Across Canada coyote populations have exploded. Humans have eradicated their competition —eagles, wolves, cougars and lynx— and so the coyotes have filled the void "rather like an unwanted guest who moves into one’s unused spare bedroom and refuses to leave."
In Ottawa, coyotes have become increasingly visible in the community, and several private hunting competitions have been organized. In February, CTV-Ottawa reported hunters calling for a province-wide bounty on the animals.
Coyotes have even been sighted in Toronto. But according to the Toronto Star, they aren’t your typical coyotes. Eastern Coyotes have bred with wolves and are now much bigger than their brethren. Their unofficial name: Coywolves.
These larger coyotes use pack-hunting and have aggressive characters stemming from their wolf genes, and they lack a fear of human-developed areas — a bad combo for farmers whose livestock are increasingly falling victim to the predators.
Coywolves have invaded the Quincy area of Boston, as well, and a new study attributes the rapid expansion to their hybrid lineage. First published online last summer, the study appeared this February in the journal Biology Letters.
Scientists who study climate change from a remote post on Ellesmere Island are planning to shut down their cash-strapped project after the federal government refused to refinance a key climate-change research foundation.
The Polar Environment Atmospheric Research Laboratory (PEARL) is located 1,100 kilometres from the North Pole, and collects data on the changing climate of the Far North, where global warming is found to be most intense.
New beautiful images from the launch of the first satellite of NASA's "Living with a Star" program that aims to learn why our stars are changing our lives.
Posted by Emma Lehmberg on Wednesday, March 10, 2010
The Arctic is a sublimely beautiful place - vast tundras of ice, unfamiliar creatures stalking the land and swimming in the sea, and best of all, you have it all to yourself. Unless, of course, you happen to be vacationing in Svalbard, Norway, for the summer.
Since 1963, when the coal mines on this Norwegian archipelago shut down, the series of islands became increasingly popular. Completely isolated from much of modern life, the research stations that dot the land are filled with scientists looking for answers about our climate (the total number of research scientists swells from 35 in the winter to 180 during the summer.) If you were to visit, you could meet ecologists, paleontologists, climatologists, and a myriad more from around the globe.
Part of the reason this place is so attractive is because the land is largely untouched. It's an unforgiving place, so human settlements never really took hold (the total population of the entire archipelago is about 2 500 with an area of 61 000 km.) This gives researchers a chance to study life as it might be without human interaction.
The archipelago is also home to some of the world's most famous climate research stations (one recently visited by UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon) and an international agricultural seed bank that hosts some 4.5 million crop seed samples.
I'd say for an island that doesn't get much attention, it's doing alright, wouldn't you?
