Brown Galingale, Cyperus fuscus - a Red Data Book weed in a suburban garden

My parent's garden is an untidy, tiny 'un-cultivated' (but not un-cared-for) fragment of suburban Sussex. Yet it harbours some lovely rarities. There are orchids on the lawn - carefully mown around since Barrie spotted their tell-tale leaves amidst the grass. Poisonous Thorn apples are tolerated in the borders. And now he's found a Red Data Book species growing as a weed...

I showed a sedgy thing which grew in a Yoghurt pot of parsley in the greenhouse to a botanist at a Woods Mill meeting, and she has said: "Your plant is Brown Galingale - Cyperus fuscus, which I've never seen before, so am delighted to have met it at last. Apparently now known in the UK as a native only from Surrey, Somerset, Hants and Jersey and RDB Vulnerable. Did you say it was in your garden? - I wonder how it got there?"
Always knew my garden was special. Red Data Book listed. Cor!

It's amazing what turns up and thrives if you let it.

First evidence of warming-related methane releases from the Arctic Sea

I've been editing some science stories for the UK's Natural Environment Research Council. This one is on the powerful climate gas methane, seeping from deep water stores in a warming Arctic Sea. It's worrying, if uncertain, news.

First evidence of warming-related methane releases from the Arctic Sea.: "Plumes of the powerful greenhouse gas methane, spotted rising from the seafloor off Spitsbergen, may be early signs of 'positive feedback' in climate change, where warming accelerates further change."

Scientists surveying the Arctic seabed, to estimate how much of the potent greenhouse gas methane might be released by climate warming, have found evidence that the process may already have started.

The team, including researchers from Birmingham University, the National Oceanography Centre, Southampton, and Royal Holloway University, London, found more than 250 plumes of methane bubbles rising from the seafloor off Spitsbergen. This is the first time scientists have found evidence suggesting such seeps are due to ocean warming...

But it's not the only bit of the puzzle. I'm working on another story that talks about a 'negative feedback' effect caused by retreating ice in the Antarctic opening up sea where new marine communities flourish. (More on that later).

Sadly, the two don't balance each other out. Climate science is complicated, yet the overwhelming evidence is that most of the 'feedback' effects on climate change accelerate rather than hold it back.

Birds benefit from agri-environment schemes

Birds benefit from agri-environment schemes: "Twenty years of agri-environment schemes designed to protect biodiversity from intensive farming have succeeded in boosting bird species and population, according to a survey of Peak District farms."

Some good news for wildlife and farming, though I still feel the tide is running the wrong way...