Spoorthy Raman

Scroll.in • 28th May 2023

Tourism boom in Kerala’s Western Ghats threatens to wipe out habitat of endemic frog species

Nestled within the lofty Cardamom Hills, which forms part of the Western Ghats Unesco World Heritage Site, lies the picturesque town of Munnar in Kerala. Lush green tea gardens carpet the rolling hills of the Western Ghats, a biodiversity hotspot, interspersed by coffee and cardamom plantations. Groves of eucalyptus, black wattle and acacia – trees grown for firewood and timber – are peppered within these plantations.

Patches of shola forests – stunted tropical montane forests which once covere

Deccan Herald • 27th May 2023

Biodiversity map reveals conservation priority areas

The need to protect various living forms, many of which are disappearing at an unprecedented rate, is often an afterthought in today’s human-centric world. Although our well-being strongly depends on the health of our environment, measures to protect the natural world are met with sluggish actions.

“The only effective way to conserve biodiversity is to integrate conservation and sustainable use of biodiversity and human welfare,” says ecologist Kamaljit S Bawa, Founder of Bengaluru-based Ashoka

Mongabay Environmental News • 22nd May 2023

As tourism booms in India’s Western Ghats, habitat loss pushes endangered frogs to the edge

Nestled within the lofty Cardamom Hills, which forms part of the Western Ghats UNESCO World Heritage Site, lies the picturesque town of Munnar in the southern Indian state of Kerala. Lush green tea gardens carpet the rolling hills of the Western Ghats, a biodiversity hotspot, interspersed by coffee and cardamom plantations. Groves of eucalyptus, black wattle and acacia—trees grown for firewood and timber—are peppered within these plantations.

Patches of shola forests—stunted tropical montane fo

Hakai Magazine • 25th April 2023

Shining the Light on Baby Crabs

It’s a gray summer evening on Galiano Island, a long strip of land about 1.5 kilometers across at its narrowest. Home to nearly 1,400 people, it is one of the 200-odd islands and islets in the Gulf Islands archipelago dotting the Salish Sea between Vancouver Island, British Columbia, and the mainland coast. The air here at the wooden pier in Whaler Bay on the island’s southeast end is heavy and moist, tinged with a whiff of boat fuel and old wood, and infused with sea salt. Amid a lineup of moto

Deccan Herald • 15th April 2023

The other face of fear

In the past couple of months, I have written about what fear might look like in our pets. Fear is complex. Fear is understudied. Fear is often misunderstood. As humans, we find it uncomfortable to talk about fear, and it takes enormous effort to deal with it and overcome our fears. A cockroach can scare me to death even today — no matter how many I have seen in my life, and despite my understanding that they can do no harm. What hopes do we have in understanding fear in our pets, who don’t speak

Mongabay Environmental News • 14th April 2023

PNG youths’ loss of tradition is bad news for hunting — but also for conservation

With two-thirds of the country draped in dense, tropical rainforests, Papua New Guinea is home to diverse wildlife, including several marsupial species, flightless cassowaries, and vibrant birds-of-paradise. Just as diverse are the cultures of its people, who have inhabited the land for nearly 50,000 years, first as hunter-gatherers and later as agriculturalists.

Today, more than 85% of the country’s population live in rural and remote areas, where subsistence hunting is still a part of life. P

World Economic Forum • 4th April 2023

Here's how deforestation is raising the risk of wildfires in Borneo

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Eco-Business • 31st March 2023

Deforestation fans fire risk in Borneo as temperatures rise

The dry season of 2015 was a devastating one for Indonesia, with around 100,000 fires engulfing thousands of hectares of tropical rainforests and carbon-rich peatlands on the islands of Sumatra, Borneo and New Guinea.

The infernos, strengthened by dry weather caused by El Niño, raged for months, in the process emitting more carbon dioxide than a year’s worth of US economic activity. The haze spread so far it threatened public health not just in Indonesia, but also in Singapore, Malaysia and Tha

BioScience • 30th March 2023

Mining the sea floor: Implications for biodiversity

An air of urgency permeates the offices of the International Seabed Authority (ISA), the international agency in Kingston, Jamaica, tasked with regulating mining-related activities on the ocean floor. Overlooking the Caribbean Sea through their windows, representatives from the 168 member states are scrambling to finalize the Mining Code, a rule book that will govern the commercial extraction of deep sea minerals.

For over a decade, different organs of the ISA have been working toward framing r

Mongabay Environmental News • 27th March 2023

Deforestation drives fire risk in Borneo amid a warming climate, study finds

The dry season of 2015 was a devastating one for Indonesia, with around 100,000 fires engulfing thousands of hectares of tropical rainforests and carbon-rich peatlands on the islands of Sumatra, Borneo and New Guinea. The infernos, strengthened by dry weather caused by El Niño, raged for months, in the process emitting more carbon dioxide than a year’s worth of U.S. economic activity. The haze spread so far it threatened public health not just in Indonesia, but also in Singapore, Malaysia and Th

Deccan Herald • 25th March 2023

Every stranger is a danger!

Last month brought a big change in our lives: we moved from a bustling megacity to a quiet town on an island known for its charm. Of course, Pippi came along, enduring a three-hour flight locked up in his crate. While we are still coping with the transition, and everything that comes with it, Pippi has been extremely quick to feel at home in his new home. He’s no stranger to moving, having crisscrossed continents, climates and cultures with us. But each time, he surprises us with his resilience.

Audubon • 24th March 2023

What Should I Do If I Find a Nest Where It Doesn’t Belong?

Mourning Doves are frequent home invaders, laying eggs in an air-conditioning vent, on an outdoor shelf, or, here, in a hanging planter basket.

Pledge to stand with Audubon to call on elected officials to listen to science and work towards climate solutions.

Some birds are quite comfortable building their homes right next to ours. It’s not uncommon to see Mourning Doves in an air-conditioning vent, Eastern Phoebes on a windowsill, American Robins in a wreath, or House Finches in flowerpots.

I

The Social Commons • 13th March 2023

Indigenous funding model a win-win for ecosystems and local economies in Canada

• First Nations in the Great Bear Rainforest and Haida Gwaii of Canada, have successfully invested in conservation initiatives that have benefited ecosystems while also increasing communities’ well-being over the past 15 years, a recent report shows.
• Twenty-seven First Nations spent nearly C$109 million ($79 million) toward 439 environmental and economic development projects in their territories, including initiating research, habitat r

Nature • 10th March 2023

TikTok’s dancing chemist catalyses joy in students

André Isaacs’ love of chemistry began at school in Kingston, Jamaica, inspired by his uncle — a teacher, who created fun ways to connect chemistry with life experiences. Isaacs earned his PhD from the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia in 2011 and did a postdoc at the University of California, Berkeley, before returning to the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts — his undergraduate alma mater — as a group leader in organic chemistry in 2012. As an educator, he mixes his

Mongabay Environmental News • 10th March 2023

Indigenous funding model is a win-win for ecosystems and local economies in Canada

Over the past 15 years, First Nations in Haida Gwaii and central and northern coastal British Columbia, Canada, have turned the tables around: once subjected to massive economic, social and cultural damages due to the extractive logging industry, they have now successfully built a sustainable economy that focuses on protecting sensitive ecosystems, while increasing communities’ well-being, a recent report shows.

The report was released by Coast Funds, an Indigenous-led conservation finance orga

Mongabay Environmental News • 7th March 2023

SE Asia’s COVID legacy is less wildlife trade, but more hunting, study finds

The COVID-19 pandemic, which began spreading in a seafood and poultry market in Wuhan, China, shone a spotlight on zoonotic diseases and the risks that markets selling wild meat can pose to human health. Following the outbreak, some countries like China temporarily closed down wet markets, while others like Vietnam banned the wildlife trade outright. A WWF survey found that the overall consumption of wildlife dropped by 30% in Southeast Asia and the U.S.

On the surface, the pandemic may seem to

Deccan Herald • 18th February 2023

Paw patrol of the right sort!

A quintessential trick in most pet training books or videos today is the ‘paw-shake’—a gesture comparable to a handshake where the pet puts forward his or her hand and rests it on yours. In our world, it’s a lovely gesture of reassurance and companionship, and pictures of pets paw-shaking with their humans are indeed cute! But, what purpose could it serve in the pet’s world? Unlike us, they don’t greet each other with paw-shakes or paw-bumps! Instead, they sniff, stare, whimper, bark or use othe

Deccan Herald • 28th January 2023

Pondering along with our pets

Weekend mornings are my favourite to walk with Pippi. A sense of calmness envelops the streets as birds chirp their dawn songs. When the sun’s out, the golden rays thaw the frosted grass, laying out a wet carpet. This New Year’s Day turned out to be one such gorgeous winter morning — the snow gods had taken a break and the temperatures were mild, with the mercury veering ever so slightly to the positive side of the Celsius scale. Pippi and I headed out early in the morning for our walk. For a ch

Deccan Herald • 25th January 2023

Fierce warriors, algal farmers

With scales coloured sparkling neon blue to eye-catching bright yellow, and patterns of polka dots to dazzling stripes, the spectacular damselfish are fish world fashionistas. Unsurprisingly, these coral reef inhabitants are prime attractions in many saltwater aquaria around the world. But there’s more to these fish than their beauty: they are the only known farmers in the aquatic world and they farm algae. These fish also fiercely protect their farms—they aggressively chase away other herbivoro

Mongabay Environmental News • 23rd January 2023

As sea lice feast away on dwindling salmon, First Nations decide the fate of salmon farms

VANCOUVER, Canada — Alongside the millions of Atlantic Salmon clustered in the open net pens that dot the waterways around Broughton Archipelago’s over 200 islands, sea lice, a tadpole-shaped parasite, feast on the fish.

In the zeal to establish a salmon market northwest of Vancouver, Canada, many aquaculture companies set up open net pens—cage-like structures where a layer of fishnet separates the farmed salmon from those in the wild—in the 1980s. They were also, however, creating conducive co