The other day, on a stony island in an Essex pool not far from
the sea, I saw an absolute dormitory of lazing or sleeping birds. The most conspicuous
were the shelducks, with their glossy green heads and chestnut belt around their
breasts.
There
has been recent press coverage about the drop in numbers of swifts breeding in
the UK, and even though anecdotal evidence can often be misleading, there does
seem to be considerably fewer swifts feeding around the nature reserve at Rainton
Meadows this year than last.
Welsh badger cull is brutal, futile and incomprehensible
It would be stupid to deny that badgers are both a reservoir
and a vector of bovine TB. They are not the only ones of course: cattle are also
responsible for spreading the disease among themselves.
Elin
Jones AM, Rural Affairs Minster discussed the new changes to tackle illegal fishing
in Wales yesterday. The Minister saw first hand the capabilities in Environment
Agency Wales' new boats designed to catch and deter illegal fishermen first hand.
Senior civil servants
in the Scottish Government fear the radical Climate Change Bill passed last week
could lead to a legal challenge blocking the proposed new Forth Road Bridge.
SNH appoints five new marine renewable
energy advisors
Scottish Natural
Heritage (SNH) has recruited five new specialist advisors to strengthen its input
to the development of Scotland’s marine renewable energy sector.
The Wildlife Trust for Birmingham
and the Black Country is very pleased to announce that it has been awarded £442,000
towards its innovative Black Country Living Landscape project by Natural England
...
If you fail to plan, you’ll plan to fail – our wildlife. That’s
the message that the RSPB is giving the government in their response to the Port
Master Plans (PMPs) guidance.
International
tuna treaty parties have totally failed to come up with ways to cap fishing capacity,
are mostly failing to follow the advice of their own scientists and are making
only slow progress in reducing illegal fishing and overfishing and bycatch of
other marine life, according to a new assessment by WWF.
Japan has asked Australia to prevent the Sea Shepherd ship Steve
Irwin leaving port to harass its whalers in the Antarctic next summer, but the
plea may have little effect.
Map of elephant DNA reveals
trail of ivory smugglers
Scientists
have used a revolutionary genetic technique to pinpoint the area of Africa where
smugglers are slaughtering elephants to feed the worldwide illegal ivory trade.
Mozambique agrees to protect lost
rainforest of Mount Mabu
The unique
lost rainforest of Mount Mabu is to be given protection from exploitation, following
a new expedition to the remote area revealed a host of new species.
Time for a pop quiz. Which mammal evolves more rapidly: the ringtail,
a raccoonlike animal common in the southwestern United States, or the closely
related cacomistle, which lives in tropical forests in southern Mexico and Central
America?
Beetles add new dynamic to forest fire control efforts
Summer fire seasons in the great forests of the West have always
hinged on elements of chance: a heat wave in August, a random lightning strike,
a passing storm front that whips a small fire into an inferno or dampens it with
cooling rain.
Fears are growing around the world over outbreaks of ranavirus
infections, which are capable of killing various kinds of amphibian species, and
the ecological effects such outbreaks could have.
Conservationists are looking to the United States to help re-establish
the authority of the International Whaling Commission after IWC delegates this
week failed to reach a deal to regulate global whaling.
Hint of conservation push brightens whaling stalemate
The International Whaling Commission(IWC) may be shifting towards
a more conservation-oriented role after this week backing an ambitious Australian
plan for non-lethal whale research.
Victory on
climate change boosts president's position
The
epic battle over universal health care is still to be fought, but Barack Obama
moved to capitalise on a defining moment of his presidency yesterday - a vote
in Congress to act on global warming - saying the time had arrived for America
to show international leadership on climate change.
Australia's planned carbon-emissions
trading scheme got a lift Sunday when the opposition Liberal Party withdrew its
threat to block enabling legislation passing through parliament.
Australian
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on Sunday hailed as an example to Australia the U.S.
House of Representatives passage of a bill to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
in the United States
Gordon Brown's bid to lead world on global warming
Gordon Brown yesterday bid to lead the world in tackling global
warming by launching a groundbreaking initiative to set up a 100bn dollar-a-year
fund, rescuing deadlocked international negotiations on a new climate treaty.
The world's emissions of the greenhouse gases causing global
warming should peak in 2020 and then start to decline, the British Government
is proposing in the run-up to the global climate conference taking place at Copenhagen
in December.
Barack Obama's climate
change bill passes first vote
US
President Barack Obama's plan to force American industries to reduce carbon dioxide
emissions and other greenhouse gases as part of a 'cap and trade' system has passed
an important hurdle in the House of Representatives.
