Bernie Krause— Nearly half a century ago I was drawn to the recording of wild soundscapes because they connected me to the natural world in ways that imparted a sense of comfort along with a feeling of physical and spiritual empowerment. In those moments, sitting quietly listening to the dawn
Gene E. Likens and Richard T. Holmes— Acid rain or acid precipitation or acid deposition as it is variably called, was first identified in North America more than five decades ago at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. Scientists who were initiating the Hubbard
Peter Crane— Recent estimates suggest that there are roughly three trillion trees in the world, almost half the number that are thought to have existed prior to their widespread use and manipulation by people over the past 10,000 years. Every year it is estimated that perhaps 15 billion trees are
Stephen Long— It can seem like a long wait for Spring to replace the browns and grays of the woods with tints of green. But this time of year has its benefits. Before lush growth turns the woods into a maze of green, we have a chance at an unobstructed
Geoff Wisner— After graduating from Harvard College in 1837, Henry David Thoreau returned to the village of Concord, where he taught school with his older brother John. At least once a week the Thoreau brothers took the students out for a walk or a boating excursion. On one of these
Christie Wilcox— I love writing a science blog. I write a lot of things—I’ve written peer-reviewed journal articles and a dissertation; I’ve written for major newspapers, science magazines, and chic, quirky outlets; I’ve even written a popular science book about venoms. But of all the writing I do, I have
Bernie Krause— Nearly twenty years ago, while exploring links between natural soundscapes and music, my dear late father-in-law introduced me to the writings of Paul Shepard. The book, The Others: How Animals Made Us Human, contained a chapter titled “The Gift of Music.” One particular line in that section stood
Dieter Helm’s The Carbon Crunch takes a look at the world’s failure to adequately address climate change and proposes pragmatic, much-needed solutions. The following excerpt is from the preface to the revised and updated edition. The underlying position continues to deteriorate. In 2012, another 2 parts per million (ppm) of
Jessica Barnes and Michael Dove— An August 2012 edition of The New Yorker magazine adopted an unseasonal topic for its front cover: Santa Claus. In the illustration, Santa is slumped on the ground against a striped pole, cheeks flushed, under the yellow orb of a bright sun. In place of
As a reflection of the state of environmental debates in the United States, the Senate recently could not pass an amendment to the Keystone XL pipeline bill affirming that “human activity significantly contributes to climate change” (although an earlier amendment to the bill declaring the “climate change is real and