Swamps News

KATHMANDU — Until a few months ago, residents of Geruwa, a rural municipality in western Nepal, used to rush to their homes before dusk and shut themselves indoors. That was…

PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Lithan, 68, grew up eating fish caught from the rivers and freshwater swamps near his village in Ogan Ilir district, near the southern tip of the island…

The fires started small, charring a handful of areas scattered across a southern stretch of Brazil’s Pantanal wetlands. Fueled by searing temperatures and months of drought, the flames quickly spread…

The world’s largest bank of the partially decomposed plant matter known as peat in the tropics is even more extensive than initially thought, according to a new study. The peatlands…

Since the last ice age, wide rivers have meandered toward the southern shores of Hudson Bay in Canada, to join its salty waters. On their way, they’ve created swaths of…

Last month, the Democratic Republic of Congo approved the auctioning off of 16 oil blocks, at least nine of which are in the fragile peatland ecosystem of the Cuvette Centrale.…

This is the wrap-up article for our four-part series “The Congo Basin peatlands.” Read Part One, Part Two, Part Three and Part Four. In the first half of December, Mongabay…

This is the fourth article in our four-part series “The Congo Basin peatlands.” Read Part One, Part Two and Part Three. The muddy cores that Ian Lawson and his colleagues…

This is the third article in our four-part series “The Congo Basin peatlands.” Read Part One, Part Two and Part Four. The logging concession moratorium signed in 2002 was supposed to shore…

This is the second article in our four-part series “The Congo Basin peatlands.” Read Part One, Part Three and Part Four. The announcement came in mid-2019: A pool of oil lay deep…

This is the first article in our four-part series “The Congo Basin peatlands.” Read Part Two, Part Three and Part Four. The notion seemed straightforward: A massive swamp in the Congo Basin…

Under the thick blanket of smoke, relentless flames spread with dizzying speed over swaths of Pantanal Matogrossense National Park, its grasslands parched by months of drought. In a charred marshland,…

BONN, Germany – A few weeks ago, international scientists, government officials and forest advocates visiting a remote community in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) confirmed the presence of…

A recent report by conservation NGO Rainforest Foundation UK (RFUK) is decrying what they say is Norwegian government complicity in funding a project they allege could result in the clearance…

Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore, star of the upcoming An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power, has come out against the hugely controversial coal plants under construction in Bangladesh’s Sundarbans,…

A vast area of peatlands in the swamp forests of the Congo Basin, known as the Cuvette Centrale peatlands, has just been mapped for the first time and shown to…

This week data from Guido van der Werf of the Global Fire Emissions Database showed that carbon emissions from fires raging across Indonesia's peatlands have surpassed 1.4 billion tons of…

The term "artificial" has acquired negative connotations in recent years. However, a recent study in Sumatra's Harapan rainforest details not only the ecological benefits, but rather the necessity, of improving…

Google Earth image showing a portion of the Pastaza-Marañón peatland Peatlands in the Peruvian Amazon store ten times the amount of carbon as undisturbed rainforest in adjacent areas, making them…

What does Jokowi have in mind for marine development and conservation? Indonesia’s new president, Joko Widodo (or Jokowi, as he’s popularly called) spent half his 11-minute inaugural address thanking God,…

Peat swamp in Malaysian Borneo Long considered an unproductive hindrance to growth and development, peat swamp forests in Southeast Asia have been systematically cleared, drained and burned away to make…

This is part of a series of articles on market transformation in the pulp and paper and palm oil sectors in Indonesia. Drainage canal that forms the boundary between the…

Mother Sumatran orangutan with baby in Gunung Leuser, North Sumatra.. In a precedent-setting case, an Indonesian court has found a palm oil company guilty of violating environmental laws and ordered…

Gary Schmelz, in a Journey to the Edge of Eden, takes us through a wonderful personal account of the conservation history of Southwest Florida. Journey to the Edge of Eden…

Australia is ending its major forest restoration project in Indonesian Borneo, reports the Sydney Morning Herald. Launched during the peak of excitement about the potential of forest conservation to help…

In order to meet the European Union's goal of 20% renewables by 2020, some European utility companies are moving away from coal and replacing it with wood pellet fuel. The…

Pulp and paper giant Asia Pacific Resources International Limited (APRIL) has launched a $7 million ecosystem restoration project to restore and protect over 20,000 hectares of peat forest in Indonesia’s…

Court orders Aceh governor to reverse decision to cancel palm oil concession in protected peatlands Court orders Aceh governor to reverse decision to cancel palm oil concession in protected peatlands…

What happens to animals when their forest is cut down? If they can, they migrate to different forests. But in an age when forests are falling far and fast, many…

The misty mountains of the Western Ghats seem to unravel new secrets the more you explore it. Researchers have discovered two new frog genera, possibly restricted to rare and threatened…