Sixteen shorebird species have been reclassified to higher threat categories as the global population of migratory shorebirds across the world saw a substantial decline, according to the latest update to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Conservation partnership BirdLife International, which helps examine the status of the world’s birds for the IUCN Red List, […]
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Local groups drive creation of new Puerto Rico marine protected area
The U.S. territory of Puerto Rico recently gained a new marine protected area off the island’s central north coast. The MPA, named Jardines Submarinos de Vega Baja y Manatí or the Vega Baja and Manatí Underwater Gardens, spans 202 square kilometers (77 square miles) and is the culmination of a 16-year effort by a coalition […]
Bobcats are back, and they’re helping protect people from zoonotic disease
A bobcat, with its characteristic reddish fur and black markings, trots across a snow-covered field in central Oregon, in the U.S. Pacific Northwest, hunting birds at the Warm Springs National Fish Hatchery. It could almost be mistaken for a giant domestic cat, except for its massive legs, a shorter neck than any house feline, ears […]
Thousands of birds seized in massive Indonesian bird-trafficking bust
Authorities in Indonesia have rescued more than 6,500 wild birds being trafficked from the island of Sumatra and destined for Java, in what’s been hailed as the single largest seizure of its kind in the country’s modern history. Quarantine authorities at the port of Bakauheni in Lampung province, the main crossing point from Sumatra to […]
Inbreeding adds to growing threats to Africa’s smallest wildcat, study finds
Populations of the black-footed cat, a little-known feline in Southern Africa, have been declining for the last half a million years and exhibit very high degrees of inbreeding. This could increase their risk of a disease called amyloidosis, according to a new genetic study. “Frequently genomic studies focus on large charismatic cats so that small […]
Population crash means African penguins are now critically endangered
Africa’s only resident penguin species is now officially critically endangered, according to a recent assessment by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Over the past century, the African penguin (Spheniscus demersus) has suffered precipitous declines in its population. In the mid-1950s, there were an estimated 141,000 breeding pairs of African penguins, or 282,000 […]
Animals consume alcohol more often than previously known: Study
What’s new: Humans know a thing or two about drinking alcohol, but accounts of animals turning to booze have often been discounted as accidental, unnatural or rare. Researchers now argue in a new study that animals drinking alcohol, or more specifically ethanol, might be more commonplace in the natural world than previously thought. “We’re moving […]
Droughts could change bird songs, creating new species, says study on Darwin’s finches
In the sunbaked Galápagos Islands, a male finch perches on a branch, hearing what sounds like another bird’s song. But something’s not quite right. The song is slower and simpler, like a familiar tune played at the wrong speed. The bird cocks its head, ruffles its feathers, but stays put. It’s just been fooled by […]