Biodiversity

"The ghost orchid is one of the rarest and most mysterious flowers in North America. Until recently, scientists could only guess at how the 2,000 or so plants that cling to the trees in Florida’s remote old-growth swamp forests are pollinated—no one had ever photographed the event before."

"A tiny Alaskan island faces a threat as deadly as an oil spill — rats."

"California and Massachusetts say they’ll go to court to fight the Trump administration’s overhaul of the Endangered Species Act."

"The Trump administration took its final step Monday to weaken the Endangered Species Act, a bedrock law that brought the bald eagle, the American alligator, the California condor, the humpback whale and the grizzly bear back from the brink of extinction."

"Joshua trees have dotted the Mojave desert for 2.5m years, but even if humans take urgent action to combat the climate crisis, their decimation is all but ensured by the end of this century, a study has found."

"An Arizona-based environmental group is hoping to stop construction of President Donald Trump's long-promised U.S.-Mexico border wall in protected Arizona wilderness that harbors dozens of endangered or threatened species."

"A federal court has overturned a permit needed for the Atlantic Coast Pipeline to continue its path across West Virginia and Virginia, where some say construction would impact endangered species."

"The Canadian government is announcing new protections for endangered North Atlantic right whales following a string of deaths and entanglements involving the marine mammals."

"Canada has made it illegal to catch and hold whales, dolphins and porpoises in captivity."

"President Jair Bolsonaro appears intent on decriminalizing Amazon deforestation, ending most fines, straitjacketing law enforcement, and gutting environmental agencies with mass firings."