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Recommended NSW rooftop solar feed in tariffs to double
Power generators commit to worker transfer scheme
4th Australasian Emissions Reduction Summit certified as carbon neutral event for the second year
4th Australasian Emissions Reduction Summit certified as carbon neutral event for the second year
4th Australasian Emissions Reduction Summit certified as carbon neutral event for the second year
Woods alive to the sound and throb of spring: Country diary 100 years ago
Originally published in the Manchester Guardian on 1 May 1917
April 30
All weekend, from dawn to dusk, the chiff-chaff throbbed in the trees, its small body jerking with each emphatic note; everywhere in the Delamere woods I heard the cheerful music of the willow wrens, which, a friend told me, reached here in numbers on the night of the 25th-26th, though he heard several at Marbury on Wednesday. Yesterday I heard a cuckoo before I was up, and it was calling at Bowdon on the previous day; the corncrake, which usually arrives about the same time as the cuckoo, was seen at Hatchmere in the middle of the week. It was seen, though not heard, for the grass, though now full of “sweeps,” is still short, and the corncrake prefers to call when it is hidden. Swallows have been joined by house martins – on Thursday a number were seen together on one Cheshire pool for the first time, though odd martins had been noticed earlier in other places. Yesterday the tree pipit was singing as it descended towards its perch, and a beautiful male redstart was in one of the woods, where the anemone is now plentiful and marsh marigolds, are at last appearing. Primroses are out on the banks with other belated spring flowers – veined wood sorrel, moschatel, dog violets, and golden saxifrage. Bumble-bees are stirring the wind-dried leaves as they prospect for future nesting holes, and hive-bees are busy in the garden. Spring has at last asserted itself.
Climate change could drive coastal food webs to collapse
Coastal marine food webs could be in danger of collapse as a result of rising carbon dioxide levels, according to our new research. The study shows that although species such as algae will receive a boost, the positive effects are likely to be cancelled out by the increased stress to species further up the food chain such as predatory fish.
Food webs are essentially networks of species that interact with each other. The connection between them can stabilise systems, for instance by preventing particular species from becoming too common, thereby encouraging the presence of a wide range of species.
These pathways can be quite stable, but they are vulnerable to ocean warming and acidification. Such food webs are therefore sensitive to changing climates, through potential changes both to plant growth (bottom-up effects) and to predator abundance and behaviour (top-down effects).
Because of the sheer complexity of species interactions within these food webs, we struggle to understand what future food webs might look like and how humans will be affected through changes in the services provided by the ocean, such as food, materials and energy.
Test tankWe used a self-contained ecosystem in a 2,000-litre tank to study the effects of warming and ocean acidification on a coastal food web. This approach can give us a good idea of what might happen to genuine coastal food webs, because the tank (called a “mesocosm”) contains natural habitats and a range of species that interact with one another, just as they do in the wild.
Our food web had three levels: primary producers (algae), herbivores (invertebrates), and predators (fish).
The results show that carbon dioxide enrichment can actually boost food webs from the bottom up through increased algal growth. This benefited herbivores because of the higher abundance of food, and in turn boosted the very top of the food web, where fish grew faster.
But while this effect of ocean acidification may be seen as positive for marine ecosystems, it mainly benefits “weedy” species – a definition that can be applied to some species of algae, invertebrates, and even fish.
In contrast, habitat-forming species such as kelp forests and coral reefs are more likely to disappear with rising CO₂ emissions, and with them many associated species that are deprived of their habitats and food.
Detrimental effectOur results therefore showed that warming had a detrimental overall effect on the coastal food web we studied. Although higher temperatures boosted algal growth, herbivorous populations did not expand. Because herbivore abundances remained similar and elevated temperatures result in a higher metabolic demand, predatory fish consumed more herbivorous prey, resulting in a collapse of these prey populations.
These results show how the benefits of one human-induced effect (increased ocean CO₂) are cancelled out by the negative effects of a co-occuring stressor (ocean warming). More importantly, it also shows how interactions between species (predator and prey, in this case) can alter the outcome of climate stressors on individual species.
Such indirect effects within the web of life have remained largely unstudied, despite the fact that they may in many cases be more important than direct effects in terms of their future impacts.
For example, habitat loss and loss of predator species are key indirect effects that can alter species populations within food webs. However, these effects also offer the opportunity for some conservation wins.
First, humans are altering marine ecosystems in many other ways than just climate change, such as through pollution, habitat destruction, and eutrophication (an excess of nutrients, often caused by runoff from land). By reducing these effects we could reduce the overall burden on marine species, potentially buying them time to adapt to climate change across generations.
Second, by reducing habitat loss from other human impacts – by implementing well-designed sanctuary zones – we can also maintain the habitats, prey and other organisms on which species depend for their growth and survival.
Finally, studies suggest that the top of food webs will be disproportionately affected by climate change, and research has shown that predators play important roles in maintaining diversity and general ecosystem health. By reducing the ongoing global overfishing of predatory species worldwide, we might relieve some of the direct effects of climate change on food webs and ecosystems.
Ivan Nagelkerken receives funding from the Australian Research Council.
Sean Connell receives funding from The Australian Research Council.
Silvan Goldenberg 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.
Shark attack injures woman at popular southern California beach
Witness says ‘all of the back of her leg was kind of missing’ after attack that experts say likely involved a great white or seven-gill shark
A shark attacked a woman wading in the ocean with friends, tearing away part of her upper thigh in the ocean off a popular southern California beach, authorities and witnesses said on Sunday.
The attack occurred on Saturday near San Onofre State Beach in northern San Diego County.
Continue reading...Trump says Paris climate agreement is 'one-sided' deal – video
US president criticises deal where ‘the United States pays billions of dollars while China, Russia, and India ... will contribute nothing’. His comments came as thousands of people across the US marched in rain, snow and sweltering heat to demand action on climate change — mass protests that took aim at his agenda for rolling back environmental protections.
Continue reading...Household food waste level 'unacceptable'
Thousands march across US to demand action on climate change – video
Mass protests in Washington, San Francisco, Denver and Seattle coincide with Donald Trump’s 100th day in office and take aim at his rolling back of environmental protections. Organisers said about 300 sister marches were being held around the country, including in Seattle, Boston and San Francisco. In Chicago, marchers headed from the city’s federal plaza to Trump Tower. In Denver, marchers were met with a dose of spring snow
Continue reading...Shops urged to help cut £10bn food waste cost
Supermarket “best before” labels could be phased out while shops should be forced to sell oddly shaped vegetables under proposals from MPs who have warned the government it needs to do more to tackle food waste.
More than £10bn worth of food is thrown away by households each year, according to a damning report from the environment, food and rural affairs select committee.
Continue reading...Nespresso bid to recycle coffee pods
Coffee company Nespresso – part of Swiss multinational Nestlé – is to trial a scheme for consumers to recycle their used aluminium capsules for the first time in the UK, in the face of a growing environmental backlash against increasingly popular single-serve pods, many of which end up in landfill.
A six-month pilot, starting this week in the London borough of Kensington and Chelsea, will allow Nespresso Club members to recycle their used capsules through their council household recycling service, using special purple bags provided by the company. The borough’s 190,000 residents will only be able to put out capsules made by Nespresso.
Continue reading...Clean energy entrepreneurship
Clean energy entrepreneurship
EPA wipes its climate change site day before march on Washington
Visitors to the website on Saturday found it was ‘undergoing changes’ to reflect the agency’s ‘new direction’, as thousands protest climate inaction
The US Environmental Protection Agency’s main climate change website is “undergoing changes” to better reflect “the agency’s new direction” under Donald Trump.
Continue reading...Last-ditch attempt to save the endangered vaquita porpoise
$4m mission in Gulf of California aims to rescue world’s most endangered sea mammal – with help from US navy dolphins
Scientists are finalising plans to make a last-ditch attempt to save the world’s most endangered marine mammal, the vaquita porpoise. They believe there are now fewer than 30 of these distinctive cetaceans left in the Gulf of California.
Only by catching the remaining creatures and protecting them in a sanctuary can the vaquita be saved, it is argued.
Continue reading...NY Times hired a hippie puncher to give climate obstructionists cover
Bret Stephens’ first piece for the Times showed exactly why some climate realists are canceling their subscriptions
Yesterday, New York Times subscribers were treated to an email alert announcing the first opinion column from Bret Stephens, who they hired away from the Wall Street Journal. Like all Journal opinion columnists who write about climate change, Stephens has said a lot of things on the subject that could charitably be described as ignorant and wrong. Thus many Times subscribers voiced bewilderment and concern about his hiring, to which the paper’s public editor issued a rather offensive response.
Justifying the critics, here’s how the paper announced Stephens’ first opinion column in an email alert (usually reserved for important breaking news):
Continue reading...Refugee guests are given hands-on experience of a shepherd's work
Ribblehead, Yorkshire Dales Willing helpers hold the week-old lambs until Rodney is ready to dock their tails
Pliers and rubber rings, a tub of aquamarine dye, plastic ID ear tags … Rodney Beresford lays out the tools of his trade on a flat-topped boulder. It’s lambing time, and he is here in the sheepfold to dock tails and castrate the days-old males.
For once the shepherd is not alone, however. For 10 years Rodney has been offering refugees and asylum seekers “a day out to remember”, as part of a Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust project. Today’s helper-guests, from St Augustine’s Centre in Halifax, have spent their morning searching his pasture for new-born lambs, guided by Rodney’s grandchildren, Lucy, eight, and Katie, five. Success? Two sets of twins born naturally – “doing grand”.
Continue reading...Insects the next superfood?
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