Ruffed grouse numbers have collapsed locally. Numbers are down by at least 80 per cent compared with previous years.

Counts of courting males indicate the local grouse population is at its lowest level in over a decade.

It is not clear if severe conditions last winter contributed to the low grouse numbers, since grouse are usually capable of weathering bad winters by feeding on buds and sheltering from cold in snow burrows.

Ruffed grouse numbers are usually assessed by monitoring abundance of “drumming” males in spring. In April and May, male grouse attempt to attract females by means of elaborate displays in which their wings “thump” a booming sound that echoes great distances.

This spring, drummers are conspicuously rare, a sure sign that numbers are way down.

Spruce grouse and snowshoe hare numbers are also much lower than usual. It is not uncommon for all grouse and hares to undergo periodic population crashes simultaneously.

Studies suggest that plant self-defense chemicals are largely responsible for causing herbivore population crashes, and that might be the root of the local grouse scarcity, researchers speculate.
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Poison ivy is sure to become much more plentiful in the near future and that is bad news for those who have an allergy to the plant.  As North America warms, poison ivy is expected to be come more abundant and more widespread, according to research at Duke University.  The plants will also become much more potent.

“Poison ivy currently grows a lot more vigorously that it did 40-50 years ago and it is becoming much more toxic,” said Wasyl Bakowsky, an ecologist at the Natural Heritage Information Centre.

Tests confirm that poison ivy is getting more poisonous.

Its most potent component, called urushiol, is sure to increase intoxicity in the future as warming intensifies.  

Studies show that as our climate warms, the rate of poison ivy photosynthesis will increase by up to 77 per cent, generating a 50-per-cent increase in plant biomass.

“The plant will become much more abundant and more toxic in the near future,” the Duke University researchers caution.

More than 80 per cent of North Americans have a severe allergy to poison ivy. Proliferation of human cases of poison ivy skin irritation is expected to take place across the plant’s core area of distribution.
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Moths are capable of navigating through a sophisticated system of sensing the earth’s magnetic field, new studies suggest.

According to Jason Chapman of Rothamsted Research in the United Kingdom, moths can adjust their flight direction when migrating when they sense they are off-course.

“This is the first good evidence for some kind of compass,” he said.

Researchers used complicated radar to trace moth flight paths during migration movements. They found that moths only migrate when the wind is roughly in the right direction.

They fly at heights of the fastest winds and they orient themselves using a “magnetic sense.”