What went right this week: wins for nature-lovers, plus more

A federation of wildlife charities plans to create a ‘showcase for nature recovery’ after buying a rural estate in the largest land sale in England for three decades.

The Wildlife Trusts has partnered with Northumberland Wildlife Trust to buy the 3,800-hectare (9,400-acre) Rothbury estate in England’s north-east. The land was owned by the Duke of Northumberland’s son, Lord Max Percy, and had been in the family for seven centuries. It was previously used for game shooting and rearing sheep, but the new ownership spells the end of hunting – and farming will be regenerative only. 

Under a two-phase deal, the charities have already bought a sizeable chunk of the estate, including the Simonside Hills (pictured) and a mixture of lowland, woods, riverside and farmland. A public appeal has been launched to raise £30m to buy the remainder. Notable wildlife includes curlew, red grouse, merlin, cuckoo, mountain bumblebee, emperor moth and red squirrels. 

“This is a thrilling moment for The Wildlife Trusts who are working collectively – coming together from across the UK – to create a national flagship for nature recovery for the very first time,” said the federation’s chief executive, Craig Bennett. “It’s a historic moment for our federation.”

Image: Duncan Hutt

A ‘remarkable’ new treatment for brain cancer has shown early promise in a clinical trial, shrinking a patient’s tumour by half in a matter of weeks.

The therapy has been pioneered by University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (UCLH) and involves injecting low levels of radiation directly into the tumour via a port in the skull. 

Paul Read, a 62-year-old from Luton, was diagnosed in December with recurrent glioblastoma, a type of brain cancer that typically kills patients within 18 months. 

He was the first to undergo the trial therapy and scans showed that after six injections spaced a week apart, his tumour had reduced by 50%.

Dr Paul Mulholland, the UCLH consultant medical oncologist who designed the trial, said the results were “really quite remarkable for someone whose tumour is so aggressive”.

Read (pictured here with his wife Pauline) added: “I am delighted to be given the opportunity to be part of this trial. Even if it doesn’t benefit me, it may benefit someone else down the line. So I have got nothing to lose and everything to hope for.”

Image: Marie Mangan

Tall tales of giant beanstalks, magic beans and pumpkin carriages can bewitch fussy young eaters into scoffing more fruit and vegetables, according to an international study led by researchers in Germany. 

Werner Sommer and colleagues at the Humboldt-University of Berlin questioned whether fairytales might encourage healthier eating choices and help combat childhood obesity.

Preschool kids were told a fantastical story of children saving their town from being drained of colour with the help of magic fruit and veg. The researchers found that after just 20 minutes of storytelling, the young listeners were more likely to choose healthy snacks over sweets and biscuits.

“These results point to the powerful effects of fairytale-like narrations to alter food preferences in early childhood at a time when unhealthy eating is becoming a pandemic,” the study’s authors concluded.

Image: Bonnie Kittle

The nature rights movement hit a high note this week with the news that a forest in Ecuador could be acknowledged as the co-creator of a song.

That’s the aim of the More Than Human Life (Moth) project, which wants Los Cedros cloud forest (pictured) to be recognised as a moral author of Song of the Cedars.

It was composed around a campfire by writer Robert Macfarlane, musician Cosmo Sheldrake, field mycologist Giuliana Furci from the NGO Fungi Foundation and MOTH founder César Rodríguez-Garavito, a legal scholar.

The foursome were visiting Ecuador as part of Macfarlane’s research for his forthcoming book – Is a River Alive? – and recorded samples of howler monkeys, rustling leaves and echo-locating bats for the composition. 

If Moth’s petition to Ecuador’s copyright office is a success, it would be the first time an ecosystem’s moral authorship has been legally recognised, meaning income from streaming would be diverted to a fund for the forest’s protection.

Macfarlane said such a measure was ‘drastically overdue. “We couldn’t have written it without the forest. The forest wrote it with us,” he told the Guardian.

The writer is also in the news this week for Riversong, his broadside ballad written in collaboration with artist Nick Hayles, which the pair are giving away for free to highlight the need for protection of the UK’s waterways.

Image: Robert Macfarlane

The turbines began turning on China’s largest offshore windfarm this week, generating the first of an estimated 2.55bn kilowatt hours of clean energy a year, and saving hundreds of thousands of tonnes of coal.

The project, in waters off the Shandong peninsula in eastern China, is made up of 106 turbines over an area of 143 sq km (55 sq miles).

China’s State Power Investment Corporation said the windfarm had been connected to the grid and will save 829,000 tonnes of coal a year, reducing carbon emissions by 2.3m tonnes. 

It follows news that China is on course to realise a combined capacity of 1,300GW of wind and solar by the end of the year, smashing a 1,200GW target set for 2030.

Image: Henry Huang

The environmentalist Chris Packham has won a landmark legal battle with the UK government, forcing authorities to concede that axing carbon-reducing green policies was unlawful – and paving the way for a rethink. 

Packham had launched legal action against the previous Conservative government after then-prime minister Rishi Sunak announced key measures from the UK’s carbon budget delivery plan (CBDP) would be dropped or scaled back.

They included delaying a ban on new petrol and diesel car sales from 2030 to 2035 and scrapping requirements for energy-efficient homes. 

Law firm Leigh Day, which represented Packham, said this week he had withdrawn his high court judicial review after the new Labour administration admitted the Tories acted unlawfully. A representative of the company added that the government had confirmed it would now reconsider its CBDP green agenda by May 2025. 

“The former government’s electioneering saw them unlawfully disregarding key elements of the UK’s plans to aim for net zero,” said Packham. “I’m very pleased that the new government has willingly settled and pledged to do better.”

Image: Pål Hansen

The migratory habits of birds in eastern Australia have been unveiled for the first time, with the help of tools that are usually used to track storms.

Birdwatchers have long known that some Australian birds migrate, but the questions of when and to where have been shrouded in mystery. 

Scientists from the University of Queensland used 16 years of weather radar data to cut through the fog and discovered structured migration patterns across Australia’s east coast. 

They also learned that, in contrast to their cousins in the northern hemisphere, Australia’s birds prefer to do their long-distance travelling in daylight hours rather than at night.

“Weather radars can tell us how many birds are flying, when and in which direction they’re moving,” explained study lead Xu Shi, a PhD candidate with the university’s School of the Environment. 

Study co-author Prof Richard Fuller said the findings could have implications for conservation efforts in the light of windfarm development. “By enabling researchers to further explore how climate change and environmental shifts affect bird migration, our findings can help us better protect birds in Australia and globally,” Fuller added.

Image: The researchers found the Silvereye is a partial migrant: some migrate while others stay in place. Credit: pen_ash

Weekend workouts may be just as effective at curbing mental decline as more frequent exercise, a study has shown. 

Academics from Colombia, Chile and Scotland studied survey data from more than 10,000 participants living in Mexico City.

They found that in ‘weekend warriors’ who exercised once or twice a week, the risk of mild dementia was reduced by 15% compared with people who did no exercise. The study concluded that sporadic exercise was just as beneficial as working out more often.

Study lead, Prof Gary O’Donovan of Colombia’s Universidad de los Andes, told Positive News that weekend exercise might be a more convenient option to fit in with busy lives, adding that it’s good for the mind as well as the body.

“If a seasoned exerciser is struggling for time on any given week, he or she should do their most intense workout rather than their longest workout in order to maintain their aerobic fitness,” he said. 

The sentiment is borne out by separate research revealed in September, which found that cramming exercise into a weekend helped lower the risk of developing more than 200 health conditions, including heart disease.

Image: fat_lads

Sharing laughter, tears or perhaps a big scare with others can make people feel more connected, new research reveals. 

A team led by doctoral researcher Victor Chung of the PSL University in Paris invited strangers to watch videos in twos, with a curtain separating half of the study pairs from each other. 

Their emotional responses were monitored and participants were also asked how they felt towards each other after watching the films.

The results showed pairs experienced stronger emotions and felt more connected when they could see each other.

The study authors said their work points to emotion having a bonding effect, and helps explain why people get involved in thrill-seeking group activities or sad commemorations.

Image: Kevin Woblick

Campaigners are celebrating this week after an oil firm suspended ‘unlawful’ drilling at a site in Surrey in the south of England.

The supreme court ruled in June that Surrey county council had failed to consider the full climate impacts of the drilling site in Horse Hill, and quashed its decision to grant planning permission to developers. 

Work at the site continued unabated until last Friday when UK Oil & Gas Plc (UKOG) announced it was suspending drilling following a legal complaint filed by Friends of the Earth (FoE).

The Weald Action Group, which brought the supreme court action, said UKOG had been ‘shamed into suspending operations’.

Niall Toru – a lawyer for FoE, which backed the action – said: “We are thrilled the developer of the Horse Hill project finally suspended oil drilling at the site. This is much owed to the tireless efforts of local activists who have kept up pressure against the development after many years of campaigning.”

It may not be the end of the fight however. UKOG said in a statement that while operations had been suspended, it would be working with Surrey county council to “facilitate a successful planning redetermination”.

Image: Friends of the Earth
Main image: Wildlife on the Rothbury estate, includes red squirrels. Image credit: Mark Hamblin/2020VISION