BEAT Pushback Extends Comment Deadline on Berkshire Gas Hike

Brittany Polito | iBerkshires

The Friends of the Great Falls Discovery Center Announce "Food, Farms, and Factories"

Press Release

"The Great Falls Discovery Center, 2 Avenue A in Turners Falls, will host a year-long exploration on the themes of 'Foods, Farms and Factories.' This multi-faceted programming will examine the topic from historic, Indigenous, immigrant, economic, industrial, and artistic perspectives. Programming will kick-off on Sunday, January 14 at 2pm with the local documentary film 'A Long Row in Fertile Ground' by WGBY with comments by Rus Peotter. Free public events will expand throughout 2024 to include history tours, an exhibition examining Polish and Eastern European immigration, gardening and sustainability workshops, a multi-disciplinary performance by Exploded View, talks about our industrial and agricultural heritage, and a harvest potluck and contradance. Visit www.discoverycenter.org for more information, as it becomes available." READ MORE

How Trees Prepare for Winter

Rebecca Perkins Hanissian | Northern Woodlands - The Outside Story

"...In handling heavy snow and ice loads – infamous for breaking branches and bending trunks – our northern tree species vary in strategy. The high-surface-area leaves that increase a deciduous tree’s photosynthetic capacity in the warmer months become load liabilities in the winter, offering ample parking for heavy snow and ice – and surfaces for catching the wind. For this and other reasons, these species drop their leaves in autumn. These hardwoods rely on branch architecture and strength to support the snow and ice that settle on them. Species such as maples, birches, and ash trees, all long-term residents of the northern forests, drop their leaves quickly in the fall. On the other hand, oaks and beeches – relative newcomers with tropical origins – often, and at their own expense, sport crinkly brown leaves well into winter. Employing a different tactic, coniferous species, including spruce and fir, hold on to their low-surface-area needles year-round. Their flexible branches bend with the weight of snow – like Christmas tree boughs adorned with a too-heavy ornaments. But as the branches droop, the snow slides off, and the branches spring defiantly back to shape. Ice proves harder to shrug off and can cause branches to break, bark to tear, and trunks to bend. That flexibility serves coniferous trees well with regard to winter winds, too. Flexing with the wind dissipates the wind’s kinetic energy, thereby reducing force on individual branches and the tree as a whole. This streamlining proves more difficult for deciduous trees with stiff branches, even after they have dropped their large leaves. [...] To cope with freezing temperatures, coniferous and deciduous trees alike are triggered by longer nights and cooler temperatures to progress to a state of dormancy and maximum cold tolerance by mid-winter. Insulation by dead cells, which constitute 99 percent of a mature tree’s woody volume, and a number of seasonal cellular changes help to prevent live cells from freezing. According researchers at Purdue University’s Department of Forestry and Natural Resources, these cellular changes include a transition to more pliable cell membranes that can withstand the sharp edges of ice crystals that form when the water between cells freezes. Within each cell, starch is converted to sugars, which will serve as antifreeze, lowering the cell’s freezing point. Lastly, as water leaves the cell through its more pliable membrane and as the content of the cell thickens and cools, viscosity increases, preventing crystallization, which can shred cell membranes." READ MORE

Beaver Winter Food Supply

Mary Holland | Naturally Curious

"During warmer months, a Beaver’s herbivorous diet consists of aquatic plants, herbaceous flowering plants, ferns, and mushrooms as well a some woody plants. However, most of these are not available or accessible once ice has formed. Even if they were, they would not store well over the winter, under water, which is the only accessible location for Beavers in northern climates. For their winter food supply, Beavers cut branches in the fall, drag them into the water and anchor them in the mud near their lodge, where often the top of the pile is visible above the water/ice (see photo). Until thick ice forms, Beavers continue to go ashore for food, but once they are locked under the ice, the Beavers feed from this underwater cache. This pile is what sustains Beavers throughout the winter. The size of the cache increases as you go north. A northern cache may contain a ton or more of wood. Beavers in more moderate climates, where ice does not form, do not store food." READ MORE

Mount Grace and Mass Audubon Partner for Historic Conservation Victory

Mass Audubon News Room

"The Winchendon Select Board had a choice to make: allow a large-scale solar energy developer to purchase a huge parcel of forest and clear-cut 350 acres or protect that land forever. After hours of moving testimony from a standing-room-only crowd of Winchendon residents, the Select Board voted unanimously to allow Mass Audubon to permanently conserve it. This decision is a monumental victory for wildlife, the climate, clean water, and the residents of Winchendon who will be able to recreate amongst these pristine forests and streams for generations to come. [...] For decades, a private landowner owned this property under a conservation restriction that granted the Town of Winchendon the right to purchase the land before it could be sold. When a solar energy developer offered to buy the land for six million dollars, the Town had three options: allow the developer to make the deal and clear-cut 350 acres, match the offer and purchase the land, or assign the rights to purchase the land to a third-party conservation organization. [...] Ultimately, Mass Audubon will transfer the land to the Massachusetts Department of Fish and Game as a Wildlife Management Area accessible to the public for recreation." READ MORE

New York Enacts Nation-Leading Law to Protect Bees, Birds, and People

Daniel Raichel | NRDC

"In a holiday gift to the state’s bees, birds, and people just before the end of the year, New York Governor Kathy Hochul signed into law the Birds and Bees Protection Act (A.7640-Glick/S.1856A-Hoylman-Sigal)—a first-in-the-nation law to rein in dangerous and wasteful uses of neonicotinoids or 'neonics.' For those who’ve read past blogs on the bill, you know that neonics are the most-used insecticides in the country, and increasingly considered some of the most ecologically destructive pesticides since DDT. Long linked to mass losses of bees and other pollinators that have driven down crop production, neonics have made U.S. agriculture 48-times more harmful to insects, prompting EPA to make the unprecedented finding that neonics likely jeopardize the continued existence of 200+ threatened and endangered species—roughly ~11% of the entire endangered species list. Beyond bees, the neurotoxic pesticides are also linked to: 

• Mass losses of birds;
• The collapse of fisheries;
• Extensive water contamination in New York (especially on Long Island);
• Birth defects in deer; and
• Threats to New Yorker’s health, especially that of children.

Indeed, recent research finding rising levels of neonics in the bodies of over 95% of pregnant women tested in New York and four other states had New York health experts ringing alarm bells. Neonics pass easily from mother to fetus, and studies link neonic exposures in the womb with birth defects of the heart and brain, reduced cognitive abilities, and autism-like symptoms. Fortunately, New York’s new law will dramatically curb neonic use when fully implemented, eliminating up to 80-90% of the neonics entering the state’s environment annually by prohibiting only neonic uses that are wholly unneeded or easily replaced with safer alternatives. [...] Under the new law, New York will become the first state in the nation to restrict the use of neonic coatings on corn, soybean, and wheat seeds." READ MORE

Monsanto hit with $857 mln verdict over PCBs in Washington state school

Clark Mindock | Reuters

"A Washington state jury on Monday [December 18] ordered Bayer's Monsanto to pay $857 million to seven former students and parent volunteers of a school northeast of Seattle who claimed that chemicals known as PCBs made by the company leaked from light fixtures and made them sick, according to court documents. The jury in Seattle found the company liable for selling polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs) used in the Sky Valley Education Center in Monroe, Washington that were not safe and did not contain adequate warnings. The verdict included $73 million in compensatory damages, and $784 million in punitive damages. The plaintiffs included five former students and two parents who spent time at the school 7 to 18 years ago. They claimed exposure to PCBs at the school caused them to have neurological, endocrine system and other health concerns. A statement from Monsanto called the award "constitutionally excessive" and said the company will move to have the verdict overturned or reduced. The U.S. Supreme Court has said that punitive damages should generally be capped at nine times compensatory damages, because larger awards would violate defendants' due process rights. The verdict marks the latest trial loss for the company, which already faced $870 million in verdicts from alleged PCB exposure at the Sky Valley center in other cases. The company is appealing those previous verdicts." READ MORE

Advocates demand US suspend weed-killing chemical that may cause cancer

Carey Gillam | The Guardian

"Citing new scientific research, a coalition of farm worker, public health and environmental advocates on Wednesday [December 13] filed a legal petition with US regulators demanding they immediately suspend authorization for the controversial weed-killing chemical called glyphosate. The petition, filed with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), alleges that the chemical does not meet the required safety standard set by federal law and the EPA has 'no valid assessment demonstrating otherwise'. If the EPA fails to address the petition, the groups said they will take the agency back to court, where the groups last year successfully garnered a judicial finding that the EPA’s most recent assessment of glyphosate was deeply flawed. The legal petition comes less than 10 days after the publication of a new scientific study that lends fuel to critics who say glyphosate herbicide products can cause cancer. In a paper published 6 December, National Institutes of Health cancer scientists said they found markers of genotoxicity in male farmers with high uses of glyphosate. The authors said their work suggested glyphosate 'could confer genotoxic' effects, and amount to “novel evidence regarding the carcinogenic potential of glyphosate”. The study was published in the journal Environmental Health Perspectives. [...] Glyphosate is the most heavily applied herbicide in history, both in the US and globally. One of the best-known glyphosate-based products is Monsanto’s Roundup weedkiller. Roundup has been used by farmers as well as consumers for more than 40 years. Officials with Monsanto and its German owner, Bayer AG, have always assured the public and regulators that exposure to the weedkiller does not pose a threat to human health. [...] The EPA has also said glyphosate is safe when used as directed, but last year a three-judge panel of the ninth US circuit court of appeals determined that the EPA ignored important studies and applied 'inconsistent reasoning' in finding that the chemical does not pose 'any reasonable risk to man or the environment'." READ MORE