My connection with Ghana began rather unexpectedly (and as it turned out, rather humorously) more than ten years ago. I was in contact with a group of birders for whom I arranged and guided an annual tour to Africa. During each trip we would discuss a destination for the following year. We already had South […]
A Chinese company has launched work on a $50bn canal across Nicaragua, an ambitious rival to the Panama canal that sceptics dismiss as a pipe dream and environmentalists say will wreck the country’s ecosystem. The Chinese telecoms magnate behind the canal, Wang Jing, inaugurated the project at a ceremony in the southern town of Rivas […]
The future of Canada’s Great Bear Rainforest still hangs in the balance. First Nations, environmentalists, industry, and government continue to forge a compromise that might keep this 64,000 square kilometre region from having the same sad fate as most of the world’s precious preserves of water, food, wildlife, and oxygen. But even if this is […]
Earlier this week, the Brazilian government announced the declaration of a new federal reserve deep in the Amazon rainforest. The protections conferred by the move will ban deforestation, reduce carbon emissions, and help safeguard the area’s renowned wildlife. Named Alto Maues, the new reserve encompasses 668,000 hectares of mostly pristine forest void of human presence, […]
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 […]
Environmentally conscious coffee drinkers already know that the brew they choose matters. They comb supermarket shelves looking for labels like “USDA Organic,” “Rainforest Alliance Certified” and “Fair Trade Certified.” Did you know, however, that there’s one more label you might want to be sure your morning cup of joe carries? Check to see whether your […]
According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, amphibians are the most threatened group of animals on Earth: currently around 30 percent of the world’s amphibians are listed as threatened with extinction. However this percentage doesn’t include those species about which too little is known to evaluate (26 percent). Amphibians face many threats but […]
Last year scientists released a study that is likely to revolutionize how conservationists track elusive species. Researchers extracted the recently sucked blood of terrestrial leeches in Vietnam’s remote Annamite Mountains and looked at the DNA of what they’d been feeding on: remarkably researchers were able to identify a number of endangered and rarely-seen mammals. In […]
From 2000-2009, scientists described on average seven new bird species worldwide every year. Discovering a new bird is one of the least common of any species group, given that birds are highly visible, mobile, and have been scrutinized for centuries by passionate ornithologists and birders. But descriptions this year already blows away the record year […]
Karman Lubis’s body was found near where he had been working on a Sumatran rubber plantation. His head was found several days later a mile away and they still haven’t found his right hand. He had been mauled by a Sumatran tiger that has been living in Batang Gadis National Park and he was one […]
The tenkile, or the Scott’s tree kangaroo (Dendrolagus scottae) could be a cross between a koala bear and a puppy. With it’s fuzzy dark fur, long tail and snout, and tiny ears, it’s difficult to imagine a more adorable animal. It’s also difficult to imagine that the tenkile is one of the most endangered species […]
After 13 years of searching for the Formosan clouded leopard (Neofelis nebulosa brachyura), once hopeful scientists say they believe the cat is likely extinct. For more than a decade scientists set up over 1,500 camera traps and scent traps in the mountains of Taiwan where they believed the cat may still be hiding out, only […]
Less than a hundred kilometers from the bustling metropolis of Jakarta, scientists have captured incredible photos of one of the world’s most endangered big cats: the Javan leopard (Panthera pardus melas). Taken by a research project in Gunung Halimun-Salak National Park, the photos show the magnificent animal relaxing in dense primary rainforest. Scientists believe that […]
