As many as 172 black bears are at risk of death in Florida after a judge approved the first hunt in a decade. Leon County Circuit Judge Angela Dempsey rejected a request from Bear Warriors United, a Central Florida-based nonprofit, to halt this year’s hunt, saying the group had failed to show a ‘substantial likelihood […]
Can mountain lions make a comeback in the US north-east? One group hopes so
Last summer, a wildlife photographer saw, or believed he saw, a mountain lion in South Burlington, Vermont. While it’s possible, it is also remarkable: the apex predator was rendered extinct in northern New England in 1881 and the nearest confirmed breeding population is in North Dakota, 2,000 miles (3,200km) away. But there could be in […]
Black wolf snake discovered on remote Indian island. It’s over a metre long and eats other reptiles
A striking new species of wolf snake has been uncovered in the forests of Great Nicobar, the southernmost of the Nicobar Islands – an archipelago found off the northern tip of Sumatra in the Indian Ocean. The glossy black snake reaches about a metre in length and is harmless to humans. It feeds on reptiles, […]
Snakes That Eat Poison Frogs Prove How Wild Evolution Can Be
Some animals have figured out how to eat deadly prey and not just survive but even turn those poisons into survival tools. According to the BBC, certain royal ground snakes (Erythrolamprus reginae) in the Colombian Amazon have evolved astonishing tactics to deal with toxic poison dart frogs. In experiments, a group of these snakes were […]
8 brutal, jaw-dropping great white shark moments captured in photos and film that expose their raw, explosive power and deadly ferocity
Awesome ocean moments reveal the raw power and regal beauty of nature’s most formidable ocean predator Great white sharks are the ocean’s ultimate ambush predators – immense, lightning-fast and armed with rows of razor-sharp teeth powered by a bite force of up to 1.8 metric tonnes. They move with astonishing speed, capable of explosive bursts […]
The land deal threatening a vital piece of Bolivia’s Chiquitano dry forest
A large forest in eastern Bolivia is on the verge of being sold to an international agriculture company, raising concerns that it might be razed to make room for new cropland. The 30,019-hectare (74,179-acre) plot in Bolivia’s northeastern Chiquitano dry forest has been sustainably managed for years. But now the land is on the verge […]
10,000 shark fins worth over $11M seized in major wildlife trafficking bust in Peru
U.S. authorities have assisted the Peruvian government in seizing an estimated 10,000 individual shark fins destined for China — one of the largest wildlife trafficking operations in Latin American history. The bust, on Nov. 10 at an industrial port outside of Lima, led to the arrest of three men tied to a transnational criminal network […]
‘Exceptionally rare’ pink grasshopper spotted in New Zealand
An “exceptionally rare” pink grasshopper has been spotted basking in the sun alongside a river in New Zealand’s South Island. A group of department of conservation researchers were conducting their annual grasshopper survey near Lake Tekapo in the MacKenzie basin when they came across the dark pink female critter. The species – the robust grasshopper […]