Authorities announce death of cub named Pirouz from kidney failure at veterinary hospital in Tehran
The last survivor of three critically endangered Asiatic cheetah cubs born in captivity in Iran has died in hospital from kidney failure.
Pirouz, who was admitted to the Central veterinary hospital due to kidney failure last Thursday, died after undergoing dialysis, the official IRNA news agency said.
Continue reading...Steven Guilbeault wants to block logging of critical old-growth forest to prevent owls from going extinct in British Columbia
Canada’s environment minister plans to use a rare emergency order to protect the last of an endangered owl species in an area where critical old-growth forest is slated for further clearcutting.
Steven Guilbeault advised the environmental groups Ecojustice and the Wilderness Committee that he believed the spotted owl was facing “imminent threats to its survival” and he would use the powers to block further destruction of its habitat in British Columbia, the groups announced on Thursday afternoon.
Continue reading...Deaths the result of deoxygenation caused by carp population boom at NSW weir, primary industries department says
Thousands of carp have died in the Menindee Main Weir in far west New South Wales, triggering a mass fish kill that ecologists worry could affect native species as water quality declines.
The NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) told Guardian Australia it had received reports of a fish death event in the Lower Darling-Baaka in Menindee.
Continue reading...Company says vessel’s construction will help ‘pass on our whaling culture to the next generation’
A Japanese company is building a new whaling ship designed to travel as far as Antarctica, sparking fears commercial operations could resume in the Southern Ocean.
Australia’s environment minister, Tanya Plibsersek, reaffirmed the Albanese government’s commitment to a global moratorium on commercial whaling, while Greenpeace condemned the practice as “brutal and unnecessary”.
Continue reading...‘Emotional’ posthumous discovery of 16-year-old hedgehog gives conservationists hope for the mammals’ future preservation
A 16-year-old European hedgehog called Thorvald has been crowned the oldest in the world, smashing the previous record by seven years.
The male hedgehog lived near the town of Silkeborg in the centre of Denmark. Dr Sophie Lund Rasmussen, from the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit (WildCRU) at Oxford University, who led the Danish Hedgehog Project that discovered Thorvald, said she was overwhelmed when she discovered how old he was.
Continue reading...Invasive species proliferating in Valais is encroaching on natural reserves and posing a biodiversity threat
The residents of the Swiss canton of Valais are used to seeing their mountainsides covered with snow in winter and edelweiss flowers in summer. But as global heating intensifies, they are increasingly finding an invasive species colonising the slopes: cacti.
Authorities say cactus species belonging to the genus Opuntia, or prickly pears, are proliferating in parts of Valais, encroaching on natural reserves and posing a biodiversity threat.
Continue reading...Exclusive: Environment minister calls for ex-president to be held to account as she prepares to tackle illegal gold miners
Former president Jair Bolsonaro should be investigated for genocide, Brazil’s environment minister, Marina Silva, has said, as she prepares an operation to drive illegal goldminers from the site of a humanitarian disaster on Indigenous land.
In the coming days, armed police and environmental protection agents will launch the first of a series of operations by plane and helicopter to expel thousands of miners, who proliferated in Brazil’s Yanomami Indigenous territory during Bolsonaro’s administration, contaminating Amazonian rivers, wrecking the rainforest and spawning Brazil’s worst health crisis in living memory.
Continue reading...The private sector is not seen to be ready to act as the main buyer and the draft is cited as nearly identical to a Morrison-era proposal
An Albanese government environment plan to encourage companies to invest in nature merely expands a Coalition proposal under Scott Morrison and is at risk of failing due to a lack of business interest, experts say.
The federal government is consulting on legislation to establish a scheme to incentivise investment in nature restoration by creating tradable certificates for projects that protect and restore biodiversity.
Continue reading...Major environmental plan includes tackling sewage spills and restoring wildlife habitats but critics question lack of funding
Every household will be within a 15-minute walk of a green space or water, under a major environmental improvement plan for England set out by the government on Tuesday.
The long-awaited measures will include commitments to restore at least 500,000 hectares (1.2m acres) of wildlife habitat, and 400 miles of river. This will include 25 new or expanded national nature reserves and 3,000 hectares (7,400 acres) of new woodland along England’s rivers. A new species survival fund will target some of the most threatened wildlife, including hedgehogs and red squirrels.
Continue reading...Fires, land conversion, logging and water shortages have weakened resilience of 2.5m sq km of forest, says study
Human activity and drought may have degraded more than a third of the Amazon rainforest, double the previous estimate, according to a study that heightens concerns that the globally important ecosystem is slipping towards a point of no return.
Fires, land conversion, logging and water shortages, have weakened the resilience of up to 2.5m sq km of the forest, an area 10 times the size of the UK. This area is now drier, more flammable and more vulnerable than before, prompting the authors to warn of “megafires” in the future.
Continue reading...Case brought under Bern convention on nature may set precedent for destruction of biodiversity in war
Azerbaijan has launched a landmark legal challenge against Armenia for allegedly destroying its environment and biodiversity during nearly three decades of occupation of the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region.
An international tribunal will consider evidence of widespread environmental destruction during the conflict between the two nations, including deforestation and pollution, and will be asked to order Armenia to pay reparations.
Continue reading...Effluent in Gloucestershire river pinpointed by digital map as water companies accused of routinely pumping out waste to rivers
The market town of Fairford, nestling in the Cotswold hills, is perhaps best known for its church, which has the only complete set of mediaeval stained glass windows in England.
But thanks to a more modern phenomenon, an interactive digital map produced by Thames Water, the Gloucestershire town, with its traditional honey coloured limestone houses, is becoming better known for its continuous, gushing, raw sewage overflow.
Continue reading...The Caribbean territory plans to exterminate at least 450 of the invasive primates – but critics disagree with the proposal
The government of Sint Maarten in the eastern Caribbean has approved a controversial plan to cull its entire population of vervet monkeys, as the proliferation of the invasive species becomes an increasing nuisance on the Dutch island territory.
Authorities will fund the Nature Foundation St Maarten NGO to capture and euthanise at least 450 monkeys over the next three years in the territory which borders French St Martin.
Continue reading...Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia have increased kangaroo harvest quotas for 2023 but impact from floods yet to be assessed
Animal welfare advocates are calling for a moratorium on commercial and recreational shooting of wildlife affected by the devastating Murray-Darling floods.
Wildlife Victoria has called for the “immediate cessation” of the Victorian government’s kangaroo harvesting program and a moratorium on the annual duck hunting season, which usually begins in March.
Continue reading...Toxic pesticides used to eradicate grain-eating quelea may harm the country’s endangered raptors, say conservationists
A drive by the Kenyan government to kill up to 6 million red-billed quelea birds that have invaded farms will have unintended consequences for raptors and other wild species, experts have warned.
The continuing drought in the Horn of Africa has reduced the amount of native grass, whose seeds are queleas’ main food source, causing the birds to increasingly invade grain fields, putting 2,000 acres (800 hectares) of rice under threat. About 300 acres of rice fields have been destroyed by the birds.
Continue reading...Scientists call on government to replace lethal control measures amid criticism of its use of federal money at the Great Barrier Reef
Scientists are urging the Queensland government to remove shark nets and traditional drum lines from coastlines, saying “ineffective” lethal methods are inhumane, amid criticism of the state’s use of federal money for measures at the Great Barrier Reef.
Lawrence Chlebeck, a marine biologist at Humane Society International, said Queensland’s lethal shark control program is “failing” on both environmental and public safety fronts and should be “discontinued”.
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Continue reading...Experts say while boom in invasive species is not good news for some native fish, there will be winners – including water birds
In creeks, rivers and flood waters across the Murray-Darling Basin, an uncountable and unfathomable number of invasive carp are turning waters into bubbling masses of flapping and flailing fish.
“It’s quite a sight,” said Dr Matt Herring, an environment consultant. “I walked through one of the schools of carp a few days ago and it’s the first time I’ve trodden on fish with every step.”
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Continue reading...Tougher sentences to be imposed for those causing accidents but activists dismiss alcohol ban as ‘laughable’
The French government has angered anti-hunt campaigners after refusing to ban hunting on Sundays during the season.
Instead, it has declared a ban on drinking alcohol and taking drugs while hunting, a move activists say is unenforceable, and will set up a voluntary application for hunters to indicate where they are active.
Continue reading...Hunters allowed to kill 75 wolves from an already endangered population of 460 amid ‘political pressure’ from hunting lobby
The biggest wolf cull in modern times has begun in Sweden as nature organisations warn it could drastically harm the population.
On Monday, the Guardian accompanied 200 hunters as they went to kill wolves in the frost-covered forests between Gävleborg and Dalarna, hunting from midnight until the sun set at 3pm. Groups will be going out across Sweden all month as they attempt to take down the large predators.
Continue reading...Project has been planting grass to help restore vital peatland but found some of it was not taking
Green sludge pours out of thick hosepipes wielded by two Welshmen in a bog in the north of England. It is not many people’s vision of cutting-edge technology.
But although the goop splattering messily on to bare patches of moorland may not look much, it is the first of its kind – a special type of glue designed to help restore vital peatland, which has been disappearing at rapid rates.
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