ROKO-ROKO, Indonesia — Residents of this village on the island of Wawonii look like they’re preparing for a battle. Men with chainsaws guard four jerry-rigged huts they’ve built to protect…
JAKARTA — Indonesia’s anti-corruption agency has charged a governor from the island of Sumatra with bribery in connection to a land reclamation project, in the latest high-profile case of environmental…
Over the past decade, archaeologists have dug out several pieces of bones and teeth from a cave on the island of Luzon in the Philippines. These fossil remains, all estimated…
Island-dwelling animals around the globe often face a common threat: alien species that compete with them for food, kill them and their young, and otherwise hamper their ability to survive.…
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…
Wearing nothing more than leaves hanging from belts of woven vegetation, the three scientists stand in the rain with little idea of what to expect. They’ve lived and worked with…
When you’re new to an area, it takes time to settle in. We all want a comfortable place to live, in a safe neighborhood, with convenient access to shops and…
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…
The Apostle Islands, dotting Lake Superior in northern Wisconsin, U.S., are home to at least 12 species of carnivores, a new study has found. These include the American marten (Martes…
The devastation wrought by hurricanes and cyclones, persistent and growing threats in today’s changing climate, can ripple through communities dependent on harvesting food from the sea, a new study has…
The construction of a hydroelectric dam in Thailand in the 1980s devastated the area’s wild birds, leaving behind just a few of the many species that once inhabited the region,…
Data from GPS-tagged seabirds, as they were swept along in the strong currents of the Irish Sea, could help researchers move a step closer to harnessing the energy in those…
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…
On October 10th the world lost an unlikely conservation hero: Bill Wood, a trapper who turned his expertise to save scores of species from extinction. Bill was 84. A third…
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…
MAUMERE, Indonesia — A newly inaugurated governor in Indonesia has called a time-out on mining in his province, citing a lack of benefits for residents from the extractive industry. “We…
More isolated oceanic islands harbor fewer native species due to the fact that plants and animals are less capable of naturally dispersing to and colonizing those islands. This is known…
JAKARTA — Locals and activists have denounced plans to build tourism infrastructure in Indonesia’s Komodo National Park, a string of sun-kissed islands best known for their resident giant lizards. Developers…
The world’s largest colony of king penguins has declined drastically by nearly 90 percent, a new study has found. The massive king penguin (Aptenodytes patagonicus) colony on the remote island…
GEORGE TOWN, Malaysia — Muddy carpets and soaked furniture lay in moldering piles on the streets of this state capital. It was Sunday morning, Oct. 29, 2017. Eight days earlier,…
Plant numbers have surged in a group of islands in the Pacific Ocean following the eradication of invasive rats that gobbled up seeds and gnawed away at vegetation, a new…
Evolution takes time and space. Enough time needs to pass for genetic differences to crop up in a population of animals and make them distinct from their forebears. And enough…
The remote island of South Georgia in the southern Atlantic Ocean has finally been declared free of invasive rats and mice in the world’s largest-ever rodent eradication effort. A monitoring…
For logging on islands to be sustainable, it must adhere to clearly defined parameters that limit the impact on water quality and soil erosion, according to new research in the…
The tropical Caribbean island of Haiti is a paradise with a rich, fascinating history, natural wonders, and diverse cultural offerings. It has also been named by some as the next big…
Though the approximately 465,000 islands on planet Earth represent just over five percent of total global land area, they are disproportionately rich in threatened biodiversity — and researchers have now…
On the island of Makira, in the eastern Solomon Islands, bat teeth are more valuable than paper money. But their use as a currency has contributed to widespread hunting of…
For years, sovereign rights in the South China Sea have been an object of fierce contention among the states that border it: the Philippines, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and Vietnam (all…
Zanzibar is home to many more individuals of an endemic monkey species than biologists previously believed, according to a recent study. “Scientists have known about the Zanzibar red colobus monkey…
A team of scientists from Seychelles, the United States and the United Kingdom has found a new caecilian, perhaps the smallest species of the legless amphibian on Earth. "As soon…