Climate change is luring Kodiak bears away from their iconic salmon streams

The researchers found that due to warm spring temperatures on Kodiak, the berries were developing fruit weeks earlier, at the same time as the peak of the salmon migration; 2014 was one of the warmest years on the island since record-keeping began 60 years ago. Although there will continue to be considerable variation in Kodiak's climate, the warming trend is likely to continue.

The research team analyzed the bears' scat to find direct evidence that the bears were consuming the berries and not the salmon.

"An earlier berry crop shut down one of the most iconic predator-prey scenes in nature," said Jonny Armstrong, an ecologist at OSU and member of the research team. "As climate change reschedules ecosystems, species that were once separated in time are now getting a chance to interact--in this case the berries, bears and salmon. This is going to have large impacts that are hard to predict."

For example, birds that depend on bears pulling salmon out of the stream, could be seriously affected, he said. Other far-reaching effects may include changes in bear demographics due to the change in their diet, evolving salmon populations and impacts on plant pollinators.

"It is a strange, indirect effect of climate change," Deacy said. "These bears eat dozens of different foods throughout the year but now two of them are overlapping. This is causing a disruption in the food web that could have profound implications for the ecology of the island."

The abundance of salmon and berries on Kodiak Island are why there are so many bears there, and why they are so large, said Jack Stanford, director emeritus at the University of Montana's Flathead Lake Biological Station and one of the study's co-authors.

"This overlap in their resources forces the bears to make a choice that could in the long run result in fewer bears and/or unexpected changes in ecosystem structure," Stanford said. More

It is time for the Cayman Islands to implement bike lanes?

Why Olympian Adam van Koeverden supports bike lanes - People can't be divided neatly into cyclists and motorists, says Adam van Koeverden.

The 2004 winner of the Lou Marsh Trophy, given to Canada's top athlete, is himself a driver on some days, a bike-rider on others. He's not alone. "Most cyclists also spend time in a car, taxi or Uber," he explains. The goal isn't taking sides but finding a way for all road-users to move safely through the city. Toward that end, he supports separated bicycle lanes.

"If there's no lane, it's a scramble," says van Koeverden, who was once sent to hospital after being doored by a truck driver. "But when a lane's been installed there's an order to the road -- there's a place for cars and a place for bikes."

The issue is successful cohabitation: protected lanes allow two- and four-wheeled vehicles to live securely side-by-side.

The two-time world champion and Olympic gold-medallist in sprint kayak likes what he sees in Europe. In Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands, for example, the relationship between automobiles and bikes is much less adversarial. There's "less 'us versus them'," he argues. There's an understanding that protected lanes also benefit drivers because "when I'm driving I don't want to hit a cyclist."

As well, European motorists realize that the more people use bikes, the less congestion there is for those taking the car.

Van Koeverden, 35, has been a Toronto cyclist since 2008. His motivation is largely pragmatic. "I use my bike a lot. It makes total sense to save money on parking and gas. It's just practical." In addition to using the bike for commuting, he enjoys riding dirt trails in the city's rugged Don Valley. "It's a little known fact that we have really, really good mountain biking in the heart of the city," he told the Metro newspaper in June.

As a kayaker, van Koeverden spends much time in lakes. Not surprisingly, he has a passion for water, sports and the environment -- issues he generously supports as an ambassador for WaterAid, Right to Play and the David Suzuki Foundation. His charitable work takes him across the country and around the world: Right to Play is supporting Indigenous youth in Canada; WaterAid is building wells in African nations.

Back home in Toronto, he's endorsing the Bloor bike lanes, which come to a council vote this fall. He hopes city hall will make the lanes -- currently a pilot -- into permanent features.

Asked what single message he'd send the mayor regarding the Bloor lanes, he answers succinctly, "Keep them." Their great value, he suggests, is building civic harmony. "I listen to experts and I haven't heard anyone dispute the value of peaceful co-existence between bicycles and autos." More

IMF admits disastrous love affair with the euro and apologises for the immolation of Greece

The International Monetary Fund’s top staff misled their own board, made a series of calamitous misjudgments in Greece, became euphoric cheerleaders for the euro project, ignored warning signs of impending crisis, and collectively failed to grasp an elemental concept of currency theory.

This is the lacerating verdict of the IMF’s top watchdog on the fund’s tangled political role in the eurozone debt crisis, the most damaging episode in the history of the Bretton Woods institutions.

While the fund’s actions were understandable in the white heat of the crisis, the harsh truth is that the bailout sacrificed Greece in a “holding action” to save the euro and north European banks. Greece endured the traditional IMF shock of austerity, without the offsetting IMF cure of debt relief and devaluation to restore viability.

It describes a “culture of complacency”, prone to “superficial and mechanistic” analysis, and traces a shocking breakdown in the governance of the IMF, leaving it unclear who is ultimately in charge of this extremely powerful organisation. More