The red-backed salamander (Plethodon cinereus) is a creature of Earth, although a brief physical description can cast sufficient doubt. One deep red stripe runs the length of its body, though…
The lights draw uncertain lines under the blanket of stars that joins the sea to the sky at El Ostional Beach in southern Nicaragua, 30 kilometers (19 miles) from the…
July 12 saw highs in the mid-80s in New York City this year — a typically hot, muggy NYC summer day. Perfect beach weather, in other words. It was a…
Any day now. That’s when Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal), the “salamander-eating” fungus, is expected to arrive in the United States, home to more than a third of the world’s species of…
A newly discovered species of amphibian that is related to the notorious Brazilian 'penis snake' has been named after President Donald Trump in a charity auction benefiting the Rainforest Trust,…
If you take a stroll in the woods, it’s worth pausing for a moment to take in the sights and sounds, peer into the undergrowth, or even turn over a…
On this episode, the true story of how 96 critically endangered sea turtles survived a New York City beach — with a little help from some dedicated conservationists and scientists.…
Suriname is a country few people have heard of, let alone visited. Located in the northeast corner of South America, Suriname is almost completely covered in rainforest. It has the…
Madagascar also has great frogs, but what fascinated me about the island was a more unusual type of beast: the chameleon. Since the first time I laid eyes on a…
Plastic pollution in the ocean is a growing threat to the survival of sea turtles, endangering the life cycle of these ancient marine globetrotters, according to a new study. Researchers…
A king penguin standing out starkly from the crowd took the top prize in the British Ecological Society’s “Capturing Ecology” photo competition this year. Chris Oosthuizen of South Africa’s University…
The highly toxic brown tree snake, which has killed off most of the native birds on the Pacific island of Guam, was once thought to have its own distinctive venom.…
In the beginning, Shahriar Caesar Rahman’s trips to the remote forests of the Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh would invariably end in frustration. Rahman was searching for reptiles, and based…
In my lifetime, global wildlife populations have seen an overall decline of more than half. That’s a statement of such enormity that it’s hard to process. The evidence comes from…
A new map plots out the last known refuges of hundreds of highly threatened species around the world. The assessment updates work done by the Alliance for Zero Extinction, or…
Frogs are incredible creatures. Usually born in water, most live the first stages of their life essentially as a fish, before undergoing a radical metamorphosis that transforms them into an…
If it happens, it’ll likely go something like this: American parents decide to buy something special for their child’s birthday – a pet salamander. Although immediately excited, the child quickly loses…
On this episode, we discuss the global outbreak of the chytrid fungus, which might have already driven as many as 200 species of frogs to extinction, but there have been…
Turtles were once a tough group of animals. Sea turtles survived the extinction event that wiped out the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago. But the modern descendants of this…
It’s like searching for a needle in a haystack — except the needle is invisible and the hay stretches for thousands of miles. Oh, and there may not actually be…
Exotic pets that grow to be big adults and are inexpensive to buy are more likely to end up in the wild, according to a recent study. “It is difficult…
In Morocco’s live animal markets, a wide variety of wildlife is available for sale. There’s the threatened spur-thighed tortoise (Testudo graeca), going for around $1, and the endangered Barbary macaque (Macaca…
In 2016, a group of researchers set out to explore Serra da Neve Inselberg, an isolated mountain and Angola’s second-highest peak, in search of frogs and toads. Now, they have described…
The highly venomous forest cobra, the largest of Africa’s true cobras, is not one, but five separate species, according to a new study. At first glance, forest cobras, which can…
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…
A researcher has identified a colorful tree frog as a new species and named the amphibian Sylvia’s tree frog, Cruziohyla sylviae, after his 3-year-old granddaughter. Andrew Gray, Curator of Herpetology…
A puzzling disease lurks among western pond turtles, one of only two native freshwater turtle species that live in the state of Washington in the U.S. The disease produces deep…
Peru has lost much of its dry forest in recent years, to the extent that only around 5 percent remains today. To stop further loss, residents of communities in northern…
A team of biologists researching sea snakes in the mining town of Weipa in Australia’s remote Cape York Peninsula have accidentally discovered a venomous snake that’s new to science. The black-and-white…
Rising temperatures and drying air pose problems for plants and animals around the planet. Amphibians, with their permeable skin and inability to travel far, are considered to be among the…
