Tag: Forests

Things are looking up – a bit

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Things are looking up – a bit

The UN General Assembly has designated 2011 as International Year of Forests. The UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), based in Rome, has conducted an assessment of the world’s forest resources every five years since 1946. Its most recent assessment, published in October, covers forests — or lack of forests — in 233 countries. Here, […]

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The oil sands: ‘The risks will endure’

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
The oil sands: ‘The risks will endure’

For more than 40 years, the Alberta oil sands mining industry has produced bitumen — a mixture of heavy hydrocarbons that can be upgraded and refined into petroleum products. With each barrel of product, the industry also produces more than 1.5 barrels of a persistent waste with the consistency of yogurt. Mature Fine Tailings (MFT), […]

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The all-important boreal forest

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
The all-important boreal forest

The number of birds breeding in North America’s boreal forest region is estimated at between 1.65 and 3 billion. Of these, landbirds are by far the most numerous, making up 97 percent of all birds breading there. The importance of the boreal forest region as a breeding ground for many bird groups is staggering. Estimates […]

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Danger in the Nursery

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Danger in the Nursery

The Canadian boreal forest is one of the world’s most important breeding areas for migratory birds, with 1 billion to 3 billion individual birds from at least 300 species known to regularly breed there. Approximately 30 percent of all shorebirds (7 million) and 30 percent of all landbirds (1 billion to 3 billion) that breed […]

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Lost legacy

| December 1, 2010 | 0 Comments
Lost legacy

Ontario’s official watcher of the woods says we need to plant billions of trees in southern Ontario alone. Why? Beginning in the 1990s, the province presided over a calamitous decline in the number of trees it plants every year. By Donna Jacobs When their sheer beauty is not enough, trees more than earn their right […]

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