It's Friday: Here's Your Week in Trees

May 18, 2012 at 10:00 am by Amanda Cooke

Here's your tree news from around the world this week. This edition includes news about goats, bats, leopards, and stinky beetles. Oh, my!

Weed whackers: A Maryland city will use grazing goats to eradicate invasive species on a seven-acre plot of land [The Washington Post]
Bats crazy! An endangered Indiana bat "maternity colony" was unearthed in a loblolly pine tree snag in Talladega National Forest [The Anniston Star]
Just hangin' out: Take a look at this incredible photo of an adult Amur leopard, one of the world's most endangered large cats, taken by infrared camera in a Chinese forest [China Daily - Europe]
Smells like old leather: The stinky hermit beetle could be the key to saving floodplain forests in the Czech Republic [Czech Position]
Make it rain: Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper said, "Money doesn’t grow on trees, but trees can create prosperity" [The Chronicle Herald]
The buried city of Xultun: Archeologists uncovered ancient Mayan artwork in a dense Guatemalan rainforest [NPR]
Farewell: Frank Knight, a man who for decades cared for New England's tallest elm, passed away at 103 years old [Project Canopy]
Frost fight: In the winter of 1894-95, Florida saw some of the worst freezes in recorded history. Read about how Lue Gim Gong, called "the citrus wizard of Florida", worked to bring the region's fruit back to prosperity [USDA Blog]
Bye-bye chai? Some say that the cultivation of cardamom, a high value spice crop, can take a toll on evergreen forests in tropical countries [The Science and Development Network]
Megaherbivores: Rhinos and elephants act as the 'gardeners' of humid tropical forests [The Times of India]
Off to a dangerous start: Wildfires are currently devouring parts of Canada, Arizona, and Colorado [Various sources]
Soyuz want to be an astronaut? Smokey Bear and NASA astronauts were launched into space [MSNBC]
Making strides: Back for its fifth year, the United Kingdom's National Forest Walking Festival kicks off tomorrow [South Derbyshire District Council]
Fossilized resin holds historical clue: Ancient gingko amber from Northern Spain revealed the first ever record of insect pollination [ESRF]
Better management needed: Scotland's Minister for the Environment said that the country's forests are in desperate need of restructuring to increase biodiversity [Farming UK]
Livelihoods: A new report announced that anywhere from 47-140 million people worldwide work in formal and informal forest-based enterprises [Mongabay]
New opportunities: Planting mangrove forests on Vietnam's coasts creates natural storm barriers and is helping to generate additional income for local families [The Christian Science Monitor]
Sci-fi-sounding experiment of the week: An Australian university has embarked on the Eucalyptus Free Air CO₂ Enrichment Experiment. The project, which attempts to recreate an environment of runaway climate change, will deliver high concentrations of CO₂ to trees within the rings [Guardian UK]
Tree Farmer and Rolling Stones’ keyboardist Chuck Leavell celebrated the USDA's 150^th anniversary [AFF Blog]

From the archives, unearthed this week:

Forests and biodiversity in focus: The FORCLIME Photo Contest exhibition ended this month. Some incredible photos were displayed as a result of this 2011 International Year of Forests initiative [FORCLIME]

Photo of 2012 Project Learning Tree International Coordinators' Conference attendees taken May 16 in front of a funny looking mountain in South Dakota.

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