Rising sea temperatures may mean prey swimming in deeper water out of reach of guillemots, razorbills, puffins and kittiwakes
Climate change is keeping temperatures higher in the fall, setting up browntail-moth caterpillars to boom in summer. Their hairs are barbed and hollow and there’s a reservoir of a toxin inside.
“This new snow has no name,” said Lars-Anders Kuhmunen, a reindeer herder from Kiruna, Sweden’s northernmost town, near the Norwegian border. “I don’t know what it is. It is like early tjaevi, which normally comes in March. The winters are warmer now and there is rain, making the ground icy. The snow on top is very bad snow and the reindeer can’t dig for their food.”
Eva-Liv Island in the Franz Josef Land Archipelago has almost lost a peninsula. A 3-km-long strait has formed between the main land and the melted part where Cape Mesyatsev is located. Russian Arctic National Park employees discovered the missing land during an expedition to study walruses.
“Last year we got several reports from tourists and scientists that they saw around six walruses dead here on the west side of Svalbard. Unfortunately, we couldn’t sample them as the dead walruses drifted away by the time we got to the place. But it’s not normal to get so many reported dead walruses in such a small area," said Christian Lydersen, senior scientist at the Norwegian Polar Institute. Now samples (collected by a Station Manager in July 2023) have tested positive for highly pathogenic avian influenza.
Northern Finland experienced unprecedented June temperatures and abnormal rainfall, deviating significantly from historical weather patterns.
The swelling Tom River in southwestern Siberia has led to a partial dam collapse in the city of Tomsk. This year’s heavy rainfall, combined with abnormally warm spring weather, has led to severe flooding in Russia’s Urals and western Siberia. So far, the floods have submerged around 15,600 homes and 28,000 land plots in 193 Russian towns and cities across 33 regions.
Authorities in Siberia’s republic of Tyva declared a regional state of emergency due to ongoing wildfires exacerbated by prolonged hot and dry weather.
Intense rainfall in Russia's Far East Primorye region caused floods, power outages, and evacuations, with water levels exceeding the norm by eightfold in some areas, following previous flooding caused by tropical storm Khanun.
Reports are coming in about hundreds of dead birds from Hammerfest in the west to Murmansk in the east. A zone with a radius of five kilometers is closed and guards are in place round-the-clock.
Northern Afghanistan devastated by flash floods, 315 dead, 1,600 injured. Thousands of homes damaged, livestock lost. Villagers lack essentials.
The Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe catches coho salmon on the free-flowing Elwha River for the first time in over a century since the removal of dams, marking a historic moment for the tribe and the river's recovery.
With homes dilapidating, shores eroding and staircases falling off the houses, Point Lay residents are living through some of the most severe consequences of the warming climate in Alaska.
Officials say a wildfire in Southwest Washington that ballooned Sunday, causing regional air quality issues, may have been started by a firework or firearm.
Fuel shipments normally take place during autumn from departure ports such as Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. However, last fall saw a sudden freeze-up and quickly accumulating sea-ice on the Northern Sea Route, including the Kara Sea. Of the two rescued barges, one contained 7,000 tons of diesel fuel, while the other was loaded with 170 tons of kerosene.
A growing number of people are visiting Norway’s protected areas. This poses new challenges for national park management. Excrement and rubbish left behind by thousands of tourists degrades Lofotodden National Park’s idyllic nature. What can be done about this problem?
King and snow crab populations in the Bering Sea have plummeted ahead of the harvest season, some by 99% compared to previous years.
The endangered mammal got tied up to the Nevelsk breakwater from debris and rope that it got caught in.
A humpback whale named Stanislav was successfully freed from a fishing net in a first-of-its-kind rescue operation in Russia's Barents Sea.
Tulips of the Korolkov variety (Tulipa korolkowii) have started to bloom a month early in the southern Zhambyl region. The air temperature has hovered around 16 degrees Celsius since mid-February.
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