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Maartje Boer explains how using social media can be good for young people, and how to spot the warning signs of problematic use. Maartje Boer explains how using social media can be good for young people, and how to spot the warning signs of problematic use.

Microbial communities in the guts of animals can influence immunity, digestion, nutrition, and the behavior of their host. Research on these communities therefore has the potential to provide insights into wildlife health and conservation, but the microbiomes of carnivores are poorly understood. Now, a study has reported unexpected differences in the gut microbiomes of male and female American mink. The team of researchers extracted bacterial DNA from fecal samples of five male and five female mink in captivity. Their analyses revealed that many of the bacteria found in females differed from those found in males, and that the bacteria males and females had in common also often differed in abundance.

An estimated 4.8 million metric tons of synthetic microfibers, such as polyester and nylon, have entered waterbodies and terrestrial environments since 1950. Many more have been shed from dyed or otherwise treated organic fibers like wool and semi-synthetic fibers such as rayon. Washing clothes is known to release them into the environment, but there are ways to capture the fibers at their source. Research by a team of Canadian and US scientists now shows that the simple addition of washing machine filters is an effective community-scale mitigation strategy.

Wilson explains that free-ranging domestic dogs (Cants familiaris) - stray, feral, herding, or otherwise unrestrained animals - are a growing conservation concern worldwide, posing a hazard to wildlife via hybridization with wild canids, resource competition, disease transmission, and predation. In a new study, scientists assessed the impact of free-ranging dogs on mammals in Iran and found that these dogs imperil some of Asia's most endangered wildlife. The reports of dog attacks - typically instigated by two or more dogs - involved 17 different wildlife species in 22 provinces across Iran.

Whitefish Lake First Nation (WLFN) is a Canadian Treaty 8 Nation of 3000 people living in northern Alberta. Although they have subsisted on the region's wildlife for millennia, they've been given little say in the approval or management of resource extraction projects within their traditional territory. Having observed changes to wildlife populations on their land, WLFN recently partnered with scientists at the University of Victoria (UVic) on a camera-trapping study to evaluate how different industrial features might account for these changes. Incorporating Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and Western science methodologies into the study design, the team deployed 100 wildlife camera traps in 2018 and 2019 across traditional WLFN territory, most frequently capturing images of snowshoe hare (Lepus americanus), moose (Alces alces), white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), Canada lynx (Lynx canadensis), black bear (Ursus americanus), wolf (Canis lupus), and coyote (Canis latrans). UVic scientists analyzed the dataset by applying several different models to see which natural and anthropogenic features best explained the distribution and relative abundance of mammal communities.

The piedmont dry forest of northwestern Argentina is the most threatened forest ecosystem in the country, with 90% already lost to agriculture and urbanization. For over a century, it has been intensively logged for 12 tree species, with little oversight. In 2007, the federal government passed the Native Forest Law to protect some of the remnant forests, and to require the regulation of and responsible use by industry in the remaining areas. However, guidelines for sustainable forestry and forest health monitoring are still being defined. Current biodiversity monitoring schemes focus on charismatic vertebrate species, despite concerns about whether they are suitable indicators of the health of other taxa. Ground-dwelling spiders, on the other hand, are a megadiverse taxonomic group with strong links to forest structure and could be used to monitor the sustainability of logging operations, according to a new study