An experiment in Malaysian Borneo found that the more species of tree seedlings planted in a previously logged plot, the more the result later resembles an old-growth forest, with greater biomass and forest complexity.
The planet’s Indigenous peoples are valued as Earth’s best stewards, protecting forests and other ecosystems holding vast carbon stores. But governments offer insufficient aid to meet the extreme climate threats now buffeting traditional communities.
If humans went extinct tomorrow, who would rule the world? Beavers. Well, at least in the Northern Hemisphere. These tree-felling, water-slowing, wetland-creating rodent engineers have a massive impact wherever they…
Margaret Kinnaird has worked in conservation for decades, from North America to Africa. But it was only when she started working in Indonesia that she heard the acronym NATO, or…
Journalist and author Gloria Dickie, in an exclusive Mongabay interview, recounts her global journey of discovery culminating in her new book, Eight Bears: Mythic Past and Imperiled Future.
In 2019, the last Sumatran rhino in Malaysia died. Her name was Iman and ever since her capture in 2014, she had been under the care of the Bornean Rhino…
Sometimes, our current mass extinction crisis can be represented by the loss of a single individual. On April 21, locals spotted a 93-kilogram (205-pound) body in the waters of Dong…
Conservation International and its partners pledged to plant 73 million trees in the Brazilian Amazon in 2017. Only 20% of that goal has been met, with the pandemic, the anti-environmental presidency of Jair Bolsonaro, and fires taking a toll.
In 2007, an NGO began linking up forest fragments in Brazil’s most at-risk biome. Today, Saving Nature has forest corridor projects underway on three continents. Part three of a three-part Mongabay mini-series on island habitat restoration.
In 2002, a couple vacationing in Costa Rica, stunned by deforestation there, bought land and regrew a transitional cloud forest — a grassroots model worth emulating: Part two of a three-part Mongabay mini-series on island habitat restoration.
Two musical instrument makers wanted to save Hawai‘i’s rare koa tree. In the process, they restored a tropical forest on the slopes of the Big Island’s Mauna Loa volcano. Part one of a three-part Mongabay mini-series on island habitat restoration.
Temperate peatlands sequester tremendous amounts of carbon, but many have experienced extensive harm. Now, as climate change worsens, land managers are urgently moving to restore these vital ecosystems.
Insect pollinator loss is already resulting in an estimated half million early deaths yearly due to reduced healthy food availability and higher prices. Researchers say action to overhaul global agriculture is urgently needed.
Imagine showers of little green sand grains drifting through the ocean: collecting on coral reefs, rolling off the backs of whales, sprinkling schools of tuna — and helping to save…
A known breeding Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sondaica) has made its way to Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium in Tacoma, Washington state, in hopes it will produce more cubs of…
Climate change-induced higher temperatures, shifting seasons, extreme drought and precipitation events, extended heat waves and fires are all impacting insects, with resonating effects on habitats, other wildlife and humanity.
In a nation besieged by poverty, deforestation, cholera, lawlessness and climate change, a Haitian conservation coalition joins with communities to reforest and protect one of the nation’s last best biodiversity hotspots.
Plants on the remote island of St. Helena in the South Atlantic evolved for many centuries in isolation, only to be devastated when human colonizers arrived. Today, rare native tree and shrub species are being restored here.
A dearth of research leaves scientists mostly flying blind as to insect abundance and diversity in the tropics. But a new study identifies losses in Brazil of terrestrial species, while aquatic species seem to be holding steady.
The world’s most endangered large mammal is in even worse shape than previously reported, according to a new population estimate. For years, officials and experts have said there were "fewer…
A new book by Wake Smith, “Pandora’s Toolbox,” explores controversial ideas for artificially cooling the planet. Smith discusses the hopes and hazards of geoengineering in an exclusive Mongabay interview.
On July 19th, 1989, Kenyan President Daniel arap Moi lit the match on twelve tons of elephant tusks soaked in gasoline. The elephants had been the victims of a relentless…
“All of a sudden, in one little lump, this project leaked into my mind,” Thomas Lovejoy recalled to writer David Quammen for the book The Song of the Dodo, about…
Update 2/2022: In late January, correspondence found among the late E.O. Wilson's papers connected him with J. Phillipe Rushton, whose research in the 1980s and 1990s has been linked with…
I’ve been writing about wild things for more than 10 years, and while there are many animals I don’t know, I thought I’d at least heard of most of the…
I think about that bat a lot. You know the bat I mean. I think about how it was likely captured from a forest in China— or perhaps somewhere further…
This article is a one year follow up to the award-winning series, The Great Insect Dying published in June, 2019 on Mongabay. The original series documents insect losses in Europe, the U.S. and the tropics — here’s what we know today.
In Malaysia’s Bornean state of Sabah, a small NGO is replanting forest over land that was once a legally operating oil palm plantation — essentially reversing time for a small…
While watching 2020 unfold has been like watching someone set themself on fire with a bucket of bacon grease and a firecracker, one morning I stumbled on something that made…
This is part 2 of a series written by Mongabay columnist Jeremy Hance. Part 1 is here. Let’s be honest: you’ve probably never heard of the Colombian dwarf gecko…
