Wind turbines hazardous to bats

Wind farms have a long-documented history of killing hundreds of thousands of birds and bats each year. As it turns out, the bat toll may be higher than previously estimated. In a new study, researchers found that environmental impact assessments — the main tool used to predict the ecological effects of a new energy development — commonly failed to predict the number of bats that would have fatal collisions with wind turbines' spinning blades. Even in the few cases where researchers said early assessments accurately predicted the danger to bats, efforts to mitigate those risks often did not succeed.

Remains of Gold Rush-era ship found

Workers building a new condo development have uncovered the remains of an old ship at the edge of San Francisco's Financial District. The discovery is almost certainly what remains of the Gold Rush ship Arkansas, which arrived in San Francisco in December 1849, was run up on the shore, and later became a saloon, a store, a boardinghouse, a bordello, a hotel and a saloon again before it was dismantled and buried for good nearly 160 years ago. The area where the ship was found was part of the fabled Barbary Coast, once one of the toughest and most dangerous districts in the world. The remains of the old ship were discovered in 1890 and rediscovered this fall.

Elephant poaching not slowing down

Elephant poaching is alive and well — and the elephants are not. A team of scientists examining seized shipments of elephant tusks from Africa have found that the vast majority of the ivory came from elephants that died within the last three years. The sobering results, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal that the killing of elephants for their ivory is continuing at a disturbing pace — even as elephant populations across the continent are in sharp decline. Central African forest elephants have fallen by an estimated 62 percent from 2002 to 2011.

How ancient humans reached South Pacific

Some 3,400 years ago, people left the Solomon Islands, crossing more than 2,000 miles of open ocean to colonize islands like Tonga and Samoa. But after 300 years of island-hopping, the explorers stopped — for 2,000 years. Computer simulations now suggest that the so-called Long Pause occurred because the early explorers were unable to sail farther against the strong wind that surrounds Tonga and Samoa. Only after their boat and methods improved were explorers able to colonize the rest of Oceania.

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