PROGRESS
THE MAP WAS THE PROBLEM.
PROGRESS
The world map is finally admitting how big Africa is.
Africa was not small. The map was weird.
SOURCEAssociated Press
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ALL THE SLOP
Every serving. No expiration date. Page 4 of 4.
ANIMALS
SHE WENT BACK. SHE STAYED.
ANIMALS
The gorilla they rescued as a baby just had one in the wild.
Rescued at 18 months. Rewilded eight years later. Now Lulingu is raising a baby of her own in the forest.
SOURCEGRACE Gorillas
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PROGRESS
RUBELLA, OFF THE LIST.
PROGRESS
Thailand just knocked rubella off the public-health list.
Decades of vaccination and surveillance turned a dangerous pregnancy infection into a preventable public-health victory.
SOURCEWorld Health Organization
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ANIMALS
653 FROGS, RELOCATED HOME.
ANIMALS
653 frogs just got their mountains back.
653 endangered frogs. Two mountain-stream releases. One species getting a real shot at coming back.
SOURCELos Angeles Zoo
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WEIRD JOY
A SHED FULL OF GLOW.
WEIRD JOY
The glowworms came back. A garden shed was involved.
After a century away, tiny green lights are blinking again in North Yorkshire.
SOURCEThe Guardian
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PROGRESS
STONE IS LOAD-BEARING AGAIN.
PROGRESS
They built a high-rise out of stone. Like, structurally.
The future of lower-carbon construction might involve a material humans have been stacking for thousands of years.
SOURCEDezeen
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WEIRD JOY
HE BOUGHT THE MARQUEE.
WEIRD JOY
Rick Steves bought his hometown movie theater so it wouldn’t die.
A century-old neighborhood movie house just got a very determined new owner.
SOURCEKNKX Public Radio
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WEIRD JOY
SNAKES, APPARENTLY, HAVE FRIENDS.
WEIRD JOY
The baby rattlesnakes are cuddling. Please adjust your worldview.
Livestream cameras in California, Colorado and Pennsylvania captured live rattlesnake births, dozens of newborns and baby snakes cuddling adults for protection. Apparently even rattlesnakes have a snuggle phase.
SOURCECal Poly / Project RattleCam
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WEIRD JOY
TINY TRACKERS, BIG MIGRATION.
WEIRD JOY
The warblers have backpacks now.
Researchers are fitting tiny songbirds with Tic Tac-sized geolocator backpacks that record light and atmospheric pressure across entire migrations. Serious science has once again required an extremely small backpack.
SOURCESmithsonian Migratory Bird Center / The Conversation
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ANIMALS
A BRIDGE JUST FOR DEER.
ANIMALS
The deer have infrastructure now.
Washington’s I-90 Snoqualmie Pass wildlife overcrossing recorded its 10,000th successful animal crossing in July. Add 11 undercrossings and the project is nearing 40,000 recorded crossings since 2014. Apparently the elk were just waiting for civil engineering.
SOURCEWashington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT) via Good Good Good
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ANIMALS
THE PARROT SAID NO.
ANIMALS
The world’s weirdest parrot refused to go extinct.
New Zealand’s critically endangered kākāpō population has reached 325, after a record 90 chicks joined the official count this season. The recovery program began in 1995 with just 51 birds. Extremely round bird: still here.
SOURCENew Zealand Department of Conservation / Kākāpō Recovery Programme
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PROGRESS
TRACHOMA, REGION-WIDE, GONE.
PROGRESS
A whole region just knocked trachoma off the public-health list.
WHO has validated Timor-Leste’s elimination of trachoma as a public health problem. Because it was the last country in WHO’s South-East Asia Region where the disease was still suspected to be a public-health problem, the entire region has now cleared that threshold.
SOURCEWorld Health Organization
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WEIRD JOY
AN EMOTIONAL SUPPORT LOG.
WEIRD JOY
The internet gave the baby porcupine an emotional support log.
Point Defiance Zoo welcomed its first prehensile-tailed porcupine baby in 121 years. Then the internet spotted the tiny porcupette clutching a log and named it an “emotional support log.” For once, the comments improved the story.
SOURCEPoint Defiance Zoo & Aquarium / Good Good Good
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ANIMALS
RELEASE DAY. TEARS INVOLVED.
ANIMALS
Crush went home. Everyone cried.
Crush, a loggerhead found cold-stunned and nearly lifeless on a Jersey beach in January, spent months in rehabilitation before being flown to the Azores, fitted with a satellite tag, and released back into the Atlantic. Good turtle. Good humans. Everybody go home.
SOURCELittlefeet Environmental / SEA LIFE Weymouth / Channel 103
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WEIRD JOY
COWS ON FIRE DUTY.
WEIRD JOY
Spain hired tiny cows to fight wildfires.
In Galicia, small, agile Cachena cattle and other grazers are being used to chew down fire-prone vegetation. A regional pilot is even using GPS virtual fencing to steer cattle toward areas that need clearing. Cow-based infrastructure has entered the chat.
SOURCEReuters / Xunta de Galicia
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PROGRESS
RABIES LOST ITS FOOTHOLD.
PROGRESS
Bhutan just kicked dog-transmitted rabies off the public-health list.
WHO has validated Bhutan’s elimination of dog-transmitted human rabies as a public-health problem — the first country in WHO’s South-East Asia Region to reach the milestone. Bhutan has gone more than two years without a human death from dog-transmitted rabies. Vaccines, surveillance and people showing up worked.
SOURCEWorld Health Organization
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