conservation

A small, red Chinese berry is at the heart of a radical new approach to conservation, “helping to save both the forest where it grows in the Upper Yangtze region — one of the most biodiverse places on the planet — and the villagers who harvest it,” writes FERN associate editor Kristina Johnson in a story co-produced with NPR’s The Salt.

A Commerce Department agency has authorized up to 20 permits for deep-water aquaculture in the Gulf of Mexico that eventually could double the finfish output of the gulf. Fish farming in the ocean would help satisfy the growing world appetite for seafood, but it also is a formidable challenge, writes Virginia Gewin. The story, produced in partnership with FERN, was published in Ensia.

Long considered ecological foes, some kinds of livestock grazing might actually benefit endangered sage grouse, says a study in the journal Ecological Applications.

Only 9 percent of Marine Protected Areas have enough staff and only 35 percent receive adequate funding, says a report published in the journal Nature. MPAs, which include marine reserves, no-take zones, sanctuaries, and parks, are an increasingly popular way to conserve marine species by restricting fishing and energy extraction.

As costs have dropped, solar panels are becoming a common sight, including in rural America, where farmers are using solar to offset their costs in a variety of ways, says Civil Eats. When farmers move beyond generating electricity for farmstead use into acres of solar panels, it creates a tussle between clean energy and preservation of open spaces for forests and farms, according to a news site in Connecticut, where solar has the upper hand.

Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch has a mixed record when it comes to rulings on public lands and environmental issues, says Fortune, based on an Associated Press review of Gorsuch’s case history. "I think that his record, although the number of cases is quite limited, shows that at times it has led to decisions that one might consider environmentally favorable, and about an equal number of times it has led to decisions some might think are environmentally unfavorable," said Donald Kochan, associate dean and professor at Chapman University's Dale E. Fowler School of Law.

A U.S. appeals court in the District of Columbia has ruled that gray wolves will no longer be considered endangered species in Wyoming, years after protections for the animals were lifted in other states, says The Billings Gazette.

More than 700 of the 4,000 wild bee species in North America and Hawaii are seeing falling numbers due to habitat loss, pesticide use, climate change and monoculture farming, says the Center for Biological Diversity.

Wild bees are disappearing in the country’s key farmlands from California to the Midwest to the Mississippi Valley, say researchers at the University of Vermont in the first study to map U.S. wild bee populations. The study found a 23-percent decline in wild bees in the contiguous U.S. between 2008 and 2013.

Urban butterfly populations dropped by 69 percent compared with a 45 percent fall in rural areas since 1995, a study in the journal Ecological Indications says. While industrial agriculture, with its heavy use of chemicals and monoculture cropping, has long been considered the prime suspect in dwindling pollinator numbers, researchers say that urban butterflies are hurting even worse.

Created during the Nixon era, the Endangered Species Act "is not working today," said Sen. John Barrasso, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee in opening a hearing modernizing the law. The Washington Post says the hearing brought "round after round of criticism from Republican lawmakers who said the federal effort to keep species from going extinct encroaches on states’ rights, is unfair to landowners and stymies efforts by mining companies to extract resources and create jobs."

Some of the country’s biggest outdoor retailers, including Patagonia, say they won’t be attending one of Utah’s biggest outdoor trade shows because of the state’s stance on public lands, says High Country News. The show brings tens of millions of dollars to the state each year, while “Utah’s outdoor recreation companies employed 122,000 people and brought $12 billion into the state each year.”

As head of the EPA, Scott Pruitt is working up plans to rewrite climate change rules, reduce staffing and close regional offices. But it’s likely he will use a “scalpel rather than a meat cleaver” to cut the agency’s authority, says The New York Times.

Conservationists are worried that new Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke will hurt the recovery of endangered species in the U.S., says The Huffington Post.

Utah senators voted 22-6 to urge President Trump to cancel the Bears Ears National Monument designation made in the last days of the Obama administration, reports Deseret News. The 1.35-million-acre area is used by Native American groups, including the Navajo, to forage for wild foods like pine nuts and juniper berries, and to hunt rabbits.

Scientists are learning how to interpret “environmental DNA” (eDNA), the DNA that marine species naturally shed in water, which will help them track endangered species, check for invasive plants and manage fisheries.

Some 1.9 million acres of grasslands in the Great Plains were converted to cropland in 2022, said the World Wildlife Fund on Thursday in its annual Plowprint report. “While this figure’s significance cannot be downplayed, it marks an improvement from the previous 10-year average of 2.6 million acres annually,” said the group.