In the forests of the Sierra Nevada, the black-backed woodpecker is without parallel. The bird appears almost born of fire, thriving on the flames that flicker through California’s coniferous forests…
This was a big year for the Mongabay Video Team. We leaned into solution-focused stories, in collaboration with the Solutions Journalism Network, highlighting the people, communities and projects making a…
The Tingana Conservation Concession sits in the center of a unique wetland in the Alto Mayo Basin, the highest swamp in Peru with Amazonian characteristics. In its flooded forest, native…
A global system dubbed the “internet of animals,” which tracks wildlife via satellite, is one step closer to becoming a reality. Project ICARUS, an initiative that taps into advances in…
From the beginning of life on Earth, microbes, small but influential single-celled organisms, have shaped the environment that animals must adapt to in order to survive. Distinct microbial populations, known…
COLOMBO — From time to time, curious tales of “fish rain” grab media attention: fish seemingly fall from the sky, far from any bodies of water, following heavy downpours. The…
In the darkness nearly a mile beneath the ocean's surface, where the pressure would crush a human and temperatures hover just above freezing, a creature with wings wider than a…
A single camera trap image of an Asian golden cat, photographed in Nepal's Jajarkot district, has expanded this felid species’ range westward by nearly 400 kilometers (248 miles). Out of…
Since 2016, Rich Collins has been plunging into the pitch-black waters off the coast of Palm Beach, Florida, at night, camera in hand, in pursuit of blackwater photography. These nighttime…
SINGAPORE — Singapore’s reputation as one of the world’s cleanest cities is being put to the test by a surge in rodent and insect infestations that experts say is being…
In May 2012, a satellite transmitter was attached to a subadult female white shark (Carcharodon carcharias) by OCEARCH as part of its shark expeditions in Gansbaai, a fishing town in…
This is the second installment of Mongabay’s coverage of beaver restoration in California. Read the first story. TÁSMAM KOYÓM, U.S. — “It’s a little wet!” Ben Cunningham shouted over his…
This is the first installment of Mongabay's coverage of beaver restoration in California. Read the second story. CHESTER, Calif. — The pictograph, an ochre-red outline with four paws and an…
Corvus splendens — Corvus meaning ‘raven’ in Latin and splendens meaning ‘shining’ or ‘brilliance’ — is a fitting name for the strikingly intelligent birds that house crows are. Crows have…
Language shapes the way we view our world. In the field of wildlife conservation, even very subtle word choices drive peoples’ perceptions around individual species or situations. These word choices…
When it comes to sleeping, few animals are as fastidious as orangutans. Each evening, as twilight approaches, the tree-dwelling great apes meticulously weave a cup-shaped nest out of branches, twigs…
In 1996, when herpetologist Rafe Brown accompanied a few biologists to the Philippine island of Mindanao to study frogs, they heard a cacophony near their campsite. In a puddle that…
"We were amazed when we first noticed this behavior," said Michael Weiss, research director at the Center for Whale Research in the U.S. state of Washington. What started as a…
Clownfish are known for their remarkable ability to change sex to survive. Turns out, one species, clown anemonefish (Amphiprion percula), popularized in the Pixar hit movie Finding Nemo, have yet…
Where are all the marine animals going? Given the vastness of the oceans, the countless species that live in them, and the lack of a global data set, it’s not…
When Leon Hohl and Alper Yelimlieş landed in the Galápagos in 2022 to volunteer in a decades-old nest survey project, they expected to look for Darwin finches and their babies.…
Open any ecology textbook and you’ll find the Canada lynx, the snowshoe hare, and their wildly oscillating population cycles offered as a classic example of the intimate relationship between predator…
Scientists have known for some time now that tropical birds are falling in number. In general, the cause has been attributed to forest degradation and fragmentation. But a 2020 study…
The search for intelligent life is looking in the wrong direction. There are billions of stars in our galaxy, some of them older than our sun and with Earth-like planets…
Named after a river in the state of Goiás, Corumbá the puma was named after a river in the central Brazilian state of Goiás. Between 2022 and 2023, as much…
CAPE TOWN — South Africa’s False Bay was once known as a global hotspot for great white sharks. But within the span of a few years, between 2015 and 2019,…
If you thought only humans had unique musical tastes that differed drastically across geographies and generations, think again. Researchers have long suspected that migration and population dynamics shape the musical…
To a layperson, it’s footage of adorable polar bear cubs with their moms against the backdrop of endless Arctic snow. For researchers who study the animals, however, it’s a rare…
Martín Maceda can still rattle off the exact date of his most memorable fishing encounter. On March 1, 2014, he was 8 kilometers (5 miles) off the north coast of…
Human activities such as mining, agriculture, urbanization, damming and logging threaten the habitats of great apes in Africa and Asia. Apes have shown resilience to these disruptions by adapting their…
Rhythmic clicks, grunts and roars fill the Año Nuevo Island Reserve in California, home to a large breeding colony of northern elephant seals (Mirounga angustirostris). For nearly 60 years, scientists…
What better way to track whales than listening in on them? Passive acoustic monitoring, in which microphones are placed underwater to pick up any sounds, has long helped scientists detect…
