Mongabay · Page 57

Birds produce an impressive variety of songs and calls, but the biological and ecological factors that influence the pitch, or frequencies, that birds create hasn’t been well understood — until now. Previous studies haven’t come to a consensus likely…

Humanity achieved a fateful milestone last year. The European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service has officially declared 2024 the hottest year on record, and the first year in history with an average global temperature rising 1.5° Celsius (2.7°…

This is the third story in the Mongabay Series – Protected Areas in East Africa. Read Part One and Two. KIKORONGO, Uganda — What do you do if you’re neighbors with an elephant? In western Uganda, the answer is: You build a fence. And not just any fence.…

Flood-mitigation infrastructure built in the southern Philippines for more than $100 million by clearing native vegetation could exacerbate flood risk in the future, reports Mongabay’s Keith Anthony Fabro. In 2011, floods and landslides caused by Tropical…

A new global data set makes it possible to track near-real-time changes in several types of vegetation across different ecosystems, including grasslands, savannas, shrublands, croplands, temperate forests and boreal forests. Called DIST-ALERT, the new product…

Groundbreaking research in the late 1990s showed that Arctic-dwelling bowhead whales could live more than 150 or even 200 years — longer than any other mammal. New research, inspired by that work, indicates that right whales (genus Eubalaena) also have…

Among New Guinea’s rainforest inhabitants is a group of birds called pitohuis, chatty songbirds that stand out for their loud, attractive songs. But there’s more to these birds than their songs: their poison. Pitohuis are among the few poisonous birds on…

Madagascar is home to weird and wonderful creatures that occur nowhere else on the planet. In many parts of the island, this biodiversity is under pressure due to wildlife trafficking, industrial-scale fishing and the destruction of forests. Yet it is fast…

A mighty blaze in Madagascar’s Ranomafana National Park is menacing the home of the world’s rarest lemur species. Disastrous dry conditions have turned the biodiversity haven into a tinderbox. The park, one of the country’s leading tourist destinations,…

Bonobo populations in the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Salonga National Park remained steady between 2002 and 2018, but there are worrying signals of decline, a recent study has found. For decades, Salonga has been known to host the largest known…

BANJARMASIN, Indonesia — In October 2023 in the Indigenous Dayak village of Bangkal, Indonesian police fired on farmers demonstrating against PT Hamparan Masawit Bangun Persada (HMBP), a palm oil plantation company owned by Indonesia’s BEST Group.…

Attending the UN climate (COP28) and biodiversity conferences (COP16) during the past two years, it strikes this observer that the UN specialist environmental agreements on climate, biodiversity, pollution, hazardous waste, desertification, and so forth, all…

Wildfires in Southern California, U.S., have killed at least five people, forced some 130,000 to evacuate, and damaged or destroyed more than 2,000 buildings.  Numerous fires are raging around Los Angeles county, a region famous for its beaches and Hollywood…

JAKARTA — An Indonesian government plan to clear forests spanning an area twice the size of South Korea for food and biofuel crops has sparked fears of massive greenhouse gas emissions and biodiversity loss. The country’s forestry minister, Raja Juli…

Extreme weather in 2024 affected around 18 in every 1,000 people across the globe, according to preliminary figures from the International Disaster Database. Mongabay has compiled the data into an interactive dashboard below. Intense droughts, floods, storms,…

Say you want to see how the world is faring when it comes to biodiversity and ecosystem protection. Is it progressing fast enough? Are we on track to meet the lofty goal to protect 30% of nature by 2030, as laid down in the Global Biodiversity Framework? In…

Over the past decade, the population of the critically endangered Siberian crane has increased by nearly 50%, according to the International Crane Foundation. The foundation said the boost in the snowy-white Siberian crane’s (Leucogeranus leucogeranus)…

Life can’t function without insects. At least, not for long. They pollinate, break down waste, cycle nutrients, and touch every node in the web of life, filling endless niches across the planet. As global temperatures continue to rise, some of Earth’s most…

South American countries registered 511,575 fire outbreaks in 2024, the highest number since 2010. Brazil accounted for 54% of them, according to the country’s space agency, INPE, with fires mainly hitting the Amazon Rainforest, but also the Pantanal…

1. Long-awaited plastics treaty flops, for now Despite around-the-clock efforts from delegates, negotiators and numerous advocacy groups, the fifth session of the U.N. Environment Programme’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5) on plastic…