Washburn fire is burning near southern portion of the park, Mariposa Grove, home to over 500 mature giant sequoias
Yosemite national park has been partially closed as firefighters try to contain a wildfire that has now stretched across more than 60 acres.
The Washburn fire is burning near the southern portion of the park, Mariposa Grove, which is home to more than 500 mature giant sequoias in the park, officials said.
Continue reading...Conservationists celebrate $200m fund for expanding national park land but concerns remain over lack of spending on renewables and emissions reduction
Queensland conservationists are celebrating a state budget with unprecedented funding for new national parks, but others are outraged it “does nothing” to address the climate emergency.
On Tuesday, the Palaszczuk government committed $262.5m to protecting more land for nature. That included $200m for expanding the national park estate, a figure the World Wide Fund for Nature described as the largest single investment in national parks acquisition in the state’s history.
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Continue reading...Visitors will be allowed on southern loop under system designed to manage crowds after flooding destroyed bridges and roads
After catastrophic flooding destroyed bridges and roads and drove out thousands of tourists, Yellowstone national park will partially reopen at 8am Wednesday.
The National Park Service announced this weekend that visitors will once again be allowed on Yellowstone’s southern loop under a temporary license plate system designed to manage the crowds.
Continue reading...The entire park, spanning parts of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, will remain closed to visitors as officials assess damage to roads and bridges
Record flooding and rockslides following a burst of heavy rains prompted the rare closure on Monday of all five entrances to Yellowstone national park at the start of the summer tourist season, the park superintendent said.
The entire park, spanning parts of Wyoming, Montana and Idaho, will remain closed to visitors, including those with lodging and camping reservations, at least through Wednesday, as officials assess damage to roads, bridges and other facilities.
Continue reading...Thousands of Indigenous people sign letter to UK, US and EU protesting at appropriation of land for tourist safaris and hunting
Thousands of Maasai pastoralists in northern Tanzania have written to the UK and US governments and the EU appealing for help to stop plans to evict them from their ancestral land.
More than 150,000 Maasai people face eviction by the Tanzanian government due to moves by the UN cultural agency Unesco and a safari company to use the land for conservation and commercial hunting.
Continue reading...A $1,500 donation will buy an Inheritance Pass, valid for entry in 2172, part of a fundraising effort to celebrate the park’s 150th year
Yellowstone national park is offering an annual pass valid for entry in 2172 in exchange for a $1,500 donation, part of a fundraising efforts in honor of the park’s 150th birthday.
The park hopes that the tickets, dubbed “The Inheritance Passes”, will be used by the donor’s descendants. Yellowstone Forever, the park’s fundraising arm, will use the money to support park projects such as trail improvements, education, native fish conservation and scientific studies.
Continue reading...She began working with the National Park Service at 84 to reveal ‘untold stories’ of Black people’s efforts during the second world war
Betty Reid Soskin, the National Park Service’s oldest active ranger, has retired at the age of 100.
Soskin, who worked at the Rosie the Riveter/WWII Home Front national historical park in Richmond, California, spent her last day as she had for the last decade and a half: sharing her experiences and those of other women who worked on the home front in the second world war.
Continue reading...Wollumbin track reopening delayed after floods, while hikers asked to reconsider climb out of respect for Indigenous sacred place
The fate of one of northern New South Wales’s most popular walking tracks remains uncertain after authorities chose to delay a controversial decision regarding its future for the fourth time.
Situated near the flood-hit town of Murwillumbah, Wollumbin national park previously attracted more than 100,000 visitors a year, and its summit is renowned as the first place in Australia to catch the sunrise.
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Continue reading...Steven Fuller has been the ‘winterkeeper’ at Yellowstone for 49 years. In that time, he has captured the breathtaking natural phenomena and the wildlife that exist there through all the seasons
Continue reading...From the return of wildlife to the pressures of tourism and the climate crisis, Steven Fuller has seen it all in his nearly 50 years watching over America’s oldest national park
• Read more: Native Americans are at the heart of Yellowstone. After 150 years, they are finally being heard
As “winterkeeper” at Yellowstone national park, Steven Fuller lives in a rustic cedar-shingled cottage, built in 1910, set on a hill a short walk from the majestic Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.
On balmier days, with the windows open, he can hear the roar of the 308ft Lower Falls tumbling into the chasm. In autumn, he is treated to the sound of bugling bull elk in rut or, in the middle of night, the howls of wolves.
Continue reading...Conservationists welcome interim injunction to stop farm development they say threatens migration of 10 million fruit bats
Conservationists in Zambia have hailed a high court injunction preventing deforestation and commercial agriculture on the edge of Kasanka national park, which they say threatens the world’s biggest mammal migration.
Every October, about 10 million straw-coloured fruit bats descend on the swamps of Kasanka from across Africa and beyond. They feast on fruit in and around the park, one of Zambia’s smallest but under the highest level of protection, dispersing seeds across the continent on their epic journey.
Continue reading...Wildlife officials in Yellowstone national park captured the unusual sight of a cheeky grizzly bear tagging along with a pack of hunting wolves, then making off with their kill.
The enthralling video, posted to the National Parks Service Facebook page, shows the October incident in which the wolves from the Junction Butte pack in northern Yellowstone were joined by a lumbering grizzly as they hunted a herd of elk
Continue reading...As my family were neither middle class nor white European I didn’t venture into the bush until I was an adult – I’ll never forget my first time
Nothing beats the New Zealand bush. The writer Ashleigh Young once tweeted: “Sometimes NZ writers say ‘the forest’ instead of ‘the bush’ (and they definitely mean ‘the bush’) because they are nervous about saying ‘the bush’. Bring back the bush. If everyone does it, we will be fine.”
So here I am, proclaiming, “I love the bush!” Perhaps this is my opinion as an outdoor enthusiast and bisexual, but “bush” is the more accurate descriptor for the native flora of Aotearoa. Our bush is dense and scratchy, inured to the trample of boots. Our bush is thick and lush all year round, as few native plant species are deciduous. Our bush is not some wan forest: it is wild and overgrown, it does not encourage easy passage.
Continue reading...With its glacial lakes, silky beaches and verdant hills, it’s a wonder this brilliant county for walking is often overlooked
Thank God no boozy poet or philandering painter was born or buried in Llandeilo in the heart of Carmarthenshire. If there were, it would probably be flooded with pilgrims. As it is, the small inland town on the mighty Tywy (or Towy) – the longest river that has its source and outlet in Wales – has a degree of quaintness, but not too much, and only a handful of gawpers admiring the pastel-painted facades. Most are, like me, on road trips, as the A40 which runs through Llandeilo is a greenery-fringed alternative to the busier Heads of the Valleys road just to the south, and there are coffees and buns and bowls of cawl (a local lamb and veg stew) to be had here.
Carmarthenshire – or Sir Gâr – known as the Garden of Wales, is one of the 13 historic counties. Still largely agricultural, it’s criss-crossed by quiet back roads and is where the M4 runs out. It’s one of many places in Wales people pass through without stopping and is something of a Cinderella county.
Continue reading...Ndakasi died in arms of her ‘lifelong friend, Andre Bauma’ says Virunga national park in DRC
Ndakasi, a mountain gorilla that famously posed in the background of a selfie taken by rangers at Virunga national park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, has died at 14 after a long illness, the park said.
“It is with heartfelt sadness that Virunga announces the death of beloved orphaned mountain gorilla, Ndakasi, who had been under the care of the park’s Senkwekwe Center for more than a decade,” a statement from the park said.
Continue reading...The world’s oldest rainforest will join landmarks like Uluru and Kakadu, where First Nations people are custodians of world heritage sites
Eastern Kuku Yalanji people will take formal ownership of the world heritage-listed Daintree tropical rainforest in northern Australia, after the Indigenous traditional owners reached a historic deal with the Queensland government.
The Daintree national park is part of 160,108 hectares (395,467 acres) of land that will be handed back to the traditional owners at a ceremony on Wednesday at Bloomfield, north of Wujal Wujal.
Continue reading...Officials have not yet been able to determine how the family died but have closed the Savage Lundy trail through 26 September
A popular national forest in California has closed trails near where a couple, their baby and the family dog were found dead last month.
Pointing to “unknown hazards found in and near the Savage Lundy trail”, officials announced Sierra national forest would close trails, campgrounds and picnic sites for nearly a month. John Gerrish, 45, his wife, Ellen Chung, 30, their one-year-old daughter, Muji, and their dog were found dead on the Mariposa county hiking trail. Officials have not yet been able to determine how they died.
Continue reading...As Covid continues to curb visits to see our iconic wildlife, now is the time to move away from western-led funding models
That African governments have failed to mobilise funds to conserve their vast protected areas is not in doubt. Countries were just about managing to pay basic salaries to rangers who barely had enough to put fuel in their patrol vehicles. Covid has exacerbated this already dire situation, with the loss of income from foreign tourism.
The continent has more than 8,500 protected areas, described by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as government-led national parks, areas jointly governed by state agencies, communities, privately owned wildlife reserves, and public-private partnerships between governments, companies and NGOs. Included too, are what the IUCN calls “indigenous peoples and communities conserved territories and areas”.
Continue reading...Police fined two men $1,000 each after helicopter and rescue crew sent to help the pair who became lost in bushland after wildlife encounter
New South Wales police have fined two men for breaching coronavirus restrictions after they were startled by a deer while sunbaking naked on a beach south of Sydney and ran into the bush, becoming lost and needing to be rescued.
Police sent a helicopter to search for the pair, who were fined $1,000 for breaching public health orders amid a coronavirus outbreak that has seen residents in greater Sydney locked down and banned from travelling outside their local area.
Continue reading...Purchase of Langidoon and Metford sheep stations is the second-biggest national parks land procurement in NSW in the last decade
The New South Wales government has purchased more than 60,000 hectares of farmland near Broken Hill for an outback nature reserve, home to at least 14 threatened species.
In an effort to expand conservation efforts in the traditionally underrepresented far west of the state, on Monday NSW environment minister Matt Kean announced the government had finalised the purchase of the neighbouring Langidoon and Metford sheep stations.
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