Pollution is a matter of life or death. In 2019, 9 million premature deaths were caused by pollution, an impact similar to tobacco products. Much of this was caused by air pollution, particularly by wood smoke in low and middle income countries. More than a million deaths were caused by water pollution. Ecotoxicology has a… (read more)
Ecologists are known as alarmists. Dealing with things that are irrelevant to daily life and likely to have only long term consequences, we naturally deal in doomsday scenarios to get attention. This is tiresome, if not downright misleading. My last review of what ecology can tell us was 12 years ago. I propose to revisit… (read more)
Robert MacArthur died at the age of 42, leaving a legacy of brilliant theory and cogent observation of nature. In his book on evolutionary ecology, Laurence Mueller credits MacArthur as being one of the founders of the field, an extraordinary achievement for such a short life. The book is part of a series on conceptual… (read more)
On December 20, 2022, the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework was agreed to by 196 countries. The secretary-general of the United Nations, Antonio Guterres, called it “a peace pact with nature”. As we have discussed elsewhere on this blog, biodiversity is the variety of life around us and an important key to our happiness. I would… (read more)
Spare a thought for the members of the IPBES – the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. We have talked about them before in this blog. While their more famous colleaues on the IPCC – the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change – garner continuing headlines, the IPBES languish in obscurity despite the detailed… (read more)
Canadians are passionate about the maple leaf. This is curious since, as a plant species, the sugar maple is not representative of the country. In fact, maples, in their various forms, are common throughout the northern hemisphere. So, why Canada? Sugar maples are a common hardwood along the shores of the St. Lawrence River, where… (read more)
During the COVID-19 outbreak, I will be posting information and hosting discussions related to my work with the Parks Canada Agency. The lack of access to internal documents makes this interim measure necessary. The information shared here is not classified. The opinions expressed do not represent those of the Government of Canada. Well-considered thresholds in… (read more)
During the COVID-19 outbreak, I will be posting information and hosting discussions related to my work with the Parks Canada Agency. The lack of access to internal documents makes this interim measure necessary. The information shared here is not classified. The opinions expressed do not represent those of the Government of Canada. One of the… (read more)
My wife and I wrap cheese when we put it into our lunchbags. I use plastic and she uses waxpaper. As the waxpaper is at least twice as thick as the low density polyethylene in my lunch bag, I initially create a smaller waste burden in our local landfill. Of course, over time, the waxpaper… (read more)
Mosses stay close to the ground. Their humble habit belies their importance to evolution and ecology. For one thing, they have been on the banner of this blog right from the beginning. I think I instictively chose mosses as the essential combination of biology and physical geography that underpins all the topics dealt with in these… (read more)
