Mongabay series: Oceans

The ocean is now warmer than it’s ever been in recent history, according to a new study. And this isn’t the first time such a record has been set. For…

POILÃO ISLAND, Guinea-Bissau — On a moonlit night in September, hundreds of sea turtles have crawled out of the sea to nest on Poilão Island. A team of turtle monitors…

It doesn’t get talked about much, but 7.8 billion humans make a lot of waste, and a lot of it is flowing into the planet’s rivers, estuaries and oceans, with major impacts on clean water, biodiversity and public health.

Conservation ecologist Thomas Davies has long known that natural light plays a pivotal role in the lives of many marine organisms. “They use it as a clock,” Davies, a lecturer…

Ten countries in the western Indian Ocean are banding together to create a network of marine conservation areas under the banner of the Great Blue Wall. The idea is to…

BOMBANA, Indonesia — Syukur Dullah grew up surrounded by a fringe of intact reefs off Lora, before the bombings decimated corals near the village in Indonesia’s Southeast Sulawesi province. “This…

This is part three of a three-article series on industrial fishing in Madagascar’s waters. Part one looked at offshore fishing; part two focused on a new exclusive-access zone for small-scale…

This is part two of a three-article series on industrial fishing in Madagascar’s waters. Part one focuses on offshore fishing; part three looks at changes to the near-shore trawling sector.  …

1. The ocean-climate nexus The presence of the ocean was felt more strongly than ever at this year’s U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP 26), held Oct. 31 to Nov. 12…

In one of the largest and most spontaneous protests in post-apartheid South Africa, thousands of people gathered on the country’s eastern coastal beaches last Sunday to voice their dissent against…

As climate change worsens, sea turtles on the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf seaboards, and in other coastal areas around the world, are increasingly at risk from cold-stunning events. But rescuers often await.

More than 50 countries have agreed to protect shortfin mako sharks, an endangered species that has been teetering on the brink of extinction due to fishing overexploitation. The decision has…

POILÃO ISLAND, Guinea-Bissau — As night falls, the only lights visible on uninhabited Poilão Island are the nearly full moon and the eerie red glow beaming from a few headlamps.…

For the fifth year in a row, a council of nations involved in Antarctic fishing operations have failed to agree on new conservation measures which experts had hoped would protect…

MARSEILLE, France — Pascal Hagmann lowered a manta trawl — a ray-shaped, metal device with a wide mouth and a fine-meshed net — off the side of his sailboat and…

Nestled on the ocean floor in Southeast Asia are five sensor-filled boxes that will reveal the future of coral reefs. For the past year, from their secret location, the Bluboxx…

Ecuador will expand the marine reserve encircling the Galápagos Islands, President Guillermo Lasso announced on Nov. 1 at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland. The current Galápagos Marine Reserve…

When Dr. Sylvia Earle, the famous oceanographer and conservationist, visited Mexico’s Cabo Pulmo National Marine Park in 2016, she called it a “hope spot” for the planet. In little more…

MANCHIONEAL, Jamaica — Nestled deep in the northeast coast of Jamaica, hidden in the thick fertile forests of Portland parish, sits the multigenerational fishing community of Manchioneal. Families have been…

While the pandemic has increased stress levels for many people, the reduction in human activity has coincided with a rare spell of good news for whales. "I think, overall, the…

Industrial agriculture feeds billions of people and created the modern world. But the nitrogen and phosphorus it’s fertilized with is putting the biosphere, and humanity, at risk.

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?

Though September sea ice extent appeared to offer a short-term recovery this fall, “that’s not the full story,” says one Arctic scientist, with low ice concentration seen in 2021, and lack of multiyear ice setting a new record.

Scientific literature is rife with accounts of desolate reefs bereft of corals, drained of color and sea life. A meta-analysis published Sept. 17 shows that these are not isolated incidents…

The recent killing of 1,428 white dolphins in the Faroe Islands has brought renewed scrutiny to the island nation’s long-held tradition of driving cetaceans into shore and butchering them for…

JAKARTA — When the STS-50 was seized in Indonesian waters for illegal fishing in April 2018, it became the poster child for global efforts to reveal the true identity behind…

BEIRUT, Lebanon — Beaches across the planet emptied as COVID-19 spread in 2020, with the first full lockdowns in many places coinciding with sea turtle nesting season. With less noise,…

When Peru declared the creation of the Nazca Ridge National Reserve in the country’s southern waters this past June, it also increased — in one fell swoop — the proportion…

(Baca dalam Bahasa Indonesia | 阅读中文版  | 日本語で読む) When Sepri was growing up, life in his village began to deteriorate. In the 1990s, the village, Serdang Menang, in the south…

Scientists have completed the first-ever global, high-resolution map of the world’s shallow tropical coral reefs. The map is part of the Allen Coral Atlas, an open-access, user-friendly coral reef monitoring…