Information about animals
Licensed release of beavers has many benefits | Letters
Bob Ward points to the flood prevention and ecosystem recovery benefits, while John Varley says beavers can be a nuisance too
If the prime minister’s office really is blocking the licensed release of beavers because it regards it as a legacy of the last government (No 10 blocks beaver release plan as officials view it as ’‘Tory legacy’, 14 January), it shows that the government really has not grasped the importance of this issue.
Beavers have a potentially critical role to play, as a reintroduced native species, in helping the UK become more resilient to the growing impacts of climate change by effectively managing the risks of floods and drought as periods of heavy rainfall and extreme dryness become more frequent and intense. Beavers also help the recovery and development of ecosystems.
Continue reading...Hitchhiking frog article hopped over a crucial detail | Brief letters
Animal welfare | Nuclear fusion | Atomic waste | Managing investments | What’s in a name?
While I am, of course, concerned about the risks posed to the UK’s delicate biosystem by the inadvertent importing of harmful fauna and flora from foreign countries, your article (Colombian tree frog found by Sheffield florist highlights invasive species threat, 17 January) left a vital question unanswered. What happened to the little tree frog?
Sallyann Halstead
Fitzhead, Somerset
• Intrigued to read about the government promising a record investment in nuclear fusion (Ministers pledge record £410m to support UK nuclear fusion energy, 16 January). Reminds me of the old joke: fusion, for the last 70 years, has always been 20 years in the future – perhaps an experiment to prove time doesn’t exist in nuclear physics?
Dr Paul Dorfman
Chair, Nuclear Consulting Group
Alaska to resume ‘barbaric’ shooting of bears and wolves from helicopters
Renewed program would allow hunters to eliminate up to 80% of the animals on 20,000 acres of state land
Alaska is set to resume the aerial gunning of bears and wolves as a population control measure aimed at boosting caribou and moose herd numbers, even as the state’s own evaluation of the practice cast doubt on its effectiveness.
The renewed program would allow hunters to eliminate up to 80% of the animals on 20,000 acres (8,000 hectares) of state land. Environmental groups opposed to what they label a “barbaric” practice of shooting wildlife from helicopters is more about sport than scientific practice in part because hunters want caribou populations to increase because they are trophy animals.
Continue reading...High fertiliser use halves numbers of pollinators, world’s longest study finds
Even average use of nitrogen fertilisers cut flower numbers fivefold and halved pollinating insects
Using high levels of common fertilisers on grassland halves pollinator numbers and drastically reduces the number of flowers, research from the world’s longest-running ecological experiment has found.
Increasing the amount of nitrogen, potassium and phosphorus doused on agricultural grassland reduced flower numbers fivefold and halved the number of pollinating insects, according to the paper by the University of Sussex and Rothamsted Research.
Continue reading...Otters among UK wildlife carrying toxic ‘forever chemicals’, analysis shows
Some wildlife species have accumulated many times more than safe amount of PFAS in their tissue and organs
- Revealed: drinking water sources in England polluted with forever chemicals
- Revealed: scale of ‘forever chemical’ pollution across UK and Europe
Dolphins, otters, porpoises, fish and birds across the UK have been found to have toxic “forever chemicals” in their tissue and organs, analysis of official data has revealed.
Manmade chemicals called PFAS, known as forever chemicals because they do not degrade, are used in a wide range of consumer products and industrial processes and some have been linked to serious diseases in humans and animals, including cancers. PFAS have been found widely to pollute water and soils and are thought to be in the blood of every human on the planet.
Continue reading...Week in wildlife in pictures: chilly pelicans, a baby gorilla and a spider fan’s dream come true
The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world
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