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Headlines from week beginning 13 November 2017 |
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A round up of the top countryside, conservation, wildlife and forestry stories as chosen by the CJS Team.
New environmental protections to deliver a Green Brexit
– Defra Environment Secretary Michael Gove announces plans to consult on a
new, independent body for environmental standards Plans to consult on a new, independent body that would hold
Government to account for upholding environmental standards in England
after we leave the European Union have been set out by Environment
Secretary Michael Gove today (Sunday 12 Nov).
Leaving the EU gives us the opportunity to put the environment at the
heart of policy making, while ensuring vital protections for our
landscapes, wildlife and natural assets are not only maintained but
enhanced. To help deliver a Green Brexit, ministers will consult on a new
independent, statutory body to advise and challenge government and
potentially other public bodies on environmental legislation – stepping
in when needed to hold these bodies to account and enforce standards. A consultation on the specific powers and scope of the new body will
be launched early next year. Environment Secretary Michael Gove said today: Just the one response so far from
CIEEM
Forecasts help predict future of UK birds –
University of Exeter Forecasts which predict how climate change will affect UK birds are
improving, new research suggests. Models have been developed in recent years to predict how the area
where a bird species lives – known as its range – will change as the
climate does. The accuracy of these models had never been tested, but the new
research by the University of Exeter and the University of Adelaide
found they are working well.
“Our findings are a real win for bird conservation in the UK and
beyond,” said Dr Regan Early, of the Centre
for Ecology and Conservation at the University of Exeter. “This is because we now have tools that not only better forecast
climate-driven range movements, but can be used to target conservation
management resources more effectively.” Dr Early, who heads the Fundamental
and Applied Biogeography research group, was part of a team of
scientists who tested how accurately different types of ecological
models predicted the contraction and expansion of the ranges of 20 UK
bird species over the last 40 years. They found that the latest generation of models, which directly
account for important ecological responses to climate change, do much
better at forecasting recent range shifts.
8,000 new trees to be planted this year in Sheffield
– Sheffield City Council The first trees have been planted to mark the start of the
city’s tree planting season. The Lord Mayor, Councillor Anne
Murphy attended the ceremony held in Burngreave. Over 8, 000
large and small trees will be planted from now until March 2018.
Scouts from the 76th Sheffield St Peter’s Ellesmere Scout Troop
planted the first large tree, known as a heavy standard, in a
small grassed area opposite St Peter’s Church. Smaller trees were
planted near to the scout headquarters on Grimesthorpe Road. The bigger trees will be planted following requests from the public
and to replace those removed from parks and green spaces due to health
and safety issues. Planting will take place across the city including
Handsworth, Stannington, Richmond, Shirecliffe, Firth
Park and Whirlow. 6, 800 smaller trees are being planted as part of an initiative to
create new woodland and increase biodiversity. All of the planting
areas are designed so as to cause no shade to homes or gardens and
improve drainage. The mix of trees are species native to the UK and consist of oak,
hazel, alder and cherry. The trees are young, two to three years
old, so they can grow with the community around them.
The pros and cons of large ears – Lund
University Researchers at Lund University in Sweden have compared how much
energy bats use when flying, depending on whether they have large or
small ears.
Large ears increase air resistance, meaning that long-eared bats are
forced to expend more energy than species with small ears. On the plus
side, large ears generate more lift and provide better hearing. Good hearing is a prerequisite for bats’ ability to echolocate, i.e.
sense the echo of the sound waves they emit in order to locate and home
in on their prey. The research results therefore show that large ears have both pros
and cons. Christoffer Johansson Westheim, senior lecturer at Lund
University, believes that evolution has made a compromise. “The crux is being able to fly as efficiently as possible while also
having optimal echolocation ability. Bats can’t be the best at both
these things at the same time”, he says.
Conservation - History in the making
Plantlife’s only Cornish nature reserve, Greena Moor, is located
within a remote and sparsely-populated region known to geographers as
The Culm. Nestled between the more celebrated areas of Dartmoor, Exmoor
and Bodmin. Culm grassland has always had a restricted distribution, being
confined to north Devon and north Cornwall, with similar grassland types
found only in south Wales, south-west Scotland, north-west France and a
few other places. Yet it is also increasingly rare; a staggering 92% has
been lost in the past 100 years, with 48% disappearing between 1984 and
1991 alone. Greena Moor is one of the largest surviving fragments of
Culm grassland in Cornwall. Yet even here, historical evidence from the
Early Bronze Age indicates that the reserve is now only a fraction of
what was once a much more extensive area of open, heathy downland, of
uninterrupted flower-rich pasture.
Pioneering new trust proposed to protect Newcastle’s parks and
allotments – Newcastle City Council On 20 November, the Cabinet of Newcastle City Council will take a
decision on pioneering and innovative plans to set up an independent
charitable trust to run the city’s parks and allotments – protecting
these green spaces for future generations.
Exhibition Park (Newcastle City Council) The Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) provided a grant towards the
development of the new proposals, which are also being supported by the
National Trust. The public consultation programme was also supported by Newcastle
University’s Open Lab with a specialised online project and community
workshops. The Cabinet will now consider the creation of a new independent body,
Newcastle Parks Charitable Trust, to take over responsibility for the
city’s parks and allotments. Subject to Cabinet approval, a recruitment
process to appoint a Chair and Board of Trustees to run the new Trust
could begin in January. Following detailed planning and preparations,
the Trust could assume responsibility for Newcastle’s parks and
allotments by the end of 2018. To demonstrate its commitment to the future of the city’s parks and
allotments, the Council is considering making a £9.5 million revenue
contribution to the proposed Trust over the first 10 years of its
operation. This would enable the Trust to source new income streams not
available to the Council; have a stronger focus on the future of parks
and allotments in the city; achieve additional efficiency savings; and
ring-fence and recycle income purely for the benefit of the parks and
allotments.
People in cities want segregated space for cycling
– Sustrans Bike Life, the UK’s biggest assessment of cycling in cities, reveals
four out of five people (78%) want more protected bike routes on roads
built to make cycling safer, even when this could mean less space for
other road traffic.
Image: Sustrans Sixty four per cent would cycle more if on-road cycle routes
physically separated from traffic and pedestrians were available. Even
people who said they never ride a bike still overwhelmingly support the
provision of segregated routes (74%), even when this could mean less
space for other road traffic. However, currently a total of just 19 miles of cycle routes on roads,
physically separated from traffic and pedestrians exist in six of the
seven cities (excluding Birmingham where no data is available). Bike Life also found that people cycling in the seven cities take up
to 111,564 cars off our roads each day. If these cars were lined up this
would equate to a 333-mile tailback – a distance greater than from
Cardiff to Newcastle.
Study offers detailed insight into early-life behaviour of grey seal
pups at sea – Plymouth University Scientists believe the insights provided could be important for the
development of future protection of key habitat for these animals Male and female grey seal pups show distinct behavioural differences
as they learn to forage in the early stages of their independence,
according to new research which scientists believe could be crucial to
the future protection of their habitat. The pups are abandoned by their mothers when they are just three
weeks old, with many of them never having ventured into the sea, let
alone sourced their own food. In a critical period lasting around 40 days after going to sea, pups
have to find regular sources of food and perfect their diving and
prey-catching techniques before their energy stores run out. Using data from tracking devices, scientists showed that female pups
from Welsh colonies were more likely to dive in shallower water than
their male counterparts, reaching the seabed more frequently and likely
having greater feeding opportunities as a result. Although adult male grey seals are much larger than females, there is
no significant difference in body size at this age and scientists think
the differences in behaviour of pups may be driven by underlying
physiological processes that prepare them for adult life. The study also presented data of young seals from Scotland, showing
them heading across the North Sea as far as Norway, while individuals
from West Wales travelled as far as the northern coast of France. Some
of the seals remained at sea without retuning to land for up to two
months during this early developmental phase. The research was conducted by academics from the University of Plymouth, the Sea Mammal Research Unit at the University of St Andrews and Abertay University, and is published in Scientific Reports.
International study on the impact of climate change on tree growth
- Technical University of Munich (TUM) Urban trees are growing faster worldwide Trees in metropolitan areas have been growing faster than trees in
rural areas worldwide since the 1960s. This has been confirmed for the
first time by a study on the impact of the urban heat island effect on
tree growth headed by the Technical University of Munich (TUM). The
analysis conducted by the international research team also shows that
the growth of urban trees has already been exposed to changing climatic
conditions for a long period of time, which is only just beginning to
happen for trees in rural areas.
"While the effects of climate change on tree growth in forests have
been extensively studied, there is little information available so far
for urban trees", said Professor Hans Pretzsch from the Chair
for Forest Growth and Yield Science at TUM. The study supported by
the Bavarian State Ministry for Environment and Consumer Protection as
well as by the Audi Foundation for the Environment, which was published
in the journal 'Nature Scientific Reports', for the first time
systematically examined the growth of urban trees worldwide for trends
resulting from changing environmental conditions. Access the paper
Back from the Brink off to a tree-mendous start
– RSPB November 15 sees the official launch of one of one the most ambitious
conservation programmes in England - Back from the Brink. Project partners, volunteers and other distinguished guests are
coming together in Windsor to celebrate the launch of the programme,
which
Image: RSPB This is the first nationwide coordinated effort to bring a wide range
of leading charities and conservation bodies together to save threatened
species. The National Lottery funding will also help a further 200 species
that are under threat including the grey long-eared bat, pine marten,
willow tit, lesser butterfly orchid and hedgehog. Natural England chairman, Andrew Sells, said “This project is nothing
short of a revolution in conservation. Never before have so many people
pledged to work together to save so many of England’s individual plants
and animals. It comes not a moment too soon for many important species
and draws together a wide range of people and organisations. “We must
thank the players of the National Lottery and our other supporters
including the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation and People’s Postcode Lottery,
whose generosity has presented this great opportunity.”
Government creating gaping Brexit environmental legal loopholes warn
charities – WWT WWT and a major coalition of 28 environment and wildlife
organisations are today warning that despite welcome commitments on
environmental protections, the UK Government could still create
loopholes in environmental law as part of the Brexit transition. This
could have damaging consequences for the environment and animal welfare.
Image: WWT Environmental groups have warmly welcomed recent commitments to a
strong new environmental regulator in England and to consult on
retaining environmental principles. However, they are concerned that the
UK Government has omitted vital EU legal principles, which protect our
environment, from the current Withdrawal Bill. They are warning that
unless the full range of environmental principles are underpinned with
legislation, we are at risk of drastically weakened environmental legal
protections which could have major repercussions. Martin Spray CBE, Chief Executive of WWT, said: Around 80% of our environmental law and policy is currently based on
EU law. Standards jointly adopted with our European neighbours have
enabled the UK to meet national and international environmental targets.
So it is essential that these EU environmental and animal welfare
protections are completely translated into domestic law as part of the
EU Withdrawal Bill. The Withdrawal Bill does not currently set out a
clear pathway for this, and the risk is that essential environmental
protections will be lost if amendments to the Bill are not made.
Detailed detective work leads to rediscovery of rare snail
- Buglife Thanks to the dedication and hard work of volunteers and Buglife
staff, Buglife Scotland’s HLF funded Marvellous Mud Snails project has
rediscovered two populations of the rare Pond mud snail (Omphiscola
glabra). One population in Falkirk had not been recorded in 100 years! A
key component of this project is to reassess the known populations of
the Pond mud snail and look through historical records to try and
rediscover old populations. The project was launched in April 2017 and is working to conserve
this small freshwater snail. Things are now in full swing and the team
are busy out talking to the people of Scotland about this once
overlooked species and going into schools to teach pupils about this
amazing little mollusc. Surveys undertaken in 2005/6 looking for the Pond mud snail showed a
64% decline from historically recorded sites with current populations
only found at fives sites in Scotland. However due to some of the
historical records coming from 1917 it was worth further investigating
the sites associated with these records. Due to volunteers and Buglife
staffs detective skills and hours of research two populations previously
thought lost have been rediscovered.
SNH and partners testing new ways to protect lambs from sea eagles
- SNH Trials are underway by Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) and its
partners on how to reduce the impact of sea eagle predation on sheep
farming. Removing trees where sea eagles nest next to lambing areas and new
scaring methods are two techniques being tested on a small number of
'monitor farms' in west coast locations. These methods are being
trialled in places where other management measures, such as extra
shepherding, have failed to prevent loss of livestock. SNH granted a licence this week to Forest Enterprise Scotland (FES)
to fell two trees where sea eagles have nested previously. The trees are
on the National Forest Estate, north of Oban, next to a farm where
losses of lambs from sea eagle predation has been thoroughly
investigated and demonstrated. It’s hoped that removing nest trees will encourage birds away from
areas where they’re feeding on lambs, as eagles can move nest locations
when nests are destroyed by natural causes. The licence will only be
granted for periods outside the breeding season to ensure that nesting
birds aren’t disturbed. The effectiveness of these techniques, and the
response of the sea eagles, is being closely monitored by SNH
contractors. New scaring techniques are another method being researched, including
audio or light-based scaring methods. If successful, these techniques could be used in the future as one of
a range of options to protect livestock where impacts are thoroughly
demonstrated.
Pesticides may cause bumblebees to lose their buzz, study finds
– University of Stirling Pesticides significantly reduce the number of pollen grains a
bumblebee is able to collect, a new University of Stirling study has
found.
Image: University of Stirling Dr Penelope Whitehorn, the University of Stirling Research Fellow who
led the research, said: “Our result is the first to demonstrate
quantitative changes in the type of buzzes produced by bees exposed to
field-realistic levels of neonicotinoid. We also show that buzz
pollinating bees exposed to the pesticide also collect fewer pollen
grains.” Dr Whitehorn, working with Associate Professor Mario Vallejo-Marin,
looked at a complex type of pollination, called buzz pollination, in
which bees use vibrations to remove pollen from flowers. They studied
captive colonies of bumblebees visiting buzz-pollinated flowers,
monitoring their behaviour and collecting bee buzzes using microphones. The scientists then analysed the acoustic signal produced during buzz
pollination to detect changes in buzzing behaviour through time. They
found that chronic exposure to the pesticide, at similar levels to those
found in agricultural fields, interfered with the vibrations of the bees
as they collected pollen which, in turn, reduced the amount of pollen
collected. Dr Whitehorn explained: “We found that control bees, who were not
exposed to the pesticide, improved their pollen collection as they
gained experience, which we interpreted as an ability to learn to buzz
pollinate better. However, bees that came into contact with pesticide
did not collect more pollen as they gained more experience, and by the
end of the experiment collected between 47% and 56% less pollen compared
to the control bees.” Each year, on 16th November, associations and falconers worldwide, public and private entities and generally anyone interested in developing activities within the framework coordinated by the IAF, from largest number of countries, working with a common theme related to falconry. The first edition took place on November 16th, 2013, the third anniversary of the recognition of falconry by UNESCO. 2013 was also the tenth anniversary of the UNESCO ICH Convention. Falconry is a wonderful world but not for the faint hearted!
Working with what are fundamentally wild birds and persuading them to do
what you want them to is no easy task and every time you fly your bird
there, at the back of your mind, is the thought, "please come back -
don't disappear over the far horizon"! There are no days off, days
are long (up until the early hours tracking an errant bird) but varied
and if it's your passion then there's nothing like it. Find out more about working with birds of prey in this article from Jemima Parry-Jones MBE of the International Centre for Birds of Prey, her insightful straight forward honest article which will really make you think if it's the path for you.
Natural England has officially designated the Mid Cornwall Moors as a
Site of Special Scientific Interest – Natural
England Rare species like the marsh fritillary butterfly and willow tit bird
have been given a conservation boost today, with Natural England
officially recognising the Mid Cornwall Moors as one of the country’s
most important wildlife sites. Following a four-month public consultation, Natural England has
confirmed the designation of the Mid Cornwall Moors as a Site of Special
Scientific Interest (SSSI), giving the area legal protection for its
important wildlife and habitats.
Goss Moor (image: Natural England) Wesley Smyth, manager of Devon, Cornwall and Isles of Scilly team in
Natural England, said: This rich and diverse landscape of Mid Cornwall is home to an array
of rare plants and insects, alongside one of the highest densities of
willow tit breeding pairs in England. That’s why we’ve designated this area as a Site of Special Scientific
Interest, recognising its vital contribution to our natural heritage and
helping its precious wildlife thrive for generations to come. Natural England is working with landowners and local organisations,
such as the Cornwall Wildlife Trust and Butterfly Conservation, to
create the perfect conditions for the rare marsh fritillary butterfly.
With further help from the Eden Project and Highways England, swathes of
devil’s-bit scabious – the main food plant for the marsh fritillary
caterpillars – have been grown and planted alongside the A30 road
corridor.
It’s official, white-clawed crayfish are back in the South West Peak!
– Peak District National Park Authority
White Clawed Crayfish (image: Peak District NPA) However, with funding from the Environment Agency, the Crayfish in
Crisis project, part of the South West Peak Landscape Partnership,
(supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund), is doing something about it.
The goal of the project is to eventually re-establish permanent and
stable populations in the South West Peak. The project team is surveying
isolated headwaters in the Peak District to identify the best locations
for white-clawed crayfish to call home. Once suitable new homes are
found, then crayfish need to be sourced from so-called ‘donor’
populations which have good numbers of healthy native crayfish at
present, but which may be at risk in the future. One such example of a donor population is from the Forestry
Commission’s Cannock Chase in Staffordshire. Nick Mott from
Staffordshire Wildlife Trust has been working with the Forestry
Commission and Staffordshire County Council at this site for the last
few years. Here, there are good populations of native crayfish but sadly
their time is limited due to ever-expanding populations of American
signal crayfish nearby. Cannock Chase represents a good donor population
to use for populating headwater streams. James Stewart, Forestry Commission Wildlife Ranger said: “We have
been working hard with Nick for several to years protect the crayfish
and improve their habitat. It is great to have such a healthy population
and be in a position to support an important project like this. The
thought that our work could contribute to a new, safe population of
native crayfish is something we are proud of.”
Man-made fibres and plastic found in the deepest living organisms
– Newcastle University Animals from six of the deepest places on Earth found to contain
man-made fibres and plastic in their stomachs, scientists have shown. A study, led by Newcastle University’s Dr
Alan Jamieson, has uncovered evidence that not only have plastics now
reached the deepest chasms of our oceans but they are being ingested by
the animals that live there. Revealing their findings today (15th November) as part of Sky Ocean
Rescue - a campaign to raise awareness of how plastics and pollution are
affecting our seas - the team tested samples of crustaceans found in the
ultra-deep trenches that span the entire Pacific Ocean - the Mariana,
Japan, Izu-Bonin, Peru-Chile, New Hebrides and Kermadec trenches. These range from seven to over 10 kilometres deep, including the
deepest point, Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, at a staggering
10,890 metres deep. Using state-of-the-art facilities at Newcastle University and
Shimadzu UK Ltd in Milton Keynes, the team examined 90 individual
animals and found ingestion of plastic ranged from 50% in the New
Hebrides Trench to 100% at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The fragments identified include semi-synthetic cellulosic fibres,
such as Rayon, Lyocell and Ramie, which are all microfibres used in
products such as textiles, to Nylon, polyethylene, polyamide, or
unidentified polyvinyls closely resembling polyvinyl alcohol or
polyvinylchloride - PVA and PVC. Research lead Dr Jamieson, said: “We published a study earlier this year showing high levels of
organic pollutants in the very deepest seas and lots of people asked us
about the presence of plastics, so we decided to have a look. “The results were both immediate and startling. This type of work
requires a great deal of contamination control but there were instances
where the fibres could actually be seen in the stomach contents as they
were being removed. “We felt we had to do this study given the unique access we have to
some of the most remote places on earth, and we are using these samples
to make a poignant statement about mankind’s legacy.
Asthma attacks reduced in tree-lined urban neighbourhoods
– University of Exeter People living in polluted urban areas are far less likely to be
admitted to hospital with asthma when there are lots of trees in their
neighbourhood, a study by the University of Exeter’s medical school has
found.
The study into the impact of urban greenery on asthma suggests that
respiratory health can be improved by the expansion of tree cover in
very polluted urban neighbourhoods. The study,
published in the journal Environment International, looked at more than
650,000 serious asthma attacks over a 15 year period. Emergency
hospitalisations were compared across 26,000 urban neighbourhoods in
England. In the most polluted urban areas, trees had a particularly strong
association with fewer emergency asthma cases. In relatively unpolluted
urban neighbourhoods trees did not have the same impact. In a typical urban area with a high level of background air pollution
- for example, around 15 micrograms of fine particulate matter (PM2.5)
per cubic metre, or a nitrogen dioxide concentration around 33
micrograms per cubic metre - an extra 300 trees per square kilometre was
associated with around 50 fewer emergency asthma cases per 100,000
residents over the 15 year study period. The findings could have important implications for planning and
public health policy, and suggest that tree planting could play a role
in reducing the effects of air pollution from cars.
Warmer water signals change for Scotland’s shags
– Centre for Ecology & Hydrology An increasingly catholic diet among European shags at one of
Scotland’s best-studied breeding colonies has been linked to long-term
climate change and may have important implications for Scotland’s
seabirds, according to research led by the Centre for Ecology &
Hydrology.
Three decades of data from the Isle of May, off Scotland’s east
coast, found that the proportion of sandeels – the bird’s usual fayre -
declined by 48% between 1985 and 2014. Over the same period, the number
of other fish prey in the diet increased, from an average of just one
species per year in 1985 to eleven in 2014. Crucially, the results, presented in the Marine Ecology Progress
Series this week and produced in collaboration with researchers from the
University of Liverpool, the Sir Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean
Science, and Biomathematics and Statistics Scotland, show that the
increase in diet diversity was linked to warming trends in Sea Surface
Temperature, an indicator of climate change in the region. The North Sea is one of the most rapidly warming marine ecosystems on
the planet, and warmed by 0.037 degrees Celsius per year between 1982
and 2012. Lead author, Richard Howells, explained that the study, "ties
in with many observations of changes in the abundance, distribution and
phenology of many species in the North Sea, and a decline in the
availability and size of sandeels.
One in ten historic coastal landfill sites in England are at risk of
erosion – Queen Mary University of London Coastal erosion may release waste from ten per cent of England's
historic coastal landfills in the next forty years, according to
research from Queen Mary University of London and the Environment
Agency. Historically it was common practise to dispose of landfill waste in
low-lying estuarine and coastal areas where land had limited value due
to the risk of it flooding. Historic landfills are frequently unlined
with no leachate management and inadequate records of the waste they
contain, which means there is a very limited understanding of the
environmental risk posed if the waste erodes into estuarine or coastal
waters.
The importance of biodiversity in forests could increase due to climate
change – German Centre for Integrative
Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Leipzig. Forests fulfil numerous important functions, and do so
particularly well if they are rich in different species of trees. This
is the result of a new study. In addition, forest managers do not have
to decide on the provision of solely one service – such as wood
production or nature conservation – as a second study demonstrates:
several services provided by forest ecosystems can be improved at the
same time. Both
Biodiverse autumn forest with Norway spruce, beech and birch
trees. (Photo: Christian Hueller) Forests are of great importance to humans: the wood grown in forests
is used in our houses for furniture, roof timbers and flooring; forests
store carbon from the air and thus counteract climate change, they help
prevent soil erosion and regulate the water cycle. Also when we go for a
walk in a forest, we use it for recreation. The basis for these benefits
are functions that constantly take place in a forest: the trees carry
out photosynthesis, grow, produce offspring, defend themselves against
hungry insects and deer, fight off pathogens and protect themselves
against drought. Nutrients are taken up by the trees and are then
released when the trees die and are decomposed. A new study, led by researchers from Leipzig University and the
German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv), demonstrates
that many of these ecosystem functions perform better in forests with a
higher level of biodiversity, i.e., when forests are made up of multiple
rather than just a single tree species.
Red kites project puts the ‘our’ into RKites
– RSPB Red kites are one of our most stunning birds of prey and this year 20
territorial pairs have been recorded in Northern Ireland, with 13 pairs
successfully fledging 28 chicks - the highest number on record.
Image: RSPB RKites, a new funded partnership project officially launched today
(Thursday 16 Nov), will focus on a dedicated public engagement programme
reaching out to 40 schools in counties Down and Armagh, young people and
members of the public in communities where the red kites are present, as
well as working alongside the Mourne Heritage Trust’s Youth Rangers
programme. This work aims to ensure that the population of red kites in
Northern Ireland thrives, flourishes and expands despite the many
challenges that they face. Scientific publications Alcock, I. et al (2017)
Land cover and air pollution are associated with asthma
hospitalisations: A cross-sectional study. Environment
International. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2017.08.009
Wilson, R. P. et al (2017)
Long necks enhance and constrain foraging capacity in aquatic
vertebrates. Proceedings of the Royal Society B.
DOI: 10.1098/rspb.2017.2072
Germain, R., Schuster, R., Tarwater, C. E., Hochachka, W. M. &
Arcese, P. (2017)
Adult survival and reproductive rate are linked to habitat preference in
territorial, year-round resident Song Sparrows Melospiza melodia.
IBIS. DOI: 10.1111/ibi.12557
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Image:
Defra
The
models would have correctly predicted changes to the range of
sparrowhawks (University of Exeter)
Lord
Mayor, Councillor Anne Murphy and Community Forestry Manager, Tim
Shortland with scouts from the 76th Sheffield St Peter’s Ellesmere Scout
Troop planting a large tree, opposite St Peter’s Church (Sheffield City
Council)
Photo:
Anders Hedenström
This
is our final article from this year's featured charity Plantlife.
We'll be introducing our new featured charity next month. %20Trevor%20Dines.JPG)
Responding
to continuing cuts in Central Government funding for the Council over
the last seven years (resulting in a 91% fall in the parks budget), the
Cabinet discussion follows three years of planning and one of the
Council’s biggest-ever programmes of public consultation.
Bike
Life, produced by Sustrans and seven major UK cities, reveals that out
of the 7,700 people surveyed over two-thirds (69%) say more cycling
would make their city a better place to live and work. Most residents
interviewed think that more space for cycling and walking or buses, as
opposed to more space for cars, is the best way to keep their city
moving, improve people’s health or air quality.
For
the study, samples of heartwood from trees in major cities such as here
in Vietnam's capital Hanoi were taken and analyzed. (Photo: TUM)
aims
to bring 20 species back from the brink of extinction. The project has
been made possible thanks to £4.6m National Lottery funding, awarded by
the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF).
The
warning coincides with amendments being debated during ‘environment day’
(today Weds 15 Nov) in the Committee stage of the (EU) Withdrawal Bill.
These amendments could help close these legal loopholes if they are
backed by MPs.
The
research, conducted by a team in the Faculty of Natural Sciences, found
that field-realistic doses of a neonicotinoid pesticide affects the
behaviour of bees – ultimately interfering with the type of vibrations
they produce while collecting pollen.
This
brings certainty and purpose to conservation work in Mid Cornwall, where
the rich mix of heathland, woodland, and wildflower meadows provides a
vital sanctuary for wildlife.
While
it may seem small to us the white-clawed crayfish is the UK’s largest
native freshwater invertebrate and is an important component of our
waterways. This often hidden and largely defenceless species is now
globally endangered due to non-native competitors, disease and
widespread habitat loss. 
Study
into the impact of urban greenery on asthma (University of Exeter)
Shag
in nest (Gary Howells)
studies
were led by scientists from Leipzig University and the German Centre for
Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv), and published in the
prestigious journal Ecology Letters.
