From UCR, ALOUD & Zocalo
Man may be king of the beasts but the evidence abounds that his environmental conduct can be just this side of beastly, though there are worries under way about species from bees to fish and the oceans as a whole:
- For all the buzz about the decimation of bees around the globe, what's really known about man's best winged-friend, the key ally in the cultivation of myriad kinds of invaluable crops? Scientists have collected almost 1 million records on various kinds of the little buzzers in 10 databases scattered across the U.S. But the accuracy and usefulness of all that information will get a boost from experts in Riverside, who will cooperate with scientists across the region (including at the UCs in Berkeley and Davis and at the Los Angeles County Natural History Museum) and the country to double-check, scrub, organize and centralize all the bee info. The aim is to ensure that experts, in examining valuable records that have been collected on the insects for as long as two centuries, can best predict the risks to bees and their 'pollination services,' in the face of climate change, habitat loss and other threats.
In Riverside, a cooperative push to upgrade 1 million records on man's best winged-friends
- In downtown tonight at 7, in a free and open conversation (for which reservations are required), a biologist and space scientist will discuss with an accomplished environmental journalist just what may occur when an inevitable consequence of climate change occurs. Peter D. Ward, an astrobiologist who works with NASA, argues that even if the present environmental carnage were to come to an abrupt halt, the rising of the world's seas due to the melting of polar ice caps will not cease. He has conjured some dire scenarios of what may ensure on 'The Flooded Earth,' including the abandonment of a lawless island Miami, guerrilla warfare in Canada and chaos and devastation in spots like Bangladesh. Must it be this way?
Dire scenarios, a call to action about climate change, the 'Flooded Earth'
- On the Westside, three folks who not only know a lot about eating but also sustainability and cuisine will take on a whopper of a topic, asking in a free, open talk (with reservations recommended) on Wednesday night at 7:30 on whether the ravenous destruction of the oceans and everything that lives therein soon will make seafood a culinary delicacy? The Brothers Gold -- Jonathan, the iconoclastic and Pulitzer-winning LA Weekly food critic (shown at right in Rena Kosnett photo celebrating his winning journalism's top award), and Mark, the noted environmentalist and head of Heal the Bay -- will join with Michael Cimarusti, a lauded master chef of seafood and the food force behind the top-rated Providence restaurant.
A whopper of a worry -- will seafood soon be a culinary rarity?
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