Articles written by Janet Mcconnaughey
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Tortoises released early into the wild in Mississippi
Scientists raising threatened tortoises at a Mississippi National Guard camp to give them a head start in the wild are trying something new – raising a few to sexual maturity and then releasing them. The Nature Conservancy and the National Guard rele...
Pandemic hampers raising rare whooping cranes for the wild
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The COVID-19 pandemic is drastically reducing the number of young whooping cranes to be released this fall to help bring back the world's rarest cranes. Zoos and other places where the endangered birds are bred have had to cut n...
COVID-19 puts National WWII Museum 20th anniversary online
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the National WWII Museum in New Orleans was planning on a 20th anniversary crowd of thousands. Now it's working to avoid crowds by selling a limited number of scheduled tickets and holding all anni...
`Like I just got out of jail!': States ease their lockdowns
GRETNA, La. (AP) — More than a dozen states let restaurants, stores or other businesses reopen Friday in the biggest one-day push yet to get their economies up and running again, acting at their own speed and with their own quirks and restrictions to...
Lawsuit filed to protect turtles in Mississippi, Louisiana
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Two environmental groups have sued the Trump administration, saying it has failed to protect map turtles found in Mississippi and Louisiana under the Endangered Species Act. The lawsuit calls for endangered or threatened status f...
About 5,000 golden eagles winter in eastern U.S.
Golden eagles are back from Canada, spending the winter in the eastern U.S. Researcher Trish Miller said there are probably around 5,000 east of the Mississippi River, compared to estimates of 1,000 to 2,500 when she and her husband, Michael...
Activists: Likely slave cemetery should scrap $9.4B project
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana should reject a planned $9.4 billion plastics complex because at least one slave cemetery is on the grounds and others may be on recently purchased property that remains unstudied, activists say. "I am concerned about t...
Water quality sensor hitching ride on Mississippi River boat
MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) — A data-gathering sensor attached to the American Queen steamboat will give scientists and cities a better understanding of water quality along the entire length of the Mississippi River, officials said Monday. U.S. Geological S...
Flooded Mississippi a threat as hurricane season heats up
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — The river that drains much of the flood-soaked United States is still running far higher than normal, menacing New Orleans in multiple ways just as the hurricane season intensifies. For months now, a massive volume of water has bee...
Pocket-sized shark squirts glowing clouds from pockets
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A pocket-sized pocket shark found in the Gulf of Mexico has turned out to be a new species. And the mysterious pouches that it's named for, up near its front fins? Scientists say they squirt little glowing clouds into the ocean. R...
'It's powerful': Tropical storm starts lashing Louisiana
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Homeowners sandbagged their doors and tourists trying to get out of town jammed the airport Friday as Tropical Storm Barry began rolling in, threatening an epic drenching that could test how well New Orleans has strengthened its f...
Flooding swamps New Orleans; possible hurricane coming next
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A storm swamped New Orleans streets and paralyzed traffic Wednesday as concerns grew that even worse weather was on the way: a possible hurricane that could strike the Gulf Coast and raise the Mississippi River to the brim of the c...
NASA: Intense work under way on rocket for future moonshots
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Crews are working around the clock at a NASA rocket factory, intent on meeting a new fall 2020 deadline to test launch a mega-rocket designed to propel astronauts to the moon and beyond, a space agency official said Friday. "I came...
NOAA: Bryde's whales in Gulf of Mexico are endangered
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Federal scientists say a tiny group of Bryde's whales in the Gulf of Mexico is endangered, facing threats including oil and gas exploration and development. "They're the only year-round baleen whales that make their home in Gulf o...
American anchor for Iranian TV is arrested on visit to US
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A prominent American anchorwoman on Iranian state television has been arrested by the FBI during a visit to the U.S., the broadcaster reported Wednesday, and her son said she was being held in a prison, apparently as a material w...
Snake names honor Darwin, fire god, Louisiana professor
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A Louisiana professor is in heady company, honored by having one of three newly identified species of snakes from the Galapagos Islands named after him. "They named one after Charles Darwin — that's a no-brainer — and one after...
Oklahoma's Choctaw horses connect to Mississippi
POPLARVILLE, Miss. (AP) — Six foals sired by a cream-colored stallion called DeSoto scamper across a pasture in southwest Mississippi — the first new blood in a century for a line of horses brought to America by Spanish conquistadors and bred by Cho...
2 states up boll weevil traps after 2 found in Mississippi
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Louisiana and Arkansas have stepped up boll weevil trapping because two of the destructive, long-snouted beetles were found in northern Mississippi. "We run scared about getting them reintroduced into the state," said Gus Lorenz, a...
Time capsule: Flags, Confederate cash, US medal
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Turn-of-the-century tour books, lots of Confederate cash, a post-Civil War medal from a Union veterans' group, and a flag too tattered by time to tell whether it was U.S. or Confederate were among items removed Friday from a 1...
Ground-penetrating radar in hunt for dead in racial massacre
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Researchers searching for a possible mass grave from a racial massacre in 1887 said they picked up signals Thursday of disturbed earth at a south Louisiana site, but they cautioned they don't know yet what ground-penetrating r...
Study: Invasive fist-sized treefrogs in New Orleans
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Invasive, noxious Cuban treefrogs that eat smaller frogs and grow as big as a human fist have established a population in New Orleans, and officials say they could soon pose a threat to native frogs across the Mississippi River. T...
Threatened listing for snake found only in Louisiana, Texas
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A burrowing snake found only in Louisiana and Texas is now listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. The Louisiana pine snake is a 5-foot-long (1.5-meter-long) constrictor found in a few longleaf pine forests in Louisi...
Study: flood control engineering likely has worsened floods
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Flood control work in the Mississippi River and its tributaries has likely made floods worse in Mississippi and Louisiana, researchers say. Using 500 years of data from tree rings and from sediment in oxbow lakes — bends that onc...
Party's over: Raucous Fat Tuesday gives way to solemn Lent
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Families camped out from early morning to catch beads and stuffed animals thrown from float riders. Revelers took to the streets in elaborate or funny costumes evoking Marie Antoinette, President Donald Trump and glamorous v...
Mardi Gras parade honors New Orleans' tricentennial
NEW ORLEANS (AP) — Tens of thousands of revelers descended on New Orleans streets for parades and rowdy fun as Mardi Gras capped the Carnival season in a city with a celebration of its own, its 300th anniversary. The anniversary of this Louisiana por...
