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Tiny particles of plastic litter in oceans causing deaths, stunted growth and altering behaviour of some fish that feed on them, research shows

Fish are being killed, and prevented from reaching maturity, by the litter of plastic particles finding their way into the world’s oceans, new research has proved.

Some young fish have been found to prefer tiny particles of plastic to their natural food sources, effectively starving them before they can reproduce.

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Barack Obama tightens restriction on sale of elephant ivory within the US to clamp down on illegal trade

Barack Obama imposed a near total ban on the commercial trade in elephant ivory on Thursday in an effort to choke off smuggling networks and end the slaughter of African wildlife.

The US Fish and Wildlife Service rules ban the sale of elephant ivory across state lines, and deepen restrictions on international ivory sales.

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Nepal's army begins work to drain rising waters in a lake near Everest, one the highest projects of its kind.

Multiple listings of banned species found and since Guardian investigation 19 ads were closed down – but controlling the trade is akin to a game of whack-a-mole

A killer algae, a monstrous pondweed, a tree that has infested the Everglades and a dozen more of the US’s most environmentally destructive plants have been discovered for sale on eBay. Online traders told the Guardian that ignorance of the law led them to create listings that had spread hundreds of illegal specimens across the country.

Ebay hosted multiple listings for 15 species from the federal noxious weeds list the nation’s highest level of plant biosecurity. Most offered import to the US from abroad. But six sellers were hawking plants from within the country.

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The world needs to move away from industrial agriculture to avoid ecological, social and human health crises, say scientists

A new approach to farming is needed to safeguard human health and avoid rising air and water pollution, high greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss, a group of 20 leading agronomists, health, nutrition and social scientists has concluded.

Rather than the giant feedlots used to rear animals or the uniform crop monocultures that now dominate farming worldwide, the solution is to diversify agriculture and re-orient it around ecological practices, says the report (pdf) by the International panel of experts on sustainable food systems (IPES-Food).

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Georgia O’Keeffe camping with Ansel Adams, paintings of the Tetons and comparisons of Yellowstone from 1871 and now are some of the highlights at the National Museum of Wildlife Art in Jackson, Wyoming. A series of exhibitions celebrates a range of arts focused on the anniversary of the national parks, running now until 28 August

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Following a four-month wait, the clutch of eggs belonging to a curious Slovenian cave salamander has started to hatch.

Exclusive: Guardian investigation reveals testing regimes similar to that of Flint were in place in major cities including Chicago, Boston and Philadelphia

• Water departments to change lead-testing methods after investigation

At least 33 cities across 17 US states have used water testing “cheats” that potentially conceal dangerous levels of lead, a Guardian investigation launched in the wake of the toxic water crisis in Flint, Michigan, has found.

Related: Chicago residents take action to be rid of lead pipes as fear of toxic water grows

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Instructions provided varied greatly, ranging from those that contained protocols the EPA advised against a decade ago to those that were periodically updated

• At least 33 US cities used water testing ‘cheats’ over lead concerns

Water departments that use controversial lead-testing practices have told the Guardian they will change their methods after an investigation revealed they were not following environmental guidelines.

Most of the water departments involved said they used the testing methods because state governments told them to, federal guidance was not clear, or they had not received any word that practices may underestimate lead content.

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The Bropkas meet the grid

In what must surely be a first for the Conversation, I am writing this post from the village of Sakteng in remote eastern Bhutan. That I can do so is a remarkable testimony to the will of the Bhutanese government in the electrification of what has to be one of the most difficult countries in the World to electrify.

Sakteng is one of Bhutan’s two main Bropka settlements. To get to Sakteng we walked from Merak, the other main Bropka settlement. It took us 8-hours trekking over the Nakchung pass at 4,100 m, though the locals take only half that time. From Sakteng to the road head is another 2 hours walk.

The Bropkas are yak herders that originate from Tibet, and inhabit the high mountains along the north eastern border of Bhutan and Arunachal Pradesh in neighbouring India. In many respects, Bropka life seems little changed from time immemorial, governed by the seasonal movement of their yak herds up and down the precipitous Himalayan mountains slopes. Traditional dress remains very much the order of the day with men in their dear skin jackets and woman adorned by their astonishing yak fur hats. But lives in these remote villages have changed in very real and tangible ways.

Bropka women from the village of Merak in eastern Bhutan, with their distinctive yak-fur hats.

Despite the road only just now reaching Merak, and not planned to get to Sakteng for a few years yet, both villages are on the grid, and have been for almost 10 years. Mobile telephony arrived soon after electricity.

A nation defined by steepness

Like few other countries, Bhutan is defined by steepness.

As anyone who has flown into the only international airport at Paro understands, precipitous slopes rise alarmingly even in the flattest parts of the country. Everywhere, the densely forested slopes are covered with landslide debris - primed for further collapse given the slightest nudge. I doubt that there is any country with a greater steepness index. One of the Himalaya’s most iconic images, the Taktshang monastery, testifies to the way the Bhutanese so readily accommodate this steepness in their daily life.

The Taktshang (Tiger’s Nest) Monastry, Bhutan.

By comparison with other segments of the Himalaya, the Bhutanese frontal ranges bordering the Indian plains of Assam and West Bengal are unusually steep. The steepness has afforded a natural defence that has helped isolate this remote kingdom for generations. The traditional Bhutanese strongholds lie in regions of comparatively low relief at 1500-3000 metres elevation, between the steep frontal ranges and the towering peaks of the high Himalayan along its northern border with Tibet. In more recent times this very steepness has created political distress of its own kind, as once welcome Nepali settlers of southern borderlands were evicted creating some 200,000 refugees.

But its topographic steepness comes with another penalty - the steep cost of moving things around.

On this trip we started our geological work in the south east corner of the country near the outpost of Daifam. By the way the crow flies it is just 250 kms from the nation’s capital Thimphu.

You can’t get to Daifam from Thimphu without leaving Bhutan and traversing through Assam. The quickest route is via the border town of Phuntsholing, 5 hours from Thimphu, and then another 9 hours via Assam. Alternatively you can take Bhutan’s main “highway” east from Thimphu to Trashigang (20 hours), down to Sandrup Jongkhar (5 hours) and across Assam (5 hours). Crows would appear to have it easy in Bhutan.

The isolated villages in the mountains to the north of Daifam are also mostly connected to the grid. To do so required carrying all the poles and wires, often up to a day’s walk up steep slopes through thick forest. Remote rural houses are provided with 100 units of electricity free, but do not go close to consuming that.

In the Bangtar district, on the southern border between Daifam and Sandrup Jongkhar, we met the electrical engineer helping build the transmission line that will send power from a hydro plant near Mongar in the north down to Assam in India. He explained it in some places it will take 2-days by foot to carry the material for the poles and wires from the road head to the proposed transmission route. All of Bhutan’s grid supplied electricity is sourced from hydro, and exports already greatly exceed domestic consumption.

The question of coal

Back in Australia, our coal lobby is fond of quotes of the ilk … “_Only when Third World children can do homework at night using cheap coal-fired electricity can they escape from poverty” .

And at least some in our government seem of a like mind.

Why, might we ask, does it matter that it is just “cheap coal-fired” electricity that alone will alleviate poverty? Why does not cheap hydro, geothermal, nuclear or whatever else, also do the trick?

No doubt coal has been a useful source of electricity in the third world, and will likely remain so for some time given that not all countries are endowed with the hydro resources of the Bhutanese. But is clear that Bhutan puts paid to the idea that coal alone can alleviate poverty.

But Bhutan also shows that there is something more fundamental that our coal lobby is loathe to acknowledge, and it speaks to the very paradox that lies at the heart of their claim - given that cheap coal has been around powering electricity systems for over 150 years, why are any children still living in poverty?

Could it be that the purported saviour of the world’s poor - the coal industry - doesn’t really have such a flash track record in the altruism stakes after all?

Bhutan shows that it is not really coal or any other source of energy that is the missing ingredient in providing electricity to children of the Third World.

Despite the immense impediment to transporting anything in such incredibly steep and forested terrain, Bhutan’s remarkable program of electrification suggests the real missing ingredient in providing access to energy is the will of government.

Disclosure

Mike Sandiford receives funding from the Australian Research Council for his geological research.

Thai authorities says they will press charges against the controversial Tiger Temple, after 40 dead cubs were found during a raid on the site.

Aboriginal doctor and researcher Prof Alex Brown has some interesting ideas about how we can harness the wisdom of the longest continuous surviving culture in the world.

A dagger entombed alongside the mummy of the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun was made with iron that came from a meteorite, researchers say.

Violent storms and downpours have lashed parts of northern Europe in recent days, leaving four dead in Germany, breaching the banks of the Seine in Paris and flooding rural roads and villages

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As scientists warn the future of the Great Barrier Reef looks even bleaker than feared, we want to see the impacts of global warming on your part of the country

Climate change has put the Great Barrier Reef into dire trouble, raising water temperatures and causing its worst bleaching event in recorded history. Researchers have warned that now is the last chance to step in and give it a fighting chance.

Meanwhile, Australia is drying out, and world heritage forests in Tasmania have burnt for the first time ever.

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EU directives have helped to protect an array of animals – even though agricultural policy has sometimes had a negative effect

From the sea to the land to the air, EU directives on habitats and birds have protected and enabled the recovery of wildlife, including dolphins, orchids and butterflies and the booming marsh-dwelling bird the bittern.

But, with the intensification of farming having seriously harmed wildlife in past decades, the impact of the EU’s huge common agricultural policy (CAP), has often been in the opposite direction.

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Worth crowing about? Birds that can problem-solve do best in cities. Gypsytwitcher/shutterstock.com

Life in the city can be stressful – for birds just as much as people. For humans, cities are expressly designed to put roofs over heads and food within easy reach, but the opposite can be true for many urban birds. They can find food and shelter harder to come by in the concrete jungle – with some notable exceptions.

For any species in any habitat, survival is about problem-solving and adapting to the environment. So what street smarts do city birds need? And why do some species, such as lorikeets, crows and ravens, seem to dominate our urban landscapes?

In general, urban birds must be bolder than those that remain in natural habitats, as can be seen by the boldness (or “habituation”) with which some species will forage for food with people nearby. But they also need to be able to avoid or retreat from unfamiliar objects or situations if they seem dangerous.

City birds also need to withstand exposure to a wide range of pathogens. A study of birds in Barbados found that urban birds have enhanced immune systems relative to their country counterparts.

While we have changed the environment in which some birds live, reducing resources in terms of food and shelter and increasing the number of pathogens that may impact their health, some birds have largely benefited from the new way of life.

Winners and losers

Within the urban ecosystem, there are winners and losers in the bird world. The suburban landscape, for example, now provides more nectar from flowers than native vegetation due to the gardens that people have established. This is a big help to nectar-feeding parrots such as Rainbow Lorikeets.

A recent study in Sydney found that the lorikeets benefit from the increased abundance of flowers in urban areas, and their numbers were higher in the leafy suburbs than in bushland.

But if urban areas are such a rich source of nectar, why are some nectar-feeding species declining?

The Regent Honeyeater feeds mainly on nectar and other plant sugars. It has been seen in orchards and urban gardens, but is listed as critically endangered by the federal government.

This is partly because widespread clearance of woodland habitat has led to the increase of the aggressive Noisy Miner and Red Wattlebird. These species find it easy to “bully” other birds in open habitats. Noisy Miners have been observed pulling apart Regent Honeyeaters' nests as they were being built.

Regent Honeyeaters, in contrast, are less adaptable to changed landscapes, because they are migratory and rely on detailed knowledge of existing food sources. If these resources are changed or removed, they may not have enough interconnected patches of habitat to move safely towards new resources – potentially leaving them vulnerable to cats, foxes and aggression from other birds.

Habitat loss can threaten some bird species or even leave them at risk of dying out if they do not locate alternative resources. The ability to find new food sources therefore becomes a valuable survival skill.

What’s more useful: flexibility or intelligence?

For some bird species, flexibility in finding food is crucial in making a successful switch to urban environments. One example is the Grey-crowned Babbler, which is endangered in Victoria, but my colleagues and I have documented it living in a suburban area in Dubbo, New South Wales.

This species usually nests in coniferous woodland and forages in the leaf litter beneath the trees. But in Dubbo, we saw these birds feeding on lawns, in playgrounds and even in leaf litter along a train track at the back of urban housing, sometimes visiting backyards along the way. This suggests that these birds can survive the loss of their woodland habitat by being sufficiently adaptable to life in the suburbs – as long as they can continue to find enough food, disperse between nearby groups and have access to native nesting trees.

For other species, such as crows and ravens, intelligence seems to be the key. These species can survive anywhere in the urban sprawl, including places where trees are scarce but rubbish bins are everywhere. Crows and ravens can literally pull food out of a bin and eat it – clearly a learned behaviour that has resulted from problem-solving.

These birds are highly opportunistic and social, allowing them to learn new ways of adapting to the almost complete removal of their natural environment.

Survive and thrive

What we can deduce from these examples is that some birds, like Rainbow Lorikeets and Grey-crowned Babblers, can adapt successfully to the urban sprawl as long as some characteristics of their habitat still remain. Other species, such as crows, have gone a step further and worked out how to survive purely on urban resources – effectively making a living in an environment that is completely unnatural to them.

This suggests that the more we urbanise an area without natural aspects, the less bird diversity we will have – and the more our urban areas will come to be dominated by those few species that are hardy, clever or adaptable enough to thrive.

Luckily, some councils in Australia and cities throughout the world are bringing the natural aspects of the forest back into the concrete jungle, so that a wider range of birds might survive here. More research is needed to work out exactly what each species will need, but planting more native plants is always a good start.

Kathryn Teare Ada Lambert does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond the academic appointment above.

Drastic cuts to hit remediation work – the process of detoxifying soil, with plans to phase it out by 2017, MPs on environmental audit committee find

The government has drastically cut funds needed to encourage new building on “brownfield” sites, despite claiming that such sites would be key to solving the housing crisis.

Many sites that have previously held buildings or other developments need remediation – a process to remove potentially dangerous toxins from the soil – in order to be considered for new houses, of which the government plans to build hundreds of thousands a year to ease the pressure on the UK’s over-stretched stock.

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Prime minister Stefan Löfven should keep his election promise of clean energy and not let state-owned Vattenfall sell its coal mines to EPH

The history of the fossil fuel industry can feel like it is told in complicated deals the public isn’t meant to understand. This is what is happening in Sweden. The government-owned energy company, Vattenfall, is demanding the sale of its coal mines and power plants based in Germany to a Czech company, EPH. The deal includes some of Germany’s largest coal mines – and three of the top 10 most polluting coal plants in Europe. They are going to a deeply unattractive buyer – EPH, a company hell-bent on burning as much coal as possible.

In the next couple of weeks, Swedish prime minister, Stefan Löfven, is facing a stark choice. On one hand, he could approve the sale of the most climate-destroying assets in Europe, breaking his own election promises in the process. Or, he could promote a transition to keep coal in the ground – and support a liveable climate – in an unprecedented decision by a government to keep fossil fuels in the ground. Coal is the most polluting of all fossil fuels, and lignite or ‘brown coal’ is the most polluting type of coal and the greatest threat to EU climate goals.

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Widdybank Fell, Teesdale Vivid bird’s-eye primroses survive and bloom in the bleak grandeur of the north Pennines

A skylark rose from among the dry grasses and heather beside the footpath, spiralling higher and higher, showering us with song until it was lost from view in an almost cloudless sky.

In dozens of visits here on May mornings over the past 40 years this was the most perfect day we could recall: still air, warm sunshine and crystal-clear visibility. Bitterly cold wind is expected and horizontal sleet not uncommon at this time of year in one of the last places that spring reaches in the north Pennines.

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