Gleanings of the Week Ending April 27, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Meet the World’s Largest Freshwater Crayfish – The Tasmanian giant crayfish. Their numbers are declining due to fishing and disturbance.

FDA urges Congress to pass bill mandating food manufacturers test for lead – I am surprised Congress did not pass this already. According to the U.S. Disease Control and Prevention, there have been at least 519 confirmed, probable and suspect cases of lead and chromium poisoning traced to imported applesauce pouches produced by brands WanaBana, Schnucks and Weis. Lead exposure in children is associated with learning and behavior problems, as well as hearing and speech issues and slowed growth and development.

Retention ponds can deliver a substantial reduction in tire particle pollution - The presence of wetlands and retention ponds alongside major highways led to an average reduction of almost 75% in the mass of tire wear particles being discharged to aquatic waters. Tire wear particles significantly outweighed other forms of microplastics, such as plastic fibers and fragments.

Climate change is fueling the US insurance problem – I’ve seen more articles about this recently….there is no good news re insurance…nothing that can overcome what climate change is doing. One state-level action that could help mitigate the impacts of climate change is the implementation of flood disclosures. Organizations like the Natural Resources Defense Council have urged states to require flood disclosure polices during property sales to help buyers decide whether buying is worth the risk. Research has shown disclosure can devalue flood-prone properties and discourage development in risky areas. Even though the number of states requiring flood disclosure policies is slowly increasing, Florida remains noticeably absent, and one-third of states still have no requirement that sellers must disclose a property's flood risk to potential buyers.

Does the time of day you move your body make a difference to your health? – Maybe – for people living with obesity.

How the iron lung paved the way for the modern-day intensive care unit – The iron lung was first used to save the life of a child in 1928. It swiftly became a fixture in polio wards during the polio outbreaks of the subsequent decades, particularly from 1948 until the vaccine was developed in 1955. And its creation paved the way for many subsequent medical innovations. Some patients spent just a short time in the iron lung, perhaps weeks or months until they were able to regain chest strength and breath independently again. But for patients whose chest muscles were permanently paralyzed, the iron lung remained the key to survival.

Food security in developed countries shows resilience to climate change - Data on American wheat production, inventories, crop area, prices and wider market conditions from 1950 to 2018, together with records of annual fluctuations in the weather for the same period reveals strong evidence of an increase in weather and harvest variability from 1974 onwards. However, Wheat prices remain relatively stable, along with the price of associated goods mainly due to farmers and agricultural industries providing a buffer, smoothing out any bumps in the supply of grain to retailers and consumers.

Where the Xerces Blue Butterfly Was Lost, Its Closest Relative Is Now Filling In - Silvery Blues collected 100 miles south of San Francisco were released at a restored a swath of dunes in the Presidio, a former military base, trying to bring back native wildlife. They will pollinate native flowers and form a critical link in the food chain there.

Colorless, odorless gas likely linked to alarming rise in non-smoking lung cancer - 5-20% of newly diagnosed lung cancers occur in people who have never smoked, many of whom are in their 40s or 50s.  Non-smoking lung cancer cases is likely linked to long-term, high exposures of radon gas. This colorless, odorless gas is emitted from the breakdown of radioactive material naturally occurring underground that then seeps through building foundations. The gas can linger and accumulate in people's homes and lungs silently unless they know to test for it. We had our Missouri house tested and radon remediation installed before we moved it!

Contents of Roman Lead Coffin Examined in England - The examination of the contents of a Roman lead coffin discovered in 2022 in the city of Leeds has identified the partial remains of a child (about 10 years old). The initial evaluation of the coffin’s poorly preserved contents found the remains of a woman between the ages of 25 and 35 at the time of her death some 1,600 years ago, a bracelet, a glass bead necklace, and a finger ring or an earring.

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 20, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Tax Burden by State – A comparison done by WalletHub that compared the 50 states on 3 types of taxes - property taxes, individual income taxes, and sales and excise taxes - as a share of total personal income in the state.

See a Restored Ancient Roman Helmet—and Two Shiny New Replicas – 2,000-year-old helmet made of silver-gilded iron.

Solar Savings in the US – Looking at the numbers….

Feral Hogs to Be Removed from Congaree National Park – My husband and I visited Congaree in 2008 and I vividly remember the feral hogs. Evidently action is being taken to remove them. They have become a pervasive problem to both the park and surrounding landowners, routinely causing widespread damage to land and water resources both within and outside of the park. Recent observations have shown that they have begun to cause more extensive damage to areas near the Harry Hampton Visitor Center, including areas where synchronous fireflies are active and where restoration of longleaf pine is ongoing.

What four decades of canned salmon reveal about marine food webs - The cans contained fillets from four salmon species, all caught over a 42-year period in the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay. Researchers dissected the preserved fillets from 178 cans and counted the number of anisakid roundworms -- a common, tiny marine parasite -- within the flesh. The parasites were killed by the canning process but still visible… counting them is one way to gauge how well a marine ecosystem is doing.

Texas Solar Power Growth Changing the Shape of Daily Electricity Supply in ERCOT – Looking at the changes between 2022 and 2023…easy to see graphically.

Functional capacity in old age is like an ecosystem that may collapse when disrupted - In old age, a tighter interlinkage between different domains of functional capacity may indicate a loss of system resilience. When functional capacity domains are tightly interconnected, a disruption in one domain can affect others and lead to a collapse in functioning.

Ming Dynasty Tomb Found in China's Xinfu District – Part of excavations before nearby highway construction begins.

I spy with my speedy eye: Scientists discover speed of visual perception ranges widely in humans - The rate with which we perceive the world is known as our "temporal resolution." Though our visual temporal resolution is quite stable from day to day in general, a post-hoc analysis did suggest that there may be slightly more variation over time within females than within males.

Study Reveals Vast Networks of ‘Ghost Roads’ in Asian Rainforests - An extensive analysis of satellite imagery has uncovered thousands of miles of unmapped roads slicing through Asia’s tropical rainforests - “ghost roads” may be laid down by miners, loggers, poachers, drug traffickers, and land grabbers, often illegally.

Then and Now: Groceries

In the 1960s, my mother did the grocery shopping for the family – usually going once a week.  I went with her occasionally but not often. She usually shopped while my sisters and I were in school. Her favorite grocery store was Safeway. I am now shopping at Walmart most of the time since it is the closest grocery store to me and once a week is still my goal. The hours my The Walmart is open from 6AM-11PM, 7 days a week; the hours grocery stores were open in the 1960s was a lot less than that and there were items they couldn’t sell on Sundays if they were open then (‘blue laws’ in Texas).

The carts were similar in design to the larger ones in most stores now although they were all metal (no plastic) and did not have seatbelts for young children. Most grocery stores now  have a few smaller carts along with the larger ones but I usually am buying enough that I get a large cart.

My mother always had a list that accumulated over the week; most of the time she made the additions to the list but as my sisters and I got old enough, we sometimes wrote in items. Now I use the OurGroceries app so that my husband and I can add items to the list from any of our devices and I use my phone when I am in the store rather than a piece of paper.

My mother only bought food at the grocery store…not toiletries or over-the-counter medications; those were purchased at a drug store which also included a pharmacy. I buy many non-groceries during my weekly shopping now; toiletries are frequently on the list, but I sometimes buy clothes or office supplies as well. It’s an advantage of shopping at Walmart rather than a grocery store. We still pick up our prescriptions at a CVS; the pharmacy at Walmart is not open at the time I usually shop (between 7 and 8:30 AM on Friday mornings).

At checkout, a cashier had to enter the price of each item on the register and the strip of paper that my mother was handed at the end only included the prices and the total. She paid with cash or wrote a check. Now I scan my purchases myself, use a credit card to pay for them, and get an itemized list that includes an abbreviated description of each item along with the total.

Mother’s purchases were put in brown paper bags by the cashier. Now the store provides single-use plastic bags; I’ve used my own bags for more than a decade (they are stronger, and I don’t have to take precautions to contain the single-use bags from littering and polluting the environment). I put my items into my bags after I scan them. All the refrigerator items go into an insulated bag and the remaining items are grouped into bags to make unloading easier once I get home (and to make sure bread, chips, and eggs are not damaged in transit).

There was a lot less plastic. Milk came only in cartons (waxed…not plastic coated) and juices and soft drinks came in glass. Canned foods were purchased frequently, and the cans were not lined with plastic. The produce section included mainly seasonal foods along with ones that could be easily stored/transported (like bananas). Broccoli was something we had periodically as a frozen vegetable, and it was packaged in a box rather than a plastic bag.  We enjoyed strawberries seasonally or frozen (in a box); now my husband likes the frozen ones (in a plastic bag) more than he likes fresh ones! Plastic is the dominate packaging now: jugs of milk, bottles of water/soft drinks/juice, bags of frozen veggies and fruit, robustly sealed meats, bags of snacks and fresh vegetables/fruits, jars of peanut butter. Sometimes there is an option to buy in class jars but most of the time there is no choice; the packaging is plastic.

The most common type of bread was white; my mother wanted ‘whole wheat’ and bought Roman Meal when she could find it. I buy Dave’s Sprouted organic bread….avoiding a lot of added chemicals that have been introduced over the years to keep bread from molding or otherwise ‘improving’ it in some way (‘improving’ is in quotes because many breads cross over into the ultra-processed realm with the additions that are quite common today).

Some of the brands are still around: Cambell’s, Nabisco, Kelloggs, Green Giant. I don’t buy them as often as my mother did…only Cambell’s Tomato Soup and Green Giant Niblets Corn for my husband.

There are a lot of products in the grocery store that were not available in the 1960s…most of them ultra-processed and they fill up whole aisles of the grocery store. It requires some willpower to steer clear of those (although it gets easier over time). On the healthier side, it is now easier to find international foods (salsas and tortillas, etc.) and things like boneless chicken breasts…a lot more options when it comes to pasta, sauces in glass jars, greens (kale and arugula were not in grocery stores in the 1960s), grains/seed (quinoa and chia are new…’chia pets’ were not introduced until the later 1970s), and no salt seasonings. There are now targeted foods for special diets; for example, milk that includes Lactaid for those that are lactose intolerant and protein shakes for diabetics or those dieting and concerned about getting adequate protein.

My mother was very conscious of nutritional guidelines; she had taken home economics courses in college. We had some form of protein at every meal along with fruits and vegetables and grains. Sugary items were only for special occasions. There were seasonal fresh foods, but she relied on canned goods more than we do now, particularly during the winter. Both sets of grandparents had big gardens and we enjoyed their bounty whenever we could – supplementing what was purchased at the grocery store; we knew how food was grown and a little of how it was preserved (canned) for later. Now we buy more fresh or frozen fruits and veggies rather than canned because they are readily available during the whole year. I also buy organic as much as I can….something that didn’t exist in the 1960s.

Groceries have changed significantly since the 1960s. Availability of healthy foods is probably better now – although it takes more attention/knowledge to avoid the ultra-processed foods that are often intermingled with the healthy food.

Previous Then and Now posts

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 13, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Touching Image of Intergenerational Love Wins Black and White Minimalist Photography Prize – Minimalist…but powerful.

How an English castle became a stork magnet – 30 White Storks from a rescue project in Poland introduced in the rewilded habitat at Knepp Castle in southern England in 2016. At one point, storks even built nests on Knepp Castle itself although they usually build their nests in the crown of huge oak trees. The young storks started migrating in 2019. The colony has grown to about 80 storks…and is the first breeding colony in Britain in 600 years.

Evidence for Domesticated Chickens Dated to 400 B.C. - A study of eggshell fragments unearthed at 12 archaeological sites located along the Silk Road corridor in Central Asia.

Noisy Summer Ahead for U.S. as Dueling Broods of Cicadas Emerge - It is the first time these two broods are going to be emerging in the same year since Thomas Jefferson was in the White House. Mating season will last until July.

California’s Live Oaks in Focus - Some centuries old, the oaks are magnificent giants that can grow up to 100 feet tall and are what remains of a forest that once blanketed the region.

New approach to monitoring freshwater quality can identify sources of pollution, and predict their effects - Analyzing the diversity of organic compounds dissolved in freshwater provides a reliable measure of ecosystem health. Microparticles from car tires, pesticides from farmers' fields, and toxins from harmful algal blooms are just some of the organic chemicals that can be detected using the new approach.

Cars & Road Trips Made a Huge Difference in Women’s History – One of the first cars ever built got taken by a woman, without permission, on the world’s first road trip! Bertha Benz wanted her husband’s invention to be seen out in the country so people would buy it, but her husband Karl Benz was being timid about it. So, she took the car out on a road trip with her kids.

Common household chemicals pose new threat to brain health - The new study discovered that some common home chemicals specifically affect the brain's oligodendrocytes, a specialized cell type that generates the protective insulation around nerve cells. Loss of oligodendrocytes underlies multiple sclerosis and other neurological diseases. They identified chemicals that selectively damaged oligodendrocytes belong to two classes: organophosphate flame retardants and quaternary ammonium compounds.

The Soundtrack of Spring on the Platte River – Sandhill cranes staging last month along the Central Platte River in Nebraska. So many birds….lots of sound.

These Are the Most Polluted National Parks – Many national parks are suffering from air pollution and facing threats stemming from human-caused climate change. 98 percent of parks suffer from visible haze pollution, while 96 percent are grappling with ozone pollution that could be harmful to human health. Four of the nation’s parks with the unhealthiest air are in California: Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park, Joshua Tree National Park, Mojave National Preserve and Yosemite National Park. Another California site, Death Valley National Park, also made the top ten list. 57 percent of national parks are facing at least one threat stemming from climate change that could permanently alter its ecosystems, with many parks grappling with multiple issues at the same time. Invasive species were the most prevalent issue.

Gleanings of the Week Ending April 6, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What do terracotta warriors tell us about life in ancient China? – Discovered 50 years ago…they are a snapshot of the soldiers of Qin – the feudal state that unified China, for the first time in 221BC under the country's first emperor Qin Shi Huang – from the soles of their shoes to their candy-colored clothes to the bronze weapons buried with them to their distinct facial features. 2,000 terracotta warriors have been excavated but more are uncovered every year.

This Map Shows Where Planting Trees Would Make Climate Change Worse - Trees draw down carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, helping to keep warming in check. But their dark, green leaves also absorb heat from sunlight. Snow and sand, by virtue of their light color, reflect more sunlight back into space. As such, trees planted in snowy areas or in the desert will absorb more sunlight than their surroundings, which may negate the climate benefits of soaking up carbon dioxide.

These 3,000-Year-Old Treasures Were Forged from Meteoritic Iron - In the 1960s, researchers discovered a trove of Bronze Age treasure in Villena, Spain. New research has revealed that some of them made between 1400 and 1200 B.C.E. were forged from iron from a meteor that struck Earth a million years ago. Who manufactured them and where this material was obtained are still questions that remain to be answered.

Vernal Pools Make Your Garden Sing - It’s not just frogs that are making homes in these little pools of water. Less vocal species like salamanders, dragonflies, fairy shrimp, and even dozens of native plants are there too. Even more species than that can be found simply visiting the pool for a drink or snack, including great blue herons, wood ducks, and box turtles.

Return of Trees to Eastern U.S. Kept Region Cool as Planet Warmed - Over the 20th century, the U.S. warmed by 1.2 degrees F (0.7 degrees C), but across much the East, temperatures dropped by 0.5 degrees F (0.3 degrees C). A new study posits that the restoration of lost forest countered warming, keeping the region cool. Still, the return of trees can only partially account for the drop in temperature. Other possible explanations include the growth of irrigation, a source of water vapor, and the uptick in particulate pollution, which reflects sunlight, thereby cooling the air.

Sweetened drinks linked to atrial fibrillation risk - 20% higher risk of irregular heart rhythm, known as atrial fibrillation, among people who said they drank two liters or more per week (about 67 ounces) of artificially sweetened drinks. The risk was 10% higher among people who said they drank similar amounts of sugar-sweetened beverages.

Measles outbreaks and what parents need to know - Measles can lead to complications such as ear infections, diarrhea, pneumonia, and encephalitis (brain swelling). One to three of every 1,000 children infected with measles dies. More than 97 percent of the people who have had their two shots of the vaccine never get measles.

A new world of 2D material is opening up - 2D materials have shown great potential for an enormous number of applications. You can imagine capturing carbon dioxide or purifying water, for example. Now it's about scaling up the synthesis and doing it in a sustainable way.

In Cleveland, mushrooms digest entire houses: How fungi can be used to clean up pollution - Fungi can eat the noxious waste from abandoned homes. Heavy metals and other toxins are extracted and captured in the mushrooms that grow, while the substrate leftovers, including the mycelium, are compacted and heated to create clean bricks for new construction. The resulting "mycoblocks" have a consistency akin to hardwood and, depending on the specifics of the manufacturing process, have been shown to be significantly stronger than concrete.

Arctic nightlife: Seabird colony bursts with sound at night - Acoustic recordings of a colony of little auks reveal their nocturnal activities and offer valuable monitoring means for avian biology in the Arctic.

Ten Little Celebrations – March 2024

Picking 10 little celebrations is only challenging because there are so many of them to choose from! I help myself by only noting one each day, but I realize when I look at the list at the end of the month that there are even more, in retrospect, worthy of celebration. Here are the top 10 for March 2024.

My mother’s life. The phrase ‘celebration of life’ is more like a savoring because there is an overlay of grief that is part of every gathering after a death. I stayed focused on making sure that someone was with my dad for the duration and providing narration of the images in the slideshow for him…varying what I said a bit each time it repeated and realizing that she had a very full 92 years!

Getting the check deposited after the sale of my parents’ house. What a relief to not be carrying around a big check!

Home again. I made multiple short trips to Dallas for various reasons and was always very glad to be home again. Even though the time away is only a couple of days, the stress of driving, my task while in Dallas, and staying in a hotel takes a toll. I don’t really relax until I am at home. Hopefully, when I am only going down to see my dad, it will not be as stressful.

Sequiota Cave Boat tour. What a great tour. I liked the non-commercial nature the tour…seeing the tiny bats roosting.

Springfield Botanical Gardens. Full of spring blooming trees.

Dickerson Park Zoo. My daughter gave us a membership for Christmas, so we’ll be enjoying the zoo often over the next year. I liked the roaming peacocks (and other things too). The post about this visit is coming day after tomorrow.

Feeling better. I got sick with something that caused sinus and throat problems. I tested for COVID for 3 days…and was negative for that. And then I recovered rapidly and I celebrated. Also celebrated that my husband did get whatever it was.

Creating more hosta locations. I divided some of my hosta plants as they first began to come up and was pleased that the new plants adjusted very quickly to their new space. I am looking forward to their lush growth this summer…and will divide more plants next spring!

Burning sticks. I enjoyed the fire in my chiminea after cleaning up the small branches and pine cones around my yard….celebrating with some pictures of the fire!

Butterfly and pollinator seeds planted. I celebrated getting the beds prepared and the seeds planted…right at the mid-March suggested planting deadline.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 30, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Floating Solar Array Is Designed to Take the Rough Stuff - Rich opportunities for solar co-location with offshore wind. By combining floating solar with offshore wind farms and thereby leveraging the same energy infrastructure and export cables, the resulting energy production capacity per used area could be drastically improved. Prototype has been developed…should be in the water by June 2024.

Lessons In Rewilding the Scottish Highlands – Working with nature…increasing biodiversity…reducing monoculture.

Five Shocking Animal Hybrids That Truly Exist in Nature, From Narlugas to Grolar Bears to Coywolves – I’ve heard about a few of these…the pictures were interesting.

Pregnancy advances your ‘biological’ age — but giving birth turns it back - Brewing a baby leads to changes in the distribution of certain chemical markers on a pregnant person’s DNA — changes similar to those that are a hallmark of getting older. But new research shows that, several months after a person gives birth, the chemical patterns revert to an earlier state.

Did You Know Sandhill Cranes Dye Their Feathers? – The birds rub iron rich mud onto their feathers…staining them. And some trivia about sandhill cranes at the Platte River (Nebraska) in the early spring:

• The birds find a lot of waste corn in farm fields, as well as small invertebrates in marshes near the river. A crane can add 20 percent to its weight during two or three weeks in the area.

• At night, the cranes move to the Platte River for safe roosting in the shallow water.

• Sandhill cranes are the most numerous of the world’s crane species.

• In the Central Flyway, more than 500,000 cranes – more than 80 percent of their population.

The heat index -- how hot it really feels -- is rising faster than temperature - Researchers looked at Texas's summer 2023 heat wave and found that the 3 degree F rise in global temperatures has increased the state's heat index as much as 11 degrees F on the hottest days! Arizona's most populous county, covering most of Phoenix, reported that heat-associated deaths last year were 50% higher than in 2022, rising from 425 in 2022 to 645 in 2023. Two-thirds of Maricopa County's heat-related deaths in 2023 were of people 50 years or older, and 71% occurred on days when the National Weather Service had issued an excessive heat warning. With climate change, the relative humidity remains about constant as the temperature increases, which reduces the effectiveness of sweating to cool the body.

158 Cherry Blossom Trees Will Be Cut Down in D.C. in Effort to Withstand Sea-Level Rise – Part of the project to reconstruct a seawall around the Tidal Basin.

Landscape Architecture Strategies Reduce Impacts of Dangerous Extreme Heat – And these apply to what we do in our yard too!

• Increase tree percentage in parks and green spaces

• Provide shade on sites

• Use plant materials and water instead of hardscape

• Switch to green ground cover, including grasses and shrubs

Plastics Contain Thousands More Chemicals Than Thought, and Most Are Unregulated – Scary! The report also highlights 15 chemical priority groups of concern. These include phthalates, which are used to make plastics more durable and have been found to affect the reproductive systems of animals, as well as per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which break down very slowly over time and have been linked to health issues including reproductive and developmental problems and increased cancer risk.

Only seven nations meet WHO air pollution standards – The US is not one of the seven: Australia, Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Iceland, Mauritius and New Zealand. Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Tajikistan and Burkina Faso were the top five most polluted countries in 2023 with PM2.5 levels nine to 15 times higher than the WHO's standard. Columbus, Ohio, was the most polluted major city in the United States, while Las Vegas was the cleanest and Beloit, Wisconsin polluted U.S. city overall.

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 23, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

6 chemical stories of colors through time – A little history of these colors….some very toxic!

Possible Neolithic Body Piercings Unearthed in Anatolia – Over 11,000 years old…found near ears and chins of human remains.

Under Threat in Their Native California, Giant Sequoias Are Thriving in Britain - First introduced to country estates in the 19th century, half a million sequoias now grow in Britain, compared to just 80,000 along the western flank of the Sierra Nevada in California, where they are increasingly imperiled by warming. Up to a fifth of all large giant sequoias in California died in wildfires in 2020 and 2021. The trees in Britain are still relatively young — sequoias can live for more than 3,000 years — and squat. In Britain’s cool, mild climate, sequoias are growing nearly as fast as in California.

Whales That Go Through Menopause Live Longer and May Help Care for Grandchildren - Female tooth whales that go through menopause (narwhals, killer whales, false killer whales, short-finned pilot whales and beluga whales) have longer lifespans than those that don’t, surviving decades past their reproductive prime!

A healthier diet is linked with a slower pace of aging, reduced dementia risk - We have some strong evidence that a healthy diet can protect against dementia…but the mechanism of this protection is not well understood. This study suggests that slower pace of aging mediates part of the relationship of healthy diet with reduced dementia risk, and therefore, monitoring pace of aging may inform dementia prevention. Additional observational studies need to be conducted to investigate direct associations of nutrients with brain aging.

The next pandemic? It’s already here for Earth’s wildlife – The pathogenic strain of avian influenza has killed millions of birds and unknown numbers of mammals. Between January 1, 2003 and December 21, 2023, 882 cases of human infection were reported from 23 countries, of which 461 (52%) were fatal. To prevent the worst outcomes for this virus, we must revisit its primary source: the incubator of intensive poultry farms.

Ultra-fast fashion is a disturbing trend undermining efforts to make the whole industry more sustainable - Ultra-fast fashion is marked by even faster production cycles, blink-and-you’ll-miss-it trends, and poor labor practices. Without change, the industry will account for 26% of the world’s carbon budget for limiting global warming to 2°C by 2050. Established brands such as Gap introduce 12,000 new items a year and H&M 25,000. But Shein leaves them in the dust, listing 1.3 million items in the same amount of time.

Seven ways to improve your sleep according to science – Science and historical perspective.

Warming Waters Bringing More Sharks to the Alabama Coast - Globally, warming waters are driving sharks to new areas where they were previously scarce. Great white sharks, tiger sharks, and bull sharks have all edged northward. From 2003 to 2020, the number of juvenile bull sharks swimming through Mobile Bay rose fivefold.

Incredible Winners of the 2024 British Wildlife Photography Awards – So many great images!

Gleanings of the Week Ending March 2, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Apples, Walnuts… and Toast? A New Study Reveals the Flavors of Ancient Roman Wine - Georgian vintners still employ a rustic approach. Grapes are crushed by hand or foot, placed in egg-shaped vessels known as qvevri, and buried for up to six months. It’s a UNESCO-recognized tradition dating back 8,000 years and researchers believe can help reveal the sight and scent of ancient Roman wine.

Mexico is suing US gun-makers for arming its gangs − and a US court could award billions in damages - In January, a federal appeals court in Boston decided that the industry’s immunity shield, which so far has protected gun-makers from civil liability, does not apply to Mexico’s lawsuit. Mexico’s lawsuit alleges that U.S. gun-makers aided and abetted illegal weapons sales to gun traffickers in violation of federal law. According to the lawsuit, feeding demand for illegal weapons is central to the industry’s business model.

Climate change reversing gains in air quality across the U.S.: study - The study finds that climate change is increasing the prevalence of two of the air pollutants most harmful to human health: particulate matter, commonly referred to as PM2.5, and tropospheric ozone. Whereas pollutants from cars and factories could be targeted by regulations over the past few decades, climate-related deterioration in air quality is a much tougher problem to solve.

Avar Grave Offers Clues to 7th-Century Heavy Cavalry - Thought to be a complete set of lamellar armor, which was made from hundreds of small iron plates, was spread out over the warrior.

What Does a Solar Eclipse on Mars Look Like? New, Breathtaking Images, Caught by NASA’s Perseverance Rover, Give Us an Idea – Images of Phobos passing across the sun’s surface…back on February 8.

Benefits of heat pumps - Nationally, heat pumps would cut residential sector greenhouse gas emissions by 36%-64%!

How millennials could give the suburbs a much-needed makeover – The trend is to move to the suburbs and not feel like you need to go to the city to have a great dinner or to see a show or live music or the arts.

The far-reaching impacts of wildfire smoke – and how to protect yourself - One study found that a quarter of the US's PM2.5 pollution was caused by wildfire smoke. In western regions, as much as half was caused by smoke. If there is a wildfire nearby, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention advise taking steps to limit your exposure where possible:

Choose a room to close off from outside air

Wear a tightly fitting respirator, if it is safe for you to do so

Keep track of fires nearby using services such as AirNow's fire and smoke map

Pay attention to health symptoms and seek medical care if needed

Ancient Lipstick Dating Back More Than Three Millennia Is Found in Iran – Analysis of the loose, dark purple fine powder revealed minerals (hematite, quartz, braunite, anglesite, and rare tiny crystals of galena) and vegetal fibers.

In Scotland, Renewable Power Has Outstripped Demand – A milestone for Scotland. The volume of electricity produced by renewables in Scotland was equal to 113 percent of demand in 2022. Fossil fuels still supply some electricity, helping to smooth over gaps in renewable power. Across the U.K., fossil fuel power is at its lowest level in nearly seven decades. Impressive.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 24, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Surprisingly vibrant color of 12-million-year-old snail shells – Polyenes (includes carotenoids) preserved almost unchanged…and found in fossils.

Asbestos: The strange past of the 'magic mineral' – Asbestos was woven into textiles fit for kings and used for party tricks. One 18th-Century philosopher even slept in a night-cap made from it. It was also used to make the funerary shrouds for monarchs; because it didn't burn, it helped to keep their ashes separated from the rest of the pyre. An account from Ancient Greece describes a golden lamp made for the goddess Athena, which could reportedly burn for a whole year without going out and had a wick made from "Carpathian flax" – thought to be another name for asbestos. In 1899, an English doctor recorded the first confirmed case of a death linked directly to the material – a 33-year-old textile worker who had developed fibrosis of the lungs. In the UK, all asbestos was banned in 1999, but much of the asbestos added before this date remains in place – as buildings degrade, it is posing a significant health risk.

Rise of Peru’s Divine Lords – Hilltop sites in the Andes…early examples of divine lordship - a form of leadership that would endure in Peru for more than 1,000 years.

Amid Record Drop in Fossil Power, Europe Sees Wind Overtake Natural Gas - The E.U. power sector is undergoing a monumental shift - fossil fuels are playing a smaller role than ever as a system with wind and solar as its backbone comes into view. Coal generation fell by 26 percent, while gas generation fell by 15 percent.

Student Design Competition: Integrating Solar and Agriculture - Some 2.8 gigawatts of agrivoltaics exist across the U.S. Many combine solar energy with pollinator habitat and sheep grazing. The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is looking for new design proposals from graduate and undergraduate landscape architecture students to push the agrivoltaics envelope!

The Moon Is Shrinking, Causing Moonquakes at a Potential NASA Landing Site - Researchers examined data on moonquakes detected by lunar seismometers, which have been on the moon since Apollo program astronauts left them there more than 50 years ago. They also used mapping data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to identify the telltale creases on the moon. Through modeling, they linked these faults to seismic activity.

Texas Reservoirs Reach Dangerous Lows - In Corpus Christi, on the south Texas coast, authorities last month stopped releasing water aimed at maintaining minimum viable ecology in the coastal wetlands, even as oil refineries and chemical plants remain exempt from water use restrictions during drought. On the lower Texas coast, the Rio Grande has not been flowing consistently, and Colorado River water releases have been minimal as that river faces shortages farther upstream.

Extreme Birding: Gull Watching at the Landfill - You can find gulls around North America (and many parts of the world), including in interior states. At least 28 gulls can be seen in North America, with additional vagrant species showing up from time to time. Individual species look different depending on age and other factors. A gull goes through three feather molts in its first year.

Poisonous Seed Stash Discovered in the Netherlands – Black henbane contained in a hollow goat (or sheep) thigh bone sealed with a plug of black birch bark…from AD 70-200.

Ocean Sponge Skeletons Suggest a More Significant History of Global Warming Than Originally Thought - An analysis of six sea sponges—centuries-old creatures with an internal chemistry that holds secrets about climate history—points to global temperatures already having increased by 1.7 degrees Celsius due to human activity --- that’s more than scientists currently agree upon….so there is a flurry of activity to corroborate the finding.

Ramping up Elder Care – February 2024

My parents have rediscovered the joy of going out to a restaurant for a meal. The weekday late lunchtime seems to work best (i.e. not crowded). It is quite a production: two elderly people with walkers…and two (or three) others with them. One of my sisters bought a small refrigerator for their room and they relish being able to put their leftovers there (and seem to prefer eating them for their next meal!). This is probably something I will try to do with them every time I visit. There are a lot of restaurants near the assisted living group home to experience.

Sometimes major bends in our life path are only recognized in retrospect; the events of January and February 2024 are a bend everyone in my family anticipated and acknowledges in real time. My sisters and I are acclimating to others providing the day to day care of our parents with their move to an assisted living home and the family has lost a long term hub for family events with the selling of their house.

• My parents moved to an assisted living group home at the end of 2023. They’ve settled into their new environment. My mother is improving; maybe it is simply a trend that started back in December, but it could also be the increased social interactions and her confidence that someone is always available to help. It is still challenging for my sisters and I to back away and not jump to assist them when we visit. The staff is helpful and patient with everyone! My dad is about the same although he was very disoriented at first; he is eating well.

• My sisters and I began to clean out my parents’ house soon after we moved them. They had lived in the house for over 30 years. There was a lot to go through. I made two short (less than a week) trips to Carrollton to help. During January we cleared most of the house by

  • Distributing furniture to family members or selling it or marking it for donation. I took two small tables, and my daughter took a larger octagon table for her office.

  • Donating clothes. There was very little that someone else in the family could wear. The closets in their assisted living rooms are filled to the brim with clothes that they wear.

  • Following the ‘bequeath’ list for decorative and kitchen items. I got 2 items from their 50th anniversary (one passed down from my maternal grandparents’ 50th), 1 from my parents’ 25th  anniversary, items that I remember from my childhood (a knife, fork and spoon of the silver plate my mother bought before she married; a orange cut glass bowl that I bought as a present to my Mother because it was her favorite color), 2 paintings my mother made (one of a dogwood blossom…and the pressed flower that I sent to her in 1984 from my Virginia house that she used as her model), the remnants of my maternal grandmother’s China….too many things to name although I am realizing that I should make a list for myself.

• The house went on the market on February 1st and we accepted a full-price offer on the 2nd. Closing was requested for 2/28. February became a sprint to clear out the two sheds on the property and donate the furniture that no one in the family wanted. I made a very focused trip to help.

  • Salvation Army came with a truck to get furniture and boxes of books. It was tricky since the city had the street in front of the house torn up (infrastructure update project). The truck managed the pickup from the alley.

  • Tools were mostly distributed to the sister that wanted them. Some were tools from my paternal grandfather.  My daughter got a telescoping tree trimmer (she has the bigger trees…but I can borrow it when I need it).

  • The trash and recycle bins were full for every pickup and some items were put at the curb in front of a neighbor’s house for bulk pickup.

  • Some odds and ends were taken to be repurposed. I got some white vertical blinds (not attached to anything…just loose pieces of blind) which I plan to cover with Zentangle patterns and hang (not sure where yet). There were three small pieces of Masonite that I got for another Zentangle project. Some pieces of wood were taken by my sisters for art projects and specific repairs at their house.

  • One sister is having the king headboard (purchased in 1963…beautiful wood) made into a display case. She also took the antique meat grinder that we found in one of the sheds.

  • Another sister is taking most of the yard equipment to distribute to her family’s houses so that it will be easier for her to do yard maintenance.

Are we through the bend….or is more to come before we settle into a new normal? As I write this my dad has tested positive for COVID-19. The symptoms were mild and initially attributed to some new eye drops. He was tested after one of my sisters that visits frequently tested positive. He is getting Paxlovid. This is the first experience with COVID for him and my mother; they are both vaccinated. Hopefully this will be a minor blip and we’ll achieve a new normal in March.

Previous posts: November 2023, November 2023 update, December 2023, January 2024

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 17, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The lost art of the death mask – In the late Middle Ages (after 50% of the population was wiped out in 4 years by plague), death masks were created by molding wax or plaster over the face, and were a useful way of copying the features of deceased relatives, so that sculptors could use them as a reference for the lifelike portraits displayed at funerals. Then in the 18th Century, something unexpected happened: people began to value death masks for their own sake. Many death masks were turned into spooky heirlooms, while some became souvenirs that command six-figure sums to this day.

Rapa Nui’s Rongorongo Tablets in Rome Radiocarbon Dated - In the nineteenth century, Roman Catholic missionaries took four wooden tablets bearing rongorongo glyphs from Easter Island. They have recently been radiocarbon dated; three of the tablets were made from trees cut down in the eighteenth or nineteenth centuries; the fourth tablet came from a tree felled sometime between 1493 and 1509, some 200 years before the arrival of Europeans in the 1720s.

Tribe Making Play to End Oil Development at Big Cypress National Preserve - The National Park Service took charge of the land 50 years ago, which is a haven for some of Florida’s most endangered wildlife species, such as the Florida panther — but not the mineral rights under the land. Those are owned by the Collier Resources Company, which has from time to time dispatched oil companies to the preserve to look for black gold.

Bird Alert: The Search for Local Rarities – The joy of birding close to home!

Archaeologists discover oldest known bead in the Americas - At the La Prele Mammoth site in Wyoming. Made of bone from a hare. Almost 13,000 years old.

Stunning Macro Photos Pay Homage to the Frozen Beauty of Winter – A good reminder to check ice as a subject for winter photography!

Ancient pollen trapped in Greenland ice uncovers changes in Canadian forests over 800 years - The onset of the Little Ice Age around 1400 and the arrival of European settlers and subsequent intensive logging practices around 1650. The pollen in ice can be dated almost to the year it was deposited!

Back Pain Explained - Many people with degenerated discs feel no pain at all….but others have severe pain. It appears that when aging or under degenerative stress, a subset of cells in the center of the disc can release a cry for help, a particular signal that causes outside neurons to extend their axons within, allowing the brain to feel the pain inside. This work could inform future treatments for discogenic lower back pain!

PACE Makes it to Space – NASA’s PACE (Plankton, Aerosol, Cloud, ocean Ecosystem) was launched February 8…preparing to move into operational phase soon.

How our drinking water could come from thin air - The solar-powered hydropanels work by using sunlight to power fans that pull air into the device, which contains a desiccant material which absorbs and traps moisture. The water molecules accumulate and are emitted as water vapor as the solar energy raises the temperature of the panel to create a high-humidity gas. This then condenses into a liquid before minerals are added to make it drinkable. There are several startups with other approaches to produce water from air too. And they all work even with dry air.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 10, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Sleep tight: A curious history of beds through the centuries – From 4,500 year old ‘beds’ at Skara Brae (Scottish island of Orkney…rectangular enclosures, around the length of a human…made from slabs of cold, hard stone…with tall headboards and raised sides) to Durrington Walls near Stonehenge (spectral outlines of long-vanished wooden bed boxes, where the builders of that monument may have once slept) to a clay figurine of a woman slumbering peacefully on her side, one hand under her head, on a simple raised platform to the gilded wooden bed in King Tut’s tomb (including a rigid, raised headrest rather than a soft pillow) to mats of dried leaves or animal skins to box beds to the ‘tick mattress’…hints of beds of the past.

Peru’s High-Altitude Hunter-Gatherers Ate Mostly Plants – Wild potatoes and the root vegetables made up 80% of their diet.

Rethinking Monarchs: Does the Beloved Butterfly Need Our Help? - The Xerces Society has published a joint statement signed by 10 top monarch biologists warning against the captive rearing and releasing of monarchs by backyard and commercial breeders. Such activities, they wrote, “promote crowding and disease spread.” The monarch is not in peril since the winter population in Mexico has shown no continued decline for the past 10 years. --- But there are some that still argue for continued ‘help.’

Deceptively Beautiful Invasive Plants – Avoid Lessor Celadine, Mimosa Tree, English Ivy…..Today, we have the opportunity to make gardening choices that benefit both the aesthetics of our gardens and local wildlife by removing invasive species and replacing them with beautiful and wildlife-friendly native alternatives. 

See the World Through the Eyes of Animals with These Stunning New Videos - To “see through” animal eyes, the team uses two cameras—one sensitive to ultraviolet light and one sensitive to visible light. Together, they capture light in four distinct wavelengths: blue, green, red and ultraviolet.

New genetic variants found in large Chinese mother–baby study - Mothers with higher blood pressure give birth to lighter and shorter babies than do mothers with lower blood pressure. This was just one of a multitude of links between maternal health and fetal development observed in a large genetic analysis of Chinese parents and their babies, which included some unexpected results. The researchers sequenced genetic data from blood samples taken from the parents and umbilical-cord blood of the infants and collected physical information about the mothers and their babies, including height and weight. The researchers identified discrepancies in the effect of some genetic variants on the same trait between mothers and their babies. For example, some variants were associated with altered cholesterol levels in infants but not in their mothers, and vice versa.

Preserving History at Bandelier National Monument – Two videos that show recreations of what the structures looked like in use based on archeological findings.

The 4-Second Nap: Unusual Sleep Habits of Animals - The killer whale, which can go a month or more without sleeping. Or the chinstrap penguin, which researchers recently discovered sleeps in four-second microbursts. Compare that to the koala, which conks out for most of the day.  When dolphins are sleeping with one hemisphere, one eye closes and one remains open. They sometimes rest motionless near the surface of the water or swim slowly, still able to breathe when needed. African elephants sleep for the least amount of time recorded of any land mammal.  The domestic horse sleeps just under three hours on average each day, and the domestic pony sleeps about three hours and 20 minutes. 

How a walk in nature restores attention - The study, conducted in 2022 between April and October, analyzed EEG data recorded on each of 92 participants immediately before and after they undertook a 40-minute walk. Half walked through Red Butte, the arboretum in the foothills just east of the University of Utah, and half through the nearby asphalt-laden medical campus. The participants that had walked in nature showed an improvement in their executive attention, whereas the urban walkers did not.

Climate change is causing a pothole plague. Are robots and self-healing pavement the solution? - In the United States, about 44 million drivers reported damage to their vehicles from potholes in 2022, which was a massive 57% increase over 2021, according to AAA. New developments offer hope for addressing potholes more effectively amid climate change, and are attracting investors….but innovations take time to be implemented.

Gleanings of the Week Ending February 3, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

5 Ways Power Sectors Worldwide Can Drive Down Emissions - The coal-to-clean transition is complex — how effective it ends up being hinges on ensuring ambitious climate action integrates priorities around energy security, affordability, reliability, and meeting growth in electricity demand.

The 'dark earth' revealing the Amazon's secrets - Amazonian dark earth(ADE), sometimes known as "black gold" or terra preta, is a layer of charcoal-black soil, which can be up to 3.8m (12.5ft) thick, and is found in patches across the Amazon basin. It is intensely fertile – rich in decaying organic matter and nutrients essential for growing crops, such as nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus. But unlike the thin, sandy soils typical of the rainforest, this layer was not deposited naturally – it was the work of ancient humans. Now businesses are attempting to capitalize on this ancient method, in a quest to help farmers to improve their soil and combat climate change at the same time.

Rusting Rivers - Researchers suspect that thawing permafrost is the cause of dozens of Alaskan streams turning orange. Along with the strange appearance of the water, they have found it tends to be higher in iron, lower in dissolved oxygen, and more acidic than nearby rivers that run clear. The dramatic shift in water quality may be felt most acutely in the villages that rely upon rivers originating in permafrost regions for fish and drinking water.

World’s Largest Green Hydrogen Plant Will Take a Poke at Russian Gas - Mitsubishi is putting up $690 million to help build the world’s biggest green hydrogen plant, to be located in the Netherlands. It will help patch up some holes in the energy independence plan of Europe, where Russian gas has been clinging to a foothold despite sanctions.

Greece Reopens the Palace Where Alexander the Great Was Crowned - The 2,300-year-old Palace of Aigai—the largest building in classical Greece—had been under renovation for 16 years. At 160,000 square feet, the Palace of Aigai was classical Greece’s largest structure. Built primarily by Alexander’s father, Phillip II, in the fourth century B.C.E., it was the home of the Argead dynasty, ancient Macedonia’s ruling family. It was destroyed by the Romans in 148 B.C.E. and endured a subsequent series of lootings.

Predictions For Heat Pump Adoption Trends In 2024 - With $8,000 rebates for space heating heat pumps, and $1750 for water heating heat pumps, the IRA is helping accelerate adoption of this technology.

Miners Discover Seven-Foot Mammoth Tusk in North Dakota - Coal miners in North Dakota have uncovered a seven-foot-long, 50-pound mammoth tusk that’s been buried for thousands of years. Paleontologists have found more than 20 additional mammoth bones so far, including parts of hips, ribs, a tooth. and a shoulder blade.

The new drugs that may bring an end to constant itching - One in five of us will experience chronic itch lasting weeks or months. Fortunately, there might be treatments that address the problem.

Global groundwater depletion is accelerating but is not inevitable - This study shows that humans can turn things around with deliberate, concentrated efforts. Fine resolution, global studies will enable scientists and officials to understand the dynamics of this hidden resource.

Syphilis microbe’s family has plagued humans for millennia - Remains of people who lived on the eastern coast of South America nearly 2,000 years ago have yielded the oldest known evidence for the family of microorganisms that cause syphilis.

Ten Little Celebrations – January 2024

There are so many little celebrations every day. Here are my top 10 for January 2024.

51 years of being married. OK – perhaps this one is not ‘little.’ We marked the day by getting a special meal (picked up, eaten at home)…but the more significant part of the celebration was the savoring of being long marrieds…of always being supportive of each other, particularly when things are stressful.

Spider lily bulbs. I celebrated getting spider lily bulbs (and some iris rhizomes) planted before the very cold weather in mid-January.

A fragrant candle. I finally used up a very fragrant candle I had moved from Maryland (in the car since they are not permitted on moving trucks). When I entered my office each morning, I celebrated how it smelled from the candle I’d burned a few hours the previous evening!

Being home. Being away from home for 7 weeks and then leaving again for Texas 2.5 weeks later for a few days gave me several opportunities to celebrate coming and being home!

Braum’s Strawberry Poppyseed Chicken Salad. Yum. I had about given up on finding something at a fast food place that I liked…so I celebrated this discovery. The greens are fresh, the grilled chicken tender, the strawberries, blueberries, and pineapple make it special.

First Snow. I celebrated being home for snow…not on the road between Texas and home!

Patterns in the snow. I celebrated my first pattern walks in the snow…hope to try it again soon.

Old friends. I celebrated that two old friends (that I hadn’t talked to in years) contacted me just when I needed to talk to them…before I even realized how wonderful that would be.

2 years cancer free. Celebrating a 2-year mark of a 5-year monitoring regime for cancer after surgery…and all the checks are indicating no cancer.

Being indoors. When the temperature is single digits or below zero…it’s worth celebrating an indoor day in a warm house.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 27, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Can autoimmune diseases be cured? - After decades of frustration and failed attempts, scientists might finally be on the cusp of developing therapies to restore immune ‘tolerance’ in conditions such as diabetes, lupus and multiple sclerosis.

Good and bad news for people with low back pain - The good news is that most episodes of back pain recover, and this is the case even if you have already had back pain for a couple of months. The bad news is that once you have had back pain for more than a few months, the chance of recovery is much lower. This reminds us that although nearly everyone experiences back pain, some people do better than others, but we don't completely understand why.

Why diphtheria is making a comeback - While this present surge of diphtheria cases is indeed unprecedented for West Africa, it is really a symptom of larger issues in global health, including insufficient infectious disease surveillance, poor vaccination rates and scarcity of public health resources.

The Prairie Ecologists Photos of the Week – January 22 2024 – Photographs from out in the cold.

The chemistry of meat alternatives – It’s complicated…..in the end are meat alternative ultra-processed food?

The strange reasons medieval people slept in cupboards – I can see how they might have been warmer….but also rather claustrophobic. And wouldn’t they be hard to keep clean?

In the time of the copper kings - Some 3,500 years ago, prosperous merchants on Cyprus controlled the world’s most valuable commodity. Beginning in the third millennium B.C., and especially during the second millennium B.C., copper was king and could make those who possessed it extremely wealthy and powerful. There was enough copper and tin on board the Uluburun ship (wrecked off the coast of Turkey) to produce 11 tons of bronze, which experts estimate could have been turned into 33,000 swords. Researchers have analyzed the Uluburun wreck’s copper and found that it all came from Cyprus. There is evidence of the surprisingly diverse nature of the community thriving there and that those Cypriots who controlled the production and distribution of copper, such as the shipment found off Uluburun, could become exceptionally rich.

Cicadas Are Coming: Rare ‘Dual Emergence’ Could Bring One Trillion of the Bugs This Year – We don’t live in the overlap area…but where we live in Missouri will see Brood XIX this summer….a great opportunity for cicada photography!

Incredible Winners of the Close-Up Photographer of the Year Contest – So many beautiful images. My favorite is ‘Spirit of Yucatan’ (drifting stems of lily pads in a Mexican freshwater cenote…the sky above).

Deepwater Horizon oil spill study could lead to overhaul of cleanup processes worldwide – Chemical oil dispersants combined with sunlight…made oil more toxic. Observations from after Deepwater Horizon, and being confirmed experimentally, to improve responses to oil spills.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 13, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

What were the death tolls from pandemics in history? – The two most recent ones are COVID-19 and HIV/AIDS. Death from the 1918-1920 flu pandemic was larger than both together….and the population of the world was less then too.

Moments of hope and resilience from the climate frontlines – Drought then intense rains leading to rolling blackouts, damage to infrastructure, agriculture failures, mosquito spread diseases. Heat stress leading to deaths of people and wildlife, wildfires. Protecting and rehabilitating damaged habitats. A new normal….not anyone ready. Heat officers to help residents cope. Coastal erosion (caused by coastal development, rising sea levels and storm surges). Taking two years rather than one to dry firewood in Lapland. Solar panels positive impact on health care in India (and anywhere where electric power is unreliable). Crop irrigation required where it previously was not. Learning from our past, simpler lifestyles.

European Imports of Russian Pipeline Gas Dropped by Half Last Year - Europe has implemented measures to conserve energy and has ramped up wind and solar power. Last year, Germany, the largest economy in Europe, drew more than half of its power from renewables for the first time.

NASA Captures Stunning Images of Jupiter’s Moon Io on Closest Flyby in 20 Years – Image from NASA’s Juno spacecraft. Io is the most volcanically active planetary body in our solar system with 100s of volcanos.

Christmas Trees on the Beach – The innovative ways communities are using the cut trees after Christmas!

How humans have changed the Earth’s surface in 2023 – Overhead pictures tell stories of the past year. The picture of the drained Kakhovka Dam in Ukraine was startling.

Photographer Travels Europe to Document Incredible Starling Murmurations – I see smaller murmurations every road trip….never in a situation to photograph them! They are not always starlings. I remember seeing one in Florida that was tree swallows.

Could Climate Change Cause More Lakes to Turn Bright Pink? – Single-celled, salt-loving halobacteria. There is a new pink pond at the Kealia Pond National Wildlife Refuge in Hawaii…but it has been happening in the Great Salt Lake’s North Arm for several decades.  The number of pink ponds could increase with warmer temperatures increasing evaporation (and increasing the salinity of waters).

Next Solar Eclipse, In April, Expected to Attract Upwards Of 4 Million Tourists - Great American Eclipse has developed a geographic model to estimate how many people will travel to see the April eclipse. This model predicts that between 1 and 4 million people will travel to the path of totality. Texas is expected to receive the majority of visitors, followed by Indiana, Ohio, New York, Arkansas, Illinois, Pennsylvania, Vermont, Oklahoma, Maine, and New Hampshire.

U.S. Dietary Committee considers if the potato is a vegetable or a grain - Agriculture officials say the average American consumes about 50 pounds of potatoes each year.

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 6, 2024

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How Britain's taste for tea may have been a life saver - The explosion of tea as an everyman's drink in late 1700s England saved many lives - the simple practice of boiling water for tea, in an era before people understood that illness could be caused by water-borne pathogens, may have been enough to keep many from an early grave. Sometimes people's existing behaviors can make more of a difference to their health than an explicit intervention might.

Carbon-Based Paleolithic Paintings Found in France - The carbon-based drawings were detected with visible light and infrared photography, X-ray fluorescence, and spectroscopy underneath previously known images. The discovery could allow for precise radiocarbon dating of the artwork. Most of the Paleolithic paintings in the more than 200 caves in the region were made with iron and manganese oxides, which cannot be directly dated with radiocarbon dating technologies.

Winners of the 2023 International Landscape Photographer of the Year Contest – Wonderful views. I wish more of them were annotated (where they were taken…comments from the photographer, etc.). One of my favorites was the Winner for Snow and Ice by Thomas Vijayan of Canada.

Which zoo animals are most active in winter and what times are best to see them? – Author commenting about zoos in the UK…but most of the comments are relevant to zoos in the US too. I particularly enjoyed the last recommendation – going to the Reptile House to warm up! My daughter gave us a membership to the local zoo for Christmas…and we’ll probably bundle up and go soon (but not while the weather is in the 20s)!

Photos of the Week – December 24, 2023 from the Prairie Ecologist – Great reminders that there are interesting subjects for nature photography in winter.

103-Year-Old Artificial Christmas Tree Sells for Over $4,000 – A sliver of history: The tree originally belonged to Dorothy Grant, whose family purchased it for their Leicestershire, England, home in 1920. When she first saw it, the 8-year-old girl was “wildly excited.” She decorated its branches with cotton wool that resembled snow, as baubles were an “extravagance” at the time. Grant cherished the tree for the rest of her life. When she died at the age of 101 in 2014, her 84-year-old daughter, Shirley Hall, inherited it. She decided to part with it to honor her mother’s memory and to ensure it survives as a humble reminder of 1920s life—a boom-to-bust decade.

Photography In the National Parks: 2023 In Review – Rebecca Lawson’s favorite shots from 2023 from Yellowstone, Glacier, Mount Rainer, Lake Chelan, Yosemite, Death Valley, and Banff National Parks.

Honeycrisp, Cosmic Crisp usher in banner year for U.S. apples - Growers report that apple production in the United States hit levels in 2023 that had not been seen since the 2014-15 season. Washington State was the largest grower, producing some 90% of the nation's crop. Of all the varieties, Honeycrisp, Gala, Red Delicious, Granny Smith and Fuji make up 76% of the total apple holdings. The big winner this year was the Cosmic Crisp apple, which experienced a 41% year-over-year growth, with 9.5 million bushels harvested.

Millions of mysterious pits in the ocean decoded - Most of the depressions in the seafloor in the German Bight are created by porpoises and other animals in search of food, and then scoured out by bottom currents. The researchers showed that the marine mammals leave pits in the seafloor when they hunt for buried sand eels.

2023 was a year of big anniversaries – 20 years ago the space shuttle Columbia disintegrated over Texas…the Concorde made its final flight, 30 years ago the World Wide Web launched into the public domain, 50 years ago hip-hop began, 60 years ago March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom (“I have a dream” speech)…JFK assassinated, 75 years ago Israel declared independence, 80 years ago Casablanca opened, 150 years ago blue jeans patented.

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 30, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Fevered Planet: How a shifting climate is catalyzing infectious disease – The geography of disease is also changing as novel pathogens affecting plants, animals and humans increase their range. New beetles are heading north and devastating Siberian forests, Alaskan mammals are struggling as new ticks arrive and human habitations in northern Norway are infested by new insects.

‘Green Roads’ Are Plowing Ahead, Buffering Drought and Floods - Designing roads to capture water through strategic channels, culverts, and ponds and divert it for agricultural use. Nearly 20 countries have either implemented Green Roads for Water or plan to begin soon, and thousands of kilometers of roads, worldwide, have already received Green Roads interventions.

Photos of the year (2023) from the Prairie Ecologist (part 1 and part 2) – Lots of great nature photos.

How Fire-Prone Communities Can Reduce Their Risk - Playbook for the Pyrocene, which offers 20 community planning and design strategies that can be applied by landscape architects, planners, homeowners, and developers. “The questions we are trying to answer here are not so much where to build, but rather how to build better within the context of wildfire broadly.”

Giant Goldfish Are Bad News for the Great Lakes - In the Great Lakes, abandoned goldfish and their kin are known to root up plants, contribute to harmful algal blooms and consume native vegetation.

Nine breakthroughs for climate and nature in 2023 you may have missed – Yes – I missed some of these!

Parts of China’s Great Wall Are Protected by a ‘Living Cover’ of Biocrusts – Lichen, moss, and cyanobacteria!

Fresh water from thin air - Atmospheric water harvesting (AWH). The need for more affordable options has spurred interest in ‘passive’ AWH systems that use moisture-hungry sorbent compounds to collect water. The small amounts of power that such systems require could, ideally, be supplied by the Sun. Typically, these sorbents are exposed to the air overnight, when temperatures are cooler and moisture is more abundant. They collect the airborne moisture as liquid in a process known as adsorption. When day breaks, the sorbents are transferred to a device that uses solar energy to drive the release of water. This water is then condensed and collected. And there are abundant opportunities beyond simply producing drinking water. For example, a harvesting system that piggybacks on existing photovoltaic solar panels, using the waste heat and energy from these panels to power water production9; the resulting water helps to cool the panels and therefore improves their efficiency

Archaeologists Discover Brutal ‘Bakery-Prison’ at Pompeii - The cramped space provided minimal light, as windows to the outside were small, high and barred.

Gleanings of the Week Ending December 16, 2023

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles and websites I found this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

The World’s Oldest Living Land Animal, a Tortoise Named Jonathan, Turns 191 – He lives on St. Helena (the small island in the Atlantic where Napoleon Bonaparte died). He has lost his sense of smell and is virtually blind from cataracts, but his appetite is good!

Extreme Weather Inflicting Higher Costs but Fewer Deaths – Improved warning systems have been key to reducing the loss of life from cyclones, floods, and fires. Kudos to the governments that have implemented them. Hopefully Africa will be able to increase their weather stations and early warning systems…catch up with other parts of the world.

25 Incredible Photos in the Running for Wildlife Photographer of the Year People’s Choice Award – Which one is your favorite? Mine is the ‘happy turtle’ with the dragonfly on his nose.

Here’s What Can Cause Itchiness – Interesting….Staphylococcus aureus could the culprit for some people with eczema….maybe resulting in effective treatment/relief.

Nēnē: The Recovery of the Hawaiian Goose - Today, there are some 3,200 nēnē in the wild. By almost any measure, it’s a stunning conservation success. The threats of habitat fragmentation and invasive predators are omnipresent, so the birds need constant attention from conservationists and wildlife managers. Currently, there are populations on Hawai’i, Kaua’i, Maui and Molokai.

Secrets of the Catacombs - A subterranean necropolis offers archaeologists a rare glimpse of Rome’s early Jewish community. More than 60 catacombs, amounting to hundreds of miles of passages, have been identified beneath the Rome; they were the common approach to burial from the second through fifth century AD. Villa Torlonia, discovered in 1919, was the sixth, and so far the last, Jewish catacomb to be found in Rome and is one of just two accessible today. The catacomb’s passageways are lined with nearly 4,000 shelves carved into the walls to hold the dead. Many of the names of the deceased are still visible, generally painted on or carved into stucco used to seal the graves, along with blessings to rest in peace and other inscriptions. In a few places, the catacomb’s narrow passageways open into atriums where colorful frescoes decorate the vaulted ceilings and many of the arched recesses. In addition to menorahs, these frescoes feature Jewish motifs such as a holy ark to house Torah scrolls; shofars, ram’s-horn trumpets blown on religious holidays; and lulavs, palm branches waved during the festival of Sukkot, which celebrates the harvest season. There are also geometric designs and illustrations of peacocks, roosters, flowers, and fruit trees, possibly meant to depict paradise.

Wild Kiwis Born Near New Zealand’s Capital for the First Time in More Than 150 Years – Another bird conservation success in this week’s gleanings!

New Thoughts on Neanderthal Hunters - Neanderthals may have gathered in large groups to hunt and consume an elephant, and they may also have been able to preserve and store such a large amount of food.

Rare, White Alligator Born at Florida Wildlife Park - The leucistic reptile was born at Gatorland, a 110-acre park located south of downtown Orlando. The new gators are descendants of a group of leucistic alligators found in a Louisiana swamp in 1987. Since 2008, three of those Louisiana gators have been living at Gatorland.

500 year old hand grenades (China) – 59 spherical projectiles discovered in a storeroom along the Great Wall near the popular Badaling section. They were made of stone and had been drilled with holes that could be filled with gunpowder and sealed, creating an explosive effect when hurled at an enemy.