We can’t expect much from the oil industry, but Greenpeace’s newest finding is as ugly as it gets.

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A rare species of sheep discovered by Marco Polo in the 13th century is edging closer to extinction due to increased trophy hunting in Central Asian countries, new research reports.

The species, once prominent in the Pamir Mountains on the border of China, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Tajikistan, now numbers around 10,000, according to George Schaller of the Science and Exploration Program of the Wildlife Conservation Society.

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Residents of Centerville, Virginia have sued Dominion Virginia Power to the tune of $1 billion for supplying 1.5 million tons of toxic fly ash to fill the hills of a nearby golf course.

The attorneys representing 400 Centerville residents claim that Dominion knew that the substance they supplied to the Battlefield Golf Club would eventually seep into the water supply. The suit also names the golf course’s developer and Dominion’s ‘coal-ash management consultant.’

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A South Korean woman living in Los Angeles has been charged with importing bear bile from China to illegally sell as an aphrodisiac. She faces up to 20 years in prison if convicted.

Investigators intercepted a package addressed the Seongja Hyun while waiting for transport to Los Angeles from a San Francisco sorting facility. Inside the package they found four containers of bear bile, leading them to further investigate Hyun.

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If you have a dog who likes to run, taking him along for a bike ride isn’t a bad idea. But when a man in Oklahoma decided to drag his pit bull behind the bike, after a while the dog didn’t want to run along.

Instead of stopping, the man continued to pedal his bike with the dog dragging on his stomach for nearly half a mile. Residents of Ardmore, Oklahoma noticed the blodied dog and notified authorities.

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While my post earlier this week about police spraying water cannons at World Water Forum protesters was intended to point out the irony, the truth is that the situation in Turkey was out of control, with unprovoked police attacks on peaceful protesters.

In addition to water cannons, police in riot gear fired rubber bullets and tear gas into a crowd, arresting 17 Turkish activists and forcing international activists to leave. The group peacefully gathered outside the official forum for the “People’s Forum” formed to oppose the “commercialization of water.”

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The Competitive Enterprise Institute has announced their own plans for March 28th from 8:30 to 9:30 pm: instead of shutting of lights with millions of people across the globe for Earth Hour, they’ll be celebrating Human Achievement Hour.

CEI is a libertarian organization that advocates for human innovation. Interestingly, green innovation doesn’t ever seem to impress them, but they did recently throw a “Celebrate Coal!” rally. Anyway, the group seems to have struck a new low with their recently announced opposition to Earth Hour.

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Despite evidence that increasing the seal hunt quota could bring the harp seal population down the dangerous levels, the Canadian government has approved a 55,000 seal increase to quota for the upcoming commercial seal hunt.

The increase brings the total to 338,000 young seals scheduled to be brutally killed. Canada’s Humane Society said the higher quota could bring the downfall of the species, much like times in the past when the population dropped two-thirds in a decade with an inflated quota.

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Apparently Turkish police have a biting sense of irony: they’ve sprayed protesters at the World Water Forum with high-pressured water cannons.

The forum, which occurs every three years, is supposed to focus on ways to eliminate water poverty across the globe, but protesters believe the forum takes a heavy-handed approach and supports construction of dangerous and environmentally-disastrous large dams.

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Alaska abruptly resumed shooting wolves from helicopters this weekend in hopes that shooting the wolves will increase the population of caribou for hunters to kill. The state plans to kill up to 328 wolves, sparing under 100 in the Yukon area.

Not everyone in Alaska is gung-ho about the plan. The National Park Service has been collaring wolves for a two-decade-long study tracking predator-prey relationships, and now many of those wolves are bound to turn up dead.

>>UPDATE: Defenders of Wildlife has taken legal action to stop the hunt.

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Two peaceful protestors with the environmental nonprofit International Rivers were deported from Turkey today after revealing a banner reading “No Risky Dams” just before the conference was set to begin.

The forum, held every three years, discusses global challenges and solutions to the water crisis. International Rivers advocates alternatives to large dams, which flood large areas, block the flow of rivers, and displace people and animals.

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In coal mining country, companies are encroaching more and more into old graveyards for the coal underneath. Unfortunately, they’re not the best at keeping track of the bodies they remove from the ground.

Walter Young, a 63-year-old man from Pigeon Creek, West Virginia, told the Associated Press that he went to check on the site of his great-grandmother’s grave one day only to find that the entire cemetery was gone. And upon questioning the coal mining company, no one had any clue where his relative’s grave had been moved.

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Around $10,000-worth of timber was confiscated from a lumber company after their illegal activities were exposed on their very own reality TV show on the History Channel.

Before we get into the details, let this sink in for a second: there’s a reality TV show that documents people competing to cut down trees. We’ve all seen some horrible television, but how on earth is this considered entertainment? Apparently 2 million people think so.

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An Arizona man who was caught by police in August 2008 after tying his horse to the back of his truck will face charges for animal cruelty in federal court this Tuesday.

Gorden Allen Bates tied a horse to the back of his truck and then proceeded to stop the vehicle and beat the animal with a PVC pipe while his 13-year-old daughter kicked it in the face. Luckily, a state trooper happened onto the scene.

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Portuguese environmentalists have condemned the killing of the country’s last remaining nesting male Iberian Imperial Eagle.

The bird, also known as the Spanish Imperial Eagle (Aquila adalberti), is one of the three rarest birds of prey on the planet, with only around 400 surviving, and is classified as ‘vulnerable to extinction’ in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.

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Oh, Utah — sometimes you’re so cute, like with the recent news that you watch more porn than any other state. But then other times, you’re straight-up scary.

Pending legislation would require that any group looking to issue a stay against a project to prevent environmental harm must first post a bond to cover any potential monetary losses that the company in question may incur during the trial. The bill is predicted to pass sometime in the next week.

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Warning: Video contains disturbing content.

This video is very hard to make out (and all online Turkish-to-English translations don’t yield much more insight), but this appears as if a small town in Turkey gathered together to encourage their dogs to attack and kill a captive wolf. Please comment if you have any idea what is going on.

Contrary to previous reports, Iceland’s new government announced that they will keep the controversial increased whaling quota that the outgoing Fisheries Minister enacted last month, just one day before leaving office.

Steingrimur J Sigfusson, Iceland’s new Fisheries Minister, said that the country will keep the whaling quota, but added that whalers should not expect the quota to extend five years, as was originally planned. The quota increase has been criticized by environmental groups because it allows the killing of 150 endangered fin whales.

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A man in Hong Kong was arrested yesterday for stuffing his luggage with 46 live animals, presumably for sale on the black market. Some animals were crammed into the tiny boxes pictured above.

He traveled fro two endangered Angonoka tortoises, 21 hedgehogs, and 23 sugar gliders into boxes filled with packing materials with small holes punched into the sides to allow the animals to breathe.

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Well, at least if you’re stupid enough to post the photos of you eating it on Facebook.

A couple vacationing in the Bahamas has been arrested after they posted pictures of themselves cooking and eating an iguana. Police said the photos showed the American couple “catching an iguana, parts of an iguana on a grill, two men eating the iguana pieces, and a man and a woman cleaning what appears to be undersized conch.”

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