Articles by Biodiversivist

The biggest Nature Conservancy financial commitment ever

The New York Times tells us about the biggest financial commitment in the Nature Conservancy's history:

On Tuesday, the International Paper Company announced it would receive $300 million in a deal arranged by the Nature Conservancy and the Conservation Fund for 217,000 acres in 10 states around the Southeast.

Urban sprawl has reached a fever pitch in many parts of the country:

If the 39,000 acres in the two tracts...near the Georgia border -- were up for sale, Mr. Frampton predicted, it would be bought up instantly and subdivided into hunting clubs and hobby farms and eventually second-home communities. There are 100 golf courses in the Myrtle Beach area... and The Charleston Post recently reported that there were 134,000 building permits in Charleston County alone.

For single-family homes, small equals green

Building "green" is a great idea, but you have to watch out for marketing hype everywhere you go. This article mentioned earlier by Dave gives an example of a 5,500 square-foot dream home (over four times the size of the one that houses my family of four). Dave hits the nail on the head when he suggests, "What's missing, of course, is a commensurate rise in eco-friendly community building ..."

In that article you will find a picture of a large house sitting all alone in the middle of what appears to be a semi-desert ecosystem. The article tries to deflect criticism of the very house they chose to highlight with the excuse that it was built large so that "... people would get mad and ask questions." I'm calling bullshit. In part, because they failed to qualify the remark by stating that the most eco-friendly house is a small one (which also minimizes profit potential for the builder).

Brazil and Indonesia protect swaths of land

According to this article in World Magazine:

Brazil's Environmental Ministry said late Sunday that 84,000 square miles of the Amazon rain forest - an area about the size of Kansas - would be declared a protected zone over the next three years.

Time will tell if this declaration will amount to jack. A lot of soybeans are presently being grown in "protected zones." Striking while the iron was hot, the alpha politician in Brazil took the opportunity to shift the blame for the destruction of his country's rainforests to the rich nations:

To boldly go where no man has gone before

This is a couple of weeks old. See those specks at the bottom of this picture? Those are helicopters. From LiveScience:

A cave so huge helicopters can fly into it has just been discovered deep in the hills of a South American jungle paradise.

Researchers found a new species of poison dart frog inside. I don't have a good feeling about this. Some scientists are starting to suspect that just maybe they are the ones responsible for spreading the fungus that is killing off the frogs of the world.