Find out what’s happened this past week in the world of forestry!

The U.S. Forest Service is launching a new PR campaign titled “Your Forests, Your Future,” with the ultimate goal to increase public engagement and awareness in national forests. The campaign, run by filmmakers Jim and Will Pattiz, will focus on the work the Forest Service does to manage wildfires. In order to engage with new audiences and stay ahead of the technological curve, the project will be released in virtual reality, as well as traditional video footage.

A recent study done by researchers at Duke University has found that medium- and large-scale clearings were largely responsible for the upsurge in global deforestation from 2000 to 2012. By analyzing previously collected data, researchers were able to identify broad global deforestation trends. Researchers hope that the data will be used to identify potential strategies to mitigate deforestation through targeted policy efforts. However, each country’s deforestation habits were unique and they caution no “one-size-fits-all” solution exists.

Mismanagement and clear-cutting of Tasmania’s old-growth forests has endangered the habitat of the swift parrot, a bird native to both Tasmania and Australia. The parrot, one of three migratory parrots in the world, spends a large portion of the year roosting in trees in Tasmania’s forests. Clear-cutting has not only eliminated much of the available habitat, it also places the bird at a much higher risk of predation from sugar gliders, a marsupial native to Australia. The report’s release has prompted the swift parrots’ endangered status to be uplifted to “critically endangered.”

New research published in Global Change Biology examines how climate change affects two of Europe’s most plentiful trees. The effects of rising temperatures, increasing rainfall and extended drought were measured on beech and spruce trees. Researchers found that beech acclimated quickly to rising temperatures, growing faster and putting on more biomass, while spruce specimens were slower to react.

Learn about the early speculative bubble of mulberry trees, which occurred in the early-1800s. The tree was prized for providing a silkworm habitat, aiding in the production of silk, but the price of trees soon outpaced the price of silkworms. This resulted in a rash of investments in mulberry trees, with no corresponding money being put into silkworms. The bubble eventually burst in 1839, but you can still see the remnants of it with the prevalence of “Mulberry Streets” across the country.

In this video for Vox’s Climate Lab, Dr. M. Sanjayan explains how the convenience of expedited shipping has on the environment, as well as identifying some consumer and corporate behaviors that could make online shopping more energy-efficient. The easiest? Select a longer shipping time at checkout to allow your separate packages to be shipped more efficiently.

Get some gift ideas for the upcoming holidays! Check out WeWood Watches, which crafts sustainable wooden watches. WeWood will plant a tree American Forests for every watch purchased!