Biodiversity

"Hate insects? Afraid of germs? Researchers are reporting an alarming combination: bedbugs carrying a staph 'superbug.' Canadian scientists detected drug-resistant staph bacteria in bedbugs from three hospital patients from a downtrodden Vancouver neighborhood."

"The Interior Department, facing an avalanche of petitions and lawsuits over proposed endangered species designations, said Tuesday that it had negotiated a settlement under which it will make decisions on 251 species over the next six years."

"Federal protections for some 1,200 gray wolves in Montana and Idaho end on Thursday under unprecedented legislation passed by the U.S. Congress last month removing them from the endangered species list."

"A New York man who admitted smuggling nearly 4,000 live Chinese snakehead fish, which pose a danger to fish native to U.S. waters, was arrested on criminal charges, prosecutors said on Thursday."

"Home is where the heart is. It's also probably where a lot of stink bugs are right now, crawling out from cracks and crevices. They were introduced into Allentown, Pa., from Asia in the 1990s and have been spreading ever since, reaching seemingly plaguelike proportions in the mid-Atlantic states. But an experiment is under way to reintroduce the stink bug to its mortal enemy: a parasitic Asian wasp."

"From chainsaws to flute solos, the lyrebird can mimic almost any sound it hears. But eavesdrop on this magical bird, and what it is singing can sometimes be troubling."

"Some of Britain's most cherished spring visitors are disappearing in their thousands. Ornithologists say species such as the cuckoo, nightingale and turtle dove are undergoing catastrophic drops in numbers, although experts are puzzled about the exact reasons for these declines."

"In February, the Obama administration declared the Pacific walrus to be at risk of extinction because its Arctic habitat was melting. But it declined to list the marine mammal as an endangered species, saying a backlog of other animals faced greater peril."

Photographer Bryant Austin's eye -- and imagination -- were so captured by snorkeling close to humpback whales that he set himself to creating life-sized portraits of the creatures.