Month: April 2015

The earthquake that struck Nepal on Saturday April 25 has left a trail of devastation. Apart from hundreds of thousands of people, countless animals are affected too. Animal Nepal launches an Emergency Appeal to respond to the crisis. Your help in this hour of need will be greatly appreciated. Donations can be send here.

The New York Times had a recent op-ed article on how Cuba’s isolation from the U.S. has helped preserve it more thickly forested areas and resulted in it being less polluted than other Carribean Islands. One of the challenges of a loosening or U.S. restrictions will be preserving Cuba’s wild areas and wildlife. Cuba has over 300 bird species including the world’s smallest bird the Bee Hummingbird, a pygmy owl and one of the world’s smallest frogs. The two Castro brothers have protected large areas of the island by establishing government-run parks. Read article at Cuba’s Wildlife on Notice – NYTimes.com.

Global Selfie – Courtesy NASA

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Video: Courtesy YouTube

Photo: Courtesy NASA

Tags: Earth Day 2015, save our beautiful planet, Earth Selfie, plant a tree

AS WE CELEBRATE THIS BEAUTIFUL EARTH ON
THIS DAY ~ LET US ALL NOT FORGET IT IS OUR DUTY TO TRY AND KEEP IT ALIVE….”TODAY AND EVERY DAY”

Earth Day is an annual event, celebrated on April 22, on which events are held worldwide to demonstrate support for environmental protection. It was first celebrated in 1970, and is now coordinated globally by the Earth Day Network, and celebrated in more than 192 countries each year.

We are the stewards of this Earth and must start holding ourselves accountable. – We have reached the Critical Point where now we have to Act Consciously with every Action we take or Do that could further Affect the Earth WE ALL SHARE…

Protect Our Home, Our Earth and All those WHO SHARE IT WITH US…..

Greatcatsofthe”World”

All wildlife Images Courtesy © Atkinson Photography and Safaris
http://www.grantatkinson.com/

Back when I wrote about our ascent of Blue Mountain Peak, I mentioned that the Rufous-throated Solitaire is a bird that can be pretty tough to spot.

In that prior post, I had a picture of the same individual featured in the video above. If you turn the volume up, you can hear all the shrill details of the bird’s call, and imagine sounds like those echoing through the misty hills — the guidebook to Jamaican birds actually describes the vocalizations as “ventriloquial,” which we found to be accurate. 

From Wildlife Extra:

New species of gecko lizard found at Indian World Heritage Site

A new type of gecko, a lizard found in warm climates, has been identified having been found in the ruins of Hampi, the World Heritage Site in Karnataka, India, reports The Hindu.

The lizard has been named Cnemaspis adii after Aditya Srinivasulu, a young herpetology researcher from Hyderabad who was involved in the discovery.

The animal belongs to the family of day geckos which are distinguished by the round pupils in their eyes which differ from the vertical pupils found in more common geckos.

Zoologists have identified the area around Hampi as having great potential for a rich biodiversity and more new species of smaller vertebrate and invertebrates.

“The discovery is significant because other species of day geckos have been, so far, reported only from the Western Ghats and southern

A dam in Guanacaste Province, Costa Rica, drives a hydroelectric plant. Developing nations will require large amounts of new energy to achieve American and European living standards. Credit Joe Raedle/Getty Images

We are in the sustainable development camp through and through, but Mr. Porter’s point is well taken:

A Call to Look Past Sustainable Development

Eduardo Porter

The average citizen of Nepal consumes about 100 kilowatt-hours of electricity in a year. Cambodians make do with 160. Bangladeshis are better off, consuming, on average, 260.

Then there is the fridge in your kitchen. A typical 20-cubic-foot refrigerator — Energy Star-certified, to fit our environmentally conscious times — runs through 300 to 600 kilowatt-hours a year.