By Rhett Bennett Sharks have been cruising the world’s oceans for millions of years. We know them as ferocious hunters, built for the kill. And some are. However, most shark and ray species have somewhat less aggressive feeding behaviour and, of course, many end up as food themselves. These magnificent creatures have adapted to an…
By Hollie Booth This Shark Week, take a moment to consider the manta ray. This much-loved gentle giant of the shark and ray (elasmobranch) family is a large, slow-growing and long-lived species, which makes it particularly vulnerable to overfishing. Unfortunately, fishers have increasingly targeted mantas in recent decades to meet emerging demand for their gills…
This article is brought to you by the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP). Read our other articles on the National Geographic Voices blog featuring the work of our iLCP Fellow Photographers all around the world. On July 11th Nathaniel ‘Nat’ Reed, a great environmental advocate, passed away at age 84. Mr. Reed had many accomplishments and tirelessly…
This article is brought to you by the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP). Read our other articles on the National Geographic Voices blog featuring the work of our iLCP Fellow Photographers all around the world. Text by iLCP Fellow Peter Mather It is 1am as I drive down Alaska’s straightest and smoothest road. We are on our…
By Safina Center Staff Pebble Limited Partnership is the mineral exploration corporation behind a proposed project to build a gold and copper mine in the headwaters of Bristol Bay, Alaska, imperiling the world’s last great sockeye salmon run. Environmentalists, scientists and local residents have criticized the project as a wish for certain destruction of this…
By Paul Greenberg, Safina Center Fellow The money shot of climate change is without doubt that of a polar bear stranded on a tiny island of ice, seemingly hopelessly adrift while the world around melts into oblivion. But as we pulled into an anchorage off Spitsbergen Island in the territory known as Svalbard this weekend,…
Celebrated sea captain James Cook implanted a British flag down into the rocky, icy ground on the shore of South Georgia in 1775. When he did so, he claimed ownership of the icy, mountainous Antarctic island not only for his country’s humans, but, inadvertently, also for its rodents. From the arrival of Cook onward, ships…
Over the past year we have received thousands of bird photographs from around the globe. This has been an amazing journey in discovering the amazing variety of birdlife that our world has to offer. This week we take a step back to appreciate some of the best of the Top 25. We hope you enjoy…
Turn over a few rocks and logs in a moist forest and you will certainly find a salamander. Well, not exactly. While this is true in many areas in North America and Europe, salamanders are quite rare in some other places, where other types of amphibians, such as frogs and caecilians, are common. Contrary to…
This week we focus on birds that live amongst us in cities. Urban areas are often thought of as ‘concrete jungles’, devoid of nature, however a number of birds tolerate urban areas and others even thrive in these areas. In a world where urbanisation is rife and wildlife is being lost at a faster rate…
Wild Bird Trust presents this week’s Top 25, “Arid Birds”. These birds face stressors such as aridity and heat but thrive nonetheless. Some birds made use of microclimates to escape the heat, using shade to keep cool. Others will dissipate the heat form their bodies by dilating blood vessels in their legs or by holding…
By Erica Cirino Florida is struggling with a fast-increasing population of invasive green iguanas that began as a small group of released and escaped pets. Thriving in the warm sunshine and humid climate, experts believe hundreds of thousands of nonnative iguanas now call the Sunshine State “home.” There, state conservation officials claim they threaten the…
This week we honour the Migratory Bird Treaty Act on 1918, an act which has protected countless birds from being hunted and exploited for the last 100 years. The strength of this act is now being threatened by legislation changes which no longer make companies accountable for bird deaths. Here the birding community can have…
With only around 6,600 Wild Dogs left in Africa, this incredible animal is one of the continent’s most at-risk carnivores, and is listed by the IUCN as Endangered. Urgent action is required to save them, and a key conservation strategy is the reintroduction of packs into viable habitats where they once occurred. The Endangered Wildlife…
By Jennifer Molnar, Managing Director and Lead Scientist of The Nature Conservancy’s Center for Sustainability Science Recently, I watched my 5-year-old nephew and 2-year-old twin nieces dig into my mom’s garden in New Jersey—looking for worms and pill bugs and other crawling treasures in the early spring dirt. It brought back early memories of doing…
