by Nicolas Mitchell The Dunnock or Donnóg (Prunella modularis) is a regular visitor to my garden, foraging on the ground for crumbs under the bird feeders, or beneath the shrubs for small invertebrates. It’s not a ‘flashy’ bird, in fact it’s quite drab, with its dun coloured plumage and unobtrusive, […]
Columnist
NASA’s global climate change website states, ‘While the effects of human activities on Earth’s climate to date are irreversible in the timescale of humans alive today, every little bit of avoided future temperature increase, results in less warming that would otherwise persist, essentially forever.’ NASA scientists report that it may not be too […]
‘New Year’s Eve 2021 – provisionally the warmest on record’ claimed the UK Guardian newspaper. Whilst MET Éireann didn’t agree; or at least not for Ireland, nevertheless it reported that, during 2021 at least ten weather stations across Ireland reached heatwave conditions where temperatures of at least 25 degrees Celsius […]
by Nicholas Mitchell ‘The rook and jackdaw are too well known to need any introduction in themselves, as one need not go far from the centre of the city before seeing one or both species. On the principle that familiarity breeds contempt, it is perhaps their very abundance which accounts […]
It is “code red for humanity…The world is running out of time,” declared UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres at the start of COP26. But even as we all know this, still we wait! Forty-four years ago ExxonMobil senior scientist James Black told the fossil fuel executives that, “ Man has a […]
by Nicholas Mitchell I am writing this during the third week of November. Ordinarily, bird feeders would have been placed around the garden three weeks ago, but it has been such a mild autumn that this has not been necessary. The birds have been less in need of supplementary food during […]