Fossil teeth show species of protemnodon that roamed Australia between 5m and 40,000 years ago lived and died near Queensland caves
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Despite their immense size, species of prehistoric giant kangaroos from a site in Queensland were probably homebodies with a surprisingly small range compared to other kangaroos, according to new Australian research.
Protemnodon, which roamed the Australian continent between 5m and 40,000 years ago and is now extinct, was significantly larger than its modern relatives. Some species weighed up to 170kg, making them more than twice as heavy as the largest red kangaroo.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
04/23/2025 - 13:00
04/23/2025 - 12:17
Chancellor says UK is ‘not going to rush a deal’ and rejects new US demands on agricultural products
Markets rise as Trump backtracks on China tariffs and firing Fed chair
Reeves looks at ending zero tax regime for low-value imports
Rachel Reeves has dashed hopes of an early breakthrough in trade talks with the Trump administration, stressing that the UK is “not going to rush” into a deal.
Speaking before her first face-to-face meeting with the US Treasury secretary, Scott Bessent, in which she was expected to lobby him to reduce tariffs, the chancellor said negotiations would take time.
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04/23/2025 - 10:58
Researchers left at US climate agency say drastic cuts could leave air ‘not breathable’ and water ‘not drinkable’
The Trump administration has shunted one of the US federal government’s top scientific agencies onto a “non-science trajectory”, workers warn, that threatens to derail decades of research and leave the US with “air that’s not breathable and water that’s not drinkable”.
Workers and scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa) are warning of the drastic impacts of cuts at the agency on science, research, and efforts to protect natural resources.
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04/23/2025 - 10:00
The Wildlife Trusts are in shock after acquiring 4,000 sheep in Rothbury estate deal as part of land restoration project
Woolly maggots, nature-destroyers – sheep are criticised by many conservationists for denuding Britain’s uplands of rare plants and trees.
So The Wildlife Trusts were shocked when they were compelled to buy 4,000 sheep as part of the biggest land restoration project in England.
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04/23/2025 - 09:58
Virtual meeting of leaders also hears UN’s António Guterres proclaim ‘no group or government’ can stop green revolution
China will continue to push forward on the climate crisis, Xi Jinping has said while appearing to criticise the “protectionism” of Donald Trump’s tariff policies.
The Chinese president was attending a closed-door virtual meeting with the UN secretary general, António Guterres, Brazil’s president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, and about a dozen other heads of state and government to discuss the climate crisis.
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04/23/2025 - 09:22
These noisy, filthy, feral creatures make my life a misery. Is there really no way to get rid of them?
Pigeons. Appalling things. I looked them up on the bird charity RSPB’s website and snorted when I came across the Where to See section. The answer is, just so you know, everywhere. Perhaps not so much outside towns and cities but in urban areas you’re never far from the sight and sound of the bloody things. If, unaccountably, you’re not familiar with this species, do feel free to get in touch and come round to my place and observe them at your leisure.
Truly they are the soundtrack of my life. For years they’ve been getting into a drainage channel on the roof. Morning, noon and night they scratch and coo and jump about. The racket is infernal. I lie in bed reflecting on the filth in that gully just above my head. I know it’s filthy, because when there’s heavy rain their revolting detritus washes down and blocks the downpipe. I have to pull their unspeakable waste out of the pipe before something bursts and floods. There are no words to describe the tangle of excrement, nesting materials, eggs, feathers and bones. Oh Lord, the bones. I’d be less repulsed rummaging through the bin outside a chicken shop on a Sunday morning.
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04/23/2025 - 07:00
Watchdog for England and Wales looking into claims refurbishment costs are ‘breathtakingly high’ compared with other countries
The water regulator for England and Wales, Ofwat, is investigating claims water companies are spending many times more on refurbishment projects than operators in comparable countries, leading to much higher bills, in what campaigners have described as a “rip-off”.
Experts have said privatisation of water companies has led to an overinflation of the costs of building infrastructure such as sewage works, as they are less incentivised than governments to find value for money for taxpayers. They are also allowed to borrow more money based on the valuation of their assets.
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04/23/2025 - 05:26
Stretch of major highway shut as 3,000 people moved to safety and homes left without power
A fast-moving wildfire burning in New Jersey forced thousands of people to temporarily evacuate on Tuesday, closed a stretch of a main highway and reached a shuttered nuclear power plant.
Flames from the Jones Road wildfire in Ocean county had reached buildings on the campus of the Oyster Creek nuclear power plant, according to the local Lakewood Scoop newspaper.
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04/23/2025 - 05:00
American Lung Association’s study says almost 156 million people live in areas with unhealthy levels of soot or smog
Almost half of Americans are breathing in dangerous levels of air pollutants, a new report shows, a rise compared with a year ago and likely to further increase in coming years thanks to the climate crisis and the Trump administration’s sweeping environmental rollbacks.
Just over 156 million people live in neighborhoods with unhealthy levels of soot or smog – a 16% rise compared with last year and the highest number in a decade, according to the American Lung Association (ALA) annual state of the air report.
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04/23/2025 - 05:00
About 89% of the public want their governments to do more to tackle the climate crisis – but don’t know they’re the majority
The Guardian is joining forces with dozens of newsrooms around the world to launch the 89% Project – and highlight the fact that the vast majority of the world’s population wants climate action. Read more
A superpower in the fight against global heating is hiding in plain sight. It turns out that the overwhelming majority of people in the world – between 80% and 89%, according to a growing number of peer-reviewed scientific studies – want their governments to take stronger climate action.
As co-founders of a non-profit that studies news coverage of climate change, those findings surprised even us. And they are a sharp rebuttal to the Trump administration’s efforts to attack anyone who does care about the climate crisis.
Mark Hertsgaard and Kyle Pope are the co-founders of the global journalism collaboration Covering Climate Now
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