July 9, 2021 (The Guardian) -Giant pandas are no longer endangered in the wild, but they are still vulnerable with a population outside captivity of 1,800, Chinese officials have said after years of conservation efforts.

The head of the environment ministry’s Department of Nature and Ecology Conservation, Cui Shuhong, said the reclassification was the result of “improved living conditions and China’s efforts in keeping their habitats integrated”.

June 25, 2021 ( ZME Science) -Every year, around 7 billion male chicks are culled, often on a macerator on a conveyor belt. It’s an ugly practice, but the industry can’t get around it — in modern-day poultry farming, the layer males are useless: they cannot grow up to lay eggs and they’re not fast-growing breeds that can be sold as poultry.

It’s not just cruel, the practice is also expensive: hatcheries spend around $1 billion year incubating and disposing of the male chicks. If there was a way to get rid of this problem, the industry would no doubt adopt it — and such a solution might be just around the corner.

June 24, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity) -The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed today to reintroduce endangered black-footed ferrets to four new areas in Arizona once their prey, prairie dogs, have increased sufficiently in numbers. A fifth area’s prairie dog population needs more growth and would be considered for ferret reintroduction later.

“Black-footed ferrets are not just exceedingly cute, they also play a fascinating evolutionary role as specialized predators of prairie dogs,” said Michael Robinson at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Returning these animals to a much wider area represents a welcome commitment to increase the numbers and distribution of prairie dogs and start healing our much-abused arid grasslands.”

June 22 , 2021 (REUTERS) -The Great Barrier Reef should be added to a list of World Heritage Sites that are “in danger”, a United Nations panel said on Tuesday, drawing an angry response from Australia, which called the recommendation politically motivated.

Australia has lobbied furiously for years to stay off the endangered list as it could lead to the world’s biggest coral reef ecosystem losing the U.N. heritage status, taking some of the shine off its attraction for tourists.

June 17, 2021 (The Revelator) -As the rainforests of Brazil disappear, so do their unique inhabitants. A tiny monkey represents the dangers faced by much of Brazil’s biodiversity but also illustrates the opportunity we have to save them.

The species inhabits areas that have suffered the effects of numerous anthropogenic pressures through extensive fragmentation and deforestation of forests due to expansion of urban areas, mining and agricultural activities. This has led to the replacement of native flora by pastures, coffee and eucalyptus plantations, as well as harmful activities like burning that are associated with agricultural expansion.

June 15, 2021 (National Geographic) -She’s devoted her life to protecting Kenya’s elephants.

Now conservation biologist Paula Kahumbu has been named the Rolex National Geographic Explorer of the Year, an honor given annually by the National Geographic Society to an individual who shines a critical light on important issues facing our planet.

It’s one of four awards presented by the Society this week during its Explorers Festival, held virtually for the first time. Other honors include two Buffett Awards for Leadership in Conservation, and the Hubbard Medal—the Society’s highest distinction.

June 11, 2021 (ENVIRONMENT MAINE)-Gov. Janet Mills signed the nation’s strongest restriction on bee-killing neonicotinoids (neonics) into law on Thursday. LD 155, sponsored by Rep. Nicole Grohoski of Ellsworth, prohibits the use of the most harmful neonic pesticides in residential landscapes. The bill won bipartisan support in the Maine State Legislature, which passed it on June 7.

Neonics are insecticides that affect the central nervous system and are highly toxic to invertebrates, including bees and butterflies. These systemic chemicals, when absorbed into a plant, contaminate nectar and pollen and remain in soil and groundwater long after they’re applied.

A significant body of scientific evidence links neonic use to massive bee population losses, threatening not only honeybee colonies, but also Maine’s 270 species of native bees.

June 9, 2021 (Wildlife Conservation Service) -In 2020, scientists highlighted a gem in the waters off the coast of Kenya and Tanzania -- a deep channel of cool water, where threatened species of corals, sharks, and dolphins still thrive despite accelerating climate change. An underwater trove of biodiversity formed by glaciers receding from the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro thousands of years ago, this marine area is a rare refuge for the species that call it home and the coastal communities who have relied on its waters for food and livelihoods for generations.

This is the story of East Africa's Coral Refuge: how it was formed, the people and wildlife whose lives are inextricably tied to it, and a call to protect it amid a warming and developing world.

Contains many wonderful videos.

June 8, 2021 (ATLANTIC SHORES) -Beginning Jan. 1 there will be steep penalties for intentionally or knowingly capturing, entangling or killing a shark in state marine waters.

House Bill 553, which failed to pass in previous legislative sessions, was signed into law Tuesday by Gov. David Ige.

Opponents sought exemptions for research, subsistence fishing and incidental takes. While some exemptions will be allowed — e.g., killing in self defense, incidental captures or in accordance with protected cultural practices — the state Department of Land and Natural Resources is now tasked with establishing rules based on the bill.

June 4, 2021 (The Revelator)-First recognized as a new species in 1993, the large-antlered muntjac is already critically endangered and heading fast toward extinction. As muntjac go, the large-antlered is the largest species, but muntjac in general are small members of the deer family Cervidae.

The species is facing a “quiet extinction,” hidden away in a minuscule global range in the Annamite Mountains of Laos and Vietnam.

(ZME Science), June 1, 2021 -It took more than two decades, but police forces in Bangladesh were finally able to track down a notorious poacher who is believed to have killed at least 70 endangered Bengal tigers (Panthera tigris). Habib Talukder, known as Tiger Habib, was captured last Saturday near the massive Sundarbans Forest on the border between India and Bangladesh.

he poacher was found by the police thanks to a tip. He was living in a village right next to the forest and would flee whenever officers raided the area.

(ZME Science), May 31, 2021 -Tracing guitar manufacturing all the way back to the trees from which the wood came from, a group of researchers took a close look at the guitar industry and its environmental footprint – and the results were surprising. The industry is struggling with scandals over illegal logging, resource scarcity, and environmental regulations related to trade in endangered species of trees.

Chris Gibson and Andrew Warren, both geographers at the University of Wollongong in Australia, spent six years tracing guitar-making across five continents, with a focus on the timber used — known in the industry as tonewoods for their acoustic qualities — and the industry’s environmental dilemmas. They visited guitar factories all over the world and analyzed materials and manufacturing techniques.

(Center for Biological Diversity), May 28, 2021 -With today’s release of President Biden’s first full budget, the administration signaled that stemming the wildlife extinction crisis and safeguarding the nation’s endangered species will not be a top priority, despite the warnings of scientists that one million species are at risk of going extinct around the world without intervention.

The Biden administration is proposing just $22 million — a mere $1.5 million above last year’s levels — to protect the more than 500 imperiled animals and plants still waiting for protection under the Endangered Species Act. It is at the same level as what was provided for in 2010.

(Boise State Public Radio), May 26, 2021 -Multiple wildlife advocacy groups Wednesday officially petitioned the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to resume endangered species protection for gray wolves in the northern Rockies. The filing is a direct response to new legislation in Idaho and Montana expanding hunting and professional extermination efforts to reduce wolf populations.

The Center For Biological Diversity, Sierra Club and the National Humane Society and its lobbying arm, the Humane Society Legislative Fund, co-signed the petition. It says the drastic reduction of wolf populations violates the 2011 delisting agreement (authored in 2009) between the states and the federal government.

(The Guardian), May 25, 2021 -“It was a huge surprise,” said Sebastián Di Martino, director of conservation at Fundación Rewilding Argentina. “I was incredulous. An incredible feeling of so much happiness. I didn’t know if I should try to follow it or rush back to our station to tell the others.”

The cause of the excitement was the sighting, last week, of a wild giant river otter – an animal feared extinct in the country due to habitat loss and hunting – on the Bermejo River in Impenetrable national park, in north-east Argentina’s Chaco province. The last sighting of a giant otter in the wild in Argentina was in the 1980s. On the Bermejo, none have been seen for more than a century.(Article includes a short video)

(The Guardian), May 18, 2021 -Leonardo DiCaprio has announced a $43m (£30.4m) pledge to enact sweeping conservation operations across the Galápagos Islands, with his social media accounts taken over by a wildlife veterinarian and island restoration specialist.

The initiative, in partnership with Re:wild, an organization founded this year by a group of renowned conservation scientists and DiCaprio, the Galápagos National Park Directorate, Island Conservation and local communities, aims to re-wild the entire Galápagos Islands, as well as all of Latin America’s Pacific archipelagos.

May 18, 2021(ZME Science), - Scientists say it will take millions of years to undo the damage humanity is currently causing on the world’s biodiversity, described as a 6th mass extinction.

A new study found that the rate of biodiversity decline in freshwater ecosystems outcompetes that during the end-Cretaceous mass extinction event, which wiped out the dinosaurs.

May 18, 2021(Center for Biological Diversity), - California Department of Fish and Wildlife Director Chuck Bonham today ordered the state’s commercial Dungeness crab fishery to close at noon on June 1 to avoid entangling endangered humpback whales now migrating along California’s coastline. The season typically ends June 30 in central California and July 15 in Northern California.

The closure order was based on data from the state’s new Risk Assessment and Mitigation Program. That program was developed in line with a legal agreement with the Center for Biological Diversity, which sued the department in 2017 over increasing whale entanglements.

May 14, 2021 (ScienceNews) -Die-offs of African elephants have once again erupted in Botswana. In just the first three months of 2021, 39 have succumbed.

The mysterious deaths occurred in the Moremi Game Reserve, in the northern part of the country, nearly 100 kilometers from a region of the Okavango Delta, where about 350 African elephants died during May and June in 2020. Puzzled scientists have been calling for thorough investigations as the government sends mixed messages on the cause of death.

May 7, 2021 (ZME Science) -Following an appeal by the agrochemical company Bayer, the European Union’s highest court has now confirmed a partial ban on three neonicotinoid pesticides linked to harming bees, preventing their use on certain crops.

The EU’s Commission had banned the pesticides in 2018 but this couldn’t be enforced due to Bayer’s appeal until now.

May 7, 2021 (ZME Science) -Some 5 million donkeys are slaughtered every year to satisfy the demand of eijao, a gelatin-based traditional medicine. If this trend keeps up, more than half of the world’s donkeys could be killed over the next five years.

May 7, 2021 (ZME Science) - Imagine you’re a long-tailed Duck (Clangula hyemalis). You see a small, delicious fish in the water and you dive towards it, looking for a tasty meal. But just as you catch it in your beak, you hit a wall of near-invisible netting, meeting the same fate as the fish you’re trying to eat.

Far from being a hypothetical scenario, this is a danger that many seabirds face every day — because of gillnets.

Apr. 30, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity)-More than 100 groups sent three letters to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today outlining urgent actions needed to protect the nation’s wildlife and their habitats from dangerous pesticides.

Conservation, environmental justice, agriculture and religious groups representing tens of millions of people detailed opportunities for ramping up protections in three letters that call for the Service to:
• Prohibit pesticide use in designated critical habitat for endangered plants and animals;
• Eliminate use of harmful agricultural pesticides on national wildlife refuges, and;
• Complete scientific reviews scrapped by the Trump administration assessing the harms that chlorpyrifos, malathion and diazinon do to protected species.

Apr. 28, 2021 (The Revelator) -Humans and whales have a complex relationship.

We’ve hunted whales for food for centuries, celebrated them in our art and culture, admired their familial relationships and songs, and even worshipped them as gods.

But at the same time, we’ve over-hunted multiple whale species to the brink of extinction, overfished their prey, poisoned their bodies and habitats, and scarred or killed them with our oceanic vessels.

Apr. 25, 2021 (ZME Science), -World Penguin Day is upon us. Pioneered at McMurdo Station — an American Research center on Ross Island in Antarctica — to raise awareness and inform the public more about the plights of flightless birds, it has been embraced by environmentalists all over the globe. It was noticed by scientists that April 25 was the specific day which the Adelie penguins began to make their trip north for food during the wintertime, so that was the day that got the devotion.

While popular belief is that all penguin species live in Antarctica, in fact, only five have ever visited, and only two (the Adelie and emperor) call it home 24/7. The Humboldt of Chile and Peru live on the shores of the Atacama Desert, the driest desert in the world where temperatures can reach around 70°F (21°C). The yellow-eyed penguins of Enderby Island off New Zealand burrow under the trees of the dwarf rata forests.

Apr. 22, 2021 (The Guardian), -The news is timed to coincide with Earth Day, the annual event established in 1970 to mobilize action on environmental issues.

The newly named Belize Maya Forest is part of 150,000 sq km (38m acres) of tropical forest across Mexico, Belize and Guatemala known as the Selva Maya, a biodiversity hotspot and home to five species of wild cat (jaguars, margay, ocelot, jaguarundi and puma), spider monkeys, howler monkeys and hundreds of bird species.

Apr. 21, 2021 (Deutsche Welle), -Livestock farming has a long history in Casanare, Colombia, and the Barragan family is one of the oldest llanero or cattle-herding clans in the region. They rear cattle, wrangling them on horseback, on a 17,000-hectare (42,008 acre) farm.

Casanare and the land around the Barragan ranch are also home to jaguars. The big cats need large stomping grounds to roam and hunt, and farms have eaten into tropical forest, encroaching on the animal's territory.

The article includes a video.

Apr. 21, 2021 (ScienceNews, -The Serengeti looks largely like it did hundreds of years ago.

Lions, hyenas and other top predators still stalk herds of wildebeests over a million strong, preventing them from eating too much vegetation. This diversity of trees and grasses support scores of other species, from vivid green-orange Fischer’s lovebirds to dung beetles. In turn, such species carry seeds or pollen across the plains, enabling plant reproduction. Humans are there too, but in relatively low densities. Overall, it’s a prime example of what biologists call an ecologically intact ecosystem: a bustling tangle of complex relationships that together sustain a rich diversity of life, undiminished by us.

Such places are vanishingly rare.

Apr. 20, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity), -The Biden administration issued a final rule today protecting 116,098 square nautical miles of the Pacific Ocean as critical habitat for three populations of endangered humpback whales. The rule could begin to help protect migrating whales from ship strikes, entanglement in fishing gear, and oil spills.

The action was prompted by a 2018 legal victory by the Center for Biological Diversity, Wishtoyo Foundation and Turtle Island Restoration Network. The groups had sued over the federal failure to designate critical habitat as required by the Endangered Species Act. The suit led the Trump administration to issue a proposed rule in 2019 and today’s final rule.

Apr. 15, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity), -The Center for Biological Diversity sued the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service today for failing to protect 19 imperiled species from across the United States under the Endangered Species Act.

The lawsuit, filed in federal court in Washington, D.C., seeks final decisions on protection as threatened or endangered species for the Franklin’s bumblebee from Oregon, the Sierra Nevada red fox, Hermes copper butterfly from California, and Bartram’s stonecrop and Beardless chinchweed from Arizona.

Apr. 13, 2021 (NationalGeographic) -As early morning fog lifts off the Baja California coastline, Alushe Camacho steers a small fishing boat through a mangrove-lined estuary, his eyes fixed on the horizon. During most of the year, Camacho hunts grouper, sole, and hammerhead sharks. Today he’s in search of gray whales.

But over the last three years, Camacho and others have noticed ominous changes. The whales are arriving in the estuary later in the year, and many appear malnourished, the jagged outline of vertebrae visible on their typically fatty backs. More whales than usual have been washing up dead along the shore.

Apr. 9, 2021 (ZME Science) -The Arctic is currently warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet and unsurprisingly, Arctic animals are desperately struggling to cope with the changes. All the creatures in the food chain are affected, but predators suffer even more, as they see their usual hunting grounds reduced year by year.

Apr. 7, 2021 (GEORGIA RECORDER) -A rare prehistoric looking turtle only found in south Georgia and north Florida might soon gain federal protection after struggling to rebound.

The announced this week that it has proposed listing the Suwannee alligator snapping turtle as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.The announcement kicks off a public comment period that will wrap up this June.

Apr. 6, 2021 (ZME Science ) -Since the disease was first reported 50 years ago, sightings have expanded to several areas. According to the CDC, this disease is present in at least 24 states in the United States and has also spread internationally — there are likely more cases we don’t know about yet.

The disease was first noticed as veterinarians were reporting deer just “wasting away” — suffering from weakness, dehydration, weight loss, and confusion, among others. Deer suffering from this dreadful disease lose their fear of humans and coordination, appearing like “walking zombies”, hence the name.

Apr. 3, 2021 (Green Car Reports),First Nations and conservationists are warning that Pacific herring populations are “collapsing” off Canada’s western coast, and are appealing for a moratorium on commercial fishing until the critical species can rebuild.

Emmie Page, a marine campaigner with the organization Pacific Wild, said in the past, five large commercial herring fisheries opened each year on the coast.

Apr. 1, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity) -In a series of letters delivered today, conservation groups urged the United States and international authorities to use sanctions to pressure Mexico to save the vaquita, whose population has dwindled to just 10 remaining animals. Despite repeated promises for decades, the Mexican government has failed to stop the use of deadly gill nets that are entangling, drowning and killing these porpoises — driving them to extinction.

Mar. 31, 2021 (The Guardian) -After two years spent turning over thousands of rocks in search of the Cupola gecko, New Zealand lizard expert Ben Barr had been starting to wonder: “Am I ever going to find this thing?”

But this month, in the Nelson Lakes national park at the top of the South Island, he lifted another rock – and there it was.

Mar. 26, 2021 (ZME Science) -The African forest elephant (Loxodonta cyclotis) is now listed as Critically Endangered and the African savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana) as Endangered on the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List of Threatened Species. They’re more in danger than they have ever been, and it’s mostly due to habitat reduction and ivory trade.

Mar. 20, 2021 (ZME Science) -Once on the brink of extinction, the recovery of the American bald eagle has now turned into one of the most successful conservation stories in the United States.

A report by the US Fish and Wildlife Service showed that the population of the eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus), a national symbol of the US, has quadrupled since 2009 — and it’s all because of the long-term conservation efforts across the country.

Mar. 20, 2021 (ZME Science) -The usually gets 20 new gorilla adoptions over the weekend. But since last Saturday it has received over 3,500 adoptions worth $350,000. Most were done out to fictional names. The funds will go towards field programs to track, monitor, and study gorillas.

Mar. 9, 2021 (ScienceNews) -When Isabel Hyman heads out in coming weeks to the wilds of northern New South Wales, she’s worried about what she won’t find. Fifteen years ago, the malacologist — or mollusk scientist — with the Australian Museum made an incredible discovery among the limestone outcrops there: a tiny, 3-millimeter-long snail, with a ribbed, dark golden-brown shell, that was new to science.

Mar. 8, 2021 (Sarasota Herald Tribune) -On a recent Saturday, the Stasiks witnessed the famine in real time along the banks of Manatee Cove Park on Merritt Island, Florida. The paradise they once padded through in this remote, mangrove- lined cove now looks lost – like an elephant graveyard. Except there are manatee bones that litter the shoreline, not tusks.

Mar. 4, 2021 (Science Magazine) -A comprehensive survey of corals has turned up billions of colonies across the Pacific Ocean. The work—based on actual head counts, satellite data, and informed estimates—suggests many species are not in immediate danger of extinction, and the census could help conservationists and policymakers make better decisions about how to protect reefs.

Mar. 3, 2021 (The Guardian) -The greyish brown pygmy hog (Porcula salvania), with its sparse hair and a streamlined body that is about the size of a cat’s, is the smallest wild pig in the world, and also one of its rarest, appearing on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) red list as endangered.

Mar. 2, 2021 (USA TODAY) -Rhonda Bomwell had never used a flea and tick collar before. Pierre, her 9-year-old Papillon service dog, was mostly an indoor animal.

Still, her veterinarian recommended she purchase one, so Bomwell went to the pet store near her home in Somerset, New Jersey, and selected Bayer’s Seresto collar.

A day later, on June 2, 2020, Pierre had a seizure, collapsing while Bomwell was making dinner. Lying on his back, the dog stopped breathing and his eyes rolled back.

Mar. 2, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity) -More than 170 groups today urged Congress to significantly increase the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s budget for endangered species conservation from $291.7 million to $592.1 million — an increase of about $300 million over last year’s budget.

According to the Service’s own data, hundreds of endangered animals and plants receive less than $1,000 a year for their recovery. Many species receive no funding at all from the agency.

Mar. 2, 2021 (INHABITAT) -Manatee mortality in Florida has shot up this year, with 358 recorded deaths in January and February. Last year, the first two months had a combined total of 143 deaths — less than half this year’s current toll. Conservationists worry that the manatees are starving to death.

Some causes of 2021 manatee deaths are known and include boat strikes, cold stress and natural deaths. But many have died for unknown reasons. Pat Rose, director of Save the Manatee Club, suspects one of these reasons is a sea grass shortage. “It’s something we’ve never really seen before,” Rose said. “It looks like we have a substantial number of manatees that are starving.”

Feb. 26, 2021 (ZME Science) -The amount of energy required by polar bears and narwhals to survive in the warming Arctic has increased by 3-400% in recent decades, according to a new study — and it’s pushing them to extinction.

Feb. 24, 2021 (WCSNewsroom) - One of the newest residents at the Bronx Zoo is an American white pelican (Pelecanus erythrorhynchos) named Amos. His bold personality and friendly demeanor will surely make him a favorite among those who are able to meet him though a Bronx Zoo in-person or virtual Animal Encounter session.

Amos arrived at the Bronx Zoo at the end of 2020. His story is even bigger than his personality. In 2016 Amos was found in the Port of Corpus Christi with drooping wings and unable to fly. He was brought to the Wildlife Rescue Center at the nearby Texas State Aquarium where radiographs revealed that both wings were broken. Veterinarians determined that he had been shot in both wings, likely while in flight.

Feb. 22, 2021 (Center for Biological Diversity) -A Fresno County Superior Court judge has rejected an effort by construction and real estate interests, along with the city of Hesperia, to strip away legal protections that currently apply to the imperiled western Joshua tree.

“This is a critical victory for these beautiful trees and their fragile desert ecosystem,” said Brendan Cummings, the Center for Biological Diversity’s conservation director and a Joshua Tree resident.

Feb. 20, 2021 (Deutsche Welle) -The scaly anteaters native to Asia and Africa were originally blamed for transmitting COVID-19 to humans. DW takes a look at the critically endangered creatures that are susceptible to coronaviruses and trafficking.

Feb. 19, 2021 (ZME Science) -Belgian wildlife photographer Yves Adams was on a two-month expedition in the South Atlantic towards Antarctica at the end of 2019 when he came upon a dazzling sight that made him rub his eyes. There he was, as a lone dandelion, a “never before seen” yellow penguin among a colony of 120,000 king penguins. These breathtaking photos speak for themselves.

Feb. 19, 2021 ( INHABITAT ) -While the brutal winter storms across the U.S. are difficult for humans, they also put wildlife at risk, particularly cold-blooded reptiles, like sea turtles. Fortunately, instead of staying home and trying to keep warm during massive power outages, volunteers in coastal Texas are braving stormy waters and cold weather by boat or on foot to haul in cold-stunned sea turtles.

The story includes a slideshow.

Feb. 19, 2021 (ZME Science) -Scientists have resurrected a black-footed ferret after it died more than three decades ago — well, sort of. Using modern techniques, the dead ferret’s DNA was used to produce a perfectly healthy clone, marking the first time scientists have cloned an endangered species in the United States.

Feb. 17, 2021 (The Revelator) -Oceanic sharks and rays live so far from land that the average person is unlikely to ever see them. But these species, which live in the vast open ocean, are also among the most revered, and include the great white shark and the giant manta ray. For millennia, their remoteness has allowed these species to largely avoid humans. But since the early 1950s, industrial-scale fishing fleets have been able to reach distant waters and gradually spread to exploit the entire global ocean.

Feb. 11, 2021 (ZME Science)-A new study from the Simon Fraser University (SFU) warns that one of the most distinctive marine species — sawfish — are at real risk of extinction due to overfishing.

Sawfishes have already disappeared from roughly half of their known range, the authors report, as overfishing is driving their numbers into the ground. The species used to be quite a common sight for around 90 coastal countries around the globe, but are now one of the most threatened family of ocean fish and presumed extinct in 46 of those nations. A further 18 countries presume at least one species of sawfish to be locally extinct, while 28 others presume at least two.

Feb. 7, 2021 (Mercury News)- Heart disease isn’t just the leading cause of death for humans in the United States. It’s also increasingly killing sea otters, especially adults in their prime — and now scientists know why.

Long-term exposure to domoic acid, which leaches from algae during toxic blooms commonly known as “red tides” and accumulates in sea otters’ favorite seafoods, is to blame, the researchers say. Algae blooms are becoming more frequent as climate change drives ocean temperatures up.

Jan. 27, 2021 (Science) -Shark populations in the high seas have fallen by 71% since 1970, researchers have found. The main cause is overfishing, which has put three-quarters of these species at risk of extinction.

“It’s the first big picture” of the decline in sharks, says Nuno Queiroz, a marine ecologist at the Research Center in Biodiversity and Genetic Resources who was not involved with the research. The new global perspective, he says, “gives you an idea how pervasive the fishing has been.”

Jan. 21, 2021 (National Geographic) - In 1998, people in Na Doi, a quiet village in northwest Thailand, noticed that their fish catches in the nearby Ngao River were declining. The fish they did manage to net were also getting smaller. Together, Na Doi’s 75 households decided to try a radical solution: they would set aside a small stretch of river to be strictly off-limits to fishing.

Nearly a quarter-century later, the experiment has paid off. The protected section of the Ngao brims with large barb and mahseer (a kind of carp), and catches outside of the reserve, where the villagers fish, have significantly increased.

Jan. 20, 2021 (NBC NEWS)- The number of western monarch butterflies wintering along the California coast has plummeted precipitously to a record low, putting the orange-and-black insects closer to extinction, researchers announced Tuesday.

Jan. 20, 2021 (NY Times Climate Forward) -A Washington State report put it bluntly: Because of the devastating effects of climate change and deteriorating habitats, several species of salmon in the Pacific Northwest are “on the brink of extinction.”

Of the 14 species of salmon and steelhead trout in Washington State that have been deemed endangered and are protected under the Endangered Species Act, 10 are lagging recovery goals and five of those are considered “in crisis,” according to the 2020 State of Salmon in Watersheds report, which was released in mid-January.

The Amboseli Trust for Elephants aims to ensure the long-term conservation and welfare of Africa’s elephants in the context of human needs and pressures through scientific research, training, community outreach, public awareness and advocacy.

An international Animal Conservation Charity in Conjunction with Howletts and Port Lympne Wild Animal Parks.

Mission: to halt extinction of rare and endangered species and return them to the wild where possible.

It's the longest-running and most successful conservation project dedicated to cheetah survival.

Their signature programs, addressing human-wildlife conflict, livelihood development, education and habitat restoration, have stabilized the wild cheetah population of Namibia – the world’s largest — and have helped launch sister programs in several other cheetah range countries. None of this would not be possible without you.

Joel Sartore has traveled the world for more than 25 years, photographing subjects from tiny to terrifying.

These images are not to be missed.

Born from one family’s passion for Kenya and its wilderness, the Trust is today the most successful orphan-elephant rescue and rehabilitation program in the world and one of the pioneering conservation organizations for wildlife and habitat protection in East Africa.

The Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International is dedicated to the conservation, protection and study of gorillas and their habitats in Africa. Our successful, integrated approach includes close collaboration with local governments and communities as well as partners from around the world

Explore 15,000 of the world’s endangered species. With over 100,000 photos and videos, discover what these animals, plants and fungi look like, what makes them special and why we should protect them.

The EDGE of Existence program is the only global conservation initiative to focus specifically on threatened species that represent a significant amount of unique evolutionary history.

See article upon article covering threats to the endangered natural world.

Set up to address fish & wildlife, hunting and game mamagement, fisheries, law enforcement, habitat ans species conservation and more.

We're counting on the commitment of our members to help our fight to uphold the Endangered Species Act and defend the wild plants, animals and places we all love.

The Endangered Species Act has an unmatched record of success and has put hundreds of species on the path to recovery, but countless plants and animals are still clinging to existence. Their futures depend on the Center for Biological Diversity and the strength of the Endangered Species Act, and we depend on you.

World of the Wild is a unique game that gives users an opportunity to participate in fun gameplay while contributing to real life wildlife conservation efforts. This app gamifies the concept of saving animals and allows you to rescue, rehabilitate and care for animals and habitats within your own carefully crafted world. Each animal in the app represents a real-life charity!

Partnered with 18 charities, World of the Wild offers unique facts and pop quizzes and will allow users to rescue animals in need! The game will empower the global community and transform online culture while restoring the natural world. It's a change to the status quo; utilising online activism to achieve tangible results in conservation.

The (NWPR) is a 22,000 square foot office and warehouse located northeast of Denver, Colorado at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge. The facility is responsible for receiving wildlife items that have been forfeited or abandoned to the U.S.Fish and Wildlife Service.

By law, these items are stored in a secure environment, many of which are donated to educational facilities, nonprofit organizations, and conservation agencies to aid in teaching about endangered species and other wildlife.

Learn about the earth's species and how they are endangered.

Planet Earth teems with life. And now you can meet some of its stars!

Established in 1964, the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species has evolved to become the world’s most comprehensive information source on the global extinction risk status of animal, fungus and plant species.

Humans are generating climate-altering greenhouse gases at a rate that will forever alter our world’s ecosystem...

There Statement: “It’s very simple: We cannot condone the dilution of the role of science in protecting endangered and threatened wildlife,” said WCS President and CEO Cristián Samper.