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European Orchard Bee is Now a Valuable Pollinator in UK–Since the Weather Got Warmer

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Andy Corbley
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Pair of European orchard bees (Osmia cornuta) GNU Free license
Pair of European orchard bees (Osmia cornuta) GNU Free license

If you happen to be on a ramble in southern Britain next year, you may see a solitary orangish bee flitting between rising flowers as early as late February.

Such days used to be too cold for Osmia cornuta, known as the European orchard bee, a regular pollinator in orchards on the mainland. However, rising global temperatures have allowed this powerhouse pollinator to find the English meadows fit for purpose.

O. cornuta will emerge in early to mid-March and begin feeding on the nectar of the earliest flowering plants like scilla, a genus of bulb-forming perennial flowers, often called squills and known for their early spring blooming of star-shaped blue, purple, white, or pink blossoms.

Though not a honeybee, it is utilized as a commercial pollinator, and deployed in almond, cherry, and apple orchards. A solitary species, the orchard bee lays a single egg in a nest dug into rotting wood. Inside, it will stash pollen for the baby bee to eat, and then seal up the hole to protect it.

If wood isn’t available, it will happily use masonry or house walls, cracked window frames, drainage pipes, and other nooks and crannies in anthropogenic locales.

MORE GOOD POLLINATOR STORIES: A Country of 2 Million is the World Leader in Beekeeping and Protecting Pollinators

Though some might interpret its arrival in Great Britain as a negative because of the warming climate, a warming climate is also blamed for reducing pollinator species, so presumably the arrival of native European pollinator will help keep England’s meadows and verges the flowerful sights they are boasted to be.

SHARE The Buzz Among Britons That There’s A New Bee On The Block… 

Renowned Salk Institute Studies Native Plants for Drug Discoveries in Weight Loss, Allergies, Asthma, and Headaches

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Andy Corbley
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(left) Artemisia annua - credit, Kristian Peters, CC 3.0. BY(right) Ephedra viridis - credit, Dcrjsr CC BY 3.0.
(left) Artemisia annua – credit, Kristian Peters, CC 3.0. BY(right) Ephedra viridis – credit, Dcrjsr CC BY 3.0.

Scientists in San Diego are working alongside Native Americans to plumb the genetic depths of medicinal plants in the name of potentially commercializing them as medicines.

Researchers from the renowned Salk Institute for Biological Studies work extensively at the Medicinal Plants Nursery in the San Diego Botanic Garden, growing and studying native California plants traditionally used to treat any malady under the Sun.

Those who know something of American medical history will know that Dr. Jonas Salk developed the vaccine for Polio. He leant his name and reputation to an institute, which today carries on the work of developing cutting edge medicines and making breakthrough discoveries in the field of aging and plant biology.

However, in this case, the sophisticated Salk laboratories are being trained on rudimentary pharmaceutical development strategies, namely those to do with medicinal herbs.

“We have co-evolved with all of these medicinal plants,” said Salk Institute biologist Dr. Todd Michael. “I mean, they make these things probably to protect themselves, but also maybe because they make their mammal counterparts happy.”

Some specimens which Dr. Michael and his colleague Dr. Ben Neiman are focusing on include ephedra, which has a history of being used to treat syphilis, weight loss, allergies, asthma, and headaches; artemisia, used to treat malaria; and yerba santa, which Salk biologists are investigating for its potential foundation in a neurological drug for Alzheimer’s disease.

In the case of the latter two, Native Americans have used them traditionally as medicine, and they are collaborating with Salk in studying them for the depth of their medicinal properties.

MORE STORIES LIKE THIS: 

KFMB, CBS 8 San Diego reports that the work done by Salk is attracting national attention, with nurseries and institutes around the country sending cuttings, seeds, and plants to further their efforts.

Dr. Neiman says that the goal of translating the work into clinical trials and commercial pharmaceutical products is a “circular ecosystem” in economic terms, since the more drugs that can be developed, the more that tribal nations in and around San Diego County, and the natural landscape where these plants thrive, can be rewarded and protected.

WATCH the story below from the Salk Institute… 

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Shopkeeper’s Chaotic Attempt to Wrangle Kittens into Their Cage is Hilarious Surveillance Video

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Chongqing, China pet shop - SWNS
Chongqing, China pet shop / SWNS

CCTV footage captured the hilarious scene as a shop owner struggled to wrangle kittens into their cage—scooping up each one while another was escaping every time.

Shared by a pet store in Chongqing, China, on April 30, 2025, the video shows the worker battling to transfer five tiny kittens from their carriers into the cage.

Like a wacky ‘Keystone Cops’ scene, the situation quickly spirals into chaos, with each kitten trying to make a break for it.

Every time he manages to get one cat inside, another darts out, creating a funny, seemingly endless cycle of escape and capture.

LOOK: Man Goes to Rescue One Kitty and is ‘Ambushed’ By 12 More in a Roadside Meet-Cute 

WATCH the video from SWNS News agency…

DON’T LET ’EM ESCAPE Before Sharing the Laughs On Social Media…

MIT Physicists Snap the First Ever Images of Atoms – Capturing Them in Their ‘Free-Range’ States

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Two types of atoms-bosons on the left exhibit bunching while the fermions on the right display anti-bunching – Credit: Sampson Wilcox / MIT
Two types of atoms, bosons on the left exhibit bunching while the fermions on the right display anti-bunching – Credit: Sampson Wilcox / MIT

MIT physicists have captured the first images of individual atoms freely interacting in space. The pictures reveal correlations among the “free-range” particles that until now were predicted but never directly observed. Their findings will help scientists visualize never-before-seen quantum phenomena in real space.

The images were taken using a technique developed by the team that allows a cloud of atoms to move and interact freely until a lattice of light is turned on which briefly freezes the atoms in their tracks. Finely tuned lasers briefly illuminate the suspended atoms, creating a picture of their positions before the atoms naturally dissipate.

The physicists sought to compare different types of atoms, including “bosons,” which bunched up in a quantum phenomenon to form a wave. They also captured atoms known as “fermions” in route to pairing-up in free space — a key mechanism that enables superconductivity.

“We are able to see single atoms in these interesting clouds of atoms and what they are doing in relation to each other, which is beautiful,” says Martin Zwierlein, a Physics Professor at MIT.

Never Seen Before

A single atom is about one-tenth of a nanometer in diameter, which is one-millionth of the thickness of a strand of human hair. Unlike hair, atoms behave and interact according to the rules of quantum mechanics; it is their quantum nature that makes atoms difficult to understand. For example, we cannot simultaneously know precisely where an atom is and how fast it is moving.

Current imaging techniques only allowed you to see the overall shape and structure of a cloud of atoms—like looking at a cloud in the sky, but not being able to see the individual droplets making up the cloud.

RELATED BREAKTHROUGH: New Class of Matter Behaves Like a Solid and a Granule in Way Never Seen Before

The new technique is called “atom-resolved microscopy” and involves first corralling a cloud of atoms in a loose trap formed by a laser beam, then flashing light that freezes the atoms in their positions, while a second laser illuminates the suspended atoms, revealing their individual positions.

“It’s the first time we do it in-situ, where we can suddenly freeze the motion of the atoms when they’re strongly interacting, and see them, one after the other,” Zwierlein told MIT News. “That’s what makes this technique more powerful than what was done before.”

Bunches and pairs

The team applied the imaging technique to directly observe interactions among both bosons and fermions. Photons are an example of a boson, while electrons are a type of fermion. Atoms can be bosons or fermions, depending on their total spin, which is determined by whether the total number of their protons, neutrons, and electrons is even or odd. In general, bosons attract, whereas fermions repel.

Zwierlein and his colleagues first imaged a cloud of bosons made up of sodium atoms. At low temperatures, a cloud of bosons forms what’s known as a Bose-Einstein condensate — a state of matter where all bosons share one and the same quantum state. MIT’s Ketterle was one of the first to produce a Bose-Einstein condensate, of sodium atoms, for which he shared the 2001 Nobel Prize in Physics.

Zwierlein’s group, which published their findings in the journal Physical Review Letters, now is able to image the individual sodium atoms within the cloud, to observe their quantum interactions. It has long been predicted that bosons should “bunch” together, having an increased probability to be near each other. This bunching is a direct consequence of their ability to share the same quantum mechanical wave—a wave-like character first predicted by physicist Louis de Broglie, which sparked the beginning of modern quantum mechanics.

MORE MIT MARVELS: MIT Makes ‘Astonishing’ Discovery That Light Can Vaporize Water Without Heat–for Clean Energy and Desalination

“We understand so much more about the world from this wave-like nature,” Zwierlein says. “But it’s really tough to observe these quantum, wave-like effects. However, in our new microscope, we can visualize this wave directly.”

The team also imaged a cloud of two types of lithium atoms. Each type of atom is a fermion, that naturally repels its own kind, but that can strongly interact with other particular fermion types. As they imaged the cloud, the researchers observed that indeed—a coupling that they could directly see for the first time.

“This kind of pairing is the basis of a mathematical construction people came up. But when you see pictures like these, it’s an object that was discovered in the mathematical world,” says study co-author Richard Fletcher, an MIT assistant professor of physics. “So it’s a very nice reminder that physics is about physical things. It’s real.”

QUANTUM REALM CONFIRMED: The Quantum Realm’s ‘Fifth State of Matter’ is Observed in Space For the First Time

Going forward, the physicists will apply their imaging technique to visualize more exotic and less understood phenomena, such as “quantum Hall physics” — situations when interacting electrons display novel correlated behaviors in the presence of a magnetic field.

“That’s where theory gets really hairy — where people start drawing pictures instead of being able to write down a full-fledged theory because they can’t fully solve it,” Zwierlein says. “Now we can verify whether these cartoons of quantum Hall states are actually real. Because they are pretty bizarre states.”

(Edited from media release by Jennifer Chu | MIT News)

SHARE THE QUANTUM BREAKTHROUGH With Science Lovers on Social Media…

“Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold.” – Zelda Fitzgerald (Happy Mother’s Day!)

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Getty Images for Unsplash+

Quote of the Day: “Nobody has ever measured, not even poets, how much the heart can hold.” – Zelda Fitzgerald (Happy Mother’s Day!)

Photo by: Getty Images for Unsplash+

With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?

Getty Images for Unsplash+

Good News in History, May 11

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Good News Network
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The Persistence of Memory, oil on canvas, and sometimes called "The Watches".

121 years ago today, Salvador Dali was born. Known for his striking and bizarre images, he is one of, if not the most famous surrealist painter in history. Inspired by the Renaissance masters, Dali nevertheless gravitated to the surrealist movements in the early 20th century. He would live in France for the duration of the Spanish Civil War, before moving to America and achieving commercial success. SEE a Couple of His Most Famous Works… (1904)

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From the Water-Wasteful ‘Ice Bucket Challenge’ Comes Pipelines Built in Nepal So Kids Don’t Have to Haul it From Afar

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Building pipelines – The Brimiri Fundation

A Scotsman, after living many years in Nepal, decided to transform the spirit of the Ice Bucket Challenge into something truly impactful—building water pipelines for remote villages. And, thanks to his efforts, over 112 families now have direct access to drinking water.

Ian Bent was in the village of Bimiri since 2014 discussing the lack of water and what could possibly be done about it, when someone tagged him in an “Ice-Bucket Challenge”, the online craze at the time.

He posted a rant on social media saying pouring good, clean water over his head was an absolute waste and made no sense.

He said if anyone wants to do something charitable, to hand over $20 or whatever they could afford for the construction of a well to provide water to “a village full of amazing people”.

2020 data from the World Health Organization showed that 3.3 million Nepalese lack access to running water, forcing many to walk long distances to bring water home.

Ian said he would personally deliver 20 liters of water to a village using a traditional basket strapped to his head, called a DOKU. The response was overwhelming. Hundreds of people reached out, sending donations totaling more than several thousand dollars—and the Bimiri Foundation was born.

Soon, his friends took part in “the DOKU Challenge” to experience firsthand the effort it takes to carry water from the source to the homes.

The DOKU Challenge – The Brimiri Fundation

“Delivering a single doku of water might seem like a drop in the ocean, but the emotional gravity of the task is massive for a person from a land of abundance to haul water like this” said Jim Tolle who was traveling in Nepal and joined the group.

WASTE NOT WATER: Sunshine Coast Recycles Wastewater to Irrigate Farms–Instead of Dumping into a River

From buckets to pipelines

The entire community is involved in building the pipelines. Children and parents dig trenches where the pipes are laid. A local engineer oversees the connections. But that’s not all. Sometimes, to deliver necessary materials, they have to build access roads or secure electricity. It’s a massive undertaking.

But the effort not only improves living conditions but also expands opportunities: small eateries emerge, more livestock is raised, and families can dedicate more time to their children’s education.

The village of Bimiri now has running water to every home so that the women and girls who live there, some as young as 10, no longer have the heavy daily burden taking up hours of their time.

“Ian is a real hero,” Tolle told GNN. “Although an outsider and a loner, he is an incredible example of the kind of person worth emulating.”

WATER BREAKTHROUGH: Billions of People Could Benefit from This Breakthrough in Desalination That Ensures Freshwater for the World

“Now that we have finally reached success in the first village,” Ian wrote on his Foundation’s website, “we have set our targets on installing one tap to every home in the entire Namobuddah district, made up of Sawara (approximately 2km from Bimiri), Cheggin, Balukurka, Gurgaon, Chinde, Darakuteri and Karbardunga.”

“We have already begun costing this project and hope to begin work very soon!”

Additionally, Tolle says a program is soon launching that will foster that role model among children. Students from a Scottish primary school will visit Nepal to support Ian’s foundation and learn about the importance of helping others.

Consider donating at TheBimiriFoundation.com – And Share the Story on Social Media So Others Might Donate…

Women Reunited With Sister After DNA Test and 57-year Search Ends the Mystery of a Forced Adoption

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Sisters June (left), Trish (centre) and Geraldine - SWNS
Sisters June (left), Trish (centre) and Geraldine – SWNS

Two women found their long-lost sister after a 57-year search thanks to DNA test results that sounded like an ‘April Fools prank’.

Now in their 60s, sisters Trish and June spent their lives searching for their oldest sibling, Geraldine, who is more than a decade older.

Geraldine was a four-year-old when her mother Mary Wills was forced to put her up for adoption by a religious order of Catholic nuns in the convent where the single mom and her daughter spent their early years.

Mary moved on and later met Peter Wills, with whom she had three children after marrying in 1956, settling in Somerset, England.

Despite always knowing they had an older sister, Trish and June weren’t able to find her before their mom died from liver cancer in 2011.

When Trish gave her daughter, Laura, 34, an Ancestry DNA test for Christmas in 2023 it didn’t turn up any matches—until last month.

Little did they know that their biological half-sister Geraldine would upload her details onto the same website database and Laura would be notified that Ancestry had uncovered a match “without a doubt”.

On April 1, Laura reached out to Geraldine through email and reassured her it wasn’t an “April Fool’s joke”.

Trish, a writer, from Somerset, England recalled: “I thought Laura was playing April Fool’s on me – turns out Geri thought the same thing too.”

The three sisters video called before meeting in person for the first time two weeks ago in Somerset, England, and felt “instant love” for their long-lost sibling.

“Meeting for the first time was emotional, and I felt an instant feeling of love for Geri,” Trish told SWNS news agency.

“Me, her, and June all have the same laugh—and I can’t believe how similar we all look.

“We feel like Mum is with us now and this is what she would’ve wanted.

“Having Geri in my life is something I’ve always wanted. June and I had always been told about Geraldine, but we hadn’t been able to track her down.”

Geraldine visiting Mary’s grave for first time – SWNS

“I couldn’t believe it when Laura said she’d found Geri. It’s just a shame we couldn’t do it when Mum was still alive.”

The sisters knew that their mum had moved from Ireland after giving up Geraldine at aged four and trained as a nurse in Bolton, near Manchester, but they had not been told the details of Geraldine’s adoption, or where she had relocated.

MORE LOVING REUNIONS:
• Woman Hires Private Detective and Finds 2 Long-Lost Sisters After 44 Years and the Death of Adoptive Parents
• Woman Looking for Birth Parents Learns That Dad Was a ‘Friend’ on Facebook

Geri learn more about her late mother—but the meeting also unveiled family secrets for Trish and June too.

They discovered their mum was a survivor of Bessborough Mother and Baby Home, in County Cork, Ireland, run by Sisters of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. The home, which was subject to an investigation by the Irish Government in 2021, was found to have forced many adoptions and treated unmarried mothers—whom they deemed “sinful”—with severe cruelty.

Mary was a victim of the convent’s ill-treatment and their policies were the reason she was forced to give Geraldine up for adoption.

AMAZING: Mom Credits a Stranger’s Comment For Helping to Save Her Son’s Life

Speaking about the reunion, Trish said: “I never thought we’d find her, and I never thought we’d be like a Long Lost Family episode.

“We took her to mum’s grave, which was very emotional… and we’re planning to take a trip to Ireland to see where Mary had spent her earlier years.

“But this is the start of making memories together now.

SHARE THE HEARTWARMING Story With Sisters on Social Media…

Okra and Fenugreek Extracts Safely Remove Microplastics From Water in New Texas Research

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Okra plant By Mae Monares
Okra plant By Mae Monares

The substances behind the slimy strings from okra and the gel from fenugreek seeds could trap microplastics better than a commonly used synthetic polymer.

Texas researchers proposed in 2022 using these sticky natural polymers to clean up water. Now, they’ve found that okra and/or fenugreek extracts attracted and removed up to 90% of microplastics from ocean water, freshwater, and groundwater.

With funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, Rajani Srinivasan and colleagues at Tarleton State University found that the plant-based polymers from okra, fenugreek, and tamarind stick to microplastics, clumping together and sinking for easy separation from water.

In this next stage of the research, they have optimized the process for okra and fenugreek extracts and tested results in a variety of types of water.

To extract the sticky plant polymers, the team soaked sliced okra pods and blended fenugreek seeds in separate containers of water overnight. Then, researchers removed the dissolved extracts from each solution and dried them into powders.

Analyses published in the American Chemical Society journal showed that the powdered extracts contained polysaccharides, which are natural polymers. Initial tests in pure water spiked with microplastics showed that:

  • One gram of either powder in a quart (one liter) of water trapped microplastics the most effectively.
  • Dried okra and fenugreek extracts removed 67% and 93%, respectively, of the plastic in an hour.
  • A mixture of equal parts okra and fenugreek powder reached maximum removal efficiency (70%) within 30 minutes.
  • The natural polymers performed significantly better than the synthetic, commercially available polyacrylamide polymer used in wastewater treatment.

DID YOU KNOW: There’s a Surprisingly Easy Way to Remove Microplastics From Drinking Water: Boil it

Then the researchers tested the plant extracts on real microplastic-polluted water. They collected samples from waterbodies around Texas and brought them to the lab. The plant extract removal efficiency changed depending on the original water source.

Okra worked best in ocean water (80%), fenugreek in groundwater (80-90%), and the 1:1 combination of okra and fenugreek in freshwater (77%).

The researchers hypothesize that the natural polymers had different efficiencies because each water sample had different types, sizes and shapes of microplastics.

Polyacrylamide, which is currently used to remove contaminants during wastewater treatment, has low toxicity, but its precursor acrylamide is considered toxic. Okra and fenugreek extracts could serve as biodegradable and nontoxic alternatives.

“Utilizing these plant-based extracts in water treatment will remove microplastics and other pollutants without introducing additional toxic substances to the treated water,” said Srinivasan in a media release, “thus reducing long-term health risks to the population.”

CHECK OUT: Plant-Based Sawdust Filter Removes Up to 99.9% of Microplastics from Water

She had previously studied the use of food-grade plant extracts as non-toxic flocculants to remove textile-based pollutants from wastewater and thought, ‘Why not try microplastics?’

MAKE A SPLASH on Social Media By Sharing the Texas Breakthrough…

Your Weekly Horoscope – ‘Free Will Astrology’ by Rob Brezsny

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Our partner Rob Brezsny, who has a new book out, Astrology Is Real: Revelations from My Life as an Oracle, provides his weekly wisdom to enlighten our thinking and motivate our mood. Rob’s Free Will Astrology, is a syndicated weekly column appearing in over a hundred publications. He is also the author of Pronoia Is the Antidote for Paranoia: How All of Creation Is Conspiring To Shower You with Blessings. (A free preview of the book is available here.)

Here is your weekly horoscope…

FREE WILL ASTROLOGY – Week of May 10, 2025
Copyright by Rob Brezsny, FreeWillAstrology.com

TAURUS (April 20-May 20):
Classical ballet dancers often seek to convey the illusion of weightlessness through highly stylized movements. Innovative Taurus choreographer Martha Graham had a different aim, emphasizing groundedness. Emotional depth and rooted physicality were crucial to her art of movement. “The body never lies” is a motto attributed to her, along with “Don’t be nice, be real.” I recommend you make those themes your guides for now, Taurus. Ask your body to reveal truths unavailable to your rational mind. Value raw honesty and unembellished authenticity over mere decorum.

GEMINI (May 21-June 20):
Gemini photographer Margaret Bourke-White (1904–1971) was a trailblazer. She was the first American woman war photojournalist, the first professional photographer permitted into the Soviet Union, and among the first to photograph a Nazi concentration camp. She was consistently at the right place at the right time to record key historical moments. She’s your role model in the coming months. You, too, will have a knack for being in the right place and time to experience weighty turning points. Be vigilant for such opportunities. Be alert and ready to gracefully pounce.

CANCER (June 21-July 22):
“Each negative word in a news headline increases click-through rates,” writes Joan Westenberg. “Negative political posts on social media get twice the engagement. The system rewards pessimism.” She wants to be clear: “Doomsayers aren’t necessarily wrong. Many concerns are valid. But they’ve built an attention economy that profits from perpetual panic. It’s a challenge to distinguish between actionable information and algorithmic amplification, genuine concern and manufactured outrage.” Westenberg’s excellent points are true for all of us. But it’s especially important that you Cancerians take measures to protect yourself now. For the sake of your mental and physical health, you need extra high doses of optimism, hope, and compassion. Seek out tales of triumph, liberation, pleasure, and ingenuity far more than tales of affliction, mayhem, and corruption.

LEO (July 23-Aug. 22):
Bees are smart. The robust and lightweight honeycombs they create for their homes are designed with high efficiency, maximizing storage space while using the least amount of resources. Let’s make the bees’ genius your inspirational role model for the coming weeks, Leo. It will be a favorable time to optimize your own routines and systems. Where can you reduce unnecessary effort and create more efficiency? Whether it’s refining your schedule, streamlining a project, or organizing your workspace, small adjustments will yield pleasing rewards.

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22):
In 1971, Virgo poet Kay Ryan began teaching English at a small community college. Though she wrote steadily, working hard to improve her craft and publish books, she never promoted herself. For years, she was virtually unknown. Finally, in 2008, she flamed into prominence. In quick succession, she served as the US Poet Laureate, won a Pulitzer Prize, and received a $500,000 “genius grant” as a MacArthur Fellow. Why am I telling you about her long toil before getting her rightful honors? Because I believe that if you are ever going to receive the acclaim, recognition, appreciation, and full respect you deserve, it will happen in the coming months.

LIBRA (Sept. 23-Oct. 22):
Libran author Diane Ackerman combines an elegant poetic sensibility and a deft skill at scientific observation. She is lyrical and precise, imaginative and logical, inventive and factual. I would love for you to be inspired by her example in the coming weeks. Your greatest success and pleasure will arise as you blend creativity with pragmatism. You will make good decisions as you focus on both the big picture and the intimate details. PS: If you immerse yourself in the natural world and seek out sensory-rich experiences, I bet you will inspire a smart solution to an achy dilemma.

SCORPIO (Oct. 23-Nov. 21):
Scorpio-born Sabina Spielrein (1885–1942) was one of the earliest woman psychoanalysts. In the 21st century, she is increasingly recognized as a great thinker who got marginalized because of her feminist approach to psychology. Several of her big contributions were Scorpionic to the core: She observed how breakdown can lead to breakthrough, how most transformations require the death of an old form, and how dissolution often serves creation. These will be useful themes for you to ruminate about in the coming weeks. For best results, be your deep, true, Scorpio self.

SAGITTARIUS (Nov. 22-Dec. 21):
In the middle of his art career, Sagittarian painter Paul Klee (1879–1940) was drafted into the German army as a soldier in World War I. Rather than fighting on the front lines, he managed to get a job painting camouflage on military airplanes. This enabled him to conduct artistic explorations and experiments. The metal hulls became his canvases. I am predicting a comparable opportunity disguised as an obstacle for you, Sagittarius. Just as the apparent constraint on Klee actually advanced his artistic development, you will discover luck in unexpected places.

CAPRICORN (Dec. 22-Jan. 19):
“To live is so startling it leaves little time for anything else,” wrote poet Emily Dickinson. I often feel that truth. As much as I would love to devote 70+ hours a week to creative writing and making music, I am continually diverted by the endless surprises of the daily rhythm. One of these weeks, maybe I’ll be brave enough to simply give myself unconditionally to ordinary life’s startling flow and forget about trying to accomplish anything great. If you have ever felt a similar pull, Capricorn, the coming days will be prime time to indulge. There will be no karmic cost incurred.

AQUARIUS (Jan. 20-Feb. 18):
David Bowie was a brilliant musical composer and performer. His artistry extended to how he crafted his persona. He was constantly revising and reshaping his identity, his appearance, and his style. The Ziggy Stardust character he portrayed on stage, for example, had little in common with his later phase as the Thin White Duke. “I’ve always collected personalities,” he quipped. If you have ever felt an inclination to experiment with your image and identity, Aquarius, the coming weeks will be an excellent time. Shape-shifting could be fun and productive. Transforming your outer style may generate interesting inner growth. What would be interesting ways to play with your self-expression?

PISCES (Feb. 19-March 20):
The Voynich manuscript is a famous text written in an unfamiliar script filled with bizarre illustrations. Carbon-dated to the early 15th century, it has resisted all attempts at deciphering its content. Even Artificial Intelligence has not penetrated its meaning. I propose we make this enigmatic document an iconic metaphor for your life in the coming weeks. It will symbolize the power you can generate by celebrating and honoring mystery. It will affirm the fact that you don’t necessarily require logical explanations, but can instead appreciate the beauty of the unknown. Your natural comfort with ambiguity will be a potent asset, enabling you to work effectively with situations others find too uncertain.

ARIES (March 21-April 19):
Just for now, you might benefit from moderating your intensity. I am pleased to see how much good stuff you have generated lately, but it may be time to scale back a bit. At least consider the possibility of pursuing modest, sustainable production rather than daring to indulge in spectacular bursts of energy. In conclusion, dear Aries, the coming days will be a favorable time for finding the sweet spot between driving ambition and practical self-care. Your natural radiance won’t have to burn at maximum brightness to be effective.

WANT MORE? Listen to Rob’s EXPANDED AUDIO HOROSCOPES, 4-5 minute meditations on the current state of your destiny — or subscribe to his unique daily text message service at: RealAstrology.com

(Zodiac images by Numerologysign.com, CC license)

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“There’s a great power in words, if you don’t hitch too many of them together.” – Josh Billings

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Quote of the Day: “There’s a great power in words, if you don’t hitch too many of them together.” – Josh Billings

Photo by: Eric Ward

With a new inspirational quote every day, atop the perfect photo—collected and archived on our Quote of the Day page—why not bookmark GNN.org for a daily uplift?

Good News in History, May 10

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Happy 65th Birthday to Bono, the singer-songwriter of U2. With his rose-colored glasses, the businessman and philanthropist (in the ONE Campaign, Product RED, and The Global Fund) has dedicated more than 20 years to eradicating global poverty—especially south of the equator in Africa—and has worked with most US presidents going back to Bill Clinton to achieve that goal. Before that he was a ‘bono-fied’ rock star, whose powerful voice and frontman persona transcended both stadium rock and adult alternative, allowing the band to acquire fans as fast as a vacuum sucks up dust. READ about his activities during COVID-19… (1965)

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New Caledonia Bans ‘Dangerous’ Seabed Mining for Half a Century in the South Pacific

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Andy Corbley
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Île Balabio, off the northern tip of Grande Terra, New Caledonia’s main island - credit NASA/GSFCLandsat 7
Île Balabio, off the northern tip of Grande Terra, New Caledonia’s main island – credit NASA/GSFCLandsat 7

The Pacific island territory of New Caledonia has announced a moratorium on seabed mining for nickel across 1.3 million square kilometers of ocean.

The rare and sweeping move places the French territory among the most restrictive in the world in terms of seabed extraction, and should enable the protection of roughly one-third of the world’s pristine coral reefs.

Lawmakers on the sovereign yet-not independent islands adopted the measure on Tuesday with broad support for a length of 50 years.

“Rather than giving in to the logic of immediate profit, New Caledonia can choose to be a pioneer in ocean protection,” said Jérémie Katidjo Monnier, the local government member responsible for the issue, during the public session according to RFI. 

“It is also a strategic lever to assert our environmental sovereignty in the face of multinationals and a strong signal of commitment to future generations,” he added.

Only 1.5% of all coral habitat in the world is considered pristine, so the protection of the New Caledonian seabed is one of the most robust measures that could be taken to ensure they stay that way.

Certain members of a political party loyal to France have argued that the measure was “disproportionate” and protects huge areas of seabed “we’ve never even seen before” in addition to the known reef locations.

Deep sea mining is extremely controversial. Japan, possibly the nation with the most advanced existing infrastructure for doing so, has the benefit of commanding territorial waters where manganese “nodules” containing copper, nickel, and other battery metals sit on top of the seabed rather than below it.

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However, Japan is also planning to mine deep sea “cobalt crusts,” mud, and hydrothermal vents. Extensive environmental surveys are being planned to coincide with the first large-scale deep sea mining projects ever conducted by a country in her own territorial waters.

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More than 20 nations have expressed great concern over the practice, believing its environmental harms haven’t been fully understood, and have either called for outright moratoriums or strategic pauses to allow proper scientific research to be conducted.

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China’s Dying EV Batteries and Solar Cells Are Powering a Circular Economy Worth $38 Billion per Year

By
Andy Corbley
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A BYD e5 Electric Vehicle Battery Model (CC 4.0. BY-SA DKMclaren) and used cathode particles from a spent lithium ion battery ( David BaillotUC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering CC 3.0.)
A BYD e5 Electric Vehicle Battery Model (CC 4.0. BY-SA DKMclaren) and used cathode particles from a spent lithium ion battery ( David BaillotUC San Diego Jacobs School of Engineering CC 3.0.)

China has always placed importance on self-sufficiency, and now the world’s largest consumer of industrial metals is digging mines into its own waste streams.

The largest producer of solar panels, batteries, and EVs, Chinese businesses are seeing in these valuable products equally valuable opportunities for recycling and revenue.

The China Resources Recycling Group, created by the State Council last year, is seeking to bring together businesses with the expertise and infrastructure to recycle offline e-waste in large quantities for its lithium, cobalt, copper, gold, aluminum, and nickel.

According to the national publication Economic Daily, the trade in recycled materials from wind and solar power and EV batteries has grown to an enormous sum of $38.5 billion per year, more than double of what the US market for solar recycling was predicted to be in 2050, and also more than the current market for recycling both solar panels and lithium-ion batteries.

Chinese manufacturers produce the greatest share of the world’s electric vehicles, and after a decade of growth, the first wave of battery retirements is crashing down on the Chinese economy. In just a few years, the retired battery tonnage is expected to reach 4 million.

Speaking with South China Morning Post, a pair of business owners said they are seeing big revenues in recycling coming from batteries and solar cells. One, Tianli Technology in Zhejiang Province, earns a quarter of all profits from just batteries, while the much larger Henan Hairui Intelligent Technology, has 70% of its productive capacity dedicated to making machines that recycle batteries and solar panels.

“There is huge potential in the business of new-energy waste, because new energy is where China and the world are going,” said Hairui sales manager Ma Long.

Beijing has so far enrolled 156 businesses to standardize the battery-recycling market’s practices for avoiding workplace accidents and environmental contamination.

Previous eras of industrial growth in China have led to disastrous instances of environmental contamination, something subsequent CCP efforts have strived to prevent. Lithium-ion batteries contain toxic metals and compounds that can leech into soils and waterways, so proper recycling is key. It’s also rewarding, as every gram of nickel and lithium safely extracted helps keep bottom lines high.

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Perhaps even more astonishing than the growth of the EV market in China was its expansion of solar panel production and installation. In one single desert solar array, 3 million panels are shimmering already under the Sun. This is an outgrowth of a ridiculously-large expansion of clean energy industry.

China became the first country to have over 100 GW of total installed photovoltaic capacity in 2017, and as of 2024, was home to 1 in every 3 panels installed worldwide as it added 277 GW of solar power in that one 12-month period, equivalent to 15% of the world’s total installed solar capacity.

Chinese firms are the industry leaders in almost all the key parts of the solar industry supply chain, including polysilicon, silicon wafers, batteries, and photovoltaic modules.

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The recycling chains for solar power are less developed than for batteries, in part because the environmental impact of batteries is higher than retired solar panels. But if the growth in producing panels, producing batteries, and recycling batteries is any indication, one would expect this deficiency to disappear rapidly as the country begins to retire its first generation of solar panels.

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The First Ever American Pope: A Missionary and Villanova Graduate From Chicago is Now ‘Leo XIV’

By
Andy Corbley
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Edgar Beltrán / The Pillar (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Pope Leo XIV waves at the people gathered in St. Peter’s Square in first public appearance as pope – Edgar Beltrán / The Pillar (CC BY-SA 4.0)

After a conclave of merely two days—a shock in itself—a far greater shock emerged when the white smoke billowing out into the skies over Vatican City heralded the election of the first American ever to hold the papacy.

Robert Prevost, born in Chicago, holds in his hands the keys to the kingdom of Catholics as the ‘Vicar of Christ’.

CNN, reporting on one of the least-predicted outcomes the College of Cardinals could have produced, said that the United States has long been considered too powerful: militarily, culturally, and diplomatically to be afforded the honor of leading the Catholic Church.

But Prevost, who considers himself a missionary at heart, is very much a child of the world. In fact, he was termed the “least American” of the US cardinals.

Pope Leo XIV is also a Peruvian citizen, having held the position of bishop during a 20-year stay in the South American country. Two years ago, Pope Francis appointed him to prefect for the Dicastery for Bishops at the Vatican. Speaking fluent Italian, he delivered the first speech of his papacy in the language of Rome. (Watch the speech below…)

Following the appointment, in an interview with Vatican News, Prevost, then 67, said of himself “I still consider myself a missionary—my vocation, like that of every Christian, is to be a missionary, to proclaim the Gospel wherever one is.”

Additionally, the revolutionary papal tenure of his predecessor, Pope Francis, whose acclaim and whose own words were on the new Pope’s lips within two minutes of his first speech as the leader of the Vatican, saw in Prevost the capability of leadership.

Francis “respected him and thought of him very highly,” according to CNN’s Vatican correspondent Christopher Lamb. “Clearly Pope Francis saw in him something—he saw him as a capable leader.”

Multiple news outlets report that it’s expected Prevost will carry on much of Francis’ work and reforms, which were some of the most impactful in the modern history of the Church, but also controversial.

For example, in the same Vatican News interview, Prevost was asked what he thought of Francis’ decision to include three women in the Dicastery for Bishops.

“I think their appointment is more than just a gesture on the part of the Pope to say that there are now women here, too. There is a real, genuine, and meaningful participation that they offer at our meetings when we discuss the dossiers of candidates,” he replied.

The Worker’s Pope

As for his papal name, Leo, it follows from Leo XIII who was known as the “Worker’s Pope” in reference to his 1891 encyclical Rarum novarum, which outlined the rights of workers to a fair wage, safe working conditions, and the formation of trade unions, while affirming the rights to property and free enterprise.

IN MEMORY OF FRANCIS:

The Vatican described the new Leo as the first pope from the Order of Saint Augustine, for which he served two six-year terms as Prior General, the first pope from North America, the first pope born after World War II, and the first pope from an English-speaking country since Adrian IV in the 12th century.

For certain he’s the first pope to ever graduate from Villanova. He earned a Bachelor of Science degree in mathematics in 1977 from the school founded by the Augustinians (the Order of Saint Augustine). He’s also a Chicago White Sox baseball fan.

Approximately 5 minutes into his speech, Saint Peter’s Square fell silent as the new pope paused, and, changing from Italian to Spanish, he beamed a smile and said “and now a greeting in Spanish to the people of my Diocese of Chiclayo, Peru.”

“To all you brothers and sisters of Rome, of Italy, of the world, we want to be a sinodal church, a church that walks forward, a church that always seeks peace, a church that always seeks to be close to those who suffer,” she added, switching back to Italian.

WATCH the speech below with a translator courtesy of CBS… 

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Zookeeper Becomes Surrogate Parent to Two Baby Gorillas Rejected by Mothers After Pregnancy Complications

By
Andy Corbley
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Alan Toyne and one of his baby gorillas - credit SWNS
Alan Toyne and one of his baby gorillas – credit SWNS

Like any good foster parent, Alan Toyne shared everything with the babies he was responsible for rearing—his bed, his dining table, his life.

And if you paid him a visit in his Bristol home during a seven-month period in 2016, you’d be impressed with his dedication to ensuring those babies learned how to climb, swing, grunt, and beat their chest—since they were a pair of lowland gorillas.

Toyne had been working for 10 years working as a zookeeper at the Bristol Zoo when he became part of the first team in the UK to hand-rear baby gorillas by working to replicate as much natural behavior as possible.

The surrogacy was necessary because Kera, one of 7 lowland gorillas at Bristol Zoo, developed pre-eclampsia, a birth complication that also occurs in humans, and her baby, later named Afia, was born 4 weeks early through an emergency C-section and rejected.

“We were the first team to use the surrogacy method of hand-rearing gorillas,” Toyne explains to the British media outlet SWNS, “other gorillas were hand-reared in the UK, but weren’t introduced to adult gorillas until they were four years old.”

The team leader of 6, Toyne, who had worked in the finance department of an engineering firm before joining a volunteer zookeeper program at Bristol Zoo in 2006, described the process as “an amazing experience.”

“I still remember the first day bringing Afia back to my home in her car seat and putting her asleep on table,” Toyne said. “My partner, Sharon, was like ‘oh my goodness’, and fell in love with her straight away.”

Unlike the other hand-rearing methods Toyne mentioned, he and his team brought Afia up side by side with the other gorillas to ensure they grew up “proper.”

“The first thing the gorillas had to learn how to do is cling onto their mothers—so we would wear these string vests,” to replicate gorilla fur, he explained. “It was all about training her how to be a proper gorilla, so you had to replicate all of the necessary factors.”

“During the day she would spend time with the gorillas, and if they came over to interact with Afia we would make sure they could—it was important to make them think she was part of the troop, as we always knew she would return to them.”

Toyne looked after both Afia and Hasani, who was also rejected by his mother after she stopped feeding him four weeks in, for around 7 months each.

The zookeeper recently wrote a memoir illustrating his unique journey with the fascinating primates in his audiobook, brilliantly-titled Gorillas in Our Midst.

“When I first brought Afia home—gorillas all eat at the same time—so when we had our tea, we’d all eat together, having our dinner with a gorilla at the table,” Toyne told SWNS, beginning to recall all the bizarreries of living with a gorilla in the house.

“If Afia wanted to wake me up to play she would slap me on the head like a bongo drum but with Sharon, Afia would gently stroke her face.”

“Like human babies, they don’t remember sitting in a car seat: they think of themselves as gorillas.”

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Alan admitted it was emotional to say goodbye to the baby gorillas at first, but he was overjoyed their hand-rearing experiences had been positive and successful.

Kera, Afia’s mom, had been reared in captivity 20 years ago, and experienced the problems that led to a re-examination of how best to hand-rear gorillas.

“Back then, if a baby gorilla needed rearing, they would go into a crèche all together, which spurs on their development and play behaviors; but the downside is they don’t understand gorilla social behavior. This meant Kera never fitted in, and was isolated,” Toyne said.

A SIMILAR LIFE STORY: Doctors Called in for Rare Emergency C-Section on Gorilla in the Zoo–and the Baby Pics Are Incredible

“The method we were using was to get the babies in with a surrogate to pick up natural gorilla behavior, then they would fit in normally and be ‘a normal gorilla.’”

After seven months, a surrogate mother took care of raising him socially, while the zoo team continued to bottle-feed Afia and Hasani for three years.

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