The Guardian

Prince of Wales says soil health is of ‘critical importance’ as he joins initiative to keep carbon locked in the world’s soils

Prince Charles urged governments, individuals and businesses to take greater care of the world’s soils as part of an initiative aimed at keeping carbon locked in soil, rather than escaping into the atmosphere and causing global warming.

The “4 per 1000” project is a pledge to reduce the amount of carbon leaked from soils by 0.4% a year, which would be enough to halt the rise of carbon dioxide levels in the air. Nearly 180 countries have signed up to the initiative that was set up by the French government as part of its efforts to make the Paris agreement on climate change, signed last year, a success.

An elusive shoebill, a Yellowstone grizzly and spawning red snappers are among this week’s pick of images from the natural world

Cap on sulphur content of marine fuels worldwide will save millions of lives in the coming decades, say campaigners. BusinessGreen reports

The International Maritime Organisation (IMO) agreed on Thursday to set a cap on the sulphur content of marine fuels, in a move that campaigners predict will save millions of lives in the coming decades.

At a meeting of the IMO’s environment protection committee this week shipping officials agreed to cap the sulphur content of marine fuels sold around the world at 0.5% by 2020, finally making good on a 2008 agreement to cap sulphur levels by 2020 or 2025.

A landmark international agreement will create the world’s largest marine park in Antarctica’s Southern Ocean, an environment home to most of the world’s penguins and whales. More than 1.5m sq km of the Ross Sea around Antarctica will be protected under the deal which was brokered in Australia between 24 countries and the European Union

Common agricultural policy money given to estates in England, including one owned by the Duke of Westminster, Britain’s richest landowner

England’s vast grouse shooting estates receive millions of pounds in public subsidies according to an investigation by Friends of the Earth.

Thirty of the estates received £4m of taxpayer’s money between them in 2014, the year examined by the pressure group, including one owned by the Duke of Westminster, the richest landowner in Britain with land holdings estimated to be worth £9bn

Odell, Bedfordshire An ape-like shuffle brings me under coppiced hazel bushes to a string of pale, sunlit fungi, their fresh young caps wrinkled like old skin

A thousand or more years ago there were blue harvests in the fields around Odell. The village was named after the plants that produced the vivid dye beloved of ancient Britons, though, over time, the Saxon’s Woad Hill contracted into its modern form.

Today the fields grow no woad, but harvests of a different sort can be found on the clay cap on top of the hill, where the great wood still stands.

Protests against the controversial Dakota Access pipeline move into a new phase when police in North Dakota make mass arrests and deploy pepper spray against protesters and the media. Activists say tear gas was also used, claims the county sheriff denies

The scientific numbers are not yet in from the UK Butterfly Monitoring scheme, but the Big Butterfly Count recorded its worst figures since it began

At first glance, it has been a bafflingly bad summer for butterflies. After a decent spring in the north-west and a dazzling late summer in the south-east, garden buddleias remained bereft. The only butterfly I’ve seen in good number is the red admiral, which thrived during the second-warmest September on record.

The scientific numbers are not yet in from the UK Butterfly Monitoring scheme (a magnificent dataset collected by 2,000 volunteers each summer which celebrates its 40th birthday this year) but the Big Butterfly Count recorded its worst figures since it began – worse than the washout of 2012.

Company operating near the border with Peru has reportedly had near encounters with indigenous people living in “isolation”

Teams from a Chinese oil and gas company exploring in the remote Bolivian Amazon have reportedly had near encounters with a group of indigenous people living in what the United Nations calls “isolation”, raising major concern for the group’s welfare.

The company doing the exploring, BGP Bolivia, is ultimately a subsidiary of the state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), one of the biggest oil and gas companies in the world. The near encounters are reported to have taken place in the north-west of the country, close to the border with Peru and just to the east of the world-famous Madidi National Park.

Mediterranean ecosystems will change to a state unprecedented in the past 10,000 years unless temperature rises are held to within 1.5C, say scientists

Southern Spain will be reduced to desert by the end of the century if the current rate of greenhouse gas emissions continue unchecked, researchers have warned.

Anything less than extremely ambitious and politically unlikely carbon emissions cuts will see ecosystems in the Mediterranean change to a state unprecedented in the past 10 millennia, they said.

Research using miniature tracking devices suggests that swifts eat and sleep in the sky, as some birds did not land at all during their migratory period

Swifts already hold the title of the fastest fliers on Earth and now the small soot-brown birds have been revealed as one of nature’s greatest endurance athletes, after scientists discovered they spend ten months of the year entirely airborne.

Using miniature trackers, scientists observed that some birds did not land once during their migratory period, suggesting that they eat and sleep in the sky.

Move would also cut Scottish whiting catches to zero, while Celtic cod and Irish sole face hefty reductions to prevent stocks collapsing

The European commission has proposed closures on commercial fishing for sea bass in the Atlantic and whiting in the waters west of Scotland from next year, in order to prevent a collapse in fish stocks.

The total allowable catch (TAC) for cod in the Celtic Sea will also be cut by 68% under the plan, while sole quotas in the Irish Sea will be trimmed by a hefty 82%.

Americans must prevail on President Obama to establish a national monument around Grand Canyon National Park before we lose this historic chance

In 1967, my father took me and eight of my brothers and sisters on a whitewater trip down the Colorado River through Grand Canyon National Park. We camped on its massive sandbars, swam in its silty waters and explored the ancient geology of this iconic American landscape. He wanted us to experience the river and to understand the benefits that stem from our nation’s commitment to protecting its inspiring natural treasures.

I had these ideas in mind when I took my own daughter, Kick, down the Grand Canyon 40 years later, in 2007. We joined my old friend, the great anthropologist Wade Davis, and his daughter Tara. Davis was working on a book, and the four of us were guests of Imax cinematographer Greg MacGillivray, who released his film about our journey, Grand Canyon Adventure: River At Risk, in 2008.

Resolution imposes stricter reviews of whales killed under the scientific programme which Japan’s critics say it abuses to hunt for meat

The world’s whaling watchdog has voted to conduct stricter reviews of whales killed under an exemption to a 30-year-old moratorium which Japan’s critics say it abuses to hunt for meat.

The resolution on Thursday, opposed by Japan and fellow whalers Norway and Iceland, was adopted by 34 yes votes to 17 against, at the 66th meeting of the International Whaling Commission (IWC).

Trees across the northern hemisphere are putting on their annual dazzling display

Two-thirds of wild animals could be lost by 2020 and the biggest driver is destruction of their homes. A radical idea to give animals a ‘voice’ could encourage land managers to think about wild areas in a new way

Researchers report that the future for the Earth’s wild animals is very bleak. Two-thirds will be wiped out by 2020. While poaching is partially responsible, the biggest threat to wild animals is our impact on their homes – we kill them when we destroy forests and pollute waterways in the name of development.

Judging by the dramatic decline in the number of wild animals, it is safe to say that existing policy responses are proving ineffective. What’s needed is a fundamental change in how we view wild areas, and the policy responses to match.

Just 17% of people surveyed back the process, the lowest level since the government survey started tracking public attitudes about shale gas

Public support for fracking has fallen to new lows, a government survey has revealed.

Just 17% of people backed the process of extracting shale gas, compared with a third who opposed it, and just under half (48%) who had no opinion, the latest figures from the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy show.

Project to open up miles of the river to enable fish to reach spawning grounds will help to restore threatened and declining species

A scheme to open up miles of the river Severn and its major tributary to help threatened fish has won almost £20m in funding.

The £19.4m project will reopen the UK’s longest river to fish species, many of which vanished from its upper reaches after weirs were installed in the 1800s to help river transport during the industrial revolution.

Is the loss of a unique life form on Earth big news? Not according to most media outlets.

On September 26th, staff with the Atlanta Botanical Garden found a frog dead in his enclosure. The frog had big brown eyes, massive feet with thick webs between the toes, and brownish skin speckled with little yellow dots. His name was Toughie. He was big for a frog and he didn’t like it when humans handled him. He’d lived a long time: 12 years.

And he was the last of his kind.

Economist says green development is the only route to global economic growth and points to China leading the world on climate change action

Clean, green development is the sole route to future global economic growth, according to British economist Lord Nicholas Stern, with a continuation of polluting, high-carbon growth only leading to self-destruction.

There is a strong argument that China is now leading the world in action on climate change, Stern said, making the country both a competitor and inspiration for other nations.