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Four more regions given drought status, putting 27 million people under restrictions on water use
Almost three-quarters of England is now in drought, as much of Europe braces for its fifth climate crisis-driven heatwave this summer.
Four more regions of England have officially been declared to be in drought: the East Midlands, Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire, Kent and East Sussex, and Solent and the South Downs.
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Its mucus, which can kill crabs and cockroaches, could be the basis of new insecticides
It’s the shuddery stuff of nightmares for some, but for a select group who admire extending ladders, giraffes and the Odyssey, one of the longest animals in the world is bound to appeal.
This creature is nneither the blue whale, nor a lion’s mane jellyfish but the humble bootlace worm, Lineus longissimus,one of the most remarkable marine invertebrates of them all.
It’s invertebrate of the year again! From 3-12 August, every day we will profile one of the thousands of amazing invertebrates that our readers have nominated. And then, when you’ve heard 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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Amid world pressure from heatwaves and fertiliser shortages, billionaire’s business has invested in circular farming and biomethane
There is a distinctive smell of cow manure in the air at the Duke of Westminster’s dairy farm near Chester. It is a world away from the collection of grand West End properties controlled by the duke that form the backbone of his near £10bn fortune, a decade on from becoming Britain’s youngest billionaire.
As part of his 349-year-old Grosvenor empire, Lea Manor Farm on the duke’s Eaton Estate in north-west England has fared better than most dairy farms in recent years.
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Northern Spain will be one of the best places in world to view phenomenon with 460,000 extra visitors expected
Authorities in Spain have warned of an increased risk of fires when hundreds of thousands of people head to the hills and beaches to get a better view of Wednesday’s total solar eclipse.
“The vegetation is extraordinarily dry and the smallest spark or carelessness could lead to devastating forest fires,” the environment minister, Sara Aagesen, said on a visit to Niebla in the south of the country, the site of Spain’s latest fire.
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Power cable linking UK and Ireland now passes near Bronze Age human burial remains instead of fictional grave on Welsh beach
Harry Potter fans have forced a new multimillion-pound power cable between the UK and Ireland to be relocated after complaining it would desecrate the “grave” of Dobby, a fictional elf.
The character was laid to rest on Freshwater West beach in Pembrokeshire, Wales, in the film Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. Fans of the wizard series come to leave stones reading “Here Lies Dobby” despite being asked not to by the land owner, the National Trust, because the beach is an ecologically sensitive site.
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Authorities warn that days of intense rain could trigger widespread flooding and landslides as storm moves north and further inland
More than a million people were moved to safety across eastern China by Sunday evening as powerful Typhoon Dolphin made landfall amid fears torrential rain would cause flooding and landslides.
Wenzhou, a coastal city in Zhejiang province, said it relocated more than 900,000 people and opened more than 1,500 emergency shelters. In neighbouring Fujian, 98,900 people were moved from high-risk areas.
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Hitchin, Hertfordshire: A rare daytime attack on our chickens led to a standoff. But I could see this animal was suffering in the heatwave
High-pitched shrieking shattered the mid-morning calm and I knew, immediately, that there was a killer on the loose. I tore out of the patio door and across the lawn to intervene between predator and prey, facing down a fox with black tail feathers in its jaws. Shouting and growling, all animal myself, I was driven by instinct to protect our chickens, Cumulus and Burnet, from further onslaught.
The fox froze. Stared. I stared back. An unfathomable silence. Breaking the stalemate, I glanced over my shoulder, but my girls had evaporated. Moss (our third hen) is broody and spends much of her time on the nest, so I sidled over to the chicken run while still watching the fox, and there she was. Fluffsome, flat and completely unharmed.
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Volunteers are on the lookout for sick birds as outbreak shatters ‘fairytale belief’ that disease would not reach Australia
Bird enthusiast Jean Turner hoped avian flu would never arrive at her doorstep.
At her home on Kangaroo Island in South Australia, bossy fairy wrens chirp at her from the deck, grey currawongs clumsily fall into her bird bath, and fluffy, hooded plover chicks emerge from speckled eggs in front of her binoculars.
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Conservationists have created a ‘coastal corridor’ of ocean-based projects designed to preserve and nourish vulnerable marine life
From disappearing manatees to bleached coral reefs, gender-changing turtles and oyster beds destroyed by hurricanes, no other state’s marine life faces the magnitude of climate-related challenges that Florida’s does.
Now, wildlife authorities are attempting to bring some cohesion to tackling the diverse slate of issues by borrowing from a playbook that has already proved successful on land.
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Extreme conditions in Washington and Oregon have fueled fast-moving fires, leaving the region draped in toxic plumes – and the danger isn’t over
Piles of twisted metal and ashen debris line the cul-de-sacs where the tranquil suburbs of Spokane, Washington, once stood.
The scale of devastation from a historic wildfire season in the Pacific north-west has come into sharper focus as firefighters wrangle a trio of blazes that consumed at least 846 structures on the eastern side of the state.
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