Forest loss in Brazil’s lush Triunfo do Xingu Environmental Protection Area marches on, driven largely by a hunger for beef, emboldened land grabbers, and a lack of law enforcement. Triunfo…
Financial giant JPMorgan Chase has agreed to expand its policies addressing deforestation after pressure from shareholders, led by the investment group Green Century Capital Management. Green Century strategically invests in…
Researchers have described a new chameleon species from the Bale Mountains of south-central Ethiopia, and say the biodiversity hotspot may harbor even more. Named Wolfgang Böhme’s Ethiopian chameleon (Trioceros wolfgangboehmei),…
Two new species of tiny screech owls from the Amazon and Atlantic rainforests in Brazil have been described by science. "They're cute little owls, probably five or six inches long…
As Earth continues to lose forests and biodiversity, many have called for an expansion of protected areas. But protected status is not a silver bullet. Designating land as a protected…
Rare camera trap video footage from Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula captured a tense standoff: For several minutes, an ocelot stares, motionless, into the face of a coati. The coati, cornered…
Iconic, romanticized, and celebrated, fireflies illuminate the evenings and twilight memories of people around the globe. For years, naturalists and conservationists have noted, anecdotally, that fireflies seem to be in…
Something is wrong in the lungs of the world. Decades of burning, logging, mining and development have tipped the scales, and now the Amazon Basin may be emitting more greenhouse…
Across the globe, women are leading the charge to protect and restore the environment. Today, on International Women’s Day, the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) honors 16 Women Restoring the Earth…
Humans aren’t the only ones feeling anxiety about environmental destruction. As forests shrink, small mammals are also feeling stressed, and we can tell by their fur. A team of scientists…
If you own a cat that roams outdoors, you’ve likely been the recipient of some grim gifts: a dead bird, decapitated mammal, ripped reptile, or even the odd, dismembered insect.…
The priest class of the ancient European Celtic societies drew their name, the Druids, from the word for oak, revered as “the tree of life.” The Greek god Zeus and…
Over the past century, researchers have discovered an average of two novel viruses per year with the ability to infect humans. Many of these viruses come from animals, and as…
As the planet continues its trajectory into what some have dubbed “the sixth mass extinction,” the diversity of life is on Earth is at risk. The Aichi Biodiversity Targets were…
Parrots, with their bright colors, charisma and intelligence, are an iconic bird group. They are also at risk, globally. Nearly one-third of parrot species are threatened with extinction. In a…
In the skies above far-flung corners of the Brazilian Amazon, a small plane aims laser beams down at the treetops to create a real-time topography down to the ground. Its…
Chances are, the works of the world’s insects touch your lips every day. The coffee or tea you savor, both are insect pollinated. Apples, oranges, cabbages, cashews, cherries, carrots, broccoli,…
An orange-furred bat, new to science, has been described from the caves and mining tunnels of the Nimba Mountains in Guinea, West Africa. Led by the American Museum of Natural…
On an expedition in the tepuis, or “sprouting rock,” landscape of the Guiana Highlands in South America, Mateusz Wrazidlo snapped a photo of an orchid he had never seen…
Thanks to the rollout of free, high-resolution satellite imagery, the job of monitoring deforestation in tropical forests just got a lot easier. Last year Norway’s Ministry of Climate and Environment…
Held aloft by a canopy crane nearly 10 stories above the forest floor, Susan Kirmse observed and collected beetles in the rainforest canopy for an entire year. What did she…
All told, this was a pretty bleak year. The COVID-19 pandemic brought tragedy and confusion; fires razed parts of Australia, the Amazon, and the Western U.S.; and the world is…
In this well-trodden world, the discovery of a species new to science is an exciting event, a glimmer of the uncharted riches of biodiversity still hidden around the globe. “Every…
The world is facing an ongoing sixth mass extinction. To curb this human-caused loss of global biodiversity, many countries have made commitments to protect and conserve large areas of land in…
Tropical trees have shorter life spans than trees in other parts of the world, living, for example, just over half as long as temperate trees. A new analysis suggests that,…
The iconic monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) meets the criteria to be listed under the U.S. Endangered Species Act — but will not be listed just yet because priority will be…
An expedition into the cloud forests of the Bolivian Andes has uncovered 20 species new to science, including a frog that may be the smallest in the Andes, a new…
Of the world’s remaining forests, only 40% are intact, with high ecological integrity, according to data from the newly developed Forest Landscape Integrity Index, the first of its kind to…
By the time the war broke out in Syria, researchers from the International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas (ICARDA) had already duplicated and safely transported most of…
Nearly 2 billion people live within 5 kilometers (3 miles) of a forest, and many rely on forests directly as a source of livelihood. But forests also play a critical…
