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Yahoo
11-07-2025
- Science
- Yahoo
Bull sharks linger in warming Sydney waters
Bull sharks are lingering off Sydney's beaches for longer periods each year as oceans warm, researchers said Friday, predicting they may one day stay all year. The predators are migratory, swimming north in winter when Sydney's long-term ocean temperatures dip below 19 degrees Celsius (66 degrees Fahrenheit) to bask in the balmier waters off Queensland. A team of scientists looked at 15 years of acoustic tracking of 92 tagged migratory sharks in an area including Bondi Beach and Sydney Harbour. Records show the sharks now spend an average of 15 days longer off Sydney's coast in summer than they did in 2009, said James Cook University researcher Nicolas Lubitz. "If they're staying longer, it means that people and prey animals have a longer window of overlap with them." Shark attacks are rare in ocean-loving Australia, and most serious bites are from three species: bull sharks, great whites, and tiger sharks, according to a national database. There have been more than 1,200 shark incidents around Australia since 1791, of which over 250 resulted in death. Researchers found an average warming of 0.57C in Bondi for the October-May period between 2006 and 2024, said the study published in the peer-reviewed journal Science of The Total Environment. Over a longer period, remotely sensed summer sea-surface temperatures in the area rose an average 0.67C between 1982 and 2024, they said. - Bull sharks 'year-round' - "If this trend persists, which it likely will, it just means that these animals are going to spend more and more time towards their seasonal distributional limit, which currently is southern and central New South Wales," Lubitz said. "So it could be that a few decades from now, maybe bull sharks are present year-round in waters off Sydney," he added. "While the chances of a shark bite, and shark bites in Australia in general, remain low, it just means that people have to be more aware of an increased window of bull shark presence in coastal waters off Sydney." Climate change could also change breeding patterns, Lubitz said, with early evidence indicating juvenile sharks were appearing in rivers further south. There was some evidence as well that summer habitats for great whites, which prefer colder waters, were decreasing in northern New South Wales and Queensland, he said. Tagged sharks trigger an alarm when they swim within range of a network of receivers dotted around parts of the Australian coast, giving people real-time warnings on a mobile app of their presence at key locations. djw/hmn
France 24
11-07-2025
- Science
- France 24
Bull sharks linger in warming Sydney waters
The predators are migratory, swimming north in winter when Sydney's long-term ocean temperatures dip below 19 degrees Celsius (66 degrees Fahrenheit) to bask in the balmier waters off Queensland. A team of scientists looked at 15 years of acoustic tracking of 92 tagged migratory sharks in an area including Bondi Beach and Sydney Harbour. Records show the sharks now spend an average of 15 days longer off Sydney's coast in summer than they did in 2009, said James Cook University researcher Nicolas Lubitz. "If they're staying longer, it means that people and prey animals have a longer window of overlap with them." Shark attacks are rare in ocean-loving Australia, and most serious bites are from three species: bull sharks, great whites, and tiger sharks, according to a national database. There have been more than 1,200 shark incidents around Australia since 1791, of which over 250 resulted in death. Researchers found an average warming of 0.57C in Bondi for the October-May period between 2006 and 2024, said the study published in the peer-reviewed journal Science of The Total Environment. Over a longer period, remotely sensed summer sea-surface temperatures in the area rose an average 0.67C between 1982 and 2024, they said. Bull sharks 'year-round' "If this trend persists, which it likely will, it just means that these animals are going to spend more and more time towards their seasonal distributional limit, which currently is southern and central New South Wales," Lubitz said. "So it could be that a few decades from now, maybe bull sharks are present year-round in waters off Sydney," he added. "While the chances of a shark bite, and shark bites in Australia in general, remain low, it just means that people have to be more aware of an increased window of bull shark presence in coastal waters off Sydney." Climate change could also change breeding patterns, Lubitz said, with early evidence indicating juvenile sharks were appearing in rivers further south. There was some evidence as well that summer habitats for great whites, which prefer colder waters, were decreasing in northern New South Wales and Queensland, he said. Tagged sharks trigger an alarm when they swim within range of a network of receivers dotted around parts of the Australian coast, giving people real-time warnings on a mobile app of their presence at key locations.
The Star
10-06-2025
- The Star
Officials urge influencers to stay away from Balearic Islands
Authorities once turned to influencers to promote lesser-known spots on the Balearics, but things have now changed. — dpa 'We're going to Ibiza!' Or are we? If the 'we' refers to influencers then the answer is a resounding 'no'. Social media-dependent selfie-takers have been told by tourism officials on Spain's Balearic Islands to make themselves scarce following complaints of overcrowding. Reported by local and international media, the rebuff comes in the wake of the picturesque but secluded Calo des Moro being swamped with phone-waving holidaymakers apparently tripping over each other to gurn into the lens for selfies with the tiny Majorca cove as a backdrop. While Calo des Moro can hold around 100 people at a time, it has been deluged by up to 4,000 visitors a day – leading in turn to anger among residents of the Balearic Islands, which include Menorca and Ibiza. The rush of selfie-hunters came about after officials turned to social media influencers to try promote parts of the Balearics thought to be less popular and less visited than the beach resorts and nightclubs the islands are known for. Calo des Moro can hold around 100 people at a time, but these days up to 4,000 visitors visit the place daily. However, the move backfired after spots such as the Calo des Moro were overwhelmed, leading to Spain's latest backlash against tourists. Last year, residents of the Balearics protested against so-called overtourism on the islands, which are economically reliant on tourism. Recent years have seen anti-tourism protests in places as far apart as Bali in Indonesia and Malaga in Spain, where city officials felt it necessary in September last year to tell scantily clad visitors to wear more clothes when ambling downtown. A month earlier, a team of Australian scientists warned that 'the hunt for the perfect selfie' has been causing 'disruptions to the breeding and feeding patterns of animals and the trampling of endangered plant species'. In work published in the journal Science Of The Total Environment, the team listed orchids, which selfie-takers appear to be particularly taken by, as vulnerable to the trend as they end up getting trampled and pulled. – dpa
Free Malaysia Today
03-06-2025
- Health
- Free Malaysia Today
Living near green spaces could reduce risk of premature birth
Mothers living in areas where new trees are planted are more likely to give birth at term, with babies of higher weights, researchers say. (Envato Elements pic) PARIS : The benefits of green spaces for human health are well established – they have been shown, for example, to promote physical activity, and reduce stress and pollution. But proximity to nature also has an impact on the number of premature births, according to a recent US study published in the journal Science of the Total Environment. Conducted by professors at Drexel University in Philadelphia, this research followed over 36,000 pregnant women who gave birth between Jan 1, 2015, and Dec 31, 2020, residing in Portland, Oregon, where over 36,000 trees were planted between 1990 and 2020. The number of trees planted within a 100m radius of the participants' addresses was evaluated. 'We found that tree planting around maternal address was associated with increased birthweight as well as a reduced probability of a small-for-gestational-age or preterm birth,' the researchers wrote. In other words, mothers living in areas where trees were planted within the past 30 years were more likely to give birth at term, with babies of higher birth weights, than those living farther away from tree-planted areas. Specifically, living within 100m of at least 10 trees is associated with an increase of about 50g in birth weight, which was the case for 2,879 babies in the sample studied. 'This might not seem like a lot, but if every baby in our sample gained 50g at birth, that means 642 fewer babies considered small for gestational age and at higher risk for worse development later in life,' said senior author Yvonne Michael. The study also notes that older trees may provide some additional benefits compared to those recently planted, such as improved air quality and reduced noise pollution from road traffic. This study isn't the first to highlight a link between a reduction in premature births and proximity to green space. But the novelty lies in its methodology, which focuses on recently planted trees and over a precise period. 'Existing tree cover is often closely tied to factors like income, education and race, making it difficult to fully account for other possible explanations when studying birth outcomes. By focusing on newly planted trees, we were able to reduce the bias – essentially treating it as a natural experiment,' Michael explained. 'This is another data point showing that planting trees is a relatively easy and low-cost way to improve public health from the earliest stages of life,' she concluded.
The Guardian
04-03-2025
- Science
- The Guardian
Invasive Asian hornets ‘eating hundreds of insect species' in Europe
Invasive Asian hornets are eating hundreds of different species of insects in Europe, including many which are important pollinators, researchers have warned. The findings, from tests of the guts of more than 1,500 larvae, raise new concerns over the 'extra threat' the hornet poses to native insects already under pressure from farming, changes in land use and chemical pollution. The study also highlights the potential impact on agriculture, with 43 of the 50 most commonly identified species in the hornet larvae's diet known to visit flowers – including Europe's three main crop pollinators. The Asian hornet, or yellow-legged hornet, a voracious invasive, is native to south-east Asia. It arrived in France in a cargo of pottery from China about 20 years ago and spread rapidly across the continent. Its main prey is honeybees. The Asian hornet can kill 50 bees a day and has devastated colonies in France and Italy. It was first seen in the UK in 2016, and there have been regular sightings since, including 44 confirmed in 2024 – largely in Kent and East Sussex. The researchers from the University of Exeter carried out genetic analysis in a method called 'deep sequencing' to identify prey species in the guts of more than 1,500 hornet larvae from 103 nests in Jersey, France, Spain and the UK. Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion They identified 1,449 different prey which had been fed by adult hornets to their larvae in the nests, more than half of which (55%) could be identified as a specific species. Prey included a wide range of flies, wasps, bees, butterflies, moths and spiders, with honeybees, common wasps and blowflies most commonly found. While the hornets have a preference for honeybees, which were found in all nests and almost all samples, a wide range of other species were also recorded, showing they are 'opportunistic' and prey on any creatures that are abundant in the areas near their nests. Europe's top three crop pollinators – the honeybee, buff-tailed bumblebee and red-tailed bumblebee – were all found among the top 50 prey species identified. The study's lead author, Siffreya Pedersen, said: 'Asian hornets are known to prey on honeybees, but until now the full range of their diet hasn't been tested. The diet varied strongly over the seasons and between regions, showing that they are highly flexible predators. She said: 'Insects play vital roles in enabling ecosystems to function – including pollination, decomposition and pest control. Most insect populations are in decline due to factors such as habitat destruction and chemical pollution. The expanding area inhabited by Asian hornets poses an extra threat.' The study is published in the journal Science Of The Total Environment.
