Oceans

Manatees, large herbivores that grace the world’s coastal marine waters, estuaries, rivers, swamps and marine wetlands, are gentle creatures often referred to as “sea cows.” Their enormous size — an average manatee is ten feet long and weighs 1,200 pounds — might remind you of their closest relative, the elephant. According to Ocean Today, manatees […]

One of the biggest concerns about the climate crisis is that warming temperatures could trigger additional releases of greenhouse gas emissions that would in turn generate more warming. One example is the melting of the Arctic permafrost. Another is the release of methane from the world’s oceans. Now, scientists have found evidence that this latter […]

Plastic pollution is an international problem, as trillions of pieces of plastic have made their way into the ocean from commercial and household waste, blown from landfills and trash cans into sewers and rivers and out to sea. Marine animals can ingest and become entangled in ocean plastic, leading to sickness, starvation and death. Plastic […]

By Jessica Corbett As the fifth and final round of talks for an international treaty to protect the high seas began at the United Nations headquarters in New York City on Monday, conservationists across the globe warned world leaders that this may be the “last chance” for a necessarily ambitious agreement. The ocean has absorbed over 90% of heat from […]

By Jonathan Bamber The Earth is approximately 1.1℃ warmer than it was at the start of the industrial revolution. That warming has not been uniform, with some regions warming at a far greater pace. One such region is the Arctic. A new study shows that the Arctic has warmed nearly four times faster than the […]

Experts in France are trying to find a way to quickly save a beluga whale that is starving and stuck in the Seine River. Feeding attempts have been largely unsuccessful but will continue alongside efforts to move the whale out of the river into a saltwater river basin near the sea for monitoring. Beluga whales […]

Of the 8.3 metric tons of plastic produced in this world to date, 6.3 billion tons of that is trash, and less than 10% of it is recycled, which has created a global crisis, not just with the environment, but our health.  Microplastics — tiny pieces of plastic debris, which result from the disposal and […]

Plastic pollution has quickly become one of the biggest environmental issues of the 21st century. Plastics that end up in waterways are the cause of millions of animal deaths each year when birds, turtles, fish and other marine organisms ingest or become entangled in plastic waste. Plastics contain toxic chemicals like PCBs and DDT that […]