At the border between Poland and Belarus lies the Belovezhskaya Pushcha National Park, one of the last old-growth forests in Europe that’s still largely untouched by humans. For the past two years, migrants from Africa, the Middle East and South Asia have been hiding in the forest while attempting to cross into the EU via Poland. Polish border police are incessantly patrolling these areas, brutalising and banishing anyone they find.

The crisis began in 2021 when Belarus’s president, Aleksandr Lukashenko, relaxed the country’s visa laws, allowing in people with a one-way ticket. The move was largely seen as retaliation against sanctions imposed by the EU after Lukashenko allegedly rigged his win in Belarus’s 2020 elections. Tensions simmered down in 2022, but have recently picked back up after Poland sent 10,000 troops to the area in response to Belarusian invasion into its territory.

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For the thousands of people hiding in the forest, living conditions are brutal. In winter, temperatures often drop below zero. People get lost in the forest during their attempts to cross and struggle to find their way back out. Since 2021, at least 48 bodies have been found there. Humanitarian aid and media access to the area have been prohibited by the Polish government.

Despite that, journalists have found ways to report on the crisis, and volunteers help the migrants with food, clothes and medical assistance. Among them is photojournalist Hanna Jarzabek, who worked undercover in the area between August 2022 and May 2023. We asked her about her photo series, The Jungle, and the stories that stuck with her the most.

VICE: Why did you decide to report on the border between Poland and Belarus? Hanna Jarzabek: I was born in Poland. Right from the start, I noticed the difference in how the government has been treating refugees from Ukraine compared to those crossing from Belarus. While humanitarian organisations can intervene at the Ukrainian border, they have to operate in secret on the Belarusian border. Poland enforces strict immigration policies there.

**What do you mean by “strict”?
**For context: 1.5 million people came from Ukraine to Poland [since the beginning of the war]. I think it’s great that they’re receiving help. Close to 40,000 people came from Belarus and are constantly pushed back. The Polish government also built a wall there.

**Why help one group and not the other?
**I believe it has something to do with ethnicity, culture and religious background.

**Who are the people at the border?
**Many are fleeing war or poverty. They first go to Russia and then to Belarus, where they get visas – they’re easy to obtain there, as the Belarusian government makes money from them. Then, they drive from Minsk to the border and are told to walk another ten kilometres through the forest. They want to get into the European Union and apply for asylum there. But the Polish border officials stop them. The journey across the Mediterranean is dangerous, but I don’t think people understand how dangerous the old-growth forest can be.

**How bad does it get?
**Last winter was harsh. Once, I walked through the forest for three hours with two volunteers. One of them was a doctor. We finally reached a Syrian refugee who was severely hypothermic. We changed his damp clothes, but his condition worsened. After two hours, the doctor had to call an ambulance. We weren’t sure he would survive the night.

**Why wait two hours?
**There’s no Red Cross or other organisations there. If you call an ambulance, the border police also show up. That’s why refugees have an emergency number to contact volunteers.

**What happened after you called?
**We waited for four more hours, at -11°C. The rescue team had our coordinates, but when they finally arrived, there was no medical personnel: only border guards and firefighters.

**Did the refugee still make it to the hospital?
**They put him in the car but never took him there.

**How do you know that?
**I was really concerned and reached out to the parliament to find out where he was.

**Did he survive?
**Yes, the officers took him to a migrant camp.

**Did you speak with anyone else?
**I remember a woman from Iran who had participated in some women’s rights protests. The Iranian government blacklisted her and she had to flee. Technically, she should’ve been eligible for political asylum.

**Why wasn’t she?
**Polish border guards pushed her back to the Belarusian side [before she could request asylum]. She was with a friend and her husband. During their second attempt, the guards assaulted them and used tear gas. The woman woke up in a Polish hospital, but her husband and friend were missing.

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**Where were they?
**Back in Belarus. It took months for the woman to send a message to her husband and find out he was still alive.

When I spoke with her, someone had taken her into their home in Poland. That’s forbidden, but some still do it. We used Google Translate to understand each other. Her stories were dreadful. But what I remember most were her eyes full of fear.

**Refusing someone the right to apply for asylum is illegal under international law. Why does it happen anyway?
**The border guards don’t even ask. If someone brings it up, they ignore it. There are no witnesses or translators. The refugees never get the chance to submit an application – they’re pushed back into Belarus. The border guards stomp on their phones and drive them back into the forest without GPS. You could say the border police are sending people to their deaths.

**Have you ever been caught by the border guards?
**Yes, when I was photographing the wall, 186 kilometres of steel and barbed wire. But I pretended I was a tourist, and since I maintained the required distance from the wall, they couldn’t take any action other than asking questions. I can’t believe that about 30 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, another wall is dividing Europe.

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**Does the wall actually stop refugees?
**Well, it’s five-and-a-half metres tall and topped with barbed wire, but people still climb over it. They fall down on the Polish side and break their legs and feet. Poland is creating more costs for itself because these people then need to go to hospital.

**Do you also know stories with a happy ending?
**I’ve heard from people who are in safe places, who made it to Germany or found their relatives in the EU.

Scroll down to see more photos:

This photo report was funded with the help of Investigative Journalism for Europe (IJ4EU).

The post Photos From the Ancient Forest Where Migrants Hide in Fear appeared first on VICE.

Then, the human killings began. A 60-year-old woman who had gone to pick cotton in the fields was later found dead with bite and claw marks across her neck. A seven-year-old boy was dragged from his home. Another woman who was also picking cotton heard a growl, only to see a tiger dragging away her 70-year-old husband by his neck. The villagers were told that their tormentor was called T1. Wildlife lovers called her Avni.

“In my forty years of experience, I have noticed that any man-eater animal is not normal from a psychological perspective,” Nawab Shafath Ali Khan, a 64-year-old civilian hunter, who led the operation that killed Avni, told VICE. “Man is not the natural prey of these animals. When a tiger cub is born, its mother prompts it never to go near a human being.”

Avni’s capture and death, however, opened a can of worms. 

Was Avni really responsible for the killings of 13 humans? And, if she was, why wasn’t she captured sooner? Why did repeated efforts to tranquilise her fail, costing the government more than Rs 130,000 ($1.6 million)? Why wasn’t there a veterinarian or biologist present for the operation, when the NTCA (National Tiger Conservation Authority, a statutory body under the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change) guidelines suggest having at least three experts, so that one person can monitor the animal’s vital signs after the animal has been darted and the immobilisation procedure is followed by the other two on board? Why did the team not have a crate or net to place the animal in after immobilisation? Why do animal rights activists refer to the operation as “a cold-blooded murder?”

To address the controversies surrounding the operation from his perspective Khan, who has been labelled a “trigger-happy hunter” by his detractors, has recently come out with the book, Avni: Inside the Hunt for India’s Deadliest Maneater, published by Bloomsbury.

Khan ascribes the reasons a tiger turns into a man-eater to hunger, injury, or psychological disorders. Another reason, according to him, is India’s increasing  tiger population, as there isn’t adequate land for them to inhabit, coupled with a loss of prey base. Khan isn’t off the mark. According to a 2018 census by the NTCA, and supported by the Wildlife Institute of India, India has 25 percent of the world’s tiger habitat, with 50 designated tiger reserves, but shelters 75 percent of the global tiger population, thus pointing to a shrinking habitat. It bears mentioning that the survey, carried out once every four years, doesn’t reveal how many of these animals die prematurely, primarily because of that shrinking habitat, as conservationists point out. 

“I am called on the ground when everything else fails and we have to start the operation afresh,” said Khan. “In Avni’s case, the forest officials didn’t even have a map of the killings. We tracked Avni on foot for days together, which was never done before we came on the scene.”

Khan added that he has never shot a wrong animal in forty years, a claim contested by animal rights activists, including Sarita Subramaniam – the co-founder of the Earth Brigade Foundation, a Mumbai-based NGO that works in the areas of wildlife conservation, street animal welfare, and women’s empowerment. Subramaniam has filed several petitions challenging the “man-eater” status of Avni and the inconsistencies in Khan’s Avni operation. 

“The word ‘man-eater’ was coined by the British,” Subramaniam told VICE. “It was hunting agents like Jim Corbett who popularised the term because we don’t find historical evidence of there ever being a man-eater. Tigers are carnivorous, stealth animals who will hunt. You can’t expect them not to be smart. When a farmer is killed, we need to ask whether he was supposed to be there. Was his farm encroaching core forest land? We just take these things at face value.” 

According to Subramaniam, the choice of Khan who has an “infamous track record” was questionable in and of itself. Various Indian states have roped in Khan to take down animals that seemed to pose threats to wildlife and humans. In 2016, he shot 250 nilgais (Indian gaur) under orders from the Bihar government, was accused of organising wildlife shootings for clients in a private safari in a national park, and was arrested in 1991 for alleged Maoist links.  

However, Khan maintains that he is just a “hangman” who follows orders from officials. “When people accuse me of being thirsty for blood, they don’t realise that the decision to kill is never mine.” 

Subramaniam said that it is unfortunate that the chief wildlife warden officer “can authorise literally anyone” to hunt an animal and the officer need not even provide a reason for the hunting orders. She added that Khan has no professional expertise in identifying the hunting patterns either. 

Avni’s alleged human killings followed no concrete pattern – they took place across seasons and age groups, and the period between two subsequent killings ranged anywhere from two weeks to two months. However, the orders to shoot her, after repeated tranquilising operations failed, were met with severe resistance by animal activist groups, with the High Court even staying the shooting order once. Things became even more complicated when Avni delivered two cubs in February 2018. The alleged killings, however, did not stop. 

“Avni kept getting smarter with every kill,” said Khan. “If I had been called after the first or second kill, the operation would have finished quicker. But two-and-a-half years was a great learning experience for her.” 

However, Subramaniam questioned such categorisation. “If Avni really wanted to only kill humans, what was she doing between two consequent human kills? Was she bipolar then?”

But why did she kill humans in the first place?

“It’s the same as a boy going to school in Texas who, one day, picks up his father’s handgun and kills 19 children,” said Khan. “There is a powerful streak of abnormality that runs through these man-eaters. Once you have identified this streak of abnormality, you need to get on with the operation to either radio-collar the animal or tranquilise it, but in India, we take years to even do this.” 

According to Section 11 of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, “the Chief Wild Life  Warden may, if he is satisfied that any wild animal specified in Schedule I has become dangerous to human life or is so disabled or diseased, as to be beyond recovery, by Order in writing and stating the reasons therefor [sic], permit any person to hunt such animal or cause such animal to be hunted.” Schedule I lists animals that cannot be hunted or traded.

Subramaniam said that Avni’s kills, if any, were likely limited to shepherds and goatherds. “Most of the human kills happened in summer months when shepherds had to go deep into the forest to collect mahua flowers or firewood because of lack of easy availability of such plants in the villages,” she explained. “This is the same as venturing into a zone where I know for a fact that the army is practising shooting, and then complaining that I got shot and demanding compensation for it.”  

A subsequent probe report by the NTCA highlighted several lapses in the Avni operation. According to Khan’s official version of records, Avni was tranquilised first, upon which she attacked members of his team, and his son fired in self-defence. The NTCA report, however, states that the tranquiliser dart was fired by Mukbhir Sheikh, who was authorised only to identify Avni and her two cubs, and not dart her. Additionally, the darting took place in the absence of a doctor. “There was no wildlife manager, veterinarian, or biologist on the team,” the NTCA report added.

The state government of Maharashtra recently re-opened the probe into the operation in the wake of the NTCA report. Khan was also gifted with a silver tiger figurine by forest officials, which didn’t help his cause, as activists claimed the gesture as proof that the killing of Avni was no more than a trophy hunt.

Further, according to reports, no human remains were found in Avni’s stomach during the postmortem, something that Subramaniam finds striking. “It is strange that you can incriminate Avni for 13 human kills, and yet not have any conclusive medical or forensic evidence that connects her to all 13 kills, despite all the medical advances available to humans.”

“I have followed all the protocols and only acted on written orders,” Khan maintained. “Our wildlife activists simply don’t care about human life. What have they done for that woman who lost her seven-year-old grandson? To save one tiger or a leopard, they ignore how most villagers end up poisoning or lynching 10 other animals in rage.”

Wenzil Pinto, a wildlife biologist, noted that the DNA analysis, too, confirmed that less than six of the 13 alleged killings could be ascribed to Avni. Subramaniam added that no DNA analysis was done in the first five cases. The way Pinto sees it, one needs to understand the ethical and moral dimensions one attaches to a tiger, too. 

“From a conservation point of view, removing a ‘problematic’ animal from the habitat, either through killing or tranquillisation, may do more for conservation of the species because retaliatory killings by humans against all the animal species do exist,” Pinto told VICE. “But from an ethical point of view, is the tiger’s life more important than a human’s? How many human killings must warrant a tiger’s removal is an ethical question which does not have easy answers.” 

Follow Arman on Twitter and Instagram.

The post Inside the Heartbreaking and Controversial Hunt for a Tigress Who Allegedly Killed 13 People appeared first on VICE.

The immense settlements stretch across some 80 square miles of the Llanos de Mojos region of Bolivia and include pyramids, causeways, canals, ramparts, elevated “forest islands,” and buildings arranged in ways that hint at cosmological worldview. The structures were built by the Casarabe culture, an Indigenous population that flourished from 500 to 1400 A.D. and came to inhabit some 1,700 square miles of the Amazon rainforest. The find is “mind blowing,” according to one member of the research team.

While field expeditions and Indigenous knowledge have previously shed light on this region’s lost settlements, a remote-sensing technique called Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) has now exposed the enormous extent and tantalizing complexity of this civilization.

Scientists led by Heiko Prümers, an archaeologist at German Archaeological Institute in Berlin, used LIDAR to probe the remains of two large settlements called Cotoca and Landívar, along with 24 smaller sites, including 15 that were previously unknown to modern researchers. The results “indicate that the Casarabe-culture settlement pattern represents a type of tropical low-density urbanism that has not previously been described in Amazonia” and that “put to rest arguments that western Amazonia was sparsely populated in pre-Hispanic times,” according to a study published on Wednesday in Nature.

“The architectural layout of large settlement sites of the Casarabe culture indicates that the inhabitants of this region created a new social and public landscape through monumentality,” Prümers and his colleagues said in the study. “We propose that the Casarabe-culture settlement system is a singular form of tropical agrarian low-density urbanism—to our knowledge, the first known case for the entire tropical lowlands of South America.”

LIDAR scanners work by shooting laser pulses at ground targets from aerial vehicles and recording the time it takes for the signal to bounce back. In this way, the method can generate minute details about topography that are beyond the range of other instruments. LIDAR is a particularly popular tool for archaeologists working at sites that are blanketed in dense vegetation, because they can expose details about past settlements that are difficult to spot or even access on the ground.

While some of the buried structures at Llanos de Mojos were known, the new LIDAR data revealed a sprawling network of settlements linked by raised causeways that extend for miles across the verdant terrain and in which water was managed by a huge system of canals and reservoirs.

The two large settlements, Cotoca and Landívar, were protected by concentric defensive structures that include moats and ramparts. Numerous signs of civic and ceremonial life are embedded in more densely populated areas, such as 70-foot-tall conical pyramids and earthen buildings that curiously take the shape of the letter U.

“The scale and elaboration of civic-ceremonial architecture are key aspects of the large settlement sites,” Prümers and his colleagues said in the paper. “The orientation of the buildings that constitute the civic-ceremonial centers of the two large settlement sites is very uniform towards the north-northwest. This probably reflects a cosmological world view, which is also present in the orientation of extended burials of the Casarabe culture.”

While most of these monuments appear in more densely populated ruins, the scanned region may also have contained countless small hamlets that are too subtle to be detected by LIDAR, the team noted. Taken together, the new findings offer a captivating look at a society that thrived in this forested region for centuries, building massive agricultural and aquacultural infrastructure that sustained a rich social and ritual life.

“The scale, monumentality, labor involved in the construction of the civic-ceremonial architecture and water-management infrastructure, and the spatial extent of settlement dispersal compare favorably to Andean cultures and are of a scale far beyond the sophisticated, interconnected settlements of southern Amazonia, which lack monumental civic-ceremonial architecture,” the researchers said in the study.

“As such, the data contribute to the discussion of the global wealth of early urban diversity, and will help to redefine the categories used for past and present Amazonian societies,” he concluded.

The post ‘Mind-Blowing’ Lost City With a Cosmic Link Discovered in the Amazon appeared first on VICE.

The 2,700-page document, which is headed to a vote in the Senate this week, proposes allocating several billion in funding for reforestation, community-based wildfire mitigation, native species protection and the study of opportunities to regrow vegetation in abandoned mines. It also includes the Repairing Existing Public Land by Adding Necessary Trees (REPLANT) Act, which frees up federal funding for reforestation efforts.

At least $5.75 billion of the bill is devoted to restoring trees, plants, and ecosystems following what E&E News reported Tuesday has been a tense debate over the definition of “infrastructure.” At various points in the talks over the bipartisan package, Republicans weighed removing childcare and electric vehicles from consideration in the legislation, for example. The published bill draft reflects collective agreement that trees are infrastructure and vital to the functioning of American society.

“This bipartisan infrastructure bill is really unprecedented in the way it has embraced America’s forests, including our national forests, as part of the nation’s infrastructure,” said Jad Daley, president and CEO of American Forests, a nonprofit conservation organization. “At this moment in time, we have never needed that infrastructure more.”

Beyond the allocation of funding, the bill also makes strides in restoration through policy steps, including the REPLANT) Act, which removes a 1980 cap on how much funding from wood import tariffs the US Forest Service (USFS) can use for regrowing trees. As per a limit on the Reforestation Trust Fund—which was established “when a carton of eggs cost 84 cents,” Daly said—the USFS is only permitted to use $30 million from wood import tariffs for reforestation in the US, leaving an estimated $93 million untouched.

Lifting this cap to release additional funds for reforestation would open up 4 million backlogged acres of national forest that are sitting ready for reforestation, according to American Forests, which has pushed for the passage of the REPLANT Act since its inception in March. The group estimates that passing the Act via the Infrastructure Package would generate nearly 49,000 jobs and capture enough carbon dioxide to offset 85.3 billion gallons of gasoline.

The current draft also breaks down millions in funding for wildfire mitigation and prevention, including $20 million for research on satellite-based fire detection; $600 million in salaries for federal wildland firefighters; $500 million in developing and installing fuel breaks (strips of vegetation that have been altered to slow fire spread); and $500 million in funding to establish a Community Wildfire Defense Grant Program, which will offer financial gifts to communities facing significant wildfire risk for prevention and response plans.

The bill also allocates $2.1 billion to ecosystem restoration and resilience between 2022 and 2026, with the goal of restoring at least 10,000 acres of federal land. $200 million of this is devoted to restoration efforts led by Indigenous communities on Federal lands; $200 million is dedicated to the detection and eradication of invasive species that can overtake an ecosystem; while the same amount has been allocated for restoring native species.

Trees are Earth’s first defense against carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels. America’s carbon sinks, including its forests, offset an estimated 12 percent of greenhouse gas emissions through the process of photosynthesis, which requires carbon dioxide and water to generate glucose (used for plant energy) and oxygen. This carbon is then stored in soil and forest biomass, like branches, roots, and leaves.

But record wildfires and decades of megadrought conditions across the western US have threatened the country’s tree stock, leaving us increasingly vulnerable to the effects of climate change without a natural sink to chip away at the emissions that contribute to global warming. Stretches of burned down forest then increase the risk of further climate disaster, as empty swaths of land are likely victims of flash floods and mudslides.

“We have national forests that have become national burn scars, where the land is sitting there, damage is unrepaired,” Daly said. “We [want to] get all the good stuff back from those damaged lands so that they start sequestering carbon again, and they become active filtration again for our water supplies and wildlife habitat.”

Critics have said the infrastructure bill, as a whole, doesn’t do enough to protect the planet. Championed by a bipartisan group of Senators including Kyrsten Sinema (D – AZ) and Rob Portman (D – OH), the bipartisan proposal is soon to be followed by a $3.5-trillion spending plan from Democrats predicted to have more in the way of meaningful climate policy, like emissions reduction requirements.

The Infrastructure bill also allocates several billion dollars to non-biological forms of carbon capture, like facilities that remove and distill carbon dioxide directly from power plants and pump it back into the ground for storage or oil and gas drilling. In recent months, this technology has come under intense scrutiny by a growing faction of progressive environmentalists for its unknown efficacy and risks.

Many of the companies behind carbon capture technologies, slated to receive public funding for its research and development, are fossil fuel interests. The Center for Environmental Law calculated at least $25-billion across the bill devoted to subsidies for the oil and gas sector. This funding is split between projects like carbon capture and hydrogen fuel, which opponents believe are false solutions for climate change.

“Throwing away money is not going to reduce emissions. We need massive investments in proven renewable solutions, not carbon capture fantasies,” said Mitch Jones, policy director of environmental watchdog non-profit Food and Water Watch in a statement released Tuesday.

“If the Senate cannot manage to get this right, climate champions in the House will need to strip out these wasteful dirty energy subsidies.”

The bill has also come under fire for lacking a Clean Energy Standard (an accepted definition of renewable energy that would require the country to replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources) and failing to implement a Civilian Climate Corps, a government jobs program President Joe Biden proposed that would put thousands of young people to work fighting climate change.

But groups like American Forests believe the bill’s investment in forestry is a step in the right direction. Daly believes forests are a “climate change solution,” noting that the USFS is a global leader in reforestation innovation. Failing to invest in trees, like any other climate innovation in the Package, would be a missed opportunity.

“Reforestation is the single broadest pathway, the most direct line to increase the scale of that carbon sink,” Daly said. “There are amazing things for transportation and electric vehicles, but forests are here, too.”

The post Biden’s Infrastructure Bill Will Try and Rebuild America’s Forests appeared first on VICE.

Summer in the northern hemisphere is nearly over, thank god, and as the nights start to get cooler, our minds are drawn to changing leaves and the natural beauty of our forests, deserts, mountains, and National Parks. In our opinion, there’s no better time to get out and camp than late summer/early fall. It’s not too hot, the scenery is beautiful, and the pesky, sleep-ruining bugs begin to disappear (though we’ve got you covered if they don’t). Whether you’re a fan of seriously roughing it, RV-ing your way across the country, or glamping à la Tom Haverford, there’s one common item you’ll need to pack: a sleeping bag.

Now, if you’re able to splurge on a super-fancy, massively expensive sleeping bag, more power to ya. However, if you aren’t, in fact, Bill Gates, or you’ve been banned from your local Money Store, you’ll probably be in the market for a more affordable model. Fortunately, these exist en masse, and you’ll be just as comfortable—especially since you’ll have a fat, padded wallet to rest your sweet little head upon.

So take a gander at these affordable sleeping bags, and enjoy the rest of the summer season as a bona fide human burrito.

14,000 campers can’t be wrong

Well, we’re sure they’re wrong about some stuff, but they’re probably spot-on with their collective, 4.5-star assessment of this Oaskys Camping Sleeping Bag. It’s designed to be used around 50-70 degrees Fahrenheit, so it’s a warm-weather bag for sure. It also has a weather-resistant design intended to “keep you warm even in extreme conditions and prevent you from any dampness.”

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Oaskys

Oaskys Camping Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$25.99 at Amazon

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A warm weather wrap

Another sleeping bag for the summer months, this model by ECOOPRO is meant for temperatures around 55-60 degrees Fahrenheit. Made with a durable nylon covering and a comfort-soft cotton interior, you’ll sleep cool and comfortably after a hard day of drinking beer in the woods. (PBRs sold separately.)

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ECOOPRO

ECOOPRO Warm Weather Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$28.99 at Amazon

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Ideal for the starfish sleeper

We see you, noble starfish. For those who like to hog the covers, and most of the bed, this rectangular Kelty Catena 30 Sleeping Bag is for you. It’s perfect for any casual or first-time camper, and keeps you warm with cozy CloudLoft insulation—good down to 30 degrees Fahrenheit.

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Kelty

Kelty Catena 30 Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$49.95 at REI

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We should cuddle… for warmth

*Winking emoji.* This two-person sleeping bag is perfect for couples or really close friends. With almost 14,000 ratings on Amazon—and a 4.5-star average—you really can’t go wrong with this option. It’s good down to 32 degrees Fahrenheit, but you’ll probably stay extra warm due to… friction. Pro tip: Go easy on the beans at the campfire.

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Sleepingo

Sleepingo Double Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$57.95 at Amazon

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British mother or dead pharaoh?

This shape of sleeping bag is called “mummy,” and we’re on the fence about what they’re referring to. While we know the camping powers that be are probably likening this insulated sleeping bag to the sarcophagus of dead, ancient Egyptian kings, we had a good chuckle imagining “mummy” as a broad-shouldered English parent.

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Marmot

Marmot Voyager 55 Mummy Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$59.19 at Amazon

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For off-grid coziness

If you’re going to disappear into the wilderness for an extended period of time, you should probably be comfy. Or at least, as the product description for this Kelty Mistral 20 Sleeping Bag explains, retain some semblance of coziness while you’re off the grid. Luckily, this model’s Cozy Cloudloft synthetic insulation offers both warmth and padding for a comfortable night’s sleep, so you’re all set on that front.

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Kelty

Kelty Mistral 20 Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$69.95 at REI

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From the makers of your favorite grills

If there’s one thing to know about the team at Coleman, it’s that they know how to warm meat. From grills to sleeping bags, the brand makes killer products at affordable prices. This Coleman Juneau 15° F Sleeping Bag will keep you comfortable in cold weather down to 15 degrees Fahrenheit, thanks to a scoop design and a Thermolock zipper system that reduces heat loss.

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Coleman

Coleman Juneau 15° F Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$69.99 at Dick's Sporting Goods

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Vest and flannel not included

This luxurious sleeping bag by The North Face is sleek, chic, and on fleek low-profile. It rolls into a tight bag for storage and transportation, and its synthetic insulation is made of 50% post-consumer recycled material. You’ll be warm down to 20 degrees Fahrenheit, and you’ll look the part with your brand-name sleepin’ sack.

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The North Face

The North Face Wasatch 20° Sleeping Bag (opens in a new window)

$89.00 at Dick's Sporting Goods

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A side sleeper’s dream

If you’re not bringing your trusty body pillow camping, what are you doing? Side sleepers deserve a good night’s sleep too, especially when under the stars. According to the product info, this model “features plenty of room for side sleepers and an integrated sleeping pad sleeve so you’ll never roll off your pad again.” Nice.

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L.L. Bean

L.L.Bean Adventure Sleeping Bag, 25° Mummy (opens in a new window)

$99.00 at L.L. Bean

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The power of padding

While we aren’t promising Princess and the Pea levels of comfort, we’re thrilled that this Trailhead Kit from Kelty includes a sleeping pad. While sleeping bags are great on their own, if you’re camping in a hard-surface area or sleeping on rocky soil, a sleeping pad is going to be your best friend.

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Kelty

TRAILHEAD KIT (opens in a new window)

$99.95 at Kelty

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OK, sleeping bag: check. Swim trunks: check. Catholic guilt: double check. We’re ready to rough it.

The Rec Room staff independently selected all of the stuff featured in this story.

The post The Best Sleeping Bags Under $100, for Every Kind of Camper appeared first on VICE.

VICE News correspondent Michael Anthony Adams reports. Want to see what the frontline of wildfire looks like? Check out Adams’ segment here.

MORE:

• Want to see what the frontline of wildfire looks like? Check out Michael Anthony Adams’ video  here.
• California wildfires are burning out of control, but farmworkers are still laboring in the fields.
• After a historic wildfire season, farmworkers in California’s famous wine region don’t qualify for federal aid because they are undocumented.
• Dario Gurrola learned how to fight fires while he was incarcerated as a juvenile. But it’s almost impossible to get a position as a full time firefighter now that he’s a free man.

CREDITS:

This episode was produced by Julia Nutter.

VICE News Reports is produced by Jesse Alejandro Cottrell, Jen Kinney, Janice Llamoca and Julia Nutter. Our senior producers are Ashley Cleek and Adizah Eghan. Our associate producers are Sam Eagan, Sophie Kazis, and Adreanna Rodriguez. Sound design and music composition by Steve Bone and Kyle Murdock.

 Our executive producer and VP of VICE Audio is Kate Osborn. Janet Lee is senior production manager for VICE Audio. Production coordination by Steph Brown. Fact checking by Nicole Pasulka.

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Following rampant deforestation and loss of their habitats in the eastern Indian states of Odisha and Jharkhand, elephants began migrating to the forests of bordering Chhattishgarh state in the 1980s.

At present, there are roughly 250 elephants spread in nine districts across the state. Some of these districts are perfect habitats for elephants because of dense forests.

But as Chhattisgarh gradually started losing its forest cover to coal mining, elephants began intruding into human-dominated areas destroying crops, properties and on some occasions, killing people.

Chhattisgarh reported 325 human deaths by elephants between 2014 and 2019. 

Biswas has visited the jungles in this region thrice to capture the devastation.

Korba, one of the districts in the state, has witnessed damaging effects of coal mining with villagers suffering from multiple respiratory ailments.

Explaining the impact of mining, a Korba resident told Mongabay-India. “Near Kete [coal mine] is an elephant corridor. The mine must have interrupted their natural route of passage and migration. After the mine opened, man-elephant conflict increased in all the villages surrounding the mine and caused severe destruction to their lives and livelihoods.”

A research paper published by Sarguja University, Chhattisgarh, noted that the human-elephant conflict is a symptom of inappropriate land-use practices such as diversion of the forests for development and mining activities leading to loss or fragmentation of elephant habitats.

Incessant mining has also displaced indigenous people of the region. In some cases, people have made groups and collectives to oppose mining.

To combat human-elephant conflict, the local state government has taken multiple measures such as alerting the villagers about the movement of pachyderms and tracking locations of elephants though radio collars.

With the hope to mitigate the conflict, the Chhattishgarh state government, in 2005, sought the approval of the central government for two elephant reserves. By 2011, one of the two reserves was established. It is believed that the state government shelved plans for the second reserve to facilitate coal mining. Last year, the state government revived the second project and is yet to finalise its size. 

“The ruthless encroachment of the forest by coal mining activity is not an impersonal episode for the forest dwellers. It is an invasion of their homes, lifestyles, privacy, and dignity,” said Biswas.

The post In Photos: With Forests Gone, Elephants Wreak Havoc in India appeared first on VICE.

When he spoke to his village elders, he realised that the decline in forest cover and deforestation were the reason the animals had lost their home. He decided it was up to him to give them back their home, and started his tree planting journey back in 1979 with just 20 bamboo seedlings. 

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Today, nearly 40 years later, the barren sandbar along the Brahmaputra in eastern Assam has turned into a lush 1,360 acre forest making it a haven for vibrant wildlife and biodiversity—all thanks to one man’s relentless commitment. 

Payeng, who is now popularly known as the Forest Man of India, has received various laurels and awards for his efforts as well— from the illustrious Padma Shri Award to the 128th Commonwealth Points of Light award. 

Now, the inspiring story of the environmental activist and forestry worker is being taught to kids in schools in the U.S.

Payeng’s tireless efforts of four decades will now be a part of the curriculum of sixth grade Bristol Connecticut school students, in what will be the latest laurel for the 57-year-old from the indigenous Mising tribe of Assam.

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“The students are studying about Padma Shri Jadav Payeng as a part of their ecology lesson,” said Navamee Sharma, a teacher at Greene Hills School in Bristol Connecticut to Deccan Herald. Other schools in the area are also showing documentaries on Payeng. “The primary reason was to inspire and encourage future generations of the country on how a single person can make a huge positive impact in the world if he or she has the right attitude and determination.”

Payeng began planting trees because of his concern over ecological degradation in Majuli island which is now a district in easten Assam. Now, the forest is home to elephants, deer, rhinos and tigers. 

An official in the Board of Secondary Education, Assam told The Sentinel that even though the Board has included chapters on Payeng in the textbooks of ninth and tenth grade classes, the development in the U.S. will enhance students’ interest.

When asked about this new development, Payeng said he was unaware but was happy to know that students in the U.S. were studying about him and his work. 

Follow Varsha on Instagram. 

The post Some Schools in the US are Teaching the Inspiring Work of the ‘Forest Man of India’ appeared first on VICE.

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In July this year, a family sleeping in their courtyard were crushed to death after the wall beside them was “violently shaken” by a troop of brawling monkeys in UP’s Shahjahanpur district.

With a monkey population of more than 50 million, there have been at least 13 deaths caused by monkey attacks across India since 2015. More than 1,000 cases of monkey bites are reported every day in Indian cities, according to a government run primate research centre.

“India has been facing a monkey menace since the late 80’s. Before that, humans and primates peacefully co-existed without such conflicts,” Dr Iqbal Malik, a primatologist, with 40 years of experience in studying monkey species in India, told VICE News.

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Dr Malik points to a variety of reasons behind the deteriorating relationship between humans and primates. “Lack of population control of both humans and monkeys, depletion of forest areas which could have been habitats for monkeys, and shift to monoculture farming has led to increased rivalry and aggression amongst monkeys.”

“This aggression then carries on to humans, especially in cases when the land inhabited by monkeys is usurped by the authorities.”

Between 2002 and 2018, India lost 310,624 hectares of forest cover due to deforestation and industrialisation.

Depending on the scale and nature of damage, state governments have come up with various ideas to tackle the issue. In the national capital, Delhi, the government has been relocating monkeys to a wildlife sanctuary. There have also been efforts to shift monkeys from Delhi to forests in neighbouring states.
In 2016, the northern Indian state of Himachal Pradesh declared monkeys as vermin, allowing people to kill them. In 2019, Uttarakhand state followed suit. In east India’s Bihar state, farmers have tried to persuade local politicians to contain attacks of monkeys on crops.

In India, people’s cultural beliefs impact the way they treat monkeys. Hanuman (also called Bajrangbali), the monkey deity, is one of the most popular gods in Hindu mythology.

“People call me to relocate monkeys in urban areas, but I can’t bear to see them caged. After all, they are our lord Bajrangbali,” Ravi Kumar, a monkey chaser in Delhi, told VICE News. Kumar, who chases monkeys by imitating their sound, describes himself as a “security guard for monkeys”.

Yogesh Gokhale, a Delhi-based botanical researcher with expertise in natural resource management, told VICE News, “In my housing society, we have a serious monkey menace, but people continue to feed these animals because they look at them as a religious symbol,” he said.

The role of local civic bodies is crucial in dealing with man-animal conflict. “In urban spaces, monkeys are usually found in places where food waste is not disposed properly,” said Khushboo Gupta, the chief advocacy officer for PETA India.

“The solution lies in town planning including forest protection, keeping bins covered and regular garbage collection.”

Last year, scientists in Delhi discussed using Immunocontraception to keep the population of monkeys in check. However, activists argue, this could potentially worsen the menace. “Sterilisation of monkeys is not an ideal first solution, as the capture process can upset and disturb them,” said Gupta.

She stressed that while sterilization is a scientific method of population control, it is our humane responsibility to look at other means to curb the menace.

“The solution is to create monkey homes or shelters in urban areas with natural greenery that allows monkeys to forage for their food,” said Dr Malik.

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“The monkeys are not the problem,” said Gupta. “Humans, who have created the circumstance that forces these animals into cities, are.”

Follow Shamani on Instagram.

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This cypress forest thrived on land at around the same time that prehistoric humans began migrating out of Africa. As individual trees died and fell to the forest floor, some of them became “entombed” in peat and sediment, according to NOAA. When the Ice Age ended, sea levels rose and these woody time capsules were engulfed by the ocean and buried again, this time under the seabed.

The ancient forest was finally exhumed from its seafloor grave by Hurricane Ivan, which hit the Gulf Coast in 2004 and exposed an arboreal seascape that now lies sixty feet underwater. The precise location of the unique forest has remained a guarded secret, for the most part, though scientists and filmmakers have paid it a few visits.

However, this one site may be “the tip of the iceberg” that hints at a far more expansive preservation of ancient underwater forests, according to Margo Haygood, a molecular biologist at the University of Utah.

“There could be much more underneath [this site] and there could also be other forests in other parts of the Gulf,” Haygood said in a call. “People stumbled upon this one site but there’s likely to be more of them and they could be looked for systematically.”

Haygood is part of an interdisciplinary team that is searching for useful biotechnologies and medical applications within the microbes of this underwater forest ecosystem. In December, the researchers embarked on an expedition to the forest on the research vessel E.O. Wilson, funded by NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration and Research.

NOAA released new footage of the underwater area earlier this week and the team expects to publish its first results from the trip within the next few months.

Just like their counterparts on land, these dead logs support a diversity of lifeforms that scientists are now beginning to collect and examine in the laboratory. “We picked apart the wood more or less splinter by splinter and found all kinds of creatures in those samples,” Haygood said, “but there will certainly be more beyond what we have discovered.”

Marine organisms are gaining a reputation as an exciting source of novel pharmaceuticals and clinical treatments, and these underwater cypress trees are packed with varieties that have never been studied before. The December expedition recovered 300 animals from trunks hauled up out of the forest, according to NOAA, and identified about 100 bacteria strains in cultures from the forests, some of which are new to science.

The most useful microbes for medical and pharmaceutical research tend to live symbiotically with host organisms, as opposed to bacteria that survive without an animal host.

“If you focus on the microbes that live in stable, benign associations with other organisms and you look at the chemicals that they produce, they have been preselected by hundreds of millions of years of evolution together to be potent, effective, and non-toxic,” Haygood explained. “They don’t make things that are poisonous to their hosts, they make things that may be useful to their hosts.”

Microbes that live inside of shipworms, a type of mollusk that feeds on ships, piers, and driftwood, are a particular fascination for Haygood and her colleagues. These woodeaters have evolved an ingenious digestive process that helps them break down the tough cellulose material that makes up trees.

The finer details of this animal’s digestive wonders remain mysterious, but scientists do know that shipworm gills contain bacteria that produce enzymes that can break down wood into sugars. These enzymes somehow travel into the shipworm gut, an unusually semi-sterile organ filled with wood chips that the animal has consumed, and transform the sawdust into sugar.

“They’ve sequestered the bacteria, or kept them away from the wood particles, so that they won’t steal all the good stuff, but they’re getting them to make the enzymes that let the host break down the wood and get all of the best food,” Haygood said. “In return for that, they are somehow feeding the bacteria that are in the gill—obviously the bacteria are surviving well there—but they are not letting them have as much as they want, only as much as the host wants.”

The whole process is extremely unique, which prompted scientists to study it more closely. The results revealed that shipworms are “stuffed full of biosynthetic pathways” that are conducive to drug development, Haygood said.

“We were just blown away; we were floored by it,” she added. “We thought these were just garden-variety nutritional symbionts and they wouldn’t have any great talents in terms of biosynthesis.”

Shipworm bacteria has already been used to develop at least one antibiotic, and scientists are hopeful that the tiny creatures living in this ancient forest can yield more.

“The thing about the shipworm bacteria is that they are a whole new universe because they don’t overlap with what’s already been discovered,” Haygood noted. “They are like a treasure chest that hasn’t been opened yet so we’re trying to get the word out that these are a really good group of bacteria to be working on.”

This forest, which flourished at a time when humans were just beginning to emerge as a globally dominant species, may ultimately become a source of life-saving treatments for their descendents.

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