"ALDER CREEK GROVE, Tulare County — The all-terrain vehicle cut through heavy brush, bounced over rocks and sliced through the undergrowth as it rumbled up a steep trail toward a meadow dominated by giant sequoia trees high in the southern Sierra Nevada mountains."
It’s poisoning fresh waters across the United States, as well as elsewhere in the Americas, Europe, Asia and Africa. Blue-green algae is on the rise, lingering later and later into the year. Our new Issue Backgrounder explains the contributing factors behind the potent toxin’s scourge, its societal and public health ramifications, and the many angles and resources to tell the story.
"Air quality regulators on Friday killed a years-long push for stronger regulation of a dangerous acid used at two South Bay refineries that has frightened many neighbors, voting instead to accept a voluntary, oil industry pledge to enhance safety measures."
"A massive marine heat wave that caused record warming of ocean waters off the West Coast five years ago, sending salmon numbers crashing and malnourished sea lions washing up on beaches across California and other Pacific states, is back, scientists said Thursday."
"California has just become the first state in the nation to outlaw fur trapping. The Wildlife Protection Act of 2019, signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom Wednesday, will prohibit the trapping of native animals including grey fox, coyote, beaver, badger and mink, along with the sale of their pelts, which often end up in foreign markets."
"The state’s beloved sea mammals have been plagued by the deadly Toxoplasma parasite. They’re catching it from feral and pet cats."
"Wells of nearly two dozen Southern California water agencies have reportable levels of PFAS, a chemical family increasingly linked to cancer, liver and kidney damage, thyroid disease, high cholesterol, low fertility, low birth weight and ulcerative colitis."
"Scientists have detected microplastic pollution in Lake Tahoe’s deep blue waters for the first time. Now they are trying to determine its source and potential harm to the lake’s flora and fauna."
"More than 40 wild burros have been found shot and killed along the Interstate 15 near the Nevada state line, Federal officials said on Friday, and they’ve offered a reward of up to $18,000 for information leading to the arrest and conviction of those responsible."
"Federal scientists pulled no punches in their report: The Trump administration’s plan to send more water to San Joaquin Valley farmers would force critically endangered California salmon even closer to extinction, and starve a struggling population of West Coast killer whales. But the scientists’ findings weren’t adopted, nor were they released to the public."
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