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'Were the soil a jungle, the worm would be its elephant': Why everything you thought about soil is probably wrong
Did you know that soil contains 59% of all the earth's species? As an exhibition at Somerset House, exploring its vital role in our planet’s future, prepares to open, Sarah Langford argues that it is high time soil become fashionable.
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Be more squirrel: What you can learn from Britain's favourite woodland animal, plus Valentines for cheapskates and our Quiz of the Day
Take a leaf out of the book of the red squirrel, and try our quiz of the day.
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A dozen walks to do before you die
Lifelong walker, and former director general of the National Trust, Fiona Reynolds selects 12 exhilarating experiences that have personal meaning for her, from mountains to cities and coasts to river valleys.
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Curious questions: how an underground pond from the last Ice Age almost stopped the Blackwall Tunnel from being built
You might think a pond is just a pond. You would be incorrect. Martin Fone tells us the fascinating story of pingo and dew ponds.
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The very hungry otter who stunned passers-by in the middle of Stratford
The home of Shakespeare is usually packed with tourists. This week, they were treated to an amazing sight.
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'I’ve come here this evening to experience darkness. I’ve been craving it, the richness and peace of it, the way you crave silence when you’ve had too much noise'
Connected to a vastness that’s beyond comprehension, the night sky has inspired both artistic and scientific visionaries since the dawn of time, says Anna Levin.
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John Lewis-Stempel: The English village, that beguiling habitat closest to the heart
Green, pub, church, duck pond and rose-garlanded cottages: did the perfect English village ever exist?
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John Lewis-Stempel: Why silence is golden
Quiet yourself and the distant hum of Nature’s parts connecting and working will soon come into focus.
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‘Look out! Look out! Jack Frost is about!’
Variously described as ‘wearing a cloak of silver’ and looking like ‘a hoary old man’, Jack Frost has attracted many artistic depictions over the centuries — some more positive than others.
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Dawn Chorus: Nature's 'wholesale fightback' is an inspiration for us all to keep trying
Tuesday's Dawn Chorus brings you five reasons to be cheerful — or six, if you count turning an austere City institution into a brightly-coloured Christmas delight.
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11 things to look out for on a Nature walk in winter
Winter is a season that few could genuinely love, yet as the leaves and flowers abandon us, the structure of the countryside is starkly revealed. John Wright takes the time to revel in form over flamboyance.
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'Fractals are everywhere, even within the human body: our nervous system, blood vessels and the structure of our brain and lungs'
What do spiders’ webs, snowflakes and snail shells have in common? They all contain fractals: Nature’s exquisite, endlessly repeating mathematical pattern.
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Dawn Chorus: Britain has its own rainforests — and they're disappearing even faster than the ones in Brazil
The rainforests of Britain, a Cornwall light show, Christmas gardens and more in our Dawn Chorus round-up this morning.
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'I could see puffs of condensed breath as he sang. Suddenly, the world felt fine': The wren, a little mite with a mighty heart
Shy yet bold, furtive yet fearless and fond of nesting in your trousers, the tiny ‘Jenny wren’ has a lusty voice that matches its sense of adventure.
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John Lewis-Stempel: Heathland, a place of freedom and unconventionality
Grey and bleak in midwinter, yet purple and exotic come high summer, our heathland is an unloved landscape that has become rarer than rainforest.
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Curious Questions: What's in a (scientific) name? From Parastratiosphecomyia stratiosphecomyioides to Myxococcus llanfair pwll gwyn gyll go gery chwyrn drobwll llan tysilio gogo goch ensis, and everything in between
Scientific names are baffling to the layman, but carry all sorts of meanings to those who coin each new term. Martin Fone explains.
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John Lewis-Stempel: The moors, a landscape of 'seamless sameness'
Once considered a vast, stretching terror-land synonymous with bog, the national perception of the ecologically invaluable moors has dramatically changed
