Animals news

• Bill Taylor testimony transcript released in impeachment inquiry

  06-11-2019 20:47 via news.yahoo.com
  
  The House committees leading the impeachment inquiry into President Trump on Wednesday released a transcript of their closed-door interview with the top former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine Bill Taylor.
  
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• Chief mouser Palmerston dies after swapping Foreign Office for Bermuda

  14-02-2026 16:10 via theguardian.com
  Social media account for Palmerston, who retired in 2020, announces death of ‘Diplocat extraordinaire’Palmerston, a rescue cat who became the chief mouser of the Foreign Office, has died in Bermuda.The cat, adopted from Battersea Dogs & Cats Home, retired in 2020 after four years of service in Whitehall. Continue reading...
  
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• Peta calls for pork-free menus as Peppa Pig show rolls into Grimsby

  14-02-2026 08:00 via theguardian.com
  Auditorium to remove bacon and sausages from cafe during stage run after request from campaign groupCampaigners are calling on theatre bosses to stop serving bacon, sausages and ham in their cafes – at least while Peppa Pig and her family are performing in the same building.Grimsby Auditorium in Lincolnshire said this week it would remove pork from the menu when Peppa Pig’s Big Family Show opens next month, after a request from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta UK). T
  
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• Social inequality is thriving in the hive | Brief letters

  13-02-2026 18:46 via theguardian.com
  Beehive socialism | Ratcliffe’s apology | Tommy Cooper’s dream | Valentine’s Day | Love boat The beehive may not be quite the utopian dream it first appears to be (Letters, 9 February). Worker bees need to be so active during the summer months that they typically only survive for about four to six weeks. Drone bees’ longevity is not much better. The lucky ones may get to service the queen, but die as a consequence. Unsurprisingly, the queen fares much better.
  Tom Challeno
  
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• Mountain lions gain protection under California’s Endangered Species Act

  13-02-2026 18:08 via theguardian.com
  State agencies are now mandated to protect the big cats, which have been increasingly vulnerable due to habitat lossMore than 1,400 mountain lions across California are now protected by the state’s Endangered Species Act, the state’s fish and game commission announced on Thursday.The commission unanimously voted to list six groups of central coast and southern California mountain lions under the California Endangered Species Act, meaning the agency determined that they are likely to
  
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• California’s mountain lion population now protected by state’s Endangered Species Act

  13-02-2026 18:08 via theguardian.com
  State agencies are now mandated to protect the big cats, which have been increasingly vulnerable due to habitat lossMore than 1,400 mountain lions across California are now protected by the state’s Endangered Species Act, the state’s fish and game commission announced on Thursday.The commission unanimously voted to list six groups of central coast and southern California mountain lions under the California Endangered Species Act, meaning the agency determined that they are likely to
  
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• Week in wildlife: a thirsty raccoon, a superhero squid and a delinquent swan

  13-02-2026 09:00 via theguardian.com
  This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world Continue reading...
  
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• Gold thief flees scene of the crime on donkey in central Turkey – video

  13-02-2026 04:40 via theguardian.com
  A suspect who broke into a jewellery store using a forklift, allegedly stole 150 grams of gold, and fled the scene on a donkey was arrested in Kayseri, central Turkey. Police teams from the provincial police department identified the suspect after reviewing security camera footage following the incident. Continue reading...
  
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• We want to protect red squirrels – so why don’t we protect their habitats? | Letter

  12-02-2026 18:06 via theguardian.com
  Conservation efforts to improve red squirrel numbers in mid Wales are being undermined by developers, writes Lorna Brazell of the Cambrian Mountains SocietyI was interested to read about the efforts being debated to conserve England’s embattled red squirrel population (‘On a knife edge’: can England’s red squirrel population be saved?, 6 February). In view of the inexorable spread of the greys across Great Britain, it was actually a surprise to learn there are still reds
  
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• São Paulo names new law after dog that stayed by owner’s grave for 10 years

  12-02-2026 17:50 via theguardian.com
  The Bob Coveiro (the Gravedigger) Law ‘recognises the emotional bond between guardians and their pets’A dog that remained beside his former owner’s grave for 10 years has now given his name to a new state law allowing pets to be buried alongside their loved ones in São Paulo.The new law – already being informally referred to as the Bob Coveiro (the Gravedigger) Law, in tribute to its inspiration – was signed this week by the governor of Brazil’s most po
  
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• Birdwatch: Rain, water, wings – a winter’s gift at Cheddar reservoir

  11-02-2026 07:00 via theguardian.com
  Vast flocks of birds return to Somerset and a rare grebe turns an ordinary walk into something specialAfter weeks of heavy rain, Cheddar reservoir in Somerset is finally full again – of water, and of birds. Thousands of coots, hundreds of gulls and ducks, and dozens of great crested grebes crowd the surface, some already moulting into their smart breeding plumage, crests and all.They feed almost constantly, building up energy reserves for the breeding season. Among the throng are some less
  
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• Country diary: Echoes of Iona at this tiny, precious church | Merryn Glover

  11-02-2026 06:30 via theguardian.com
  Kincraig, Badenoch: The Loch Insh Old Kirk is a compelling place, and yet, like the copious wildlife here, it is on the edge of existenceThe snow has retreated to the tops of the Cairngorms and the last fragments of ice are crumbling at the edges of Loch Insh. In a muddy landscape, an old white church rises on a knoll on the northern shore. The simple stone building with its bell tower and arched windows dates to 1792, though the site was established by early monks from Iona, probably as fa
  
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• Gray wolf appears in Los Angeles county for first time in more than 100 years

  11-02-2026 00:43 via theguardian.com
  Three-year-old black coat female, known as BEY03F, crossed into LA county around 6am on 7 FebruaryA gray wolf wandered into Los Angeles county for the first time in more than a century on Saturday morning.“This is the most southern verified record of a gray wolf in modern times,” Axel Hunnicutt, gray wolf coordinator for the California department of fish and wildlife, said. Continue reading...
  
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• ‘We feel kinda bad when a solo bird shows up’: Canada sees its first European robin – but how did it get there?

  10-02-2026 13:00 via theguardian.com
  Birdwatchers flock to Montréal for rare sighting of ‘vagrant’ bird that has made its home during a bitterly cold winterOn a quiet Montréal street of low-rise brick apartment buildings on one side and cement barrier wall on the other, a crowd has gathered, binoculars around their necks and cameras at the ready. A European robin has taken up residence in the neighbourhood, which is sandwiched between two industrial areas with warehouses and railway lines and, a few blocks
  
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• Misery for many as rain falls for 40 days in some parts of UK

  10-02-2026 10:00 via theguardian.com
  Persistent wet weather is affecting farmers, builders, sports, wildlife – and damaging roads and homes“Feel like it hasn’t stopped raining?” the Met Office asked on Monday. For some places, the forecaster said, it really had rained every day so far this year.People who live in parts of Devon, Cornwall and Worcestershire have been dodging deluges or showers for 40 days – the same number of days that it rained in the Bible’s Noah’s ark story, the same numb
  
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• Country diary: Ding ding! Round 2 for the brawling badgers | Ed Douglas

  10-02-2026 06:30 via theguardian.com
  Abbeydale, Sheffield: I’m genuinely scared when I wake at 2am to the sound of screaming. Then I see two male badgers in an almighty scrapFast asleep, my dreamworld takes an unexpected swerve as raucous screaming erupts outside the open bedroom window. For a moment, I assume this is imagined, some emotional outburst from my subconscious. Then I realise that I’m awake. This is real. I check the time: 2am. The screaming continues. In fact, it’s now louder and somehow more intense.
  
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• ‘A beaver blind date’: animals given freedom to repopulate Cornish rivers

  09-02-2026 20:00 via theguardian.com
  Release into Helman Tor reserve marks historical first for keystone species hunted to extinction in UK 400 years agoShivering and rain-drenched at the side of a pond in Cornwall, a huddle of people watched in hushed silence as a beaver took its first tentative steps into its new habitat. As it dived into the water with a determined “plop” and began swimming laps, the suspense broke and everyone looked around, grinning.The soggy but momentous occasion marks the first time in English h
  
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• The pet I’ll never forget: Mishka, the surly but beloved raccoon

  09-02-2026 12:00 via theguardian.com
  She hated water, attacked our Christmas tree, destroyed our wallpaper – but everyone who met her was won overMishka was about eight weeks old when we got her. It was 2004, we were living in Dibden, New Forest, and I was looking to buy some guinea pigs. I saw an ad for a raccoon on the secondhand site Preloved. My husband, Graham, and I lived in Florida in the 90s and had a raccoon that would come into the yard. It had a bad leg, and we nurtured it, so I was very interested in raccoons.I me
  
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• Country diary 1926: Is the keeper wise to destroy weasels and stoats?

  09-02-2026 07:00 via theguardian.com
  12 February 1926: Everyone who knows anything about game-rearing admits that the brown rat is the worst enemy to contend withWe have improved on the “good old days” when we hung transgressors against the law on gibbets by the wayside, awful examples or timely warnings. But the gamekeeper does it still when he gets one of his real or supposed enemies, though I notice that he never gibbets a poaching dog, nor, as a rule, a cat; even the cat may be counted as property. Among some very d
  
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• ‘Sea puppy pancakes’: what it’s like to pat a 300kg wild stingray

  08-02-2026 01:30 via theguardian.com
  Visitors to a site near Gisborne in New Zealand’s North Island get to interact with the animals in their habitat and learn about their importance to Māori cultureIn a shallow reef close to New Zealand’s east coast shore, a group of 30 people wearing khaki overalls and boots huddle together like a crescent moon, waiting for the stars of the show to arrive.They don’t have to wait long. Continue reading...
  
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• Rembrandt lion drawing raises $18m for big cat conservation at US auction

  07-02-2026 10:00 via theguardian.com
  Chalk artwork sold for record price at a New York Sotheby’s auction with proceeds going to the Panthera charityA tiny chalk drawing of a lion by Rembrandt recently sold for the record-setting price of $18m in New York City to benefit the conservation of big cats.After selling at a Sotheby’s auction Wednesday, Young Lion Resting shattered the previous mark for the most expensive drawing by the 17th-century Dutch painter ever auctioned: the $3.7m Portrait of a Man with Arms Akimbo. Con
  
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• Cost of UK pet insurance falls despite higher vet fees and inflation

  07-02-2026 09:00 via theguardian.com
  Competition is driving down prices, albeit slowly, with the median lifetime cover put at £247 for dogs and £180 for cats a yearVet fees continue to rise and many other costs are on the increase, but pet insurance has on average become slightly cheaper as providers compete for custom, new research claims.The pricing data coincides with a study which found that one-third of UK pet owners don’t have insurance, with cost cited as one of the biggest factors. Continue reading...
  
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• Bermuda snail thought to be extinct now thrives after a decade’s effort

  07-02-2026 07:00 via theguardian.com
  Special pods at Chester zoo helped conservationists breed and release more than 100,000 greater Bermuda snailsA button-sized snail once feared extinct in its Bermudian home is thriving again after conservationists bred and released more than 100,000 of the molluscs.The greater Bermuda snail (Poecilozonites bermudensis) was found in the fossil record but believed to have vanished from the North Atlantic archipelago, until a remnant population was discovered in a damp and overgrown alleyway in Ham
  
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• One person dead from Nipah virus in Bangladesh, WHO says

  07-02-2026 02:45 via theguardian.com
  The case in Bangladesh, where Nipah cases are reported almost every year, follows two Nipah virus cases identified in neighbouring IndiaThe World Health Organization said on Friday that a woman had died in northern Bangladesh in January after contracting the deadly Nipah virus infection.The case in Bangladesh, where Nipah cases are reported almost every year, follows two Nipah virus cases identified in neighbouring India, which has already prompted stepped-up airport screenings across Asia. Cont
  
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• Geese guided our beloved dog back home | Letters

  06-02-2026 19:05 via theguardian.com
  Jill Webster shares her own experience of birds carrying a message of comfortI was moved by both your published letters on birds carrying messages of comfort (2 February) and Zoe Williams’ reflections on Jilly Cooper’s memorial (3 February) to recall a stoic old dog who we rehomed a few years ago.She’d had a difficult life, much of it spent at the whims of unhappy owners, and after she died we buried her in our garden. Continue reading...
  
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• ‘On a knife edge’: can England’s red squirrel population be saved?

  06-02-2026 16:00 via theguardian.com
  Government plans to protect species by increasing woodland and removing greys, but campaigners say it needs to go furtherWhen Sam Beaumont sees a flash of red up a tree on his Lake District farm, he feels a swell of pride. He’s one of the few people in England who gets to see red squirrels in his back garden.“I feel very lucky to have them on the farm. It’s an important thing to try and keep a healthy population of them. They are absolutely beautiful,” he said. Continue r
  
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• Week in wildlife: cuddling sloths, dazed iguanas and a very fat seal

  06-02-2026 09:00 via theguardian.com
  This week’s best wildlife photographs from around the world Continue reading...
  
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• Country diary: A trip to the sheep auction – interrupted by light and legend | Andrea Meanwell

  06-02-2026 06:30 via theguardian.com
  Hawes, North Yorkshire: A stunning ray of sunshine, beamed on to a farmhouse, is a reminder of my family’s history in this landscapeIt is early Saturday morning and I’m on my way to the Hawes Honeys sale of “in-lamb” (pregnant) ewes at Hawes auction. Usually I drive through Nateby and up over the tops into North Yorkshire, past the big pipe under the road where I used to play with toy cars when I was little, and remembering my sons shouting “hold your breath ev
  
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• Purr-fect casting: is Orangey the most important movie cat ever?

  05-02-2026 18:14 via theguardian.com
  A new retrospective celebrates the work of the cat credited with roles in Breakfast at Tiffany’s, The Comedy of Terrors and RhubarbIn the midst of Oscar season, it becomes evident just how much work it takes to win an Academy Award, both in on-screen work and off-screen campaigning. Consider, however, that multiple actors have won more than one Oscar. (Emma Stone, one of this year’s best actress nominees, won twice in the past decade.) Only a single cat, meanwhile, has twice won the
  
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• Why is monogamy is in crisis? The animal kingdom could give us some clues | Elle Hunt

  05-02-2026 16:29 via theguardian.com
  As fewer people choose to pair up, let alone marry, it could be that our species’ mating patterns are moving closer to the natural orderMonogamy, you may have heard, is in crisis. Fewer people are in relationships, let alone opting to be in one ’til death. And even those who have already exchanged vows seem to be increasingly looking for wiggle room. “Quiet divorce” – mentally checking out of your union, rather than going through the rigmarole of formally dissolving
  
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