2011 - International Year of Forests http://www.un.org/en/events/iyof2011/
2011 - International Year of the Bat http://www.yearofthebat.org/ and http://www.facebook.com/yearofthebat?sk=wall
MONTHS
January
February
2 - World Wetlands Day http://www.ramsar.org/cda/ramsar/display/main/main.jsp?zn=ramsar&cp=1-63-78^24106_4000_0__
March:
beginning of spring (UK)
22 - World Day for Water
22 – UN Earth Day
April
22 – US Earth Day http://www.earthday.org/
May
22 - World Biodiversity Day http://www.cbd.int/idb/2011/ (every 2 years)
June
5 – World Environment Day http://www.unep.org/wed/2009/english/content/about.asp
8 – World Oceans Day http://worldoceansday.org/
21 - summer solstice. The summer solstice occurs exactly when the Earth’s semi-axis in a given hemisphere is most inclined towards the sun, at its maximum tiltof 23° 26′. Though the summer solstice is an instant in time, the term is also colloquially used like Midsummer to refer to the day on which it occurs.
July
11 - World Population Day
August
September
: beginning of autumn (United Kingdom) and China
October
November
December
: beginning of winter.
21 or 22 December: *Winter solstice : The winter solstice occurs exactly when the axial tilt of a planet is farthest away from its star, depending on the polar hemisphere of reference. Earth’s maximum axial tilt to our Sun during a solstice is 23° 26′. More evidently from high latitudes, a hemisphere’s winter solstice occurs on the shortest day and longest night of the year, when the sun’s daily maximum position in the sky is the lowest.[2] Since the winter solstice lasts only a moment in time, other terms are often used for the day on which it occurs, such asmidwinter, the longest night or the first day of winter.
