Science & Earth

Chester Zoo and partners report that reintroduced greater Bermuda land snails have established six colonies in Bermuda after captive breeding and releases following their 2014 rediscovery.

An elasmosaur found on the Puntledge River in 1988 by amateur collector Mike Trask helped spark sustained community-led paleontology in British Columbia and contributed to new societies and provincial fossil management policies.

NASA delayed Artemis II by at least a month after a hydrogen leak was found during fueling; the leak came from a quick-disconnect connector and officials plan another wet dress rehearsal before agreeing to a launch date.

A dataset provides daily lake-wide algal bloom indices (extent, intensity, severity) for Lake of the Woods during the June–October monitoring season, derived from ESA MERIS (2002–2012) and ESA OLCI (2016–present) satellite sensors.

The federal government says Randal Reef's clean-up is delayed to 2027 to repair a structural issue; officials report the contaminated sediment inside the containment structure is held in place.

A University of Exeter researcher has secured Leverhulme funding for a four-year project to build a theory of scientific error, assemble a database of error types and strategies, and create benchmarks to test how AI systems reason about experimental error.

A University of Leeds-led study tracked 76 regrowing tropical-forest sites for up to 20 years and found nitrogen additions roughly doubled recovery rates during the first decade, while phosphorus alone did not produce the same response.

Reports say Russian billionaire Pavel Durov has offered frozen sperm through his clinic and claims to have fathered about 100 children, while Chinese billionaire Xu Bo is reported to have arranged more than 100 U.S.-born children via surrogacy; the article raises ethical concerns about responsibility for mothers and children.

The federal government is closing the Mactaquac Biodiversity Facility and discontinuing the Atlantic salmon live gene bank and related stocking work; scientists, conservationists and the Wolastoqey Nation say they were not consulted and warn of harm to salmon and treaty rights.

Two people were escorted out after interrupting Premier Doug Ford at a Mississauga Board of Trade event to protest mercury contamination at Grassy Narrows; Peel Police said no arrests were made.

A judicial review started in Penticton over the provincially approved Summerland gravel pit mine, with petitioners citing environmental and procedural concerns; hearings are continuing this week.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans released a five-year Whalesafe Fishing Gear Strategy to expand whalesafe equipment and identify high-risk entanglement areas in Atlantic provinces.

The federal government announced a five-year 'whalesafe fishing gear strategy' to promote on‑demand gear and lower‑breaking links intended to reduce North Atlantic right whale entanglements.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada has published the Whalesafe Fishing Gear Strategy to reduce whale entanglements by promoting on‑demand ropeless systems and low breaking‑strength rope in high‑risk areas, with pilots planned for 2027, management areas by 2028 and wider rollout to high‑risk fisheries by 2030.

NASA discovered a liquid hydrogen leak during a wet dress rehearsal and now says March is the earliest possible launch window; the four-person Artemis II crew has been released from quarantine and will return about two weeks before the next launch opportunity.

Susan Bryan, a volunteer nature reserve liaison with the Thunder Bay Field Naturalists, was named a community champion by Ontario Nature on World Wetlands Day for her long-standing work protecting local wetlands; the group protects more than 11,000 acres in the district.

A study of more than 600 residents in the Dehcho and Sahtu regions and Old Crow, Yukon found that traditional foods such as lake trout, ducks and geese are linked to higher hair mercury measurements, but overall mercury exposure remained relatively low and within health guidelines.

Colossal Biosciences and the UAE unveiled the Colossal BioVault and World Preservation Lab at Dubai’s Museum of the Future, a public-facing facility intended to preserve endangered species and genetic material. The UAE led an initial $60 million investment to support the project, which aims to store millions of samples and create a distributed global network.

The Nature Conservancy of Canada will protect 91 hectares of the Marlborough Wetland in south Ottawa after the family of the late Doug Smith donated the land through the federal ecological gifts program; the conservancy plans an inventory and restoration work, and Ontario Nature has noted recent reductions in provincial wetland protections.

A fully integrated numerical groundwater–surface water climate model using HydroGeoSphere was developed for a gauged basin in the discontinuous permafrost zone, and the resulting dataset is provided to verify numerical methods and test conceptualizations for regional-scale modelling.

Research, expert interviews and modelling in the article suggest responders would face major challenges containing a large bitumen spill off B.C.'s north coast because of severe weather, fast currents and long travel times for equipment.

J.D. Irving has proposed swapping some protected Crown lands it could harvest in exchange for conserving other areas, and several New Brunswick municipalities have asked the natural resources minister to weigh local social and economic interests; Riverview council will vote Feb. 9 on whether to join a letter supporting that request.

A national report by the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction profiles the City of Merritt's STUWI(x) Naturalization Project, which includes a voluntary buyout program and plans to remove permanent structures from a repeatedly flooded area to restore the river and floodplain.

Jeremy Hansen, from Ailsa Craig, is set to join NASA's Artemis II mission that could launch as early as Feb. 8; his former school and local community in southwestern Ontario have organized tributes and events ahead of the flight.

Several Toronto women have moved from corporate roles into full-time work in sustainable fashion, including vintage retail, personal styling and content creation, and they emphasize curation, inclusion and longer-lasting clothing.

B.C. is providing $3.3 million for Fraser Valley flood planning, and Comox has declared a flooding state of emergency.

Dalhousie is seeking approval for a 16-month master of fisheries science that would emphasize practical training in analytics, field work and stock assessment, and the faculty is preparing for a first cohort of 15–25 students in September.

Ontario's Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry has proposed population targets for black bears across 29 regions and is seeking public feedback; the plan would introduce a lottery tag system if local populations fall below targets and could permit a second harvest where populations exceed upper thresholds.

NASA's Artemis program plans crewed lunar missions beginning with Artemis II, a 10-day flyby carrying four astronauts including Canada's Jeremy Hansen, and Artemis III aims for a south-pole lunar landing around 2028.

Astronomers report detecting thiepine (C6H6S), a 13-atom ring-shaped sulfur-bearing molecule, in the molecular cloud G+0.693-0.027 near the Milky Way’s center. The identification was confirmed by matching laboratory spectra from an electrical-discharge synthesis to radio observations from IRAM and Yebes telescopes.