Amid lockdowns, travel restrictions and wet market closures to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, wildlife traders shifted their business online. A trade once dominated by face-to-face interactions now sees sellers and…
Uganda’s Kibale National Park is a primate haven, home to 13 primate species, including chimpanzees. And while these great apes and monkey species are frequently ensnared in traps laid out…
Humanity’s response to pandemics to date is similar to our climate change response: mitigation rather than prevention. A new study says preemption could save trillions of dollars and millions of lives; but preparation is grossly underfunded.
On the title page of Hidden: Animals in the Anthropocene is a black-and-white portrait of a lamb. The little animal, probably only a few weeks old, stands alone on the…
Medical, public health, and conservation experts are calling for greater pathogen surveillance and regulation of the legal wildlife trade in order to quickly identify pathogens and prevent the next pandemic.
CROSS RIVER NATIONAL PARK, Nigeria — It wasn’t supposed to be this straightforward. For days, we’d crisscrossed rainforest-blanketed mountains, hacked through thorny thickets and corkscrewing lianas, narrowly escaped rockfalls, and…
All seven sea turtle species are already endangered. Now humanity’s overshoot of planetary boundaries — climate change, ocean acidification, pollution and more — is upping the ante. Can turtles, people and conservation adapt?
Every October, at least 10 million straw-colored fruit bats (Eidolon helvum) arrive in Kasanka National Park in Zambia from the rainforests of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Besides its spectacular…
In May 2020, Shivaprakash Nagaraju, senior scientist at The Nature Conservancy in India, was working in New Delhi when he contracted COVID-19. “I had breathing problems and other symptoms, and…
In Madagascar’s jungles, the fossa (Cryptoprocta ferox) is king. A cousin of the mongoose, this cat-like creature is the island’s top predator, able to hunt Madagascar’s other unique offering to the…
The new, more contagious COVID-19 Delta variant is raging worldwide, while new pandemics are emerging at an ever-faster rate. But we’re still not taking the urgent action needed to prevent the next zoonotic disease outbreak, experts say.
Indian Ocean yellowfin tuna (Thunnus albacares), one of the most profitable fisheries in the world, is just a few years away from collapse. A meeting that began June 7 will…
Despite a 2019 self-imposed ban, Facebook continues linking wildlife traffickers with buyers around the globe, while the U.S. government has so far done little to regulate trade facilitated by Facebook and other social media firms.
MANILA — When COVID-19 emerged in early 2020 in Southeast Asia, its governments took rapid containment actions: lockdowns, travel restrictions and trade suspensions, alerting the public about the virus. The…
So far, the Sumatran serow has eluded Pungky Nanda Pratama. Some villagers tell him the animal, a type of goat-antelope, sleeps in the trees hanging by its horns, or scales…
The Swiss NGO Bruno Manser Fonds (BMF) has lodged a complaint against the local subsidiary of furniture giant Ikea and its CEO, Jessica Anderen, accusing them of violating Swiss wood…
Ally arrived at the veterinary hospital the way most rescued pangolins do: underweight, dehydrated and suffering from pneumonia. But a routine ultrasound revealed that Ally wasn’t a typical patient —…
HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — On July 23, after several months of anticipation within Vietnam’s conservation community, the government released a new directive on managing the wildlife trade in…
Narwhals are Arctic-dwelling whales with a unique feature: the males have spirally, sword-like tusks that can extend up to 3 meters (10 feet). But these magical-looking creatures are facing a…
Habitat loss and climate change are often blamed for the decreasing numbers of migratory shorebirds in a major flyway in the Asia-Pacific region in recent years. But it might be…
HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam – Conservation organizations in Vietnam sent a letter to the Prime Minister last week asking for an update on planned measures to curtail the trade…
The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, popularly known as CITES, is a rare animal: an international environmental treaty with teeth. It regulates the global trade in some of…
Over four months after the first cases of COVID-19 surfaced in China, the world remains in the grip of the COVID-19 pandemic, with nearly 1.5 million confirmed cases and almost…
HO CHI MINH CITY, Vietnam — As the coronavirus pandemic continues its deadly onslaught around the world, the Vietnamese government has moved to ban the wildlife trade. Amid scientific theories…
MANILA — Governments across Southeast Asia have vowed to strengthen cooperation in curbing the illegal wildlife trade, suspected to have sparked the novel coronavirus epidemic. The issue will be at…
ILOILO, Philippines — A pig growled in pain. I walked up to the enclosure of sharp, rusty metal grill to see a Visayan warty pig (Sus cebifrons), known locally as…
VIETNAM, July 2019 – I’m chasing a ghost, I think not for the first time, as night falls and I gather up my gear in a hotel in a village in…
Police and wildlife officials confiscated nearly 30 metric tons (33 tons) of pangolin carcasses, meat and scales, as well as dozens of the live animals, in Malaysian Borneo on Feb.…
Researchers have captured a camera trap photograph of a spotted hyena (Crocuta crocuta) in a national park in Gabon where the predator hasn’t been seen for two decades. Conservation groups…
Think of the illegal wildlife trade, and elephant tusks and rhino horns come to mind. But another of the world’s largest land mammals is slipping under the radar: the common…
