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With the help of citizen scientists, researchers studying rare humpback ‘jaw-gaping’ believe the move could be a social display
Off the coast of Western Australia, a humpback whale is “pirouetting”, sweeping its pectoral fins through the water, its massive jaw hanging wide open. Surrounded by companions, the animal isn’t lunging for a meal: rather, it is putting on a mysterious behavioural display.
This underwater ballet, captured on camera by an onlooker and shared online, is one of the clearest examples of a rarely documented phenomenon known as “gaping”.
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Vitória Régia imagines rightwing Bolsonaro plot succeeded with US help – and highlights threats facing Indigenous peoples
The year is 2025 and far-right coup plotters have annihilated Brazil’s democracy, assassinating the president, closing the national congress and surrendering the Amazon rainforest and its untold riches to the United States.
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the Amazon of America,” a thick-accented North American soldier tells a group of journalists being taken on a propaganda tour of an oil refinery in the newly annexed jungle realm. Nearby, a replica of the Statue of Liberty has been carved out of the wilderness to celebrate Washington’s tutelage over more than half of Brazil.
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The Eden Project’s National Wildflower Centre is opening entries for its Wildflower Photographer of the Year 2026 competition on 29 May. The contest showcases images of some of Britain and Ireland’s 1,600 wildflower species, and a selection of photos from last year’s competition will be on display at Eden Dock, Canary Wharf, London, during CWG’s Nature Week, from 13 July
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Allendale, Northumberland: Once again, wildlife has made a home here, in part because they feel safe
A big moon is cresting the Scots pine as I sit at an upstairs window looking down on to the garden. Awaiting the dusk emergence of a female tawny owl has become an evening ritual. After a day spent in the confines of a nest box in our sycamore tree, her departure shifts back by a few minutes every night. Completely silent, she drops towards the woodland border and skims the plants, each time on the same trajectory, a grey shadow in the gloaming.
Another movement on the path below catches my eye: a woodcock slinking along, using the box hedge to disguise her passage. If I hadn’t been watching for the owl I would never have known that she too is nesting somewhere in the garden’s thick leafiness. In July 2023, I wrote about a woodcock nesting in a flower border a few metres from the house, four chicks successfully hatching from four eggs. Last year, another attempt was disturbed by a cat captured on trailcam. This may be the same bird returned for a third time. Woodcocks are extremely secretive birds, their close proximity to a house very unusual.
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East Midlands electric car club helps residents and cuts emissions – but the need for a volunteer-led scheme reflects a much wider problem
In the aftermath of the Covid pandemic Miriam Stoate, a regenerative farmer from rural Leicestershire, noticed that too many people in her small village in England’s East Midlands were struggling to get around.
Although there were plenty of cars parked in Tilton, too often she found some of the village’s residents did not have access to one when they really needed it.
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Sarah Eberle hopes to inspire people to nurture where town and countryside meet and nature is need of protection
Stinging nettles, buttercups, broken crockery, fly-tipped flowers and a discarded gnome are not the usual hallmarks of an RHS Chelsea flower show garden.
But this year’s On the Edge garden by Sarah Eberle – the most decorated designer at Chelsea – is designed not to look like a garden at all, rather to transport its visitors to the liminal spaces on the outskirts of towns where the countryside begins and nature is in critical need of protection.
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Emissions understated by factor of five in Essex plans for tech giant, while Greystoke’s Lincolnshire plans show similar error
Developers working for Google have significantly misstated how much carbon two proposed AI datacentres will contribute to the UK’s total emissions in planning documents reviewed by the Guardian.
The tech company wants to build two huge datacentres – one 52-hectare (130 acre) project in Thurrock and another at an airfield in North Weald, both in Essex. To do so, developers are required to submit planning documents calculating how much carbon these projects will emit as a proportion of the UK’s total carbon footprint.
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London mayor talks up coalition-building, highlights his environmental record, and worries national Labour party is on the wrong track
When Sadiq Khan was first elected as mayor of London 10 years ago, Barack Obama was US president, the UK was still in the European Union and Leicester City had just been crowned the unlikely champions of the English Premier League.
In the intervening decade, Donald Trump has gone from reality TV star to two-time US president, the UK has had six different prime ministers, and Brexit has convulsed the country. London has been rocked by tragedies ranging from terror attacks to the Grenfell Tower fire.
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Council’s plan will leave Federal Emergency Management Agency ill-equipped to respond to extreme weather events, experts say
Sweeping changes may be in store at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema), the nation’s frontline emergency response coordinator, that experts warned could further erode US capacity to handle disasters as the risks of extreme weather fueled by the climate crisis continue to rise.
Fears about a fundamental overhaul of Fema’s form and function have been brewing since Donald Trump returned to the White House. After castigating the agency over claims that it was too expensive and “doesn’t get the job done”, Trump set to gutting Fema as an early priority for his second term.
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In record 40C heat on 19 July 2022, 18 homes were lost in village of Wennington – a signal for firefighters to adapt, but UK response remains fragmented
When neighbours urged Lynn Sabberton and her partner, Terry, to flee from their home in Wennington one day in 2022, the couple weren’t sure they should bother. A fire was burning in their village, on the eastern edge of London, but Terry thought it was too far away to be a problem. Struggling with a lung disease made worse by the record 40C heat that day, 19 July, he was wearing only his underwear and refused to budge from his armchair.
Lynn remembers two police officers kicking open their front door and shouting that it was time to go. Lynn pleaded to be allowed to get Terry some clothes and was bundled upstairs to find them. Could she grab some papers? No. Her purse? No. Her cat, Jack? Also no.
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