Articles by Morgan Erickson-Davis

A new study finds that 2 percent of Southeast Asia's mangroves were lost during the past decade, owing primarily to aquaculture, rice, and palm oil.

Bolivia's Tacana communities have developed successful sustainable land-use methods, for which they were awarded the prestigious Equator Prize during a ceremony at COP21 in Paris.

Global Forest Watch Climate tracks carbon loss as the world attempts to halve deforestation-related emissions and fend off climate catastrophe.

International NGOs are denouncing the charges brought against Nasako Besingi, a leader in the fight against a project by U.S. agribusiness giant Herakles Farms to develop oil palm plantations in Cameroon.

This weekend a decade-long dream became a reality, with official declaration from the Peruvian government making Sierra del Divisor the world's newest national park.

New research indicates that a dip in deforestation rates may have prevented the deaths of 1,700 people per year.

Forests around the world are whittled away as trees are felled for lumber, land is cleared for agriculture, and fires ravage landscapes. Protected areas are established as a way to prevent…

Scientists warn dams and other human activities may submerge many of the region's mangroves by 2070.

A new analysis finds many of the 1.5 billion people living in indigenous and local communities don't have rights to the land on which they live and depend.

The authors of a study published this week say riverbank forests could hold a key to saving frogs on palm oil plantations.

Scientists have discovered the meaning behind a little woodpecker's special style.

Good news for tigers came last week with government approval of an extension for Parsa Wildlife Reserve in Nepal.

A major expedition happening right now in Bolivia's Madidi National Park is aimed at figuring out just how many vertebrates live in this little-explored region. But along the way, it's also shedding light on the park's invertebrate diversity.

Identidad Madidi is bringing biologists to little-known parts of Madidi National Park, where they are finding some surprising things.

Researchers have found a new species in the cloud forests of the Peruvian Andes.

There's another wolf in the world, according to results published yesterday.

A win for Siberian tigers came last week as a major logging company, together with local authorities and an international conservation NGO, announced plans to dismantle unused logging roads in part of the Russian Far East. They hope this move will make it harder for poachers to access the last refuge of the world's largest cats.

From the flukes of whales to the stripes of zebras, biologists use patterns to identify individual animals and monitor populations. But what do you do when you can't see those…

Forest near Iquitos, close to where the new reserve is. Photo by Morgan Erickson-Davis. A tract of Peruvian rainforest bigger than California's Yosemite National Park is officially more protected, with…

Fragments of cerrado forest in Brazil's Mato Grosso state. The proposed railroad route goes through some of the last standing intact forest in the state. Photo by Rhett A. Butler.…

Chukchi, where the proposed exporatory drilling is to take place, is home to about 2,000 polar bears. The species is currently declining as global warming melts the sea ice on…

A Madagascar nightjar (Caprimulgus madagascariensis), which shares a genus with the endangered Itombwe nightjar (Caprimulgus prigoginei). Photo by Francesco Veronesi Many of the world's endangered animals live in only one…

Marilyn Baptiste, 2015 Goldman Environmental Prize winner for North America, led the Xeni Gwet'in community in defeating one of the largest proposed gold and copper mines in British Columbia that…

Researchers were in for a surprise when they viewed footage from a remote and little-explored area of southeastern Tibet. Within the more than 700 photos captured by their camera traps,…

A pastured sheep near the Chimborazo volcano in the Ecuadorian Andes. Photo by Guido Alvarez. As tropical forests around the world are cleared for human development, scientists and conservationists are…

Deforestation for an oil palm plantation abuts forest in Sabah, Malaysia. Photo by Rhett Butler. Forests not only house many of the world's species, but also much of its carbon.…

Redwoods in Big Basin State Park, California. Photo by Rhett A. Butler. If you Google "rainforest," you're almost assured to get a page of search results mostly about the tropics.…

A pale-headed brush-finch (Altapetes pallidiceps)., one of the most endangered birds in the world. An unassuming brown bird, tiny both in body and population size, hovers on the edge of…

A recent study examines the evolution of viper species in East Africa, highlighting the region's mountaintop forests as among the most biodiverse in the world and calling for their protection.…

New study asserts lax, nonexistent land rights put indigenous-held forests at risk of development Carbon emissions from human activities are the big player in global warming, and scientists have long…