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Climate Change & Conservation eNews

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Forest With Light Peeking Through
Judy Anderson

Clear-cut forests are ‘dead zones,’ emitting more greenhouse gases than fossil fuels, report finds

The clear-cutting of B.C.’s forests is contributing more to greenhouse gases than the burning of fossil fuels, according to a new report from the Sierra Club of B.C.

The report found that 3.6 million hectares of old-growth and second-growth forests were clear-cut in the province between 2005 and 2017—creating “dead zones” that, combined, are larger than Vancouver Island…

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Monarch On A Purple Stemen
Pixabay

Mysterious monarch migrations may be triggered by the angle of the sun

The new study adds “an important piece to the puzzle” of butterfly migration—and potential decline, says Anurag Agrawal, an ecologist at Cornell University…

Nailing down this “window” for successful migrations could help conservationists assess how external factors—including climate change—affect monarchs on this perilous trip, says Andrew Davis, an animal migration ecologist at the University of Georgia in Athens who praises the “incredible amount of effort” put forth by researchers and volunteers…

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Smoke Cloud From Fire
Desmog

Debunked Australian Bushfire Conspiracy Theories Were Pushed by Alex Jones, Murdoch Media

“As unusually intense and widespread bushfires have ravaged a drought-ridden Australia, bots and trolls have begun pushing climate science denial across the internet in the form of conspiracy theories about the fires. Thanks to climate change, exceptionally hot, dry drought conditions have worsened and lengthened Australia’s typical fire season.

Two of the main conspiracies about the fires are based on the false ideas that they are caused by a spate of arson and they have been worsened by the Green Party’s supposed efforts to stop controlled burns as a fire management and reduction measure…”

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Australia Fires
Pixabay

How climate change influenced Australia’s unprecedented fires

The climate factors contributing to Australia's bushfires are strikingly similar to those at play in California. If we continue on our current path—towards 3 degrees Celsius—this will be more common in other parts of our country, as well. We need to get off fossil fuels ASAP to save the lands and waters we love. Over 1 billion animals have been estimated to have died, and that's not the end of it.

Despite widespread conspiracy theories about the bushfires, emerging science continues to find links between global warming and worsening wildfires, with the issue a focus of continuing investigation. As climate scientist Kevin Trenberth explained in a recent interview with videographer Peter Sinclair, global warming directly intensifies wildfires by drying out soil and vegetation, creating more fuel to burn farther and faster. That’s particularly a problem in drought-prone regions like Australia and California…

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BlackRock boss Larry fink says protesters, such as these people in Australia, have been quicker to recognise the climate crisis than the financial sector
Jenny Evans/Getty Images

World’s biggest fund manager vows to divest from thermal coal

“BlackRock, the world’s largest fund manager, has announced it will put sustainability at the heart of its investment decisions.

In his annual letter to chief executives, the BlackRock boss, Larry Fink, writes that the climate emergency is altering how investors view the long-term prospects of companies. “Awareness is rapidly changing, and I believe we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance.”

Fink acknowledges that financial markets have been slower to reflect the threat to economic growth and prosperity posed by the climate crisis than protesters who have taken to the streets, including during the Extinction Rebellion demonstrations…”

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Hemlocks In Early Spring
Judy Anderson

Researchers find some forests crucial for climate change mitigation, biodiversity

A study by Oregon State University researchers has identified forests in the western United States that should be preserved for their potential to mitigate climate change through carbon sequestration, as well as to enhance biodiversity.

Those forests are mainly along the Pacific coast and in the Cascade Range, with pockets of them in the northern Rocky Mountains as well. Not logging those forests would be the carbon dioxide equivalent of halting eight years’ worth of fossil fuel burning in the western lower 48, the scientists found, noting that making land stewardship a higher societal priority is crucial for altering climate change trajectory.

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Goat Peeking Out Of Barn Opening
Judy Anderson

After a rough year, farmers and Congress are talking about climate solutions

As millions of acres of American farmland sat under historic floodwaters this spring, a remarkable pattern began to emerge.

Even among fields that sat side-by-side, with the same crops and the same soil type, researchers and farmers noticed that some bounced back faster than others.

What made the difference?

The fields that were slow to drain and remained waterlogged longer had been farmed conventionally—tilled, left bare, and unplanted over the winter. The fields that drained quickly and were ready for sowing hadn’t been tilled in years and had been planted every winter with cover crops, like rye and clover, which help control erosion, improve soil health and trap carbon in the soil…

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Elder Female Hiker
Judy Anderson

Lifestyle changes aren’t enough to save the planet. Here’s what could.

Your local land trust could share articles like this and help people understand how local, state, and national policies are important. Individual action is important so we don't just shut down, but we need to come together and inspire greater change, too.

There is a long history of industry-funded “deflection campaigns” aimed to divert attention from big polluters and place the burden on individuals. Individual action is important and something we should all champion.

But appearing to force Americans to give up meat, or travel, or other things central to the lifestyle they’ve chosen to live is politically dangerous: it plays right into the hands of climate change deniers whose strategy tends to be to portray climate champions as freedom-hating totalitarians.

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Coyote Run Farm

One man is trying to fight climate change by mobilizing an unlikely team: Iowa’s farmers

In early March, just a week before the Midwest was inundated by catastrophic flooding, a dozen farmers gathered at the First Presbyterian Church in Grinnell, Iowa, for an event billed as a conversation about “Faith, Farmers, and Climate Action.” “How is God calling you to use your farm to improve the world?” asked the evening’s facilitator, Matt Russell. “We’ve got this narrowing window of time in which we can act,” he said. “When we think about climate action—are you feeling any call to that?”

Russell directs the Iowa branch of Interfaith Power and Light, a nonprofit that promotes a religious response to global warming. A fifth-generation farmer who runs a livestock operation with his husband in nearby Lacona, Iowa, the 48-year-old nearly became a Catholic priest in his twenties but then got a degree in rural sociology. Now he preaches that America’s farmers—a demographic seen as religious and conservative—are a secret weapon in the climate fight.

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Steve Ghan Selfie
Steve Ghan

Climate change fears propel scientists out of the lab and into the world

When Steve Ghan set out to walk 1,500 miles of the Pacific Crest Trail, he brought along a bright blue hat emblazoned with four words: “Make Earth Cool Again.” It often drew compliments from other hikers, which he used as an opening.

“I’d tell them, ‘Yeah, I’m a climate scientist and I want to stop climate change,’” said Ghan, who completed the California segment of the trail in 2018…

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