#seasonal-nature-events

#seasonal-nature-events

"The responders weren't just FEMA, it was people taking up direct collections for food, for clothing; it was a community response."

To fuel our bodies, we must eat other living things, killing them in the process. However, most plants and algae are autotrophs. They bootstrap their biomass without the barbarism of eating others: using photosynthesis, turning sunlight, water, and carbon into energy.

The sound of rain spurs rice seeds to sprout up to 40 percent faster than they would otherwise, according to a study published today in Scientific Reports.

A study by researchers at the University of California Berkeley has found that ethanol is surprisingly common in floral nectar, the sugary fuel that keeps pollinators alive. Yeast feeding on those sugars produces trace amounts of alcohol, and in this study, it showed up in 26 of the 29 plant species sampled.

Death Valley National Park is treating visitors to what rangers are calling the most outstanding bloom year in a decade - the best since the 2016 "superbloom" - according to National Park Service. Recent rainfall and mild winter temperatures have triggered dormant seeds to sprout, creating a fleeting spectacle of desert color.

The tilt of the Earth's axis as it orbits around the sun causes seasons. Different parts of the world receive different amounts of sunlight depending on that angle. In the Northern Hemisphere, we experience winter from December to March, while the Southern Hemisphere soaks up the sun.

With a major winter storm about to blast pretty much every US state east of the Rocky Mountains, many are scrambling to prepare for the cold, ice, and snow. And according to popular meteorology influencer Max Schuster, there's yet another winter-weather hazard to watch out for: trees exploding in the frigid air. On a viral post on X-formerly-Twitter, Schuster - who holds a meteorology degree

"Granted, "[p]lants have extensive and well established mechanisms of communication, with that of volatiles being the most well studied and understood," he added. "There is also growing recognition that root exudates play a role in plant-plant interactions, though this is only now being deeply investigated. Nothing else, communication through mychorriza, has withstood independent investigation."

In Indra's Net of pearls and jewels, every gem reflects every other, a shimmering image of interdependence. This ancient Vedic metaphor for connection across the cosmos also illuminates what the environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht first proposed in 2014as 'theSymbiocene': the era after the Anthropocene, in which human technologies take their cues from living systems and work in partnership rather than through dominance.

Spring ends the winter season like light ends the darkness. The coming of spring reminds us of the peaks and valleys of life. If you are in a valley, know that there is light at the end of the tunnel and a peak will come soon. Just as the seasons change, so too will your life.

When British author Karen Armstrong won the TED prize in 2008, she used the money to convene a group of religious thinkers from a wide range of faiths to craft an updated version of the Golden Rule for the 21st century. What emerged was the Charter for Compassion, which calls on people around the world "to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the center of our world and put another there, and to honor the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity and respect."

Climate breakdown is occurring more rapidly with the heating rate almost doubling, according to research that excludes the effect of natural factors behind the latest scorching temperatures. It found global heating accelerated from a steady rate of less than 0.2C per decade between 1970 and 2015 to about 0.35C per decade over the past 10 years.