Articles by Isabel Esterman

Fatu doesn’t seem to care about the carrot she’s been offered by her caretaker. She raises her enormous head and gives it a sniff before returning to what she was…

Camera traps monitor a handful of the world’s remaining Sumatran rhinos in Sumatra’s Way Kambas National Park. Wildlife managers tend to a female rhino at a breeding center in Kalimantan,…

Eating crops is a risky business for chimpanzees, who run the risk of injury or death if they are caught by farmers protecting their livelihoods. But new research shows that…

In January 2017, researchers noticed two ill chimpanzees in Taï National Park in Côte d'Ivoire. The baby and adolescent West African chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) were coughing, breathing hard, and…

Between 2002 and 2005, a series of Ebola outbreaks spread through the forests of northwest Republic of Congo. Dozens of people died. For the region’s western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla…

In the 1960s, there were an estimated 1 million wild chimpanzees in West Africa. Today, there are fewer than 300,000. With habitat loss, hunting and wildlife trafficking taking their toll,…

In mid-December 2019, a team of veterinarians and caregivers looked on as a gorilla named Freedom quickly disappeared out of sight, the pounding of his feet on the forest floor…

The Sumatran rhinoceros — the smallest, hairiest and most endangered of all rhino species — is today only found in Indonesia. But for a quarter century, the remaining few have…

In the early morning hours of Feb. 23, a gunshot rang out from deep within a Congolese forest. And then another, followed by one last bang. The shots were fired…

BINTUNI BAY, Indonesia — Residents of this part of the island of New Guinea have long known they live atop a coal deposit. Some local people recall hearing traditional stories…

Dramatic images of orangutans being rescued from clear-cut forests are ubiquitous on the web and in nature magazines, but new research suggests that rather than being a crucial tool for…

In the 23 years since founding Volcanoes Safaris, Praveen Moman has weathered a range of crises in the region around Rwanda and Uganda: Ebola outbreaks, economic strife, kidnappings, political unrest.…

Nigeria's Ekiti state government has moved to establish a conservation area within the Ise Forest Reserve, an important step toward protecting the habitat of the Nigeria-Cameroon chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes ellioti).…

By supporting programs aimed at securing the economic well-being of communities in Nigeria's Cross River state, the European Union hopes to help protect Cross River gorillas (Gorilla gorilla diehli), Africa's…

LAKE POSO, Indonesia – In the aftermath of a violent communal conflict that set neighbor against neighbor around this ancient lake in the mountains of eastern Indonesia, local leaders were…

Papua New Guinea's government has ambitious plans to expand its road network, aiming to build more than 3,000 kilometers (1,900 miles) of road in the five-year period leading up to…

Logging for timber by definition reduces tree cover. But what happens when logging stops? A new study has found that in concessions where timber firms have stopped operating, deforestation actually…

JAKARTA — Indigenous activists in Indonesian Borneo have scored a big win in a lawsuit against a coal mining firm that sought to operate on their land. After a two-year…

Nepal is set to receive its first grant under the Green Climate Fund, an international fund established to help developing countries cope with the impacts of climate change. While authorities…

BITUNG, Indonesia – Animals and humans alike have been caught by surprise the excavators, roads and factories that have appeared in the last few years in this port city in…

In 2017, a group of researchers working in Indonesia announced they had identified a new genus of tree-dwelling toads living in forests and caves on the mountaintops of Indonesia's Sumatra…

As the forests of South Kalimantan province were whittled away by extractive industries, just one district in this corner of Indonesian Borneo remained free of both mining and oil palm…

GUWAHATI, India — One August afternoon in 1991, rangers at India's Kaziranga National Park rescued a startled rhino calf. The young female, believed to be just a few months old,…

As Indonesia prepares to launch a new captive-breeding facility for Sumatran rhinos (Dicerorhinus sumatrensis) in the northern province of Aceh, authorities and conservationists are intensifying efforts to survey and protect…

September 22 marks World Rhino Day, a global event established to celebrate the world's five rhinoceros species, as well as to reflect on the challenges facing them. Of the five…

KATHMANDU, Nepal — Nepal's government plans to conduct a census of greater one-horned rhinos (Rhinoceros unicornis) in March 2020, a year after postponing the count due to lack of funds.…

Off the coast of Indonesia’s North Sumatra province, the Malacca Strait was once home to dolphins. In their place, there are now barges filled with coal, brought by sea to…

The rainforests that once carpeted Indonesia's Sumatra Island are among the world's most biodiverse ecosystems, home to iconic species like the Sumatran tiger, rhino and orangutan. They are also among…

Mongabay investigates the disappearance, death and discovery of a wandering rhino in Northeast India.

KOH KONG, Cambodia — In a rare ruling, a court in Cambodia has decided to acquit a Spanish environmental activist charged with incitement, the state’s default accusation against most forms…