Wildlife officials in nearly 30 African states say they are appalled by an EU decision to oppose a comprehensive global ban on the ivory trade. In a position paper released on 1 July, the European commission said that rather than an all-encompassing ban it would be better to encourage countries with growing elephant numbers to […]
Tag: mass extinction
Could we set aside half the Earth for nature?
As of today, the only place in the universe where we are certain life exists is on our little home, the third planet from the sun. But also as of today, species on Earth are winking out at rates likely not seen since the demise of the dinosaurs. If we don’t change our ways, we […]
Will mining company drive mass extinction of Madagascar’s wildlife?
Madagascar’s unique wildlife may be in serious trouble. An invasive poisonous toad, called the Asian toad (Duttaphrynus melanostictus), is rapidly spreading across the island country, threatening the survival of its rare and endemic species, scientists say. Currently, scientists estimate that there are about 4 million toads on the island. According to a recent report, the […]
Will Humans Survive the Sixth Great Extinction?
In the last half-billion years, life on Earth has been nearly wiped out five times—by such things as climate change, an intense ice age, volcanoes, and that space rock that smashed into the Gulf of Mexico 65 million years ago, obliterating the dinosaurs and a bunch of other species. These events are known as the […]
Earth enters new extinction phase
The Earth has entered a new period of extinction, a study by three US universities has concluded, and humans could be among the first casualties. The report, led by the universities of Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley, said vertebrates were disappearing at a rate 114 times faster than normal. The findings echo those in a report […]
Scientists identify 137 protected areas most important for preserving biodiversity
Want to save the world’s biodiversity from mass extinction? Then make certain to safeguard the 74 sites identified today in a new study in Science. Evaluating 173,000 terrestrial protected areas, scientists pulled out the most important ones for global biodiversity based on the number of threatened mammals, birds, and amphibians found in the parks. In […]
Over 700 species added to the threatened categories on the IUCN Red List (photos)
In another sign of the global biodiversity crisis, the IUCN Red List has added 715 species to its threatened categories of Vulnerable, Endangered, and Critically Endangered in this year’s update. Some of these species were evaluated by the IUCN Red List for the first time while others saw their conditions deteriorate, such as the the […]
Humans killed over 10 percent of the world’s bird species when they colonized the Pacific Islands
Around 4,000 years ago intrepid Polynesian seafarers made their way into an untamed wilderness: the far-flung Pacific Islands. Over a thousands or so years, they rowed from one island to another, stepping on shores never yet seen by humans. While this vast colonization brought about a new era of human history, it also ended the […]