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Why the best diet for you is also good for the planet

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Monday, June 10, 2024

Can you eat a diet that’s good for your health and good for the planet?A new study suggests that it’s possible. It found that people who ate mostly minimally processed plant foods such as nuts, beans, fruits, vegetables, whole grains and olive oil, along with modest amounts of meat, fish, eggs and dairy, had lower rates of premature death from heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases.At the same time, their diets had a smaller environmental footprint because they consisted of foods that were grown using relatively less land and water and that were produced with fewer greenhouse gas emissions.The study, published Monday in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, was inspired by a landmark 2019 report from the EAT-Lancet Commission, which designed a “Planetary Health Diet” capable of sustaining 10 billion people and the planet by 2050. The planetary health diet, in broad strokes, encourages people to eat more plants and whole foods alongside small portions of meat and dairy. It was designed to be flexible and adaptable to different cultural, culinary, and personal preferences.The new report is among the first large studies to examine how eating within the contours of the planetary health diet affects a person’s likelihood of dying prematurely from major diseases. The study analyzed data on more than 200,000 men and women in the United States who were followed closely for over three decades. The new study found the following:Lower mortality risk: People whose eating habits most closely adhered to the planetary health diet were 30 percent less likely to die prematurely compared to people who ate the lowest amounts of foods that form the basis of the planetary health diet.Less illness: Planetary health eaters had a 10 percent lower risk of dying from cancer, a 14 percent lower likelihood of dying from cardiovascular diseases, a 47 percent reduction in the risk of dying from lung disease, and a 28 percent lower likelihood of dying of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders.Lower infectious-disease risk: Women whose eating habits closely aligned with the planetary health diet had a 38 percent lower risk of dying of infectious diseases.Better planet health: An environmental impact analysis found that this approach to eating was associated with 29 percent lower greenhouse gas emissions, a 51 percent reduction in cropland use, a 21 percent reduction in fertilizer use and 13 percent lower irrigation and water needs.How to follow a planetary dietIn the study, people whose eating habits adhered closely to the planetary health diet ate large amounts of the following foods:Whole fruits and non-starchy vegetables such as carrots, broccoli, asparagus, cauliflower, cucumber and leafy greens.Peanuts and tree nuts such as walnuts, hazelnuts, pecans, cashews and pistachios.Legumes such as beans, lentils and peas.Chicken and other forms of poultry.Foods that are rich in unsaturated fats, like avocados, olive oil and sunflower oil.Whole grains such as brown rice, wild rice, oatmeal, quinoa and barley, as well as foods that are made with whole grains (for example, whole wheat bread and rye bread)Lower amounts of red and processed meats, eggs, soft drinks, fruit juices and sugary processed foods including candy, cakes, breakfast cereals and desserts.Walter Willett, a senior author of the new study and a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, stressed that adopting a planetary health diet does not require giving up meat.He described it as an omnivorous diet that makes room for two servings a day of animal foods. A typical week on the diet, for example, might include one daily serving of dairy such as milk, cheese, or yogurt, a weekly serving of red meat, one weekly serving of eggs, two weekly servings of poultry, and two weekly servings of fish.The diet prioritizes generous amounts of fruits, nuts and vegetables and a variety of plant sources of protein such as beans, lentils and other legumes, which makes it relatively easy to follow, Willett said.“You can put these pieces together with the flavors and foods of almost every traditional culture,” he added. “There’s a lot of flexibility.”How healthy eating slows climate changeFood production accounts for about 30 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. Much of that is driven by methane emissions from livestock, widespread deforestation, and emissions from food processing, farm machinery, the use of synthetic fertilizers and other aspects of agricultural production.Most of the cropland in America is used to grow just two crops — corn and soy — that are fed to livestock. This practice of monoculture farming can degrade soil, reduce biodiversity and require more irrigation, pesticides and herbicides. Only about 5 percent of farmland in America is used to grow other vegetables, fruits, nuts and legumes, Willett said. Changing our diets and our food production system will not be enough on their own to put the brakes on climate change, but they are important steps, Willett said.“What this study shows is that we can both shift our diets to be far healthier than the average American diet and also at the same time have a substantial impact on slowing down climate change,” he added. “We don’t have to trade off planetary health for human health. We can have both — it’s a double win.”The new study was observational, meaning it found correlations between what people ate and their risk of major diseases, not necessarily cause and effect. It’s possible that other lifestyle behaviors could explain the findings. But the researchers took into account factors such as whether the participants smoked, exercised, drank alcohol, or had family histories of heart disease, cancer and other diseases. The health benefits of eating a diet high in nuts, olive oil, whole grains, fruits and vegetables have also been documented in rigorous clinical trials.Marion Nestle, an emeritus professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at NYU, said the federal government should adopt food policies to promote diets that are not only nutritious but sustainable. “The government could produce clear dietary guidelines, set healthier standards for school meals, support production of food for people — rather than feed for animals or fuel for cars — and stop subsidizing industrial production of meat,” said Nestle, who was not involved in the new study.Do you have a question about healthy eating? Email EatingLab@washpost.com and we may answer your question in a future column.

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Can you eat a diet that’s good for your health and good for the planet?

A new study suggests that it’s possible. It found that people who ate mostly minimally processed plant foods such as nuts, beans, fruits, vegetables, whole grains and olive oil, along with modest amounts of meat, fish, eggs and dairy, had lower rates of premature death from heart disease, cancer and other chronic diseases.

At the same time, their diets had a smaller environmental footprint because they consisted of foods that were grown using relatively less land and water and that were produced with fewer greenhouse gas emissions.

The study, published Monday in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, was inspired by a landmark 2019 report from the EAT-Lancet Commission, which designed a “Planetary Health Diet” capable of sustaining 10 billion people and the planet by 2050. The planetary health diet, in broad strokes, encourages people to eat more plants and whole foods alongside small portions of meat and dairy. It was designed to be flexible and adaptable to different cultural, culinary, and personal preferences.

The new report is among the first large studies to examine how eating within the contours of the planetary health diet affects a person’s likelihood of dying prematurely from major diseases. The study analyzed data on more than 200,000 men and women in the United States who were followed closely for over three decades. The new study found the following:

  • Lower mortality risk: People whose eating habits most closely adhered to the planetary health diet were 30 percent less likely to die prematurely compared to people who ate the lowest amounts of foods that form the basis of the planetary health diet.
  • Less illness: Planetary health eaters had a 10 percent lower risk of dying from cancer, a 14 percent lower likelihood of dying from cardiovascular diseases, a 47 percent reduction in the risk of dying from lung disease, and a 28 percent lower likelihood of dying of Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders.
  • Lower infectious-disease risk: Women whose eating habits closely aligned with the planetary health diet had a 38 percent lower risk of dying of infectious diseases.
  • Better planet health: An environmental impact analysis found that this approach to eating was associated with 29 percent lower greenhouse gas emissions, a 51 percent reduction in cropland use, a 21 percent reduction in fertilizer use and 13 percent lower irrigation and water needs.

How to follow a planetary diet

In the study, people whose eating habits adhered closely to the planetary health diet ate large amounts of the following foods:

  • Whole fruits and non-starchy vegetables such as carrots, broccoli, asparagus, cauliflower, cucumber and leafy greens.
  • Peanuts and tree nuts such as walnuts, hazelnuts, pecans, cashews and pistachios.
  • Legumes such as beans, lentils and peas.
  • Chicken and other forms of poultry.
  • Foods that are rich in unsaturated fats, like avocados, olive oil and sunflower oil.
  • Whole grains such as brown rice, wild rice, oatmeal, quinoa and barley, as well as foods that are made with whole grains (for example, whole wheat bread and rye bread)
  • Lower amounts of red and processed meats, eggs, soft drinks, fruit juices and sugary processed foods including candy, cakes, breakfast cereals and desserts.

Walter Willett, a senior author of the new study and a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, stressed that adopting a planetary health diet does not require giving up meat.

He described it as an omnivorous diet that makes room for two servings a day of animal foods. A typical week on the diet, for example, might include one daily serving of dairy such as milk, cheese, or yogurt, a weekly serving of red meat, one weekly serving of eggs, two weekly servings of poultry, and two weekly servings of fish.

The diet prioritizes generous amounts of fruits, nuts and vegetables and a variety of plant sources of protein such as beans, lentils and other legumes, which makes it relatively easy to follow, Willett said.

“You can put these pieces together with the flavors and foods of almost every traditional culture,” he added. “There’s a lot of flexibility.”

How healthy eating slows climate change

Food production accounts for about 30 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. Much of that is driven by methane emissions from livestock, widespread deforestation, and emissions from food processing, farm machinery, the use of synthetic fertilizers and other aspects of agricultural production.

Most of the cropland in America is used to grow just two crops — corn and soy — that are fed to livestock. This practice of monoculture farming can degrade soil, reduce biodiversity and require more irrigation, pesticides and herbicides. Only about 5 percent of farmland in America is used to grow other vegetables, fruits, nuts and legumes, Willett said.

Changing our diets and our food production system will not be enough on their own to put the brakes on climate change, but they are important steps, Willett said.

“What this study shows is that we can both shift our diets to be far healthier than the average American diet and also at the same time have a substantial impact on slowing down climate change,” he added. “We don’t have to trade off planetary health for human health. We can have both — it’s a double win.”

The new study was observational, meaning it found correlations between what people ate and their risk of major diseases, not necessarily cause and effect. It’s possible that other lifestyle behaviors could explain the findings. But the researchers took into account factors such as whether the participants smoked, exercised, drank alcohol, or had family histories of heart disease, cancer and other diseases. The health benefits of eating a diet high in nuts, olive oil, whole grains, fruits and vegetables have also been documented in rigorous clinical trials.

Marion Nestle, an emeritus professor of nutrition, food studies and public health at NYU, said the federal government should adopt food policies to promote diets that are not only nutritious but sustainable. “The government could produce clear dietary guidelines, set healthier standards for school meals, support production of food for people — rather than feed for animals or fuel for cars — and stop subsidizing industrial production of meat,” said Nestle, who was not involved in the new study.

Do you have a question about healthy eating? Email EatingLab@washpost.com and we may answer your question in a future column.

Read the full story here.
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Montana Judge Allows 2025-26 Wolf Hunting and Trapping Regulations to Stand While Lawsuit Proceeds

A Montana judge is allowing the wolf hunting and trapping regulations the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission adopted earlier this year to stand, saying it's doubtful hunters and trappers will meet the record-high quota of 458 wolves this season

A Helena judge has allowed the wolf hunting and trapping regulations the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission adopted earlier this year to stand, despite flagging “serious concerns” about the state’s ability to accurately estimate Montana’s wolf population.In a 43-page opinion, District Court Judge Christopher Abbott wrote that leaving the 2025-2026 hunting and trapping regulations in place while he considers an underlying lawsuit will not “push wolf populations to an unsustainable level.”In its lawsuit, first filed in 2022, WildEarth Guardians, Project Coyote, Footloose Montana and Gallatin Wildlife Association challenged four laws adopted by the 2021 Montana Legislature aimed at driving wolf numbers down. Earlier this year, the environmental groups added new claims to their lawsuit and asked the court to stop the 2025-2026 regulations from taking effect. The groups argued that a record-high wolf hunting and trapping quota of 458 wolves, paired with the potential for another 100 wolves to be killed for preying on livestock or otherwise getting into conflict with humans, would push the state’s wolf population “toward long-term decline and irreparable harm.” According to the state’s population estimates — figures that the environmental groups dispute — there are approximately 1,100 wolves across the state.In a Dec. 19 press release about the decision, Connie Poten with Footloose Montana described the ruling as a “severe setback,” but argued that the “resulting slaughter will only strengthen our ongoing case for the protection of this vital species.”“The fight for wolves is deep and broad, based in science, connection, humaneness and necessity. Wolves will not die in vain,” Poten said.Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks declined to comment on the order, citing the ongoing litigation. Montana Sportsmen for Fish and Wildlife and the Outdoor Heritage Coalition, nonprofit groups that backed the state’s position in the litigation, could not be reached for comment on the order by publication time Monday afternoon.The order comes more than a month after a two-hour hearing on the request for an injunction, and about three weeks after the trapping season opened across the majority of the state. The trapping season is set to close no later than March 15, 2026.During the Nov. 14 hearing at the Lewis and Clark County courthouse, Alexander Scolavino argued on behalf of Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks and the Montana Fish and Wildlife Commission that hunters, trappers and wildlife managers won’t come close to killing 558 wolves this season. Scolavino added that the highest number shot or trapped in a single season was 350 wolves in 2020 — well shy of the 458-wolf quota the commission, the governor-appointed board that sets hunting seasons for game species and furbearers, adopted in August.Abbott agreed with Scolavino’s argument, writing in his order that it’s unlikely that hunters and trappers will “achieve anything near the quota established by the commission.” To reinforce his claim, he noted that hunters and trappers have not killed 334 wolves — the quota commissioners adopted for the 2024-2025 season — in any of the past five seasons. “In short, nothing suggests that the 2025/2026 season is likely to push wolf populations to an unsustainable level or cause them irreparable injury,” he concluded.Abbott seemed to suggest that livestock-oriented conflicts are waning and that it’s unlikely that the state will authorize the killing of 100 “conflict” wolves. He noted that livestock depredations dropped from “a high of 233 in 2009 to 100 per year or less today.” On other issues — namely the Constitutional environmental rights asserted by the plaintiffs and the reliability of the state’s wolf population-estimation model — Abbott appeared to side with the plaintiffs. Those issues remain unresolved in the ongoing litigation before the court.Abbott wrote that the plaintiffs “are likely to show that a sustainable wolf population in Montana forms part of the ‘environmental life support system’ of the state.” The environmental groups had argued in their filings that the existing wolf-management framework “will deplete and degrade Montana’s wolf population,” running afoul of the state’s duty to “preserve the right to a clean and healthful environment.”In his order, Abbott incorporated material from the plaintiffs’ filings regarding the economic and ecological benefits of wolves, including “the suppression of overabundant elk, deer and coyote populations,” “restoring vegetation that aids water quality, songbirds and insect pollinators,” and “generating income and jobs” by contributing to the wildlife-watching economy anchored by Yellowstone National Park.Abbott also expressed “serious concerns” about the way the state estimates wolf numbers — a model that relies, among other things, on wolf sightings reported by elk hunters — but ultimately concluded that the court is currently “unequipped” to referee “the palace intrigues of academia” in the wildlife population-modeling arena. In the press release about the decision, the environmental groups described these pieces of Abbott’s order as “serious and valid questions” that the court must still address.Another lawsuit relating to the 2025-2026 wolf regulations is ongoing. On Sept. 30, Rep. Paul Fielder, R-Thompson Falls, and Sen. Shannon Maness, R-Dillon, joined an outfitter from Gallatin County and the Outdoor Heritage Coalition (which intervened in the environmental groups’ litigation) to push the state to loosen regulations by, for example, lengthening the trapping season and expanding the tools hunters or trappers can use to pursue and kill wolves. The plaintiffs in that lawsuit argue that liberalizing the hunting and trapping season would reaffirm the “opportunity to harvest wild fish and wild game animals enshrined in the Montana Constitution,” and bring the state into alignment with a 2021 law directing the commission to adopt regulations with an “intent to reduce the wolf population.”According to the state’s wolf management dashboard, 83 wolves have been shot or trapped as of Dec. 22. The department closed the two wolf management units closest to Yellowstone National Park to further hunting and trapping earlier this year after three wolves were killed in each of those units. This story was originally published by Montana Free Press and distributed through a partnership with The Associated Press.Copyright 2025 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Photos You Should See – December 2025

Animals
Health
Science

Pink platypus spotted in Gippsland is cute – but don’t get too excited

Biologist says monotreme a Victorian fisher has nicknamed Pinky is ‘unusual but not exceptional’Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastCody Stylianou thought he saw a huge trout. But, skimming just below the surface, it was moving differently than a fish would.The creature surfaced and, amazed, the Victorian fisher reached for his phone. Swimming in front of him was a pink platypus. Continue reading...

Cody Stylianou thought he saw a huge trout. But, skimming just below the surface, it was moving differently than a fish would.The creature surfaced and, amazed, the Victorian fisher reached for his phone. Swimming in front of him was a pink platypus.Stylianou regularly fishes in the Gippsland spot, which he is keeping secret to protect the rare animal. He thinks it could be the same one he saw years ago, just older and bigger.“The bill and feet are super obviously pink,” he says. “When he did go a bit further into sunlit areas, he was easy to follow underwater, which is how I got so many videos of him surfacing.”Stylianou had been on his first trout fishing trip of the season in September when he saw the platypus, which he has nicknamed “Pinky”. He watched it feed at the top of the tannin-stained river for about 15 minutes.Sign up: AU Breaking News email“I’ve seen other platypus in the same river system, just regular coloured ones,” he says. “Probably about five to eight of them over the years, from memory. Normally, they just pop up at the top of the water and then disappear once they see me.”After Stylinaou shared footage of the monotreme, commenters online speculated that it could have been a rare albino platypus. But the biologist Jeff Williams says it is just lighter in colour than what most would expect.“Platypus do vary a lot in colour,” the director of the Australian Platypus Conservancy says. “And this one’s at the extreme end of the light ones. It’s not one that we consider should be added to the list of albino and leucistic ones.”Just as humans have different coloured hair or skin pigment, platypus also come in different variations, Williams says. He said the platypus captured on video was “unusual but not exceptional”.“What I’ve seen and what every other leading platypus person has looked at, it says, is that it’s well within the sort of variation in colour that one would expect,” he says.“Let’s put it this way, it’s cute, but it’s not a breakthrough … We think this is just one of the extreme ends. Every so often, you will get a genetic anomaly that just throws up things, just as it does with some humans, who have more freckles and so on.“It’s somewhat unusual, but it’s nothing to get particularly excited about, we’re afraid.”Sniffer dogs are being trained to track down threatened platypus populations – videoThe platypus is listed as near-threatened on the International Union for Conservation of Nature. There has also been a decline in Victorian populations, making them more vulnerable, Williams says.“Platypus were in significant decline up until about the 1990s when all the impact of European settlement on our waterways was becoming apparent,” he says.“We messed up pretty much the flow of every river we’ve got. We cleared native vegetation along most of our waterways, and, not surprisingly, that put a lot of pressure on the platypus population.”Replanting programs along the waterways, and consideration of environmental impacts near rivers, have started to help the population come back.“We’ve still got a way to go, and we can’t be complacent,” Williams says.“But the good news at the moment is most of the survey work that’s being done around the place is suggesting numbers that are coming back, certainly the number of sightings in some places where there was concern.”

Animals
Conservation
Nature

A “scientific sandbox” lets researchers explore the evolution of vision systems

The AI-powered tool could inform the design of better sensors and cameras for robots or autonomous vehicles.

Why did humans evolve the eyes we have today?While scientists can’t go back in time to study the environmental pressures that shaped the evolution of the diverse vision systems that exist in nature, a new computational framework developed by MIT researchers allows them to explore this evolution in artificial intelligence agents.The framework they developed, in which embodied AI agents evolve eyes and learn to see over many generations, is like a “scientific sandbox” that allows researchers to recreate different evolutionary trees. The user does this by changing the structure of the world and the tasks AI agents complete, such as finding food or telling objects apart.This allows them to study why one animal may have evolved simple, light-sensitive patches as eyes, while another has complex, camera-type eyes.The researchers’ experiments with this framework showcase how tasks drove eye evolution in the agents. For instance, they found that navigation tasks often led to the evolution of compound eyes with many individual units, like the eyes of insects and crustaceans.On the other hand, if agents focused on object discrimination, they were more likely to evolve camera-type eyes with irises and retinas.This framework could enable scientists to probe “what-if” questions about vision systems that are difficult to study experimentally. It could also guide the design of novel sensors and cameras for robots, drones, and wearable devices that balance performance with real-world constraints like energy efficiency and manufacturability.“While we can never go back and figure out every detail of how evolution took place, in this work we’ve created an environment where we can, in a sense, recreate evolution and probe the environment in all these different ways. This method of doing science opens to the door to a lot of possibilities,” says Kushagra Tiwary, a graduate student at the MIT Media Lab and co-lead author of a paper on this research.He is joined on the paper by co-lead author and fellow graduate student Aaron Young; graduate student Tzofi Klinghoffer; former postdoc Akshat Dave, who is now an assistant professor at Stony Brook University; Tomaso Poggio, the Eugene McDermott Professor in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, an investigator in the McGovern Institute, and co-director of the Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines; co-senior authors Brian Cheung, a postdoc in the  Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines and an incoming assistant professor at the University of California San Francisco; and Ramesh Raskar, associate professor of media arts and sciences and leader of the Camera Culture Group at MIT; as well as others at Rice University and Lund University. The research appears today in Science Advances.Building a scientific sandboxThe paper began as a conversation among the researchers about discovering new vision systems that could be useful in different fields, like robotics. To test their “what-if” questions, the researchers decided to use AI to explore the many evolutionary possibilities.“What-if questions inspired me when I was growing up to study science. With AI, we have a unique opportunity to create these embodied agents that allow us to ask the kinds of questions that would usually be impossible to answer,” Tiwary says.To build this evolutionary sandbox, the researchers took all the elements of a camera, like the sensors, lenses, apertures, and processors, and converted them into parameters that an embodied AI agent could learn.They used those building blocks as the starting point for an algorithmic learning mechanism an agent would use as it evolved eyes over time.“We couldn’t simulate the entire universe atom-by-atom. It was challenging to determine which ingredients we needed, which ingredients we didn’t need, and how to allocate resources over those different elements,” Cheung says.In their framework, this evolutionary algorithm can choose which elements to evolve based on the constraints of the environment and the task of the agent.Each environment has a single task, such as navigation, food identification, or prey tracking, designed to mimic real visual tasks animals must overcome to survive. The agents start with a single photoreceptor that looks out at the world and an associated neural network model that processes visual information.Then, over each agent’s lifetime, it is trained using reinforcement learning, a trial-and-error technique where the agent is rewarded for accomplishing the goal of its task. The environment also incorporates constraints, like a certain number of pixels for an agent’s visual sensors.“These constraints drive the design process, the same way we have physical constraints in our world, like the physics of light, that have driven the design of our own eyes,” Tiwary says.Over many generations, agents evolve different elements of vision systems that maximize rewards.Their framework uses a genetic encoding mechanism to computationally mimic evolution, where individual genes mutate to control an agent’s development.For instance, morphological genes capture how the agent views the environment and control eye placement; optical genes determine how the eye interacts with light and dictate the number of photoreceptors; and neural genes control the learning capacity of the agents.Testing hypothesesWhen the researchers set up experiments in this framework, they found that tasks had a major influence on the vision systems the agents evolved.For instance, agents that were focused on navigation tasks developed eyes designed to maximize spatial awareness through low-resolution sensing, while agents tasked with detecting objects developed eyes focused more on frontal acuity, rather than peripheral vision.Another experiment indicated that a bigger brain isn’t always better when it comes to processing visual information. Only so much visual information can go into the system at a time, based on physical constraints like the number of photoreceptors in the eyes.“At some point a bigger brain doesn’t help the agents at all, and in nature that would be a waste of resources,” Cheung says.In the future, the researchers want to use this simulator to explore the best vision systems for specific applications, which could help scientists develop task-specific sensors and cameras. They also want to integrate LLMs into their framework to make it easier for users to ask “what-if” questions and study additional possibilities.“There’s a real benefit that comes from asking questions in a more imaginative way. I hope this inspires others to create larger frameworks, where instead of focusing on narrow questions that cover a specific area, they are looking to answer questions with a much wider scope,” Cheung says.This work was supported, in part, by the Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) Mathematics for the Discovery of Algorithms and Architectures (DIAL) program.

Animals
Culture
Energy

Common household rat poisons found to pose unacceptable risk to wildlife as animal advocates push for ban

Environmentalists say proposed temporary suspension of second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides ‘doesn’t go far enough’Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastCommonly available rat poisons pose unacceptable risks to native wildlife, according to a government review that has stopped short of recommending a blanket ban on the products, to the consternation of animal advocates.The long-awaited review of first- and second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides – FGARs and SGARs – has recommended the cancellation of some products, but a large array of waxes, pellets and blocks could continue to be sold to consumers subject to stricter labelling and conditions of use. Continue reading...

Commonly available rat poisons pose unacceptable risks to native wildlife, according to a government review that has stopped short of recommending a blanket ban on the products, to the consternation of animal advocates.The long-awaited review of first- and second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides – FGARs and SGARs – has recommended the cancellation of some products, but a large array of waxes, pellets and blocks could continue to be sold to consumers subject to stricter labelling and conditions of use.Baits containing anticoagulant rodenticides are widely available in supermarkets and garden stores such as Bunnings, Coles and Woolworths.The baits have come under scrutiny because they have been found in dead native animals such as tawny frogmouths, powerful owls and quolls that had eaten poisoned rats and mice.The second-generation products are more toxic and are banned from public sale in the United States and parts of Canada and highly restricted in the European Union.Commercially available rat poisons have been found in dead native animals. Photograph: Fabio De Paola/The GuardianConsumers can identify SGARs in Australia by checking whether they contain one of the following active ingredients: brodifacoum, bromadiolone, difethialone, difenacoum and flocoumafen. There are three FGAR active ingredients registered for use in Australia: warfarin, coumatetralyl and diphacinone.The Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA), in response to the review which was published Tuesday, has proposed a temporary suspension of SGARs while public consultation about the recommendations is under way. If the suspension goes ahead the APVMA said the affected products could still be used, but only in accordance with the proposed stricter conditions.“If suspended, the importation or manufacture of SGARs would be illegal. They could only be sold if they meet the new strict conditions around pack size and use,” a spokesperson said.Holly Parsons, of BirdLife Australia, said the review “doesn’t go far enough and crucially, fails to address secondary poisoning that is killing owls and birds of prey” such as when, for example, a native bird ate a poisoned rat.“Despite overwhelming evidence provided in support of the complete removal of SGARs from public sale, we’re yet to see proposed restrictions that come close to achieving this,” Parsons said.She said consumers should be able to “walk into stores under the assumption that the products available to them aren’t going to inadvertently kill native animals” but the APVMA has put “the responsibility on to the consumer with an expectation that labels are fully read and followed – and we know that won’t be the case”.The review also recommended cancelling the registration of anticoagulant rodenticides baits that come in powder and liquid form or which do not contain dyes or bittering agents, finding they do not meet safety criteria.But it found other baits sold as waxes, pellets and blocks could continue to be sold to consumers with some changes to labelling and conditions of use.Sign up: AU Breaking News emailThe APVMA found that under “current instructions” it could not be satisfied that these types of products would not have unintended, harmful effects on non-target animals, including native wildlife, nor that they would not pose undue safety risks to people who handled them including vulnerable people such as children.But it found the conditions of product registration and other “relevant particulars” could be varied in such a way as to allow the authority “to be satisfied that products will meet the safety criteria”.Some of the proposed new instructions would include limiting mice baits to indoor use only when in tamper-resistant bait stations; placing outdoor rat baits in tamper-proof stations within two metres of outside a building; changes to pack sizes; and tighter directions for the clean-up and disposal of carcasses and uneaten baits.The recommendations are subject to three months of public consultation before the authority makes a final decision.John White is an associate professor of wildlife and conservation biology at Deakin University. In 2023 he worked with a team of researchers that studied rat poison in dead tawny frogmouths and owls, who found 95% of frogmouths had rodenticides in their livers and 68% of frogmouths tested had liver rodenticide levels consistent with causing death or significant toxicological impacts.He said the authority’s proposed changes failed to properly tackle the problem that SGARS, from an environmental perspective, were “just too toxic”.White said even if the authority tightened the conditions of use and labelling rules there was no guarantee that consumers would follow new instructions. “We should be completely banning these things, not tinkering at the edges,” he said.A spokesperson for Woolworths said the supermarket would await the APVMA’s final recommendations “to inform a responsible approach to these products, together with the suppliers of them”.They said the chain stocked “a small range of second-generation anticoagulant rodenticides for customers who might have a problem with rats or mice in their home, workplace, and especially in rural areas where it’s important for customers to have access to these products” while also selling “a number of alternative options”.Bunnings and Coles declined to comment.

Animals
Government

Trail Cameras in Vermont Captured Something Strange: Moths Sipping a Moose's Tears

Tear-drinking, known as lachryphagy, has mostly been observed in the tropics, so scientists were somewhat surprised to find the unusual behavior so far north

Trail Cameras in Vermont Captured Something Strange: Moths Sipping a Moose’s Tears Tear-drinking, known as lachryphagy, has mostly been observed in the tropics, so scientists were somewhat surprised to find the unusual behavior so far north Sarah Kuta - Daily Correspondent December 16, 2025 8:49 a.m. A trail camera in Vermont captured 80 photos of moths fluttering around a moose's head, likely slurping up its tears. Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department Laurence Clarfeld was sifting through images captured by a trail camera in Vermont when he came across a photo that stopped him in his tracks. Clarfeld, an environmental scientist at the University of Vermont, knew he was looking at a moose. But, beyond that, he was totally perplexed. “It almost looked like the moose had two [additional] eyes,” he tells Scientific American’s Gennaro Tomma. When he flipped through more photos in the sequence, Clarfeld finally understood what he was seeing: Moths were sipping tears straight from the ungulate’s eyes. Scientists have observed this unusual phenomenon, known as lachryphagy, among other types of animals. But, as far as anyone knows, the photos represent the first documented evidence of moths drinking moose tears. Clarfeld and his colleagues describe the encounter in a new paper published November 20 in the journal Ecosphere.  Moths seen drinking moose tears for first time ever The photos were captured in the early morning hours of June 19, 2024, in the Green Mountain National Forest, a large swath of protected woodlands in southern Vermont. Researchers had deployed them as part of an ongoing wildlife survey by the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department. In total, the camera captured 80 snapshots of the moths fluttering around a moose’s head. The photos don’t specifically show the moths’ proboscises, the long, slender, straw-like mouthparts they use to suck nectar from flowers. But lachryphagy is the “most plausible explanation,” the researchers write in the paper. Roughly a year later, a colleague captured video footage that appeared to show the same thing—moths hovering around a moose’s eyes, per Scientific American. Scientists have previously observed moths, bees and butterflies feeding on the tears of other animals. They’ve documented solitary bees drinking the tears of yellow-spotted river turtles in Ecuador, stingless bees harvesting human tears in Thailand, erebid moths feasting on the tears of ringed kingfishers in Colombia and erebid moths slurping up the tears of sleeping black-chinned antbirds in Brazil. But most of these instances have occurred in subtropical and tropical regions. Only one known case of lachryphagy has been documented outside the tropics, according to the researchers: a moth eating the tears of a horse in Arkansas. At first, researcher Laurence Clarfeld didn't know what he was seeing when he spotted moths hovering around a moose's eyes. Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department It may be that lachryphagy is simply more common in the tropics. But it’s also possible that “not a lot of scientists are looking in [other] places,” Akito Kawahara, an entomologist at the Florida Museum of Natural History who was not involved with the research, tells Scientific American. Why do moths and other insects feed on tears? It’s not entirely clear, but scientists suspect they may be seeking out certain essential nutrients, like sodium, during periods when those substances may be harder to find elsewhere. They may also be looking for protein boost. Insects typically get protein from plant nectar, but tears may be a handy backup. “Vertebrate fluids are the main alternative source for obtaining proteins,” Leandro Moraes, a biologist at the University of São Paulo who observed tear-feeding moths in Brazil, told National Geographic’s Sandrine Ceurstemont in 2018. Did you know? Resourceful insects Aside from tears, butterflies and moths have been known to take advantage of whatever resources are available, gathering up nutrient-rich liquids in and around soil, feces and carrion, including sweat and blood. Scientists call this feeding behavior “puddling.” Though lachryphagy appears to be relatively rare in nature, researchers still want to learn more about this unusual behavior. The tear drinker obviously benefits, but what about the tear supplier? For now, the relationship appears to be fairly one-sided—and might even be harmful to the host. In moose, for instance, eye-visiting moths could be transmitting pathogens that cause keratoconjunctivitis, which can lead to eye lesions and “significant health impacts,” the researchers write in the paper. For now, though, that’s just a hypothesis. Now that tear-drinking has been observed outside its typical range, the researchers are curious to know where else this behavior might be taking place, and among which other species. They’re encouraging wildlife scientists to keep an eye out because lachryphagy might ultimately be “more widespread than the lack of past records would suggest,” they write. Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

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