Scientists have sequenced the first-ever draft genome of the Philippines’ highly threatened Visayan spotted deer. The genome could guide efforts to save it from extinction, reports contributor Pippo Carmona for Mongabay.
The Visayan spotted deer (Rusa alfredi) was once found across six islands in the central Philippines. But deforestation and hunting decimated its population, prompting the IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority, to list it as endangered in 1988. By 2019, Philippine authorities had classified the species as nationally critically endangered. The last count from 2016 recorded only about 700 mature individuals, now only found on the islands of Negros and Panay.
To understand the genetic health of the species, researchers from Silliman University and the Philippine Genome Center Visayas collaborated to map its DNA.
They used a tissue sample from Abraham, a captive Visayan spotted deer that was raised and died at Silliman University’s Center for Tropical Conservation Studies (CENTROP). The sequenced genome contains 2.5 billion DNA letters and 24,531 genes. It’s the first genome that’s been sequenced for any of the Philippines’ endangered mammals.
The researchers found Abraham’s heterozygosity score, a measure of genetic differences, was just 0.17, far below the 0.3 score typical of healthy, genetically diverse wild populations. The low score indicates his parents were genetically closely related.
“Since Abraham is from a captive population, we expected to get a low heterozygosity result,” said Albert Noblezada, who runs the bioinformatics pipeline at the Philippine Genome Center Visayas. Noblezada added that decades of isolation have allowed inbreeding to quietly take hold in the captive colony.
Despite this, biologist Persie Mark Sienes at Silliman University said he wanted to see just how much genetic diversity remained in the population and whether there are individuals that carry genetic variations that could improve breeding outcomes. So he scanned the genome and identified a genetic marker that could help restore the colony’s genetic health. “We have identified a rare allele found only in one individual here, and luckily this individual is still sexually active,” he said.
Silliman University biologist Robert Guino-o said this finding was the proof they needed to revamp CENTROP’s captive breeding. “We are pursuing a genome-based breeding protocol,” Guino-o said, adding this will replace the old method based entirely on pedigree tracing.
The researchers agree that to boost overall genetic diversity, deer exchanges between CENTROP and two other captive facilities — Mari-it Wildlife and Conservation Park and Negros Forest Park — should resume. The last exchange, between CENTROP and Negros Forest Park, was in 2007.
The researchers said they hope to test mixing of individuals from captive and wild populations to close the genetic gap between the two. They plan on testing this at the 300-hectare (741-acre) Bayawan Nature Reserve on Negros, which hosts 70 deer.
Read the full story by Pippo Carmona here.
Banner image: A Visayan spotted deer at Silliman University’s Center for Tropical Conservation Studies. Image by Pippo Carmona for Mongabay.
The recent Ebola outbreak caused by the Bundibugyo strain of the virus has reportedly claimed more than 3,000 lives, and more than twice as many reported cases, in the Democratic Republic of Congo, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. At the same time, analysts warn that roughly 26 million people across the region are experiencing a food insecurity crisis, a compounding factor that increases both the spread and lethality of the virus.
“Hunger and disease are old companions,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, director-general of the World Health Organization, said in a statement referring to the outbreak. “People weakened by hunger are far more vulnerable to infections.”
Ebola weakens the immune system, making it more difficult for the body to fight the disease and recover once infected. Healthy food can both support an immune system response and improve conditions for medications to work properly, thus accelerating recovery, Grace Kwakezime Mongame, emergency nutritionist at the World Food Programme in DRC, told Mongabay in a call.
A lack of reliable food can force people out of their homes where they potentially spread or contract the disease from others in the community.
“Since the disease is transmitted through contact, moving around risks creating new layers of infection; the aim is to keep people within a single environment, Kwakezime said.
WFP also provides food to patients’ families, especially dependent children, so the sick can rest and recover instead of leaving isolation to care for their dependents.
The need for food can also drive people to hunt in forests like the DRC’s Virunga National Park, which can increase the risk of spreading the virus to humans and wildlife alike, including endangered gorillas. Between 2002 and 2003, roughly 5,000 western lowland gorillas (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) died from Ebola in the Republic of Congo, Mongabay has reported.
Ebola is a zoonotic disease that originally spread from wildlife to humans who came in contact with infected bodily fluids, like blood from butchering, or ate infected meat.
However, wild meat or “bushmeat” is a vital source of protein for many and not easily replaced. “Forest use is often essential for livelihoods, food security, medicine, trade, and survival,” researchers note in a recent study. “Narratives focusing narrowly on the risk of bushmeat hunting become stigmatizing when detached from the poverty, insecurity, displacement, and limited alternatives that shape daily decisions.”
The government needs to create economic opportunities, work and agricultural practices outside national parks to reduce the dependence of local communities on forest resources, Dr. Eddy Kambale, head veterinarian of Gorilla Doctors in DRC, told Mongabay.
The lives and health of humans and wildlife are interdependent, and losing balance threatens life on the planet, Kambale said.
Banner image: Carl Skau, acting executive director of the World Food Programme, left, checks food prepared by a WFP volunteer at the Rwampara Ebola treatment center in Ituri, eastern DRC, on July 29. Image by AP Photo/Dieudonne Dirole.
KATHMANDU, Nepal (AP) — Some survivors sheltering in relief camps after deadly floods in Nepal struggled Thursday to obtain essential medicines and cash, even as authorities provided food and other basic supplies to thousands of displaced people.
The shortages are adding to the hardships of those living in temporary shelters after having lost homes and belongings.
Suresh Kumar Karanjit, who has been staying at a relief center in Devighat, a town in one of the worst-affected areas in Nuwakot district, lost his younger brother in the floods last week. He said the camp did not have the exact medicine prescribed for his heart condition.
Karanjit only managed to get the cash he needed to buy his regular medicine after selling a carton of noodles he received as relief for 400 rupees ($2.60). “We have been living here for a week. The relief materials are being provided, which is good. But there is a lack of medicine,” he said.
Nepal’s disaster chief, Dharam Raj Uprety, said health centers staffed by doctors and stocked with medicine have been set up at each shelter. Uprety said authorities were also focusing on hygiene and sanitation to reduce the risk of disease.
The Aug. 26 floods that were likely caused by a glacier collapse devastated towns and valleys in Nepal, destroying homes, roads, bridges and other critical infrastructure. At least 1,252 people were killed and more than 4,200 remain missing, according to the country’s disaster management agency. China as of late Wednesday said 21 people were killed and 541 were missing on the Tibet side of the border.
Nearly 4,000 people displaced in Nepal are staying in 34 relief centers.
In some of the worst-affected areas, residents were finding other ways to navigate after floodwaters left communities cut off from regular routes.
In Bidur town, along the Trishuli River, residents used a temporary zip line to cross between the riverbanks. Army personnel helped people onto the makeshift crossing and assisted them as they reached the opposite bank, while others waited along the riverbank for their turn.
Meanwhile, rescue efforts have increasingly focused on tunnels at several hydroelectric projects where workers are believed to be trapped. About 900 workers remain missing, while specialized rescue teams from India, China and the United States are involved in efforts to reach those trapped in the tunnels.
It was unclear whether workers feared to be trapped in the tunnels were alive.
At the Trishuli-3A tunnel, workers began manually opening the upper section of the passage, according to lawmaker Ram Neupane. An access road was built over the past week to reach the excavation site, but more rock blasting and debris clearing will be needed before heavy machinery can reach the area, he said.
By Shristi Kafle, Associated Press
Banner image: Residents pull a newly installed zipline to help people commute across the Trishuli river in the aftermath of flash floods at Bidur in Nepal’s Nuwakot district, Nepal, Wednesday, Sept. 2, 2026. Image courtesy of Rajesh Kumar Singh, Associated Press
“Development bank-backed transition minerals projects are frequently associated with significant environmental, social, and human rights risks.” This is the conclusion of the latest report by the International Accountability Project (IAP), an international advocacy organization.
IAP analyzed 77 projects globally, approved between 2023 and 2025. The analysis resulted in the Transition Minerals Finance Tracker, an interactive online database documenting transition minerals projects. It reveals that more than half of the projects analyzed, and nearly three-quarters of African projects, show evidence of actual, probable or potential harm to local communities.
“There are many companies that are multinational mining corporations who have a very bad track record in terms of human rights, yet they do get loans from the development banks,” Vaishnavi Varadarajan, program coordinator at IAP, told Mongabay in a phone interview. “It is raising the question of the due diligence that is being done by the banks beforehand.”
Since the Paris Agreement in 2015, a growing number of countries are investing in renewable energy sources such as solar and wind power as well as electric vehicles to limit their greenhouse gas emissions. Such technologies require components made from minerals and rare earth elements that are often found in the Global South and shipped to the Global North for value-added processing, Varadarajan said. “[I]t is kind of reinforcing a colonial way of extraction.”
The report denounces an unfair transition, in which countries financing extraction reap most of the economic benefits, while countries where raw materials are located face water depletion and contamination, forced displacements, deforestation, criminalization of land and environmental defenders, and human rights violations.
Elias Jika, program coordinator for Africa at the IAP, told Mongabay that many projects “started out with like ‘Oh, let’s end poverty!‘ But at the end of the day, the motivations of most development banks are profit-related.”
“We are fighting for them to put safeguards in place, to require government social impact studies to be done, to require mitigation measures,” Jika added.
Among the projects financed in Sub-Saharan Africa, three-quarters are for extracting cobalt copper and nickel, which are all used for renewable energy. Roughly 44% are with support from the U.S. International Development Finance Corporation (DFC), the American development bank.
“The DFC has over time increased its presence and interest in the African region. As you know China owns the majority of transition mineral projects, they dominate the market. The U.S. government is trying to compete with China. So, banks like the DFC and the IFC [International Finance Corporation — part of the World Bank Group] are increasingly financing transition mineral projects,” Jika said.
Mongabay contacted the DFC to learn more but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
Banner image: of destroyed crops along the Chambishi Stream in Zambia after a mining spill. Image courtesy of Southern Africa Litigation Center.
Authorities in Vietnam have intercepted more than a ton of elephant ivory along with big-cat bones in a shipment from the Republic of Congo.
Gia Lai provincial authorities announced that the haul of 1,193 kilograms (2,630 pounds) of ivory and 79.3 kg (175 lb) of bones was uncovered at Quy Nhon Port in early August. It’s the first seizure of this scale at the regional port, according to local media.
The shipment contained 165 wooden crates declared as African sawn timber, which arrived in July under the name of the Thanh Cong Trading Services and Translation Joint Stock Company, according to Gia Lai provincial police.
Investigators used specialized scanning equipment to discover hidden compartments inside 12 timber crates that were hollowed out, local media reported. Traffickers had packed the ivory and bones in wax in those compartments and sealed them with wood to make the packages appear ordinary and bypass inspections.
The Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology subsequently tested the ivory and bones and confirmed they came respectively from elephants and big cats.
Chris Shepherd, who campaigns against wildlife trafficking with the U.S.-based Center for Biological Diversity, told Mongabay by email that the massive seizure is a reminder of the persistent demand driving the illegal wildlife trade market.
“For me, the red flag is that this is still continuing in Southeast Asia, as it has for decades, regardless of raised levels of awareness among governments and enforcement agencies, significant investment to build capacity to tackle the illegal trade, and most of all, the continuing decline in species in Southeast Asia and around the world,” Shepherd said.
He noted that a shipment from Africa that includes big cat parts reflects a changing landscape as local species disappear. “As Southeast Asian cats, such as tigers and leopards, dwindle, cat parts are sought elsewhere,” he said.
Shepherd added that lion bones are heavily traded from African countries to Southeast Asia to meet the demand for traditional Asian medicine.
While Shepherd applauded the Vietnamese government’s enforcement action, he said issues like corruption still undermine conservation efforts. “Corruption is a major facilitator and enabler of wildlife trade,” he said.
Governments need to invest heavily to take down the organized crime networks that carry out these activities, Shepherd added. “Sadly, this is not often happening. However, Vietnam’s actions against syndicates trafficking ivory is a very positive step in the right direction.”
Gia Lai provincial police said investigators have launched criminal proceedings and temporarily detained several suspects connected with the shipment.
Mongabay reported earlier this year that since the mid-2000s, China and Vietnam have emerged as global hotspots for the illegal wildlife trade, with Africa being the prominent source of the contraband.
Banner image: An elephant in South Africa’s Kruger National Park. Image by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.
On the island of Sumatra, Indonesia, in the buffer zone of a national park, a women-led farming group has come up with a solution to reduce encounters with elephants.
Deforestation and oil palm encroachment have stripped Tesso Nilo National Park of more than three-quarters of its old-growth forest. This has forced the park’s roughly 150 Sumatran elephants (Elephas maximus sumatranus) into frequent, costly clashes with local communities, report Mongabay Indonesia contributor Suryadi and Mongabay’s Yenni Kwok.
To prevent elephants from coming too close, some villagers elsewhere in Indonesia resort to setting out poison bait or putting up electric fences. However, in the village of Lubuk Kembang Bunga in Tesso Nilo’s buffer zone, the Batang Nilo Women’s Forest Farmer Group, known as Perbani, has championed an alternative for protecting their crops: dense fences made of citrus trees, a natural repellent for elephants.
“Before we had the citrus trees, elephants always ate our oil palm fruits,” Ernita, a 33-year-old farmer and Perbani member, told . “Praise be to God, since we planted the citrus trees, the elephants haven’t eaten our oil palm fruits.”
To foster peaceful coexistence, the group elsewhere plants elephant-friendly fruit trees like jackfruit, its cousin cempedak, and stink beans, known in Indonesian as petai.
Yuliantony, the executive director of the Tesso Nilo National Park Foundation (YTNTN), the community-based organization that proposed the citrus initiative, said women are often overlooked in conservation efforts, although they frequently have in-depth knowledge of local ecology. “That is why it is important to involve women in the conservation and management of natural resources,” Yuliantony told Mongabay Indonesia.
A study by researchers at the University of Riau highlights how Perbani’s actions have transformed local dynamics. “Perbani demonstrates that women are not ‘victims’ of conflicts with elephants who need to be saved but creative problem solvers,” lead study author and sociologist Mita Rosaliza told Mongabay.
Perbani also empowers its 30-plus members through monthly classes on leadership skills and a dedicated savings-and-loans scheme, allowing members to borrow money to pay for home repairs, children’s school expenses, and farming costs.
Their efforts earned the group official Wanawiyata Widyakarya status from Indonesia’s forestry ministry in 2024, an award given to community organizations that successfully run conservation and forestry-related enterprises and provide training to residents.
Read the full story by Suryadi and Yenni Kwok here.
Banner image: A female elephant and her calf in Tesso Nilo National Park. Image by Rahmi Carolina/Mongabay Indonesia.
European Black oil beetle larva lures unsuspecting bees by manufacturing smells that mimic floral scents, new research suggests. The larva then hitches a ride on the bee to its burrow, where it eats the bee’s eggs and pollen, and develops into an adult beetle. This is the first known instance of an animal hijacking the smell of a flower to lure another animal to parasitize it, the study’s authors say.
Larvae of the European black oil beetle (Meloe proscarabaeus) are orange and gather on the tips of plants to attract bee hosts, which they then parasitize. The research team hypothesized that the larvae emit some kind of chemical to attract the bees.
Using chemical analysis, the researchers found that the beetles emit compounds called floral monoterpenoids, the same chemicals that produce the scent of flowers in many plant species.
The researchers prepared a synthetic mix of the compounds in the lab and found that bee species in the wild were attracted to them, supporting the hypothesis that the beetle’s larvae imitate flowers to lure bee hosts.
Ryan Alam, the study’s lead author from the Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology in Germany, told Mongabay by email that the team hasn’t identified a specific flower with a scent that matches the floral chemical profile the larvae emit. However, he added that the compounds are known components of the scent of willow flowers, which makes the plants an intriguing candidate.
“Determining the precise floral source (if any!), and understanding how closely the larval scent matches it, would be an exciting next step,” Alam said.
He added that there’s a closely related beetle species in North America that releases chemicals that mimic the sex-pheromones emitted by female bees to lure male bees and parasitize them. This suggests that chemical-based mimicry has evolved in multiple beetle species, Alam said.
The researchers suspect that chemical mimicry may be more widespread in beetles than currently known, but may be much harder to detect than visual mimicry, Alam added, “It is quite possible that similar examples exist in other groups of insects, or even in other animals, but they may have gone unnoticed so far.”
Jim McLean, an evolutionary biologist at Macquarie University in Australia not involved in the study, told Scientific American that Alam’s research “presents a convincing case that the beetle larvae are mimicking flowers chemically, and perhaps visually, so as to deceive and attract bees.”
Banner image: A cluster of European oil beetle (Meloe proscarabaeus) larvae on a blade of grass: Not only could they be mistaken for a flower at first glance, but to wild bees, their smell cannot be distinguished from the scent of many flowers. Image courtesy of Danny Kessler, Max Planck Institute for Chemical Ecology.
On the banks of the Aguarico River in the Ecuadorian Amazon, a group of Indigenous Siekopai women are combining traditional knowledge and modern technology to help a threatened native turtle recover.
Their efforts center around charapa turtles (Podocnemis unifilis), also known as the yellow-spotted Amazon River turtle, Mongabay Latam’s Astrid Arellano reported. The animal’s populations have declined due to hunting adult turtles, harvesting eggs from nests and pollution from garbage, oil and gasoline.
“Sometimes we see plastic, garbage bags,” Janeth Piaguaje, a Siekopai community leader of the project, told Mongabay Latam. “We also see dead animals floating down the river. We can’t control all of that, but we do make a significant effort to clean the beaches where we work.”
Boat traffic is also eroding riverbanks, and climate change has caused water levels to rise, flooding the flats where turtles make their nests. Charapa turtles are listed as vulnerable by the IUCN, the global conservation authority.
To help the turtles recover, a group of seven Siekopai women, who call themselves Tari Nomiowa’i, or “turtle women,” patrol the riverbanks looking for turtle tracks and nests. When they find nests, the women carefully collect the eggs, a skill Piaguaje said she learned from her father.
“He taught me how to handle the eggs, how to see on what dates and in what months the turtles lay their nests,” she said.
The women document the date, time, location and number of eggs in each nest using the Epicollect5 app, a field data collection tool.
Then they take the eggs to an incubation facility where they are protected from predators, flooding and pollution. Once the eggs hatch, the women continue to care for the baby turtles for another month, feeding them cassava, sweet potato and taro leaves.
Their painstaking work has paid off. Over the 2025-26 nesting season, the women collected 235 eggs and successfully hatched and released 208 hatchlings into the Aguarico River over March and April this year. The group invited the local community, including schoolchildren, to participate in the turtle release and attend workshops.
“A little girl said, ‘I’m going to take care of them, I’m going to tell them not to touch the eggs,’” Piaguaje recalled.
A driving force behind the work of the Tari Nomiowa’i is their culture and the ancestral belief that the turtles are a link between the visible and spiritual worlds, each swimming with protection from Koouwajëo, the spiritual chief, mother and ancestral guardian of the turtles.
“I want Koouwajëo to be proud,” said Piaguaje. “When we protect turtles, we don’t just care for a species; we honor the spirits of the river, strengthen our culture and maintain the sacred pact between our community and nature.”
Read the full story by Astrid Arellano in Spanish here.
Banner image: The Tari Nomiowa’i women collecting charapa turtle (Podocnemis unifilis) eggs, taking data and measuring the nest. Image courtesy of CI Ecuador.
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