Seeing the Changes 1869

In Bynea, a Red fox (Vulpes vulpes) darted across the cycle route, behind me!

Insurers Like It Rare?

Hurricane Idalia made landfall in a relatively sparsely populated area of Florida, before going on to create further havoc in Georgia and the Carolinas. This will have kept insurance costs down, somewhat. In spite of this, Idalia has an estimated preliminary cost of almost $10bn. It could still prove to be the US's costliest climate disaster of 2023 (https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/aug/31/hurricane-idalia-cost-update-category-3-florida-georgia). Unfortunately, billion dollar climate disasters are increasing frequent in the US. Insurance companies want to make money. They operate on the basis of having to pay out for occasional disasters. Predictably, there's been a flight of insurance companies from Florida. Getting reinsured is going to get a lot harder, even in Mar-a-Lago.

Funga Face?

Fungi have always, compared to animals and plants, been a relatively neglected group of organisms. When, for example, conservationists speak about a location, they generally refer to its Fauna (animals) and Flora (plants). There's no Latinised term for the fungi. The Fungi Foundation, now advocate introducing the term 'Funga', to deal with conservation issues (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/aug/30/flora-fauna-and-funga-un-backs-new-term-for-conservation-discussions). 'Funga', isn't a Latin term, but has 'morphological similarity' to Fauna and Flora. This seems a sensible suggestion and could lead to fungi being more recognised and protected as important components of ecosystems. Why, however, stop there? Bacteria are also important agents, determining environmental health. Perhaps, we should refer to an environment's Fauna, Flora, Funga and Bacta?

Some of My Favourite Pictures of Insects From France

Insects have always seemed more exotic in France.