Public Notices

Top Audubon Successes of 2022 Audubon

Throughout 2022, Audubon continued its rich tradition of advocating for and securing the space, clean air, and clean water that birds and people need to live and thrive.

This past year, Audubon and the Audubon Action Fund helped more than 150,000 people make their voices heard, fighting for stronger climate actions in the Inflation Reduction Act, for Lights Out and Native Plant proclamations in cities across the country.

for coastal community protections and natural infrastructure that also supports bird colonies, and for better water policies across the West. Audubon staff, chapters, and partners worked on the ground to protect and restore vital habitats and natural spaces.

Read on to learn more about Audubon’s most important advocacy, conservation, and local achievements across the hemisphere this year!.

before the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works about the importance of improving coastal resilience for birds and people.

Audubon was asked to represent the conservation community on important climate adaptation issues and provide input on four pieces of legislation, including the Strengthening Coastal Communities Act of 2022. This is a national priority for Audubon, as it would expand the bipartisan.

and its system of protected areas, protecting vital coastal ecosystems while saving federal tax dollars. This was the first time Audubon’s CEO has been invited to give congressional testimony in over 10 years.

In a huge win for birds and the Great Salt Lake ecosystem, Audubon and The Nature Conservancy were awarded an unprecedented $ 40 million gran to lead and implement a water trust to benefit Great Salt Lake and its wetlands. Audubon’s leadership, scientific expertise, commitment to collaboration, and long-standing conservation record at Great Salt Lake led to this major investment.

is a strategic initiative that promotes the creation, consolidation, management, and strengthening of 100 or more new local strategic protected areas at the subnational level, regional, municipal, ethnic, and private territories covering more than two million hectares in nine Latin American countries. This innovative approach, in partnership with BirdLife International, American Bird Conservancy, and the RedLAC funds.

recently closed the call for proposals phase in Colombia, and soon will have the call for proposals in Peru. Early next year Conserva Aves will reach Bolivia and Ecuador, moving forward with this crucial initiative that responds to climate change challenges in the hemisphere.

Ensuring water flows to Great Salt Lake and its wetlands over the long term is the single most important strategy to prevent further drying of the lake and protecting the birds and people that depend on the health of this irreplaceable ecosystem.

Public Notices

Japan just found 7,000 islands it didn’t know it had

Japan has recounted its islands – and discovered it has 7,000 more than it previously thought.

Digital mapping by the Geospatial Information Authority of Japan (GSI) recently found there to be 14,125 islands in Japanese territory, more than double the figure of 6,852 that has been in official use since a 1987 report by Japan’s Coast Guard.

However, the GSI this week stressed that the new figure reflected advances in surveying technology and the detail of the maps used for the count – it did not change the overall area of land in Japan’s possession.

It said that while there is no international agreement on how to count islands, it had used the same size criterion as the previous survey 35 years ago.

That entailed counting all naturally occurring land areas with a circumference of at least 100 meters (330 feet).

The new number does not include any artificially reclaimed land.

The islands surrounding Japan have been at the heart of several territorial disputes.

Japan lays claim to the Russian-held southern Kuril islands, which Tokyo calls the Northern Territories, a dispute that dates to the end of World War II, when Soviet troops seized them from Japan.

Japan also says it has a historical claim to the uninhabited Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, which it currently administers, but China has repeatedly challenged that claim.

Meanwhile, Japan and South Korea remain locked in a more than 70-year dispute over the sovereignty of a group of islets known as Dokdo by Seoul and Takeshima by Tokyo in the Sea of Japan, which Korea calls the East Sea.

Public Notices

Yosemite National Park to partially reopen after 3-week closure

Yosemite National Park will begin to reopen Saturday with limited access and hours, the US National Park Service has announced. The park remains closed today.

The popular park, nestled in the Sierra Nevada mountains, was closed because of a series of damaging storms that have swept across the region in recent weeks.

Public Notices

Charles and Camilla

Britain’s King Charles III and his wife, Queen Camilla, have been married since 2005. They reportedly met at a polo match in 1970 and became friends when Charles was a prince.

When Charles joined the Royal Navy in 1971, Camilla married cavalry officer Andrew Parker Bowles.

Charles married Diana Spencer in 1981 but then admitted in 1994 that he had been having an extramarital affair with Camilla. Diana confirmed his infidelity and her own the following year.

Camilla got a divorce in 1995, and Charles and Diana divorced in 1996. Camilla all but vanished from public life at the time as public and media support swung behind Diana.

In 1999, Clarence House embarked on a program to reintroduce Camilla to the public with a carefully orchestrated first appearance with Charles outside the Ritz Hotel in London.

Six years later, their decades-long love story culminated in a wedding that had the consent of Charles’ mother, Queen Elizabeth II. Camilla was confirmed as Charles’ official consort and future queen.