Articles written by Melina Walling


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  • On "Farmtok," agriculture gets its moment in the spotlight. What would it mean if that disappeared?

    MELINA WALLING and JOSHUA A. BICKEL|Jan 22, 2025

    BUCYRUS, Ohio (AP) — Zoe Kent hopes people get a little joy out of her talking about farming on the Internet. In one of her latest videos, she compares pesticide application to dry shampoo. "Farming is for the girls," she quips. On Instagram and TikTok, under the handle "farmwithzoe," Kent films herself putting on boots to load corn into a massive truck bed, posts memes about the price of grain and documents just about everything else about farm life from getting rocks stuck in her equipment to eating lunch on long days out in a combine. Now, t...

  • What this week's winter wallop means for farmers across the U.S.

    MELINA WALLING|Jan 8, 2025

    A nasty dose of winter weather has pummeled much of the U.S. from Kansas to the East Coast, leaving many Americans to dig out of the blizzard — including farmers. And more is on the way, with the polar air expected to continue to grip some places until at least Friday. Farmers always watch the weather, but depending on where they're located and what they produce, winter always presents mental challenges for growers, said Carolyn Olson, an organic farmer in southwestern Minnesota who is also vice president of the Minnesota Farm Bureau F...

  • Negotiators are urged to get down to business as climate talks in Baku enter second week

    SIBI ARAS and MELINA WALLING|Nov 15, 2024

    BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) — United Nations climate talks resumed Monday with negotiators urged to make progress on a stalled-out deal that could see developing countries get more money to spend on clean energy and adapting to climate-charged weather extremes. U.N. Climate Change executive secretary Simon Stiell called for countries to "cut the theatrics and get down to real business." "We will only get the job done if Parties are prepared to step forward in parallel, bringing us closer to common ground," Stiell said to a room of delegates in Baku,...

  • Control the path and power of hurricanes like Helene? Forget it, scientists say

    MELINA WALLING and SETH BORENSTEIN|Oct 4, 2024

    Hurricanes are humanity's reminder of the uncontrollable, chaotic power of Earth's weather. Milton's powerful push toward Florida just days after Helene devastated large parts of the Southeast likely has some in the region wondering if they are being targeted. In some corners of the Internet, Helene has already sparked conspiracy theories and disinformation suggesting the government somehow aimed the hurricane at Republican voters. Besides discounting common sense, such theories disregard weather history that shows the hurricanes are hitting...

  • After Beryl, Houston-area farmers pull together to face unique challenges

    MELINA WALLING and JUAN A. LOZANO|Jul 12, 2024

    PORTER, Texas (AP) — Hurricanes cause trouble for everyone, but farmers have a whole other list of problems. Beryl has been no exception: Over the past week, the storm damaged crops, soaked rabbits and chickens, terrified goats, put horses at risk of developing colic and left cows without fences to keep them penned in. And the lasting power outages have been particularly devastating for animal caretakers who urgently need water, feed and supplies. But with trees downed, power out, gas in short supply and many local businesses temporarily out o...

  • Tornado hits Michigan, killing toddler, while Ohio and Maryland storms injure at least 13

    LEA SKENE and MELINA WALLING|Jun 7, 2024

    BALTIMORE (AP) — A tornado that ripped through suburban Detroit earlier this week downed trees that smashed through the roof of Abby Sata's family home, sending water gushing below. Though they now have a giant crane taking trees off the house, they were lucky no one was hurt. The tornado that damaged Sata's home in Livonia, Michigan, tore through several neighborhoods and felled a tree that killed a toddler on Wednesday. It developed so quickly that there was no advance notice from the National Weather Service or others that would have normall...

  • YouTuber charged for having a helicopter blast a Lamborghini with fireworks, authorities say

    MELINA WALLING|Jun 7, 2024

    A YouTuber who specializes in "car shenanigans" is facing federal charges after authorities said he directed a video in which two people in a helicopter blasted fireworks at a speeding Lamborghini from above. Alex Choi, 24, is charged with causing the placement of an explosive or incendiary device on an aircraft, the Department of Justice announced Thursday. If convicted, Choi faces a maximum of ten years in federal prison. Prosecutors allege that Choi posted a video last July, made without filming permits, entitled "Destroying a Lamborghini...

  • Two years after deadly tornadoes, some Mayfield families are still waiting for housing

    MELINA WALLING|Feb 7, 2024

    MAYFIELD, Ky. (AP) — Ashley Prince and her family have been chasing "normal" for years now. Two years ago, the tornado that whipped through Mayfield peeled the roof off their rental property "like a band-aid." She and her fiance Dylan watched from inside as the mile-wide storm knocked over the water tower behind their house, sucker-punching her in a rush of rapids. The ordeal left her with a severely injured leg. What came next was a monthslong journey to put their lives back together. That meant about a year spent with Ashley's parents, t...

  • Red hot October almost guarantees 2023 will be the hottest year on record

    MELINA WALLING|Nov 8, 2023

    This October was the hottest on record globally, 1.7 degrees Celsius (3.1 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the pre-industrial average for the month — and the fifth straight month with such a mark in what will now almost certainly be the warmest year ever recorded. October was a whopping 0.4 degrees Celsius (0.7 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the previous record for the month in 2019, surprising even Samantha Burgess, deputy director of the Copernicus Climate Change Service, the European climate agency that routinely publishes monthly b...

  • Even frozen Antarctica is being walloped by climate extremes, scientists find

    MELINA WALLING|Aug 9, 2023

    Even in Antarctica — one of the most remote and desolate places on Earth — scientists say they are finding shattered temperature records and an increase in the size and number of wacky weather events. The southernmost continent is not isolated from the extreme weather associated with human-caused climate change, according to a new paper in Frontiers in Environmental Science that tries to make a coherent picture of a place that has been a climate change oddball. Its western end and especially its peninsula have seen dramatic ice sheet melt that...

  • To fight berry-busting fruit flies, researchers focus on sterilizing the bugs

    MELINA WALLING|Jun 14, 2023

    Paul Nelson is used to doing battle with an invasive fruit fly called the spotted wing drosophila, a pest that one year ruined more than half the berries on the Minnesota farm he and his team run. In recent years, they've cut their losses closer to 5%, but it's been labor-intensive and expensive. "It's a pest that if you're not willing to stick the time into it, it's going to take over your farm," said Nelson, the head grower at Untiedt's, a vegetable and fruit operation about an hour west of Minneapolis. Nelson and other growers may someday ge...