Brownsea Island, Dorset: I've been here lots of times to see the squirrels, so I know exactly where to find them - behind the church in the woods

Every October my family have an annual trip to Brownsea Island. We go in autumn because this is a good time to see the red squirrels. In the other seasons, they are high up, hidden in the trees. We catch the ferry from Poole Harbour, and we know we are close when we can see the castle come into view. When we arrive we're greeted by nosy chickens and attention-seeking peacocks on the lawns.

We go behind the little church into the woods. It is a different world there. There is a mix of crunchy and soggy brown leaves on the ground and little mushrooms popping up from the earth. Some mushrooms are sprouting from rotting logs.

Tim and Geli Harris have spent more than a decade fighting to protect Catfield Fen, a rare wetland in the Norfolk Broads

Polluters and regulators who fail to stop pollution must quake in their boots when they receive a letter from the lawyers for Tim and Geli Harris. The couple, who farm 460 acres in the Norfolk Broads, have now scored a hat-trick of landmark legal victories to save an internationally important wetland after they won again in the high court this month.

Lady Justice Lieven found that Natural England failed in its statutory duty to protect Catfield Fen from pollution after nitrates and phosphates washed from arable fields into one of the finest examples of calcareous fen in western Europe, home to 2,500 species including rarities such as the fen orchid, crested buckler fern, breeding bittern and swallowtail butterflies.

Season will be less vibrant with trees such as birches, which usually offer a striking burst of yellow leaves, already bare

Among a canvas of copper, red and purple autumn leaves on display at Wisley garden in Surrey, south-east England, one tree stands conspicuously naked.

"The birch has lost all its leaves," says Guy Barter, the chief horticulturist at the Royal Horticultural Society. "That's the effect of drought, so it'll have no autumn colour this year."

At the midpoint of the last century the region had 1,450 glaciers and a new study reveals the extent of losses

Electrifying your block of flats could cut emissions and save money. Don't wait to plan the change

• Change by degrees offers life hacks and sustainable living tips each Saturday to help reduce your household's carbon footprint

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Around Australia, homes are getting off gas. Gas cooktops are being swapped for induction stoves, gas hot water replaced by heat pumps, and gas space heating with reverse cycle air conditioners.

In combination with solar panels, batteries and better insulation, electrification saves money, cuts emissions and makes homes healthier to live in.

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Exclusive: Angela Eagle tells utility bosses next price review 'must focus on value for money for customers'

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Ministers will make an unprecedented intervention in water bills and how companies prioritise investment, directing bosses to bring down costs and stop leaks and sewage overflows.

Angela Eagle, the environment secretary, has told suppliers in England and Wales she plans to intervene in the next price review - conducted by the water regulator, Ofwat.

UK allies have long urged people to stockpile supplies for a crisis. How are people from France to Australia being advised to prepare?

The UK has told people to fill their pantries with food for three days in case of catastrophe, joining a host of countries urging citizens to ready themselves for core systems failing.

Such advice, once dismissed as the preserve of preppers, has become more common in government circles as climate breakdown worsens weather extremes and geopolitical tensions turn cyberattacks and sabotage into a regular occurrence. Even in countries with national strategic food stockpiles - a buffer the UK lacks - authorities have asked individuals to play their part in societal resilience.

Far-right presidential candidate is popular among those who believe more mining can help revitalise local economies

It was the night before the first round of Brazil's presidential election and Rosimari Monteiro was so excited she couldn't sleep. The 38-year-old spent hours tossing and turning at her home in the Amazon town of Mucajaí before rising at dawn to cast her vote.

"I was the first person to vote at my polling station … I voted 22, so we got off to a positive start," recalls Monteiro, as she stands in her sitting room with her two young daughters.

People succumbed to heat at highest rates in Malta, Italy and Hungary, with health issues, loneliness and poverty exacerbating toll

Heat killed a record 50,000 people in European cities this summer, new research suggests, with scientists blaming climate breakdown for two in every three of the deaths.

Morgues and funeral homes filled with bodies from June to August as the heat added by planet-baking pollution cut short an extra 32,000 lives in urban areas, the researchers found. Hot days pushed vulnerable bodies into overdrive and warm nights prevented them from recovering.

This week's best wildlife photographs from around the world

People near south Wales river were told to keep windows and doors shut after thousands of litres of kerosene from a GE Aerospace site got into the water

Oily slicks of kerosene still appeared to be leaking into the River Taff this week, several days after a breach of thousands of litres was spotted by members of the public.

The breach into the Welsh river was identified last Friday, after people reported strong chemical odours emanating from it. Natural Resources Wales (NRW) officers arrived on site soon afterwards to identify the source of the pollution and were assisted by the south Wales fire and rescue service, which placed absorbent mats and booms to contain as much kerosene as possible.

An app and a camera phone are all that's needed at more than 200 spots to help researchers monitor coastal areas

The shoreline changes with the weather. Tracking these changes over time is a labour-intensive task, and an army of citizen scientists with camera phones is a great asset.

The CoastSnap project started in Australia in 2017 and has spread to beaches worldwide. You may have spotted the setup while out walking along the coast: a cradle to rest your phone on while taking a picture and a sign explaining where to send the snap.

Falmouth, Cornwall: The rainbow sea slug is a bizarre and breathtaking animal, and with warming seas it's gaining a toehold in the south-west

I have never seen a species quite so flamboyant in appearance. A couple of centimetres in length, it was curled beneath the submerged rock like a piece of gaudy costume jewellery.

When the cry went up that one had been found, I had to prevent myself from breaking into a run as I navigated the slippery seaweed-covered boulders to catch my first glimpse of this rarity.

PM pledges commitment to address climate crisis, saying in Guardian article that his 'determination is unwavering'

• Andy Burnham: We will make the net-zero transition work for Britain

Andy Burnham has said he will not "abandon the responsibility" of fighting the climate crisis after the government approved the Jackdaw gasfield, pledging to block new North Sea licences and keep Britain on track for net zero by 2050.

The comments are the prime minister's most forthright yet on net zero, after many MPs have privately cast doubt on the authenticity of his commitment to tackling the climate crisis.

​As world leaders struggle to meet deadlines to halt nature loss set four years ago, a rare leopard in host country Armenia offers a symbol of what is at stake

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The Armenian capital Yerevan is chock-a-block right now with officials, scientists and environmentalists from all over the world gathering for Cop17. Everyone is here to try to rescue a historic deal to end the destruction of nature.

The pressure is on. Targets set for 2030 are woefully off track, and the nearly 200 countries present need to agree on a plan to speed things up. All this is happening at a time when national budgets are tight and leaders are distracted by conflict, protests and the global energy crisis.

This Norwegian village is one of the fastest-warming places on Earth. How can its people save it?

What does the UK's approval of the Jackdaw gasfield mean?

US extreme weather survivors are a growing group - now they want to be a political force

The high court found NSW is responsible for emissions from burning exported coal. What message does it send when the government can step in and bypass the law?

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As someone who lost their home in the black summer bushfires, I was buoyed by the high court finding in favour of a small community group in the Hunter Valley earlier this month.

Led by two retired science teachers, Wendy Wales and Tony Lonergan, the Denman Aberdeen Muswellbrook Scone Healthy Environment Group took on a massive coal corporation and won. As a fellow schoolteacher, I felt a particular sense of pride seeing these ordinary Australians act on their care for their community and future generations.

New study reveals dramatic population drops in fish, cephalopods and more after the Deepwater Horizon spill

Marine life in the Gulf of Mexico plummeted by about 60% after BP's 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill and has still not fully recovered, according to a new study.

The April 2010 explosion of an offshore drilling unit 50 miles off the Louisiana coast triggered the largest marine oil spill in history, releasing 134m gallons of oil into the ocean. According to the study published Monday in PNAS, the disaster - which also killed 11 people and injured 17 others - led to the "sudden, severe and persistent declines in the abundance" of marine life for more than a decade.

Protecting jobs and strengthening energy security in the short term does not mean wavering on Labour's deep commitment to a cleaner, greener future

• Andy Burnham vows UK will hit net zero target despite Jackdaw gasfield approval

On Wednesday, the energy secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, gave the go-ahead for gas production to begin at the Jackdaw gasfield in the North Sea. This has been the subject of fierce debate for many years, with strong views on both sides. I want to explain what the decision means and how it fits with Britain's climate commitments.

At a time of acute global instability, it makes sense to responsibly use our resources here at home. Gas from this field will begin heating our homes and powering our businesses this winter. In the longer term, it will significantly strengthen our energy security by increasing domestic gas production by about 6% and support the UK's energy supply for more than a decade. Wednesday's decision will also protect hundreds of jobs in Scotland and add almost £3bn to the UK economy over the lifetime of the project.

Andy Burnham is prime minister of the United Kingdom

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Company ordered to stop work at two sites in country, which has found itself at forefront of tech firms' latest push

Behind a wire fence lies a vast gaping wound of earth. Before Google's arrival a few months ago, an estimated quarter of a million trees occupied the 330 hectares (815 acres) of forest near the town of Muhos in rural northern Finland. Now they are all gone.

After the tech company illegally stripped the entire area to build a datacentre - taking even the top soil with it - all that remains is a vast expanse of mud indented with the trail marks of machinery, puddles and mounds of earth, roots and branches. Residents say that brown water flowing off the site is going into a stream that feeds the Oulujoki River.

After decades of violent displacement and land theft, the country's quilombola communities are fighting back

For most of his 39 years, Josias Dias dos Santos, known as Jota, has endured degrading cycles of displacement as a quilombola, a descendant of Black people once enslaved on Brazil's sugar cane and coffee plantations. He says his and other quilombola families subsisting in the rainforests in Pará, northern Brazil, were first forced out of their settlements by violent loggers, then by ranchers and miners.

Yet, they say the worst came with the arrival of the palm oil industry in what is now the country's most deforested state. Palm oil companies producing biofuels and supplying global customers, subsidised by the federal government, have laid claim to ever larger tracts of traditional quilombola territory over the past two decades.

The Cali Fund, set up to raise $1bn a year for biodiversity from drug companies, remains near empty

Big pharmaceutical companies have been accused of "free-riding on nature", after a landmark biodiversity fund that invites businesses to put some of their profits back into conservation was left virtually empty.

The Cali Fund set out to raise $1bn (£750m) annually, by asking companies that profit from nature's genetics to contribute towards conservation in low-income countries. But more than 18 months after the fund was launched, it remains far below this target.

With no wind to disperse the low cloud, mist and fog and less sunlight to burn it off, anticyclonic gloom can set in

In summer, a high-pressure system over the UK usually means fine weather. But in the colder months it can result in anticyclonic gloom, characterised by grey skies, mist, fog and drizzle.

A settled high-pressure system brings stable conditions and impedes the usual vertical movement of air. This is a recipe for sunshine when humidity is low, but can act like a lid, trapping atmospheric moisture near the surface.

Rare small blues and dingy skippers among species found on former wheatfields two years after start of transformation under commercial nature project

An "amazing" abundance of 5,290 butterflies, including rare small blues and dingy skippers, has appeared on land that was barren wheatfields just two years ago.

The speed with which nature has bounced back at Halnaker Hill farm in West Sussex has surprised experts after 133 hectares (330 acres) of intensively farmed land were turned into a commercial nature restoration project.

If Flávio Bolsonaro is elected, Brazil's ecosystems will face collapse. The ruling class would rather burn the world than share it with the poor

However grim the trajectory might seem, I've always believed that sense will ultimately prevail. As the great perils of dismantling the living world become increasingly obvious, even the most rapacious exploiters must come round. Nobody wants to live on a dead planet, do they?

There are - or were - signs that this wasn't just wishful thinking. Since 2015, mostly thanks to China, the area of the planet being reforested has increased, while thanks in large part to Brazil, the global rate of forest destruction has declined. The area of the Brazilian Amazon forest cleared each year is one-sixth of what it was when records began in 1988. In the past four years, as a result of Brazilian government policy, the deforestation rate has fallen by 71%. If Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is re-elected president on Sunday, the country could reach zero deforestation by 2030. The arc of the moral universe seems to have bent towards justice.

Video released by Randwick city council shows a whale carcass floating in the water in a Sydney bay, causing the closure of two busy beaches. The whale's decomposed body was found on Thursday morning at Lurline Bay, a rocky cove surrounded by cliffs in Sydney's eastern suburbs. It's believed to be a juvenile humpback

• 'Almost looks fake': two Sydney beaches closed after whale carcass washes up

Climate campaigners have condemned the UK government's decision to allow the drilling of the Jackdaw gasfield. Critics argue the move will put climate targets at risk, while failing to reduce energy bills and the cost of living crisis. But there could be a significant victory for green activists when it comes to the much larger Rosebank oilfield, with the energy secretary, Miatta Fahnbulleh, leaning towards rejecting approval. Michael Safi speaks to environment correspondent Matthew Taylor - watch on YouTube

This foolish decision undermines hopes that this government will take the necessary steps the climate crisis demands

When the news broke that the UK government had approved the Jackdaw gasfield, I was at a Guardian climate event at the Royal Geographical Society. Appropriately, the theme suggested by readers was what can the public actually do in the face of what feels like paralysing climate doom?

There is so much going on that is hopeful: biodiversity tracking, river protection, rewilding. Shruti Suresh, from the independent watchdog Global Witness, told those in attendance that if they wanted to effect change, they should protest against Jackdaw and the Rosebank oilfield project. The message was so well understood that it didn't need labouring. The mood in the room when the news came in was one of audible dismay. People had just watched the minister for climate transition declare that she could see the challenges ahead and was ready for them. The Jackdaw announcement will face immediate protest and legal challenge, but it sends a very clear signal from the government: we don't mean what we say about ending emissions.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

Exclusive: Officials say Miatta Fahnbulleh minded not to give approval in victory for climate campaigners

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Miatta Fahnbulleh is leaning towards rejecting the giant Rosebank oilfield, the Guardian understands, in what would be a blow for the North Sea energy industry and a major victory for climate campaigners.

Officials say the energy secretary is minded to refuse approval for the field, which would be one of the biggest in the North Sea. Fahnbulleh approved the smaller Jackdaw gasfield on Wednesday, prompting protests from some in the green movement.

Action needed to avoid disastrous overshoot of climate targets, according to organisation's environment body

The world needs to cut carbon emissions by nearly a fifth in the next four years, and by close to half within a decade, to avoid overshooting climate targets by a disastrous margin.

Although the "window has closed" on holding temperature rises to 1.5C, in line with scientific advice, limiting the "overshoot" of that target is still possible, according to the UN Environment Programme (Unep).

'She carried the dead calf for hours even though it wasn't hers. She had had a miscarriage two years before - and now picked up the stillborn babies of other mothers'

My love of African animals, in particular elephants, dates back to when I was three or four years old, growing up in Milan in a house full of old nature books. When I was six, my parents took me on my first safari in Kenya - I cried on the plane home, feeling I was being torn away from the savanna I'd dreamed of, somewhere I really loved. But for the past 20 years, that's where I've lived, guiding photographers on the Maasai Mara National Reserve and elsewhere in Africa.

I've spent time photographing other animals, especially big cats, but elephants are still my favourite subject. They have this extraordinary presence, dominating the landscape and making it come alive. I love to follow them in different habitats. They are extremely adaptable - in Kenya they're associated with the savanna and acacia woodland, and they can also live in extremely arid areas, such as the deserts of Namibia, where this photograph was taken.

Iboga root, central to several Gabonese ritual traditions, is believed to have huge potential for use in treating addiction and some mental illnesses

The temple is dark, its sandy floor edged with candles. People sit shoulder to shoulder beneath palm fronds hung from the rafters. Through the night, they swallow what they have come here for: a bitter root bark called iboga.

Tabernanthe iboga is a slow-growing central African rainforest shrub, the root bark of which has long been used in several Gabonese ritual traditions.

The Conservative leader, Kemi Badenoch, thanked the prime minister for backing Jackdaw after the Tories approved it in 2022. But Burnham said he made a decision on something the Tories messed up, and the government had made a bridge to the future and the transition to clean energy

• UK politics live - latest updates

• UK approves Jackdaw gasfield in North Sea

• Climate campaigners condemn 'maddening' decision to approve Jackdaw gasfield

United Utilities, Environment Agency and local campaigners say 12-mile tunnel could take sewage away from England's largest lake

Plans are under way for a new giant tunnel to transport sewage away from Windermere, England's largest lake.

Windermere, in the Lake District, has suffered from widespread raw sewage and bacterial pollution driven by discharges from United Utilities. Campaigners say this pollution has caused more frequent toxic blue-green algal blooms, with the public advised to avoid swimming in the lake.

At a gathering in Texas, near where floods killed 136 people last year, survivors are united on the need for urgent action

It may be a club none of its members actually want to be in, but the growing number of people in the US affected by extreme weather disasters are starting to organize into a political force.

Severe wildfires, floods storms and other calamities now touch the lives of huge numbers of Americans - about half of all people in the US by one estimate - as the climate crisis supercharges extreme events. Some survivors are now coalescing to push for improved disaster response and even action on the politically contentious issue of global heating.

Government decision is about how much oil and gas is sensible for UK to produce on the way to net zero

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Andy Burnham hit the nail on the (well)head in his first fortnight as prime minister when he said: "The question isn't whether Britain will still be using oil and gas, the question is, where does it come from?"

It was a nod towards several awkward energy facts. First, oil and gas provided 75% of the UK's energy in 2025, government data shows. Second, even with the rollout of domestic renewables for generating electricity, about 43% of overall energy was imported last year.

This summer alone, 26 local authorities in the UK had to stop accepting fridges and freezers for recycling. Now the appliances are piling up around the country - with no proper disposal date in sight

Not much is happening in the tiny Norfolk hamlet of Little Hautbois on the day I visit. The pub, once popular with airmen from RAF Coltishall, stopped being a pub a long time ago, even before RAF Coltishall stopped being RAF Coltishall. It's not Saturday, so there are no weddings at Hautbois Hall. Nor is it 19 May, so the restless, headless ghost of Thomas Boleyn isn't driving his carriage across the bridge over the River Bure, as he is said to do on the anniversary of the execution of his daughter, Anne. Today, a lovely autumn one, all is as it should be.

But half a mile down a narrow country lane is an incongruous and baffling sight: a strip of gentle hillside made up of large white rectangular blocks, piled up and sparkling in the sunshine. A glacier, you might think, if you were in Norway rather than Norfolk. (And ice is involved, as it happens.) As you get nearer, the picture becomes clearer; the blocks have coils on one face, doors and handles on the opposite one, plus the manufacturers' names. It's a glacier of fridges, more than 3,000 of them.

Decision was widely expected after lobbying by Shell but will dismay environmental campaigners

• What does the UK's approval of the Jackdaw gasfield mean?

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The UK government has approved the controversial Jackdaw gasfield in the North Sea, a widely expected move that will nonetheless dismay environmental campaigners and a number of Labour MPs.

While Labour's 2024 election manifesto committed to a ban on new drilling licences in the North Sea, the companies behind Jackdaw and the Rosebank oilfield project, which is being decided on separately, have sought environmental approval for existing licences.

As glaciers melt and permafrost thaws, Longyearbyen, on the remote Arctic islands of Svalbard, faces climate-induced problems from tap water to housebuilding to landslides

• Heavy metals make Norwegian village's tap water toxic

On a rugged mountain plateau of snow-dusted rocks, in the remote archipelago of Svalbard, a glaciologist, Andy Hodson, points out the "ears" of ice, white against the rock, that gave Foxfonna glacier its name, after the arctic fox.

The small glacier, on a mountain 8 miles (15km) outside the Norwegian village of Longyearbyen, is a popular summer hike for tourists who come here seeking the Arctic experience.

Poole, Dorset: At this time of year, migrants are constantly on the move here, whether leaving, arriving or just stopping to refuel

With the sadness of our summer migrants departing the UK for another year comes the joy of our wintering birds returning. Working in conservation at Poole harbour, I'm out most days, connected to the ebb and flow of this change.

As it is one of the largest natural harbours in the world, and located on the East Atlantic Flyway, birds are constantly on the move here, whether leaving, arriving or stopping to refuel.

Amateur wildlife photographer Rhys Morgan has caught extraordinary footage of one of the largest whale species on Earth.

While sailing off the Pembrokeshire coast in Wales, Morgan and his friends spotted the blowholes of a fin whale in the distance, recognisable by the hooked fin near its tail, a dark grey upper body, white belly, and an asymmetrical jaw that is dark on the left and white on the right.

People who have enjoyed the video online are trying to raise awareness of fin whales being hunted in Iceland and calling on government ministers to take action

Researchers say almost 90% of participants in unconditional basic income scheme in Peru adopted environmentally beneficial practices

A pioneering project to provide Indigenous people in the Peruvian Amazon with an unconditional basic income has contributed to the protection of the rainforest, according to a study.

The analysis from the University of Bath is expected to contribute to a growing debate about the role of direct payments to communities that maintain globally important ecosystems.

Failed rains and a dire El Niño threaten the waterway that sustains the country, with farmers selling cattle to survive

The cattle should be ambling, grazing contentedly, through Robert Delgado's fields. Instead, the animals slump in the shade, tongues lolling, in futile attempts to avoid the blistering heat. Soon it will matter little whether their appetite returns, for there will be no grass left to graze.

In Azuero, an agricultural region in Panama's Arco Seco (Dry Arc), the summer is generally relentless and unforgiving. But this year, the crucial rainy season that precedes it - typically from May to December - has brought little rain to parched fields. The watering holes, streams and rivers that farmers rely on have not been replenished, and pastures - the vital source of animal feed during the dry months - have not regenerated themselves.

These yachts are highly popular with the 'super-bourgeoisie' - and getting bigger. Can anything be done to stop them destroying our seas?

Who knew? Apparently everyone did, apart from me: you don't wear shoes on a superyacht. Now, about to step on to my first teak deck at the Monaco Yacht Show, I've got to take my trainers off, and I'm having a sock panic. Have they got holes? Do they even match? Do they smell?

To be honest, I've come dressed all wrong for Europe's big annual superyacht trade exhibition. The code for men seems to be crisp and tucked in, blazers and chinos, navy and white, sculpted hair and designer sunnies. (I went colourful, loose, casual). For women, it's something like Riviera elegance. Everyone - whether they're Italian, French, English, German, American, exhibitors, buyers, brokers, charterers - seems to know each other. The international superyacht community seems to be a close-knit one, and I'm not part of it. Yet.

As Cop17 kicks off, records since 1921 show more bee species declining than increasing in all parts of Europe except the Alps

Most of Europe's wild bee species and about half of its hover fly species have declined over the last century, a study has found, as a UN biodiversity summit begins in Armenia.

Records since 1921 show more bee species are declining than increasing in all parts of Europe except the Alpine region. The richness of bee and hover fly species suffered a persistent drop in the Atlantic and Continental regions, the study found, though trends in other regions were mixed or even positive.

Saudi Arabia, Russia and China among those claiming developed countries have skewed findings of IPCC review

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suspended an important meeting on Friday in Addis Ababa without setting out a firm timetable for its next report. The world's governments are due to meet in less than a month for the Cop31 climate summit, and this leaves the future of scientific advice to governments on the climate in doubt.

Elk, bear, frogs and other animals have used the overpass, which connects 39,000 acres of habitat, since its completion

Colorado officials have tracked herds of elk, bears, pronghorn and even northern leopard frogs ambling across its new wildlife overpass. According to a newly released report, the overpass, which acts as a bridge over a busy stretch of interstate, has helped cut wildlife-vehicle collisions by 91% since its completion 10 months ago.

The overpass is the centerpiece of a larger system built by the state to assist wildlife crossing the highway, which also includes miles of 8-ft tall fencing and five large wildlife underpasses.

Ouse Fen, Cambridgeshire: The great egret's story is remarkable, as is the conversion of this low-grade agricultural land into one of the richest wetlands in Britain

In keeping with this region's summer of torrid heat and drought, the field by the path was an expanse of burnt, dead thistles. What was totally unexpected were the 13 great egrets among it. Ironically, the birds may well be here as a consequence of the climate crisis, but their appearance in a parched brown expanse felt strange.

First, they are creatures of freshwater marsh and routinely hunt fish. Second, great egrets are the size of grey herons, but pure white, aside from lemon eyes and dagger-like beaks of pale autumnal orange. What was weirdest of all was the gestalt whole; the way they threaded through that horizon of brown, long necks extending and retracting like winding snakes, and all this gleaming intensity focused on catching voles. Then a bird would fly, the white rope of its neck rising, followed by a ragged cloak of wings, turning eventually to the stolid beat of heavy flight.

Inspired by a gothic cathedral partly built using human bones, this gleaming monument to recycling boasts 62,000 bricks derived from construction waste - each made by the public during a two-day brick-making festival

Museums often try to reflect the world around them, but rarely are they made so literally of their surroundings as the new design museum in Ghent. Rising above the Belgian city's medieval tiled rooftops like an angular white watchtower, the new building has vacuumed up the city's condemned concrete frames, windows, car windscreens, sinks and old toilets, and transformed them, phoenix-like, into a gleaming monument to recycling.

"There's nothing new about reuse," says Andy Groarke, co-founder of Carmody Groarke, the London-based architects who designed the €20m (£17m) project with local firms Atama and Re-st. "We've just forgotten how to do it."

Florida governor has consistently opposed any legislation to curb planet-heating emissions, calling it a 'radical climate agenda'

A life-sized statue of Ron DeSantis, the Florida governor, was unveiled and promptly began melting in front of an audience in Tallahassee in a symbolic protest at his rejection of action on the climate crisis.

The silvery statue, revealed to an audience of onlookers last week, melted away to show a skull under DeSantis's face. The structure was cast from solid gallium, a metal that melts at 85.6F (29.8C), which is below summertime high temperatures frequently reached in Tallahassee, Florida's capital.