There’s a new series on BBC2 on Sunday evenings:   Climate Change:  Ade on the Frontline.

Ade Adepitan looks at climate change and the impact it is having on the environment – however, he is also looking at some amazing people who are doing what they can to  help stop the pace at which is progressing and/or help the species affected by it.  He is looking for solutions to climate change around the world. 

And he does touch on the fact he is flying around the world to bring this to us.  But unless we all find out what is happening in various locations and how people and wildlife and nature are being affected by climate change, there won’t be a story to tell. 

Solomon Islands

Ade starts off in the Solomon Islands and we see and hear first-hand from local people who are affected by rising sea levels. 

Great Barrier Reef

Adi heads to the Great Barrier Reef, one of the wonders of the world – and a breeding spot for the green turtle.   Because the world is getting warmer, so is the sand and that has meant that that nearly all the turtles being born are female.  This presents a major problem because it means that there are very few males being born.   Adi finds out about a project which is trying to cool the sand so that more male green turtles might be born. 

One of the questions Adi asks is “how do we wean ourselves off fossil fuels?” 

Rural Queensland

He visits rural Queensland, a heart breaking visit because of the draught, and the city of Sydney where an amazing woman from Sydney Wildlife is working hard to help all the bats which have been affected by the terrible wildfires.

Ozharvest

And he visits the incredible people involved in Ozharvest – they collect food which is due to be chucked from the supermarkets and take it to a market where people can get it for free, to save it being wasted.  The young woman from Ozharvest says a simple thing we can all do is to plan what we need when we shop and buy just what we need.  When you know that people are going hungry in the world, that fact is made worse by the amount of food being wasted elsewhere – and when you add how much that impacts on the environment and climate change, that makes things much worse.

Tasmania

Finally Adi heads to Tasmania where plants – giant kelp - are being planted under the water as they excel at sucking up CO2 and also they grow at an incredible rate.  Their success is hampered by sea urchins so there is a project to try to encourage people to eat sea urchins so that we might gain control over them.

He also sees how wind power in Tasmania could be used to power some of Australia’s mainland cities/places through a cable under the sea.

We can turn things around

Finally, Adi meets one of Australia’s top thinkers on climate change, an ex-Greenpeace employee, Paul Gilding, who warns that the plant is on the verge of total collapse.   He believes we can turn things around.  The key, he says, is to eliminate all fossil fuels by 2030.   Governments must have the strength to enforce it – and it is up to you and I, the people who vote them in, to put the pressure on and show them that they must get on with it. 

Next week features Bangladesh and Bhutan – don’t miss it!   BBC2 at 8pm, Sunday 18 April 2021.

Useful resources:

Sydney Wildlife

 Ozharvest

Turtle Cooling Project

Giant Kelp Restoration Project in Tasmania

The World Land Trust is a conservation charity that works with local conservation partners all over the world.  It is an amazing charity and one of my favourites.

One of things it has is an Action Fund.  This is something people who care about conservation can donate to, and what it enables the Trust to do is to put the donations into action fast if a piece of vital wildlife habitat is in danger of being lost.  The Trust can work with partners on the ground and ensure that the habitat is purchased and saved for wildlife and for local people living in the area.

The Action Fund was put into action recently; and as a result, there’s a natural safe habitat for the incredible 1,000 mature black-and-chestnut eagle.  There are fewer than 1,000 of these left in the world, so very few indeed.

But they now have a natural safe haven in Ecuador!

The World Land Trust reported that over 34,000 acres were added to endangered eagle haven in Ecuador.   Their partner Naturaleza y Cultura Ecuador (NCE for short) has worked been working hard for four years, and as a result, the Santiago Municipal Reserve was officially declared in March 2021!

Scientists have already recorded 344 plant species, 152 bird species, 57 amphibian, 47 mammals and 11 reptiles in the area so it is full of wildlife.

It expands a key corridor- the Sangay-Podocarpus Connectivity Corridor – and it sits between two national parks in Ecuador.   Last year the corridor became Ecuador’s first corridor – is covers 1.4 million acres of diverse, fragile   ecosystems, and includes a bit of another reserve – the Podocarpus – El Condor Biosphere Reserve.  WLT works here with NCE.  Animals such as the jaguar and bear will be able to roam safely.

The connections go further, because north of the corridor is 200 mile long spine of reserves and national parks along the eastern Andes, connected by reserves backed by the World Land Trust in the llanganates-Sangay Biological Corridor with Fundacion Ecominga. 

The networked protected areas cover about 4 million acres!

How was this money raised to buy this 34,000 acres?   In part, by World Land Trust supporters who donated to the Action Fund.  It really does make a difference.

Read all about the 34,000 acres saved in Ecuador and the impact for the network here.

The 7th April is International Beaver Day.

Beavers can be quite controversial animals in the natural world;  personally I admire them for their incredible engineering skills.

About 400 years ago, beavers were hunted to extinction in the UK but they are being re-introduced (with caution) in the hope that they will help restore our wetlands to their natural state and also reduce  the impact of flooding.

Forestry England has produced this video showing why beavers build dams.   Their teeth are really quite something  (the beavers, not  Forestry England.)

Now, a number of the UK's Wildlife Trusts have beaver appeals and they are Dorset, Derbyshire, Devon, Cheshire, Cornwall and Kent.

The Wildlife Trust's website describe beavers as the engineers of the animal world and looking at the video above, it's easy to see why. 

To support the Wildlife Trust's conservation efforts, you could Adopt a Beaver  either for yourself or as a gift for a nature lover!  You could also buy them this Give a Dam t-shirt:

This t-shirt is made from 100% organic cotton 
and it's printed in the UK in a renewable energy powered factory.
£19.00   Find out more about it

Of course you should also take a look at the Beaver Trust.   I hope they won't mind me quoting their very exciting mission which is:

"to recover Britain’s waterways and landscapes through the rapid and widespread re-establishment of beaver wetlands across whole river catchments."

Their belief is that beavers are a practical, low-cost solution for long-term restoration.  They can help revesse the trend of extinction of British wildlife. You can see from their map where beavers are in the UK.

Furthermore, the Beaver Trust reports that in the US West, land managers and scientists hare using beaver dam analogs to do three things:

1. To heal damaged streams
2. To re-establish beaver populations
3. To help wildlife

And they've seen positive changes in 1 to 3 years in many cases!   Find out all about it here

Visit their website to have a good look round and see how you can  help.     

Green People sell organic beauty products for all the family.  I love their products and I also love the way they work with charities such as the Woodland Trust, Plantlife, the Marine Conservation Society.

And they've emailed to say they need help.

You see, their offices are located on the Knepp Rewilding Project.

And the project is an amazing example of nature restoration.   Boar, deer, beaver, storks, the nightingale and purple emperor butterfly all call it home.

But this biodiverse area is under threat.

There are plans for a housing development of 3,500 right next door – and the fear is that if this goes ahead, wildlife won’t have the freedom they need to roam about.

The new houses would effectively cut off the Knepp estate from both St Leonard’s and Ashdown forests.  The estate would, in short, be a wildlife land in a sea of housing.

The Buck Barn development would also increase the traffic and pollution at the Buck Barn Crossing where the A24 and A272 meet.   This is a busy junction already.  I would mention that another developer has put in plans for 10,000 homes just east of it. 

The Government keeps banging on about being environmentally friendly and how keen it is on being green, but that means nothing if it allows councils and developers to build on key wildlife corridors. 

Last year, white stork chicks hatched on the Knepp Rewilding Project for the first time in 600 years.

There must be another way to provide housing.  

Please sign the petition to stop the development at Buck Barn and to give wildlife the corridor it needs and deserves to survive and thrive.

Green People has a lovely range of sun care products for the summer!