Nov 23rd, 2009 at 3:30PM: The Archaeological Survey of India has been struggling to control water damage to ancient Buddhist paintings in the Ajanta Caves in the state of Maharashtra. The 29 caves in this UNESCO World Heritage Site are decorated with sculptures and paintings dating back as far as the second century B.C. They depict Buddhist tales and images of the Buddha and various Bodhisattvas. The addition of new ...Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.
conservation posts
Ancient Buddhist caves under threat
Nov 23rd, 2009 at 3:30PM: The Archaeological Survey of India has been struggling to control water damage to ancient Buddhist paintings in the Ajanta Caves in the state of Maharashtra. The 29 caves in this UNESCO World Heritage Site are decorated with sculptures and paintings dating back as far as the second century B.C. They depict Buddhist tales and images of the Buddha and various Bodhisattvas. The addition of new ...Remote African nation saves rare giraffes from extinction
Nov 10th, 2009 at 9:30AM: Niger doesn't get in the news much. This landlocked Saharan nation doesn't have much in the way of national resources, is listed by the UN as one of the world's least developed countries, and yet it has a serious attitude towards conservation. Niger is home to a unique subspecies of giraffe, pictured here. Poaching and desertification had reduced its numbers to only fifty individuals a decade ago, ...The Spice Isle: Making the most of a cruise stopover in Grenada
Nov 6th, 2009 at 2:00PM:
It's official -- the cruise season in Grenada has begun. Actually, the first day of the season fell on a day when I was there recently. I might've missed the influx because I was across the island during most of their 12-hour stay, but I saw the big boat sail in during my breakfast, and sail away during my dinner. Ideally, you'd want several days on the island where you could see waterfalls in ...Guaranteed green in Las Vegas
Aug 18th, 2009 at 4:00PM:
tweetmeme_url = 'http://www.gadling.com/2009/08/18/guaranteed-green-in-las-vegas/'; tweetmeme_source = 'Gadling';
You may hope to find a lot of green in Las Vegas, and there's one way to ensure you can at least say your stay involved a lot of green: stay --and play -- in an eco-friendly hotel and casino.
Harrah's Entertainment (parent company to Caesars Palace, Flamingo, Bally's, Rio), has ...How green is your hotel?
Aug 7th, 2009 at 8:00AM:
Not too long ago, any hotel that had one of those "please reuse your towels" signs in the bathroom was considered "green". But with new hotels upping the ante by adding more features that reduce waste and environmental impact, it takes a lot more than that to truly be green. Here are some of the greenest hotel features to look for in an eco-friendly hotel.
Sheet and Towel Reuse Programs ...Saving Endangered Species Through Tourism
May 3rd, 2009 at 8:00AM: One of the real successes in ecotourism over the past decade or so has been the use of tourist dollars to aid in wildlife conservation. Many countries have discovered that travelers are willing to pay a good deal of money for the opportunity to observe wildlife in its natural habitat, and those funds can go a long way to not only protecting that wildlife, but building an economy as well. With ...Afghan wildlife refuge: no hand grenade fishing
Apr 24th, 2009 at 8:00AM: Afghanistan is going green. The war-torn country has declared Band-e-Amir its first conservation area. While it may be premature to book your trip to this spectacle, at least there's hope that you'll get to enjoy it someday.
Band-e-Amir, like the rest of Afghanistan, has had a rough run over the past 30 years. Let's face it: that's how long the country's been engaged in one war or another. The ...Star Island won't make you change
Jan 11th, 2009 at 9:00AM: It seems like every effort to "go green" requires a change of behavior. Hotels let you choose to use towels or sheets twice. Your parents instructed you to turn the lights off when leaving a room. These measures can affect change, but they usually don't. Despite the clear benefits, people just won't change. But, what if you could find a way to protect the environment without having to change any ...Catching the travel bug: Attack of the killer mosqitoes
Nov 6th, 2008 at 1:00PM: Welcome to Catching the Travel Bug, Gadling's mini-series on getting sick on the road, prevailing and loving travel throughout. Five of our bloggers will be telling their stories from around the globe for the next five weeks. Submit your best story about catching the travel bug in the comments and we'll publish our favorite few at the end of the series. The swamp here could be the stuff of ...Dispatch from China: Tracking and playing with pandas (part 2 of 2)
May 20th, 2008 at 9:30AM: Read part 1 of this story here. The excited cry of a park ranger pierces the stillness of a bamboo forest high in the Min Mountains. Zhan Xiangjiang, an ecologist who I'm hanging out with for the day, bounds through waist-deep snowdrifts to investigate. Catching up with the ranger, he kneels down and points at a small, round object that, at first glance, looks like a greenish yam. "Smell this!" ...Dispatch from China: Tracking and playing with pandas (part 1 of 2)
May 19th, 2008 at 9:00AM: On a single-lane dirt road wending between misty crags deep in Sichuan Province, traffic has slowed to a crawl. Hundreds of dump trucks and steamrollers are expanding the only road to Wolong Nature Reserve into a modern freeway. Conservation biologist George Schaller of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York City was the first Westerner to study giant pandas in China when he came to ...Dispatch from Sumatra's nastiest swamp (part 1 of 2)
Apr 29th, 2008 at 9:00AM: Forget for a moment the dreadful conditions in this miserable Sumatran swamp, which include being eaten by tigers (seven in the surrounding area last year). Just getting here is an ordeal in itself. Start by taking the 1,400-kilometer flight from the capital, Jakarta, to Sumatra's bustling northern port, Medan. Then it's a grueling twelve-hour ride straight across the island's dramatic ...A giant rat in front of your tent
Dec 21st, 2007 at 3:00PM: So I've been following the discoveries coming out of New Guinea's so-called "Lost World," a patch of mountainous jungle in the Mamberamo Basin. It was only explored for the first time in 2005, when dozens of new plants and species were discovered. This time around, the research expedition--organized by Conservation International--found an almost 3 pound Mallomys giant rat five times the size of a ...Better book those diving trips fast
Dec 13th, 2007 at 9:32PM: This week's issue of Science is devoted to coral reefs, specifically the dire condition they're in and the dangers they face. Not sure if anyone else here reads the magazine as religiously as me (give me a shout-out if you do), but they do a great job in highlighting the fast-eroding plight of the world's coral. Did you know that global warming, disease, and humans have already destroyed 20% of ...NYT's series on China
Dec 6th, 2007 at 3:00PM: The New York Times has been running a series this year discussing China's remarkable economic growth, and how that has impacted the country's environment. The latest in this saga (we're on part 6) is the under-reported tale of the last two soft-shell Yangtze River turtles in the world. Having reported from the Yangtze River, I can tell you that the place is a mess. Having said that, I would urge ...G is for Gnu, P is for..
Sep 11th, 2007 at 6:57AM: You're probably still working out how to use your Garmin thingy or get the most out of your Navman, but the bushmen of the Kalahari in southern Africa are becoming adept at using PDA technology to keep track of endangered species.
Special software has been developed which displays more than 40 different plants and animals, and includes different icons to reflect a range of behaviour including ...
