An unexpected anomaly was found in the Pacific Ocean – and it could be a global time marker

Feb 17, 2025 03:34 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

Earth must have experienced something exceptional 10 million years ago. Our study of rock samples from the floor of the Pacific Ocean has found a strange increase in the radioactive isotope beryllium-10 during that time....

Habitat restoration is a long-haul job. Here are 3 groups that have endured

Feb 09, 2025 03:30 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

TREAT volunteers planting trees TREAT Like ferns and the tides, community conservation groups come and go. Many achieve their goal. Volunteers restore a local wetland or protect a patch of urban bush and then hang up the...

Burkina Faso’s nature reserves are worth protecting – but people have to be part of the plan

Feb 03, 2025 10:59 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

Burkina Faso is a west African dryland country known for its diverse ecosystems, including savannas, forests and wetlands. Large herbivores like elephant, giraffe and hippopotamus, and predators like lions, leopards and...

Lake beds are rich environmental records — studying them reveals much about a place’s history

Feb 03, 2025 10:57 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

Canada has more lakes than any other country in the world, with a huge diversity of lake sizes, depths, shapes, water chemistries, underlying geologies and hydrologies (the waters that flow in and out of them). Sediments...

Swimming in the sweet spot: how marine animals save energy on long journeys

Jan 31, 2025 08:42 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

Competitive swimmers know that swimming underwater causes less drag resistance than swimming at the surface. Splashing around making waves isnt the most efficient way to swim. Any energy spent creating waves is essentially...

Suffocating seas: low oxygen levels emerging as third major threat to tropical coral reefs

Jan 29, 2025 12:13 pm UTC| Insights & Views Nature

Corals in low-oxygen seawater may not show visible signs of stress. Mike Workman/Shutterstock Coral reef research has focused on the twin evils birthed by record-high greenhouse gas emissions: warming oceans and...

As the Black Summer megafires neared, people rallied to save wildlife and domestic animals. But it came at a real cost

Jan 29, 2025 06:50 am UTC| Insights & Views Nature

As the 2019-2020 megafires took hold across eastern Australia, many of us reeled at the sight of animals trying and often failing to flee. Our screens filled up with images of koalas with burned paws and possums in...