[About the Project]
[About the ApocaDocs]
[About Equal Share]
[TwitterFollow: apocadocs]

Explore:

Play:

It's weekly, funny, and free!
Play:

Click for paper-free fun!

Ads for potentially
microfunding this site:


What A Week It Was: Apocadocuments from
View By Scenario:
Species Collapse:(6)
Plague/Virus:(2)
Climate Chaos:(12)
Resource Depletion: (5)
Biology Breach:(9)
Recovery:(4)
This Week's Top Ten Very Scary Tags:
climate impacts  ~ ecosystem interrelationships  ~ contamination  ~ global warming  ~ water issues  ~ holyshit  ~ toxic buildup  ~ smart policy  ~ economic myopia  ~ governmental idiocy  ~ arctic meltdown  



ApocaDocuments (10) matching "ecosystem interrelationships" from this week
[see full week] ~ [see all stories tagged "ecosystem interrelationships"]
Sat, Aug 8, 2009
from Concord Monitor:
The effects of white-nose on bats
Biologists are watching the state's bat population this summer, looking for the fallout of white-nose syndrome, a little-understood illness that has killed thousands of hibernating bats in the Northeast and was found to have reached New Hampshire in January... In Vermont's largest hibernating colony, Mt. Aeolus, where tens of thousands of bats have been documented, scientists found the floor of the cave littered with carcasses. Thousands were dead.... In the meantime, scientists will keep chipping away at the many questions that remain. They aren't sure if the white fungus is what's responsible for killing the bats or if it's a byproduct of another culprit. "Is it a virus?" Brunkhurst said. "Is it a bacteria? It is some kind of contaminant?" And what will the fallout be for the bats that make it through the winter? One Westmoreland colony was between 200 and 300 bats strong. In July, someone watching the colony reported that just a few bats remain. ...


We're flapping out about this problem.

ApocaDoc
permalink

Sat, Aug 8, 2009
from BBC (UK):
Extinction hits 'whole families'
Whole "chunks of life" are lost in extinction events, as related species vanish together, say scientists. A study in the journal Science shows that extinctions tend to "cluster" on evolutionary lineages -- wiping out species with a common ancestor. The finding is based on an examination of past extinctions, but could help current conservation efforts. Researchers say that this phenomenon can result in the loss of an entire branch of the "tree of life".... "In seabirds for example, the same drivers -- climatic change and habitat loss -- are threatening whole groups of species." Richard Greyner likened this loss to a fire in a library. "Because whole sections are lost -- the whole of the physics section, or all of the romantic fiction, the overall loss is much worse than if you randomly burned every 400th book." ...


'Family' comes between 'Class' and 'Genus' -- and between 'birth' and 'death.'

ApocaDoc
permalink

Fri, Aug 7, 2009
from New Scientist:
Consumerism is 'eating the future'
[A]ccording to leading ecologists speaking this week in Albuquerque at the annual meeting of the Ecological Society of America, few of us realise that the main cause of the current environmental crisis is human nature. More specifically, all we're doing is what all other creatures have ever done to survive, expanding into whatever territory is available and using up whatever resources are available, just like a bacterial culture growing in a Petri dish till all the nutrients are used up. What happens then, of course, is that the bugs then die in a sea of their own waste.... He points out that like the accelerated growth of a cancer, the human population has quadrupled in the past 100 years, and at this rate will reach a size in 2025 that leads to global collapse and catastrophe.... In an ideal world, it would be a counter-advertising campaign to make conspicuous consumption shameful. "Advertising is an instrument for construction of people's everyday reality, so we could use the same media to construct a cultural paradigm in which conspicuous consumption is despised," he says. "We've got to make people ashamed to be seen as a 'future eater'." ...


The business community and vested interests would surely sponsor those PSAs!

ApocaDoc
permalink

Fri, Aug 7, 2009
from Science, via Science Daily:
Scientists Find Universal Rules For Food-web Stability
New findings, published in the journal Science, conclude that food-web stability is enhanced when many diverse predator-prey links connect high and intermediate trophic levels.... Natural ecosystems consist of interwoven food chains, in which individual animal or plant species function as predator or prey. Potential food webs not only differ by their species composition, but also vary in their stability. Observable food webs are stable food webs, with the relationships between their species remaining constant over relatively long periods of time.... Applying this innovative modeling approach ... the scientists have succeeded in discovering not just one, but several universal rules in the dynamics of ecosystems. "Food-web stability is enhanced when species at high trophic levels feed on multiple prey species and species at intermediate trophic levels are fed upon by multiple predator species," says Ulf Dieckmann of IIASA. ...


OK: biodiversity, interdependence, and varied predator-prey relationships yield ecosystem stability. Good work! Now: what happens when we screw it up?

ApocaDoc
permalink

Thu, Aug 6, 2009
from Desdemona Despair:
Dramatic Decline in SE Coastal Sharks
The eastern seaboard’s longest continuous shark-targeted survey (UNC), conducted annually since 1972 off North Carolina, demonstrates sufficiently large declines in great sharks to imply their likely functional elimination. Declines in seven species range from 87 percent for sandbar sharks (Carcharhinus plumbeus); 93 percent for blacktip sharks (C. limbatus); up to 97 percent for tiger sharks (Galeocerdo cuvier); 98 percent for scalloped hammerheads (Sphyrna lewini); and 99 percent or more for bull (C. leucas), dusky (C. obscurus), and smooth hammerhead (S. zygaena) sharks (Fig. 1 and table S5). Because this survey is situated where it intercepts sharks on their seasonal migrations, these trends in abundance may be indicative of coastwide population changes. ...


What happens when there are no sharks left to jump?

ApocaDoc
permalink

Wed, Aug 5, 2009
from NUVO Newsweekly:
Unsafe waters in Indianapolis
A fast and toxic algae growth spurt on Central Indiana waterways in recent weeks is responsible for hundreds of dead fish in White River in Indianapolis, as well as warnings to those using the Geist or Morse reservoirs for summer recreation... "When the algae are in very high concentrations, like they are right now in the White River, they make oxygen during the day, but rob oxygen from the water at night," according to Lenore Tedesco, director of [the IUPUI Center for Earth and Environmental Science]. "Without enough oxygen, fish will basically suffocate." While the presence of this type of algae is natural, the excessive and fast growth as seen in recent weeks, and the resulting dead fish, are not produced by natural causes. "Right now we are seeing algal blooms in may of our freshwater systems," Tedesco said. "This suggests excessive nutrients in the water." ...


Sounds positively vampiric!

ApocaDoc
permalink

Wed, Aug 5, 2009
from via ScienceDaily:
Earth's Biogeochemical Cycles, Once In Concert, Falling Out Of Sync
What do the Gulf of Mexico's "dead zone," global climate change, and acid rain have in common? They're all a result of human impacts to Earth's biology, chemistry and geology, and the natural cycles that involve all three. On August 4-5, 2009, scientists who study such cycles -- biogeochemists -- will convene at a special series of sessions at the Ecological Society of America (ESA)'s 94th annual meeting in Albuquerque, N.M.... Now, with global warming and other planet-wide impacts, biogeochemical cycles are being drastically altered. Like broken gears in machinery that was once finely-tuned, these cycles are falling out of sync. ...


Oy. Pass me the Koyaanisqatsi stomach medicine.

ApocaDoc
permalink

Wed, Aug 5, 2009
from Environmental Health News:
Rural well water linked to Parkinson's; California study implicates farm pesticides
Rural residents who drink water from private wells are much more likely to have Parkinson's disease, a finding that bolsters theories that farm pesticides may be partially to blame, according to a new study. The risk to people in California's Central Valley was 90 percent higher for those who had private wells near fields sprayed with certain insecticides. People with the incurable neurological disease "were more likely to have consumed private well water, and had consumed it on average 4.3 years longer," UCLA scientists reported. Unlike municipal water supplies, private wells are largely unregulated and are not monitored for contaminants. ...


We could call it Pesticidinson's Disease.

ApocaDoc
permalink

Mon, Aug 3, 2009
from United States Geological Survey via ScienceDaily:
Large Trees Declining In Yosemite National Park, U.S.
Large trees have declined in Yosemite National Park during the 20th century, and warmer climate conditions may play a role. The number of large-diameter trees in the park declined 24 percent between the 1930s and 1990s. U.S. Geological Survey and University of Washington scientists compared the earliest records of large-diameter trees densities from 1932-1936 to the most recent records from 1988-1999. A decline in large trees means habitat loss and possible reduction in species such as spotted owls, mosses, orchids and fishers (a carnivore related to weasels). Fewer new trees will grow in the landscape because large trees are a seed source for the surrounding landscape. Large-diameter trees generally resist fire more than small-diameter trees, so fewer large trees could also slow forest regeneration after fires. ...


Say it ain't so, Sam!

ApocaDoc
permalink

Mon, Aug 3, 2009
from Science News:
The Biofuel Future
Biofuels are liquid energy Version 2.0. Unlike their fossil fuel counterparts -- the cadaverous remains of plants that died hundreds of millions of years ago -- biofuels come from vegetation grown in the here and now. So they should offer a carbon-neutral energy source: Plants that become biofuels ideally consume more carbon dioxide during photosynthesis than they emit when processed and burned for power. Biofuels make fossil fuels seem so last century, so quaintly carboniferous. The only way that biofuels will add up is if they produce more energy than it takes to make them. Yet, depending on the crops and the logistics of production, some analyses suggest that it may take more energy to make these fuels than they will provide. And if growing biofuels creates the same environmental problems that plague much of large-scale agriculture, then air and water quality might not really improve. Prized ecosystems such as rain forests, wetlands and savannas could be destroyed to grow crops. Biofuels done badly, scientists say, could go very, very wrong. ...


What the heck are we gonna do w/ all this darn corn!

ApocaDoc
permalink

Other
Weeks' Archived
ApocaDocuments:

Sep 26 - Dec 31, 1969
Sep 19 - Sep 26, 2011
Sep 12 - Sep 19, 2011
Sep 5 - Sep 12, 2011
Aug 29 - Sep 5, 2011
Aug 22 - Aug 29, 2011
Aug 15 - Aug 22, 2011
Aug 8 - Aug 15, 2011
Aug 1 - Aug 8, 2011
Jul 25 - Aug 1, 2011
Jul 18 - Jul 25, 2011
Jul 11 - Jul 18, 2011
Jul 4 - Jul 11, 2011
Jun 27 - Jul 4, 2011
Jun 20 - Jun 27, 2011
Jun 13 - Jun 20, 2011
Jun 6 - Jun 13, 2011
May 30 - Jun 6, 2011
May 23 - May 30, 2011
May 16 - May 23, 2011
May 9 - May 16, 2011
May 2 - May 9, 2011
Apr 25 - May 2, 2011
Apr 18 - Apr 25, 2011
Apr 11 - Apr 18, 2011
Apr 4 - Apr 11, 2011
Mar 28 - Apr 4, 2011
Mar 21 - Mar 28, 2011
Mar 14 - Mar 21, 2011
Mar 6 - Mar 14, 2011
Feb 27 - Mar 6, 2011
Feb 20 - Feb 27, 2011
Feb 13 - Feb 20, 2011
Feb 6 - Feb 13, 2011
Jan 30 - Feb 6, 2011
Jan 23 - Jan 30, 2011
Jan 16 - Jan 23, 2011
Jan 9 - Jan 16, 2011
Jan 2 - Jan 9, 2011
Dec 26 - Jan 2, 2011
Dec 19 - Dec 26, 2010
Dec 12 - Dec 19, 2010
Dec 5 - Dec 12, 2010
Nov 28 - Dec 5, 2010
Nov 21 - Nov 28, 2010
Nov 14 - Nov 21, 2010
Nov 7 - Nov 14, 2010
Nov 1 - Nov 7, 2010
Oct 25 - Nov 1, 2010
Oct 18 - Oct 25, 2010
Oct 11 - Oct 18, 2010
Oct 4 - Oct 11, 2010
Sep 27 - Oct 4, 2010
Sep 20 - Sep 27, 2010
Sep 13 - Sep 20, 2010
Sep 6 - Sep 13, 2010
Aug 30 - Sep 6, 2010
Aug 23 - Aug 30, 2010
Aug 16 - Aug 23, 2010
Aug 9 - Aug 16, 2010
Aug 2 - Aug 9, 2010
Jul 26 - Aug 2, 2010
Jul 19 - Jul 26, 2010
Jul 12 - Jul 19, 2010
Jul 5 - Jul 12, 2010
Jun 28 - Jul 5, 2010
Jun 21 - Jun 28, 2010
Jun 14 - Jun 21, 2010
Jun 7 - Jun 14, 2010
May 31 - Jun 7, 2010
May 24 - May 31, 2010
May 17 - May 24, 2010
May 10 - May 17, 2010
May 3 - May 10, 2010
Apr 26 - May 3, 2010
Apr 19 - Apr 26, 2010
Apr 12 - Apr 19, 2010
Apr 5 - Apr 12, 2010
Mar 29 - Apr 5, 2010
Mar 22 - Mar 29, 2010
Mar 15 - Mar 22, 2010
Mar 7 - Mar 15, 2010
Feb 28 - Mar 7, 2010
Feb 21 - Feb 28, 2010
Feb 14 - Feb 21, 2010
Feb 7 - Feb 14, 2010
Jan 31 - Feb 7, 2010
Jan 24 - Jan 31, 2010
Jan 17 - Jan 24, 2010
Jan 10 - Jan 17, 2010
Jan 3 - Jan 10, 2010
Dec 27 - Jan 3, 2010
Dec 20 - Dec 27, 2009
Dec 13 - Dec 20, 2009
Dec 6 - Dec 13, 2009
Nov 29 - Dec 6, 2009
Nov 22 - Nov 29, 2009
Nov 15 - Nov 22, 2009
Nov 8 - Nov 15, 2009
Nov 1 - Nov 8, 2009
Oct 26 - Nov 1, 2009
Oct 19 - Oct 26, 2009
Oct 12 - Oct 19, 2009
Oct 5 - Oct 12, 2009
Sep 28 - Oct 5, 2009
Sep 21 - Sep 28, 2009
Sep 14 - Sep 21, 2009
Sep 7 - Sep 14, 2009
Aug 31 - Sep 7, 2009
Aug 24 - Aug 31, 2009
Aug 17 - Aug 24, 2009
Aug 10 - Aug 17, 2009
Aug 3 - Aug 10, 2009
Jul 27 - Aug 3, 2009
Jul 20 - Jul 27, 2009
Jul 13 - Jul 20, 2009
Jul 6 - Jul 13, 2009
Jun 29 - Jul 6, 2009
Jun 22 - Jun 29, 2009
Jun 15 - Jun 22, 2009
Jun 8 - Jun 15, 2009
Jun 1 - Jun 8, 2009
May 25 - Jun 1, 2009
May 18 - May 25, 2009
May 11 - May 18, 2009
May 4 - May 11, 2009
Apr 27 - May 4, 2009
Apr 20 - Apr 27, 2009
Apr 13 - Apr 20, 2009
Apr 6 - Apr 13, 2009
Mar 30 - Apr 6, 2009
Mar 23 - Mar 30, 2009
Mar 16 - Mar 23, 2009
Mar 9 - Mar 16, 2009
Mar 1 - Mar 9, 2009
Feb 22 - Mar 1, 2009
Feb 15 - Feb 22, 2009
Feb 8 - Feb 15, 2009
Feb 1 - Feb 8, 2009
Jan 25 - Feb 1, 2009
Jan 18 - Jan 25, 2009
Jan 11 - Jan 18, 2009
Jan 4 - Jan 11, 2009
Dec 28 - Jan 4, 2009
Dec 21 - Dec 28, 2008
Dec 14 - Dec 21, 2008
Dec 7 - Dec 14, 2008
Nov 30 - Dec 7, 2008
Nov 23 - Nov 30, 2008
Nov 16 - Nov 23, 2008
Nov 9 - Nov 16, 2008
Nov 2 - Nov 9, 2008
Oct 27 - Nov 2, 2008
Oct 20 - Oct 27, 2008
Oct 13 - Oct 20, 2008
Oct 6 - Oct 13, 2008
Sep 29 - Oct 6, 2008
Sep 22 - Sep 29, 2008
Sep 15 - Sep 22, 2008
Sep 8 - Sep 15, 2008
Sep 1 - Sep 8, 2008
Aug 25 - Sep 1, 2008
Aug 18 - Aug 25, 2008
Aug 11 - Aug 18, 2008
Aug 4 - Aug 11, 2008
Jul 28 - Aug 4, 2008
Jul 21 - Jul 28, 2008
Jul 14 - Jul 21, 2008
Jul 7 - Jul 14, 2008
Jun 30 - Jul 7, 2008
Jun 23 - Jun 30, 2008
Jun 16 - Jun 23, 2008
Jun 9 - Jun 16, 2008
Jun 2 - Jun 9, 2008
May 26 - Jun 2, 2008
May 19 - May 26, 2008
May 12 - May 19, 2008
May 5 - May 12, 2008
Apr 28 - May 5, 2008
Apr 21 - Apr 28, 2008
Apr 14 - Apr 21, 2008
Apr 7 - Apr 14, 2008
Mar 31 - Apr 7, 2008
Mar 24 - Mar 31, 2008
Mar 17 - Mar 24, 2008
Mar 10 - Mar 17, 2008
Mar 2 - Mar 10, 2008
Feb 24 - Mar 2, 2008
Feb 17 - Feb 24, 2008
Feb 10 - Feb 17, 2008
Feb 3 - Feb 10, 2008
Jan 27 - Feb 3, 2008
Jan 20 - Jan 27, 2008
Jan 13 - Jan 20, 2008
Jan 6 - Jan 13, 2008
Dec 30 - Jan 6, 2008
Dec 23 - Dec 30, 2007
Dec 16 - Dec 23, 2007
Dec 9 - Dec 16, 2007
Dec 2 - Dec 9, 2007
Copyright 2009 The Apocadocs.com