Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Leaders say automated mowers’ blades threaten nocturnal animals as studies highlight risks to wildlife German mayors have called for a nationwide ban on night-time use of robot lawnmowers to protect hedgehogs and other small nocturnal animals from being killed or maimed in the dark. Recent studies have highlighted the threat lawnmower blades pose to wildlife active between dusk and dawn, prompting growing calls for regulation. Hedgehogs also tend to curl into a ball when threatened rather than running away, making them harder for a robot mower’s sensors to detect. Continue reading...

Oliver Tokic-Bensley, 16, says he had been in the water mere minutes when a shark bit his foot Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast A teenage surfer bitten by a shark at a South Australian beach has described how he “flicked it off” and “legged it back to shore”. Oliver Tokic-Bensley, 16, was bitten on his foot while surfing on Good Friday near his family beach house at Middleton, 80km south of Adelaide. Continue reading...

Making women more powerful in my farm business and closing the gender pay gap was not just the right thing to do – it has brought commercial benefits On International Women’s Day this year, I found myself in Selfridges listening to my wife, Geetie, talk about her experiences as a childhood communard, mother, restaurateur, environmental campaigner and, of course, as a woman. I was one of two men in the audience. Some might ask what a 65-year-old male farmer was doing there at all. I would contend, first, that as many of the issues discussed on IWD relate to male behaviour, men should be paying as much attention as women; and second (and more practically) that too many blokes being blokey does not get the strawberries picked. Success in farming depends on being able to build and maintain relationships. I’d say that’s true of most businesses. When we first measured our gender pay gap at Riverford in 2017, women earned an average of 91p an hour to their male colleagues’ £1. We made excuses and weak efforts at change, but most of the men at the top were unwilling to challenge their unspoken prejudice. My own farm, Baddaford, has been happier, more productive and more profitable since I, and my male head grower, put our best picker – a woman half our age – in charge of the picking and people. Guy Singh-Watson is the founder of organic veg box company Riverford Continue reading...

Rally met with bipartisan support after US border patrol revealed plans for steel wall across parts of beloved parks The story is co-published with Public Domain, an investigative newsroom that covers public lands, wildlife and government Thousands of people gathered at the steps of the Texas capitol on Saturday to protest against the construction of a border wall through Big Bend, in a show of bipartisan opposition to the White House’s plans. Continue reading...