Searching for sawfish following the clues of environmental DNA
What has a body like a shark’s, a saw protruding from its head and critically endangered status according to the IUCN? The largetooth sawfish is a species of ray that…
Articles by Sue Palminteri
Sue Palminteri -- Mongabay's wildtech editor, conservation biologist, professional tennis player, and long-time exercise enthusiast -- passed away on November 30th, 2019. She was 54. Sue is greatly missed by her friends, colleagues, and family. Her contributions to conservation were immense.
How’s my target species recovering? A new tool to help you evaluate
A short biodiversity monitoring manual is now freely available online
Farmers lead the way to reduce elephant crop raiding in Tanzania
Seven more ways to make chili fences more effective
Experts hack away at portable DNA barcode scanner to fight timber and wildlife trafficking
How could we harness DNA barcode technology in a handheld device that frontline officials could use to combat timber and wildlife trafficking?
Hot stuff: improving chili fence effectiveness (in protecting crops from elephants)
Some tips from a chili fence expert on how to make the most of a low-tech approach to reducing crop raiding and retaliatory killing of elephants
Solving Global Grand Challenges, One MOOC at a Time
A newly-launched online course aims to address the complex challenges facing conservation and development.
END LOOP: Coding to end wildlife trafficking
What’s coding got to do with conservation? The first ever Zoohackathon will convene this October 7-9 across six zoos in the US, Europe, Asia and Pacific. Organized by the US…
Five tools are better than one: determining deforestation drivers from above
Staying up to date with rapid advances in remote sensing technology to help conserve the Amazon rainforest
Solving Global Grand Challenges, One MOOC at a Time
A new online course aims to address the complex challenges facing conservation and development.
Understanding the ghost of the mountain
The grayish-white form of the ghost of the mountain slinks through the snowcapped slopes of Central Asia. Its remote, harsh habitat, cryptic coat and elusive nature have impeded investigation and…
Identifying the drivers of Amazon deforestation through high-tech maps and stories
The MAAP project integrates a range of satellite imagery and analysis tools to detect and disclose deforestation across the Peruvian Amazon.
DART-TOFMS: Finding the chemistry in wood
Earlier this summer, members of the Forest Legality Alliance (FLA) gathered in Washington, DC for their Semi-Annual Membership Meeting. As a precursor to the upcoming CITES COP17 meeting in September,…
Chew on this new way to detect disease in primates
Preoccupied with snipping a saliva-soaked plant part with a scalpel and placing it in a little tube of viral transport media, veterinary epidemiologist Tierra Smiley Evans thought she was alone,…
Piloting PALM Risk to detect palm oil-driven deforestation
What do lipstick, detergent and instant noodles have in common? They all contain palm oil. Half of every packaged product stocking supermarket shelves can be traced back to a ruthless…
Wildlife Law Enforcement in Sub-Saharan African Protected Areas: A Review of Best Practices
“Across Africa, illegal killing and trade in wildlife, especially of iconic species such as elephants and rhinos, has now reached crisis proportions. Illicit wildlife trafficking now comprises the fourth largest…
GDELT: Mining and mapping global wildlife crime news
In the eighth grade, at an age most boys spend their time outside school watching sports and playing videogames, Kalev Leetaru was delving into large-scale web mining and founding his first web company. With…
Bringing Star Trek tricorder analysis to the 21st century
Handheld, palm-sized, lightweight DNA preparation and sequencing devices are coming your way soon.
Bridging the Gap between Land and Space
The United Nations/Kenya Conference on Space Technology and Applications for Wildlife Management and Protecting Biodiversity aims to expand the use of space technology in conservation.
5 Tech Projects That Are Protecting Sharks
Annually, approximately 100 million sharks are killed by commercial fisheries. Coupled with climate change and a decrease of food supply from overfishing, some shark populations are teetering on the edge…
A World of Tings
The real-time wildlife sighting app, Latest Sightings, can help to link a global community of wildlife enthusiasts and promote conservation one “ting” at a time.
Combining high-tech and low-tech to turn satellite images into action
Since its founding, the Jane Goodall Institute (JGI) has been on the forefront of conservation science, and in recent years the group has been applying remote sensing, mobile phone technologies,…
Drink beer, help the ocean?
Beer may have a bad rep among carb-fearing ab-chiseling fitness fans, but it could now be better for the environment than it was before. Well, at least the new kind…
e-Eye of the tiger: Complex surveillance system extends watch over India’s wildlife sanctuaries
A new set of eyes is keeping watch over tiger reserves across India. They're electronic, but they seem to have hawk-like observational faculties. And they may be related to how…
Online forest mapping made easy
Global Forest Watch enables you to monitor tree cover and forest change for your region of interest in a free online platform.
Five technologies help thwart illegal logging by tracing wood’s origin
Timber tracking tech helps governments and business trace movements of wood products and verify their timber supply chains.
Reducing human-wildlife conflict in the blink of a light
Invented independently by a US game bird farmer, a young African herder and an Australian sheep farmer, disruptive lights can dissuade lions and other predators from attacking livestock.
Search, map, measure, and count
Inspiration: 10 novel ways to use drones for conservation
Want to identify that bug or beetle in your photo? Ask the crowd.
The iSpot web application helps further biodiversity knowledge by connecting users interested in identifying the species they capture in photos.
Light, long-lasting and low-cost: the technology needs of field conservationists and wildlife researchers
Results of an assessment of the technology needs of front-line conservationists and researchers that informs wildtech.mongabay.com
Earth Day and Half Earth
Happy Earth Day -
Special series
Forest Trackers
- Bolivia’s El Curichi Las Garzas protected area taken over by land-grabbers
- Authorities struggle to protect Bolivian national park from drug-fueled deforestation
- Poverty and plantations: Nigerian reserve struggles against the odds
- Logging, road construction continue to fuel forest loss in Papua New Guinea
Oceans
- Warming seas push India’s fishers into distant, and more dangerous, waters
- No protection from bottom trawling for seamount chain in northern Pacific
- Annual ocean conference raises $11.3b in pledges for marine conservation
- Caribbean startups are turning excess seaweed into an agroecology solution
Amazon Conservation
- Deforestation haunts top Peruvian reserve and its Indigenous communities
- Amid record-high fires across the Amazon, Brazil loses primary forests
- A web of front people conceals environmental offenders in the Amazon
- Brazil boosts protection of Amazon mangroves with new reserves in Pará state
Land rights and extractives
- Hyundai ends aluminum deal with Adaro Minerals following K-pop protest
- Brazil’s illegal gold trade takes a hammering, but persists underground
- Maluku bone collector unearths troubling consequence of coastal abrasion
- New FPIC guide designed to help protect Indigenous rights as mineral mining booms
Endangered Environmentalists
- Indonesian activists face jail over FB posts flagging damage to marine park
- Vietnamese environmentalist sentenced to 3 years in prison for tax evasion
- Son of slain Quilombola leader will still strive for community’s rights
- Video: Five Tembé Indigenous activists shot in Amazonian ‘palm oil war’
Indonesia's Forest Guardians
- Fenced in by Sulawesi national park, Indigenous women make forestry breakout
- In Borneo, the ‘Power of Mama’ fight Indonesia’s wildfires with all-woman crew
- Pioneer agroforester Ermi, 73, rolls back the years in Indonesia’s Gorontalo
- After 20 years and thousands of trees planted, Kalimantan’s veteran forester persists
Conservation Effectiveness
- The conservation sector must communicate better (commentary)
- Thailand tries nature-based water management to adapt to climate change
- Forest restoration to boost biomass doesn’t have to sacrifice tree diversity
- How scientists and a community are bringing a Bornean river corridor back to life
Southeast Asian infrastructure
- Study: Indonesia’s new capital city threatens stable proboscis monkey population
- Indonesia’s new capital ‘won’t sacrifice the environment’: Q&A with Nusantara’s Myrna Asnawati Safitri
- Small farmers in limbo as Cambodia wavers on Tonle Sap conservation rules
- To build its ‘green’ capital city, Indonesia runs a road through a biodiverse forest
