An international effort to halt a massive oil spill from a wrecked ship in a far-flung province of the Solomon Islands in the southwest Pacific has finally succeeded. But the…
As rising sea surface temperatures drive more frequent and more intense coral bleaching episodes around the world, global models have often predicted that few healthy coral reefs will remain in…
Coral reefs in protected areas that regulate fishing and pollution have declined to the same extent as reef systems in unprotected areas, according to recent research. The study, published in…
JAKARTA — Indonesia has clinched a $2.52 million settlement from the operators of two foreign-flagged ships that damaged coral reefs in the sea off southeastern Sumatra in 2017. The Bahamian-flagged…
A new marine protected area (MPA) has been founded in the Philippines within what are considered some of the most biologically diverse waters on Earth. The new MPA, which has…
Central Island province in the Solomon Islands has blocked new logging and mining operations in an apparent attempt to halt the degradation of the archipelago’s sensitive ecosystems. “With timber on…
At an oil industry event in Houston in September, representatives of Madagascar’s government went into auctioneer mode. Their message: “Let the bidding commence!” They had traveled to Texas to announce…
Brazil’s environmental regulatory agency, Ibama, announced last Friday that it was denying French oil company Total license to drill for oil near the Amazon Reef. The reef system, discovered off…
When a vibrant coral reef teeming with life transforms into a barren skeleton in the tropical shallows — as a result of bleaching linked to climate change, for example —…
Some types of coral reef islands could potentially grow as a result of climate change-driven sea level rise, according to a recent study, which suggests that all of these islands…
Papua New Guinea has announced its commitment to creating 7,500 square kilometers of marine protected areas in the Bismarck Sea by 2021. The government of Papua New Guinea (PNG) made…
When Luiz Rocha, a fish biologist at the California Academy of Sciences, goes scuba diving, he tacks on one and a half times his body weight in specialized diving gear.…
Mexico protected 10 species of parrotfish in October, a move that conservationists say will help the country’s coral reefs recover, in addition to safeguarding the species’ numbers. “It’s really good…
New, highly detailed maps now reveal the state of the world’s wilderness, both on land and at sea, and the picture looks bleak. In a series of recent studies, a…
New research suggests that coral bleaching triggers rapid behavioral shifts in reef fish. Higher ocean temperatures caused by global warming are the leading cause of the mass bleaching events that…
From lavender to orange, pink to yellow polka dots — researchers have just described 17 stunning new species of sea slugs that live among coral reefs in the Indo-Pacific region.…
Some corals look like giant boulders, others like branching trees—anything but what they actually are: animals. That is, unless you are lucky enough to see coral at night, when their…
Logging in the Solomon Islands, a small country of 667,000 people in the South Pacific, is decimating natural forests there at around 19 times the rate considered sustainable, the watchdog…
Marine ecologists have described a bright-red species of coral from Panama that’s new to science. The researchers found the coral growing at a depth of 45 to 50 meters (148…
New research finds that the mass bleaching event that led to the death of 30 percent of shallow-water corals on the Great Barrier Reef in 2016 also had a substantial…
On the morning of March 1, 1954, the United States tested its largest thermonuclear bomb over Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands. Code-named “Castle Bravo”, the explosion was more than…
Some corals stand a chance of surviving the current rise in global sea temperatures, a team of scientists recently reported, thanks to the diversity of their algal counterparts. They found…
Researchers at the Cape Eleuthera Institute (CEI) have been mapping the deep waters at the northern end of the Bahamian archipelago for many years, but their efforts got a boost…
The local fishermen looked on skeptically. From the deck of a small motorboat, scuba divers grabbed odd chunks of ceramic – which could be described as rocky brains stuck on…
The government of New Caledonia voted on Tuesday to establish marine protected areas across 28,000 square kilometers (10,800 square miles) of waters around the French overseas territory, safeguarding coral reefs, marine habitats,…
While it might lack the coordinated attacks that lions or wolves can mount against their prey, a species of coral has shown that it, too, can pull together a collaborative…
New research confirms the fragility of life living in the world’s oceans, which are growing warmer and more acidic as carbon dioxide levels rise. The carbon dioxide that ends up…
BANDA ACEH, Indonesia — Fishermen and environmental activists in Indonesia are demanding accountability after a barge spilled 7,000 tonnes of coal off the Sumatra coast, polluting beaches, damaging coral and…
These were the most read stories published by our Spanish-language service, Mongabay-Latam, last week: Scientists in Colombia strive to understand what is happening with the Athelopus frog genus in order…
Prior to the back-to-back bleaching events that hit the Great Barrier Reef in 2016 and 2017, the UNESCO World Heritage Site had suffered two other bouts of extensive bleaching in…