PLANET IN PERIL

nature Photo by  Andreas Weith Melting sea ice makes it hard for the Arctic predators to consume enough calories to survive. More here.

EcoWatch Say good-bye to the "ghost cat." This week the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service officially declared the eastern cougar ( Puma concolor couguar ) to be extinct and removed it from the endangered species list.  Story here. Photo credit - Pexels.

by Larry Powell A "Snowy" swoops down on its prey (probably a lemming). Photo credit - Government of Quebec. The beautiful Snowy Owl, like so many other wild creatures on Earth, faces an uncertain future. The  “Red List,”  a British agency, has just put the graceful, white bird of prey on the “vulnerable” list for the first time. It has drastically downgraded earlier estimates of 200 thousand individuals, worldwide, to as low as 10 thousand.  Snowy Owl numbers have proven hard to judge since they fluctuate so widely, depending on the availability of food. Factors in their decline may include illegal hunting, collisions with vehicles and power lines and climate change, which can affect the availability of prey. So the agency’s prognosis is a somber one.  “This species faces a high risk of extinction in the wild in the medium-term future.”  Snowy Owls nest in the Arctic, but have a range that spans the northern hemisphere.”  A conservation spe

ScienceNews Any species in the eastern or midwestern United States could potentially be at risk. Story here. A mating ball of garter snakes. Oregon State University. Will they be next?

|NATIONAL OBSERVER The British Columbia government announced on Monday it was ending the trophy hunt of grizzly bears throughout the province. Story here. Grizzlies in Yellowstone Park. Chris Servheen/USFWS

EcoWatch The U.S. Senate has passed a Republican tax-reform package that contains a provision to authorize oil drilling on the coastal plain of Alaska's  Arctic  National Wildlife Refuge, placing the biological heart of one of our last pristine, untouched places in severe peril. Story here. Barrenground caribou, Nunavut.  Ansgar Walk photo. RELATED: Proposed oil development threatens yet another caribou herd.

Common Dreams "For all of you still trying to hold a ridiculous 'debate' about whether there's something wrong with our planet, please watch this, if you can." Story here. A starving polar bear in  the Norwegian Arctic. Photo by  Andreas Weith

Nature Tracking study suggests the Arctic whales are particularly vulnerable to human disturbance. Story here. Image by  Pixabay.

ScienceDaily Endangered Species Research journal publishes pioneering whale feces research; also being used to investigate unprecedented number of right whale deaths this summer. Story here. A North Pacific right whale. Photo by John Durban, NOAA

It’s not looking good for the vaquita.   Photo: C. Faesi / Proyecto Vaquita 1992. The vaquita are porpoises which measure only about 1.5 meters, fully grown. They’re among the smallest of the cetaceans, an order of marine mammals which includes porpoises, dolphins and whales. Their numbers have now dwindled to fewer than 30 in Mexico’s Gulf of California, where they live.   The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration reports vaquita numbers have declined an astonishing 92% since 1997.  Gill net   fishing is the main culprit. The vaquita have become “collateral damage” as poachers target a fish whose swim bladder fetches $20 thousand dollars per kilogram for use in Chinese medicine. Mexico has imposed a permanent ban on the taking of vaquita. But authorities have been unable to enforce the law sufficiently to make a difference. Now, the magazine, Science is reporting, an eleventh-hour bid by a team of conservationists, to bring them back from the brink,

CISION In the boreal forest, the environment and the economy are linked: all stakeholders have a part in protecting it. Our government is committed to conserving wildlife habitat and protecting species at risk in this vast swath of Canadian forest. Story here. Photo credit - Jon Nickles  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

nature The first new species of great ape described in more than eight decades faces threats to its habitat. Story here.

NATIONAL OBSERVER Canadian scientists are racing to test a remedy that they hope will save bats from a deadly fungus that has already killed millions of the winged mammals across the continent. Story here. Hibernating healthy Virginia big-eared bats in W.V.  U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service 

Nature|News Leading suspect — climate change — doesn’t fully explain what is happening to leatherback turtles in the US Virgin Islands. Story here. Little leatherbacks leave their nest in Aruba. Photo by  Elise Peterson

CBCnews 4 chimney swift chicks were rehabilitated after falling from building at Lower Fort Garry. Story here. Other Swifts seen here in a chimney.  Photo by  Greg Schechter from San Francisco, USA

CBC news Fishing lines killed at least 2 whales, and 2 others were freed by rescuers.  Story here. We destroy our kindred creatures in ways that are varied and wondrous. This northern right whale was run over by a ship. Photo by NOAA.

RELATED: PinP reviews the book - "The Sixth Extinction - an unnatural history."

World Wildlife Fund                    Burrowing owl.                                   Great Blue Herron. Bobolink. (PinP photos.) The fate of wildlife in Canada is in our hands. WWF -Canada’s Living Planet Report Canada shows that wildlife is on a troubling decline. It’s time to come together and turn things around. Story here.

ECOWATCH A conservation group is suing the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, challenging the  agency's rule stripping grizzly bears in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem of Endangered Species protections. Story here.

CBCnews The rapid decline of a tiny butterfly living in an equally small patch of Manitoba has prompted the Nature Conservancy of Canada to take action in hopes of saving the species from extinction.  Story here.