Parts of Brazil’s Amazon rainforest are being illegally sold on Facebook, the BBC is reporting. From the report: The protected areas include national forests and land reserved for indigenous peoples. Some of the plots listed via Facebook’s classified ads service are as large as 1,000 football pitches. Facebook said it was “ready to work with local authorities”, but indicated it would…
Tag: rainforest
New species are more likely to evolve in areas where few already exist
It has long been thought that new species are most likely to evolve in biodiversity hotspots like the Amazon rainforest, but a genetic analysis of birds suggests that extreme environments where few species exist help drive evolution Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2262570-new-species-are-more-likely-to-evolve-in-areas-where-few-already-exist/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Archaeologists find vast network of Amazon villages laid out like the cosmos
The remnants of circular and rectangular villages dating to 1300 were discovered in the Amazon rainforest. Source: https://www.livescience.com/clock-face-shaped-villages-amazon-rainforest.html
Amazon rainforest could turn into grasslands
Scientists have warned that the Amazon is at a crucial tipping point that could see it turn into savannah. There’s no denying the impact that mankind … Source: https://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/news/339941/amazon-rainforest-could-turn-into-grasslands…
A New York Clock That Told Time Now Tells the Time Remaining
For more than 20 years, Metronome, which includes a 62-foot-wide 15-digit electronic clock that faces Union Square in Manhattan, has been one of the city’s most prominent and baffling public art projects. Its digital display once told the time in its own unique way, counting the hours, minutes and seconds (and fractions thereof) to and from midnight. But for years observers…
Amazon River from space
Video tour – via satellite – of the Amazon River meandering through the Amazon rainforest in South America. Source: https://earthsky.org/todays-image/amazon-river-satellite-image…
An Unusual Meteorite, More Valuable Than Gold, May Hold Life’s Building Blocks
Slashdot reader sciencehabit tells the strange story of a 4.5-billion-year-old meteor from “the cold void beyond Jupiter” that sent “blazing fireballs and rocks raining down on farms and fields.” On 23 April 2019, a space rock the size of a washing machine broke up in the skies over Aguas Zarcas, a village carved out of Costa Rica’s rainforest. The falling fragments,…
The Congo River Basin: Home of the deepest river in the world
The Congo River is a long, arcing river in West-Central Africa, featuring a rainforest and providing food and transport for 75 million people. Source: https://www.livescience.com/congo-river.html
Fifth of Brazilian beef exports to EU linked to illegal deforestation
Around 20 per cent of the beef and soya the Euopean Union imports from Brazil has been linked to illegal deforestation in the Amazon rainforest and Cerrado savanna Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/2249083-fifth-of-brazilian-beef-exports-to-eu-linked-to-illegal-deforestation/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Forecast: Dust and sand from the Sahara
Masses of dusty air form over the Sahara Desert and move westward across the tropical North Atlantic frequently from spring to fall. A particularly large swath of dust is headed our way now. Watch for hazy skies in the Caribbean by this weekend, and possibly into the U.S. by next week. Source: https://earthsky.org/todays-image/animation-goes-east-dust-sand-sahara…