On a wet August afternoon in 2015, Jorjo Tana Tara, 48, a member of the indigenous Nyishi community and an anti-logging activist, discovered illegal loggers and poachers at a large…
The Bukit Tigapuluh landscape in Indonesia has been sliced and diced by roads, opening its forests to threats from the outside. As forest vanishes in the region, so too does…
When World War II broke out in 1939, it triggered an unintended fisheries experiment in the North Sea. Fishing vessels stayed away from fear of being blown up by naval…
KALPITIYA, Sri Lanka — Sri Lanka is known for the blue whales (Balaenoptera musculus) that occur throughout the year in the waters around this Indian Ocean island. But a lesser-known…
A new green pit viper species discovered in a Himalayan biodiversity hotspot has been named Trimeresurus Salazar, or the Salazar’s pit viper, after Salazar Slytherin, a character from J.K. Rowling's…
A new species of frog endemic to the Western Ghats, a mountain range in India that is considered a global biodiversity hotspot, is the first new addition to the genus…
Scientists and conservationists have long expressed concern about the consumption of bushmeat, mindful of its impact on wildlife and human health. Yet the marine equivalent has received relatively little attention,…
Prinson Daimari is overwhelmed with pride every time he visits the lush green forest with birds’ nests perched on the treetops inside the Bhairabkunda reserve forest in Udalguri district of…
The Isha Foundation, a spiritual organization headquartered in south India, is taking on the cause of revitalizing India’s imperiled rivers. With government and public support, it says it has successfully…
For many Himalayan pastoral societies, yaks are a cornerstone of their livelihoods as much as of their social and religious traditions. Climate scientists consider this cold-adapted creature a barometer of…
The discovery of a new-to-science species is always an awe-inspiring bit of news, filling us with hope. This year, researchers introduced us to several such species. Some were the result…
Every year, billions of fish — almost one-fifth of the world’s annual wild catch — are dried, pressed and ground into oil and meal. The majority of this material is…
While out on routine coastal surveys this past summer, a group of researchers noticed something odd. There were huge clusters of small, black mussels clinging on to wood stumps, plastic…
India’s Ganga is a noisy river. There’s the churning of sediment, the hums, grunts and growls of fishes and turtles. There are the cacophonous stretches of cities and industries breathing…
JAKARTA — Indonesia earlier this year condemned the practice of wealthy countries sending it their waste, but is now doing the same by shipping that same waste to other countries…
COLOMBO — His eye was trained from a young age to observe details, be it about a plant, an animal, or a legal document. Jagath Gunawardena, a veteran lawyer and…
SAGAR ISLAND, India — Saktipada Bhuinya looks out over the ocean that surrounds Sagar Island. The Indian part of the Sundarbans, the vast mangrove forest in the Bay of Bengal,…
GUWAHATI, India — One August afternoon in 1991, rangers at India's Kaziranga National Park rescued a startled rhino calf. The young female, believed to be just a few months old,…
In the 1980s and 1990s, whale sharks (Rhincodon typus) were being slaughtered by the hundreds in the waters off the coast of Gujarat, a state in western India famous for…
When the flood waters began to rise in India’s Kaziranga National Park in July, five greater one-horned rhino calves found themselves separated from their mothers and stranded in deep water.…
