Author: Kate
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Why are Coral Reefs DYING? What is Coral Bleaching?
Coral reefs are the basis for ocean life. A quarter of the ocean’s inhabitants depends on them—and so do millions and millions of humans. But with the warming ocean waters and more extreme weather events, coral reefs are struggling. The corals bleach. But what is coral bleaching? Coral reefs are cities underwater. About a quarter…
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Why Are Our Oceans Getting SOUR?
All that carbon dioxide that humanity has been throwing into the atmosphere has to go somewhere. The ocean is an excellent buffer but it isn’t fast. The surface ocean becomes more and more acidic and organisms of all sizes suffer because of it. Global warming, sea level rise, desertification, green house gases, and today’s topic:…
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What is a KEYSTONE Species?
Keystone species are the glue for their ecosystems and hold everything together. Without them, entire ecosystems collapse. What are keystone species? What do they do? Why do we care? All species fulfill their purposes but some species are so important that their survival is essential to the ecosystem they live in. Keystone species can determine…
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What Causes RED TIDES and Algae Blooms?
Florida has been suffering a particularly bad red tide this year. The algae bloom has been killing tons and tons of marine life. Algae blooms and bacteria blooms cause problems all over the world and a lot of them are made worse by human impact. CORRECTION: Karenia brevis is also not a plant. It belongs…
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What Are INVASIVE Species?
Invasive species are one of the biggest threats to ecosystems. We humans are probably the most damaging invasive species both because of the harm we cause to ecosystems and because of how carelessly we help other invasive species along. Mentioned in this episode: National Geographic: People and Invasive Species (choose your reading level) Australian Government:…
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What JELLYFISH and CORAL Have in Common
If I tell you that we’ll be talking about cnidaria (pronounced nahy-dair-ee-uh) today, you probably have no idea what I’m talking about. And if I made you google it, we’d quickly figure out that no one knows how to spell it either. To spare you all that, I’ll tell you what cnidaria are: Cnidaria, also…
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What is EVOLUTION? Will it SAVE us?
We discuss what evolution is and why it won’t save us from climate change. I go into the basic mechanisms of evolution and the big issues with relying on evolution to solve anything. For full show notes, see the podcast.
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Climate Change is HUMANITY’s Fault
In this week’s Environmental Essentials segment, I explain how we know that humans caused climate change and why so many people still don’t know this. For full show notes, please see the podcast.
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What is GREENWASHING?
Companies exist to make money and now that consumers are slowly waking up to the environmental emergency of climate change, they are using every tool in their toolbox to make us think their products are better than they are. For full shownotes, see the podcast.