Visit the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Endangered Species Program's multimedia gallery to hear podcasts about featured species, such as the whooping crane, Gila trout, piping plover, desert tortoise, Florida panther, and Jesup's milk-vetch. Most appropriate for use with middle and high school students, each 5- to 10-minute episode describes the species and reports on its status, updating listeners on the progress of any programs working to aid it protection. Teachers can download a written transcript of each podcast.

Political ecologist Susanna Hecht has incurred the wrath of some conservationists by arguing that the notion of the primeval forest is largely a myth and that disturbed forests play a vital ecological function. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, she makes the case for a "new rurality" that places less emphasis on protected forests and more on the areas where people live.

A new study published in Nature reveals how biodiversity helps remove excess levels of nutrients that commonly degrade water quality in streams. As the # of species of algae in a stream increases, their greater their geographical distribution and water cleaning capacity.

"With the steep decline in populations of many animal species, scientists have warned that Earth is on the brink of a mass extinction like those that have occurred just five times during the past 540 million years."

Articles on innovative efforts by Quaker schools to meet environmental challenges. Topics: Teaching, Green Practices, Food, Green Buildings and Spaces, and Service and Action. b

New aerial photos show an uncontacted tribe on the border of Brazil and Peru in detail. According to a press release by Survival International, the photos "reveal a thriving, healthy community with baskets full of manioc and papaya fresh from their gardens", but a community that is also threatened by illegal loggers from Peru."

Can 'water footprinting' help cut the 500 liters of H2O needed to produce a carton of OJ? Carbon trading promotes good behavior by creating a standardized currency representing a verifiable environmental benefit. Payments for watershed services do the same for cutbacks in water pollution, albeit on a smaller scale. Now, the Nature Conservancy and the Coca-Cola Company are experimenting with a new method of "water footprinting" that could do the same for total water use - a key component in the development of a market-based scheme that would promote responsible water usage.

Live footage showing the nest of a Channel Island Allen hummingbird in Orange County, California. She has been laying 4 to 5 clutches each year for several years.

The Land Use Calculator is a tool for rapid scenario analysis of land-use implications, useful for decision-makers to address real-world challenges and for classroom teaching of conservation biology, sustainable development, environmental economics and global change biology. It is a decision-support tool targeted at land-use decision-makers in the tropic, allowing users to evaluate the implications and tradeoffs of pursuing alternative development scenarios by simultaneously accounting for the societal priorities of agricultural production, economic development, carbon conservation and biodiversity protection. Users specify a few environmental and socioeconomic parameters describing a landscape scenario, and the tool determines the implications of that scenario in terms of biodiversity, carbon stocks, greenhouse-gas emissions, financial returns of the land and employment opportunities.

A free downloadable textbook written by the top names in conservation biology with the principal aim of disseminating cutting-edge conservation knowledge as widely as possible. Topics include balancing conversion and human needs, climate change, conservation planning, designing and analyzing conservation research, ecosystem services, endangered species management, extinctions, fire, habitat loss, and invasive species.

The GigaPan process allows users to upload, share, and explore brilliant gigapixel+ panoramas from around the globe. Users can zoom in to explore and collect observational data from these images.

Some GigaPan images are posted on Google Earth, a Google application that allows for close zooming on any area of the earth. Places where GigaPan images are placed allow for clearer, more detailed images than Google Earth itself would display. The images posted on the GigaPan website and Google Earth of places all around the world have made it easier for geology students to experience a variety of fieldwork

"In this activity, undergraduate students use Google Earth to investigate a variety of renewable energy sources and select sites within the United States that would be appropriate for projects based on those sources. These sources include solar energy, bioenergy, hydroelectricity, tidal power, wind energy, wave energy, and geothermal energy."

"In this exercise, undergraduate students use Google Earth and information from several web sites to investigate some of the consequences of climate change in polar regions, including the shrinking of the ice cap at the North Pole, disintegration of ice shelves, opening of shipping routes, effects on polar bears, and possible secondary effects on climate in other regions due to changes in ocean currents. "

"In this activity, undergraduate students learn to use satellite and aerial imagery, maps, graphs, spreadsheets, descriptive information, and statistics to compare energy and oil consumption rates between states in the United States and among various countries. They also use this information to explain these differences, as well as differences in categories of consumption, such as domestic, transportation, industrial, and commercial use. They are also asked for opinions regarding what measures countries should take toward reducing oil consumption. "

"ideas for a sustainable economy in a world of finite resources"

An informative summary by the Ecological Society of America

Plant and animal extinctions are detrimental to your health. That's the conclusion of a paper published in this week's issue of the journal Nature by scientists who studied the link between biodiversity and infectious diseases. Species loss in ecosystems such as forests and fields results in increases in pathogens, or disease-causing organisms, the researchers found.

Environmentalists to use new Google 3D Trees mapping tool to preserve forests

Community mapping, a form of citizen science whereby local people participate in geographically defining an area, is increasingly taking on greater significance--especially during times of emergency and natural disaster. Director of the University of California, Santa Barbara's Center for Spatial Studies Michael Goodchild discusses "From Community Mapping to Critical Spatial Thinking: The Changing Face of GIS"