The Guardian

Explore.org, Polar Bears International, Frontiers North Adventures and a group of wildlife experts have launched a wild beluga livestream, broadcasting footage from a boatcam that will follow the whales as they migrate to a small estuary on Hudson Bay. The livestream will run until 21 August, with a guide narrating footage from above and below the water

A team of scientists, teachers and Indigenous rangers find new arachnids during survey of the Cape York peninsula in Queensland’s far north

Thirteen new species of spider have been discovered on Queensland’s Cape York peninsula – adding to the thousands of known species that give Australian wildlife its fearsome reputation.

The new species were found by scientists, teachers and Indigenous rangers during a 10-day journey to the largely unsurveyed area.

They’ve divebombed pensioners. They’ve eaten tortoises. Now a seagull has been found dead in Bridport. Tragic accident or mob-style warning? Our gumshoe found a tale of starling-swallowers, salmonella – and a second victim

“They sent you all this way to ask about a seagull?” The taxi driver looked at me in the mirror. In his eyes, I saw confusion, maybe a little fear. I smiled wearily. Not now, I thought. Not him, too. No more talk of seagulls. It had been a long couple of days. I was so nearly out of Saigon I could hear the rotor blades thumping above.

By Saigon, of course, I mean Bridport, west Dorset, a seaside market town of charity shops, estate agents and bad local art galleries. By rotor blades, I mean seagulls. For the past 36 hours I had thought about little else. If you gaze at the seagull long enough, I learned, it gazes back at you. You wonder whether it has a demonic quality. A seagull will do strange things to a man.

Survey reveals population has nearly doubled to over 1,000 despite significant increase in number of animals culled every year

Wild boar numbers in the Forest of Dean have nearly doubled since 2013 despite an increase in the number culled, according to the Forestry Commission.

Results of an annual thermal imaging survey estimate the population is now more than 1,000 animals.

Surfer says it may be months before he goes back in the ocean after the terror of escaping a shark while competing in South Africa

Surfer Mick Fanning says it could be months before he gets over the shark attack in South Africa, but says he will return to the water.

A shaken Fanning appeared at a media conference of about 150 journalists in Sydney on Tuesday afternoon to recount fighting off a shark while competing at the J-Bay Open in South Africa.

Environment Agency found about 150 dead fish in the river Penk and more in the river Sow, near Stafford – identifying the tarmac-melting fire as the likely cause

A lorry fire that shut a motorway for 16 hours after it melted the road is believed to be responsible for killing more than 100 fish in nearby rivers, the Environment Agency has said.

Tests are being carried out by environmental officers, with the agency saying the fire caused chemicals to seep into the watercourses. Around 150 fish were found dead at the river Penk near Stafford, while there were further reports of dead fish at the river Sow.

Paul Hickson says when he signed access agreement he had no idea of physical or psychological impact that gas drilling could have on him and his family

A farmer who gave an energy company permission to dig a test borehole for coal bed methane gas out of a sense of national duty has warned other landowners not to allow fracking and other unconventional gas exploration companies on their land.

The potential of gas drilling to pollute water courses and the effect it could have on the value of farmland left Paul Hickson and his family stressed for years and no wealthier, he said.

Powered by the sun, this low cost three-bedroom house is the first in the country to produce and sell more energy than it uses

Britain’s first low cost ‘energy positive’ house, which can generate more electricity than its occupants will use, opens on Thursday despite George Osborne axing plans to make housebuilders meet tough low carbon housing targets from next year.

The modest three-bedroom house built in just 16 weeks on an industrial estate outside Bridgend in Wales cost just £125,000 to build and, said its Cardiff University designers, will let occupants use the sun to pay the rent.

Under pressure from shareholders, company promised eight years ago to stop funding climate denial – but financial and tax records tell a different story

ExxonMobil gave more than $2.3m to members of Congress and a corporate lobbying group that deny climate change and block efforts to fight climate change – eight years after pledging to stop its funding of climate denial, the Guardian has learned.

Climate denial – from Republicans in Congress and lobby groups operating at the state level – is seen as a major obstacle to US and global efforts to fight climate change, closing off the possibility of federal and state regulations cutting greenhouse gas emissions and the ability to plan for a future of sea-level rise and extreme weather.

Counting impact of toxic gas NO2 for the first time suggests more than twice as many people as previously thought die prematurely from pollution in UK capital

Nearly 9,500 people die early each year in London due to long-term exposure to air pollution, more than twice as many as previously thought, according to new research.

The premature deaths are due to two key pollutants, fine particulates known as PM2.5s and the toxic gas nitrogen dioxide (NO2), according to a study carried out by researchers at King’s College London.

From wolves to grey whales and lynxes, plans are afoot to introduce some iconic species back into the countryside and UK waters

A new national organisation called Rewilding Britain launches on Wednesday with the aim of reversing centuries of ecological damage by returning species and habitats to the British countryside that have been absent for decades and sometimes much longer. In the process it hopes to recharge the natural world with wonder and help people to reconnect with it. Here are some of the species that have been lost to our countryside but may yet return:

Andy Gotts has photographed almost 60 celebrities wearing the Save the Arctic T-shirt designed by fashion icon and activist Dame Vivienne Westwood, in a project that has taken 18 months. Here are more than a few of his pictures

Unusually high winds allowed Denmark to meet all of its electricity needs – with plenty to spare for Germany, Norway and Sweden too

So much power was produced by Denmark’s windfarms on Thursday that the country was able to meet its domestic electricity demand and export power to Norway, Germany and Sweden.

On an unusually windy day, Denmark found itself producing 116% of its national electricity needs from wind turbines yesterday evening. By 3am on Friday, when electricity demand dropped, that figure had risen to 140%.

Study of past sea level changes shows coastal communities may face rises of at least six metres even if we limit global warming to 2C, reports Climate Central

Even if world manages to limit global warming to 2C — the target number for current climate negotiations — sea levels may still rise at least 6 meters (20 ft) above their current heights, radically reshaping the world’s coastline and affecting millions in the process.

That finding comes from a new paper published on Thursday in Science that shows how high sea levels rose the last time carbon dioxide levels were this high.

A newly unearthed missive from Lenny Bernstein, a climate expert with the oil firm for 30 years, shows concerns over high presence of carbon dioxide in enormous gas field in south-east Asia factored into decision not to tap it

ExxonMobil, the world’s biggest oil company, knew as early as 1981 of climate change – seven years before it became a public issue, according to a newly discovered email from one of the firm’s own scientists. Despite this the firm spent millions over the next 27 years to promote climate denial.

The email from Exxon’s in-house climate expert provides evidence the company was aware of the connection between fossil fuels and climate change, and the potential for carbon-cutting regulations that could hurt its bottom line, over a generation ago – factoring that knowledge into its decision about an enormous gas field in south-east Asia. The field, off the coast of Indonesia, would have been the single largest source of global warming pollution at the time.

Habitat loss is seen as the primary threat to at-risk species but recovery plans avoid addressing it and governments have entrenched the extinction process

Successive Australian governments have failed to protect the habitat of the country’s most endangered creatures, with 90% of the 120 most endangered animals having no safeguards to prevent the loss of their homes, a new study has found.

An analysis by environmental groups of the official recovery plans for Australia’s endangered wildlife has discovered that just 12 of the 120 most endangered animals were covered by plans that placed limits on the future loss of their habitat.

Arctic activists Marc Cornelissen and Philip de Roo’s last expedition ended tragically in April when they fell through thinning ice. Fellow environmental campaigner Ruth Dawkins recalls the vital work and warm spirits of her inspirational friends

In April of this year, two Dutch polar explorers, Marc Cornelissen and Philip de Roo, set off from Resolute Bay in the Canadian Arctic. They were headed for Bathurst Island, a journey of 400km that was due to take around a month. This was part of the Last Ice Survey expedition to gather data about snow and ice thickness for York University, Ontario. They would walk and ski across a region known as the Last Ice Area, where summer sea ice is expected to be most resilient to climate change.

A few days into their trip, when they were still in Resolute Bay preparing for the hard month ahead, Philip found Marc’s sled from a previous unsuccessful expedition being used by a local hunter. In one of the many short voice recordings which they uploaded each day during their journey, Marc talks about what a special feeling it is to be back in the region and how pleased he is to be there with his trusted expedition partner Philip. “That [last expedition] was a failure, but if we make it there this time, it will be a beautiful contrast.”

Veteran pilot tested to the limit of endurance on record-breaking solar-powered flight across the Pacific, on the eighth leg of round-the-world journey

A solar plane attempting the world’s first flight around the globe has landed in Hawaii, after breaking the record for the longest non-stop solo flight in history.

Solar Impulse 2, piloted by the Swiss pilot André Borschberg, took off from Nagoya in Japan at 3am on Monday, for the five-day crossing of the Pacific Ocean, the riskiest leg of its journey.

TV presenter and naturalist Steve Backshall was asked by a British newspaper to write about the ‘invasion’ of jellyfish this summer. But they didn’t like what he had to say, so we’re publishing it here in full instead

While the sunshine may be an unpredictable visitor to UK summer shores, there’s one silly season certainty that you can count on. It’s an invasion striking terror into the hearts of humble Brits, causing widespread panic, forcing terrified tourists to abandon our seas and seek safer foreign waters. Yes, it’s the early summer newspaper headline, designed to get us all terrified of Mother Nature.

Whether it’s false widow spiders that leap from their webs and rot your flesh, vile sunspiders that inject novocaine into our British soldiers, rats the size of cows, man-eating foxes or a lone great white shark travelling across the Atlantic with the sole intent of savaging plucky Cornish surfers, testicle-munching pacu fish set to invade our seas … these genuine news stories have two things in common: they are factual nonsense, and they all contain the message that nature is evil, and she’s out to get you.

Harmondsworth villagers say they will support direct action against any attempt to bulldoze 750 homes if government backs expansion

Community leaders in Harmondsworth, the village that would be largely flattened to make way for a third runway at Heathrow, have reacted with anger at Howard Davies’s recommendation that the plan should go ahead – and alleged they were “deceived” by the government.

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