"The Arctic is cooking. Across northern Russia—a region that is famously bitterly cold—temperatures this week have routinely surpassed 90 degrees Fahrenheit (32.2 degrees Celsius), adding to the mountain of broken heat records this summer has racked up so far." […]

Aphaenogaster fulva disperses seeds, pollinates plants, and hunts small insects. They also clean up dead insects and improve soil quality. Ants get attention only if they are: * very large * able to sting or bite people * destructive to crops or invaders of houses * make big mounds, or have big […]

Giant clams love light. As a general rule, the more light they can get for their symbiotic algae, the better. Some species will even continue to photosynthesize in air for hours exposed by the tide, since their photosynthesis provides them some oxygen. Which makes the "devil clam" (Tridacna […]

I'm not sure folks have realized just how crazy the second half of 2026 and 2027 will be for global temperatures – on the back of a record-smashing El Niño event. Here is my latest estimate of where both years will end up compared to global temperatures since 1850.

🇵🇫 French Polynesia just gave a huge boost to ocean #conservation 🐠. They expanded protections so about 30% of their waters are now more strongly safeguarded, helping protect #MarineLife and keeping these waters healthier for the future. A pretty big impact for an island nation.

French Polynesia expands ocean protections to 30% of its waters

The government of French Polynesia announced it is expanding the extent of ocean where extractive industries like seabed mining and industrial fishing will not be allowed. With this move, 30% of Frenc...

news.mongabay.com

A lovely story www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...

How eight beavers solved a decades-old Tube flooding problem

The creatures were reintroduced in 2023 after being hunted to extinction 400 years ago

independent.co.uk

📰 WILDLIFE WEDNESDAY 🌍 Mozambique: A community-led effort to stop devastating seahorse harvesting has been successful. 💰 The effort had to overcome a high economic motivation to pull and dry the regulated fish illegally for the black market. The rate of extraction was projected to eliminate […]

Protecting the seabed & local community: a Zegna fellowship awarded at Art Basel to the GOODLand project founded by artist Martha Atienza at Bantayan in the Philippines: https://www.visibleproject.org/zegna-announces-the-2026-visible-situated-fellowship-during-art-basel-in-basel-2026/ […]

On the British seizure of an oil tanker: an analysis by Craig Murray, a former Head of Maritime Section at the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2026/06/the-uk-joins-the-pirates/ #MaritimeLaw #shipping #CraigMurray

The UK Joins the Pirates

I was genuinely surprised by the Starmer regime’s refusal to state that the Israeli boarding of the Global Sumud flotilla on the High Seas was illegal. I did not realise it was because the UK was planning to undertake similar illegal seizure itself. The Gaza Flotilla seizure was illegal: while for obvious reasons freedom of […] The post The UK Joins the Pirates appeared first on Craig Murray.

craigmurray.org.uk

A crucial issue: deregulation by stealth, which could expose us to a greater range of hazardous chemicals than the EU permits, contrary to government promises. We at Fighting Dirty are suing. We need your help. Please see crowdfunder in next post. Thank you 🧵 www.theguardian.com/environment/...

‘Fast-track’ regulation could expose Britons to harmful chemicals, say campaigners

Exclusive: Fighting Dirty taking legal action against government over proposal it says could import weaker standards

theguardian.com

Sea beasts. bestiary, England ca. 1226-1250. Bodleian Library, MS. Bodl. 764, fol. 106r. #medieval #MedievalArt

Spawning Minnows! Among the great wonders of UK wildlife, unbeknownst to most of us, but to be found in our luckier rivers. My prize upon slipping into our local chalk stream, River Lark, Cavenham Heath, at start of Whitsun, suffering withdrawal from not having been in one since March. #MySwim 1/15

Conservation experts from European BirdLife Partners, on a conference fieldtrip in Albania, were horrified & swung into action... https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2026/6/11/i-saw-kushners-albania-resort-up-close-it-is-an-environmental #Kushner #Albania #BirdLife #conservation #wetlands

I saw Kushner’s Albania resort up close — it is an environmental disaster

The damage at Vjosa-Narta is not fake news. Bulldozers are tearing into one of Europe’s most precious wetlands.

aljazeera.com

@dantheclamman trees too. Trees: - Cannot move to avoid threats. - Suffer not just from animal predation/parasites but from human logging and clear-cutting. - Also die in forest fires, storms, and floods. And yet: - They outnumber humans by a factor of at least 100:1. - While human settlements […]

Clams have a lot of lessons for these times. Everything wants to destroy them, and sometimes the clams fight back, but mostly they win by building back harder, working together to engineer the environment they want to live in. They play a long game and they continue to win.

Britain’s River Wye granted legal rights in landmark move. Councils and protected-area bodies across England and Wales have endorsed a charter recognising the River Wye’s entire 209-kilometre catchment as a living ecosystem with rights to flow, regenerate, support biodiversity and be represented […]

"Brown" Trout seems a misnomer for this exquisite colour-shifting #fish with gold flanks, white rimmed red & black spots, & often white-trimmed fins - no 2 individuals the same. Their colour can darken as they move from light sand to the dark caves they like to rest in below overhanging trees. 4/25

Bower's Lake, Leeds was bejewelled by damselfies, a few caddisfly larvae to be found on the vegetation along with Great Pond Snails (Lymnaea stagnalis), but the most abundant #invertebrate species were, I think, the invasive alien Jenkin's Spire-Snail (Potamopyrgus antipodarum). #molluscmonday 5/6

Terrific article on the deep sea: how little we knew in the past, the wonders we are just beginning to discover, & the vital importance of protection from new threats. https://www.theguardian.com/news/2026/jun/09/ping-pong-sponges-black-smokers-and-floating-somethings-the-secrets-of-the-deep-sea […]

Giant clams produce ~8 kg/cm2 of closure pressure (114 psi), less than a human bite. So you'd feel a big pinch if one closed on you, but not dangerous! They generally don't want you in their shells with them also, so they'll reopen if you keep still, and large clams often can't close completely […]

"Global coral reef collapse is not inevitable" - so this new paper calls for care in communicating threats, new info, & possible courses of action. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tree.2026.04.018 #coral #ocean #SciComm #ClimateChange

Fab news from China! Congrats to citizens & scientists who saved a key Spoon-billed Sandpiper wintering site, shared with 20,000 waterbirds of 46 species, from a new highway in Guangxi! Thanks Beijing for halting it & local government for seeking alternatives. www.sixthtone.com/news/1018593 #birds

How a Rare Bird Stopped a Highway Project in South China

The road was planned to cut through a critical spoon-billed sandpiper habitat. By first organizing online, and then taking action offline, amateur activists halted its construction.

sixthtone.com

I worked with these researchers and NOAA back in the 2000s, so I know how vital this information is to accurate forecasting. This is a huge step backwards for marine science and oceanography.

Water & life: an interdisciplinary initiative open to exploring the flow... https://www.bio.cam.ac.uk/research/water-and-life #CambridgeUniversity #biology #poetry #EcoArt #water

There's a good article by Chinese wildlife conservationist Lishu Li on the #PBSNature site about her efforts to curb wildlife trafficking. "The turtle on my grandmother’s kitchen floor today reminds me not of wrongs committed, but of perspectives that have broadened and must continue to shift […]

I hugely enjoyed ‘Ocean Art'. It’s teeming with wondrous creatures, & human perceptions changing due to both art & science. Helen Scales' first book was on seahorses, & here it’s her first image. 🎨 Hashime Murayama, 1920 #IconicFishes #seahorse #NewBook […] [Original post on ecoevo.social]

The River Little Ouse was the place to be yesterday, on hottest day of year, though barely cooling at 20.6°C. Quite a bit of boat traffic ruining already patchy visibility. But the Bream stirred things up even more; when swimming upstream, if visibility suddenly plummeted, Bream would follow. 2/11

@trishgreenhalgh.bsky.social there's a website where you can train spotting drowning children: http://spotthedrowningchild.com/

Spot The Drowning Child

Can you spot the drowning child in this crowded wave pool? An interactive public service announcement. To the untrained eye, drowning can look just like swimming. The Instinctive Drowning Response is frequently missed, even by people nearby.

spotthedrowningchild.com

Every summer I repost this article on how to spot drowning. Please read it and pass on. In the last few years I’ve had SIX messages from people who saved a kid’s life after clicking on the link from my feed. slate.com/technology/2...

Drowning Doesn’t Look Like Drowning

Drowning is not the violent, splashing call for help that most people expect.

slate.com