Water & Oceans

"Wildlife advocates plan to challenge the approval of a new Yellowstone River dam aimed at benefiting Montana and North Dakota farmers that critics say could kill off a dwindling population of a fish species dating to the time of dinosaurs."

"A little-known federal program that avoids publicizing its accomplishments to protect from looters the thousands of Native American sites it's tasked with managing has been caught up in a big net."

"The Colorado River is like a giant bank account for seven different states. Now it's running short. For decades, the river has fed growing cities from Denver to Los Angeles. A lot of the produce in supermarkets across the country was grown with Colorado River water. But with climate change, and severe drought, the river is reaching a crisis point, and communities at each end of it are reacting very differently."

"The Louisiana coast loses a football field’s worth of land every 38 minutes. This staggering rate of land loss has been brought on by climate change and coastal erosion accelerated by human activities, including water diversion projects and damage done by the oil and gas industry."

"The view from the observation deck over a meadow of brown marsh grasses would make a nice postcard. Eagles roost on tall pines, muskrats burrow in mounds of mud and straw, and black ducks splash in a pond."

"There was a time when whiting were plentiful in the waters of Rhode Island Sound, and Christopher Brown pulled the fish into his long stern trawler by the bucketful."

"Like many Louisiana coastal residents, the Native Americans of Grand Bayou village have seen the landscape surrounding their community collapse over the past 50 years. The lush, freshwater wetlands and high ground that sustained them for centuries is now a ragged patchwork of crumbling salt marshes and expanding lagoons."

"The Mosul Dam is failing. A breach would cause a colossal wave that could kill as many as a million and a half people."

"Desperate towns have turned to private equity firms to manage their waterworks. The deals bring much-needed upgrades, but can carry hefty price tags."