• Human Footprint Covers Most of the Earth
  
• Toxic Fertilizers Challenged by Lawsuit
  
• Irradiation Approved for Imported Produce
  
• Last of Wild Condor Chicks Found Dead
  
• Pfiesteria Experts Answer Critics
  
• Seismic Detectors Can Monitor Nuclear Testing
  
• Scorecard Rates Congress, Informs Voters
  
• Parts of Ocala Forest Closed to Off Road Vehicles
  

Human Footprint Covers Most of the Earth

A team of scientists from the New York based Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and Columbia University's Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) published the map in the latest issue of the scientific journal "BioScience." The team says the map should serve as a wake up call that humans are stewards of the natural world, something that the team argues should be viewed as an opportunity.

The map adds together influences from population density, access from roads and waterways, electrical power infrastructure, and land transformation such as urbanization and agricultural use. It reveals that 83 percent of the land's surface is under human influence, while 98 percent of the area where it is possible to grow rice, wheat or maize is influenced by human beings.

Wide swaths of land remain wild, including the northern forests of Alaska, Canada and Russia, the high plateaus of Tibet and Mongolia, and much of the Amazon River Basin.

According to WCS and CIESIN, wild areas can still be found in all the ecosystems on the land's surface, though some on a much smaller scale. The authors look at these less influenced areas as opportunities for conservation of wild places all over the world.

"The map of the human footprint is a clear eyed view of our influence on the Earth. It provides a way to find opportunities to save wildlife and wild lands in pristine areas, and also to understand how conservation in wilderness, countryside, suburbs, and cities are all related," said the paper's lead author Dr. Eric Sanderson, a landscape ecologist with WCS. "The map should be looked at as a blueprint for individuals, institutions and governments to understand our current influence on the planet and figure out ways to lessen the negative impacts, while enhancing the positive ways that people interact with the environment."

The authors of the study also gave numerical scores to various areas around the world - the lower the number, the lesser the degree of human influence. Many of the world's largest cities, including New York, Beijing and Calcutta, received the highest scores.

But the authors of the study say that even among areas under heavier human influence, there are still opportunities for wildlife, pointing to examples like the progress made in restoring the Hudson River, and in India, where tigers share their landscape with one billion people.

"This map can be used to set specific targets for action," said data specialist Marc Levy of CIESIN. "What can't be measured can't be managed - with this map we have an important management tool, a basis for scientific measurement of anthropogenic influences on nature."

The study also illustrates the application of geographic information systems (GIS) technology as a way of integrating diverse geographic data to reveal new patterns in a persuasive way. This work was possible because of increased access to global datasets on roads, land use, and human population density in recent years.

"The two lessons of the human footprint are this: we need to conserve the last of the wild, because they are places where all the parts of nature are more likely to remain, and where conflicts with human infrastructure are least; and we need to transform the human footprint, so nature can still be nurtured everywhere, including in more heavily influenced areas," said Sanderson. "We can do both and nature is often resilient, if given half a chance."

To view the map and article, visit: http://www.wcs.org/humanfootprint

The data set may be downloaded at: http://www.ciesin.columbia.edu/wild_areas

Toxic Fertilizers Challenged by Lawsuit

Under the rule, toxic heavy metals, including lead, arsenic, mercury, and cadmium may be recycled into zinc based fertilizers. The hazardous waste derived fertilizers would not be labeled as such, and may be applied to farm lands and home gardens without further restrictions.

While industries have long been disposing of their hazardous wastes through fertilizers, the practice was not officially authorized until this rule.

Many of the heavy metals that will be recycled into fertilizers are toxic substances. Lead has been known to cause behavioral problems, learning disabilities, seizures and even death. Mercury may cause neurological abnormalities, including cerebral palsy in children and severe deformations in animals. Arsenic and cadmium may damage internal organs, skin, and nerve function.

The rule would allow these heavy metals to be applied to farms and gardens in concentrations that exceed the limits set for disposal of the hazardous wastes in lined and monitored landfills.

"The government's own studies show that, over the past few years, heavy metal levels in children's diets have risen," said Patty Martin, a former mayor of Quincy, Washington, and the founder of Safe Food and Fertilizer. "Rather than take steps to reduce the toxic burden on children, however, the EPA is illegally authorizing a practice that will put our children at even greater risk from exposure to lead, arsenic, and other toxic heavy metals."

The groups are concerned that the heavy metals in the fertilizers could migrate through the soil, run off into streams, and leach into waterways, affecting neighboring lands.

"In Oregon alone, over 1.6 billion pounds of fertilizers are used each year," said David Monk of the Oregon Toxics Alliance. "On a national level, the cumulative effects of these fertilizers could be staggering."

Safe Food and Fertilizer, Family Farm Defenders, the Oregon Toxics Alliance, and the California Public Interest Research Group (CALPIRG) claim that the "land ban" provisions of the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act (RCRA) prohibit the EPA from allowing hazardous wastes to be put in fertilizers that end up on farm fields and home gardens.

While treated wastes may be placed in land disposal facilities, the facilities must be designed to prevent migration of the hazardous wastes and have, at a minimum, double liners and leachate collection systems. The EPA's rule defies this scheme, by allowing hazardous wastes - including untreated wastes - to be disposed of on farmlands and home gardens.

In 1994, the EPA banned a similar type of practice, in which hazardous wastes were being used in road de-icing chemicals. The EPA justified that ban by noting that hazardous wastes could not legally be applied to the land in an uncontrolled manner.

"The EPA has already recognized that it has no authority to allow this type of uncontrolled land disposal of hazardous wastes," said Melissa Powers, an attorney with the Western Environmental Law Center, the law firm representing the plaintiffs in this case. "This rule will not withstand judicial review."

Irradiation Approved for Imported Produce

USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has issued new regulations, effective today, providing for the use of irradiation to control species of fruit flies and the mango seed weevil in imported fruits and vegetables. The agency says irradiation would provide an alternative to current control methods, such as fumigation and cold and heat treatment.

"The irradiation alternative allows importers to sell riper, more valuable fruit, with less damage," USDA said.

The final rule will require additional inspection and monitoring of foreign irradiation facilities. It will also increase the radiation dose required for one pest, the mango seed weevil.

Irradiation exposes food to low doses of electrons or gamma rays to destroy harmful organisms and pests. The process has been endorsed by the World Health Organization, and has been approved by U.S. regulators for use on raw meat, spices and dried seasonings.

Critics of irradiation warn that it may reduce the nutritional value of foods, or leave behind harmful byproducts. Irradiation facilities also create hazardous wastes through their use of radioactive materials.

Under federal law, irradiated foods must carry a label noting that they have been treated with radiation. For irradiated produce, the label may take the form of a sign posted next to a bin of fruit or vegetables.

Last of Wild Condor Chicks Found Dead

The cause of the chick's death is yet to be determined, but it means that all three of the condors to be laid and hatched in the wild since 1984 have now died. The first chick hatched May 11 was found dead October 4, the second chick hatched April 11 was found dead in its cave on October 13. The latest chick found dead was hatched April 28.

After the first two chicks were found dead, biologists concentrated their efforts on getting a visual of the last remaining chick, who they had only seen a handful of times due to the remote location of the nest cave. Dr. Allan Mee of the Zoological Society of San Diego, who has been monitoring condor nesting behaviors since January, discovered the latest death on October 21.

Still recovering from a long and difficult two day hike to recover the second chick's body last week, U.S. Fish and Wildlife (USFWS) biologist Greg Austin again set out with a team, Monday to retrieve the body of the last remaining chick.

"This is not what I expected to be doing today, but this has to be done and it has to be done quickly," Austin said. "We need to get the body to the lab as soon as possible."

The body will be taken to San Diego Zoo for a necropsy. A preliminary lab report on the first chick has still not provided a cause of death, although it was determined to have no detectable levels of lead.

The necropsy on the second chick revealed a dozen bottle caps, shards of plastic and glass in the crop and stomach. Pathologists suspect the death of the second chick was caused by these foreign objects.

Marc Weitzel manager of the Hopper Mountain National Wildlife Refuge, which supervises condor recovery in Southern California, noted that "A certain level of mortality is expected in any reintroduction program."

"Although this is a sad day for everyone involved, having had three chicks laid and hatched in the wild this year is still a great success for the California Condor Program," Weitzel added.

There are 75 condors now living in the wild in California, Arizona and Baja California, Mexico and 126 in captivity at the Los Angeles Zoo, San Diego Wild Animal Park and the Peregrine Fund's World Center for Birds of Prey in Boise, Idaho. The goal of the California Condor Recovery Plan is to establish two geographically separate populations, one in California and the other in Arizona, each with 150 birds and at least 15 breeding pairs.

Pfiesteria Experts Answer Critics

When the team cultured the same strain of Pfiesteria shumwayae studied by the dissenting scientists, it produced a toxin that killed fish within minutes, the group said.

Dr. JoAnn Burkholder, director of North Carolina State University's Center for Applied Aquatic Ecology, presented the results of the new study on Tuesday at the 10th International Conference on Harmful Algae in St. Petersburg, Florida. The findings are said to reconfirm a decade of research showing that Pfiesteria is a dangerous toxic organism.

Last summer's papers had been critical of work by Burkholder and other scientists who discovered Pfiesteria and described its life cycle and toxic impacts on fish and mammals. However, the dissenting scientists' work was based primarily on research with one strain, Burkholder said.

In the new study, three laboratories, assisted in toxin analysis by a fourth "blind" lab, have shown that this so called nontoxic strain does produce toxin after all. Burkholder said that their team's results differed because they grew the culture under conditions that allowed it to express toxicity.

"I hope these findings finally help set the record straight by addressing the widespread misinformation about this issue during the past few months," Burkholder said. "Growing these cultures is very complex and difficult work. We are entirely confident that the strain we have tested, taken from the very same culture they used, is toxic and dangerous."

Populations or strains of Pfiesteria, like other toxic algae, are known to vary in toxicity. There are strains that can kill fish with toxin and benign strains that cannot. More than 50 peer reviewed science articles have been published about toxic Pfiesteria, in research based on more than 400 toxic strains and 200 nontoxic strains.

Review of the culture methods used in last summer's studies raised concerns among Burkholder, Drs. Andrew Gordon and Harold Marshall at Old Dominion University, and Dr. Alan Lewitus at the University of South Carolina.

"Pfiesteria is difficult to culture in actively toxic mode, and their methods did not follow the only standard procedure that has worked so far in producing toxic Pfiesteria," Burkholder explained. "We decided to re-test that strain of Pfiesteria shumwayae using the standard protocol."

The P. shumwayae strain used by the dissenting scientists had been grown on algae for two years. In previous research, all but four of the 400 toxic strains examined by Burkholder and other specialists on toxic Pfiesteria had lost their ability to make toxin when they were not grown with live fish.

"When we used the standardized method with this P. shumwayae strain, it responded to fish very quickly," said Lewitus. Within a few days the culture was killing fish at low to moderate cell densities of 800-5000 cells per milliliter. Fish died at comparable rates when exposed to the known toxic strain, but all control fish remained healthy.

"With the nontoxic control strain, even at very high densities of 40,000 cells per milliliter, there was no fish death or apparent stress," said Marshall, "although there was some physical attack."

The new data are said to demonstrated that the scientists who reported that Pfiesteria is not toxic had a toxic strain all along.

"Toxic Pfiesteria strains are widespread and easily found in many estuaries," said Burkholder. "The controversy here is not a culture availability issue. This multi-laboratory study shows that it is, instead, a culturing issue. It is really important for laboratories to use procedures that allow Pfiesteria to express toxicity."

Seismic Detectors Can Monitor Nuclear Testing

Professor Lynn Sykes of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory analyzed 72 questionable events since 1960 in an article that appears in the October 29 issue of "Eos," a journal published by the American Geophysical Union.

Verification was a major issue in the U.S. Senate debate in 1999, in which American ratification of the treaty was defeated. Since 1995, the International CTBT Organization has detected many small seismic events and has determined that many were earthquakes or otherwise identifiable.

Under the treaty, however, the international organization is not charged with identifying all seismic events and is, in fact, not permitted to declare an event a nuclear explosion. Unresolved cases and possible nuclear events are referred to national CTBT agencies, whose work is often classified.

Therefore, Sykes explained, scientists do not always know how well the difficult cases are resolved. Only 72 events have been flagged in the literature or by the media as questionable or difficult to identify - a small fraction of all events recorded over the past 42 years - demonstrating the progress made in verification, Sykes said.

By studying technical characteristics of the seismic signals, almost all of the 72 events have been identified as nuclear explosions, chemical explosions, earthquakes, or mine collapses, he wrote.

Thirty years ago, problem events registered seismic magnitudes (mb) of 4.3 to 5.6, whereas today, most attention is focused on the mb 2.0 to 3.5 level. Since the magnitude scale is logarithmic, this represents an improvement factor of 300 in the size of signals that can be identified.

It means that nuclear explosions 1,000 times smaller in their energy release can now be identified, said Sykes.

Since 1990, all of the problem events greater than mb 2.5 have received special study and have been identified. There is no evidence, Sykes said, that any countries have exploded nuclear devices since the CTBT was opened for signature in 1996, aside from India and Pakistan, which have not signed the treaty.

Under the International Monitoring System, which began in 1995, seismic monitors have been placed close to, or in, countries that possess nuclear weapons, and the shorter the distance high frequency seismic signals have to travel, the better the identification of their source, Sykes wrote.

Indian nuclear explosions on May 11, 1998, and Pakistani ones later that month, were well recorded and identified. Sykes said the Indian claim of two tests with a combined yield of 0.6 kilotons on May 13, 1998, is exaggerated, as they created no detectable seismic signal.

Media reports in 2001 of an Iraqi nuclear explosion in 1989 appear to be false, Sykes wrote, as no seismic signal was produced.

As for the future of verification, Sykes said that only on site inspections can resolve any doubt in suspected events where the nuclear yield is zero, and this becomes possible once the CTBT enters into force. Short of that, occasional problem events may occur at the limits of detection, but these will become fewer, as investigations of previous questionable events are published and the science of verification advances further, he concluded.

Scorecard Rates Congress, Informs Voters

The Scorecard, released after every congress since 1970, evaluates the environmental voting record of every representative and senator based on the most important legislative actions to hit the floor of each chamber.

Congress finished 2002 with a 47 percent average score for the House and 43 percent average score for the Senate, but individual candidates locked in close races fared far worse, threatening their chances on Election Day, LCV says.

In the 107th Congress, LCV recorded the positions of members on 46 different votes, from promoting renewable energy and protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from oil and gas drilling, to helping farmers conserve farmland and improve water quality.

"Environmental voters have the power in the 2002 elections to make the difference between a Congress that shares their values and one that doesn't," said Deb Callahan, LCV president. "The 2002 National Environmental Scorecard is a great tool for voters to gauge which candidates are on their side when it comes to clean air, safe water and open spaces, and which are not."

The congressional delegations of Vermont, Rhode Island and Massachusetts led the way for environmental progress in the 107th Congress, while those of Louisiana, Alabama, Kentucky and Oklahoma stood in its path, the LCV report says. Thirty House members and two Senators scored perfect 100's in the 107th Congress, compared with 57 House members and 13 Senators who earned zeroes for their votes on environmental issues.

The average for 49 first year House members was 35 percent, which contrasts with first year Senators who earned an average of 62 percent.

Overall, Democratic House members averaged 79 percent in the 107th Congress and their Senate colleagues averaged 72 percent. The lowest scoring Democrats were Representative Ralph Hall of Texas, who scored a five percent, and Senator Zell Miller of Georgia, who scored 16 percent.

On the Republican side of the aisle, House members averaged 17 percent and Senators averaged 13 percent. Connie Morella, a Maryland Representative with an 86 percent score, shares honors with Olympia Snowe, a Maine Senator with a 72 percent score, as the highest scoring Republicans in the House and Senate.

For all the votes and scores of the 107th Congress, visit: http://www.lcv.org

Parts of Ocala Forest Closed to Off Road Vehicles

Beginning November 4, 2002, motorized vehicles will be restricted to designated roads in about 7,000 acres. This partial closure will remain in place until a decision can be reached on the ongoing Access Designation Process, dealing with motorized vehicle access in the national forests.

The USFS action, announced Tuesday, was applauded by conservation group Defenders of Wildlife (DoW) as a "positive if overdue step."

"Until today the U.S. Forest Service in Florida has been unable and unwilling to bring the ecological damage caused by ORVs under control and we applaud them for doing something about it," said Christine Small, habitat conservation associate with Defenders of Wildlife. "The closures in the Ocala National Forest are a step in the right direction."

Illegal trails in the areas of the Ocala National Forest known as Paisley Woods and Lake Delancy have increased by 20 percent over a period of 11 months, Small said. Illegal mud bogging and vehicular play activities have torn up, and in many cases, destroyed 80 percent of the ecologically important wet prairies and isolated wetlands in surveyed areas of the Ocala.

ORV users run over and crush birds, salamanders and plants, and damage scientific study sites and restoration areas. ORV users are also displacing hikers, campers, and other passive recreationists, and ruining hunting opportunities by disturbing wildlife and degrading habitat.

In September, Defenders of Wildlife released the report "The Impacts of Off-Road Vehicles and Roads on Wildlife and Habitat in Florida's National Forests," which can be found at: http://www.defenders.org/florvs/. The report is the first ever science based assessment of ORV and road/trail impacts on Florida's ecosystems.

Scientists reviewing the damage determined that what were a limited number of narrow hiking trails and firebreaks have now become vast webs of thousands of miles of wide travelways with new side trails branching into adjacent terrain. The report also documents the years of underfunded law enforcement and the USFS's poor history of monitoring and controlling ORV damage.

The Ocala National Forest now has two officers and a canine to police its more than 383,362 acres. Law enforcement is further reduced on weekends, when the majority of motorized activity takes place.

"I hope that the public will send the message to motorized recreational groups that ORV use is a privilege and not a right, applaud the Forest Service for its action to protect our natural resources, ask them to expand the closures in the Ocala, close impacted areas of the Apalachicola and Osceola national forests, make closures permanent, and ask Congress for increased funding for law enforcement and recreation management," Small said.