Ecology and the Environment

Once upon, on this internet thingy, I read an article that examined how much we can decrease our land usage if we stop farming animals and start obtaining all our food only from plant farming. They claimed that the needed lysine (an essential amino acid) production is the limiting factor on how low land area we must use (because high-yield crops, grains specifically, are lysine limited). So I am wondering about the most basic question - is there any domesticated animal that can actually synthesize lysine? I see pigs and chickens are given lysine supplementation for better growth, so obviously pigs and chicken can not. Can any animal at all synthesize lysine or is thi…

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/scientists-stage-worldwide-climate-protests-after-ipcc-report-180979913/ Over 1,000 scientists from 25 different countries staged protests last week following the release of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s new report. The report warned that rapid and deep cuts to greenhouse gas emissions are necessary by 2025 to avoid catastrophic climate effects. The group, called the Scientist Rebellion, writes in a letter that “current actions and plans are grossly inadequate, and even these obligations are not being met.” Their protests “highlight the urgency and injustice of the climate and ecological crisis,” per a …

Hello everyone!! please can you take 10 minutes to fill out my survey regarding people's perception of different species and how that affects their willingness to donate to certain charities. It's for my university dissertation and would mean a lot! https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdfPFyTZsy4nmgATNc45AQOWsQuOpG6uMS4bjXkB2_B7I13Ig/viewform?usp=sf_link

It seems like only yesterday that the East coast of Australia, faced one of the worst bushfire seasons in living memory, with hundreds of homes destroyed, whole towns wiped out,lives lost and billions of our native animals perishing. Now we have the same east coast having our worst floods in living memory, with month's worth of rain falling in a single day...Roads interstate impassable, and whole towns flooded, by what are being called a once in a thousand year flood! https://phys.org/news/2022-03-australia-tens-thousands.html The couples' home floated fully intact for about a kilometre While I am aware of extreme weather events around th…

Twenty seven years ago, our Marine Park started a long-term "experiment" in coral development, albeit inadvertently. They installed concrete mooring blocks, 1m x 1m x 1m, along the town shoreline for yachts and boats to moor. Coral colonies began inhabiting the block faces. Years later, I’ve noticed that this intriguing growth is not randomly uniform but instead follows patterns, some quite puzzling. Here is one of them. There are two lines of the moorings between South and North ends of the downtown boulevard. One line consists of a dozen moorings constructed from three blocks each and is located about 50m from shore, just near the reef drop-off. Another line consists…

Does anybody know if and how rockets polute the air?

Kiss the Ground is a full-length documentary narrated by Woody Harrelson that sheds light on an “new, old approach” to farming called “regenerative agriculture” that has the potential to balance our climate, replenish our vast water supplies, and feed the world. https://kisstheground.com/ https://kissthegroundmovie.com/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=pmd_sXZwpzlLiKcpMB4MO_lqAHkwgBgHg6fEZcHvv2F_LCU-1634936908-0-gqNtZGzNAhCjcnBszQgl Kiss the Ground reveals that, by regenerating the world’s soils, we can completely and rapidly stabilize Earth’s climate, restore lost ecosystems and create abundant food supplies. Using compelling graphics and visuals, along with st…

When I was born, the world population was 2.5 billion. Today, it's about 7.7 billion. Surely there's a clue in there somewhere? What would the world ecology look like today, if the population was still 2.5 billion? Would there even BE any environmental crises?

I woke up today feeling like I needed to write a letter to the United Nations about evolving the human race. I am a regular citizen with a possible career in retail pharmacy; but that does not mean I do not have concerns over the impact my own work has on the environment. Even at previous jobs, I knew that my work was not helping the planet heal. If I get any response to this, please let it be what I can do to potentially lower my own carbon foot print. After that, to pass it on to my child who grows up on me everyday.

Many think that there are multiple environmental crises assailing the planet. Here is an article on a fresh report from the https://www.ippr.org/, by the BBC https://www.ippr.org/ The degradagation of arable land is cited in the New Scientist book https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1473629772/ref=asc_df_147362977258469057/?tag=googshopuk-21&creative=22110&creativeASIN=1473629772&linkCode=df0&hvadid=310865071345&hvpos=1o1&hvnetw=g&hvrand=18039469306525565984&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=1007149&hvta…

Can someone please explain what the difference between deterministic vs stochastic cause of extinction are with examples. I can't seem to find a clear definition anywhere.

Hello all, I am reading a textbook on ecology, and I get confused spatially explicit model and implicit model. My understanding is that in spatially explicit model, the spacial information is clearly declared, while it is not declared in the other model. Is this interpretation correct? Otherwise, what do they mean exactly?

Hi everyone, I am new to the forum😎. After reading about carbon footprint I have decided to change job and to focus only on environmental projects😃 I am a believer that 2 things to solve climate change (and our planet), it will be a combination of high carbon footprint activity decline (stop taking a car when you can avoid it, stop flying 2000 miles for a week end trip etc, don't buy plastic packaging when you can avoid it) and green technology development (electric cars with low carbon footprint mix like nuclear or renewables, carbon sequestration etc). I feel like the community is generally split between the 2 sides: Aurelien Barreau or others for the …

I know most of you are aware of the wastewater spill in Florida, if not there is a short video at the end of this you can watch. My concern is that it keeps coming up that this waste water is radioactive, is it, and if so why? It would appear this wastewater is being dumped into canals that are channeling it into Tampa Bay, how dangerous is this really? I've heard so many conflicting reports it seems to be either an environmental disaster or just harmless. Does anyone have any evidence other than what the authorities are giving or the people who claim it is a disaster are giving? Some truth should be brought out on this and if there is deception on the part of state and f…

https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2021-03-18/cows-fed-seaweed-methane-emissions-reduced-82-per-cent/13253102#:~:text=Feeding cattle a small amount,up to 86 per cent. Cows fed small amount of seaweed burp 86 per cent less methane in trial: Feeding cattle a small amount of a seaweed species found in Australia has been shown to reduce their methane emissions by up to 86 per cent. Supplementing either 0.25 per cent or 0.5 per cent of a cow's daily feed with Asparagopsis taxiformis — a red seaweed native to Australian coastal waters — resulted in an average drop in methane production of over 50 per cent and 74 per cent respectively over a 147-day period, accord…

I'm interested in learning more about botany and/or zoology. Would appreciate any kind of information. Thank you!

While I was observing a water sample taken from vellayani lake I had found a type of microbial worm in it, can anyone help me to identify this

While I was observing a water sample taken from vellayani lake I had found a type of bioluminescent microbe in it, can anyone help me to identify this

for a while I've posted here and there info about fracking methane math, but no one responded to confirm it or debunk it as prime trigger on the global warming ... So I would appreciate any comment about the notion How Soon Is Now around the tipping point in this respect ... https://defendingthetruth.com/threads/stop-fracking-is-biden-aware.127418/ not that usA and the science community are not aware of this problem, but any scientific alarm is cleverly silenced, almost as sedated patient that dont need to stir the masses, at least on the amount of vented fracking risks all the usA response looks like that to me i.e. still we dont have all the data, we…

Since food chains can be as long as you want them to be, I am wondering what is the longest 'natural' food chain. Also, I don't want humans to be counted in as they are omnivores and can interfere in any part of the food chain! What is the longest food chain known to man?

With all these new developments happening and plans for developments cropping up all over the UK, I have started this fourm post just to further understand peoples feelings on the statement 'net biodiversity gains.' Each new development is now under the environmental bill 2020 required to achieve net biodiversity gains. This would require developers to leave the biodiversity in an area they plan to build on to be in a 10% better condition to when the area was initial there. I have a understanding of biodiversity and ecology having studied Environmental Science at University, and for me personally I feel this is unachievable. A developers main focus is profit and the…

Is this book peer-reviewed?

Over the last year or so, I have been lucky enough to have watched three documentaries on different aspects of life and the little blue Orb we live on. Perhaps others may also enjoy..... The first is called "Love and Bananas: An Elephant Story. If this doesn't bring a tear to your eye well there's something wrong. This woman is incredible! The second is called "Chasing Ice" with some of the most spectacular scenery you can imagine..... It is out on dvd....real food for thought. The third is called "Blackfish" on a Orca or Killer Whale in captivity.... All three are well worth buying on dvd, or wat…

The distinguishing characteristic of all annelids is the fact that they are made up of multiple segmented rings. In fact, their name comes from the Greek word for little rings, annelus. Candidate: Spirobranchus giganteus The Annelids, despite only consisting of about 22,000 extant species, show a truly remarkable variation in shape and size. S.giganteus belongs to the class polychaeta, meaning it has several appendages called chaetae on each of its segments. This species is affectionately known as the “Christmas-tree worm” due to the fact that it has two large appendages coming out of its side which spiral up to a point and therefore resemble a ch…

This is my first in a series of articles I will be writing on beautiful animals in each animal phylum. Please write down what your favourite animal is in each phylum below! The word comes from Greek akanthos and kephale (thorn and head respectively). So all Acanthocephalans are characterised by the synapomorphic trait of a spiky proboscis which has been turned inside out and looks somewhat like a thorny head This phylum should not be confused with the genus of the same name, which belongs to a group of new world insect species which we are not interested in Candidate: Pomphorhynchus laevis It was a bit difficult to choose a species…