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A 16-year study of mountain forest songbirds across New York and New England, including thrushes, warblers and other iconic species, has documented their population changes. Although species like Black-capped Chickadee and Swainson’s Thrush have thrived in the mountains during recent decades, some species that depend on the region’s evergreen forests of spruce and fir – notably Blackpoll Warbler – appear to have undergone substantial declines.

A new study from the Telethon Institute for Child Health Research has revealed a potential link between professional pesticide treatments in the home and a higher risk of children developing brain tumours. Published this week in the international journal Cancer Causes & Control, the study found that exposure by parents to professional pesticide treatments prior to conception could increase the chances of a child developing a brain tumour.

Historian Heiko Stoff has recently sketched a fascinating controversy in the 1950’s on chemical risk assessment. Two renowned scientists in the Farbstoffkommission (Dye Committee) of the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Community), pharmacologist Hermann Druckrey and biochemist (and Nobel Prize winner) Adolf Butenandt, were advocates of a preventive risk approach. Only substances with a reversible mechanism of action and dose-dependent toxicology were acceptable in their eyes because safe exposure concentrations below a threshold of toxicity could be defined.

The annual arrival of the river herring signifies the official arrival of spring. It draws many of us to the run, to witness the upward migration of these beloved fish, who after surviving several years at sea, return to spawn in the same exact lake or pond where they were born. River Herring [Alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus) and Blueback Herring (Alosa aestivalis)] are referred to as a “keystone species” as they are a vital part of the marine, estuarine, and freshwater food webs.

More than 15 southern waterways appear on a list of rivers "lost or in noticeable decline" as public trout fisheries. The list was coordinated by NZ Federation of Freshwater Anglers executive member Steve Gerard. Southern waterways appearing on the list include the Pomahaka, Oreti, Makarewa, Mokoreta, Upukerora, Whitestone and Mararoa rivers, and the Waipahi, Otamita, Waimea, Lora, Otapiri, Dunsdale, Hedgehope, Titipua, Waimatuku, Orauea and Mimihau streams. Gerard said New Zealand's trout fisheries were "going downhill".

Along its 46,000km coastline, the Mediterranean Sea supports around 150 million people living along its shores. The report Reviving the Economy of the Mediterranean Sea: Actions for a sustainable future, launched today, shows that the Mediterranean Sea plays a fundamental role in the region's economy but that the sea's underlying natural asset base – which supports much of the economy and community wellbeing – is eroding.

Frogs, toads and salamanders often fall through the cracks of scientific study, but according to recently published research from Montana State University, they play a role so important they should be incorporated into strategies for conserving freshwater fisheries. In his first peer-reviewed paper as sole author, Niall Clancy, 22, said that native fish populations continue to decline around the world despite advances in management practices. Therefore, fisheries managers might want to add new approaches to the old.

The spotted handfish (Brachionichthys hirsutus), endemic to the Derwent River, is listed as critically endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature red list. It is also listed as endangered on the Tasmanian threatened species list. Handfish are coastal ­anglerfish that walk on the sea floor on their “hands”. There are 14 species distributed across South East Australia, with seven endemic to Tasmania and Bass Strait. Spotted handfish once extended up Tasmania’s East Coast as well as Frederick Henry Bay in the South East.

The tea houses in a fishing town in northern Istanbul were crowded with Turkish fishermen in the mornings in September, when they usually should have been busy on the sea as the fishing season just began. To the fishermen in Rumeli Kavagi at the northern mouth of Istanbul's Bosphorus Strait linking the Marmara Sea and the Black Sea, their disappointment resulted from the sharp decline in fish stocks. Fishing is the sole source of income for most residents in the town, which has been a major supplier of fish to Istanbul and other cities in the region.