Breaking Waves: Ocean News

Prisoners fled when the walls of their jail collapsed in the country’s worst flooding in two decades More than 200 inmates escaped from a prison in north-east Nigeria in the aftermath of the worst flooding there in over two decades, authorities have announced. There have been 37 deaths in Borno state after parts of its capital Maiduguri were overrun by water on 9 September following the collapse of a dam, according to the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA). As many as 200,000 others have been displaced. Residents of the city said some areas were still flooded on Monday when President Bola Tinubu visited. Continue reading...

Scientists have discovered a new species of fish, the 'grumpy dwarfgoby'. Found among coral reefs in the Red Sea, it has large canines and a fierce expression, even though it is only 2 cm long. Its existence highlights the region's rich biodiversity, but also stresses the need for conservation efforts as climate change causes major disturbances to the reef's ecosystem.

Cultural protection order has been framed as a push to curry favour with inner-city seats, ignoring grassroots campaigns from Indigenous and non-Indigenous locals Sign up for the Rural Network email newsletter Join the Rural Network group on Facebook to be part of the community Among the concerns listed by the 2,000 farmers who converged on the lawns of Parliament House in Canberra last week was the protection of prime agricultural land from renewable energy developments. It has become a common refrain. The National party leader, David Littleproud, warned at the party’s annual federal council on Friday of the risk to prime agricultural land from energy transition projects. The mining magnate Gina Rinehart took to the stage at a business event last year to warn that one-third of Australia’s prime agricultural land could be “taken over” by renewable energy projects. In almost every campaign against a proposed development in the bush, the potential impact on prime agricultural land is raised as a key concern. Sign up to receive Guardian Australia’s fortnightly Rural Network email newsletter Continue reading...

Birds practising kleptoparasitism – harassing each other until they drop their saliva-covered food – seen as ‘plausible pathway’ for arrival of H5N1 Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updates Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast Scientists have identified a new way for an aggressive strain of bird flu to enter Australia, via the habit of some migratory birds of harassing other birds and stealing their food and potentially their viruses. Australia is the only continent to have so far escaped a virulent H5N1 strain of avian flu – known as 2.3.4.4b and discovered in Europe in 2021– that has devastated bird populations in other parts of the world. Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...