New Yellowstone Park earthquake swarm

No. It doesn’t mean the end is near 😉

University of Utah seismic station.

Earthquake swarm in park tops 1,000. Billings Gazette.

Note added 1-24.  As expected, the swarm has dropped off a lot.

The explorers’ club

Meet the scientists risking their lives to find Earth’s rarest species

This is an interesting article about cryptozoology, the “study of hidden animals”. One of the scientists mentioned is Dr. Jeff Meldrum, associate professor of anatomy and anthropology and my old college advisor at Idaho State University in Pocatello, who spends part of his time searching for sasquatch. I remain skeptical about their existence but I don’t dismiss it entirely. I had many long conversations with him about his hypothesis and also encountered a few pranksters who visited his office or sent him information. He’s a very intelligent scientist who knows his stuff.

The article also talks about the many unusual discoveries in recent years.

The explorers’ club
By Helena de Bertodano – Telegraph UK

New Sierra Club chief brings confrontational style to the job

Michael Brune is a big foe of industrial polluters-

He has a hard job ahead after yesterday’s Supreme Court decision giving corporations more political power than they have had in a hundred years.

New Sierra Club chief brings confrontational style to the job. “The new leader of the US’s largest environmental group will come to the job with a record of ‘environmental agitation’ against big industrial polluters. From Grist, part of the [U.K.] Guardian Environment Network”  

Pneumonia outbreak widens; FWP will kill 95 sheep in West Riverside herd

Four recent outbreaks of disease in the west

Bighorn Sheep from the Bonner herd © Ken Cole

There are four disease outbreaks among bighorn sheep herds in the news this winter, two in Montana, one in Nevada, and one in Washington State. This is the time of year when bighorn sheep are concentrated so diseases are more easily transmitted.

There has been no mention of where these sheep contracted pneumonia but, as I mentioned in the recent story about this, there is domestic sheep grazing in an effort to control weeds in the nearby mountains. Could this be the cause?

Pneumonia outbreak widens; FWP will kill 95 sheep in West Riverside herd
By ROB CHANEY of the Missoulian