In spring 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic took off in the United States just as the breeding season for the black-footed ferret (Mustela nigripes) commenced. Disease is always at the forefront…
BOGOTÁ — In Colombia’s Chocó department, renowned by environmentalists for its abundant biodiversity, Afro-Colombian communities collect gold from rivers as part of an ancestral way of life. “When we talk…
BOGOR, Indonesia — The population of the nearly extinct bowmouth guitarfish in Indonesia is being depleted by overfishing, according to a recent study that calls for a reduction in its…
They say you should never smile at a crocodile. But that’s exactly what happened on Sept. 9 when a team of researchers discovered a group of eight Siamese crocodile (Crocodylus…
September 24 marks World Gorilla Day, set aside to celebrate these threatened giants of the forest as well as to renew calls for action to protect them. All gorilla species…
2020 will forever be remembered as the year a global pandemic brought the world to its knees. But at the rate the planet’s temperature is rising, forever might not be…
I saw my first wild gorillas in Rwanda in 2002 and I was immediately drawn in by their power, their beauty, and the awareness that these amazing creatures were, despite…
This month, the leaders of nation states from around the world have been gathered in New York City to attend the 76th Session of the United Nations General Assembly. Covid,…
Fires have destroyed at least 18,000 hectares of vegetation (44,480 acres) in central Brazil’s savanna region and now threaten a national park that’s home to rare species such as jaguars,…
Primatologist and conservation icon Jane Goodall has formally joined a global effort to counter climate change and the extinction crisis by planting a trillion trees within a decade. On Tuesday,…
COLOMBO — The leaf litter and other decaying plant matter that carpet Sri Lanka’s lowland rainforests are potential lurking points for numerous blood-sucking leeches and hideouts of some venomous snakes.…
JAKARTA — Most forest trees that persist in areas dominated by oil palm plantations die before they can mature, a new study shows, emphasizing the urgency of conserving or restoring…
Industrial agriculture feeds billions of people and created the modern world. But the nitrogen and phosphorus it’s fertilized with is putting the biosphere, and humanity, at risk.
On a cold and humid morning in March, two bird surveyors stood in the dim forests of Kenaboi State Park in Malaysia, straining their ears for birdsong. From where they…
Next spring, California condors will soar in northern California for the first time in a century. Four young condors will be released in Redwood National and State Parks, reintroducing this…
New study addresses the effects of fires on biodiversity loss in the world’s largest forest during the last two decades. Researchers measured the impacts on the habitats of 14,000 species of plants and animals, finding that 93 to 95% suffered some consequence of the fires.
Most people are familiar with the world's "big cats": Lions, tigers, leopards, jaguar, puma, and cheetah. But far fewer people know about the much larger number of small cat species,…
They were once considered the most threatened bird in the world: with just four remaining individuals on the island in 1974, the Mauritius kestrel (Falco punctatus) seemed doomed to extinction.…
All seven sea turtle species are already endangered. Now humanity’s overshoot of planetary boundaries — climate change, ocean acidification, pollution and more — is upping the ante. Can turtles, people and conservation adapt?
Every October, at least 10 million straw-colored fruit bats (Eidolon helvum) arrive in Kasanka National Park in Zambia from the rainforests of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Besides its spectacular…
Efforts to protect wildlife and landscapes have generally been shifting away from "fortress conservation" — where local people are excluded from the lands they've traditionally managed — toward more inclusive…
It happened eight years ago: Elicarlos Ferreira da Silva and his family were returning home one afternoon from the town of Caetité in Brazil’s Bahia state when they were stopped…
Peering back over the last 120,000 years, scientists have uncovered where chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes) rode out past periods of global change, providing insights into how they might be affected by…
Camera traps bring you closer to the secretive natural world and are an important conservation tool to study wildlife. This week we are meeting the common hippo. Common hippos (Hippopotamus…
The fires that tore through South America’s Pantanal region in 2020, destroying 30% of its area, are still scorched in memory. And now, the world’s largest wetland that fans out…
In early July, the ephemeral promise of a new life blinked into existence. Not in the usual way, but on a clear microscope slide in a sterile lab in Cremona,…
African Parks, a South Africa-based conservation group that manages 19 protected areas covering 14.7 million hectares in several African countries, has secured a $100M commitment from the Rob and Melani…
Today we take a look at some of the key outcomes of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature’s World Conservation Congress, a global gathering of governments, scientists, NGOs,…
We see disposable masks everywhere these days. Littered on the street and sidewalks, hanging out of garbage cans, floating through the neighborhood on a windy day. Unfortunately, the ubiquitous face…
In the wake of COVID-19, transformative change away from the unsustainable status-quo to effectively address the roots of the climate and biodiversity crises is perhaps more urgent than ever. One…
