Earthweek: a diary of the planet

For the week ending Friday, Feb 10.

Road to extinction

A report by the group NatureServe says 34% of all plants and 40% of all animals in the U.S. are at risk of extinction. Authors of the report say the warning is based on 50 years of extensive data collected by the nonprofit. “Two-fifths of our ecosystems are in trouble,” said the Virginia group’s vice president for data and methods, Regan Smyth. “Freshwater invertebrates and many pollinators, the foundation of a healthy, functional planet, are in precipitous decline.” Most “imperiled” are all of the country’s tropical forests, tropical savannas and various grasslands.

Bird flu risks

U.N. health experts say that even though bird flu has recently been detected in minks, otters, seals, foxes and bears, they believe the current prevailing strain of H5N1 avian influenza would have to undergo significant mutation to be able to spread among humans. Europe is in the grip of its worst outbreak of the disease, which has led to tens of millions of poultry being culled worldwide as well as a huge death toll among wild birds in several regions. Experts say that should it somehow manage to mutate and circulate in humans, the current flu vaccines could easily be updated to provide protection.

Connections

The vast burning of trees in the Amazon has been linked to the melting of glaciers in the Himalayas and even Antarctica because of newly discovered atmospheric pathways that threaten to push some regional climates beyond tipping points that cannot be reversed. Writing in Nature Climate Change, an international team of researchers says the Amazon-Himalayan climate connection stretches 12,400 miles from Brazil to Tibet. That means that as the Amazon warms and receives more rainfall, the mountains of South Asia get less precipitation and become warmer.

‘Toadzilla’

A giant toad discovered deep in an Australian rain forest is believed to be the largest in the world. Dubbed by forest rangers “Toadzilla,” the gargantuan amphibian weighed 6 pounds, which is 0.11 pound heavier than a Swedish pet toad listed in 1991 as the heaviest by Guinness. But all did not end well for Toadzilla. Because it is an invasive species in Australia, it was euthanized because of what rangers called its “ecological impact.” Most toads typically meet the same fate when found across Australia. "Their capacity to reproduce is quite staggering,” park ranger Barry Nola said.