Many Indigenous communities in northern Nicaragua are struggling with hunger and malnutrition as increasing land invasions force them from ancestral forests that they once sustainably managed for crop cultivation. Residents…
Up in the trees of a misty sky island, folded into the foliage, a tiny rainfrog bears the name of a climate giant. The new-to-science species, found on a mountain…
The Río San Juan Biosphere Reserve in Nicaragua is one of the most biodiverse ecosystems in Central America. It is also part of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor, which extends from…
Northern Guatemala is covered in more than 3,000 square miles of rainforest. Some parts of it have been burned down by cattle ranchers and drug traffickers. Other parts remain pristine,…
JOCOTÁN, Guatemala - Baudilio García walks up past alternating rows of trees and dried maize lining the hillside. Together with family members, he’s preparing to substitute the crops between the…
After she collected a set of camera traps from the ridgeline above Corcovado National Park, conservation biologist Eleanor Flatt said that scientists, staff, and tourists all huddled around her computer…
The flooding of land for hydroelectric dams has affected more than one-fifth of the world’s tigers (Panthera tigris) and one in two hundred jaguars (Panthera onca), according to the findings…
A group of women in rural El Salvador is standing up against a major infrastructure project that threatens to clear hundreds of hectares of forest and cut off access to…
Female hummingbirds sometimes look like the brightly colored males of their species. Researchers have long pondered the reason for this. Now, a study of hummingbirds in Panama suggests that sporting…
The jaguar population in Mexico increased by about 800 animals from 2010 to 2018, according to the first two censuses of the elusive carnivores ever conducted in the country. The…
Scientists have long identified a link between livestock production and deforestation, with reams of research showing the detrimental effect of agricultural activities on natural resources. Little is known, however, about…
Like many rural families in Central America, Martín García and his sons devoted part of every growing season to slashing and burning a new strip of their land, knowing that…
Exequiel Ezcurra was dubious when he first heard about the possibility of mangroves on the San Pedro Mártir River in southern Mexico from Carlos Burelo-Ramos, a botanist at Mexico’s University…
COVID-19 has devastated communities around the world, but for some Indigenous groups, the pandemic posed an existential threat. Few people are better placed to speak to the impact COVID is…
TALAMANCA, Costa Rica — “How do I say lemon in Bribri language?” ask Andy, 9, and his cousin Sergio, 11, of their grandmother, Marina López. They’re playing among cocoa trees…
All seven sea turtle species are already endangered. Now humanity’s overshoot of planetary boundaries — climate change, ocean acidification, pollution and more — is upping the ante. Can turtles, people and conservation adapt?
Scientists have come to a surprising conclusion about jaguars. Lands in central Arizona and New Mexico provide a huge potential for jaguar habitat and recovery. This rugged landscape – stretching…
Camera traps bring you closer to the secretive natural world and are an important conservation tool to study wildlife. This week we are meeting the crab-eating raccoon. The crab-eating raccoon…
The fragility of Latin American forests has been demonstrated by a pioneering study published in the journal Science Advances, which reveals an alarming finding: half of the region's forests would…
I was quite thrilled reading Jut Wynne’s commentary on the Maya Forest Corridor (MFC) published by Mongabay on May 24th of this year. Jut described the critical importance of the…
PETÉN, Guatemala — Once or twice a year, a jaguar visits Uaxactun at night. It slinks under the great stone pyramids built by the ancient Mayans and past the moonlit…
The alleged mastermind of the 2016 killing of environmental and Indigenous rights activist Berta Cáceres was convicted of homicide by a Honduran court on Monday. Roberto David Castillo Mejía, the…
The asteroid impact 66 million years ago that killed more than 75% of all species on Earth, including all non-avian dinosaurs, triggered an ecological catastrophe that took the neotropical rainforests…
Luke Mahler didn’t exactly set out to study lizards that could breathe underwater. But when he and fellow scientist Rich Glor were out on a research expedition in Haiti in…
What growls, chirps, chuckles and swims in the swift flowing rivers of Central and South America? A new study reveals that neotropical river otters (Lontra longicaudis) have a rich repertoire…
Belize sits on the cusp of protecting the key piece of the largest rainforest preserve north of the Amazon. In April 2021, the Nature Conservancy and a consortium of conservation…
Beginning along Honduras’s northeastern coastline and stretching south into its dense interior rainforests lies the Río Plátano Biosphere. Named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1982, the Río Plátano is…
Tucked away on the Caribbean side of Honduras lies the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve, an area some in size with abundant green forests, rivers, ponds, and a great variety of…
Camera traps bring you closer to the secretive natural world and are an important conservation tool to study wildlife. This week we’re meeting the northern tamandua. The northern tamandua (Tamandua mexicana)…
Over the past 20 years, the conservation sector has increasingly recognized the contributions Indigenous communities have made toward achieving conservation goals, including protecting biodiversity and maintaining ecosystems that sustain us.…
