Scientists Puzzled by New Bird Species Discovered in Africa

Written by Sam Aola Ooko

Just over a month since the Smithsonian Institution announced the discovery of new bird species in Africa, little is still known about the olive-backed forest robin named for its distinctive olive back and rump.

Scientists are trying to unravel the little bird’s specific diet, mating and nesting habits, and the species’ complete habitat range, but the dense undergrowth of tropical forest where it was sighted may still offer further surprises.

Adult members of the robins - both male and female - measure just about 4.5 inches in length and average 18 grams in weight.

Males exhibit a fiery orange throat and breast, yellow belly, olive back and black feathers on the head. Females are similar, but less vibrant. Both sexes have a distinctive white dot on their face in front of each eye.

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The bird was first observed by Smithsonian scientists in 2001 during a field expedition in southwest Gabon but it was initially thought, however, to be an immature individual of an already-recognized species.

To ensure that the specimens collected were a new species, geneticists at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo compared the DNA of the new specimens to that of the four known forest robin species.

The results clearly showed that these birds were in fact a separate and distinct species but anything else is remains a puzzle to scientists.

“I suspected something when I found the first bird in Gabon since it didn’t exactly match any of the species descriptions in the field guides,” Brian Schmidt, a research ornithologist at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and a member of the team that made the discovery, said.

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Is Grandpa Bad for the Environment?

By Jacob Leibenluft

Everyone's always talking about how an aging population, with more retirees, is going to wreak havoc on Social Security and the federal budget. Here's my question: What impact will that have on the planet? After all, my grandparents don't seem to care much about global warming, their refrigerator is from the 1970s, and they use an awful lot of air conditioning at home. Give it to me straight: Are Grandma and Grandpa bad for the environment?

"Do it for the kids" has always been one of the most popular arguments in favor of environmentalism: Older people need to get their act together, or else it's the children who will suffer the environmental consequences. Indeed, in terms of what they buy and how they vote, younger Americans tend to be more eco-conscious than seniors, who are less likely than anyone else to believe that global warming is a man-made phenomenon. But here's the weird thing: In practice, it's the older folks who are better for the environment.

In an effort to improve models of global warming, a team of researchers led by Brian O'Neill of the National Center for Atmospheric Research estimated (PDF) what U.S. emissions would look like in two different cases: one in which the age structure of the population looked exactly the same as today's, and another where—as many demographers project—the percentage of Americans over 65 more than doubled.

Their conclusion: Grayer is greener, with the aging population expected to produce anywhere between 10 percent and 37 percent fewer emissions by the year 2100. At first glance, the Green Lantern assumed this must be because older Americans spend their money in a more environmentally friendly way. For one, they drive a good deal less, so they spend less money on gas and produce less air pollution. They are also less likely to buy new big-ticket items, like cars or large appliances. And they spend a huge percentage of their income on health care, which—dollar for dollar—doesn't produce that much pollution or require that much energy.

In fact, says O'Neill, the consumption mix for older people isn't significantly more carbon-efficient than the mix for younger folks. Older Americans spend a higher percentage of their incomes heating and cooling their homes—so much so that it just about cancels out whatever benefits they generate by driving less (PDF). (If you are elderly or have elderly parents, that makes it even more important to invest in insulation and other energy-saving fixes.) The elderly do spend a lot of their money on health care, but the rest of us put more resources into education, another clean way to spend.

The real reason older Americans are better for the environment is that they work less and have lower incomes. It's not so much that they spend their money in a better way—it's just that they don't spend as much in the first place. The general aging of the population will make America somewhat poorer—after all, economic growth will slow as a greater share of consumers become unable to work. A slowed economy in turn produces less pollution. All told, the aging of the population won't reduce U.S. emissions enough to halt climate change, but it might make our work a little bit easier.

What can younger folks learn from the elderly about becoming more environmentally friendly? Not much. Growing older means becoming greener only because it involves a lifestyle change that no young person wants to make—namely, becoming a good deal poorer. In that sense, the aging of America—and to an even greater extent, Western Europe and Japan—offers just about the least attractive plan there is for combating global warming. With a smaller percentage of the population working, the challenge is to find a way to keep growing in a grayer world, while making sure that growth is green, too. Modern environmentalism—and this column!—put great stake in the idea that small, individual choices, added together, can make a big difference. It turns out that who we are, demographically speaking, ends up mattering at least as much as what we do.

Is there an environmental quandary that's been keeping you up at night? Send it to ask.the.lantern@gmail.com, and check this space every Tuesday.

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Huge Ancient Lake Discovered in Russia

By Andrea Thompson, Senior Writer

A huge ancient lake once dammed up by the vast ice sheets of the last Ice Age has been found by geologists in Russia.

Large glacial lakes were known to cover parts of Russia and North America during the Ice Age. One of the most well-known is Lake Agassiz, which covered portions of Canada and northern Minnesota more than 10,000 years ago. At the time it was the largest freshwater lake on the planet, with an area larger than all of the present-day Great Lakes combined, larger even than California.

Last year, geologists found the remnants of a lake near a Russian village called UstNem. Now, the same lake has been found to extend 435 to 497 miles (700 to 800 kilometers) to the west, near another village called Kotlas. By comparison, Lake Superior, the largest of the Great Lakes, is 350 miles (560 km) long at its greatest length. The ancient lake— no longer a lake — is just a few tens of kilometers away from the Ural Mountains.

Geologists are taking samples of sediments to shed light on the history of this and other glacial lakes that formed in the region.

"We're trying to find out just what these lakes have looked like," said Eiliv Larsen, a geologist with the Geological Survey of Norway. "Where did the sediments come from and how did the lakes influence the environment and the climate in the region?"

Lake Agassiz is thought to have possibly influenced the North Atlantic climate when it suddenly drained into what is now Hudson Bay, potentially raising sea levels and altering the ocean circulation.

The Russian lake could have had similar consequences when the ice hemming it in finally melted and the lake's freshwater potentially poured into the Arctic Ocean.

Geologists studying the area as part of the International Polar Year effort have found evidence of the surrounding ice.

"We're finding traces of the snout of a glacier that calved into the lake from the north," Larsen said. "This probably took place around 20,000 years ago and this was the youngest lake in the region."

Larsen and his colleagues are also finding traces of older glacial lakes.

"Lakes have probably been situated here in two periods during the last Ice Age," he said. "We've found river delta deposits which suggest that the oldest lake formed some 65,000 years ago."

These lakes can also leave an imprint on the surrounding land: Lake Agassiz left remnant lakes behind, and the land it once covered is still rebounding from the lost weight of the water pressing down.

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