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As residents, nature wardens and experts consider the damage to the heathland and how to restore it, the climate crisis is foremost in their minds
A local community pulling together, emergency services saving homes and caravan parks from catastrophe, and farmers and nature reserve wardens working to rapidly create fire breaks to halt a marauding fireball 40 metres high – there was plenty to praise the week after a swathe of east Suffolk burned.
But local people were also in tears at the blackened, ruined state of more than 112 hectares (277 acres) of Dunwich Heath, mourning the devastation of a much-loved nature reserve alongside neighbouring Minsmere. The rare birds that inhabit the reserve have lost crucial habitat, while the rare invertebrate species there will have been “decimated”, according to the reserve staff.
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Researchers find microplastics can persist in compost, leaching into agricultural soils
Plastic contamination should be a central concern in efforts to deal with food waste, which campaigners call one of the most overlooked problems of the climate crisis, researchers have said.
This is despite the fact that, as the chef, author and activist Max La Manna puts it, food waste management is “one of the few climate problems where everyone wins”.
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Abernethy: It’s been a period of heartbreak and gratitude, mourning the scorched landscape and staying away from home when the smoke got too close
Parts of the Cairngorms have been on fire for over three weeks. Many places I take for granted that I can walk to are off-limits. Huge swathes of moorland that should be purple with heather, understoreys that should be thick with blaeberries, granny pines and younger trees, are scorched black. In places, the fires has burned down into the tree root system and the peat layer, and may smoulder for weeks.
It’s been a period of uncertainty and despair. I’ll never forget the day the wind changed direction and a huge plume of smoke rose behind the trees immediately beyond our house. We waited to see if we would be evacuated, gathered passports, important documents, medicines, and packed a bag of clothes. When residents of nearby Nethy Bridge were advised to evacuate, we stayed with a friend just outside the perimeter for the night, something I never imagined having to do.
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Scientists race to untangle complex links between exposure and mortality as fire weather grows more prevalent
A thousand kilometres from the infernos gorging on northern Ontario’s boreal forests, Erin O’Connor watched the sky above Canada’s biggest city turn an “almost post-apocalyptic” orange as it filled with light-scattering particles of soot and ash. Stepping outside the halls of Toronto General hospital, where air filters were keeping patients safe from the worst of the fumes, she was struck by a smell so strong it felt like standing by a campfire.
“It really hit you in the face as soon as you walked outside,” said O’Connor, who runs University Health Network’s emergency department and saw a rise in patients presenting with allergies and shortness of breath. “As the days progressed, it was like that everywhere. It seemed even inside you could smell that burning.”
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London mayor points to ‘terrifying scenes’ this summer amid speculation Burnham may back Jackdaw and Rosebank projects
Sadiq Khan has called on the government to commit to revamped climate action and to reduce the UK’s reliance on oil and gas, as the UK endures a summer of drought, wildfires and heatwaves.
Writing in the Guardian, the mayor of London said that Andy Burnham’s administration must reaffirm its commitment to net zero and make clear it will continue to reduce the UK’s reliance on oil and gas “to get Britain back on track.”
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Wandering gliders are descended from some of the earliest known insects – and breed as one global population
Revealed: the top 10 invertebrates of the year
All hail the wandering glider, a citizen of the globe, an insect for all of us.
Whenever we see a dragonfly zipping through the airspace and devouring tiny insects with aplomb, we can appreciate they are so timelessly effective that they have barely needed to tweak their way of life in 200m years. Odonates are directly descended from some of the earliest winged insects, known as griffin flies, which evolved around 317m years ago.
It’s invertebrate of the year again! From August 3-12, every day we’ll be profiling one of the thousands of amazing invertebrates that our readers have nominated, and then, when you’ve got to hear about all of them, we’ll open the voting so you can choose your favourites. Don’t hesitate to get in touch with thoughts and ideas: email us at [email protected] with Invertebrate in the subject line.
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The mission of the Flock app is quietly subversive: to encourage users to ditch their screens and explore the wonderful world of birding
On a brilliantly bright afternoon in his gallery and studio in Bolinas, a small town on the northern California coast, Keith Hansen was putting the finishing touches on a watercolor of an almost improbably flamboyant painted bunting.
With an ultra-fine sable brush, he made a few intricate additions to the cobalt blue plumage on the bunting’s head, and, satisfied with his work, slipped the watercolor into a stout binder that every few days welcomes a new addition.
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Architect’s vision for redevelopment of heart of EU quarter unrealised amid political wrangling and rising costs
The redevelopment plan for Schuman Square at the heart of the EU quarter in Brussels was very ambitious. From a traffic-clogged, nondescript roundabout, it would become “an urban agora”, a greener, calmer meeting place, nothing less, said a former head of the Brussels government, than “a symbol that beats as the heart … of the European project”.
It did not turn out that way. The result, say critics, is Europe’s largest frying pan, a concrete expanse with little greenery or shade. While the number of cars has reduced and the space is remodelled with smart grey paving, the centrepiece – a steel canopy with a green roof – was never built.
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Australia’s bird population will experience ‘large mortalities’ and risk species loss, modelling based on global outbreaks shows
Sandwich terns are a graceful seabird known for their committed, forceful and spectacular plunging dives into the ocean to catch fish.
Thousands of the species started to fall sick across Europe in 2022 with tens of thousands dying as a lineage of the H5N1 bird flu – 2.3.4.4b – spread through the continent’s wild flocks.
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Also known as the tree lobster, this ultra-rare creature was inadvertently driven to the brink by European settlers
When small species are left alone to evolve for centuries on small islands, they often become larger. Quietly, over thousands of years, Dryococelusaustralis grew to a great size on Lord Howe Island, in the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand.
But the peaceful life of the Lord Howe Island stick insect, an invertebrate of such gargantuan proportions that it is also fondly known as the tree lobster, was destroyed by European settlers. In 1918, a shipwreck brought black rats to the island. The flightless insects were once so common they were used by settlers as bait for fishing, but the rats wiped out the entire population on the island in just two years.
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