Rhett Ayers Butler

Rhett Ayers Butler

Website

About

Rhett Butler is the founder and CEO of Mongabay.

Rhett founded Mongabay out of his passion for wildlife and wild places.

He has traveled widely in the tropics and enjoys photography, hiking, and scuba-diving.

LinkedIn Profile | Personal website | Contact

Some background on Mongabay's origin:

RSS
2064 stories
Giant Galápagos tortoises. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

The slow demise of turtles and tortoises

Rhett Ayers Butler 27 Aug 2025
Redwood forest in the San Francisco Bay Area in August 2025. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler.

Ecosystems as infrastructure: Tim Christophersen on how to rebuild humanity’s ties to nature

Rhett Ayers Butler 26 Aug 2025
An adult leopard shark at the North Stradbroke Island summer aggregation site in Australia. Photo by MV Erdmann

Can we undo extinction? A growing effort to restore lost sharks

Rhett Ayers Butler 25 Aug 2025
Rainbow over Jambi, Indonesia. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler.

How can we make nature’s wellbeing impossible to ignore? For Natalie Kyriacou, it is the defining challenge

Rhett Ayers Butler 25 Aug 2025
Augustin K. Basabose. Image by Allison Shelley for Wild Earth Allies

In eastern Congo’s war-torn forests, Augustin Basabose gave hope to gorillas and people

Rhett Ayers Butler 25 Aug 2025
In the dump, men, women and children are looking for plastic and clothes that they can then sell. The people who work on the dump often wear no protection. It is estimated that 3,000 households make a living from this recycling.

The clothes that never die: How fast fashion is burying Africa in plastic

Rhett Ayers Butler 22 Aug 2025
Burning within Tesso Nilo National Park.

Indonesia’s idle land problem

Rhett Ayers Butler 21 Aug 2025

How rain can reveal what lives in rainforest treetops

Rhett Ayers Butler 20 Aug 2025
John Landsiedel. Image from his social media.

John Landsiedel, Alaska wildlife biologist and pilot, died on July 25, aged 33

Rhett Ayers Butler 19 Aug 2025
Patrick Kilonzo Mwalua at work. Image from his social media.

Patrick Kilonzo Mwalua, water bearer to Tsavo’s wild, died June 18, 2024, aged 51

Rhett Ayers Butler 14 Aug 2025
Shark meat on sale in Brazil is labeled as “cação,” a generic term whose true meaning is unknown to most Brazilians, surveys show.

Brazil’s shark meat problem

Rhett Ayers Butler 13 Aug 2025
Leopard shark. Photo by Alex Kydd.

Can we undo extinction? A growing effort to restore lost sharks

Rhett Ayers Butler 13 Aug 2025
Rainbow over the Amazon rainforest. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler

People on nature’s frontlines aren’t waiting for miracles, says author Alan Weisman

Rhett Ayers Butler 12 Aug 2025
Dang Dinh Bach speaking.

Dang Dinh Bach: He fought for clean air. Now he breathes through bars.

Rhett Ayers Butler 12 Aug 2025
A full-circle rainbow arcing over a vast oil palm plantation in Jambi, Indonesia, carved out of what was once native rainforest. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

The case for hope in environmental journalism

Rhett Ayers Butler 11 Aug 2025
Rex Mann. Image courtesy of the American Chestnut Foundation.

Rex Mann, American chestnut evangelist, died July 2, aged 81

Rhett Ayers Butler 8 Aug 2025
Ed McNabb. Image courtesy of the Australia Wildlife Sound Recording Group (AWSRG).

Edward McNabb, pioneer of conservation bioacoustics died on May 7, aged 81

Rhett Ayers Butler 7 Aug 2025
Lúcio Flávio Pinto

Lúcio Flávio Pinto: The Brazilian reporter who wouldn’t be bought or silenced

Rhett Ayers Butler 6 Aug 2025
Paul-Loiselle at the New York Aquarium. Image courtesy of Julie Larsen/Wildlife Conservation Society.

Paul V. Loiselle, champion of cichlids, died April 15, aged 79

Rhett Ayers Butler 6 Aug 2025
Torres in the Amazon in 2024. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler.

She built a newsroom across 7 countries—Here’s how she did it

Rhett Ayers Butler 5 Aug 2025
Jayantha Jayewardene. Image from The history of Ceylon tea.

Jayantha Jayewardene, Sri Lanka’s elephant advocate, died July 30, aged 81

Rhett Ayers Butler 5 Aug 2025
The critically endangered lemur leaf frog (Agalychnis lemur), found in Costa Rica, Panama and Colombia. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

Requiem for the nearly lost

Rhett Ayers Butler 4 Aug 2025
Devils Hole pupfish in the Ash Meadows Fish Conservation Facility. Photo by Olin Feuerbacher/USFWS

Devils Hole pupfish hit by micro-tsunami from 8.8-magnitude Russian earthquake

Rhett Ayers Butler 3 Aug 2025
The Amazon Rainforest in Brazil. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

Community patrolling reduced environmental crime by 80% in the Amazon

Rhett Ayers Butler 1 Aug 2025
John Robbins in his 70s. Image courtesy of the Food Revolution Network.

John Robbins, heir to an ice cream empire who chose a life of principle, dies at 77

Rhett Ayers Butler 31 Jul 2025
Mobula munkiana rays in the Sea of Cortez. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler / Mongabay

Guarding Mexico’s blue frontiers: A conversation with Alejandro González

Rhett Ayers Butler 30 Jul 2025
Coral reef in the Sea of Cortez. Photo courtesy of Legacy Works.

Forget decrees; try patience. Martin Goebel plays the long game in conserving Baja California Sur

Rhett Ayers Butler 29 Jul 2025
Hamid Moradi. Photo courtesy of the Hengaw Organization for Human Rights.

Hamid Moradi, died on July 25th after battling a forest fire in Iranian Kurdistan, aged 36

Rhett Ayers Butler 29 Jul 2025
An adult female kākāpō (Strigops habroptila) in a tree at night. Kākāpō are nocturnal and flightless. Image by Andrew Digby/New Zealand Department of Conservation.

World Nature Conservation Day: How a large, flightless parrot rebounded from the verge of extinction

Rhett Ayers Butler 28 Jul 2025
Left: Ranger Claude, photographed by Brent Stirton. Right: Ranger Daniel, photographed by Virunga National Park.

Two rangers killed in a plane crash in DRC’s Virunga National Park

Rhett Ayers Butler 26 Jul 2025
Sharon Haussmann,. Image courtesy of Greater Kruger Environmental Protection Foundation.

Sharon Haussmann, guardian of rhinos, died on May 31, aged 51

Rhett Ayers Butler 24 Jul 2025
Akana at Nyungwe National Park in southern Rwanda. While the park is best known for its chimpanzees, as well as owl-faced and colobus monkeys, the canopy walkway offers a unique vantage point over the valley and surrounding forests. Photo by Kuimo Donald.

From sports desk to nature’s frontlines: David Akana’s unlikely path to lead Mongabay Africa

Rhett Ayers Butler 23 Jul 2025

News and Inspiration from Nature's Frontline.

Collage featuring a puma and Ida Isabel Auris Arango, shepherd and Quechua woman
Videos
Mulkharka residents who oppose the Nagmati Dam project and are campaigning to stop construction.
Articles
Coastline of Big Sur in California. In 2013, a group of researchers found eggs of California condors in the coastal redwoods of Big Sur contaminated with DDT, even though the pesticide has been banned in the U.S. since 1972. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.
Podcasts

you're currently offline