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Nature Watch

Nature Watch

Jelsa's Trees and History

Published in Nature Watch

The trees which adorn Jelsa have marked significant changes in Jelsan culture and attitudes to the environment over time. Vito Gospodnetić is a dedicated protector of Jelsa's precious natural resources alongside its cultural and historical heritage.

Former times, Jelsa's greenery seen from the air.
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Rue: a Paradox Plant

Published in Nature Watch

A plant family full of amazing magical promises!

Ruta graveolens, Humac on Hvar Island, flowering in June 2023
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Precious Birds: Saving Owls

Published in Nature Watch

The Scops Owl is a welcome visitor to Hvar Island every summer. Arriving between the middle of March or beginning of April its persistent single-note call is the hallmark of the warm season. 

Floof ready to fly...
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Birdwatching report Hvar Island: May - October 2024.

Published in Nature Watch

Reading Steve Jones' report earlier this year, keen birdwatcher Tomislav Sjekloća was inspired to check out the Dračevica pond and other parts of Hvar, and we are delighted he has shared his sightings with us.

Blue Rock Thrush near Fortica in Hvar Town
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Hvar birds, September 2024

Published in Nature Watch

In early September 2024 a birdwatching couple visited Hvar and we are delighted to report that their trip was reasonably fruitful!.

European Turtle Dove
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BATS: know, cherish and protect them!

Published in Nature Watch

In 2023 the honour of celebrating International Bat Night, which aims to raise people's awareness of the vital importance in our ecosystem, fell to the Krka National Park,which organised a superbly imaginative programme beside its exquisite Skradinski Buk Waterfall.

BATS: know, cherish and protect them!
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Orchids need care

Published in Nature Watch

Highlighting Croatia's wild orchids and the need to treat them with love and respect, the highly active and successful BIOM ASSOCIATION published an article in the spring of 2024 with a plea to pay attention to these fascinating and invaluable plants.

Orchis italica
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Orchids: Humble, Amazing, Delightful!

Published in Nature Watch

In 2023 on Hvar there were two special orchid finds by visiting experts from Zagreb, who located the endemic Ophrys pharia and the Himantoglossum robertianum.

Ophrys pharia, 'Forka'
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Re-wilding in Rovinj: success and failure

Published in Nature Watch

A visitor to Rovinj in June 2024 found much to admire in the eco-friendly Grand Park Hotel - alongside a major cause for concern.

Re-wilding in Rovinj: success and failure
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Eco Environment News feeds

  • Why are onions turning up on Brighton beach?

    Food produce and other waste has been littering Sussex coastline as capsized shipping containers wash ashore

    Coral Evans was walking along the beach in Brighton on Tuesday evening when she came across an unfamiliar sight.

    “Hundreds of dust masks had washed up, along with single-use plastic gloves and cans of dried milk,” she said. “It was odd to see in winter – because nothing surprises us in summertime with the amount of people on the beach.”

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  • Inventor says robo-vaccination machine could be used to combat bovine TB

    Tony Cholerton created Robovacc to inoculate a timid tiger at London zoo – but says it could administer jabs to badgers

    It began with the tiger who wouldn’t come to tea. Cinta was so shy that she refused to feed when keepers at London zoo were around, and staff wondered how they would ever administer the young animal’s vaccinations without traumatising her.

    So Tony Cholerton, a zookeeper who had been a motorcycle engineer for many years, invented Robovacc – a machine to quickly administer vital jabs without the presence of people.

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  • ‘I’m losing £1,800 a day’: the stark reality for Britain’s dairy farmers

    The cost of producing milk is higher than that being paid by milk processors, leaving farmers operating at a loss

    “Every morning that I roll out of bed at 4.40am, I know I’m losing £1,800 that day, just by getting up.” This is the stark daily reality for Paul Tompkins, as he and his fellow dairy farmers struggle in the face of plummeting milk prices.

    Tompkins, who is the third generation to run his family’s 234-hectare (600-acre) farm in the Vale of York, can produce milk for about 40p a litre from his 500-strong herd of black and white Holstein cows. However, he is being paid only 29p a litre by his milk processor, leaving him operating at a loss, despite trying to run his business as efficiently as possible.

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  • Rare twins born in DRC raise cautious hope for endangered mountain gorillas

    Virunga park ranger says babies are well cared for by mother Mafuko but high infant mortality makes first weeks critical

    It was noon by the time Jacques Katutu first saw the newborn mountain gorillas. Cradled in the arms of their mother, Mafuko, the tiny twins clung to her body for warmth in the forest clearing in Virunga national park, in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

    Katutu, head of gorilla monitoring in Virunga, has seen dozens of newborns in his 15 years as a ranger. But, he tells the Guardian, even he was touched by the sight of the fragile infant males, who face serious obstacles if they are to become silverbacks one day.

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  • UK urged to ratify high seas treaty to avoid being shut out of Ocean Cop summit

    As international treaty comes into force, bill to make it law in Britain is moving at ‘glacial pace’ through parliament

    The UK risks being shut out of a historic oceans summit because parliament has failed to ratify the UN’s high seas treaty, environmental charities and campaigners have warned.

    The high seas treaty, formally known as the Agreement on the Conservation and Sustainable Use of Marine Biological Diversity of Areas Beyond National Jurisdiction, comes into force on Saturday, after two decades of talks.

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  • Country diary: There’s a hard, ancient pleasure to laying a hedge | Michael White

    Cranbrook, Kent: I have a stretch of leggy hawthorn that needs attention, so I head out into the cold with my axe and billhook

    Wire netting is everywhere in the Kent Weald – barbed boundaries to ancient pastures where sheep and cattle still idly graze. But what did farmers do for the hundreds of years before stock fencing was invented?

    Hedges, so rooted in what we wistfully consider to be our natural landscape, are in fact human-made features, planted almost solely for the purpose of enclosure. Unmanaged hedges are not a permanent solution, though: young trees mature, trunks become bare, and animal‑sized holes appear, rendering them useless. To remedy this, the practice of hedge laying was developed; unlike bricklaying, it is an act of maintenance rather than creation.

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  • ‘Garden of Eden’: the Spanish farm growing citrus you’ve never heard of

    Todolí foundation produces varieties from Buddha’s hands to sudachi and hopes to help citrus survive climate change

    It was on a trip with a friend to the east coast of Spain that the chef Matthew Slotover came across the “Garden of Eden”, an organic farm growing citrus varieties he had never heard of. The Todolí Citrus Foundation is a nonprofit venture and the largest private collection of citrus in the world with more than 500 varieties, and its owners think the rare fruit could hold the genetic secrets to growing citrus groves that can deal with climate change.

    The farm yields far more interesting fruit than oranges and lemons for Slotover’s menu, including kumquat, finger lime, sudachi and bergamot.

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  • Australia’s koala paradox: why is the beloved marsupial endangered in parts but overabundant in others?

    There are so many koalas in some places that food is the issue – while elsewhere populations are threatened by habitat loss. And there are no easy fixes

    On French Island in Victoria’s Western Port Bay, koalas are dropping from trees. Eucalypts have been eaten bare by the marsupials, with local reports of some found starving and dead. Multiple koalas – usually solitary animals – can often be seen on a single gum.

    Koalas were first introduced to French Island from the mainland in the 1880s, a move that protected the species from extinction in the decades they were extensively hunted for their pelts. In the absence of predators and diseases such as chlamydia, the population thrived.

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  • Dublin Bay’s oyster graveyard rises from dead in effort to restore rich ecosystem

    Pioneering scheme hopes species that thrived for thousands of years in Irish waters can do so again

    The dinghy slowed to a stop at a long line of black bobbing baskets and David Lawlor reached out to inspect the first one.

    Inside lay 60 oysters, all with their shells closed, shielding the life within. “They look great,” beamed Lawlor. So did their neighbours in the next basket and the ones after that, all down the line of 300 baskets, totalling 18,000 oysters.

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  • The fate of the planet’s coastlines depends on how fast Antarctica’s ice sheets melt. We don’t know what’s coming

    Some regions of the continent have enough ice to push up sea levels by 15 metres if they all melt, but researchers don’t yet fully understand the consequences

    On one side of Dr Ben Galton-Fenzi’s view across the vast Totten ice shelf, the sun sat low on the Antarctic horizon. On the other, a full moon.

    The ice shelf is “flat and white”, says Galton-Fenzi. “If there’s cloud around, you lose the horizon.”

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