Arianna Edwards

The neighbouring palloza, where Celia Alonso López was born in 1959, needs a full teito repair. "It rains longer inside than outside," Alonso told me while looking at the roof's leaks one rainy afternoon. "It will cost me 50,000 to 60,000 euros to repair the entire teito. But without help from the regional government, I can't do it," she said. Some owners ended up installing a metal roof sheet; no one likes the solution, but it's a more affordable choice.

The fight to save polar bears is intrinsically linked to the efforts fight climate change. However, there are several organisations dedicated to aiding polar bears. Polar Bears International is the only conservation group dedicated to helping polar bear. Comprising scientists and conservationists, they are dedicated to expanding our knowledge about polar bear using state-of-the-art technology, such as drones and electronic collars with cameras attached.

One night, we make camp along the river, serenaded by tree frogs and katydids—and watch fireflies flash in an open field, mirrored by twinkles of lightning in a brooding storm cloud on the horizon. Camping in Florida in August is not for the faint of heart, though, as a self-regenerating swarm of mosquitos appears at dusk—the likes of which I’ve never experienced.

The volcanoes are central to this island’s existence and to the people that live there. Réunion is a small tropical island, measuring only 69km (43 miles) at its widest. This small area holds rare endemic species, spectacular rainforest covered mountainous landscapes, rumbling volcanoes, vibrant coral reefs and a unique culture in tune with each other and the natural world.

A lion’s mane is usually seen as a way of calculating the s*xual appeal of a lion to potential mates. The more voluminous the mane, the greater the appeal of the male. However, recent evidence refutes this as a universal rule. Maneless male lions in Tsavo were shown to be able to attract mates as well as being able to successfully defend a territory against other males.

In some cases, such as baby sand tiger sharks Carcharias ta**us, this predatory behaviour starts early. It’s a survival of the fittest from day one for them: they compete in the womb, which results in the strongest frequently eating their siblings. Intrauterine cannibalisation, to use the correct term, means the 100mm long sand tiger shark embryos in the womb will feed on their fellow brothers and sisters until only the two biggest and strongest are left. It’s not just embryos these baby sharks eat, but also the mother’s unfertilised eggs which provide extra nourishment before they’re born.

Their gigantic mouths – big enough to house 100 people – can capture enormous quantities of prey with each gulp of water, filtering the nutritious krill from the expelled water with stiff bristles that grow from the roof of the mouth. During the summer months, they eat up to 6,000kg of krill a day.

To address these gaps in our knowledge, Cetalingua Project (my research group which decodes marine mammal communication) has launched a citizen science study called “Manatee Chat” on the Zooniverse website. First, we are asking people to help us identify manatees’ calls and eating noises by listening to sound files and visually examining a spectrogram (a visual representation of the sound and its frequency changes over time). In the second phase, we will classify these sounds and decode the individual calls of specific animals.

Unsure about puffin projectiles, I shifted so I could look upwind while continuing my conversation with my hosts, Rick Chaulk and his granddaughter. The two volunteered to show me Elliston's highlights, and despite being one of the best places in North America to view puffins, the 315-person village's real claim to fame is its stone- and turf-built root cellars.

Until now, scientific tags have been fitted to the whales mostly to monitor their sound and movement, creating a three-dimensional model of their underwater world, but new camera technology is allowing us to immerse ourselves in the depths of the ocean as s***m whales embark on their deep-sea hunt. Dives can be to depths over a kilometre as they hold their breath for over an hour.

In addition to s*x and shelter, food is the other key motivating factor behind the rush of autumn activity. Grey squirrels, which spend more time foraging on the ground than their red cousins, will bury thousands of the season’s abundance of nuts to provide a larder through winter. Their caches are scattered throughout woodlands, and scientists have found the animals have excellent spatial memories that help them retrieve their stores.

For a country that's half the size of Wales, Lebanon is tremendously diverse. The country's population is split roughly evenly between Sunni Muslims, Shia Muslims and Christians, and the state officially recognises 18 different sects. Sectarian divisions played a role in the country's bloody civil war, and more than 30 years after the war ended, many of these divisions remain.

On May 17, 2021, this famous natural bridge named for the English biologist collapsed into the Pacific Ocean, a result of erosion, according to Ecuador’s Ministry for the Environment. Popular with tourists visiting by cruise ship, the UNESCO World Heritage site teems with marine fauna, from manta rays to whale sharks and hawksbill turtles.

Cautiously reversing, an unhealthy grinding sound came from my vehicle as its four-wheel drive fought for traction. I was on sheer ice. The main roads and towns were blissfully clear, but turning off onto jagged moorland tracks for the final 30 minutes of my drive, the conditions worsened mile by mile. These are the joys of visiting Tan Hill Inn in December.

Our first day's hike saw us skirt the southern shore of Loch Hourn, a steep-sided, fjord-like body of water that reaches like a witch's finger between the peninsulas of Glenelg and Knoydart. The route traced the edges of the loch shore – it was mostly rocky and easy to discern, but often collapsed into boggy marsh, which sucked our boots and smeared our ankles in mud. This was once a deer-stalker's path, and, more forebodingly, a coffin road – a route along which corpses were carried to the Kilchoan burial ground in Inverie.

Rewind to 1565, and Sark was little more than a den for pirates smuggling contraband from its rugged coves and bays. Back then, Queen Elizabeth I gifted the island to settlers from the neighbouring island of Jersey in return for them ridding the island of buccaneers. Soon after, the settlement permitted the establishment of Sark's feudal system – a social system that largely died out in the previous century – and it still remains one of the world's most archaic islands.

The piece of land poking out of the Hebridean loch is an example of a remarkable form of a man-made island known as a crannog, which were created in multitudes via an inspiring blend of ingenuity and effort. Nearly 600 of these artificial islands have so far been recorded across mainland Scotland and its islands, built big enough to support large communal roundhouses or clusters of smaller dwellings, and linked by slender causeways or piers to the shorelines of myriad lochs in often stunning locations of wild beauty.

Cycling The Bog Road through Roundstone Bog in Connemara, County Galway, I met more sheep than cars as the free-range animals wandered across both the road and the spongy landscape. I stopped and stepped off the road to take a photo, and mud oozed around my foot. In Ireland's peat bogs, land is not separate from water.

The second event that has long defined the island occurred in 1941, when the SS Politician, carrying some 22,000 cases of fine malt whisky in its hold, struck submerged sandbanks off Eriskay.

Mount Rishiri, a dormant volcano and the island's imposing lone peak, rises up at the island's centre. Toshiya started pulling out maps, photos and magazine cuttings, his thick weather-worn fingers pointing out countless skiable lines – all of which he says he has skied in more than 20 years exploring the island's backcountry.

The famous temple complex of Angkor Wat is the largest religious monument in the world, sprawling over 400 sq km just outside Siem Reap. Constructed in the early 12th Century as the capital of the Khmer empire, the Unesco World Heritage site was originally a Hindu temple, but was converted into a Buddhist temple by the end of the century and is now one of the world's most important pilgrimage sites for Buddhists.

On remote, windswept Yttygran Island, a tiny isle in Siberia's Bering Sea, there's an arrangement of giant whale ribs and vertebrae known as "Whale Bone Alley". The 550m-long passageway, which juts out of the ground next to the ocean, is an eerie, slightly grisly sight.

This outside interest also changed the way locals feel about their culture. "We felt looked down on – for our ways, our language and our subsistence living," Murphy said. "Now we look at all these skills and we're proud of how self-sufficient we were. From there we started to value other things; our music, our food, our sense of humour."

So, it was only fair that I tried out the Michelin-starred Paul Ainsworth at No. 6, a restaurant known for its inventive plays on Cornish fare. While No. 6 pays homage to the area's fishing heritage, it doesn't overlook Cornwall's more land-locked offerings. Sometimes in one dish – like my first course, a warmed, raw scallop in an acorn ham broth with kohlrabi tartare.

In the heart of the Bahariya depression about 370km south-west of Cairo, an oasis brings life to one of the harshest regions on Earth. As with most oases in the Western Desert, Bahariya Oasis was formed after the depression reached the water table and natural springs emerged.

Those who make the journey usually come to dive off the south-western tip, Punta Francés, staying at the island's one hotel. Or, they tour the island's panopticon prison, Presidio Modelo (now an eerie museum), where Cuba's late Communist leader Fidel Castro was incarcerated in 1953 for attacking army barracks – an event that triggered the 1959 Cuban Revolution.

They sniffed hard, inhaling pariká, a hallucinogenic powder made of Amazonian barks and plants. Minutes later – after retching and gagging – they were bright-eyed and alert, moving among the crowd, waving their arms wildly, deep in conversation with beings that I, for one, was not able to see.

We all need to harness and process oxygen and turn it into energy, but it’s not as simple as sucking in air, delivering it to the lungs and distributing it via the bloodstream. The animal kingdom has a baffling, remarkable and innovative number of ways to deal with respiration. Here are just a small number of the most amazing…