Environment

Organic Food Pitfall: Manure Elevates Nitrogen Accumulation And Loss

Nitrogen is an essential nutrient for plant growth, and nitrogen fertilization and is often used in agriculture in the developing world and in organic process farming in wealthy countries. But organic farmers have to worry about yield also, and that has l ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 4 2016 - 3:39pm

Regulations, Liabilities Limit Prescribed Fire Use For Brush Control

Fire use for brush control is nature's way of keeping the ecosystem thriving but as the 20th century progressed, natural methods gave way to environmental lobbying and legal bullying. California, which led the nation in environmental activism, has se ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 10 2016 - 12:52pm

Like Not Having The Next Ice Age? Thank Global Warming

Though 90,000 out of every 100,000 years in recent geological cycles have been Ice Ages, and it has been 12,000 years since the last one, a new glacial inception hasn't happened. That's because humanity has become a geological force that is able ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 13 2016 - 3:00pm

Urban Agriculture? Only 1 Percent Of Seattle Residents Could Eat Locally Even With All Viable Space In Use

Farm to fork, locally grown and all of the other progressive terms for agriculture self-identification leave out one important fact: People would starve. Seattle, for example could feed 4 percent of its population with P-Patches and backyard gardens teemi ...

Article - News Staff - Jan 14 2016 - 4:54pm

Do You Need To Wash Fruit And Vegetables?

There is a growing demand for fruit and vegetables across the Western world, thanks to increased awareness of their nutritional and health benefits. But we’ve always been taught they might not be safe to eat straight out of the supermarket, and they have ...

Article - The Conversation - Jan 15 2016 - 9:30am

When Conservationists Stop With 'Park Vs. People' Thinking, Wildlife Wins

What is a great way to ensure that conservation has no support at all from the public? Hand nature over to centralized bureaucrats and create environmental groups full of lawyers to sue to make sure people are treated as the enemy. Or just have centralize ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 1 2016 - 3:05pm

Glyphosate Now Most Popular Weed Killer In History, Laments Economist Chuck Benbrook

Monsanto's signature herbicide glyphosate, first marketed as "Roundup," is now the most popular weed-killer in the history of chemical agriculture in both the U.S. and globally, according to a paper in Environmental Sciences Europe written ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 2 2016 - 6:47pm

In Africa, Livestock Yields Higher Income, Improved Diet

Western elites may embrace a vegetarian lifestyle but impoverished countries would happily trade places with them. Despite claims like it takes a gallon of gas to create a pound of beef being long debunked, activists continue to promote the notion that a ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 16 2016 - 3:46pm

Testing The Best Seeds For Africa’s Needs

Soybean farmers in the United States can choose from a “candy store” of hundreds of varieties of soybean seed—high-yielding seed with proven performance traits for every region and latitude. Not so in Africa. For a variety of political reasons, soybean far ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 19 2016 - 8:01am

Fungi Are At The Root Of Tropical Forest Diversity, Or Lack Thereof

The types of beneficial fungi that associate with tree roots can alter the fate of a patch of tropical forest, boosting plant diversity or, conversely, giving one tree species a distinct advantage over many others, finds a study in Ecology Letters which s ...

Article - News Staff - Feb 22 2016 - 2:43pm