Around The Web

Beachcombers and beach cleaning equipment reduce shell numbers and endanger some organisms

You might think twice next time you snag a seashell from the beach and drop it into your pocket: you might be altering the seaside environment.

In a study more than 30 years in the making, researchers have found that the removal of shells from beaches could damage ecosystems and endanger organisms that rely on shells for their survival.

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Australian Heritage Council today announced this year’s recipient of the Sharon Sullivan National Heritage Award.

The overarching focus of the Review is to consider whether the Water Act is delivering on its objectives effectively and with the minimum necessary regulatory burden imposed on the water industry, water managers and irrigators. Submissions close Friday 4 July 2014.

National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Amendment Determination 2014 - consultation draft - Comments close 5 June 2014

National Greenhouse and Energy Reporting (Measurement) Amendment Determination 2014 - consultation draft - Comments close 5 June 2014

Application to vary methodology determination Native forest protection (Avoided deforestation) - comments close 25 June 2014

The National Waste Policy Implementation Report 2012 and 2013 sets out progress against the National Waste Policy’s five-year implementation plan.

On 29 April 2014, Ministers signalled their intention to vary the National Environment Protection (Ambient Air Quality) Measure for particles reflecting the latest scientific understanding on health risks arising from particle pollution. The...

The Environment Portfolio Budget Statements for 2014-15 were released on May 13 2014.

The Department is seeking public comment on a draft assessment bilateral agreement with the Queensland. Comments close 13 June 2014.

The cocaine byproduct is just one of the many traces of pharmaceutical compounds and other contaminants found in our water – and new contaminants are discovered all the time. But should we really be worried?

According to various headlines this weekend, we Brits use so much cocaine that traces of the drug have been found in our water supply. A study by the Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI) aimed at assessing the danger from pharmaceutical compounds in drinking water revealed that even after intensive purification treatment, minute quantities of benzoylecgonine – the metabolised form of cocaine – were found at four sites in Britain. So are we a nation of coke-heads? And does the presence of something related to a class-A drug in the water we drink actually matter?

The answer to the first question, says Sue Pennison of DWI, the independent body that ensures the water companies supply water fit to drink, is not clear. Benzoylecgonine, she notes, "is also an ingredient in a popular muscle-rub, and there's no way of telling which it came from".

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Harvard study shows neonicotionoids are devastating colonies by triggerring colony collapse disorder

The mysterious vanishing of honeybees from hives can be directly linked to insectcide use, according to new research from Harvard University. The scientists showed that exposure to two neonicotinoids, the world's most widely used class of insecticide, lead to half the colonies studied dying, while none of the untreated colonies saw their bees disappear.

"We demonstrated that neonicotinoids are highly likely to be responsible for triggering 'colony collapse disorder' in honeybee hives that were healthy prior to the arrival of winter," said Chensheng Lu, an expert on environmental exposure biology at Harvard School of Public Health and who led the work.

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Islamist militancy in Nigeria is being strengthened by western and regional fossil fuel interests

The kidnapping of over 200 Nigerian school girls, and the massacre of as many as 300 civilians in the town of Gamboru Ngala, by the militant al-Qaeda affiliated group, Boko Haram, has shocked the world.

But while condemnations have rightly been forthcoming from a whole range of senior figures from celebrities to government officials, less attention has been paid to the roots of the crisis.

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The Emissions Reduction Fund exposure draft legislation is now open for public comment. Comments close 23 May 2014.

The Emissions Reduction Fund exposure draft legislation is now open for public comment. Comments close 23 May 2014.

The Threatened Species Scientific Committee is seeking comments on the assessment of six species. The public consultation period closes 20 June 2014.

A fisherman trawling for shrimps off the coast of Florida has become one of the … err … lucky few people to have come face to face with this monster of the deep

Name: The goblin shark.

Age: You'd have to ask it.

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ASC NEPM ERRATA update and Frequently asked questions

Soaring numbers of albino California king snakes prompts warning that they could take over 70% of Spanish island

Invasive species experts will gather in Gran Canaria this week to offer their advice on how best to control an albino variety of a popular pet snake whose population has exploded across the island in recent years, decimating local bird and lizard species.

Originally brought to the island as pets, the albino California king snakes were set loose or escaped decades ago, said Ramón Gallo, a biologist who is spearheading the effort to control the population through a project called LIFE+Lampropeltis.

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The island is the EU's last outpost of licensed spring shooting. The TV naturalist explains why it's time to stop the barbarity

When it comes to life and death I'm probably more stoic than most. But last week I cried in front of more than 20,000 viewers on YouTube. Like all our team, I was close to exhaustion – we'd been on four hours sleep a night for days. I was also clearly depressed by the daily slaughter we had been witness to and the relentless attrition that had been mounting with every dead bird I'd seen blasted from the Maltese skies. But in truth from the moment I reached into the cardboard box that held a shot Montagu's harrier and gently felt its badly broken wing, as soon as I saw the blood of this beautiful and rare raptor on my fingers and looked at the defiance and confusion in its brilliant yellow eyes, it was a predictable reaction.

I like birds, and this was a very special bird. That morning I had been out with a team of observers from BirdLife Malta, patrolling the dry fields of this tiny island where about 10,000 hunters wander and wait to shoot at turtle doves and quail. It's their highly controversial spring hunting season, the only such in the European Union, of which Malta has been a member since 2004.

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