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Representative Image of a child examining ancient fossil footprints preserved in rock in Mentougou, Beijing (AI-generated image) In early 2025, 12-year-old Ni Jingchen was out exploring with his parents in Beijing's Mentougou district when he noticed two tiny marks on a slab of exposed rock. Ni already loved fossils and knew enough to realise that the strange impressions were worth a closer look, so he photographed them and shared the find online. He had no idea that his casual discovery would eventually bring professional palaeontologists to the site and reveal something scientists had never documented in Asia before. Associate professor Xing Lida of the China University of Geosciences in Beijing saw the photographs and organised a team to investigate. Their analysis showed that the slab preserved a forefoot and hind-foot track made by a small amphibian roughly 160 million years ago, during the Middle Jurassic. The animal most likely belonged to Salamandroidea, the group that inc..

A feral cat with a tipped ear, indicating it was neutered in a trap-neuter-return program. Images Credit: Brocken Inaglory/Wikipedia Ascension Island offers a striking example of how quickly an introduced predator can reshape an island’s wildlife. Cats brought to the South Atlantic island in 1815 preyed heavily on seabirds, driving almost all species away from the main island and leaving surviving colonies in places cats could not reach. More than a century later, conservationists began a major effort to remove the feral cats while protecting the island’s domestic animals and people.The campaign succeeded, and the last feral cat was killed in January 2004. In the years that followed, seabirds began returning to parts of the mainland where they had previously been unable to breed safely. The study published in ‘Oryx’ (The International Journal of Conservation, Cambridge University Press) documents both the difficult eradication campaign and the early signs of recovery, showing how remov..

UK-based beauty chain Opatra London has distanced itself from a Hong Kong distributor accused of using “deceptive sales practices”, even after the local branch said it offered to refund about a quarter of a HK$60,000 (US$7,650) shopping bill on skincare products.
The company said on Monday night that it deeply regretted if any customers had a “distressing experience associated with our brand”, and revealed it had initiated an independent review of the local distributor.
The move came after local…

AdvertisementSpainWorldEuropePregnant woman among 3 killed in suspected gang shooting in SpainThe three victims were a pregnant woman in her eighth month of pregnancy, a 62-year-old woman and a 16-year-old boy
1-MIN READ1-MIN ListendpaPublished: 10:52pm, 17 Aug 2026Updated: 10:52pm, 17 Aug 2026Three people have been shot dead in a suspected revenge attack linked to the drug trade in southwestern Spain, the authorities in the Andalusia region said on Monday.
The three victims were a pregnant woman in her eighth month of pregnancy, a 62-year-old woman and a 16-year-old boy. The unborn child also did not survive, the authorities said, adding that two other people were injured in the attack.
According to official statements, the attack took place in Isla Cristina, a town of 21,000 inhabitants in the Andalusian province of Huelva. Two masked perpetrators approached the victims on a motorcycle late on Sunday evening and fired numerous shots. The victims were left lying in the street and coul..

Representative image An 8-year-old boy’s unexpected catch during a fishing trip at a lake near Philadelphia has raised concerns about exotic pets being introduced into local waterways.On Saturday morning, Seamus Coffey, 8, reeled in a 2-lb red-bellied piranha, which he initially thought might be a large bass while he was fishing with his dad at a lake outside the city.”I'm reeling it in, and I think there's a bass,” Seamus said, ABC reported.His father, Michael Coffey, thought it was unlike anything they had caught before. “I was like, 'Slow down, dude, you might lose it. This looks like something we haven't caught before.'”The boy, however, identified the fish from YouTube videos and alerted his father, Michael, to the unusual catch.“I was like, 'Oh, this is a bluegill, I don't know what this is.' And he said, 'It's a piranha!'” Michael recalled.Pic courtesy: Facebook/ Mike Coffey The Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission spokesma..

Four Antonello da Messina works stolen in Renaissance painter's hometown Four works attributed to celebrated Sicilian Renaissance painter Antonello da Messina have been stolen from a regional museum in Messina, Italian media reported Sunday, in a heist carried out during the country’s Ferragosto holiday.The theft took place Saturday evening at the MuMe regional museum, where the thieves reportedly bypassed alarm and security systems and escaped with four artworks.Among the stolen pieces were three of the five surviving panels of the “San Gregorio Polyptych,” dated to 1473, as well as a double-sided panel depicting the Virgin Mary and the dead Christ in “Pietà.” The latter was removed from an armoured display case, according to Italian news agency LaPresse.Museum director Marisa Mercurio said the theft occurred shortly before 10 pm.“We are devastated by what happened,” Mercurio told ANSA, describing the stolen works as two of Antonello da Messina's most important and best-know..

A silver Montblanc fountain pen owned by Singapore’s first prime minister Lee Kuan Yew has sold for S$461,500 (US$360,000), nearly 10 times its highest estimate, after drawing 111 bids at an auction.
Singapore auction house Hotlotz said the sterling silver Montblanc Meisterstuck No 146 fountain pen, engraved with “SM Lee Kuan Yew”, sold on Sunday at its “Interiors & Collectibles – August, Fine Art Focus” online auction.
The pen had a presale valuation of S$30,000 to S$50,000, with bidding…

A raw, handcrafted Chinese animation has become an unlikely box-office sensation despite being widely panned by critics and social media users.
Niu Lai, or The Arrival of the Ox, has been criticised for its “rough” and “broken” style and a plot that many viewers found hard to follow.
But the film has generated some of the loudest online discussion in recent days, despite the competition from two Hollywood blockbusters: Christopher Nolan’s epic version of The Odyssey and Spider-Man: Brand New…

Welcome to the Island Where Egrets Rule A century after wildlife wardens began protecting a small island in Texas, the 35-acre site has become the world’s largest nesting colony for Reddish Egrets. Green Island sits in the Laguna Madre, a coastal lagoon in southern Texas. In 1923, Audubon Texas signed its first sanctuary lease with the Texas General Land Office to protect the island. At the time, coastal birds were under severe pressure from hunting. Their feathers were highly valued by the fashion industry, while people also collected their eggs and hunted the birds for meat. This caused Reddish Egret numbers to fall sharply across the Gulf Coast, leaving the species close to disappearing from Texas. Today, Green Island is the centre of a much larger conservation network. Audubon Texas manages 175 coastal islands, and the Texas Gulf Coast now has the world’s largest concentration of Reddish Egrets. The islands are also home to thousands of Great Blue Herons, Great Egrets, Roseate Spoo..

Chantal Doecke at Onkaparinga River in Adelaide A commercial DNA test has helped an Australian woman discover that she has a twin brother living only a short flight away. Chantal Doecke was evacuated from Saigon as a newborn in 1975 and brought to Australia during Operation Babylift, an international effort to move children out of Vietnam as the war came to an end. Doecke was taken to Adelaide in April 1975. She was carried onto the evacuation flight in a shoebox, with her umbilical cord still attached. For most of her life, she knew very little about her biological family or where she came from. Forty-nine years later, a DNA match revealed that she had a twin brother named Glenn, who was living in Brisbane. Doecke described the extraordinary discovery in a first-person account published by The Guardian as part of its “Experience” series.Evacuated in a shoeboxIn early 1975, Doecke’s adoptive parents answered an advertisement in an Australian newspaper asking families to adopt orphaned ..