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Thames at Ham designated as one of 13 new swimming areas across England to be monitored for water quality
The first designated bathing water area on the River Thames in London will welcome swimmers for the official start of the bathing season on Friday as one of 13 new monitored swimming areas across England.
The Thames at Ham, in south-west London, has been designated as a new river bathing water area after campaigners gathered evidence to show thousands of people use the river for swimming throughout the year.
Canvey Island foreshore, Essex
East Beach at West Bay, Bridport, Dorset
Falcon Meadow, Bungay, Suffolk
Granville Parade Beach, Sandgate, Kent
Little Shore, Amble, Northumberland
New Brighton Beach (east), Merseyside
Newton and Noss Creeks, Devon
Pangbourne Meadow, Berkshire
Queen Elizabeth Gardens, Salisbury, Wiltshire
River Dee at Sandy Lane, Chester, Cheshire
River Fowey in Lostwithiel, Cornwall
River Swale in Richmond, Yorkshire
River Thames at Ham and Kingston, Greater London
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Butterfly Conservation poll is open until 7 June with choice of 60 species from small tortoiseshells to purple emperors
Will it be the rapidly disappearing former garden favourite, the small tortoiseshell? Or the poet John Masefield’s “oakwood haunting thing”, the charismatic purple emperor? Or perhaps the brimstone, the ultimate harbinger of spring?
The question of which is Britain’s favourite butterfly is being put to a popular vote for the first time. The charity Butterfly Conservation is running the poll, which runs until 7 June, giving people the chance to choose their favourite from the 60 species that fly around Britain every summer.
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In this week’s newsletter: The public stranding of a young humpback exposes tensions between animal rights activism and other choices around biodiversity
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Timmy the whale is lost at sea, presumed dead.
In normal circumstances, the loss of a young humpback whale would be a sad yet unremarkable part of the circle of life. Dead whales help sustain thousands of marine species – and are part of the global carbon cycle.
Smuggled in syringes: how Nairobi became a nexus for the black market in giant harvester ants
Don’t reach for the bug spray: scientists find insects may feel pain after crickets nurse sore antennae
Labour must fulfil promise to introduce clean air act, charities urge
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Glenn Murcutt pioneered architecture that was sensitive to its environment, and accomodating to changing temperatures and wildlife
The house teaches you things, Lynne Eastaway says. Today, a choir of cicadas fill the scrub with a rhythm that rises and falls. On other days, there may be visits from birds, goannas, echidnas, wombats, wallabies and kangaroos.
“The bush ends, and the house begins,” she says. “You’re not the centre; you’re just part of it. That’s the thing you learn.
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Murlough Nature Reserve, Dundrum, County Down: Its arrival signals the start of summer, and another cycle of its extraordinary breeding method
Sheltered from the Irish Sea by the towering white foredunes of Murlough beach, I follow a trail through the heather and scrub. In the distance, the Mourne mountains slip in and out of view, already charred by this year’s wildfires. My attention turns to the season’s happier signs: sand martins chittering overhead; the scratchy cries of a whitethroat deep in the gorse; a meadow pipit stuttering into song flight. And now, the chant that clinches summer’s arrival.
I follow the cuckoo’s call and find him perched in a stunted sycamore. Through binoculars, I meet his orange eye. As he leans into his song, his jaunty tail and drooping wings make a fin for the long torpedo of his body – the ideal form for a life lived on the move.
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When the birds started nesting on her land at Useless Bay, Chile, Cecilia Durán Gafo decided she would protect them from people and predators
Five pairs of rubbery feet carry velvet-sheathed black-and-white bodies towards the rope line separating the king penguins from the dozen or so visitors, who look on in awe. As these emissaries shuffle over, a hundred of their cohorts parade on a nearby bank, splashing around in the water and regurgitating food into their chicks’ open beaks.
The king penguin (Aptenodytes patagonicus)makes its home almost exclusively on islands in the Southern Ocean. But it has been coming to this wind-battered bay in southern Chile’s Tierra del Fuego region for hundreds of years, probably because its shallow shores offer protection from marine predators and humans.
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Woodland Trust also finds significant north-south divide in tree cover, leaving many people at risk of poor health
Nigel Farage’s constituency of Clacton-on-Sea is a “tree desert”, leaving people more exposed to air pollution, poorer health, lower life expectancy and the impact of rising temperatures, according to a new report.
The Essex town is rated the worst-performing for equal access to trees in England, with the highest proportion of urban residents – 98.2% – living in neighbourhoods with critically low access to trees.
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Study of samples from seven winters suggests neurotoxic metal coming from wood itself rather than old paint
Wood heating is reintroducing lead into the air of local communities and homes, a systematic investigation by academics has found.
Overwhelming evidence of lead’s neurotoxicity meant the metal was banned as an additive in petrol more than 25 years ago. The research by academics from the University of Massachusetts Amherst began by analysing samples of particle pollution from five suburban and rural towns in the north-east US. They looked for tiny particles of potassium that are given off when wood is burned and also particles containing lead.
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Ever fancied creating your own enormous effigy? One Cornish art collective has reinvigorated the practice – and now they want to draw on the public’s skills, too
This New Year’s Eve, environmentalist and author Lisa Schneidau did something she had never done before. She welcomed in 2026 with giants. “At a certain time of the evening, they started appearing from all over the town. Then everyone flooded out of their houses and congregated into a massive procession of giants and lights and drums and music. It was absolutely extraordinary.”
Schneidau’s fairytale experience happened in Lostwithiel, the Cornish home town of the art collective The Lost Giants (TLG), a group of craftspeople and artists reviving the British tradition of making giants and beasties and goliaths. The giants she celebrated with were made of wooden frames and cloth, papier-mache and card, but were full of life.
To apply for a giant, go to The Lost Giants website
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A warm spell mitigated some of the effects of the strike but colder weather would have taken their own toll
May 1926 is remembered in Britain for the general strike, when the TUC called out millions of workers in support of miners who had been locked out while fighting a pay cut.
The strike, which lasted from 3 May to 12 May, took place during a spell of relatively mild weather with little rain. Transport was disrupted but fine conditions allowed many people to walk or cycle to work. There was a shortage of coal but this was mitigated because there was less need for heating. The TUC, fearing legal action and doubting the strike could be sustained, called it off after nine days.
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pub. Verso, London, New York, 2012
pub. Random House, 2006
