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☆ Swarm of bees delays a Delta flight by three hours
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Marnie Hunter | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +3 min

CNN —A swarm of bees touched down on a parked Delta Air Lines aircraft Wednesday, delaying a flight from Houston to Atlanta for about three hours. Delta apologized to customers on the delayed flight. My flight leaving Houston is delayed because bees have congregated on the tip of one of the wings. A swarm of bees delayed an Air India flight in 2019. The airport involved in Wednesday’s bee-related delay hasn’t joined in airport beekeeping efforts – yet.

☆ Bees on a plane! A swarm of bees piled onto the wing of an airplane, delaying a Delta flight for 3 hours.
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Kelsey Vlamis | Aditi Bharade | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A Delta flight from Houston to Atlanta was delayed by three hours because bees swarmed around its wing. Photos and a video showed the large swarm of bees collecting on the tip of the plane's wing. Ground equipment was used to push back the airplane, and the bees were removed before takeoff. A Delta flight from Texas to Georgia was delayed for three hours on Wednesday after other flying objects latched onto the plane — a swarm of bees. Honey bees typically swarm when an established colony has grown too crowded and the bees fly off to establish a new one.

☆ Global issuance of mortgage-backed securities falls to a 23-year low
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-04 | by ( Patturaja Murugaboopathy | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

May 4 (Reuters) - The issuance of global mortgage-backed securities (MBS) slumped to a 23-year low in the first four months of this year, highlighting the turmoil in the real estate sector as higher mortgage rates hit property sales and refinancing. According to Refinitiv data, global MBS issuance stood at $100 billion in the first four months of this year, the lowest since 2000. Reuters GraphicsThe property sector, often a leading indicator for other economic activity, has seen a slump this year due to a spike in mortgage rates as global central banks increased interest rates to tame inflation. MBS consist of pools of home loans and other real estate debt and typically carry higher yields than U.S. Treasuries. The refinancing of existing mortgages may also be affected, as there may be fewer lenders available to refinance existing loans leading to private lenders and higher rates."

Catalonia, Spain CNN —Standing in his field of stunted, withered maize, Santi Caudevilla is very worried. It’s becoming increasingly hard to make ends meet as crops shrivel through lack of water – or cannot be planted at all. “This is the worst period that we have had for the last 100 years,” Samuel Reyes, director of the Catalan Water Agency, told CNN. Allison Nussbaum/NASA Allison Nussbaum/NASA These two images show shrinking water reservoirs in the Catalonia region of Spain. In April, Spain requested emergency funding from the European Union to help farmers cope with the impacts of the drought.

☆ Britain's Charles to use crimson and purple robes at coronation once worn by George VI
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-29 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

LONDON, April 29 (Reuters) - Britain's King Charles will wear robes of crimson and purple silk velvet at his May 6 coronation which were once worn by his grandfather King George VI at his own coronation in 1937, Buckingham Palace said on Saturday. Charles and his wife Camilla will wear two sets of robes at the coronation service: crimson Robes of State when they arrive and purple Robes of Estate as they leave, all conserved or made by the 334-year-old London tailors Ede and Ravenscroft. Kirsty O'Connor/Pool via REUTERS 1 2 3Insects, including bees and a beetle, will feature on a coronation robe for the first time, the palace said. Pictures released by the palace showed members of the Royal School of Needlework carrying out work on a crimson velvet robe several feet long with a gold lace border, to be worn by Charles. Reporting by Sachin Ravikumar; Editing by Daniel WallisOur Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

☆ The Ultimate Grassroots Issue: Should You Mow the Lawn?
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( James R. Hagerty | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

As May 1 looms, Americans face a complicated moral choice: Whether to mow their lawns. Scores of U.S. cities and towns are embracing a British movement called No Mow May, whose supporters refrain from cutting their grass during that month. The goal is to allow more flowering plants to thrive, and provide nectar and pollen to nourish bees and other pollinators, vital parts of the food chain.

☆ I made $194,000 in a year as a freelancer taking pictures of M&Ms, Burt's Bees, and other products. Here's the exact email I used to land clients.
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Ella Hopkins | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

See the email template Schlabs uses to land clients such as Burt's Bees and M&M's. I studied marketing at college and had a marketing job lined up but decided to instead go into freelance product photography after I graduated. I decided to try product photography freelanceWhen I left college in May 2020, I decided to try out product-photography freelancing. My name is Deidre Schlabs, I own Fluff Media, a full-service photography agency focusing on editorial and content product photography. I am reaching out to see if you are in need of product photography and/or social media content creation.

☆ Nicolas Cage, Ranked From Wild to Mild
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( Erik Piepenburg | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In the early 1980s, Nicolas Cage got his first big breaks in Martha Coolidge’s “Valley Girl” and Amy Heckerling’s “Fast Times at Ridgemont High,” films that zeroed in on the peculiar allure of his dopey bad boy persona. Watching him was like eating a banana split: You tasted something nutty, sweet, indulgent, all-American. Since then, few actors have been able to match how nimble a polymorph Cage is in genre, how easily he power-bounces between action (“National Treasure”), comedy (“Moonstruck”) and horror (“Pay the Ghost”). He’s done the same for a who’s who of boundary-pushing directors, including the Coen brothers (“Raising Arizona”), David Lynch (“Wild at Heart”) and Spike Jonze (“Adaptation”). Each is rated on a scale of bees — one for sleepy, five for loony — in honor of the insects that tortured him in the 2006 remake of “The Wicker Man.”

☆ Brentford deepen Chelsea's slump with 2-0 win at Stamford Bridge
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-26 | by ( William Schomberg | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

The loss left toothless Chelsea 11th in the Premier League table, stumbling towards possibly their worst campaign since the 1993/94 season - when they finished 14th under Glenn Hoddle - despite their new U.S. owners' huge outlay on players. The three points pushed Brentford up a spot to ninth in the league, eight points ahead of their big-spending west London neighbours for whom this season cannot finish quickly enough. Media reports said Chelsea were close to hiring former Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino as coach from next season. It doesn’t come in football because the Premier League moves so fast, it’s competitive," the former midfielder who is Chelsea's all-time top scorer, said. Brentford coach Thomas Frank was able to celebrate surpassing his side's points tally for all of last season - their first in the Premier League - with Wednesday's win.

☆ Carnivorous plants may lure their insect prey with specialized scents
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Kate Golembiewski | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

CNN —Sarracenia pitcher plants, found in bogs throughout eastern North America, look like trumpet-shaped flowers, often in purplish or reddish hues. Different kinds of Sarracenia pitcher plants tend to eat different kinds of insects — some species trap more ants, while others feast on bees and moths. But recently opened pitcher plants that don’t stink of rotting bug carcasses provide an opportunity to identify the scents, she explained. The biggest challenge with the study, honestly, is that they did it in France,” rather than in the Sarracenia pitcher plants’ native North American bogs. It’s important to study pitcher plants due to the unique role they play in their increasingly fragile ecosystems, he added.

☆ Opinion: Top secrets come spilling out
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-16 | by ( Richard Galant | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +16 min

We’re looking back at the strongest, smartest opinion takes of the week from CNN and other outlets. Writing for CNN Opinion, Rep. Justin Pearson noted, “This should be a chastening moment for revanchist forces in Tennessee’s legislature and across the country. Over the long haul, the undemocratic machinations employed to oust us from office are destined to fail. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once famously said that the moral arc of the universe bends toward justice. “As a Jewish historian,” Perry wrote, “I worry about the tension between preserving the memory of past hardships while not locking our entire history into a tale of oppression.

☆ Myth or fact? Eating local honey can cure seasonal allergies: 'It's a complicated answer,' doctor says
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-14 | by ( Renée Onque | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Many people believe that eating local honey can lessen or even cure your seasonal allergies. This is commonly referred to as "local honey," which Cote collects across the five boroughs in New York City. And yet, the myth of local honey persists. Can eating local honey cure seasonal allergies? The pool of studies that examine the effects of local honey on allergy symptoms is extremely small, he adds, which makes it difficult to come to a clear conclusion.

☆ ‘The New Big 5’: Wildlife photography book turns the lens on animals at risk
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-03 | by ( Flo Cornall | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

However, British photographer Graeme Green has reclaimed the narrative, creating a global “New Big Five” for wildlife photography. Green says that the book celebrates wildlife and is a global call to action on issues impacting wildlife, including habitat loss, poaching, pollution and climate change. British photographer Graeme Green is the founder of the New Big 5 project, an international conservation initiative supported by photographers, conservationists and wildlife charities. “These are the species that we are at risk of losing.”"The New Big 5: A Global Photography Project For Endangered Wildlife" by Graeme Green is out now. “The New Big 5: A Global Photography Project For Endangered Wildlife,” by Graeme Green, published by Earth Aware Editions, is on sale from April 4, 2023.

[1/5] One of the dishes created by Bolivian chef Marsia Taha and Peruvian chef Virgilio Martinez with ingredients from the Amazon, gets served at Gustu restaurant, in La Paz, Bolivia, March 31, 2023. REUTERS/Claudia MoralesApril 3 (Reuters) - In the high altitudes of Bolivia's La Paz, some of South America's top chefs are paying homage to regional Amazonian culinary ingredients including gusanillo, or worm chili, tree bark that tastes like garlic, and honey from stingless bees. At Taha's restaurant Gustu in La Paz, a feast of colors and flavors was carefully spread out on wooden tables decorated with large leaves to celebrate the gastronomic diversity of the Peruvian and Bolivian Amazon. "This is not only a celebration of the Amazon and its biodiversity but of our producers as well. They are the ones who make it possible for these products to arrive to our homes or our restaurants," said Taha.

☆ Plants let out an ultrasonic scream when their leaves are cut or they don't get enough water
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-30 | by ( Marianne Guenot | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

They may be filling your house with deafening clicks, but these are too high for you to hear, scientists have found. Plants that aren't stressed are almost quietTomato plants are being recorded in a greenhouse in this picture from Tel Aviv University. For instance, tomato plants emit sounds of stress before they started looking dehydrated, Hadany said. Animals — and perhaps even plants — may be able to hear the soundsA fruit bat might be one of the animals who can hear noises from plants. It's also possible plants themselves could react to these sounds, Hadany said.

☆ Food prices push UK shop price inflation to new high: BRC
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-27 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

REUTERS/Hannah McKayLONDON, March 28 (Reuters) - Soaring food prices pushed annual inflation in British shops to its highest in at least 18 years in March, industry data showed on Tuesday. The British Retail Consortium said overall shop price inflation rose to 8.9% from 8.4% in February, the largest increase since the British Retail Consortium's (BRC) records started in 2005. "Shop price inflation has yet to peak," said BRC Chief Executive Helen Dickinson, who cited the rising cost of sugar as a major driver of higher food prices in March. Sugar prices have been hit by falling production, rising energy prices and a pesticide ban in Britain to protect bees. The country's annual consumer price inflation - which includes services and other non-shop goods such as energy - rose unexpectedly to 10.4% in February.

☆ This teenager is breaking records at soccer and training with the boys — and she's hungry for more
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-06 | by ( Goh Chiew Tong | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

I think I worked very hard, I put my head down and continued to work," said 18-year-old Danelle Tan. The perception that soccer is a "male sport" isn't new, but Tan said she believes that's changing. Snakes and laddersTan knows all about breaking barriers — she's already made history more than once at a young age. I don't think there's anybody in the entire world who can be motivated every single day ... "I don't think there's anybody in the entire world who can be motivated every single day.

☆ Are Butterflies Wildlife? Depends Where You Live.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-04 | by ( ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +10 min

The creatures are simply left out of state conservation statues, or their situation is ambiguous. “State agencies are really at the forefront of conservation for wildlife,” said Scott Black, executive director of the Xerces Society, a nonprofit group that advocates for insect conservation. Sometimes, aquatic insects come under the purview of state wildlife agencies. But across the states without insect authority, officials are often reluctant to broach adding it, Mr. Winton said. Seven of the states without insect conservation authority are in the West, which has felt the effects of climate change intensely.

☆ Documentary 'On the Adamant' wins Berlin Film Festival's top award
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-25 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

[1/2] Nicolas Philibert poses for a photo with the Golden Bear for Best Film for "On the Adamant" at the 73rd Berlinale International Film Festival in Berlin, Germany, February 25, 2023. Jorg Carstensen/Pool via REUTERSBERLIN, Feb 25 (Reuters) - "On the Adamant," a documentary about a floating daycare centre in Paris for adults with mental disorders, won the Berlin Film Festival's Golden Bear award on Saturday. Accepting the Berlinale's top prize, director Nicolas Philibert said he was deeply touched by the jury's decision to award it to a documentary rather than a work of fiction. "That documentary can be considered cinema in its own right touches me deeply," he said. The festival's Silver Bear for best leading actor went to Sofia Otero, who plays an 8-year-old transgender child in "20,000 Species of Bees."

☆ 'The grass does not grow': In Chile's far south, the worst drought in 50 years
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

[1/5] A view of parched earth as a wetland is drying up, in Punta Arenas, Chile February 2, 2023. In the far south city of Punta Arenas, that has led to a water emergency declared last year. "In 2022 Punta Arenas had its driest year in 52 years," said Nicolas Butorovic, a climatologist from the regional University of Magallanes. "The wind picks up and dries everything and the grass does not grow, that is the drama we're facing," said Hector Garay, a livestock farmer in the region. "If there is no irrigation water, water from rain, the grass does not grow.

☆ Bayer says chemicals farmers use to fight insects are safe, but it's more complicated than that, says its ESG head
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-06 | by ( Catherine Boudreau | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

The European Union, also in 2018, banned some pesticides that Bayer makes because scientists and regulators linked them to deaths of bees. "It felt like we were on the grill at a barbecue," Kunz, Bayer's head of environmental, social, and governance strategy, told Insider. Beyond neonicotinoids, Kunz said Bayer's strategy to meet its environmental targets involved what he called a more systems-based approach. Bayer also makes digital tools that help farmers apply fertilizer and pesticides more precisely, which can dramatically reduce how much they're needed, Kunz said. Bayer's sustainability efforts are attracting at least some ESG investors and ratings firms.

☆ I'm one of 2 honey sommeliers in the US — here's how I ended up tasting this sweet but surprisingly complex substance for a career
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-05 | by ( Lakshmi Varanasi | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Marina Marchese is one of two certified honey sommeliers in the US. Marchese said the work often involves tasting honey to identify its botanical sources. My origin storyI came into the world of honey tasting by way of beekeeping. Since then there has been a second, which only underscores the point that there are very few honey sommeliers in the country. Unlike wine sommeliers who swirl their glasses before they taste to release a wine's aromas and compounds, we honey sommeliers smear our glasses.

The government had been preparing a third and final annual dispensation to cover the 2023 sugar beet crop. Sugar beet growers group CGB condemned the "brutality of the decision" a few weeks before spring planting. That could further discourage sugar beet growers who faced drought-related yield losses last year and put a question mark over sugar production capacity. "When sugar manufacturers don't have enough sugar beet they have to close. The EU court's ruling followed a challenge to a similar exemption for neonicotinoid use on sugar beet in Belgium.

Here are 12 of the weirdest and most fascinating animal behaviors scientists spotted in 2022. Here are 12 bizarre and amazing things animals were spotted doing, some of which had never been seen before. It turned out that at least 12 species of primates had been reported doing so, a review published in the Journal of Zoology in October found. A dolphin swallowed 8 venomous sea snakesA sea snake (indicated with pink arrow), moments before it is captured and eaten by a Navy dolphin. Though animals have often been spotted using tools, these usually are used to give the animal a clear survival advantage.

Indeed he has no use for electricity and for more than half a century has lived entirely off the grid. That makes him one of the few people in Europe unconcerned about rising energy costs this winter. Right now, he has two house mates, a rooster, three chickens and a cat in a community he calls "The Tribe of the Harmonious Walnuts". "I feel privileged to have the freedom to choose my freedom," said Agnese, 35, who moved in two years ago. The "harmonious walnuts" grow fruit and vegetables, olives to produce olive oil, and keep bees for honey.

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