#501: Green to Grey

Green to Grey tracks environmental change in the EU.

Here's the opening shots of the website which includes a wealth of information and imagery on environmental change. Would go well with Daniel Raven Ellison's 100 Seconds films.

The website has many stories and details of specific locations.

It was featured in this recent Guardian piece outlining the rate of change of the environment. We often talk about deforestation in the Amazon, forgetting that we are degrading the landscape here in Europe, and even more so in the nature-depleted UK.

Thanks to Alice Griffiths for the tipoff here.

#110: The State of Nature? Not good...

Cross posting from my LivingGeography blog.

Earlier this week, a report on the state of the UK's nature was released. It makes for grim reading... 

This is the latest in a series of reports exploring the steady decline in the UK's biodiversity, and the likely risks to other species as food chains and webs begin to break down. The decline in insects is vital, for example.

State of Nature Data is also available from the same website.

Here we present the data underpinning the State of Nature report. For the first time we are excited to include an interactive app (below) where you can explore the data in more detail, at a UK and country scale. We also include the metadata file with the full references and a guide to interpretation of the data and data files to download.

Some headline figures:

Download the infographic from here.

Humanity has now impacted every part of the Earth System

Atmospheric carbon dioxide ⏫ >50% and methane ⏫ >150% since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution

We have warmed the planet by 1.2˚C

All due to capitalism, colonialism and global consumer culture.#Anthropocene pic.twitter.com/vDxBWLdE0d

— Professor Mark Maslin 𝕏 🙄 (@ProfMarkMaslin) September 28, 2023

#106: Sycamore Gap tree felled

A few days ago, I saw a tweet from Robert MacFarlane which was rather shocking: the iconic sycamore tree in the 'Sycamore Gap' along Hadrian's Wall had been deliberately felled  the previous night by someone / a group of people with a chainsaw. A big one at that given the size of the tree...

Sick to the core to see this.
A tree known & loved by millions.
Stories, memories, histories, lives, all entwined with it.
100s of years of patient growth, felled in a few minutes, the day the State of Nature report is published.
War waged on nature by individuals & government. https://t.co/F9Gq7hBkqo

— Robert Macfarlane (@RobGMacfarlane) September 28, 2023

 I really cannot understand why this might have been done.

Others do have some theories, particularly if you look at the quality of the cut and the circumstances under which the act took place... see below

The tree was special to many people in many different ways. It sits in a dramatic location where the wall dips down after a steep cliffed section of the Whin Sill. The tree had stood there for around three hundred years.

One thing to note is that sycamore trees can regenerate with new growth from a stump.

Image: Claire Kyndt

The Guardian shared some pictures of the tree in a feature here.

Personally find it unlikely a 16 year- old would bother to do this in a storm for a prank, let alone mark a saw cut with white paint #SycamoreGap pic.twitter.com/M1rDdJjYYH

— Dr Jonathan Foyle  (@JonathanFoyle) September 28, 2023

Update 

A new piece from Robert.

I spoke about the need to understand the Sycamore Gap tree’s slaughter in context of the wider “hostile environment” towards the natural world in the UK.
And also about how the best way to mourn the loss of this tree is to grow a forest. https://t.co/iLkq7CWbVP

— Robert Macfarlane (@RobGMacfarlane) September 29, 2023

It's possible that the story of the tree may form part of some sort of material for the draft specification - perhaps an image on the front cover, or as a reminder of the way that some trees and nature gain additional significance for people. 

Updated October 12th 

Preparations are underway to remove the tree at Sycamore Gap tomorrow. The 50-foot tree had stood for almost 200 years until it was felled in an act of vandalism two weeks ago - it will now be carefully moved by crane and taken to a property in our care, to be safely stored. 1/5 pic.twitter.com/zal78fEd3O

— National Trust in the North (@NT_TheNorth) October 11, 2023