Environment
Terrified young orangutan rescued from being boarded up in wooden crate.
Conservationists have released photos and video of the rescue of a young female orangutan found boarded up in a wooden crate in a village in West Borneo. The infant, thought to be about three years old, had been found by a local man from Banyu Abang Village, Teluk Batang Districk, Kayong Utara Regency. He claimed to have found the orangutan on his farmland, not far from a palm oil plantation. The villager, known as Bahtiar, kept the orangutan for about...
Over half a tonne of fish killed by irresponsible canal management
Around 1,200lbs of fish corpses were dragged out of a canal last week in what has been described as a “level one fish kill”. A local fishing club blamed the Canal and River Trust for irresponsibly clearing the canal without considering the repercussions of their actions. The haul of dead fish weighed the equivalent of more than a whole polar bear. Steve Sharp, spoke on behalf of the fishing club and said: “Sadly overnight on Sunday 1st October there was...
Half a tonne of rubbish removed from Britain’s highest mountains over the weekend
An army of volunteers removed half a tonne of rubbish from Britain's highest mountains over the weekend - including a massive ball of chewing gum. The haul from Ben Nevis - the country's highest mountain - included a 30-year-old peanut wrapper and enough gum to form a 9lb gumball. Volunteers also made their way to the top of Scafell Pike and Snowdon, clearing as much as they could from the summit areas and popular routes. Volunteers pick rubbish from Ben...
Austerity Britain – Homeless person dealing with cold…by living in a fridge
A homeless man has been beating the autumn cold - by living in a fridge. Eyebrows were raised when his den was discovered – inside a massive refridgerator. The rough-sleeper set up home in the industrial fridge, which was dumped near an abandoned grocery shop, and set up camp. His abode was stumbled upon by unwary council workers investigating the rubbish-strewn back alley in Harrow, north west London. The massive fridge in which the homeless man had made his home....
Giant panda’s habitat ‘threatened by grazing livestock’
The giant panda's future is being threatened by hungry horses and cows, reveals new research. More than a third of the panda's habitat in China's Wanglang National Nature Reserve has been damaged by grazing livestock, suggests the study. The destruction of the habitat coincides with a nine-fold increase in livestock numbers within the park over the past 15 years, according top findings by Chinese and American scientists. Study leader Doctor Binbin Li, assistant professor at Duke Kunshan University's Environmental Research...
More beavers are set to be released into the wild in Scotland
More beavers are set to be released into the wild in Scotland in an attempt to give the current small population a better chance of survival. A small number of Norwegian beavers were introduced to a mid-Argyll forest in 2009 to ensure their progress could be monitored through the Scottish Beaver Trial. But now up to 28 additional Eurasian beavers will be released in Knapdale Forest over the next three years thanks to a new licence granted by Scottish Natural...
Britain needs to fix its ‘broken food system’ and make farming fit for future, says report
New report launched today at the Conservative Party Conference calls for a shake-up of UK agriculture as the country prepares to leave the European Union and the Common Agricultural Policy. The Grow Green II report, written by the New Economics Foundation and commissioned by The Vegan Society, declares that the UK’s food system is fundamentally broken, environmentally unsustainable and unhealthy. The New Economics Foundation claims a shift to plant protein as a substitute for animal protein is “desperately needed” and...
Scotland’s longest lasting patch of snow melted this weekend
Britain has lost its longest-lasting patch of snow for the first time in over a decade - an event which has happened only six times in the past 300 years. The patch at Garbh Choire Mor on Braeriach in the Scottish Cairngorms, nicknamed the Sphinx, disappeared over the weekend. The snow on the UK's third-highest mountain had remained in place ever since 2006. The last snow patch(L) on Garbh Choire Mor on Braeriach in the Cairngorms on August 27 2017....
15 tonnes of plastic waste retrieved from ‘pristine’ waters off Russian coast
A large plastic pollution clean up has collected 15 tonnes of plastic off the coast of the Russian Arctic Ocean in a single day. The shocking discovery, made on the coast and sea off Murmansk, North East Russia, which was previously considered to be one of the globe's most pristine bodies of water, has heightened existing fears as to the impact of manmade pollution on the world's oceans. In response to the worrying findings, a new organisation The Slava Foundation...