"The controversial six-month dolphin hunting season began on Monday in the infamous town of Taiji, but bad weather would delay any killing, a local official told AFP."

"SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The worst drought in a generation has pushed California lawmakers to overhaul the state's longstanding "pump-as-you-please" groundwater policy under a package of bills lawmakers sent Friday to Gov. Jerry Brown."

"It began forming in May, when heavy spring rains loaded the rivers and creeks with fertilizer washed from farms and suburban lawns. It grew rapidly over the summer, as a broth of chemicals, animal waste and microbes simmered in the warm, slow-moving waters of the Chesapeake Bay."

"PITTSBURGH - Six years into a natural gas boom, Pennsylvania has for the first time released details of 243 cases in which companies prospecting for oil or gas were found by state regulators to have contaminated private drinking water wells."

"An outbreak of algae-produced biotoxins that attack animals' brains also poses a grave risk to humans"

"In just 80 years, some 2,000 square miles of its coastal landscape have turned to open water, wiping places off maps, bringing the Gulf of Mexico to the back door of New Orleans and posing a lethal threat to an energy and shipping corridor vital to the nation’s economy."

"In a sharp rebuke of state plans for a massive water tunnel system in Northern California, federal environmental officials say that the project would violate pollution standards and could worsen conditions for imperiled fish species."

"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) hit back Thursday after a top Republican accused it of trying to take over large pieces of private land and water."

"The federal government is protecting 20 types of colorful coral by putting them on the list of threatened species, partly because of climate change."

"FLATEY ISLAND, Iceland – When the days grew long, seabirds flocked to this hamlet on the edge of the Arctic to rear their chicks under the midnight sun. “Kria,” shrieked the terns, calling summer up from the slumbering ground. Black cliffs were transformed into snowbanks of white kittiwakes. Puffins whirred between land and sea. Murres plied the shoreline, fulmars patrolled the skies. Everywhere sounded their vibrant chorus."