KATHMANDU — A hilly town close to Nepal’s eastern border with India has declared an area under its jurisdiction as the country’s first community-based red panda (Ailurus fulgens) conservation area,…
KATHMANDU — Amid the tall, rustling elephant grass on the banks of a nearly stagnant Rapti River, half a dozen spotted deer approach mounds of rhino excrement. Unbeknown to them,…
KATHMANDU — News of four cheetah cubs being born recently in India has sparked interest in the species in the conservation community in neighboring Nepal, where the big cat’s historical…
KATHMANDU — A spark of good news for the gharial crocodile (Gavialis gangeticus) in Nepal last month shouldn’t obscure the challenges that remain in conserving the critically endangered species, experts…
Researchers have found a snake species never before described by science — on Instagram! During the COVID-19 lockdowns in India, Virendar Bhardwaj, a master’s student at Guru Nanak Dev University,…
Leopards are among the most widespread of all big cats, with a historical range covering large parts of Africa and Asia. Though humans have whittled away about 80 percent of…
Reporting on the plight of wild tigers (Panthera tigris) generally doesn’t lead us down very many pleasant paths. Poaching, habitat loss and the decimation of their natural prey has led…
In May 2011, a young male Bengal tiger (Panthera tigris tigris) made its way to a village in the state of Karnataka in India. The tiger had been quite a…
A new project aims to track the movements of the Critically Endangered species in a last ditch effort to preserve it. Bilal Habib is closely tracking the flight of a…
"Selfies" are all the rage this year, and even bears have jumped on the trend. Especially the shaggy-coated, termite-loving sloth bears (Melursus ursinus), who seem particularly fascinated by the cameras…
Legend has it that lonely sailors mistook them for beautiful, mythical mermaids. But as it turns out, the muse behind these beguiling sea nymphs was instead the dugong – a…
India’s last dancing bear has retired. As the stars of their cruel little roadshows, sloth bears danced to the piercing sounds of the damru for hundreds of years. Orphaned by…
Scientists have discovered two new species of leaf beetles in southern India that display a novel way of using leaf holes and their fecal pellets to build shelters – a…
Give it a few thousand years, and tusks could completely disappear from the Asian elephant (Elephas maximus). The beautifully smooth, elongated ivory incisors neatly bordering a long trunk are iconic…
The Nilgiris, also known as the "Blue mountains," in southern India are an extraordinary mountain range that form one of the most diverse biospheres in the country, the Nilgiri Biosphere.…
Located in the southwestern corner of India, the state of Karnataka is celebrated for its stunning biodiversity. In order to honor the natural beauty of the region, wildlife photographer and…
The Western Ghats are a globally recognized repository of biological diversity for our planet. We know very little about most species found here, particularly the ecologically sensitive and spectacularly beautiful…
In October last year, an astounding mass hunting came to light—an estimated 120,000–140,000 Amur falcons were being hunted and killed in Nagaland, India, every year. A small bird of prey,…
In the upcoming session of the Indian Parliament, MPs will debate whether researchers and poachers should be treated in the same manner for a breach of law. A new bill…
Fishing communities on Agatti Island in Lakshwadeep, India, blame their reduced fish catch on green turtles; according to them, green turtles chomp their way through the seagrass beds lining the…
_______ In the unforgivingly cold, arid and harsh high-altitude regions of Central Asia, nomadic herders have survived for several centuries. Guided by a keen understanding of the environment they live…
Amphibians hop onto your Android phone in an app that focuses on ease of use. There are many among us who have gone out for a walk in the night,…
Designating protected areas in a country with 1.27 billion people comes with its own consequences: around each protected area in India lies a zone where wildlife strays out, and people…
Keeping track of the number of wild animals killed illegally has never been easy. From counting carcasses, to looking at official records and trade logs, managers have had to innovate.…
For a young wild sloth bear who found himself amidst a panic-stricken village in India, rescue was fortunately, and surprisingly, close at hand. In a one-of-a-kind heartwarming story, a team…
Running late that morning, the Kanchankanya Express train zipped past Gulma and entered the Mahananda Wildlife Sanctuary in northern West Bengal, India. Till a few minutes ago, impatience was writ…
Thirty percent of the fish exported from India in the past seven years were from dozens of threatened species including the endangered red-lined torpedo barb (Puntius denisonii) and the miss…
An edited version of this article first appeared on NatureIndia on July 8th, 2013. “Gone are the tiger-filled days when Corbett, as a small boy wandering the jungles of Nepal…
The flagship species of India's grasslands and savannas, the Critically Endangered Great Indian Bustard (Ardeotis nigriceps). Photo by: Ramki Sreenivasan/Conservation India. The Great Indian Bustard, one of India's iconic birds,…
A comprehensive survey of the wildlife sold in the markets of Tuensang has resulted in a stunning record of the wildlife trade in the state of Nagaland in northeast India,…
There are often many obstacles for scientists when gauging wildlife decline and forest loss, and one of the most difficult is civil conflict, like the situation in the Similipal Tiger…
The Whitley Awards is a prestigious international prize awarded annually to individuals working in nature conservation at a grassroots level. They were first awarded in 1994 and over the past…