Biodiversity

"The mysterious collapse of honey-bee colonies is becoming a global phenomenon, scientists working for the United Nations have revealed."

"The federal government has agreed to step up its efforts to force freighters sailing on the Great Lakes to begin treating their biologically contaminated ballast water discharges like any other industrial pollutant."

"Seven decades after the last reported sighting of the eastern cougar, the federal Fish and Wildlife Service declared it extinct Wednesday and recommended that it be removed from the nation's endangered species list."

"Rising temperatures, drought and the spread of destructive insect pests will shrink the North American range of the lodgepole pine nearly 10 percent by 2020, a new study finds."

"The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service decided Thursday that wild plains bison do not deserve protection under the Endangered Species Act."

"Restrictions on water pumping that helps supply Southern California, intended to protect California's delta smelt, will be relaxed through June."

Unacceptable death rates of laboratory animals have forced a New Zealand government research agency to end its experimental program on cloning of agricultural animals.

"A federal judge [Wednesday] appeared reluctant to ask the Obama administration to reconsider whether the polar bear should be listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act."