Environmental and Earth Sciences

Arctic Science, Geography, Geology, Oceanography, Hydrology, Glaciology, Seismology, Meteorology, Climate Science, Limnology, Remote Sensing, Natural Resources, Mining, Green Tech, Renewable Energy, Sustainable Development, Archeology, Paleontology

Snakebites: folded dentine and a new hypothesis for the evolution of venom fangs

Aaron Leblanc Biology and Life Sciences, Environmental and Earth Sciences, General Science
Snakes are iconic predators that have evolved unusual ways of subduing their prey. Some snakes constrict their prey before swallowing it whole, whereas others use highly toxic venoms to disable their unfortunate victims first. This second strategy is associated with some sophisticated dental anatomy in snakes: some of their teeth are grooved, or even hollow, … Continue reading Snakebites: folded dentine and a new hypothesis for the evolution of venom fangs

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New virtual training for digital geoscience

Matt Hall Environmental and Earth Sciences
Looking to skill up before 2022 hits us with… whatever 2022 is planning? We have quite a few training classes coming up â€” don’t miss out! Our classes use 100% geoscience data and examples, and are taught exclusively by earth scientists. We’re also always happy to teach special classes in-house for you and your colleagues. Just get in touch. Special classes for CSEG in CalgaryCSEG Crash Course, 7 to 10 September — there are no prerequisites for…

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Alexandra Morton on fighting for sea-life, fighting against sea lice and the beauty of dancing, spawning salmon

Mark Leiren-Young Biology and Life Sciences, Environmental and Earth Sciences, Policy and Politics
Eco-warrior, Alexandra Morton, on her fight to save wild salmon, being gaslit by the Canadian government and her adventures in Green politics. She also dares people to sue her over her essential new book – Not On My Watch:  How a renegade whale biologist took on governments and industry to save wild salmon. “The salmon farming industry is harming wild salmon, is harming whales, is causing algae blooms and really needs to be controlled.” Skaana…

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Are virtual conferences… awful?

Matt Hall Environmental and Earth Sciences
Yeah, mostly. But that doesn’t mean that we just need to get back to ‘normal’ conferences — those are broken too, remember?Chris Jackson, now at Manchester, started a good thread the other day:Just a reminder that when people say, “virtual conferences are awful”, what they might really mean are “virtual conferences don’t work for me for these reasons”…— Prof Christopher Jackson (@seis_matters) August 9, 2021 This led, in a roundabout way, to some pros and…

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100 years of seismic reflection

Matt Hall Environmental and Earth Sciences
Where would we be without seismic reflection? Is there a remote sensing technology that is as unlikely, as difficult, or as magical as the seismic reflection method? OK, maybe neutrino tomography. But anyway, seismic has contributed a great deal to society — helping us discover and describe hydrocarbon resources, aquifers, geothermal anomalies, sea-floor hazards, and plenty more besides.It even indirectly led to the integrated circuit, but that’s another story.Depending on who you ask, 9 August 2021…

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“Canadian company @Recon_Africa drills for oil in the Okavango delta”

Elisabeth Kosters Environmental and Earth Sciences, Science in Society
This title is paraphrased from several headlines over the last few months. There was public outrage over the fact that Recon Africa was allowed to drill in elephant migratory territory in northeastern Namibia. Much was also written about the company being suspected of being dishonest about its objectives and basis for investment. The Globe and Mail’s Geoffrey York (@geoffreyyork) wrote no fewer than four articles about the issue (here, here, here and here; all other…

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Hunting Robber Flies (Asilidae) in the Chilcotin Mountains of British Columbia, Canada

chloevanloon Biology and Life Sciences, Communication, Education and Outreach, Environmental and Earth Sciences
A recent trip to Big Creek Provincial Park by way of Tyaughton creek and Lorna Pass inspired this post’s topic because ohhh holy moly the Robberflies were A-BUN-DANT! I’ll explore the reason why I think they were out in great numbers and diversity on this trip. But first, what is a Robber fly?  The Family Asilidae are commonly known as Robber flies which got their name from their ambush style of capturing prey. These flies…

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New Canadian Mountain Podcast: UN Sustainable Development Goals and their relation to Canadian mountains

Chenoa Sly Environmental and Earth Sciences, General Science
What are the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and why are mountain landscapes integral to achieving these goals? In 2015 the UN adopted 17 SDGs for all member countries to achieve by 2030. These goals are focused on promoting peace, prosperity and halting unsustainable development, and consider all aspects of sustainability, from people, nature and the environment to climate, culture, equality and poverty. Each SDG has a number of targets and indicators to…

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New Canadian Mountain Podcast: UN Sustainable Development Goals and their relation to Canadian mountains

Chenoa Sly Environmental and Earth Sciences, General Science
What are the United Nations (UN) Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and why are mountain landscapes integral to achieving these goals? In 2015 the UN adopted 17 SDGs for all member countries to achieve by 2030. These goals are focused on promoting peace, prosperity and halting unsustainable development, and consider all aspects of sustainability, from people, nature and the environment to climate, culture, equality and poverty. Each SDG has a number of targets and indicators to…

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More ways to make models

Matt Hall Environmental and Earth Sciences
A few weeks ago I wrote about a new feature in bruges for making wedge models. This new feature makes it really easy to make wedge models, for example: import bruges as bg import matplotlib.pyplot as plt strat = [(0, 1, 0), (2, 3, 2, 3, 2), (4, 5, 4)] wedge, *_ = bg.models.wedge(strat=strat, conformance=’top’) plt.imshow(wedge)And here are some examples of what this will produce, depending on the conformance argument: What’s newI thought it might be…

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