The Glastry Clay Pits on the Ards Peninsula, the Belfast Waterworks
and the Balloo Nature Reserve in Bangor have all suffered invasions by non-native
aquatic plants.
Species like
yellowhammer and bullfinch have seen numbers drop by around half in the last 40
years. There has also been a decline in song thrushes, blackbirds and house sparrows.
Carrion
crows are coming down into bushes to tear off twigs for their nests. They use
live, sappy twigs rather than dead ones since these can be woven into the nest
without snapping.
A mystery killer has struck
in Coxley and its victims number over 100. On Sunday evening, scores of starlings
started to fall out of the sky over one house in the village, and no one can understand
why.
A
government agency would report back to UK finance minister Alistair Darling within
weeks on the options for a green bank to stimulate offshore wind and other big
infrastructure projects, treasury officials said on Tuesday.
UK offshore wind costs at least twice nuclear: study
Generating Britain's electricity from offshore wind farms is
likely to be at least twice as expensive as nuclear power, according to a new
report by engineering consultants Parsons Brinckerhoff.
From giant hydraulic oysters that sit on the sea floor, to long
rubber snakes that writhe in the ocean swell, there's no shortage of creatures
designed to harness the power of the waves.
There are plans to open
up a network of caves and tunnels to the public as part of a bid to transform
a quarry into a "significant" tourist attraction.
Michael McCarthy: A literary spell of warm weather
Spring came last week and so did its first notable event, though
not in a flowering, an emerging or a singing, but in a publication: Richard Mabey
published his essays.
Wealthy
and developing nations should be able to seal an agreement this year on deforestation,
unlocking a key part of the next treaty on global warming, Indonesian negotiators
said Monday.
Four environmental groups
have sued the European Union's executive for withholding documents they say will
add to a growing dossier of evidence that biofuels harm the environment and push
up food prices.
Egypt wants visitors to discover its Mediterranean coast at a
marine reserve being established near the border with Libya, the government said
Tuesday.
Researchers from the Centre for Ecological Research and Forestry
Applications (CREAF) and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB) have demonstrated,
using a map of the potential distribution, the alpine marmot's capacity for adaptation
in the fields of the Pyrenees.
Shanta Persaud was standing at the photocopier one morning when
she saw a little bird fly directly into a large window on the ground floor of
her Scarborough office building.
Economic value of nature 'still
invisible', says UN
A United Nations
initiative is making massive calculations in an attempt to put a price on nature
services such as soil, forest or fresh water in a drive to convince policymakers
to implement the 'polluter pays' principle to protect nature, said Pavan Sukhdev,
who leads the initiative.
World's nature 'becoming extinct at fastest rate on record',
conservationists warn
The world’s
animals and plants are being killed off by humans faster than new ones can evolve,
for the first time since dinosaurs became extinct, experts have warned.
CITES can help save bluefin tuna and stem wildlife poaching crisis
Governments meeting on 13th March
for the largest wildlife trade convention will have a unique opportunity to preserve
the world’s oceans and simultaneously stem a worldwide poaching crisis.
Thresher shark fishing banned by
Indian Ocean Tuna Commission
The
Shark Alliance is applauding a historic ban on fishing for thresher sharks adopted
last week by the Indian Ocean Tuna Commission (IOTC) at their annual meeting in
Korea.
The world will almost certainly
fail to draw up a new treaty on climate change this year, the minister in charge
of last year’s Copenhagen summit has admitted, delivering a heavy blow to the
barely flickering hopes for a swift global settlement.
EU climate chief wants Europe to "lead by example"
Europe's new climate chief sought to reinvigorate international
climate talks on Tuesday, laying out a strategy for the EU to lead the world by
example.
China and India joined almost all other major greenhouse gas
emitters Tuesday in signing up to the climate accord struck in Copenhagen, boosting
a deal strongly favored by the United States.
Obama to push climate change in White House meeting
President Barack Obama will corral on Tuesday key Republican
and Democratic senators whose support is critical for passing a climate change
law, seeking to jump-start stalled efforts to overhaul energy policy.
Leaked emails between climate scientists at the University of
East Anglia have caused a furore. Phil Jones on how not to get caught out by freedom
of information requests
Oxygen isotopes in clamshells
may provide the most detailed record yet of global climate change, according to
a team of scientists who studied a haul of ancient Icelandic molluscs.
The United States and Britain
are threatening to withhold support for a $3.75 billion World Bank loan for a
coal-fired plant in South Africa, expanding the battleground in the global debate
over who should pay for clean energy.
The
head of the International Monetary Fund has proposed a plan for the world's governments
to pool together to raise money needed to adapt to climate change, a rare step
for an organisation that normally does not develop environmental policies.
Carbon traders and green businesses are increasingly concerned
that Japan's planned emissions trading scheme could be watered down after the
government released a draft climate bill that provided few details of how the
proposed initiative would work.
Sarkozy seeks funding, training for nuclear energy
International development banks must finance civilian nuclear
projects to help emerging nations build energy plants, French President Nicolas
Sarkozy said on Monday, laying out ambitious plans to develop the industry.
