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âHe took five bullets and returned to work on planktonâ: the double lives of Ukraineâs Antarctic scientists
When the research team at Vernadsky base are not defending their homeland, they are on the frontline of the climate crisis
When Ukraineâs Antarctic research and supply vessel Noosfera left Odesa on its maiden voyage on 28 January 2022, it passed Russian warships in the Black Sea. A month later, Vladimir Putin launched Russiaâs full-scale invasion of its neighbour. Noosfera has not been back since.
âA few weeks later, and Noosfera would have been an important symbolic target for Russia,â said Vadym Tkachenko, a biologist who recently completed his second Antarctic winter at Ukraineâs Vernadsky base. The ship now supplies both Ukrainian and Polish Antarctic bases from Chile and South Africa twice a year, at the start and end of the winter.
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Copernicus online portal offers terrifying view of climate emergency
Looking at the mass of information, there is only one conclusion: we are running out of time
There is so much information on the newly launched Copernicus Climate Change Service atlas that my laptop started to overheat trying to process it all. As well as all the past data, it predicts where the climate is going and how soon we will breach the 1.5C âlimitâ, and then 2C. You can call up the region where you live, so it is specific to what is happening to you and your family â and all the more disturbing for that.
A separate part called Climate Pulse intended particularly for journalists is easier to operate. The refreshing bit is that the maps, charts and timelines from 1850 to the present day on the main atlas are entirely factual measurements, so there can be no argument on the trends. It then follows those trends into the likely scenarios for the next few years. Examining current temperature increases, it seemed to this observer that scientists have been underestimating for some time how quickly the situation is deteriorating.
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Extortionate Easter eggs and shrinking sweets: fears grow of a âchocolate meltdownâ
Poor harvests in extreme weather conditions have led to a tripling of cocoa prices â but farmers have seen no benefit
Around the world this holiday weekend, people will consume hundreds of millions of Easter eggs and bunnies, as part of an annual chocolate intake that can exceed 8kg (18lb) for every person in the UK, or 5kg in the US and Europe. But a global shortage of cacao â the seed from which chocolate is made â has brought warnings of a âchocolate meltdownâ that could see prices increase and bars shrink further.
This week, cocoa prices rose to all-time highs on commodity exchanges in London and New York, reaching more than $10,000 a tonne for the first time, after the third consecutive poor harvest in west Africa. Ghana and Ivory Coast, which together produce more than half of the global cacao crop, have been hit by extreme weather supercharged by the climate crisis and the El Niño weather phenomenon. This has been exacerbated by disease and underinvestment in ageing plantations.
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Country diary: Iâve become a taxi service for the ladybirds | Charlie Elder
West Dartmoor, Devon: They must have got into my house last autumn, and now theyâre emerging in a wonderful variety of markings and spot numbers
Ladybird, ladybird, fly away home⊠Only, it seems they have all flown into mine. Every morning I come across several on the inside of the windows, like droplets of nail varnish motoring around on tiny legs.
These spotty beetles could drive me dotty. Some days I release half a dozen outside, making numerous trips to the back door, cupping them in my palm like dice. And while their joyful polka dot patterns have a nursery school simplicity about them, identifying ladybirds is far from straightforward. The variety of colouring and markings, even among the same species, means that one cannot always rely on simply counting the spots.
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Vegetables are losing their nutrients. Can the decline be reversed?
A process called biofortification puts nutrients directly into seeds and could reduce global hunger, but itâs not a magic bullet
In 2004, Donald Davis and fellow scientists at the University of Texas made an alarming discovery: 43 foods, mostly vegetables, showed a marked decrease in nutrients between the mid and late 20th century.
According to that research, the calcium in green beans dropped from 65 to 37mg. Vitamin A levels plummeted by almost half in asparagus. Broccoli stalks had less iron.
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âBeing so helpless is hard to describeâ: can rescuers win the race against time to save an orphaned orca?
Experts are trying everything from drums to whale calls to lure kÊ·iisaáž„iÊis â or Brave Little Hunter â out of the Canadian lagoon she has been trapped in since the stranding death of her mother
As a two-year-old orca calf circled a lagoon off the west coast of Canada on Monday, she heard a comforting sound resonating through the unfamiliar place in which she found herself: the clicks and chirps of her great-aunt.
But the calf, named kÊ·iisaáž„iÊis (pronounced kwee-sahay-is, which roughly translates as Brave Little Hunter) by local First Nations people, could not locate another whale in the shallow waters. The calls, broadcast from speakers placed underwater, were part of a complex and desperate operation still under way to try to save the stranded calf.
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âPeople mustnât feel meat is being taken awayâ: German hospitals serve planetary health diet
A group of hospitals serve up a menu rich in plants â and say they have had few complaints
Patrick Burrichter did not think about saving lives or protecting the planet when he trained as a chef in a hotel kitchen. But 25 years later he has focused his culinary skills on doing exactly that.
From an industrial park on the outskirts of Berlin, Burrichter and his team cook for a dozen hospitals that offer patients a âplanetary healthâ diet â one that is rich in plants and light in animals. Compared with the typical diet in Germany, known for its bratwurst sausage and doner kebab, the 13,000 meals they rustle up each day are better for the health of people and the planet.
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âWeâd like to shoot them allâ: growing army of wolfdogs raises hackles across Europe
Experts say the hybrids risk âpollutingâ the genetic stock, but scientists disagree on how to deal with them. In Piedmont, Italy, the sight of a blond wolfdog signals the risk of another new litter
- Photographs by Alberto Olivero
From the moment the rangers first saw him on their trail cameras, the problem was apparent. The wolf, spotted deep in the woods of Italyâs Gran Bosco di Salbertrand park, was not grey like his companion, but an unusual blond. His colouring indicated this was not a wolf at all, but a hybrid wolfdog â the first to be seen so far into Piedmontâs alpine region. And where one hybrid is found, more are sure to follow.
âWe thought he would go away,â says Elisa Ramassa, a park ranger in Gran Bosco who has tracked the local wolves for 25 years. âUnfortunately, he found a female who loves blonds.â
Elisa Ramassa and fellow ranger Massimo Rosso search for wolf tracks in Gran Bosco di Salbertrand park; and a wolfdog in the mountains (photographed by Massimo Rosso)
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Sinking US cities increase risk of flooding from rising sea levels
Subsidence linked to extraction of groundwater and natural gas, and weight of buildings pressing into soft ground
A number of cities on the US east coast are sinking, increasing the risk of flooding from rising sea levels.
Between 2007 and 2020 the ground under New York, Baltimore and Norfolk in Virginia sank between 1mm and 2mm a year, other places sank at double or triple that rate, and Charleston, South Carolina, sank fastest, at 4mm a year, in a city less than 3 metres above sea level.
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Surge of new US-led oil and gas activity threatens to wreck Paris climate goals
Worldâs fossil-fuel producers on track to nearly quadruple output from newly approved projects by decadeâs end, report finds
The worldâs fossil-fuel producers are on track to nearly quadruple the amount of extracted oil and gas from newly approved projects by the end of this decade, with the US leading the way in a surge of activity that threatens to blow apart agreed climate goals, a new report has found.
There can be no new oil and gas infrastructure if the planet is to avoid careering past 1.5C (2.7F) of global heating, above pre-industrial times, the International Energy Agency (IEA) has previously stated. Breaching this warming threshold, agreed to by governments in the Paris climate agreement, will see ever worsening effects such as heatwaves, floods, drought and more, scientists have warned.
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Thames Water investors pull plug on ÂŁ500m of funding amid standoff with regulator
Decision increases concerns about financial future of UKâs biggest water firm and increases prospect of nationalisation
Investors in Thames Water have pulled the plug on ÂŁ500m of emergency funding amid a standoff with the industry regulator over attempts to raise bills, increasing the prospect that the heavily indebted company may be nationalised.
The beleaguered utilities company said on Thursday that its shareholders had refused to provide the first tranche of ÂŁ750m funding to secure its short-term cashflow, after the company had failed to meet certain conditions.
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Country diary: A Japanese painting outside a Shrewsbury nightclub | Paul Evans
Welsh Marches, Shropshire: After all the rain, cold winds and more rain, suddenly an explosion of flowers from this Mount Fuji cherry tree
The way to the spring equinox was precarious. We began to wonder if spring would come and go, and it would still be winter. Daffodils looked pissed off. Bleachy damson and blackthorn blossom stained early. Rain, cold winds, rain, floods, more rain. Then suddenly this â boom â an explosion of flowers into a moment of balance.
Emerging from the dark half, I thought it might be the Mount Fuji cherry, Prunus serrulata âShirotaeâ. Battered by decades of standing outside a Shrewsbury nightclub, surrounded by walls and traffic in the corner of a shopping centre due to be demolished, and entangled with gossamer packaging material, this cherry had endured its suffering, and suddenly flowered like a Japanese painting. AÂ Zen moment at the equinox.
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Water companies in England face outrage over record sewage discharges
Call for environmental emergency to be declared after data reveals 105% rise in raw sewage discharges over past 12 months
Water companies in England have faced a barrage of criticism as data revealed raw sewage was discharged for more than 3.6m hours into rivers and seas last year in a 105% increase on the previous 12 months.
The scale of the discharges of untreated waste made 2023 the worst year for storm water pollution. Early data seen by the Guardian put the scale of discharges at more than 4m hours, but officials said the figures were an early estimate.
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Englandâs sewage crisis: how polluted is your local river and which regions are worst hit?
Rivers in north of England among most polluted, shows new data. Search your postcode to see how sewage spills into your local river
Rivers in the north of England are bearing the brunt of the sewage pollution crisis, analysis by the Guardian reveals, with the regionâs waters experiencing the highest rates of waste discharge in the country.
Storm overflows around the Irwell valley, where the rivers Croal and Irwell run through to Manchester, discharged raw sewage 12,000 times in 2023 â the highest rate of all English rivers when accounting for length, at 95 spills per mile.
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It takes a village: the Indian farmers who built a wall against drought
In rural Rajasthan, villagers have taken action against climate damage by constructing water-saving walls, trenches and dams to revive their farmland
The villagers of Surajpura have built a wall: a 15ft (4.5 metre) mud bulwark that snakes through barren land for nearly a mile, with an equally long trench dug beneath it. It might not look like it, but for the 650 residents who toiled on it for six months in 2022, it is an architectural marvel.
The wall passed its strength test last year when it stopped rainwater runoffs, and the trench channelled the water to parched farms in the drought-prone region of Rajasthan in north-west India, reviving them for the first time in more than two decades.
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âA lot of question marksâ: $70m renewable-energy microgrid project divides Daintree
The financial viability of the government-subsided scheme in the world heritage-listed area is just one of its many unknowns
There are some mixed feelings in the Daintree community in far north Queensland about building a renewable-energy microgrid.
The 8MW solar farm with a 20MW battery and a 1MW clean hydrogen plant was pushed through parliament weeks before the 2022 election by the Morrison government with the promise of it providing renewable power by 2024.
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From a graceful turn to a dangerous toy: the World Nature Photography awards 2024 â in pictures
The World Nature Photography award winners have been announced from a pool of entries from all corners of the globe â including a baby elephant in Kenya and an owl-like plant in Thailand. The top award and cash prize of $1,000 went to Tracey Lund from the UK for her image of two gannets under the water off the coast of the Shetland Islands. Lund and her fellow winners were drawn from thousands of images
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The Albanese government is drifting from its environmental commitments â itâs time for transparency and good faith | Jack Pascoe
Environment minister Tanya Plibersekâs reforms are running so late thereâs speculation the government will weaken them at the expense of the environment
After less than two years in power, the Albanese government is showing signs of getting comfortable. Consultation, transparency and coherent policy appear to be out. Cosiness with powerful stakeholders and policy on-the-run appear to be in.
Parliament is now debating amendments to the Offshore Petroleum and Greenhouse Gas Storage Act, which, if passed, could carve out oil and gas approvals from Australiaâs environmental law.
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Why is the right at war with cyclists? Weâre not âwokeratiâ â weâre just trying to get around | Zoe Williams
Riding a bike is not a political act, yet cyclists have become the bete noire for the anti-woke, anti-green, anti-liberal crowd
Getting my bike nicked was like losing a pet. I didnât want a new one; I wanted to go back in time and not lose my old one. But, in the end, an inanimate object is not infinitely grievable and I need wheels. This is how I fetched up with a Liv bike, my precious first born putting the seat up for me. I said how proud and heart-filled I was, watching him do a little job that I didnât want to do myself for the first time, and he said: âIâve been showing you how to use a remote control since I was six years old,â and I thought: OK, fair, but, more to the point, look at my lovely bike.
Freshly re-enamoured of the world of two wheels, I have plunged straight back into the cycling discourse, the perfect microcosm of the wokeness split in all its forms. Take the ex-footballer Joey Barton, who is being sued by Jeremy Vine for calling the broadcaster a âbike nonceâ. Meanwhile, the socials are full of people furiously agreeing that aggressive cyclists pose more danger to them than articulated lorries. The fervent attacks on low-traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs) and low-emission zones such as Ulez in London are really just a full-throttle loathing of people on bikes, aggrandised by acronyms and libertarian bat signals.
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Blaming John Howard is easy, but his government helped shape the world we live in â now and for future generations | Grogonomics
An overheated property market, education taxes and more expensive healthcare â successive governments have left a bitter legacy for millennials
When asking âWho screwed the millennials?â should we just apply Ockhamâs razor and answer âJohn Howardâ? His government certainly shoulders a lot of blame but so do those who have done nothing to help since he was voted out.
The earliest millennials will be 70 in 2050, meaning almost all will be working when the world is forecast to reach temperatures more than 2C above pre-industry averages unless we do something.
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Could Labor dissent on energy see Plibersekâs veto on offshore gas projects restored? | Paul Karp
Internal lobbying has added safeguards to a power for the resources minister to water down consultation requirements
The Albanese government has kept a lid on dissent over changes to the approval process for offshore gas projects, but a late internal push has seen the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, regain a power to prevent consultation rules being watered down.
While the resources minister, Madeleine King, had labelled claims she was taking over environmental approvals a âconspiracy theoryâ, widespread opposition from the Greens, the crossbench, First Nations activists and environmental groups spurred an informal Labor pro-climate group into action.
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âCautious optimismâ as penguins test positive for bird flu but show no symptoms
Asymptomatic cases may seem reassuring for the penguins, but scientists fear they could act as âTrojan horsesâ for other species
Adélie penguins in Antarctica are testing positive for bird flu without showing outward signs of disease, according to researchers who travelled around 13 remote breeding sites on an ice-breaking cruise ship.
Since bird flu arrived in the region this year, there have been concerns about the virus reaching the Antarcticâs fragile penguin populations. In November last year, researchers warned in a pre-print research paper that if the virus caused mass mortality in these colonies, âit could signal one of the largest ecological disasters of modern timesâ.
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I discovered why seemingly healthy amphibians were being wiped out
The mass deaths were puzzling scientists around the world â there were no signs of viruses or parasites. Then we looked closely at their skin
It was while we were sitting and talking in a hotel bar at the first global congress of herpetology that the worldâs amphibian experts realised there was a problem: frogs, toads, salamanders and newts were disappearing in their thousands around the world and nobody understood why.
Not a single talk at the 1989 congress at the University of Kent had discussed the strange disappearance of the worldâs amphibians. But scientist after scientist had the same story: from Central America to Australia, they were vanishing.
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Scientists find skull of enormous ancient dolphin in Amazon
Fossil of giant river dolphin found in Peru, whose closest living relation is in South Asia, gives clues to future extinction threats
Scientists have discovered the fossilised skull of a giant river dolphin, from a species thought to have fled the ocean and sought refuge in Peruâs Amazonian rivers 16m years ago. The extinct species would have measured up to 3.5 metres long, making it the largest river dolphin ever found.
The discovery of this new species, Pebanista yacuruna, highlights the looming risks to the worldâs remaining river dolphins, all of which face similar extinction threats in the next 20 to 40 years, according to the lead author of new research published in Science Advances today. Aldo Benites-Palomino said it belonged to the Platanistoidea family of dolphins commonly found in oceans between 24m and 16m years ago.
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Eyes in the sky: why drones are âbeyond effectiveâ for animal rights campaigners around the world
Inexpensive and easy to use, drones are proving invaluable for activists monitoring illegal fishing, hunting and deforestation â as well as keeping tabs on zoos and aquariums
Late last year, UrgentSeas received an anonymous tip from a former employee at the Miami Seaquarium about animal tanks away from public view. The advocacy group went to investigate.
In November, they posted a short clip of what they found by flying a drone over the property: an elderly manatee living alone in a decaying private pool. Within a month, the clip had been watched millions of times and the outcry had grown so intense that the US Fish and Wildlife Service moved the manatee, Romeo, and his mate, Juliet, to a sanctuary.
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Kate Winslet, Sigourney Weaver and Zoe Saldana do underwater photoshoot for ocean conservation charity
Stars of Avatar: The Way of Water photographed in baroque style by Christy Lee Rogers
Photographs of the actors Kate Winslet, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver seemingly floating underwater in elaborate blue dresses, with eyes shut and arms outstretched, are to be sold to raise money for ocean conservation.
The images are the work of one of the worldâs most celebrated underwater photographers, Christy Lee Rogers, who teamed up with the stars of the 2022 film Avatar: The Way of Water and its director, James Cameron, a longtime proponent of ocean conservation, who commissioned the photoshoot.
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âHooveredâ up from the deep: 33,000 hours of seabed trawling revealed in protected UK waters
Analysis shows alarming prevalence of harmful fishing methods thought to âdestroy whole ecosystemsâ
Industrial vessels suspected of using a harmful fishing method known as bottom trawling spent more than 33,000 hours in British marine protected areas last year, a new analysis of satellite data shows.
Ten of these vessels, primarily from the EU, were responsible for a quarter of this activity in offshore protected areas, according to Oceana UK, a conservation group.
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âHoly grail of shipwrecksâ: recovery of 18th-century Spanish ship could begin in April
The San José, sunk in 1708, has been at the center of a dispute over who has rights to the wreck, including $17bn in booty
Since the Colombian navy discovered the final resting place of the Spanish galleon San JosĂ© in 2015, its location has remained a state secret, the wreck â and its precious cargo â left deep under the waters of the Caribbean.
Efforts to conserve the ship and recover its precious cargo have been caught up in a complicated string of international legal disputes, with Colombia, Spain, Bolivian Indigenous groups and a US salvage company laying claim to the wreck, and the gold, silver and emeralds onboard thought to be worth as much as $17bn.
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Canada moves to protect coral reef that scientists say âshouldnât existâ
Discovery was made after First Nations tipped off ecologists about groups of fish gathering in a fjord off British Columbia
Deep in the hostile waters off Canadaâs west coast, in a narrow channel surrounded by fjords, lies a coral reef that scientists believe âshouldnât existâ. The reef is the northernmost ever discovered in the Pacific Ocean and offers researchers a new glimpse into the resilience â and unpredictability â of the deep-sea ecosystems.
For generations, members of the Kitasoo Xaiâxais and Heiltsuk First Nations, two communities off the Central Coast region of British Columbia, had noticed large groups of rockfish congregating in a fjord system.
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âThe anti-livestock people are a pestâ: how UN food body played down role of farming in climate change
Exclusive: ex-officials at the Food and Agriculture Organization say its leadership censored and undermined them when they highlighted how livestock methane is a major greenhouse gas
The night before publication, Henning Steinfeld was halfway across the world dealing with panicked politicians and an outbreak of avian flu. His report, and how it would be received, was frankly the last thing on his mind.
With a small group of officials, Steinfield, head of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)âs livestock policy branch, had been working for months on a report analysing the link between the six major species of livestock and climate change, which they all knew could be explosive. âI was very frustrated by the fact that the livestock-environment issue hadnât resonated even though people accepted in private that it was a big issue â for climate change, and also water and biodiversity,â he said. âBut no one was interested in getting into it because I think they were afraid of what it could mean.â
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Ex-officials at UN farming body say work on methane emissions was censored
Exclusive: Pressure from agriculture lobbies led to role of cattle in rising global temperatures being underplayed by FAO, claim sources
Former officials in the UNâs farming wing have said they were censored, sabotaged, undermined and victimised for more than a decade after they wrote about the hugely damaging contribution of methane emissions from livestock to global heating.
Team members at the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) tasked with estimating cattleâs contribution to soaring temperatures said that pressure from farm-friendly funding states was felt throughout the FAOâs Rome headquarters and coincided with attempts by FAO leadership to muzzle their work.
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Top grain traders âhelped scupperâ ban on soya from deforested land
Cargill and ADM led push to weaken new protections for threatened ecosystems in South America, report says
Cargill and ADM, two of the worldâs leading livestock feed companies, helped to scupper an attempt to end the trade in soya beans grown on deforested and threatened ecosystem lands in South America, a new report alleges.
Soya is one of the cheapest available types of edible protein, and is in huge demand for feed for animals around the world; as our consumption of meat and dairy has risen globally, the need for soya has soared too.
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Italy culls tens of thousands of pigs to contain African swine fever
Outbreaks in the Lombardy âpork beltâ were extinguished, say experts, but wild boar could act as a reservoir
Huge pig culls took place last week in Italy in an attempt to contain the countryâs largest outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) virus since the 1960s, which threatened the entire pig-farming sector.
ASF is deadly to pigs and poses a serious threat to the global pig industry but is not a danger to humans, according to the World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH).
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Week in wildlife â in pictures: pedalo hijinks and a raccoon doing a handstand
The best of this weekâs wildlife photographs from around the world
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Changes in Antarcticaâs glaciers and ice sheets: in pictures
Turkeyâs eighth national Antarctic science expedition is seeking answers to questions about the future of the world with 22 different projects on the continent. Anadolu Agencyâs photojournalist Sebnem Coskun is documenting the expeditionâs scientific research, climate change impacts and life in the region to share the findings with the world.
The expedition involves uncovering concealed data within the ice, gathered from years of research on crucial topics like sea ice and glacier dynamics.
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'Paddington' bears spotted in Bolivian forest raise hopes for species' survival â video
A Bolivian conservation programme has identified at least 60 'Paddington' bears in areas where they had not been spotted before. The animal is the inspiration behind the beloved fictional character Paddington, who travels to London, is adopted by a family and eats lashings of marmalade. In 2017, Chester zooâs Andean carnivore conservation programme installed trap cameras in Tarija forest areas, and in 2023 it spotted members of the thriving bear community playing and walking among the trees. According to Ximena Velez-Liendo, the programme's coordinator, the Andean bear is vulnerable to extinction. The expert said if threats to the species, such as the loss of habitat, retaliatory hunting and the effects of the climate crisis were not addressed by 2030, the region could lose almost 30% of the population
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Week in wildlife â in pictures: a majestic crane, a clumsy owlet and sleepy seals
The best of this weekâs wildlife photographs from around the world
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Endangered pygmy hippo born at Athens zoo â video
For the first time in 10 years, a baby pygmy hippo has been born at Attica Zoological Park. Zoo staff said they were thrilled to welcome the birth as a lack of male pygmy hippos in captivity made breeding efforts complicated. The rare male calf was born on 19 February and joins his parents, Lizzie and Jamal, as the only pygmy hippos at the zoo. Native to western Africa, pygmy hippos are listed as an endangered species by the International Union for Conservation of Nature
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Video shows koalas clinging to trees as gum trees cut down on Kangaroo Island â video
WARNING: contains images some viewers may find distressing
Footage supplied to Guardian Australia shows koalas clinging to falling blue gums as logging occurs on Kangaroo Island in South Australia. The footage was taken across two days in November 2023 and January 2024. Logging has been stopped while an investigation takes place.
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Galapagos biodiversity under threat â in pictures
Greenpeace has called for the creation of a high seas protected zone under a new UN treaty to secure a much wider area around Ecuadorâs Galapagos archipelago, whose unique fauna and flora inspired Charles Darwinâs theory of evolution
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