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East African mahogany (Khaya anthotheca), Chirinda Forest, Zimbabwe. Image courtesy of Tony Robello via Wikimedia Commons.

Too many African plants fall into the IUCN’s ‘not evaluated’ trap (commentary)

Victor Nsereko Wantate 20 Jan 2026
Orchid

Myanmar’s botanical data gaps risk its unique flora, collaborations could help, study says

Carolyn Cowan 13 Jan 2026

Photos: Kew Gardens’ top 10 newly named plants and fungi for 2025

Liz Kimbrough 12 Jan 2026
Rainforest in northern Borneo. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler

Endangered knowledge and endangered plants: Threats to Indigenous medicinal traditions in Borneo

Cassidy Beach 1 Dec 2025
Fruit from the 70 last known adults of the endangered tree Magnolia polyhypsophylla.

Botanists decode secret life of rare plants to ensure reintroduction success

Katarina Zimmer 25 Nov 2025
Tropical forest and river in Suriname. Image courtesy of Mark J. Plotkin.

Top ethnobotanist Mark Plotkin’s COP30 reflections on Amazon conservation (analysis)

Mark J. Plotkin 17 Nov 2025
Aloyce Mwakisoma. Photo by Andrea Bianchi

Aloyce Mwakisoma, keeper of forest knowledge in Tanzania’s Udzungwa Mountains, has died at 45

Rhett Ayers Butler 15 Oct 2025
Giant monkey frog in the Western Amazon. Image by Rhett Ayers Butler

The hidden environmental cost of psychedelics

Rhett Ayers Butler 11 Oct 2025
Hema Sane. Image courtesy of Vision Publications

Hema Sane, botanist who lived without electricity, died on September 19th

Rhett Ayers Butler 26 Sep 2025
The California jewelflower (Caulanthus californicus) is an endangered species in the state and federally because of habitat loss, overgrazing, urban development, and loss of pollinators.

Timing, not traits, helps California’s jewelflowers adapt to diverse landscapes

Spoorthy Raman 19 Sep 2025
Banner image of an Encephalartos horridus in a greenhouse under natural sunlight. Image courtesy of Takashi Nobusawa/Hiroshima University.

Scientists decode the unusual silver-blue color of an ancient South African plant

Kristine Sabillo 29 Aug 2025
Donovan Kirkwoord, Curator of the Stellenbosch University Botanical Garden. Image courtesy of the Stellenbosch University Botanical Garden.

Donovan Kirkwood, protector of South Africa’s rarest plants, dies aged 54 in search for one of the world’s most endangered species

Rhett Ayers Butler 29 Aug 2025
Flowers and leaves of the Vanda thwaitesii.

After 160 years, an old drawing leads scientists to a long-lost Sri Lanka orchid

Malaka Rodrigo 28 Aug 2025
A flowering shoot of jambu.

Amazon jambu blends tradition and science for numbing flavors and healthcare

Sarah Brown 18 Aug 2025
A botanist scales a Tieghemella heckelii in Yapo-Abbé Forest, Côte d’Ivoire, during a training session by Sebastain Walaita.

To collect native seeds, Ugandan botanists are climbing forest giants

Ruth Kamnitzer 28 May 2025
Banner image: Schoolchildren walk to school in Niamey, Niger in 2013.

Urban forests in Niger’s schoolyards serve climate resilience and education

Victoria Schneider 26 May 2025
Alwyn Gentry at work in Ecuador. Image courtesy of Randall Hyman.

Alwyn Gentry died young, but left a forest’s worth of ideas behind

Rhett Ayers Butler 7 May 2025
Banner Image: Reshu Bashyal receives the Whitley Award from Princess Anne, patron of the Whitley Fund for Nature in London. Image courtesy WFN.

Reshu Bashyal becomes fourth Nepali in as many years to win Whitley Award

Abhaya Raj Joshi 1 May 2025
Giant quiver tree, Namaqualand, South Africa. Image by Leonie Joubert.

Bleak future for Karoo succulents as desert expands in South Africa

Leonie Joubert 20 Mar 2025

Two South American scientists win ‘environmental Nobel’ on human-nature divide

Shanna Hanbury 14 Feb 2025
A golden shrimp plant (Pachystachys lutea) in Missouri Botanical Garden.

Digitizing 6 million plant specimens: Interview with Gunter Fischer & Jordan Teisher

Abhishyant Kidangoor 24 Jan 2025
Standing amidst a vibrant field of cosmos flowers, Azharul Islam Khan highlights their numerous benefits.

In Bangladesh, a botanist brings quick, fun lessons to social media

Mohammad Al-Masum Molla 17 Jan 2025
The 2024 paper proposes Leopardus pardinoides, or the clouded tiger cat, as a new species. This small wildcat is found in the cloud forests of Costa Rica, south to Panama, Colombia, Peru, Bolivia and Argentina. Image courtesy of Johanes Pfleiderer. Article title - A tiger cat gains new species designation, but conservation challenges remain

Photos: Top new species from 2024

Liz Kimbrough 26 Dec 2024
Tree cover in Kauai. Photo by Rhett Ayers Butler

Trees live out their lives in surprising ways, massive new study finds

Collin Blinder 5 Dec 2024
Citizen scientist photographing a Northern Queen of Sheba Orchid in Lesueur National Park, Western Australia. Photo credit: Thomas Mesaglio

Citizen scientists can boost IUCN species assessments, but need better guidance from ecologists

Mahima Samraik 26 Nov 2024
Rainfall over the Amazon river. Photo by Rhett A. Butler

The Amazon is ablaze again. What it means for us (commentary)

Mark J. Plotkin 30 Sep 2024

‘Miracle’ in miniature as rare new plant defies deforestation in Ecuador

Liz Kimbrough 28 Jun 2024

Global study maps most detailed tree of life yet for flowering plants

Liz Kimbrough 24 Apr 2024
Researcher Alain Senghor K. Ngute looking at a photo of a millipede on a laptop, and making notes on a clipboard on the desk in front of him. Image by Haimdu Mnendendo.

Tanzania’s ‘mountain of millipedes’ yields six new species

Ryan Truscott 26 Mar 2024
The new orchid species, Solenangis impraedicta, has a long nectar spur. Image courtesy of Marie Savignac.

‘Mind-blowing’ new orchid species found in Madagascar forest canopy

Liz Kimbrough 22 Mar 2024

Conflict in the canopy as human and climate factors drive liana dominance over trees

Logan Rance 12 Mar 2024
Neem flowers

Ghana’s medicinal plants, the ‘first aid’ for communities, are under threat

Sonam Lama Hyolmo 2 Feb 2024

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