In London alone, Reynolds has led dozens of covert digs with hundreds of flower-empowered followers to transform derelict dirt on street corners, roadways and roundabouts into places of rediscovered horticultural beauty -- one of his favorite projects, Reynolds says, is a lavender field planted in a once-barren median on Westminster Bridge Road.

CNN: Guerrilla gardeners green their city on secret moonlit missions

Several hours from the South Pole, in the barren expanses of western Antarctica, a small team of American researchers has just finished their second field-season with the West Antarctic Ice Sheet (WAIS) Divide Ice Core project.

ECONOMIST: The South Pole as location and metaphor