests that sequester more carbon
- Study pushes origins of human caused climate change back thousands of years
- Disposable masks, gloves are harming and killing wildlife
- One third of Antarctic ice shelf is in risk of collapse
- Dolphins spotted in Venice’s Grand Canal – for real this time
- Otters at Georgia aquarium test positive for Covid-19
- A mystery brain disease is killing black bears in the western USA
- Critter Cam – a day in the life of a wolf
- Radioactive fall out from cold war nuclear tests found in US honey
- Researchers turn spider webs into music
- Recent discoveries in science and space
- Manatees are facing death, starvation in polluted Florida waters
- Why some airports are now hiring bee keepers
- To fight climate change American needs more seedlings
- How do we preserve biodiversity on Earth?
April 2021
- Amazing composite photo of the Milky Way
- The Amazon rainforest now emits more greenhouse gasses than it absorbs
- Carbon sequestration in the Amazon disrupted by climate change and human activity
- Trawl fishing releases as much carbon as airplane travel does
- What the Spring Equinox looks like from space
- Is there life on Mars and where might it be hidden?
- What happened to the water on Mars?
- European summer droughts worst in 2,100 years
- Philadelphia and other cities are turning off lights on skyscrapers at night, to save migrating birds
- Cascading extinctions in ecosystems spells trouble for humans
- Invasive Zebra Mussels found hiding in aquarium décor
- Northern California kelp forests have collapsed
- Time lapse images of the Sun
- Watch the blossoming of a rare Amazonian Moon Flower cactus
- Cuttlefish passes cognitive test designed for human children
- Climate change threatens European forests
- Long lost Babbler Bird found in Borneo after 170 years
- Step in to the world of mosses
- The problem with outdoor cats – billions of animals are killed by them each year
March 2021
- Rewilding Ireland
- Climate map of the future USA
- Is there life on Mars?
- Sea turtle rescue operation during Texas polar vortex emergency
- Earth’s hidden crystals; new insights
- 4-k images of Mars (video)
- Planet 9 – latest theories
- How Star Trek inspired NASA
- What would happen if we met aliens?
- Even common house sparrow numbers are now declining
- Meet Farfarout – the most distant object in our solar system
- The Atlantic ocean is widening
- Ice sheets now melting as fast or faster than the last deglaciation
- The new Civilian Climate Corps is straight out of the New Deal
- How slime mold stores memories
- One third of fresh water fish now face extinction
- Where the dinosaur killing asteroid came from
- Pigs have been taught to play video games, raising ethical questions about their treatment on farms
- New life forms have been found under the Antarctic ice
- Bees adore hemp and it could help save them (PS they love Japanese Knotweed too, I think it helps them stay healthy!)
- Deforestation is stressing mammals out
- Climate restoration and the Biden presidency – signs of hope!
- Sea level is likely to rise faster than thought
- The Arctic ocean was covered with sea ice and filled with fresh water at least twice during ice ages
- How to stop climate change and the Paris agreement (podcast)
- Thousands of bee species have disappeared since 1990
- “Looked at one way, humans are just a highly-modified form of fish and our bodies have been greatly influenced by just these kinds of developmental tweaks. “If a fish can make a limb,” Hawkins asks, “what are humans able to do?”
- The new science of our ancient bond with dogs
- Polar bears live on the edge of the climate change crisis
- Oceanic sharks and rays have declined 70% since 1970
- A data base of birds reveals western US migration patterns
- A new whale species has been identified, living in the Gulf of Mexico
- A giant exo-planet has been found and measured
February 2021
- Monarch butterflies now closer to extinction
- Earth used to be even cooler than was thought which changes the math on climate change
- Earth is now losing 60% more ice per year than in 1994
- Corporations start to push for climate change action
- Listen to the sounds of a snow leopard
- Climate change will alter the position of the tropical rain belt
- Earth will reach the temperature tipping point in 20-30 years
- Melting icebergs are key to the onset of an ice age
- Orangutans and otters are friends in a Belgian zoo
- A new bat species with Halloween colors
- An endangered Florida Manatee found with “Trump” carved into its back
- Frost flowers and rime ice are winter wonders
- The Arctic National Wildlife Refuges is safe – for now
- Humpback wales are being severely affected by climate change
- Reawakening of a geyser is not a sign that Yellowstone is ready to blow
- The mega drought that happened in the Middle Ages
- Biodiversity and the future of the Antarctic
- Dire Wolves were not wolves after all
January 2021
- The growing footprint of agriculture means loss of habitat and species
- Massive bird die-off in the American Southwest explained “Ultimately, Hayes and Desmond say drought and the bout of unseasonal, extreme weather point to one ultimate cause of the die-off: climate change”
- 10 discoveries about aliens in 2020
- Local Experts Record Chorus of Humpback Whales Singing Same Song Off the Humboldt Coast (audio)
- Kilauea volcano on Hawaii’s Big Island erupted on December 20
- Mysterious radio signals are coming from Proxima Centauri
- The Sun has started a new 11 year cycle, sunspot photo captures the beginning
- Are these the first detected radio signals from an exo-planet?
- The Moon may be affecting methane release from the sea floor
- Some hopeful conservation stories from 2020
- The oldest tropical reef fish known to science (and they killed it) ☹
- Exquisite creatures that once roamed the Earth
- How to make friends with crows
Related: Ravens appear to be as smart as great apes - The Clean Air Act has saved 1.5 billion birds
- The collapse of the Arecibo telescope is a major loss for astronomical observations
- A study of wolves in Yellowstone Park
- Understanding bat language (turns out they argue a lot)
December 2020
- Understanding bat chatter, songs and vocalizations
- Satellites launched to measure the Earth’s wellbeing
- Astronomers detect millions of signals from an intelligent civilization: Us
- Murder Hornet nest found with 200 queens
- Asteroid Apophis is speeding up as scientists recalculate odds of 2068 impact
- Arctic wildlife are shifting behaviors due to climate change
- Planned satellite constellation poses collision threat
- A bacterium that survived on the outside of the space station for a year
- Asteroid trailing Mars could be our Moon’s twin
- The USA is officially out of the Paris climate agreement now, but Biden pledged to get us back in on “day one” of his administration
- Coastal Greenland is being reshaped by ice loss
- An Earth sized rogue planet is careening untethered through the galaxy
- A coral reef taller than the Eiffel Tower found off the coast of Australia
- Astronomers find a new way to search for the elusive planet 9
- Off the coast of Los Angeles is a DDT dumping ground
November 2020
- For the first time Arctic sea ice fails to freeze by end of October
- The Moon is not dead – evidence for tectonic activity shows
- Water has been found on the Moon
- Signs of life on Venus
- Even the deepest, darkest depths of the oceans are now warming
- Are the Great Plains headed for another dust bowl?
- 80% of threatened species lack protection
- Due to melting glaciers a mega-tsunami is predicted in Alaska
- Before trees populated the Earth, giant fungi stalked the land
- Do we live in a simulated universe? Chances are about 50/50
- UFO news – newly declassified files and calls for more research
- Eight countries (but no Russia or China) sign the Artemis Accord peace treaty, a legal framework for Lunar exploration
- Earth has a serious space junk problem and is only getting worse
- Earth grows fine gems within minutes
- Planets more hospitable to life than Earth may already have been discovered
- September 2020 was the hottest ever recorded
- There are an estimated 14 million tons of micro-plastic on the sea floor
- Why Blue Whales sing
- Conservation groups re-introduce Tasmanian Devils to mainland Australia
- Scientists find a great white shark Queen of the Ocean
- Wildlife suffers as Brazil’s Pantanal wetland burns
- Scientists want to build a SETI observatory on the Moon
- Joshua trees become the first plant protected due to climate change
- A new enzyme that breaks down plastic
- Half of the Great Barrier Reef is now dead due to climate change
- Scientists clone and endangered wild horse species
October 2020
- There may be sub-surface, salty lakes on Mars
- Antarctica is on track to lose all of its ice, we have about a century left to stop it
- Are some black holes wormholes in disguise? (I have always thought so)
- How birds are adapting their songs to the quiet of the pandemic
- An insect that threatens North America’s Ash trees
- Beyond the Anthropocene | Johan Rockström (video)
- A historic mass stranding of whales in Tasmania
- 350 elephants die from toxic algae, in Botswana
- The Arctic tundra is rapidly greening, due to global warming
- The melting of Greenland’s ice sheet has reached a point of no return
- The new solar cycle promises calm space weather
- Siberian permafrost erosion is quickening
- Plant extinction is now more common than was recognized
- More than 90% of protected areas are isolated from each other, due to human activity
- The Arctic Is Transitioning Into A New Climate State
- Ancient Volcanoes Once Boosted Ocean Carbon, But Humans Are Now Far Outpacing Them
- The devastating effect of humans in the American tropics since colonialization
- Why birds survived when the dinosaurs didn’t after an asteroid hit Earth
- New evidence for the evolution of flowers found trapped in amber
- Humans have wiped out 2/3 of planet’s wildlife in the last 50 years
- Trees now growing faster, dying earlier, due to climate change
- A huge chunk of Greenland’s ice cap has broken off
More…
- Possible hint of life on Venus
- Australian telescope finds no signs of alien technology in 10 million star systems
- How big oil deceived the public into thinking plastic would be recycled
- Earth barreling toward ‘Hothouse’ state not seen in 50 million years, epic new climate record shows
- Fire season in the Arctic is worst since tracking began
- West Coast wildfires as seen from space
- Micro-fibers from blue jeans found in the Arctic oceans
- Mastodons travelled vast distances due to climate change
- Bering sea ice is at the most reduced state in 5,500 years
- Mapping technology reveals warm water under a Florida sized glacier
- The true size of prehistoric mega sharks
- New Guinea singing dogs thought extinct, found in the wild
- Study: plants adapted to high amounts of carbon the past
- Past Rapid Warming Levels In The Arctic Associated With Widespread Climate Changes
- Fossil pollen shows our vulnerability to mass extinction
September 2020
- How Sea Otters benefit the ocean ecosystem
- Antarctic ice shelves going fast – could disappear in a flash
- Comet Neowise has survived its brush with our Sun – look for it again in 6,800 years
- An asteroid will come very near Earth the day before the presidential election
More… - A graph of how much of the Earth’s resources humans are spending
- Solar panels are starting to die – massive recycling will be needed
- California’s Redwoods may survive the fires
- Protecting Joshua trees (a podcast)
- 20 signs of a hard winter ahead
- Oumuamua interstellar object – maybe it was aliens after all?
- August 14 the brightest star in the night sky rises (and it is not the North Star)
- Elephant Shrew re-discovered in Africa after 50 years
- Climate change will bring longer droughts to Europe
- Death Valley reaches 130 degrees, which may be a new record
- Complete loss of sea ice in the Arctic predicted by 2035
- Drop in emissions due to Covid will have no effect on climate
- White storks return to the UK after a 600 year absence
- Canada’s last fully intact ice shelf has collapsed
- Ancient Mars was likely covered in ice, not water
- Wild bees are crucial for American crops
- River otters are real party poopers
- 100 million year old sleeping microbes wake up
August 2020
- Polar bears now critically endangered, due to global warming
- A Martian meteorite is going home
- Evidence suggests that 7 million years ago crocodiles swam to the Americans from Africa
- California’s only known grey wolf pack has eight new pups
- Australian bees that grow spiral honeycombs
- Of milkweeds and monarchs
- Judge upholds hunting ban on grizzly bears in Yellowstone park area
- Antarctica is more widely impacted by humans than was thought
- Global methane emissions now highest on record
- RIP, smooth handfish. You were weird, and now you’re extinct.
- Facts about comet Neowise
- See the Sun’s surface in unprecedented detail
- The African continent is slowly coming apart, will eventually form a new ocean
- Evolution After Chicxulub Asteroid Impact: Rapid Response Of Life To End-Cretaceous Mass
- Viper’s DNA tells the ancient history of South America
- A giant extinct dolphin that probably hunted whales
- Earth could hit a key climate threshold within the next five years
More… - European Bison to be re-introduced to a woodland in Kent
More… - Heatwave trend accelerates worldwide
- The consequences of the wildfires in Siberia
- Brazil is seeing record forest fires again this summer
- A new paleoclimatology study shows global warming has followed 6,500 years of cooling
- Dinosaurs and Pterosaurs may have evolved from a tiny insect predator
- Permaculture: an ecological technology
- A new name for nature during Covid-19 – “The Anthropause”
Related: road kill decreased during lockdown but its picking up again as traffic comes back
July 2020
- Soap bubbles can be used to pollinate flowers – but can they replace bees?
- Extreme heat is causing forest changes
- Scientists receive grant to search the universe for technological civilizations
- The Arctic is over 100 degrees in June, 2020, sets a new record for heat
More… - The truth behind NASA’s parallel universes
- Saturn’s largest Moon has dried up lake beds
- Arctic ocean acidification is worse than expected
- Scientists sampled the most pristine air on Earth and here is what they found
- A giant squid washes ashore in South Africa
- Microfibers, plastic, found in digestive tracts of birds of prey
- Plastic rain now falls on national parks
- A Triassic “sea monster” fossil found in the Austrian Alps
- Fifth state of matter created on the Space Station
- Urban foxes appear to be domesticating themselves, just like dogs once did
- Roadkill study shows which animals are most at risk in Europe
- Black holes have heart beats
- There may be as many as 6 billion Earth like planets in our galaxy
- Did life on Earth begin underground?
- A football pitch of rainforest is lost to logging every 6 seconds
- 51 Stunning images from under the sea
- US court bans sale of Dicamba, a Bayer pesticide (some good news!)
- Hubble makes a surprising find about the early universe
- Human caused mass extinctions are accelerating
June 2020
- The Sun sends out a massive flare, appears to be waking up
- An Earth type planet found close to a nearby star – Proxima Cantauri
- With Space-X astronaut launch a new era in space exploration has begun
- Mysterious herds of moss balls seem to roam the arctic together
- New footage of the last Tasmanian tiger ever seen alive
- Scientists identify a temperature tipping point for tropical forests
- Forests are becoming shorter and younger all over the world
- The 1908 Tunguska meteor explained
- Dinosaur dooming asteroid struck at worst possible angle for Earth
- Blue bee, thought extinct, found in Florida (question – why did they kill it?)
- Due to the pandemic, carbon emission have dropped, but could bounce back quickly (can we all keep working from home please? That could help)
- New study estimates chance of life, intelligence, on other planets
- Astronauts could use their own pee to build Moon bases
- The Arctic melts when plants stop breathing
- Modern Sea-Level Rise Linked To Human Activities, Rutgers Research Reaffirms
- World’s smallest cat chirps like a bird
- Solar energy project in Nevada to be built is biggest ever in US
- Moths pollinate the plants the bees have skipped – at night
- Microplastics found in sea breezes
- Why do otters juggle?
- Amazon deforestation hits a record high
- Human pollution is affecting even underground water
- Images of Jupiter’s stormy surface More: https://archaeologynewsnetwork.blogspot.com/2020/05/a-multilayer-haze-system-observed-on.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed:+TheArchaeologyNewsNetwork+(The+Archaeology+News+Network)
- Zoonosis and emerging diseases
- How to make your own yeast for bread, beer
- Mars explorers could live in lava tubes
- Watch the monarch butterflies as they swarm (video)
- Plans for commercial exploitation of the Moon
- If you were living on the Moon the Earth would appear to go through phases
- Should Americans be afraid of Murder Hornets?
- US Supreme Court rules that the Clean Water Act also covers underground water
- Saving the planet starts with the soil
May 2020
- A gorgeous new Moon map is the most detailed yet
- Hubble celebrates its 30th anniversary
- A more nuanced picture of the insect apocalypse
- Summer sea ice will disappear by 2050
- Put Americans back to work through conservation
- Ancient crocodiles evolved to spend time at sea
- Wild Aussie wallabies living in Ireland
- What happened before the Big Bang?
- Is there life elsewhere in the universe?
- Bald eagles found nesting in saguaro cactus for the first time in decades
- Baby Leatherback turtles thriving thanks to Corona virus beach restrictions
More… - Climate change deniers are now attacking Covid-19 modeling
- Is the American west headed for a mega drought?
- Plant diversity in European forests is declining
- A huge ozone hole has opened over the North Pole
- As of end of April it has finally closed! (Whew!)
- The longest creature ever discovered underwater
- Six new Corona viruses found in bats
- Mountain lions at Yellowstone have plague (yes, THAT plague)
- Hand-reared monarch butterflies are weaker than their wild cousins and unable to migrate successfully
- Scientists warning about decline in insect numbers worldwide, and what we can do to help
- Microbes living in deep sea rocks spawn hope for life on Mars
- Trafficked Venezuelan songbirds are victims of societal collapse
- Emissaries of the Wild – an animal sanctuary (video)
- Nuclear bombs and carbon dating reveal the age of whale sharks
- In a case of human to animal infection, a tiger tests positive for Covid-19 at Bronx Zoo
- During the pandemic, nature gets a rest
- A melting glacier that could cause a 5 foot sea level rise
- A huge ozone hole has opened up over the Arctic
- Pluto may have a subsurface ocean
- 7 new species of Peacock Spiders found in Australia
- Scientists discover a plastic munching microbe
- Hubble detects a spiral within a spiral galaxy
- What is the origin of Earth’s Water?
April 2020
- A new feathered carnivorous dinosaur found in New Mexico
- Microplastics accumulating in the deepest oceans
- Greenland and Antarctica continue to shed ice at record levels
- We may live in a giant inter-galactic bubble
- Is this primeval worm the ancestor of all animals?
- Australia’s wilderness is starting to come back from wildfires
- Urban coyotes eat a lot of garbage and cats
- An asteroid will fly close to Earth in April
- Horses could stop melting of permafrost and help cool the climate
- A plan to turn half the planet into a nature preserve – why we need this
- What causes Ice Ages to end?
- Madagascar’s forest cats
- Tropical forest’s carbon sink is rapidly weakening
- A near Earth asteroid will zoom by in April, 2020
- Trump appointed Department of Interior official has been inserting false and misleading statements about climate into reports
- Coyotes deserve respect, not fear
- Wildlife camera in PA captures all the animals that use a fallen log as a bridge
March 2020
- How to avoid endangering hummingbird nests when pruning
- Earth has a second Moon, at least temporarily
- Corona virus FAQ (podcast)
- The Covid-19 epidemic and warnings about bringing samples back from Mars
- Melting ice in Antarctica reveals a new island
- How solar storms affect whale migration
- String theory and extra dimensions
- Is the universe flat or curved?
- 12 trippy objects hidden in the stars
- Methane emissions by humans have been vastly underestimated
- Pangolins are being illegally trafficked in unbelievable numbers. A threatened species in Australia.
- Melting Arctic sea ice contributed to past climate cooling
- Inside the brains of bees
- A plan to save Earth’s oceans
- Jeff Bezos to give 10 billion to fight climate change
- How to stop a planet killer asteroid from hitting the Earth
- Tourists pose ongoing threat of disease to endangered mountain gorillas
- Melting Antarctic ice could raise ocean levels by 3 meters or more (it’s happened before)
- Antarctica registers record breaking temperature again at 69 degrees
- The Curious Case of the Disappearing Snakes
- Chinese Paddlefish declared officially extinct – Sturgeon may soon disappear as well
- Scientists warn of insect decline – and what you can do about it
- First results of analysis on meteors that fell on Germany last September
- Trump is blowing up protected cactuses and Native American sacred sites for his border wall
- One third of plant and animal species could be gone in 50 years
- How peat could protect the planet
- Saturn’s Earth-like moon, Titan, does not harbor life
- Attention Attenborough (and Trump), Greta Thunberg gets a BBC series
- One of Antarctica’s fastest-shrinking glaciers just lost an iceberg twice the size of Washington, D.C.
- Using mushrooms to help the bees
- Ocean currents are speeding up
- Pluto has a heart beat
- Record breaking heat in Antarctica (65 degrees)
- Save large species and save the planet
- Melting permafrost is crating massive sink holes
- British UFO files about to be released
- A film to give us hope about climate change
February 2020
- Australian fires have made things bleak for the platypuses
- Underwater robot explores underside of a rapidly melting glacier in Antarctica
- A new geologic age that may explain why Earth periodically flips its magnetic polarity
- Did comets spread life from Earth to other planets?
- Highest resolution images of our Sun, ever
- Black holes are not supposed to behave like this
- Pesticides are now even more toxic to honeybees (and butterflies and any other pollinator…and birds)
- A parallel universe where time runs “backwards” (from our perspective)
- As glaciers melt never before observed viruses are emerging
- Newly Created Embryo Nourishes Hope For The Survival Of The Northern White Rhino
- The case for building low tech “dumb” cities
- Warming ocean has killed about 1 million sea birds
- The 2010’s were the hottest decade on record
- Staggering ice loss in the Himalayas documented
- Scottish rocks reveal evidence for a previously unknown ice age
- Apparently even water bears are affected by global warming
More… - 2019 was the second hottest year on record
- Ocean waters were the warmest in recorded human history in 2019
More… - The oldest known material on Earth, 3 billion years older than our Sun
More… - Spiders that build a “Stonehenge” structure
- Navy confirms UFO files – but you are not allowed to see them
- Why is this glacier melting so fast?
- Australian Animals Face Extinction Threat As Bushfire Toll Mounts
- For the first time scientists identify exactly where to plant trees to mitigate climate change
- The largest insect that ever existed
- 200 million year old Chinese Paddlefish has gone extinct
- 800,000 Years Ago, a Meteor Slammed Into Earth. Scientists Just Found the Crater.
- No one can agree how fast the universe is expanding, new physics may be needed
- An Earth sized planet found in the habitable zone of a nearby star, it may even have water
- Climate Change And Deforestation Could Decimate Madagascar’s Rainforest Habitat By 2070
- New Study Estimates The Global Extent Of River Ice Loss As Earth Warms
- Thousands of Tardigrades have landed on the Moon
Now what? - Are birds dinosaurs?
- Bushfires devastated forests that have never burned in Australia
- Australia’s angry summer – this is what climate change looks like
- Australia is committing climate suicide
- Could this be the solution to Australia’s drought crisis?
- Axion strings – the invisible web of the universe (magicians have long known this. Its called The Web of Wyrd)
- The Amazon lost more than 10 million football fields of forest in one decade
January 2020
- 100 best science photos of 2019
- Best space images of 2019
- The biggest scientific discoveries of this decade
- Epic space discoveries made in 2019
- 10 times nature was totally metal in 2019
- The Earth did weird things in 2019
- Giant star Betelgeuse may be about to explode
- How trees are talking to you and how to listen to them
- 500 million animals lost in Australian bush fires
- Palm-Sized Baby Dinosaurs Revealed In Australia
- Biodiversity Has Substantially Changed In One Of The Largest Mediterranean Wetlands
- Research Points To Unprecedented And Worrying Rise In Sea Levels
- Regrowth of Amazon rainforests is much slower than was thought
- Recent Rise In CFC Emissions Could Delay Ozone Hole Healing By Almost 20 Years
- Endangered mountain gorillas make a small comeback
- In Ancient Scottish Tree Rings, A Cautionary Tale On Climate, Politics And Survival
- World’s oldest forest
- NASA has made a water map of Mars
- Is the Amazon rainforest on the road to ruin?
- Birds sing to their eggs which may help their babies withstand climate change
- European space agency to send a robot into space to clean up space junk
- Do single cell organism exhibit decision making?
- Finnish photographer proves fairy forests are real with nature photos
- NASA’s Parker Probe reveals Sun’s secrets
- Victoria Falls is running out of water and may disappear due to drought, climate change
- Trump administration ok’s use of cyanide bombs that indiscriminately kill wildlife
- Birds are evolving longer wing spans and smaller bodies in response to climate change
- Tiny woodlands more important than was thought
- 2019, a year of Wildfires and the hottest decade on record. Is your country on the list?
December 2019
- Woolly Mammoths to be brought back from extinction (is this a good idea in a rapidly warming world?)
- Climate change tipping points arriving faster than anyone thought
- Scientists find a place on Earth where there is no life
- Two million-year-old ice cores provide first direct observations of an ancient climate
- The role of light pollution in the insect apocalypse
- A star is seen speeding out of our galaxy, thrown out by a black hole
- First detection of sugars in meteorites gives clues to origin of life
- Galaxies seem to be synchronizing, no one knows why
- The first map of Saturn’s Moon Titan completed
- Astronomers Detect Record-Breaking Gamma Ray Bursts From Colossal Explosion in Space
- Entomologist claims photos show evidence of life on Mars (????)
- Saving ‘half Earth’ for nature would affect over a billion people
- A new seahorse discovered – the size of a grain of rice
- Your cheap “bee house” may be killing bees
- Giraffes on the way to extinction now
- South Atlantic humpback whales are making a comeback
- “Night Parrot” thought extinct has been found in western Australia
- Scottish wildcats to be reintroduced to the Highlands
- What happened when America lost the bison
- New study proposes light signature for detecting black hole mergers
- Exo-planets explored
- Global climate change concerns for Africa’s Lake Victoria
- Last Arctic Ice Refuge Is Disappearing
- Dung beetles navigate via the Milky Way
- At future Mars landing spot, scientists spy mineral that could preserve signs of past life
- With Mars methane mystery unsolved, Curiosity serves scientists a new one: Oxygen
- NASA Names Most Distant Object Ever Explored ‘Arrokoth,’ the Powhatan Word for Sky
- Larval fish found to live in coastal nurseries choked with plastic
- A fanged, cat-sized deer thought extinct has been found in Vietnam
- Russia frees captured Beluga whales bound for China
- Unless Warming Is Slowed, Emperor Penguins Will Be Marching Towards Extinction
- Human activities drying out the Amazon: NASA study
- Australian Koalas now “functionally extinct” after habitat loss and massive wildfires
- Scientists worldwide declare a climate emergency
- Abrupt Shifts In Arctic Climate Projected, due to permafrost melting
- Carbon bomb: Study says climate impact from loss of intact tropical forests grossly underreported
- Ravens are basically feathered apes
- Two million-year-old ice provides snapshot of Earth’s greenhouse gas history
- Mother trees recognize their kin and send them more nutrients, wisdom
- What’s up with the universe? Physicists baffled
- Scientists further refine how quickly the universe is expanding
- ‘Are we alone?’ Study refines which exoplanets are potentially habitable
- In Southeast Asia, illegal hunting is a more threat to wildlife than forest degradation
- Decline in insects is “frightening” to scientists
- Scientists find no evidence for ‘insect Armageddon’ but there’s still cause for concern
- Insect decline in Germany more extensive than suspected
- Orangutans are facing extinction in the wild due to palm oil plantations and burning of forests
- Beyond Jupiter, researchers discover a ‘cradle of comets’
- Is Earth On Fire?
- Rising seas will affect more people than was thought, by 2050
November 2019
- Humpback whale population on the rise after near miss with extinction
- Large-scale afforestation of African savannas will destroy valuable ecosystems
- No place like home: Species are on the move, but many have nowhere to go
- CO2 emissions have reached record levels (Trump still calls this fake news)
- What actually happens to your donated clothing?
- A monster galaxy from just after the big bang detected
- Earth’s magnetic north pole has officially flipped
- Why some scientists downplay the risks of climate change
- Meet the rare white raven
- The giant geode of Pulpi
- Wild Irish salmon in danger of extinction unless drastic measures are taken
- Extreme snowfall kept Arctic species from breeding in 2018
- This scientist used to hand illustrate microscopic finds
- Upside down rivers are speeding polar ice loss
- Meet the ‘mold pigs,’ a new group of invertebrates from 30 million years ago
- Bacteria contradict Darwin: Survival of the friendliest (Bacteria are Socialists!)
- Teaching baby orangutans to feed in, scoop water
- Whale mothers whisper to their babies to keep them safe
- A plan to laser map all land on Earth – a gift for future generations
- Permafrost is melting and seas are boiling with methane in the Arctic
- A raptor found in Alberta
- First paper to link C02 and global warming was written in 1856
- An invasive fish that breathes and moves on land found in Maryland, Georgia, and other states (“And Georgia officials have issued blunt instructions to anyone else who stumbles upon a northern snakehead: “Kill it immediately.”)
- A new meteorite with organic molecules that predate our solar system
- Things we can do to protect the oceans from climate change
- African evidence support Younger Dryas Impact Hypothesis (and an asteroid that may hit Earth eventually)
- The Golden Ratio observed in human skulls
- New pterosaur discovered in Australia’s outback Queensland
- Help name 20 newly discovered Moons of Saturn!
- Saturn’s 20 newly found Moons
- System successfully cleans ocean of plastic for the first time
- New Organic Compounds Found in Plumes From Saturn’s Icy Moon Enceladus
- The cosmic web seen for the first time
- Marshes grow stronger when CO2 increases
- Fearing the insect apocalypse? Get rid of your lawn
- Sing an Algonquin water song (video) (all women should do this!)
- Conservation group to buy largest privately held Redwood forest – donations needed
- Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute weighs in on climate change
- A climate change solution: soil (video)
October 2019
- How to survive the climate change apocalypse
- Ecofascists and the environmental movement (please read this all the way to the end)
- The tallest known trees in the Amazon
- Climate studies hidden by Trump administration released by Democrats
- We are in an “ocean emergency” caused by warming, science report
- Just released UN climate report
- Evidence that even shy cats are bonded with their humans
- Venus may have been habitable for billions of years
- The bee is declared the most important living being on the planet
- The ancient art of skep bee keeping (video)
- Greta Thunberg’s powerful plea to world leaders
- Do bees dream when they sleep?
- Dust from a giant asteroid crash caused an ancient ice age
- Study of ancient climate suggests future warming could accelerate
- We keep looking for space aliens but are they looking for us?
- Hubble Reveals Latest Portrait Of Saturn
- Satellite study of Amazon rainforest land cover gives insight into 2019 fires
- English Channel dolphins carry ‘toxic cocktail’ of chemicals
- Greta Thunberg interview in NYC (with Trevor Noah)
- A hub where humpback whales share songs
- Another exo-comet found
- Diversity Increases Ecosystem Stability
- New insight into how much atmosphere Mars lost
- A newly described pterosaur
- What happened the day the dinosaur killing asteroid hit
- A new theory of time
- A recently discovered neutron star that’s almost too big to exist
- Forest loss in Brazil contributing to rising temperatures
- A new duck-billed dinosaur, Kamuysaurus japonicus, identified
- Could the Loch Ness monster be a giant eel?
- China claims rover found a gel like substance on the Moon
- Astronomers determine earth’s fingerprint in hopes of finding habitable planets beyond the Solar System
- Changing climate linked to major changes in flooding across Europe
- Europe warming faster than expected due to climate change
- Analyzing the world’s oldest woody plant fossil
- Ancient die-off greater than the dinosaur extinction
- Paleontologists discover diversity of insect pollinators in 99-million-year-old amber
- Fossil colour studies are changing our idea of how dinosaurs looked
- Dinosaurs had special skull windows to keep cool
- Alaska’s sea ice has melted completely for the first time in recorded human history
- Physicists observe a magnetic bridge between galaxies for the first time
- Why scientifically illiterate climate change deniers are terrified of Greta Thunberg
- Saving the bees – ways you can help
September 2019
- Asteroid found flying backwards near Jupiter
- Giraffes aren’t silent after all – they hum at night
- Couple spend 20 years replanting a forest and now endangered animals and plants have returned
- Thousands of students join Greta Thunberg at a UN protest August 30
More…
- Birth of 3 baby gray wolves in California means the species may be returning to the wild
- The last 14 Loa water frogs on Earth rescued from their decimated natural environment
- A house cat parasite is killing California sea otters
- A near total ban on selling elephants to zoos has been put in place
More… - Nesting birds need native shrubs in suburban yards, just to survive
- Five of Jupiter’s Moons get new names
- Astronomers study a Mercury-like exo-planet
- The Amazon fires – statistics
- Saturn is losing its rings
- Spacecraft will explore Titan, Saturn’s Moon
- Condors could be back in Northern California thanks to a local tribe
- Microplastics now being found in snow
- Researchers study largest impact crater in the US, buried for 35 million years
- Fracking causes rise in methane emissions
- Lightning strikes at the North Pole (which are almost unheard of)
- Ancient pigs endured a complete genomic turnover after they arrived in Europe
- Trump seeks to weaken the Endangered Species Act threatening more extinctions
- When trees sleep at night they relax their branches
- Dark matter may be older than the big bang, study suggests
- 88 percent decline of big freshwater animals
- Ocean circulation appears to be slowing due to a warming planet (fasten your seat belts)
- New finds for Mars rover, seven years after landing
- Planting trees is a good idea but not in grasslands
- Climate change threatens the world’s food supply
- Looking For Warm Dark Matter
- Ocean Temperature ‘Surprises’ Becoming More Common
- Distant ‘heavy metal’ gas planet is shaped like a football
- Toxic pesticides fueling the insect apocalypse
- Are Tardigrades now on the Moon?
- Earth’s polarity flip will probably take longer than once thought
- Why coyotes replaced saber toothed tigers
- It will take 50 million years for New Zealand’s bird diversity to recover
- The health impact of plastic on sea birds and other mammals (including us)
- Greenland lost record breaking 12.5 billion tons of ice in a single day
- Tyson Foods responsible for largest “dead zone” on the US coast
- Russia’s land of permafrost is thawing
August 2019
- Study suggests frozen earthlike planets could support life
- Siberia forest fires spark potential ‘disaster’ for Arctic
- The Milky Way is warped
- A mushroom that eats plastic
- Arctic wildfire season is worst ever recorded
- Irish teen wins award for method to remove microplastics from water
- 200 dead reindeer in Norway – researches blame climate change
- How 21 kids could force turnaround climate action
- Trump administration firing half of scientists in 2 agencies
- Goats are as intelligent and loving as dogs, say scientists
- A scientist loses her job in the Trump administration for reporting the climate crisis
- There is no doubt left in scientific consensus about human caused global warming
- James Lovelock: asteroids are a major threat to humanity
- The climate is warming faster than it has in the last 2,000 years
- Star circling black hole at our galactic center confirms Einstein’s theory of relativity
- Greta Thunberg on the state of the climate (video)
- Greta Thunberg music video
- Memorial plaque set up for Iceland’s first glacier lost to climate change
- Hubble spots a spiral galaxy
- Meteor shower calendar 2019
- Wolves, Bears, Lynx and Wolverines to have their own (small) wild park in Britain
- Condors making a comeback!
- World’s northernmost permanent settlement set a temperature record this month
- These may be some of the most important fossils ever discovered, so why have so few people ever seen them?
- Chimps more sociable after watching movies together
- How to farm on Mars
- Environment, more than evolution, might underlie human-ape differences in social cognition
- Giraffes are an endangered species now
- Evidence that sound waves carry mass
- Sperm Whales communicating with divers using clicking noises
- 40% of bees died last winter. We need to drastically change how we treat bees.
- 87% of Americans don’t realize there is a scientific consensus on climate change
- 7000 more species added to the endangered “red” list
- Ancient tree discovered that shows shift in Earth’s magnetic field
- Goats have emotions and humans should not be surprised at that
- Cockatoo choreographs his own dance moves
- Snowball dancing (video)
- Japanese spacecraft lands on an asteroid
- Climate change and deforestation together push tropical species towards extinction
- Instability in Antarctic ice projected to make sea level rise rapidly
- Breaching a ‘carbon threshold’ could lead to mass extinction
- Hundreds of sharks and rays entangled in plastic
- A rare “Black Witch” giant moth found in Chicago
- USDA has stopped tracking the declining number of honey bees
- USDA stops counting bees as bee killing pesticide is approved
- Whales targeted by Japan face extinction threat
- Comet and asteroid experts agree on natural origin for Oumuamua
- Hubble captures cosmic fireworks
- Insect apocalypse: German bug watchers sound alarm
- The Arctic town that is heating faster than anywhere on Earth
- Group of biologists tries to bury the idea that plants are conscious
- A huge algae bloom now in the Atlantic keeps on growing
- Climate change is making deadly heatwaves more likely
- A friendly baby dugong becomes a conservation symbol
- June 2019 was the hottest ever recorded on Earth
- NASA’s TESS mission finds its smallest planet yet
- Some Extinct Crocs Were Vegetarians
- When The Dinosaurs Died, Lichens Thrived
- Amazon deforestation increased dramatically this year
- A Chaos Found Only On Mars
MAY 2019
- The return of Cthulhu – the small sea creature
- Simultaneous heatwaves caused by anthropogenic climate change
- New research reveals climate change secrets hidden in the Yukon permafrost
- A Rare Bald Eagle Trio—Two Dads and a Mom—Captivates Webcam Fans
- Due to sea level rise, New Orleans post- Katrina levees will be obsolete in just 4 years
- Spending time in space causes subtle physiological changes, NASA twins study finds
- Two thirds of Alpine ice will be gone by 2100
- First ever picture of a black hole released
- A giant exo-planet 13 times the size of Jupiter
- Arctic warming now unprecedented and threatens global climate
- Global warming disrupts recovery of coral reefs
- Global centres of unsustainable harvesting of species identified
- More CO2 than ever before in 3 million years, shows unprecedented computer simulation
- Gorillas gather around and groom their dead
- Evidence for life on Mars?
- Sea turtles struggle years after unexplained die-off
- When it rains on the Sun; Unexpected rain on sun links two solar mysteries
- A glacier the size of Florida is set to change the course of human civilization
- Cats can recognise their own names, say scientists (we knew this)
- Scientists invent ‘transparent wood’ in search for eco-friendly building material (but I don’t think cutting trees is eco-friendly)
- Methane possibly detected on Mars
- Last time CO2 levels were this high, there were trees at the South Pole
- Climate Change Threat To Dolphins’ Survival
- How much hunting is too much hunting?
- WWF sounds alarm after 22 kilos of plastic found in dead whale
- Canada passes a ban on captive dolphins, whales
- Restore natural forests to meet global climate goals
- The Transpolar Drift is faltering: Sea ice is now melting before it can leave the nursery
- A slippery slope: How climate change is reshaping the Arctic landscape
- Which came first, the lizard or the egg?
- EU votes to ban single use plastic by 2021
- Africa is building a great green wall to stave off drought, hunger