World

Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming has turned to an unusual conservation strategy to save one of its fastest-declining bird populations: robot birds. Park officials and wildlife experts have deployed lifelike robotic greater sage-grouse that mimic the species’ elaborate courtship dances, puff out their chests and broadcast recorded mating calls in an effort to attract…

In many parts of the eastern United States, getting rid of mosquitoes has become just another household service. Homeowners hire private companies to spray their yards, or they buy insecticides and foggers themselves, hoping to reclaim summer evenings from constant bites. But new research from North Carolina State University suggests those choices may be quietly…

The Tower of London, a fortress standing on the banks of the River Thames for close to a thousand years, is preparing for one of the biggest changes in its recent history. Historic Royal Palaces, the charity that manages the site, has launched a new initiative called Tomorrow’s Tower, aimed at turning the historic landmark…

They are the size of a football with bright orange bills, long legs, yellow-beady eyes and can fly up to 2,000 miles. While they populate American beaches today, once there was a time when American oystercatchers had been wiped out from New England.By the turn of the 20th century, these birds had gone extinct in…

Every week, 73-year-old Dave Whitlow walks into the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at the Children’s Hospital of Richmond at VCU in Virginia, where some of the hospital’s smallest and most vulnerable patients are fighting for their lives. For the past eight years, he has volunteered as a “baby cuddler”, gently holding premature and critically…

Archaeologists working on farmland between the villages of Halberton and Sampford Peverell in Devon have uncovered a striking mosaic floor from a fourth-century Roman villa, along with an elaborate bathhouse that suggests the site once belonged to a family of considerable wealth. The discovery is the latest breakthrough from the Saving Halberton’s Ancient Roman Environment…

Long before modern theatres began using motorised stages and rolling sets, ancient Greek theatre builders appear to have solved the same problem using wood, stone tracks and simple wheels. New research from a team at Kumamoto University in Japan has strengthened the case that theatres from the Hellenistic period used large, moveable wooden stage structures…

Three adults were sleeping on the floor in a house surrounded by waste, including dead rats and mice. (Picture: Durham County Council) A landlord company in County Durham has been fined £42,500 after tenants were found living in unsafe conditions, including sleeping on the floor surrounded by dead rats, mice, human waste and urine.Carter Property…

For Londoners living around Greenford Tube station, tiptoeing through floodwater to get to work was a part of their daily routine. The ticket hall found itself inundated after a heavy downpour with neighbourhoods flooded and sandbags routinely deployed to make way.The local council of Ealing, a borough in West London faced the daunting reality every…

A major railway construction project in England has uncovered a remarkable glimpse into the past, with archaeologists discovering a 1,740-year-old Roman silver coin bearing the name of Emperor Carausius. Found during excavations for the East West Rail route linking Oxford and Cambridge, the coin is helping researchers understand the timeline of ancient activity in the…

For years, efforts to track invasive Burmese pythons in Florida have centred on the Everglades, where the giant snakes have become one of the state’s most persistent wildlife problems. That picture is beginning to change. Wildlife officials now say a separate breeding population has become established farther north along Florida’s Gulf Coast, suggesting the species…

As soaring summer temperatures bring swarms of biting insects across the UK, one animal charity in Devon has found an unexpectedly charming solution to keep its rescued donkeys comfortable. Around 40 donkeys at The Donkey Sanctuary in Sidmouth are now wearing adapted pyjama bottoms, leggings and specially designed “don-gerees” to shield their legs from painful…