Most people are completely unaware of the existence of wildlife killing contests. They take place in all but 10 states where they have been fully or partially banned. Every year, tens of thousands of wild animals—including bobcats, coyotes, foxes, mountain lions, prairie dogs, crows, raccoons, and wolves—are slaughtered in these unethical contests. Participants compete to kill the greatest number, the largest or even the youngest of the target species for prizes and entertainment. These contests exploit the lack of killing limits or restrictions for many of these species. Coyotes are frequently targeted in these contests, because they can be killed in unlimited numbers, year-round, with almost any method (e.g. high-powered rifles with night scopes, snares, poisons, killing pups in dens) in most U.S. states. This film, “Wildlife Killing Contests,” directed by Filipe DeAndrade, was produced to shine a bright light on this heinous practice. A national coalition, co-founded by our colleagues at Project Coyote, has formed to abolish killing contests nation-wide. Please check these websites for actions you can take to help end these barbaric contests.

Today’s episode reveals the work of often unsung heroes of wildlife conservation across the US: people like Nadia working to ensure state agencies prioritize coexistence with predators. To learn how you can support work like Nadia’s in your state – be sure to listen until the end for action items you could start on today.

Nadia and Jack discuss the crucial work being carried out in preparation for the 2025 State Wildlife Action Plans (SWAPs). These critical plans, revised every decade, set conservation priorities necessary for states to receive federal funding. Nadia highlights the importance of public engagement in the SWAP revision process to ensure essential species, particularly carnivores like cougars and wolves, are protected and restored. She also addresses challenges such as regulatory gaps, funding deficits, and political influences on wildlife management. Emphasizing the need for cooperation among various organizations, Nadia advocates for concerted efforts to enhance biodiversity and ecological resilience, especially in the Northeast. The episode concludes with practical steps listeners can take to support wildlife conservation efforts.

USFS staff accompanied us on a recent site visit to our Champion Mine South property just outside Colorado's Mt. Massive Wilderness as we assessed cleanup of the old mine site to restore the property to its wilderness character prior to transfer.

You’ve likely heard us say before that The Wilderness Land Trust isn’t an advocacy organization: our focus is to have a real and tangible impact in our wild places by directly acquiring lands at risk of development within and surrounding them. Just as wilderness is nonpartisan, so is the Trust. While we don’t engage in advocacy work, endeavoring to steer government policies, it doesn’t mean wilderness, our work, and our community aren’t impacted by those policies.

Last week we saw thousands of employees of the federal land management agencies we work closely with fired. About 3,400 US Forest Service staff, 1,000 National Park Service staff, and 800 Bureau of Land Management staff who had been in their roles for less than two years were abruptly terminated. We are already seeing impacts to our public lands and wilderness areas as trails are closed due to staffing shortages. Come summer, we’re almost certain to see more.

Throughout the Trust’s 33-year history, we’ve worked with thousands of staff from hundreds of ranger districts, National Forests, state, regional, and national offices of these land management agencies across the country. We’ve shared many miles on the trail together and hauled everything from garbage to mining equipment to entire vehicles out of the wilderness together. We’ve worked through complex title issues and crafted applications to secure funding together. We’ve sweated, laughed, and problem-solved together, inspired by our shared love for wilderness and public lands. Overwhelmingly they have been dedicated, passionate, bright, and a joy to work with. Likely, some of them were among those who lost their jobs last week. Even more will be impacted as the desks around them empty and they must stretch to try and fill the voids left in the work that must be done. The Trust’s successes would not be possible without these individuals, and they have our sincere gratitude, respect, and support.

While we expect to see these staffing cuts impact our work, we’re as determined as ever to continue protecting the wild places you love. We may see timelines for transferring lands to be added to wilderness areas slow, but we will continue working with willing landowners to acquire properties and protect them from the risk of development. The Trust’s work is designed to be patient and our ability to hold properties until the opportunity to transfer them once again arises is part of what has made the Trust so uniquely effective as we've worked successfully with nine different administrations over the years. - Seattle Times Article

The Wilderness Land Trust is excited to welcome Jordan Jimmie to our Board of Directors!

Jordan is a proud Diné (Navajo) raised in Flagstaff, Arizona. Near his childhood home, he grew up exploring Coconino National Forest with friends, which cultivated a reverence for our environment and a yearning for adventure. Jordan witnessed a small stream transform into a roaring torrent near Oak Creek Canyon in high school which encouraged him to study hydrology at the University of Arizona, earning a bachelor’s degree. Following college, he went on to earn a master’s degree in forestry at the University of Montana – Missoula (UM), and another master’s degree in Biological and Ecological Engineering at Oregon State University (OSU).

His thesis at UM modeled the implications of surface water delivery in the Flathead Indian Irrigation Project with the then-recent enactment of the Confederated Salish and Kootenai Tribes water rights settlement and compact. His work at OSU looked into the drainage time of applied surface water to an active aquifer recharge project located in the lower Toppenish Creek watershed in Yakama Nation.

Currently, Jordan resides in Portland, OR, and is a Water Resources Designer at Otak, Inc. He fully enjoys spending time outdoors and is particularly keen on backpacking, trail running, angling, and exploring new areas in Oregon. Jordan can also be found weightlifting, reading about Native American history, and listening to music.

A federal judge on Wednesday ruled that a California couple who built a home without a permit on the bank of McDonald Creek in Glacier National Park did so legally, and that a local conservation district that ordered the home’s demolition, as well as the damaged streambed’s restoration, has no jurisdictional authority to enforce state environmental protection laws.

For John and Stacy Ambler, the defendants in the case, the order granting them summary judgment in their lawsuit against the Flathead Conservation District (FCD) is a clear victory; however, it raises questions about which entity, if not the state of Montana, holds jurisdictional authority over private property owners who wish to develop isolated parcels within the boundaries of Glacier National Park.

Rob Farris-Olsen, an attorney representing Friends of Montana Streams and Rivers (FMSR), a group of West Glacier and Apgar residents who joined the lawsuit as intervenors in the case, both to support the FCD’s position as well as to represent themselves as stakeholders, said the order relegates the property to a sort of jurisdictional gray area.

“It’s my understanding that you cannot construct anything within a national park without a permit, and there were no permits granted in the case,” Farris-Olsen said Thursday morning after reviewing the order. “If the park has exclusive jurisdiction, I don’t know why it didn’t require a permit for the construction of the Amblers’ house. Right now, it seems like there’s no real regulation over those private inholdings.” - Read Full Article

Healthy wetlands are vital for biodiversity, climate, and local communities. In the Oder Delta, the rewetting of the Rożnowo Plain is showcasing the transformative impact of rewilding and delivering wide-ranging benefits.

In the Oder Delta, a vast watery ecosystem on the German-Polish border, the restoration of a wetland is highlighting the transformative impact of rewilding. Water is returning to 26 hectares of the Rożnowo Plain, a wetland located within the Oder Delta rewilding landscape on the floodplain of the Ina River. Marking a significant milestone in delta rewilding efforts, revitalization of the ecosystem is offering a brighter future for an array of wildlife species and benefitting local farmers and communities.

Human interventions in the Oder Delta have widely disrupted the natural flow of water and negatively impacted ecosystems. Many areas surrounding rivers have been drained and the land reclaimed for human activity, such as agriculture and forestry. People straightened, deepened, and embanked riverbeds, while numerous barriers such as dams and weirs further restrict waterways.

Today, in collaboration with local partners, the Rewilding Oder Delta team are rewetting peatlands, improving water retention, and restoring riparian connectivity. The return of more natural water flow is bringing positive change, boosting biodiversity, enhancing the positive climate impact of the landscape, and enriching lives and livelihoods.

In 2023, to address the challenges faced by their local landscape, Marta Hapoń-Sobieraj and Maciej Sobieraj established the Foundation for Climate and Biodiversity.

“The condition of the Ina River and its watershed is close to my heart,” says Maciej. “The Rożnowo area is a valuable source of water for the Ina River and home to some amazing biodiversity. In 2001, the Maszewo Municipality identified the Rożnowo Plain for protection, but no further action was taken. My wife Marta and I finally decided that we had to do something and began looking for ways to enable nature recovery in this area, which is a critical refuge for wetland birds and amphibians.”

Thanks to close cooperation with Rewilding Oder Delta team, Marta and Maciej obtained funding from Rewilding Europe to purchase and protect nearly 26 hectares of the Rożnowo Plain. With beavers returning to the area around a decade ago, the couple then left the eco-engineers to go about their business.

“The beavers continue to do a great job at restoring natural processes,” says Marta Hapoń-Sobieraj. “All they needed was for us to stop interfering. They have reshaped the landscape in such a way that water doesn’t escape, and their positive impact can be seen across an extensive area. Including adjacent forest areas, we can confidently talk about rewetting 80 hectares. We are witnessing the revitalization of the landscape everywhere, with alder forests regenerating and new habitats appearing.” - Read Full Article

In the Iberian Highlands rewilding landscape in Spain, an ambitious volunteering programme is advancing rewilding efforts, equipping participants with valuable knowledge and skills, and creating passionate new advocates for nature recovery.

The launch of a new volunteering programme in the Iberian Highlands rewilding landscape has seen the Rewilding Spain team build engagement and provide young people with the opportunity to advance their personal rewilding journeys. The Iberian Highlands, with its stunning landscapes and captivating wildlife, provided the perfect backdrop for the programme. Kicking off in the spring of 2024, it saw volunteers from ten countries come together in Spain last year to help restore habitats, monitor wildlife, and interact with local communities.

The volunteers, who were mostly aged under 30, supported nature recovery in the landscape through fieldwork and hands-on conservation efforts. From monitoring and tracking large herbivores that have been reintroduced by the rewilding team, to conducting wildlife population surveys and maintaining essential infrastructure, the volunteers engaged in a range of activities aimed at enhancing biodiversity and promoting human-wildlife co-existence.

The efforts of the volunteers not only advanced rewilding in the landscape, but also served as a gateway for them to join the rewilding movement, deepening their connections with wild nature and equipping them with invaluable knowledge and skills. Several volunteers were university students who used the opportunity to complete their undergraduate or master’s degree internships, or to include the work they carried out in the preparation of their doctoral thesis, with tutoring provided by Rewilding Spain’s technical team.

During their stays, which ranged from one to three months, the volunteers deepened their understanding of the principles of rewilding. By actively engaging with the landscape and its inhabitants, they gained valuable insights into the potential of rewilding to address wide-ranging challenges and pave the way for a future where nature and people can flourish alongside each other. The programme also provided participants with the opportunity to learn more about the great natural and cultural heritage of the Alto Tajo, Serranía de Cuenca, and Sierra de Albarracín regions.

The experience left a lasting impression on volunteers. Emily Saunders, a student from the UK who volunteered for two months, found the volunteering experience immersive and enriching. She particularly enjoyed participating in herbivore censuses led by herd manager Manuel Villa, as well as animal behaviour studies.

“The behavioural work was really interesting for me, particularly with my background in zoology. I found the application of my theoretical knowledge in the field highly rewarding.”

Mona Rieux, a French volunteer with an academic background in geography, embraced opportunities to learn about wildlife tracking and vultures. She also participated in a study on Przewalski’s horses, which have been released into the landscape by the Rewilding Spain team. Her exchanges with members of the Rewilding Spain emphasised the transdisciplinary nature of the programme. - Full Article

With support from Rewilding Europe’s European Wildlife Comeback Fund, four beautiful Bonelli’s eagles have just been released on Sardinia. Re-establishing a thriving population of these iconic birds on the Italian island will benefit nature and help turn the tide for this threatened species in Europe.

Four Bonelli’s eagles have just been released in northwest Sardinia, as part of a long-term programme to reintroduce these majestic yet endangered birds on the Italian island. With the support of a 49,800-euro grant from Rewilding Europe’s European Wildlife Comeback Fund, three juvenile and one adult bird were returned to the wild in mid-January, in Tepilora Natural Park. Factors such as the theft of eggs and chicks, direct persecution, and collisions with power lines meant the species had become locally extinct on the island by the 1990s, with reintroductions beginning in 2018. The grant also supported the release of four birds in 2024.

The Bonelli’s eagles are being released on Sardinia under the framework of the multi-partner, EU-funded “LIFE Abilas” initiative. The Spanish NGO GREFA, which received the comeback fund grant, was responsible for transferring the birds to the island, with releases overseen by ISPRA (the Italian Institute for Environmental Protection and Research). Three of the eagles were bred in captivity in the French Vendée region, while the fourth was provided by the Andalusian regional government in Spain.

“The reintroduction of Bonelli’s eagles in Sardinia, supported by EU funding, shows how international partners can work together to return a once extinct species to a landscape where it should be present,” say GREFA president Ernesto Álvarez. “With the overall objective of establishing a viable breeding population of the birds on the island, we are aiming to release a further six to eight eagles every year through till 2030, with the possibility of up to 10 in some years.”

The Bonelli’s eagle, a relatively large bird of prey often found in hilly or mountainous habitats, is emblematic of many Mediterranean regions. With an extensive Eurasian range, it can be found from Portugal in the west to Indonesia in the west. It still breeds on the Italian island of Sicily, where there are currently estimated to be around 40 mature individuals.

With a diet composed mainly of rabbits, hares, and medium-sized birds such as pigeons, the Bonelli’s eagle is considered a keystone species, helping to maintain healthy, balanced ecosystems.

“Rewilding focuses on restoring natural processes, not just on the land, but also in the skies,” explains Sophie Monsarrat, Rewilding Europe’s Rewilding Manager. “As one of the island’s few large raptors, the Bonelli’s eagles on Sardinia will play a vital role in the island’s food web and circle of life.” - Full Article

When our new secretary of the interior sees public lands, he sees only money. Former North Dakota governor Doug Burgum became a billionaire by selling his software company to Microsoft. Though now the statutory steward of more than 2 billion acres of public lands and waters, Burgum still thinks and acts like the entrepreneur/capitalist/corporatist/oil-state politician that he primarily identifies as. Burgum has not risen to this occasion.

During his confirmation hearing Mr. Burgum said he viewed America’s public lands and waters as part of the country’s financial “balance sheet,” with potentially trillions of dollars worth of oil, gas and minerals waiting to be extracted beneath the surface.

“We have all this debt,” Mr. Burgum said. But “we never talk about the assets,” he said. “It’s our responsibility to get a return for the American people.”

“Not every acre of federal land is a national park or a wilderness area,” Mr. Burgum said, adding, “Some of those areas we have to absolutely protect for their precious stuff, but the rest of it, this is America’s balance sheet.” [emphasis added]

In a speech to the National Congress of American Indians on February 12, 2025, Burgum said:

If we’re going to pay down the $36 trillion dollar debt, then we gotta figure out a way to not just focus on our liabilities—that’s the $36 trillion—but we got a bunch of assets. We might have $100 trillion in assets. Those assets are out there in public lands . . . I’m talking about the fact that we have 500 million acres of land that are in public hands that were put away for the benefit and use of the American public. . . . Some of that land is inhospitable or unoccupied, but underneath that it has value to allow us . . . whether it’s critical minerals, energy resources, using that for wind or solar—whatever—almost equivalent to a quarter of the lower 48 is public lands, and yet our return on that investment right now is almost nothing. It’s one of the ways we can create the funding for everyone.

Fortunately, national parks and wilderness areas are not on Burgum’s balance sheet, as these are among the areas he says “we have to absolutely protect for their precious stuff.” We can hope this category also includes such areas with “precious stuff” as national monuments, national wildlife refuges, national scenic areas, national recreation areas, national conservation areas, and other national whatever areas including wild and scenic rivers, national trails, and the like. (Burgum would probably not consider the national forests to be “precious stuff,” but the National Forest System is not under his jurisdiction.)

Certainly on Burgum’s balance sheet (pronounced “hit list”) are those of the public’s lands that are “inhospitable or unoccupied” (coming from North Dakota, he would know best). Assuming that Burgum will not put the National Park System or the National Wildlife Refuge System onto his balance sheet, that leaves those 247.3 million acres of the public’s lands administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). More than 38 million acres of BLM lands are in the National Landscape Conservation System (where Burgum’s ability to play is severely limited because Congress has deemed these lands as having “precious stuff”), but that leaves more than 209 million acres of BLM land in some jeopardy.

Assuming Burgum has priced the assets underlying the public’s lands and waters in his domain correctly at $100 trillion, there is no question that the public’s lands and waters are financially underperforming. Monetizing the nation’s public lands is ill-conceived. One should never, ever collateralize assets so precious that their loss would be catastrophic, irretrievable, and irreversible if the deal goes bad. An individual or corporation risking property through collateralization is one thing. Such is central to capitalism and property rights. Risking the people’s public lands and waters is quite another. Such is a violation of the public trust.

The United States is not so poor that it must monetize the nation’s public lands, nor so rich that it can afford to. As that great environmentalist Oscar Wilde said, “A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.” Billionaire Bergum is certainly as cynical a secretary of the interior as we have ever had (and we’ve had some doozies). Paraphrasing Ronald Reagan, the nine most terrifying words a secretary of the interior such as Burgum can utter are: “I’m from Big Business and I’m here to help.”

Public lands provide goods and services that private lands are unable or unwilling to provide. Public lands should be protected from the whims and greed of markets by isolating them from markets. - This article was originally published in Andy Kerr’s Public Lands Blog.

Andy Kerr is the Czar of The Larch Company and consults on environmental and conservation issues. The Larch Company is a for-profit non-membership conservation organization that represents the interests of humans yet born and species that cannot talk.

He is best known for his two decades with the Oregon Wild (then Oregon Natural Resources Council), the organization best known for having brought you the northern spotted owl. Kerr began his conservation career during the Ford Administration.

In this episode of the Rewilding Earth podcast, Jack Humphrey chats with Center for Biological Diversity‘s Cooper Freeman about Alaska’s unique conservation challenges, particularly under the Trump administration. They delve into the new administration’s aggressive rollback of environmental protections and the bleak prospects this spells for Alaska’s biodiversity. The conversation covers the importance of maintaining legal and political pressure, the role of public participation, and the necessity of financial support for conservation efforts. The episode ends with a call to action, urging listeners to stay informed, involved, and supportive of initiatives aimed at safeguarding Alaska’s future. - Alaska's Stand

Unlike the clear tropical waters of southern Florida, most of the northern Gulf Coast is characterized by dark, nutrient-rich rivers that transition into salt marshes before entering the Gulf. Those estuaries provide habitat for shrimp, crabs, birds, fish, oysters, and other animals and plants.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the region contains 16 major estuarine systems. Historically, it has also been incredibly productive. This “Fertile Fisheries Crescent,” provides livelihoods for thousands of people along the coast.

However, the recent arrival of new species, due to the “tropicalization” of the waters, has researchers looking into what impact they will have on native plants and animals. There’s also concern as to what happens to more temperate water species, such as Gulf oysters, spotted seatrout, and flounder, as climate change continues to warm the ocean. That’s because, unlike species along the east or west coasts, Gulf species can’t go any farther north.

“We’re still kind of teasing all that stuff apart,” says Charlie Martin, a marine sciences professor at the University of South Alabama. “New species moving in might have an impact on the resident flora and fauna.”

While it is unclear what this might mean for native fisheries, researchers have examples along the Florida peninsula, where mangroves have slowly been creeping up for decades. There, once-productive oyster beds are nearly completely covered by mangroves. Researchers are also worried about the possibility of tropical fish outcompeting or replacing the more temperate species of the northern Gulf Coast.

Common snook, for example, a sportfish once rare along the northern Gulf Coast, have been showing up more often in off the coast of Louisiana, Alabama, and the Florida Panhandle.

Another recent study, tracking increasing temperatures, was more concerning. The northern Gulf of Mexico is home to the last largescale wild oyster harvest in the United States, providing around 70 percent of the nation’s wild caught oysters. For decades, the oyster reefs along the coast, as in other parts of the world, have been in decline. Apalachicola Bay, Florida, which once produced around 10 percent of the country’s wild oysters, was closed to harvest in 2020. The fishery collapsed due to a number of reasons, including hurricanes, changes in salinity levels, and overfishing. Rising temperatures may have also been to blame.

The study found that oyster reproduction declined significantly in Apalachicola and Mobile bays during years with heatwaves that lasted 11 or more consecutive days. Prolonged exposure to continuous warm weather resulted in much fewer oyster larvae during those years. The region is expected to see more of those types of heatwaves moving forward, according to NOAA.

While researchers suspect some fish may be able to migrate to deeper waters as the Gulf Coast heats up, oysters won’t have that option. Instead, reefs along the Gulf may start to look like those found further south, in Tampa, Florida. Less than a century ago, that area was home to around 2,000 acres of oyster beds; today, it has just 171 acres. A study by the University of South Florida found that from 1938 to 2020, around 83 percent of the area’s oyster reefs were taken over by mangroves.

“Mangroves are moving up both sides of the Gulf of Mexico,” says Kenneth Heck, professor of marine sciences at the University of South Alabama. Mangroves have firmly established themselves on the Chandeleur Islands in Louisiana and steadily marched up Florida’s Big Bend and Panhandle areas. More recently, they’ve been found on Horn Island, off the coast of Mississippi.

“The only state far as I know that has no mangrove is Alabama,” Heck says, “but I’ve been expecting that to show up any time.” Black mangroves, which are more cold-tolerant than other types of mangroves found in the Gulf of Mexico, are outcompeting salt marsh plants as they migrate north.

While mangroves have historically tried to take hold as far north as Louisiana, they were usually beaten back by especially cold weather during winters. That’s changing too. - Earth Island Journal

We made the supporter list for businesses and organizations that support the Wild Fish Conservancy...

The Washington Board of Natural Resources cast a historic vote to permanently ban commercial net pen aquaculture in Washington marine waters. This decision ensures that polluting and dangerous net pens will never return to threaten our public waters again, safeguarding wild salmon and Puget Sound's ecosystems for all current and future generations. Read the Seattle Time's coverage here: WA bans commercial net-pen fish farming

Today, we can proudly declare that Washington is the first—and only—place in the world to successfully remove and permanently ban commercial net pens to protect our public waters.

This victory is the direct result of our coalition's decade of relentless advocacy, unwavering dedication, and tireless collaboration. Since 2017, we’ve stood united under the banner of Our Sound, Our Salmon, speaking truth to power, standing firm against corporate interests, and demanding a future where the health of our waters and wildlife is prioritized.

All of our success to date, culminating in yesterday's historic action, is a powerful statement of what is possible when people unite to challenge the status quo. This victory honors the strength and resilience of Tribal Nations, the tireless efforts of local communities, and the overwhelming will of the public who have championed a vision for a cleaner, healthier Puget Sound. It is a testament to the power of collective action and the belief that when the people speak, lasting change is possible.

Ute ladies’ tresses are one of the rarest and most beautiful orchid species in the western United States — and they’re at a critical juncture. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed stripping these delicate flowers of their federal protection just when they need it most.

Ute ladies' tresses are in serious decline. They're threatened in about 72% of their known locations and critically imperiled in five of the eight states where they grow. The rest aren't far behind. Since the orchids gained Endangered Species Act protection in 1992, their plight has only gotten worse due to intensifying threats like climate change, habitat loss, shifting water flow, and dwindling pollinator populations. Removing protection now could push the species past the point of no return. - Add Your Voice Here

The Gallatin Range—Montana's largest roadless wilderness—could not be at a more critical juncture. This wild 250,000-acre expanse of public lands immediately adjacent to Yellowstone National Park is under threat by the Forest Service and the Gallatin Forest Partnership—a "conservation" collaborative that is seeking to break up this critical landscape to special interests at the expense of wildlife and wilderness.

The Gallatins are home to wolves, wolverine, grizzly bear, bison, elk, cutthroat trout and many more species. Do we have the foresight and humility to protect the Gallatins as federally designated Wilderness or will we capitulate to private interests and industrial strength recreation? - Watch Here

Wildlife for All is a national movement to reform state wildlife management to be more democratic, just, compassionate, and focused on protecting wild species and ecosystems. Because wildlife is held in the public trust, and everyone should have a voice in wildlife decisions. Wild animals deserve to be treated fairly as members of the community of life and are sentient beings worthy of our empathy and respect. - Wildlife for All

George Schaller has explored the wilderness of the world since 1952. A legendary scientist and master biographer of the planet’s most charismatic species, he has conducted extensive field research with gorillas, pandas, lions, tigers, snow leopards, and jaguars. George’s work has led to the creation of more than 20 parks and reserves worldwide and has inspired generations of field biologists and conservationists. Watch a short video on George Schaller and his work here.

John Davis, executive director of The Rewilding Institute, met with George Schaller at his home in New Lebanon, New Hampshire, to have a conversation that highlights and reflects on George’s work in the field and around the world over the last 70 years. Below is a transcript of the interview.

John Davis: George, how did you choose places to study? How did you choose where you wanted to study?

George Schaller: Sometimes I was asked. For example, Johns Hopkins University asked me to go to India. They had a program there, and I could study where I wanted. Then the Tanzania National Parks Director asked me to come to Tanzania, so I studied lions and their prey. Some of the areas I selected myself because very little was known about them, and I was interested in seeing what was there.

John: You often just went into an area and started studying various species and then figured out where the important habitats were?

George: I like to sit and watch animals. If it’s an area that has quite a few animals, I look around for a place where there’s still natural habitat. And then I get information on the animals and suggest to the government that maybe this should be a protected area.

John: And you had remarkable success. I’ve read that at least 20 parks and other protected areas owe their existence to your work. How did you do that? How do you take biology and translate that into land protection?

George: Once governments trust you, most governments are fine. I’d come with my wife, Kay, and our children, and we would sit there and talk about what interested the government and what they could do. Then I would give them my data and suggest on the map an area that would be suitable to protect wildlife. Most of the time, they were very cooperative. The total area we helped protect, I once calculated, is about the size of California.

John: Goodness, that’s incredible—about 100 million acres! I live in Adirondack Park, which is in northern New York, and it’s about six million acres in size. It’s the biggest park in the eastern U.S. One of your protected areas, I gather, Changtang, in northern China, is nearly 80 million acres in size. That is huge. But are most of these protected areas really protected? Are the governments maintaining the borders and keeping poachers out, or does it really vary by place?

George: It varies a lot by place. I have tried to go back to visit these areas again. And then I can go to the government, and say: “Look, these are problems; let’s do something.” And they usually do. But it is like everywhere and a matter of money and staff.

John: How did you develop the patience to just watch animals? To sit still and watch, that takes amazing patience and dedication.

George: With the gorillas and the pandas, for example, I’d go to certain groups every day. So pretty soon they look up and see, oh, there he is again, and they do their business. Some just fall asleep. Gorillas got very curious and started investigating me. But the point is, animals learn quickly and are very tolerant if they don’t feel threatened.

John: Does that apply even with, say, cougars? I ask partly because I have wandered thousands and thousands of miles through the American West hoping to see a puma, and I never have. Are they even more elusive than some other big cats, or are cats more wary than other animals?

George: It depends on what you do. For example, if a puma has killed a deer and you give it another deer and another deer, he will get used to eating at this place and used to seeing you at a distance. The animals watch, and they habituate. People think these cats are solitary, but they are part of a community. And the only way to find that out is to find them.

John: Did the U.S. government ever ask you to do studies here or was it usually countries in other parts of the world?

George: Usually overseas, although I had a project in Alaska with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

John: Do you think most of those governments that brought you in are still supportive of conservation studies, or has that changed?

George: I’d have to live there a few months to see attitudes, but in general, governments are aware of population growth and habitat destruction.

John: Do you think the Half Earth or Nature Needs Half concept that E.O. Wilson popularized—that we should protect at least half of Earth’s lands and waters—is a good message to promote?

George: I think people’s minds are not on the world. You have to make a map of each country and say: This area is essential for us to protect.

John: So, people are not thinking at the global scale, they’re thinking at the national scale, is that what you mean?

John: Yeah, we’re not going to implement anything globally, we would do it nation by nation. So we need a “Half America” strategy, perhaps.

John: Do you think maps are effective tools for communicating conservation vision? Did you say you drew maps sometimes to show what places should be protected?

George: Yeah, in trip reports. But it’s a personal thing. If you just send it in to a government department, it gets filed away and that’s it. Better to find the right person, then go meet them and show them your map of what is important.

George: It depends on habitat. Most primates, other than baboons, are forest animals. As the forest goes, so do they. And deforestation continues. Nowadays, if you go walking in the Amazon forest, you can go hour after hour and never see a monkey because they’ve all been shot for food.

George: Sure, you can call it bushmeat trade, but often it is families shooting them for dinner.

John: And are primates like large carnivores in being relatively slow to reproduce or does that vary a lot by species?

George: It varies by species. When you have these guys walking through the forest with a shotgun, not much the wild primates can do.

George: It looks different. Shorter hair and so forth. The mountain gorilla was fun to study because their faces are so distinctive; you could give all of them names. And if I remember, I had 169 gorillas in the area I was working.

John: Can you get to the point where you recognize individuals of jaguars or tigers or other carnivores by their patterns, or are they too similar to our eyes to tell apart?

George: With tigers, I knew individuals who were in my area by the stripe pattern. There were nine tigers where I was working, and I got so I could just look at their face and know who it was.

A jaguar watches George Schaller’s approach from a riverbank in the Pantanal, the world’s biggest wetland. The Wildlife Conservation Society began working to conserve and understand jaguars in the late 1970s when Schaller completed pioneering studies of jaguars, focusing on their ecology and range use within the region.

George: You could, but I didn’t spend enough time with jaguars, even though I saw some repeatedly. You can do it from photographs.

John: Did you sometimes feel like you formed a relationship with an individual animal? Or did you try to be more objective and not get emotionally connected?

George: Oh, you get emotionally connected. An animal, too, responds to you individually. If I went with a companion, the animals would get all nervous. That happens now with the mountain gorillas, where people go in big groups and see them.

John: Did you ever worry that forming an emotional attachment with a wild animal would interfere with your scientific objectivity or bias your studies?

George: No. If anything, it’s a positive because you become more intense and interested. Especially if you’re watching a female with a baby and you see it develop and so forth.

John: What were your favorite wild places? What are your favorite wild parts of the world?

George: Certainly, the Serengeti is one. I also like to wander around the Himalayas.

John: Do the animals there—like blue sheep and snow leopards—go up really high? Do they go up high in the mountains, or is that just too inhospitable?

George: Oh yes, gorillas especially play. I’ve seen snow leopards just go and slide down a slope. Much of what you consider fighting, like bashing heads between horned animals, is not serious. It may be testing dominance, but they enjoy it.

John: Almost like playful sparring? And wild animals have fun, just like we do, right?

George: Yes, probably, but it’s hard to know what they’re thinking. Other favorite places included the mountain gorilla sites. They were beautiful. You have the volcanoes above the forest, and you can climb up and see the landscape. Also, India’s Kanha National Park was really beautiful. The government let us have a bungalow, and Kay and the children were there part of the time. We had many deer around, and in the morning, we had to go out carefully and look that a tiger wasn’t sleeping on our porch.

George: Not many. Most snakes are afraid of you. But you don’t want to wrestle a cobra.

John: Decades of studying these animals, and you were never hurt by them.

Schaller moved his young family into a little bungalow in the forest, in the jungles of Central India, to study wildlife in Kanha National Park. (1963-1965) Here, his wife, Kay, and their two boys, Eric and Mark, play with toy boats by a creek. Schaller’s 1967 book, The Deer and the Tiger, is his detailed account of the ecology and behavior of Bengal tigers and four species of the hoofed mammals on which they prey, based on observations in Kanha National Park.

John: I believe I remember Rick Ridgeway telling me about a trip he took with you and maybe Jimmy Chin, where you pulled rickshaws way into the Tibetan Plateau. Is that right?

George: It’s improving again. The Tibetan antelope has the finest wool in the world. Shawls are made from it that can cost $15,000. So they got killed by the thousands, but that’s been pretty well stopped.

George: There are communities, particularly on the periphery, but there are big wild areas in the northern part. I took one trip there west to east, and in 1,000 miles of travel, I didn’t see anybody.

John: And you saw nobody else? That’s amazing. Were you on a road or just going through?

George: A few. There are quite a few areas in South America that I’ve never visited.

John: When you were studying in a particular area, did you make a point of trying to talk with local people?

George: There are very few studies of animals and a lot of studies of people. I visited people and chatted about wildlife and so forth, but I wasn’t focused on helping the communities.

John: I would applaud you for focusing on wildlife, but I assume that in learning about wildlife you could get some knowledge from the local people.

John: Did it often seem like the local people were knowledgeable about wildlife, or did they often have misunderstandings, or did it vary a whole lot?

George: In general, they are knowledgeable about wildlife around them. But usually they don’t have much interest, unless a wild animal comes and eats their livestock.

George: I think that hunting for subsistence is okay. Hunting just to brag about a bigger trophy, that time has passed.

An adult (silverback) male mountain gorilla and a subadult male watch Schaller as Schaller observes them nearby. In 1959 and 1960, Schaller and his wife, Kay, lived in Karaba — the saddle between Mikeno and Karisimbi, the two highest volcanoes in the Virunga Mountains — to conduct the first intensive study of the mountain gorillas.

George: Oh, I took a lot of trips to Mongolia. I was studying snow leopards and the huge herds of Mongolian gazelles, among other things, as I described in my book Into Wild Mongolia. The fortunate thing in Mongolia is that there are very few people in some areas.

John: That is good. Are the traditional cultures there remaining traditional?

John: Did you find over your decades of studying that as tribal or traditional cultures modernized, they became more destructive of wildlife?

George: I don’t know, but there are more people, and they need more land. And many areas where people live, agricultural land is very scarce. People are very poor and try to find a way to survive.

George: Some governments do give money to the poorest people, but most of the world’s poor people remain poor. If they took some of the billions of dollars, they spend shooting rockets at the moon and Mars and gave the money to people, it would be more useful.

George: Not compared to what it needs. We don’t really even know what’s out there yet, do we? Most of the undiscovered species are small.

George: That’s a general term, like barking deer. But this was a giant muntjac (Muntiacus spp.), bigger than the regular one.

George: I don’t remember the lizard’s name. All I know is I collected it, and the museum reported it as a new species.

George: Not really. With small creatures all over the world, you can find many new species.

John: Of the many large mammals, you have studied, which ones would you say are doing relatively well and which ones are doing poorly? Which ones are in the most trouble?

George: Gorillas live in very small areas, and the ones I studied in the Virunga Volcanoes of Uganda, Rwanda, and the Congo, now they’ve increased back to their former numbers because of better protection.

Tigers are in big trouble because all the body parts of tigers are used in traditional medicines in China. They’re difficult to protect because if you kill a tiger, you can make $500. And as a poor villager, that’s worth your while. Besides, tigers kill livestock. You have an excuse. They killed my cow.

Schaller studied wildlife in Kanha National Park in Central India from 1963 to 1965. Here, a tigress pulls a domestic calf she has killed into a thicket. In 1967, Schaller published The Deer and the Tiger, his detailed account of the ecology and behavior of Bengal tigers and four species of the hoofed mammals on which they prey, based on his observations.

John: The sale of body parts of wild animals for traditional medicine is a big problem for wildlife in many places. Is there an effective way of addressing that problem? Could we put pressure on the Chinese government to crack down on the trade?

George: Yeah, but even if it’s illegal, if you make a lot of money from it, people will still take advantage of it.

John: And are there places where a controlled market may work? I think there’s debate with elephants about whether there should be a complete ban on the trade of tusks or whether there should be a carefully regulated market.

John: What about trophy hunting? I don’t like the idea of trophy hunting at all. But I have heard arguments, including from a couple of friends who’ve done conservation work in Africa, that if you can charge a lot of money for trophy hunting, and then put the fees toward land conservation, it might actually have a net positive effect.

George: The problem is, the money is given to the government rather than the communities. Not enough trickles down to the communities. But private NGOs are sometimes involved in paying local people. If a tiger kills a cow, the landowner gets paid for the dead cow and agrees not to kill the tiger, that sort of thing.

John: Are tigers doing okay anywhere, or are they in trouble everywhere? Is that a tragedy we may see, the extinction of the tiger, or is there still hope?

George: There’s hope for tigers in specific, small areas. What is more difficult is to keep those small populations connected with others so they don’t suffer from inbreeding.

John: Are any countries implementing region–wide wildlife corridor systems? My mentor Dave Foreman was always preaching about the importance of big wild Cores connected by Wildlife Corridors and buffered with multiple–use areas, a Reed Noss model of conservation. Is that being implemented in Asia or Africa, or anywhere?

George: Tanzania is trying to implement it. These days, most countries have some biologists who have had training overseas; in fact, with enough training, they don’t need foreigners and may not want foreigners.

George: Most definitely. It’s nice to have somebody check up on things, but what would you think in your protected area in upstate New York, if suddenly you had six Chinese show up saying: “I’m going to do research.”

John: That would really upset some local people. Would you tell me a few of your favorite wildlife experiences?

A wild female panda entered George Schaller’s tent and slept on the bed. When he returned home, she looked at him through the window, then left. In the early 1980s, Schaller became the first foreigner allowed to study the panda in its native habitat in China’s Sichuan Province. (Photo courtesy of George Schaller)

George: Since we were just talking about them, I’ll mention a mountain gorilla experience: I got them used to me enough that I liked to climb a low branch of a tree and sit so I could look down into the brush at them. One day a female with her baby climbed up and sat next to me on a branch.

But what you don’t do is stare at gorillas. You move your head so they don’t feel threatened, because a stare from either humans or gorillas is a direct threat.

George: Haven’t tested it in most, but any staring makes animals nervous. Try it with a dog.

George: And the same with pandas. I followed some pandas day after day, until they all looked up and off, like there he is again. Then I sat down, and sometimes a panda would sit 50 feet away and fall asleep.

John: With the pandas, I don’t suppose it would work to put out food because they’re just eating bamboo, right? So how did you get them used to you?

George: Yeah, don’t get too close to begin with. But if they want to make a decision and come close to you, that’s fine.

John: Did you find that you were less likely to see animals if you were moving, if you were walking, than if you were sitting?

George: In a lot of these areas, you can follow animals by the broken brush, by droppings, and so forth. And, you learn.

John: With snow leopards, did you ever get any of the cats accustomed to you, or is that a very different animal?

George: That’s very different, but again, there were ways to get close. For example, there was a female with two cubs, and she had a kill. I stayed far enough away, so she didn’t flee from the rocks where she was. I gave her more goats, and moved slowly closer. I stayed a whole week with them. Sleeping out at night with them.

George: In some places, like in India, the government let us use a lovely bungalow. And in the Congo, in the gorilla area, there was a decrepit shed, which Kay and I moved into. So there’s usually something, which especially helps in countries with a lot of rain and snow. But if the weather is reasonable, all I need for the night is a sleeping bag and a snack.

George Schaller studied wildlife, particularly jaguars, in the vast swamps of the Pantanal in Southwest Brazil. Here, Schaller follows a river with his pet white-lipped peccary, a species of the South American wild pig. (Photo courtesy of George Schaller)

John: We want to see jaguars come back into the United States, as well as increased numbers in northern Mexico. But one challenge is that while males still cross the border, females are about 100 miles to the south. Might females somehow get across that distance, or is that longer than you would expect a female jaguar to travel?

George: Those jaguars are probably in a more-or-less settled community. So if a female has young, and a male grows up, he’s not welcomed by the resident male who has that territory. So the young males tend to move off to find their own place. Whereas the females don’t need to.

John: So a basic paradox with cat restoration efforts is that the young males tend to disperse, but the young females usually do not.

George: It depends on the local situation, but if they’re part of a community, why would the females disperse?

John: It’s very interesting you talk about the communities, because you don’t hear that very often. As you said earlier, people tend to assume that pumas and jaguars are solitary animals, but they actually are part of communities?

George: Yeah, and tigers, too. Tigers wander through an area, squirt urine against a tree, claw the tree… This is all a signal to the next tiger that comes past. And this says, so and so has been here.

George: Males more, but yes. That’s one way of maintaining community stability, of knowing your neighbors as long as they’ve been there.

John: For jaguar recovery to succeed in the United States, what do you think we would need to do? Do you think we need to physically move some females north? Active reintroduction should be considered?

John: Maybe how Rewilding Argentina did it in Iberá is a good way to consider?

John: You were part of a conversation with Mark Elbroch and his Panthera colleagues, and they were talking about the feasibility of restoring cougars to the northeastern United States. I’m a big advocate for that. One of my main goals in life is to see pumas back on the ground before I die. Would similar guidelines apply?

George: You can’t just dump them, because that’s like if I took you to the Amazon and dumped you. What do you do? Right. We’ve got to have some reason to stay in that area.

George: That would vary by animal, obviously. One male is happy to have several females. You have got to just experiment. You’re going to lose some animals, especially during hunting season.

John: Do you have suggestions on how to build social support for rewilding efforts for large carnivores? You probably hear in the news about wolf restoration efforts in the West and particularly in Colorado now; and you know we’re contemplating cougar restoration efforts in the Northeast. How do we build enough social support that the animals won’t be shot?

George: A very small percentage of wolves are going to kill livestock and dogs. If people object to that, what kind of compensation can you give them? People like compensation in material things, in money, or in good publicity.

George: As a sideline. When I go to an area, I try to study everything. Not only what the tigers eat, but what the wolves eat, etc.

John: With the kind of work you did over the past seven decades, could a young biologist hope to have a similar career, or is it just too politically difficult now to do studies in foreign countries?

George: It depends on your foreign country. Most of these countries have sent students to the U.S. who return home and now can do their own studies. I think of Iran; it’s a wonderful country, and the last Asiatic cheetahs are there. There are only maybe 30, 40 left. I made five or six trips there to work with Iranian wildlife officials in protecting them. Now there is no way an American can safely go there.

George: The big problem is, with so few cheetahs, they must travel far to find mates. So one of the main causes of death is roadkill

George: Yeah, Indian ones are gone. The other countries bordering Iran say there is an occasional cheetah, but that’s not a population.

George: They live in one small area in the Gir Forest in India. And they’re well protected. But is that a future? I don’t know.

John: In a case like that, is it ethical to use artificial means to keep the population alive? I don’t know whether that would be supplemental food or bringing in individuals from zoos to mix up the genetics. Is that kind of manipulation appropriate or is that meddling too much?

George: It depends. African lions seem to be genetically just enough different to call them a subspecies.

John: Now, if I may ask you a sticky question, some of us believe that many of the problems facing wildlife are insurmountable if we don’t address what some of us think is a fundamental problem: human overpopulation. Do you see that as a driver of the extinction crisis?

George: That, together with climate change, is obviously a basic issue… but you can’t change people.

John: Do you give them advice on what they might do with their lives? Or are they too young for that?

John: Do you feel guardedly optimistic about the future, or pessimistic, or somewhere in between?

John: I don’t know if you ever heard this quote. Arnie Ness, the father of deep ecology, would say, “I’m a pessimist for the 21st century, an optimist for the 22nd.” I think he meant civilization as we know it would not last much longer, but maybe something better will emerge afterward.

George: Yeah, with climate change… look at these tornadoes in Florida—billions of dollars in damage.

George Schaller uses a scope to observe Marco Polo Sheep. at a hunting concession in the Eastern Pamirs, outside of Murghab, Gorno-Badakshan Autonomous Region, Tajikistan. 2005. (Photo courtesy of George Schaller)

John: During your work life, did you see the effects of climate change already, or is it becoming more evident now than it was when you were out in the field?

George: The only time we actually checked was up in northern Alaska. I revisited a site that I photographed 50 years before. One of the students who had been with me was there, and we compared the trees over 50 years, from then to now. There had been changes.

John: As the Bering Sea warms, the Western Arctic is getting not just warmer but also wetter and the shrub line is advancing. Some of the traditional caribou migration routes apparently are being abandoned because the caribou don’t like to thrash through thick shrubs, and so they’re detouring around. That sounds like a direct result of climate change.

George: Oh, absolutely. Climate change has been going on for thousands of years, but we are speeding the process.

George: I did my undergraduate work in Alaska. One summer, I went to northern Alaska with a friend, and we went by canoe from the mountains down to the ocean to record birds. Then, the next summer I worked with the Fish and Wildlife Service to follow caribou migrations. And the summer after that, I went to Mount Katmai National Monument—an interesting place to see wildlife, with lots and lots of big brown bears.

John: Any general suggestions for those of us engaged in conservation? For people who follow Rewilding Earth?

George: Every area can use somebody to check on things and talk to communities and see how they need help or what they need to conserve wildlife, and so forth. There’s not enough of that all over.

In Alaska's waters, where salmon have long shaped both ecosystems and communities, we are witnessing a chronic decline in Chinook salmon. Despite their historical abundance, data shows sharp declines in abundance, age, diversity, and spatial structure. In response, Wild Fish Conservancy filed a formal petition in January 2024, calling for federal protection for at-risk Chinook populations in Alaska’s Gulf of Alaska.

Just last week, we notified NOAA of our intent to sue for disregarding their legally required deadline to complete a species status assessment and issue a 12-month finding on whether these at-risk populations warrant protection under the ESA.

Cook inlet and Kodiak Island streams, world-renowned for Chinook salmon, saw the worst returns on record. Runs that used to number in the tens of thousands have returned at only a couple hundred, or in some of the most severe cases, less than 100 Chinook in the last year. The Kenai River that once produced the world’s largest Chinook has now gone three consecutive years without any of its largest, oldest age-7 salmon returning.

Over time, steadily declining returns have resulted in consecutive years of emergency fishery closures for in-river commercial, recreational, and subsistence fisheries, including for indigenous communities. As recent as two days ago, Alaska announced new restrictions and complete closures for a number of Chinook fisheries in the Gulf of Alaska.

Meanwhile, Alaska’s government continues to authorize and defend large-scale commercial ocean fisheries that harvest or kill as bycatch Chinook from these same populations. Instead of returning to sustain in-river communities and ecosystems, these ocean-caught Chinook, which include large numbers of migrating at-risk Chinook from Washington, Oregon, and British Columbia, are then certified and marketed as 'sustainable' Alaskan Chinook.

On the Olympic Peninsula, another species continues to decline while NOAA delays ESA protections. Alongside our partners at The Conservation Angler, we filed a lawsuit last month challenging NOAA for failing to issue a final determination on our 2022 petition seeking federal protection for Olympic Peninsula steelhead. NOAA itself acknowledges the risks these fish face. Their status assessment prepared to inform a final decision determined they face a 'moderate risk of extinction', yet as of today, the agency is now 562 days overdue in issuing a final determination that would allow the recovery planning process to begin.

For Alaskan Chinook and Olympic Peninsula steelhead, every day of inaction allows the threats facing these fish to intensify, making their survival and recovery even harder to achieve.

These legal actions are essential to securing and enforcing protections already warranted under the ESA. When we defend the requirements of the ESA, we unlock resources for recovery planning, habitat restoration, and coordinated conservation efforts that have helped many species recover.

Learn more about these recovery actions and read our recent press releases on our website.

ALBUQUERQUE— A federal judge (Jan. 29th) upheld efforts by the U.S. Forest Service to remove feral cattle from the Gila Wilderness, America’s first designated wilderness and one of the Southwest’s largest ecologically intact tracts of public land. The U.S. District Court order dismissed livestock industry arguments against the removals. The Center for Biological Diversity intervened in the industry’s lawsuit, which aimed to block the Gila National Forest’s cow removal plan, to support the U.S. Forest Service.

“This sensible ruling validates the Forest Service’s efforts to protect the Gila Wilderness and its remarkable biological diversity,” said Taylor McKinnon, Southwest director at the Center. “It’s a victory for America’s first wilderness that will lead to a cleaner, healthier Gila River and restored wildlife habitat.”

Gila National Forest officials received more than 5,000 public comments that supported removing feral cattle from the wilderness, including using lethal means. Feral, unbranded cattle have been destroying fish and wildlife habitat, overgrazing native vegetation, trampling stream banks and polluting critical water sources within the Gila Wilderness for decades. Recent Forest Service surveys have found little or no sign of feral cattle in the Gila Wilderness.

The area is critical habitat for several endangered and threatened species, including Mexican spotted owls, yellow-billed cuckoos, loach minnows, Chiricahua leopard frogs and narrow-headed garter snakes. Years of roundup efforts and ecological monitoring have confirmed that the feral cows in the Gila Wilderness are unowned, unbranded, unauthorized animals that have been reproducing independently of any ranching operation. There are no ranches or active grazing allotments near areas where feral cattle have been found.

The Gila National Forest has full legal authority to remove unauthorized livestock from federal lands under its management.

Slender-billed curlews, Key Largo tree cactuses, and obliterated whitefish are just a few of the species scientists declared extinct in 2024.

In November 2024, after years of searches for the Slender-billed curlew, scientists declared that the species was gone for good — the first documented extinction of a bird species from mainland Europe, North Africa and West Asia.

“It is a tragedy on a par with the dodo and the great auk, and we should hang our heads in shame,” wrote Mary Colwell of the conservation group Curlew Action. “Our disregard for wildlife speaks volumes for who and what we are. The slender-billed [curlew] may not have had an economic value, it contributed nothing to the bottom line of anyone’s financial spreadsheet, no one relied on these birds for their jobs or wellbeing, there was no conceivable reason to drive them to extinction. But it seems that is exactly what we have done.”

The biggest tragedy about this bird’s loss: We didn’t act soon enough to save it.

Key Largo tree cactus — This coastal plant still grows on a few scattered islands, but not on the island that gave it its name. Encroaching seas have wiped it out in the past couple of years, making it “the first local extinction of a species caused by sea-level rise” in the United States. That’s shocking for a population that was considered “thriving” as recently as 2021.

“Unfortunately, the Key Largo tree cactus may be a bellwether for how other low-lying coastal plants will respond to climate change,” Jennifer Possley, director of regional conservation at Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden, said in a statement announcing the extinction.

Expect more in future. But we can also use this as an opportunity: Scientists saw it coming and collected enough cactus flowers and fruits to keep the species growing in a greenhouse. Maybe one day they’ll be able to return to Key Largo. Until then the island has a hole in its ecosystem.

The obliterated whitefish was last seen in Lake Zug in 1939 and, according to a press release, “would have been completely forgotten if specimens had not been found by Eawag scientists Oliver Selz and Ole Seehausen in the historical Steinmann-Eawag Collection.” It and other species died out from eutrophication — lack of oxygen in lake water caused by algal blooms, themselves caused by phosphates from domestic wastewater and fertilizer runoff from agriculture. (The Ören declined due to introduced predators like Eurasian pikeperch and acid rain.)

Sangihe dwarf kingfisher — A bird we didn’t know to keep looking for before it disappeared. A paper published this past March details decades of taxonomic confusion — enhanced by poor documentation of the first scientific specimen in the 1870s — that kept the animal from being recognized as its own species. Once native to Sangihe Island in the Philippines, it apparently no longer exists there.

Malagodon honahona — A paper published this past April described this newly recognized fish species from Madagascar … and also announced its possible extinction. The researchers — Emily M. Carr, Rene P. Martin, and John S. Sparks from the American Museum of Natural History — recount how they first encountered this species in a small, isolated swamp in 1994, where introduced mosquitofish were competing with the native fish for resources.

But that wasn’t the only pressure, as they wrote: “The region upstream of their only known habitat lies outside the Réserve Spéciale de Manombo protected area and is afforded no protection. As a result, the watershed has experienced rapid deforestation in recent decades such that the fragile type locality has suffered severe degradation. It is likely M. honahona became extinct in the late 1990s, not long after it was first discovered.” In that fate it joins a similar species, M. madagascariensis, which Sparks, and other researchers declared extinct in 2018 as part of an IUCN assessment of Madagascar’s freshwater fish.

Smooth hornwort — This wide-ranging plant isn’t extinct, but a 2024 assessment of liverwort and hornwort species in Serbia calls it “possibly extinct” within that country, making it a noteworthy regional extinction.

Hieracium tolstoii — This Italian plant presented scientists with some challenges. The Hieracium genus (better known as hawkweed) has more than 10,000 documented species, many of which remain under debate due to variations in their appearance and frequent hybridization, as well as a mutation process called polyploidization that can cause dramatic shifts in chromosomes. But a paper published this past September examined the records and confirms H. tolstoii (which once grew on “ancient brick walls” but hasn’t been seen since 1938) as a unique species — one that went extinct at some point in the 20th century. (Previous research had also declared it extinct but maintained some doubt it was a unique species.)

Fucus virsoides — This “glacial relict” algae species isn’t extinct, but it’s rapidly disappearing and deserves a shoutout. A paper published this past August warned that we could be heading toward “the first documented extinction of a marine macroalga in the Mediterranean Sea.” The researchers wrote that “F. virsoides could be considered functionally extinct in Istria (Croatia), critically threatened with extinction in Italy and Montenegro and locally extinct in Slovenia.” They hypothesize its decline has been caused by “a variety of anthropogenic stressors (e.g. habitat destruction, pollution, overgrazing) exacerbated by climate change,” all of which increased the Adriatic Sea’s surface temperature and salinity.

Taiwanese swallowtail butterfly — Rumors of this butterfly’s extinction have fluttered around for years. It was last seen in 1999, before the Jiji earthquake struck Taiwan, killing more than 2,400 people, destroying the homes of 100,000 more, and causing $300 billion in damage. According to a paper published this past November, the earthquake also caused “multiple landslides” that “permanently altered” the butterfly’s habitat. Research published in 2018 and 2023 suggested the earthquake caused the butterfly’s extinction. This new research examines its morphological characteristics and DNA to confirm that it was a unique subspecies and notes that it “was well on its evolutionary track to become its own distinct lineage as a separate species.”

The paper also notes the butterfly’s importance to Taiwanese culture — “its image is imprinted on the personal ID cards of Taiwanese citizens,” the researchers write. They also suggest we keep looking for it: “Even though the butterfly has not been seen or collected since 1999, one can always hope that it still persists in the remote mountain regions in the Taiwan highlands.”

White-chested white-eye— The Australian government has listed this 5-inch bird as extinct since 2000, but scientists kept looking for it for several years. The IUCN finally reassessed it as probably extinct in 2024. Native to Norfolk Island, the bird suffered most of their declines due to introduced black rats, which predated on their eggs. They were last officially observed in 1979, although possible sightings persisted into this century.

Multiple Polynesian tree snails — The IUCN listed several snail species as extinct this past year.

The herbicide atrazine is a lethal threat to frogs: Concentrations in thousands of U.S. rivers, ponds, and streams can get high enough to cause the death of amphibians, including imperiled dusky gopher frogs and Illinois chorus frogs. And in people atrazine exposure is linked to birth defects, elevated cancer risk, and other health problems.

The Center sent a comprehensive analysis to President Donald Trump’s Environmental Protection Agency showing how a Biden-era plan would allow extremely harmful levels of atrazine pollution in 99% of the nation’s 11,249 contaminated watersheds. Trump says he wants to make America healthy again, so now’s the moment to reject this plan and ban the poison — as 60 other countries already have.

“President Trump has an early opportunity to make good on his pledge to clean up the nation’s water with a ban on atrazine,” said Center biologist Nathan Donley. “A 99% failure rate is unacceptable in any context but horrific when we’re talking about an extraordinarily toxic pesticide killing wildlife and contaminating the drinking water of millions of Americans.”

You have an awesomely daunting choice before you. You can nominate any one of the 1.3m known invertebrates to become Invertebrate of the Year 2025. You can read about last year’s competition here. We focused on UK invertebrates in our shortlist of 11 but this year we are going global. We are keen to receive your entries from all parts of the world. Last year, readers overwhelmingly chose an invertebrate that is “useful” – vital – for human life: the common earthworm won a landslide 38% of the popular vote. This dynamic soil-maker and recycler was popular not only for its huge contribution to fertility and growth but also because it has often been a cultural underdog, feared or derided. Many of you hailed its grace and beauty.

Second in the 2024 contest was the rare and endangered shrill carder bee (pictured above), while the romantics’ choice, the glowworm (pictured top), came third. Bringing up the rear with 0.8% of the vote last year was the disrupter, the invasive Asian or yellow-legged hornet, despite being championed by broadcaster and naturalist Chris Packham. His plea for appreciation for this biological marvel even made the front page of the British tabloid, the Daily Star.

I’m starting things off by nominating the fen raft spider, an incredible, fish-hunting beast that pursues its prey on the ground, in the water and on the water. It is an emblem of hope and tolerance for the much-feared arachnids. Once teetering on the brink of extinction in Britain, its populations are thriving again thanks to some brilliant conservation work and individual effort. One ecologist, Dr Helen Smith, raised thousands of spiderlings in her kitchen.

This competition is your contest, and readers will nominate all others on the shortlist. Simply send us your nomination, with your reasons why you love this invertebrate, or why you want it to be more widely celebrated. We will pick a shortlist and publish a story about each shortlisted invertebrate and what readers say about them.

We live in an increasingly winner-takes-all world. The winner of Invertebrate of the Year 2025 will receive no prize. They will not be elevated above any other species. But we hope this moment of fun, celebration and gratitude will spotlight all invertebrates. We hope it will help us all, in a small way, live a little better alongside our friends and neighbors – our fellow species – with whom we share this miraculous planet.

We are prone to obsessing over ourselves and over animals like us. But most of the life on Earth is not like us at all. Barely 5% of all known living creatures are animals with backbones. The rest – at least 1.3 million species, and many more still to be discovered – are spineless.

All hail the invertebrates, animals of wondrous diversity, unique niches and innovative and interesting ways of making a living on this planet. They include insects (at least a million), arachnids, snails, crustaceans, corals, jellyfish, sponges and echinoderms.

And yet, despite their numerical advantage, originality and dazzling charisma, invertebrates are overlooked in favor of animals that more closely resemble us or, more precisely, a human baby: big, slow-moving species with two soulful eyes; species with whom we can empathize or anthropomorphize. We lavish money on saving a polar bear stranded upon a melting glacier or a giant panda isolated in a fragmented forest because we feel their pain. Meanwhile, we’re not even sure if nematode worms feel pain.

A tiny elite of invertebrates is on our radar because they are visible in our daily lives – red admiral butterflies, say, or giant house spiders or honeybees – but the vast majority live beyond our ken, untouched by human acclaim or scientific study. These animals certainly don’t need our applause; mostly they simply need to be left alone. Unfortunately, the Anthropocene does not leave any species alone; many living things are being decimated without us even realizing. The sixth great extinction is under way, and we are its architects.

We must take action to slow and halt this extinction crisis, not least because this wave of extinctions will ultimately engulf Homo sapiens. As the US biologist EO Wilson warned in 1987: “The truth is that we need invertebrates, but they don’t need us.” He predicted that humanity would not last more than a few months without invertebrates. If we wipe out pollinators, oxygenators, food suppliers, hygienists and all those other unheralded roles performed by invertebrates that bequeath untold benefits to us, we are not long for this world.

And yet despite evidence of plummeting flying insect abundance around the world, most invertebrates are more resilient than we are. Insects predated dinosaurs by millions of years. They’ve survived the five previous mass extinctions. We are more likely to wipe out ourselves before we can destroy every invertebrate, but while we are here, we surely have a moral obligation to allow as much of the planet’s life as possible to flourish alongside us.

In Britain, the global extinction crisis is unfolding in microcosm. Because of its long history of human occupation, its early industrialization, its high population and its alienated-from-nature culture, Britain has become one of the most nature-depleted countries on the planet. Even so, alongside the paltry 107 mammals of land, sea and air that regularly appear around our archipelago, we still share our land and seas with at least 40,000 invertebrates. Conservation scientists estimate that one in six species are at risk of extinction in Britain.

This week we’re launching a competition to celebrate the diversity of invertebrate life found in Britain. In showcasing the wild world of invertebrates, their innovative ways of being and their importance, we hope we can raise awareness of the loss of their abundance and diversity, and what we can do about it.

We’ve chosen a shortlist of 10 species for British invertebrate of the year 2024. It’s hopelessly inadequate of course, because so much life is invertebrate. We’ve picked a mixture of well-known and more obscure invertebrates from a range of phyla and classes. Each nominee tells a story of a remarkable way of life and a way of surviving in the Anthropocene.

Some nominees carry a message of hope and herald a warning. A few are thriving in an era of global heating. (Never underestimate the capacity of a small animal to adapt to the extremes of our world and the climate we are changing.) Others are declining, and here they are non-human ambassadors and activists, urging us to change and take action.

If you are a marine biologist or entomologist or amateur naturalist, or even if you don’t hold much knowledge of other life at all, you will almost certainly spot glaring omissions in our shortlist. So please nominate your own invertebrate of the year, and tell us your reasons, and we will add one of the best to the shortlist.

Whoever wins will be worthy. Hopefully the big winner will be the wonderful world of every invertebrate, as we take notice, take heed and take action to allow them to prosper on our planet alongside us.

The Lahontan Cutthroat was listed under the ESA more than half a century ago, yet most of its remnant habitat has been and continues to be destroyed by livestock. We recently published two articles by Nevada resident Karen Klitz on her decades-long efforts to recover this species:

So, it was of great interest when I received an invitation to a film on Lahontan Cutthroats in northern Nevada by Adam Bronstein of Western Watersheds Project. Here is how you can sign up to get a link to the screening.

Join Western Watersheds Project for the premiere of The Desert Trout, a compelling short documentary that reveals the challenges facing Nevada’s Lahontan cutthroat trout — and the broader ecological impacts of public lands livestock grazing that threaten their survival.

Explore the remote and rugged Basin and Range ecosystem, home to these rare trout, as the film takes you deep into the heart of Nevada’s high desert. Once abundant, Lahontan cutthroat trout now struggle to survive, with only 5 out of 71 remaining populations considered resilient by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The film highlights the Marys River Exclosure, a large, protected area of Bureau of Land Management (BLM) lands where habitat has rebounded after cattle removal—benefiting not just the trout, but a thriving web of wildlife.

Right now, the BLM is reevaluating management across 40 key grazing allotments that overlap with the trout's habitat, and your voice is critical in shaping the future of these waters. Stay for a post-screening Q&A session with the filmmaker and WWP’s Nevada Director to learn how you can take action to protect these irreplaceable fish and their fragile ecosystem.

In my thirty-plus years living in California’s Del Norte County, I have seen three cougars, but the poem “Cougar Breath” comes from an experience when I felt the presence but did not see the cougar. “Cougar Breath” was initially published by Turtle Island Quarterly and subsequently in Bright Darkness, a 2017 book from Flowstone Press.

Ken Letko - Ken Letko has published six poetry chapbooks and numerous poems in journals and anthologies, including Abandoned Mine, California Quarterly, Earth’s Daughters, Lake Effect, Rattle, Ravens Perch, and Spillway. Both North American Review and Poetry South have nominated his poems for Pushcart awards. In 2017, Flowstone Press published his book Bright Darkness. He lives in Del Norte County on California’s far northern coast, where he enjoys juggling and gathering firewood. kenletko.com.

An Interview with Jonathan Ratner, Director of Sage Steppe Wild

On episode 76 of the Green Root Podcast—the official podcast of Eco-Integrity Alliance—host Josh Schlossberg gets litigious with Jonathan Ratner, Director of Sage Steppe Wild, as they challenge The Nature Conservancy’s schemes to log and graze public lands and whether the billion-dollar entity should still be considered an environmental group.

The nearly universal and permanent degradation caused by public lands livestock grazing

North America’s largest bird disappeared from the wild in the late 1980s. Reintroduction work in the United States and Mexico has brought this huge vulture back to the skies. This is the story of its comeback.

The spring morning is cool and bright in the Sierra de San Pedro Mártir National Park in Baja California, Mexico, as a bird takes to the skies. Its 9.8-foot wingspan casts a looming silhouette against the sunlight; the sound of its flight is like that of a light aircraft cutting through the wind. In this forest thick with trees up to 600 years old lives the southernmost population of the California condor (Gymnogyps californianus), the only one outside the United States. Dozens of the scavenging birds have been reintroduced here, to live and breed once again in the wild.

Their return has been captained for more than 20 years by biologist Juan Vargas Velasco and his partner María Catalina Porras Peña, a couple who long ago moved away from the comforts of the city to endure extreme winters living in a tent or small trailer, to manage the lives of the 48 condors known to fly over Mexican territory. Together — she as coordinator of the California Condor Conservation Program, and he as field manager — they are the guardians of a project whose origins go back to condor recovery efforts that began in the 1980s in the United States, when populations were decimated, mainly from eating the meat of animals shot by hunters’ lead bullets.

In Mexico, the species disappeared even earlier, in the late 1930s. Its historic return — the first captive-bred condors were released into Mexican territory in 2002 — is the result of close binational collaboration among zoos and other institutions in the United States and Mexico.

The California condor, North America’s largest bird, has taken flight again. It’s a feat made possible by well-established collaborations between the US and Mexico, economic investment, the dedication of many people and, above all, the scientific understanding of the species — from the decoding of its genome and knowledge of its diseases and reproductive habits to the use of technologies that can closely follow each individual bird.

But many challenges remain for the California condor, which 10,000 years ago dominated the skies over the Pacific coast of the Americas, from southern Canada to northern Mexico. Researchers need to assemble wild populations that are capable of breeding without human assistance, and with the confidence that more birds are hatched than die. It is a tough battle against extinction, waged day in and day out by teams in California, Arizona and Utah in the United States, and Mexico City and Baja California in Mexico.

The US California Condor Recovery Program, initiated in the 1970s, represented an enormous change in the strategy of species conservation. After unsuccessful habitat preservation attempts, and as a last-ditch attempt to try to save the scavenger bird from extinction, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service and the California Fish and Game Commission advocated for a decision as bold as it was controversial: to capture the last condors alive in the wild and commit to breeding them in captivity.

Some two dozen condors sacrificed their freedom in order to save their lineage. On April 19, 1987, the last condor was captured, marking a critical moment for the species: On that day, the California condor became officially extinct in the wild.

At the same time, a captive breeding program was launched, offering a ray of hope for a species that, beyond its own magnificence, plays an important role in the health of ecosystems — efficiently eliminating the remains of dead animals, thus preventing the proliferation of diseases and environmental pollution.

The California Condor Recovery Program produced its first results in a short time. In 1988, just one year after the collection of the last wild condors, researchers at the San Diego Zoo announced the first captive birth of a California condor chick.

The technique of double or triple clutching followed, to greater success. Condors are monogamous and usually have a single brood every two years, explains Fernando Gual, who until October 2024 was director general of zoos and wildlife conservation in Mexico City. But if for some reason they lose an egg at the beginning of the breeding season — either because it breaks or falls out of the nest, which is usually on a cliff — the pair produces a second egg. If this one is also lost or damaged, they may lay a third. The researchers learned that if they removed the first egg and incubated it under carefully controlled conditions, the condor pair would lay a second egg, which was also removed for care, leaving a third egg for the pair to incubate and rear naturally.

Xewe (female) and Chocuyens (male) were the first condors to triumphantly return to the wild. The year was 1992, and the pair returned to freedom accompanied by a pair of Andean condors, natural inhabitants of the Andes Mountains in South America. By 2023, the global population of California condors reached 561 individuals, 344 of them living in the wild. - Full Article

Since 1979, Tom Biebighauser has enthusiastically restored wetlands, lakes, streams, and rivers. He has designed over 10,000 wetland projects and successfully supervised the construction of more than 3,000 wetlands and streams in 26 states, three Canadian provinces, Mexico, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, and Taiwan. He has a deep and long-standing concern for the environment and finds it rewarding to assist individuals interested in restoring wetlands and streams.

Tom worked as a Wildlife Biologist for the U.S. Forest Service for 34 years, helping personnel from federal, state, and county agencies initiate wetland and stream restoration programs across the Country. During his career with the Forest Service, he led the completion of hundreds of partnership projects to build emergent, ephemeral, forested, peatland, shrub, and wet-meadow wetlands on public and private lands.

Tom’s passion for restoring wetlands has been recognized with 45 awards, including the Robert Lauderdale Award from the Kentucky Water Research Institute in 2023. You can read more about Tom and his work on his site.

Wetland Restoration: Challenges, Benefits, and Hands-On Learning

In this episode of the Rewilding Earth podcast, Tom Biebigauser discusses the importance of wetland rewilding and shares his approach to educating and involving people in these efforts. Topics include identifying signs of drained wetlands, the biodiversity supported by wetlands, the historical reasons for wetland drainage, and the methods used to restore these vital ecosystems. Tom also highlights his hands-on workshops, the benefits of wetlands for flood control and groundwater recharge, and inspiring stories of individuals and communities working to bring back wetlands.

A groundbreaking report, Taking Animals Into Account, released February 2 on World Wetlands Day, reveals how wild animals play an underestimated but vital role in keeping the world’s wetlands functional and resilient. Compiled by the Global Rewilding Alliance and ten partner organisations, the study outlines impactful evidence that reintroducing and protecting key wild animal species could be a game-changer in tackling climate change, biodiversity loss, invasive species control, and water security challenges.

Taking Animals into Account underscores the urgent need to rewild both inland and coastal wetlands by restoring the wild animal species that keep these wetland ecosystems thriving. (See the full report here and see a summary of the report here.)

Wetlands are often celebrated for their role in regulating water cycles, storing carbon, and supporting biodiversity. However, this new report sheds light on an overlooked reality: the essential role of wild animals in wetland ecosystem health.

Taking Animals into Account presents compelling evidence on how species such as salmon, beavers, hippos, seabirds, terrapins, and even ants act as ‘ecosystem engineers’—shaping landscapes, dispersing nutrients, improving water quality, and stabilizing shorelines. Among the more surprising revelations:

Neotropical fish disperse the seeds of more than 100 tree species, maintaining the diverse tropical Amazon forests that border their rivers.

Beavers mitigate droughts and floods by creating natural reservoirs and wetlands that store water in extreme weather.

Seabirds boost the health of mangroves and coral reefs by nesting and defecating, spreading nutrients, after returning from the open ocean.

Predatory crabs, sea otters, and terrapins prevent saltmarsh collapse, ensuring these coastal habitats remain resilient amidst rising sea levels.

Sharks and parrotfish are critical for the wellbeing of the world’s coral reefs.

Migrating salmon nurture the biodiverse temperate rainforests along the Pacific Coast of North America by transporting vital nutrients upstream that sustain entire ecosystems.

Waterbirds transport aquatic invertebrates, plants, and even fish eggs between lakes, ponds, and rivers over huge distances.

Hippos and water buffalo fertilize wetland ecosystems, increasing plant productivity and supporting fish populations.

The report details how the decline of these species has led to the weakening of critical ecosystem functions, urging for their restoration not just as a key conservation strategy but an essential approach to assure all of the benefits that wetlands provide for local communities and society as a whole.

The report draws from eleven case studies across Asia, Europe, and Latin America, showing real-world success in rewilding wetlands. Highlights include:

Scotland’s beaver ponds: Bringing back beavers has restored natural water cycles, improving biodiversity and reducing flood risks.

The wetland giants of the Netherlands: Large herbivores, such as domestic water buffalo, are causing the return of huge biodiversity within wetlands, thereby improving their resilience.

White-clawed crayfish in the Central Apennines, Italy, maintain the health of the streams by providing food for animals like otters, fish, and birds, and keep waterways clean through their consumption of decaying organic matter.

These case studies illustrate how reintroducing and protecting animal species can significantly enhance wetland ecosystems and restore the array of ecosystem services they provide, and we benefit from. (See the full case studies here and see a summary of all case studies here.)

The report warns that the ‘defaunation’ of wetlands—where key animal species are lost—threatens their ability to provide essential ecosystem services that we all depend on. With 85% of freshwater populations of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians degraded since 1970, conservation efforts must integrate the restoration of wild animals as a core strategy.

“This is not just about saving species—it’s about saving the very processes that make wetlands exist, maintain resilience in a changing world, and thrive with life,” said Magnus Sylvén, Director of Science-Policy-Practice for the Global Rewilding Alliance and lead author of the report. “Rewilding—specifically the return of key wild animals—is a nature-based solution that brings practical hope in the face of the dual crises of climate change and biodiversity loss.”

“The evidence is clear: wetlands cannot function as we need them to without wild animals. It’s time to rethink how we protect and restore these vital ecosystems by prioritizing the role of nature’s own engineers.”

Amid the global decline in wildlife and a lack of adequate recognition of wild animals in conservation policies, the new insights of the study outline an opportunity for more effective wetland restoration and conservation; a new ‘way forward’ that recognises the essential role of wild animals.

While this study represents only an initial effort to summarize current knowledge on wildlife-ecosystem connections for wetlands, the results underscore the need to place wild animal species at the core of the ecological functional agenda of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. The Conference of the Parties this year provides an opportunity to do this.

Anchored in the Global Charter for Rewilding the Earth: Advancing nature-based solutions to the extinction and climate crises, the Global Rewilding Alliance was founded by The Wild Foundation and Re:wild in 2020. The Alliance is a network of 225+ rewilding organisations working across all continents to rewild the land and sea. Together, they are currently helping to influence the rewilding of 2.2 million sq.km of land and 5 million sq.km of sea in 124 countries. The mission of Global Rewilding Alliance is to build the global rewilding movement to mainstream rewilding in science, policy, and practice globally by 2030. Learn more at https://globalrewilding.earth/.

House Bill 0286 is a proposed bill that would strip critical protections for cougars in Wyoming.

Elimination of hunting zones and geographic boundaries for cougars.
Removal of statewide and local mortality limits, allowing unrestricted killing of cougars at any time, by any means.
Authorization of cougar trapping and snaring, practices that are neither selective nor humane.
Remove existing revenue stream from Wyoming Game & Fish Department with broad allowances for hunting cougars with other game licenses, such as antelope, deer, or elk licenses, bypassing the requirement for a dedicated cougar license.

The folks at WyoFile just published an article on this. UPDATE: Just as we were about to publish, we got news from WyoFile that the hearing on the kill mountain lions anywhere/anytime bill that even organizations who the bill's sponsors probably thought would be lovers of the bill came out against it.

While every state has laws to protect animals, farm animals are often left out of the picture. Most anti-cruelty laws exclude "normal" practices in the farm industry -- no matter how painful -- so the industry can continue making money. And federally, there's not a single law on the books that protects "animals when they're on a farm." This means that horrific practices, like removing calves' horns without pain relief, are completely legal!

Although the best way to stop these painful practices would be to publicly expose them, like this brave investigator did, "ag-gag" laws make that difficult. Typically, ag-gag laws make it a crime to do things like secretly film factory farms or slaughterhouses. In the agricultural industry, a rich and politically influential colossus, this leaves thousands of animals in terrifying danger across the US.

Currently, ag-gag laws are totally legal in 6 states. What we really need to make legal is exposing unnecessary cruelty. Sign the petition to urge Congress to pass legislation banning ag-gag laws so we can expose animal cruelty on farms!

Thankfully, it seems like states are finally starting to question these laws. In Pennsylvania, an investigation exposed a dairy farm for dehorning calves without pain relief. While this is a common practice in the dairy industry, thanks to the video -- which showed calves having hot irons pressed to their head, burning through their flesh and horns as they writhed in pain -- the judge realized it was inhumane. Now, the district attorney must prosecute the farm for animal cruelty after he initially refused.

In Iowa, The U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Iowa ruled the state's second Ag-Gag law unconstitutional. This change was also launched thanks to a whistleblower documenting pigs being slowly cooked to death in a "depopulation" or culling event -- another common practice in the industry.

Often, these laws also prevent people from reporting workers' rights abuses, environmental offenses, and food safety violations. Filming these wrongdoings should not be a crime. If we want true accountability for a trillion-dollar industry that controls the lives of billions of animals, as well as what goes on our plates, we need to give states transparency and legal avenues. Sign the petition to tell Congress to ban ag-gag laws to make farm animals safer! - Sign the Petition

CALIFORNIA — President Donald Trump made good on his vow to "turn on the water" in California to curb wildfire risks last week, but the move to push extra water into the Central Valley during the rainy season has since sparked concerns over flooding and wasted resources. It also drew criticism because water released into the Central Valley won't actually help Southern California's wildfire prone areas.

On Thursday, the abrupt release of water by the Army Corps of Engineers incited panic among water officials in Tulare County, who were forced to mitigate flood damage downstream, Politico reported.

With just an hour's notice, water managers along the Kaweah and Tule rivers scrambled to move equipment and notify farms about potential flooding.

"If the purpose of these releases is to help fight wildfires in Los Angeles County (which are already almost fully contained), what is the plan to transport this water to Los Angeles rather than let the water simply be discharged into Tulare Lake where it will evaporate?" State Sen. Alex Padilla wrote in a letter to Trump's administration on Jan. 31.

On Trump's order, the U.S. Army Corps has dramatically increased the flow of water from two dams in Tulare County. The move sent massive amounts of water into farmlands in the San Joaquin Valley. The flow, as reported by the LA Times, increased from 57 cubic feet per second to more than 1,500 on Friday. The order was given largely without consultation with local and state agencies. Water experts and officials say the move could ultimately prove to be wasteful.

"I don’t know where this water is going, but this is the wrong time of year to be releasing water from these reservoirs. It’s vitally important that we fill our reservoirs in the rainy season so water is available for farms and cities later in the summer," Peter Gleick, a water scientist and senior fellow at the Pacific Institute told the Times. "I think it’s very strange and it’s disturbing that, after decades of careful local, state and federal coordination, some federal agencies are starting to unilaterally manipulate California’s water supply."

Following the decision, the Westland Water District, which represents farmers and communities in the San Joaquin Valley, thanked the president for the order. "The challenges that he highlights are real, and his leadership in addressing the barriers to water delivery are welcomed. It’s clear that what we’ve been doing for the past few decades has not been working; not for the people, for agriculture, or for the fish," the district wrote in a Monday statement.

But experts say the move could hurt farmers. “This takes water out of their summer irrigation portfolio,” said Dan Vink, a water consultant who previously served as general manager of the Lower Tule River Irrigation District. He told the Times that the move was "extremely unprecedented." Following the release, the two reservoirs are notably less full. Lake Success, dropped from 20 percent full to 18 percent, and Lake Kaweah fell from 21 percent full to 19 percent of capacity over the weekend, according to the Times. - Kat Schuster, Patch Staff

A remote bay on the Gulf of Alaska is an important stopover for migrating shorebirds. Jenell Larsen Tempel shares highlights from her muddy and rewarding shorebird research in this wild place, in the company of wolves and big coastal brown bears, in Alaska Fish and Wildlife News.

Anchorage is home to moose, bears, and thousands of Alaskans. Wilson Puryear shows how wildlife safety educators teach kids to live with Alaska’s urban wildlife and be safe – and one man’s considerable accomplishments. - Riley Woodford

Tens of millions of wild bison once roamed across western North America. Today, wild bison occupy less than one percent of their former range. Yet in spite of this, the National Park Service's new bison management plan does nothing to expand the range of the 5,000 wild bison that live almost exclusively in Yellowstone National Park.

Instead, the Park's new bison management plan is based on outdated and unscientific assumptions that result in thousands of wild bison being slaughtered to theoretically prevent them from infecting cattle with brucellosis, a disease that can cause cattle to abort.

The State of Montana, meanwhile, takes the position that almost all of the bison that cross the Park's invisible boundaries at the wrong time and place should be killed. Too bad no one told the bison that their natural annual migration was wrong. The result has been about one-quarter of Yellowstone's herd being slaughtered in years with deep snow for doing nothing more than following their genetic instincts to migrate to lower elevations in the winter for food.

Despite there never having been a documented case of bison transferring brucellosis to cattle, the government's 25-year-old management plan, originally issued in 2000, focused on wild bison as a threat to the state's cattle industry.

That, however, is no longer accepted science. The federal government itself undertook an exhaustive study to determine if the Park's brucellosis management was working. Contrary to the original assumptions, the study found that over the past 20 years, it has been wild elk — not wild bison — that transmitted brucellosis to livestock 27 times. Wild bison were not responsible for a single transmission.

However, when the Park Service prepared and approved its new plan in 2024, the agency refused to consider a single alternative in the new plan’s Environmental Impact Statement that addresses the proven source of brucellosis transmissions to livestock, which are elk, not bison.

Astoundingly, the Park Service also failed to analyze where and when natural Yellowstone bison migration paths might overlap with cattle grazing on Bureau of Land Management and Forest Service lands outside Yellowstone National Park. Without this basic information, it’s impossible to know where cattle might possibly interact with wild bison. Consequently, we don’t know where -- or even if -- the Park and State's aggressive and controversial management practices are needed to keep cattle separate from wild bison.

Additionally, and critically, after more than 20 years, the management tool most used by the government -- the highly controversial "capture and slaughter" of thousands of bison -- has failed to reduce the percentage of Yellowstone bison that test positive for brucellosis antibodies. And yet the government just reauthorized the use of this tool that has proven to be ineffective at reducing brucellosis.

This is why we sued. You can see our complaint here. The Park's new management plan fails to provide any rational reason whatsoever to continue hazing, capturing, and slaughtering the nation's last herd of wild bison. We are going to court to force the Park Service to follow the law, analyze these issues using the best available science, and stop the senseless harassment and pointless slaughter of our national mammal.

As many of you know, domestic sheep are the primary impediment to bighorn sheep recovery because the domestic sheep transmit disease to the bighorn sheep.

What the video fails to mention is that livestock permits on our public lands are a privilege, not a right, and can be canceled at any time. The problem is that federal land managers place the interests of a handful of sheep ranchers above the greater public good. So the problem continues year after year, decade after decade, with the only progress coming from private buyouts such as those paid for by The Sagebrush Habitat Conservation Fund, The National Wildlife Federation and others.

I find myself questioning just how much of the current phenomenon of whip-like winds and erratic jet streams can actually be attributed to geoengineering—something that's often considered a taboo topic, widely denied or dismissed as a significant factor in the environmental crises we're witnessing on Earth.

All the specific circumstances of L.A.’s fatal firestorm are not attributable to climate change. But there is no doubt it set the conditions for the hellish devastation that has enveloped the City of Angels. As whole neighborhoods were reduced to ash, it was reported last week that temperatures on the planet rose past the 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) mark set by the Paris Climate Accord as a dangerous threshold beyond which calamity calls. For those living in L.A., calamity is already here.

In part, the catastrophe that struck the most populated county in the U.S. was collectively self-inflicted by real estate developers, lax lawmakers and residents seeking to nestle their dwellings in the natural beauty of the state, all of whom dismissed the well-known risks.

Long before widespread human habitation of the hills, mountains and canyons, the Indigenous Chumash named the San Fernando Valley “the valley of smokes.” That was because the chaparral-covered terrain that surrounds the flatlands there, like much of the rest of the now urbanized southern California landscape that stretches from the desert to the sea, burned every few years.

As development sprawled into those very fire zones over recent decades, the chaparral has been prevented from burning. When it does finally ignite after such long intervals, all that pent-up fuel explodes beyond control when desert winds fan the flames and carry their embers far and wide, including to the sensibly settled flats, as happened in lower Altadena during this particularly ferocious episode.

Other factors behind the firestorm are more directly related to climate change, most notably what is called the “hydroclimate whiplash.” That is when rainstorm deluges foster lush growth of grasses and bushes in one year, followed by bone-dry drought in the following cycle where that abundant flora becomes desiccated tinder ready to ignite at the smallest spark.

As University of California, Los Angeles climate scientist Daniel Swain explained to the Los Angeles Times, with each additional degree of warming, the atmosphere absorbs and releases more water. It is like an “expanding sponge” that leads to more intense downpours. “The problem is that the sponge grows exponentially, like compound interest at a bank,” he said. “The rate of expansion increases with each fraction of a degree of warming.”

In those years when La Niña conditions across the Pacific dominate, the spongy atmospheric rivers that carry heavy precipitation to Southern California are diverted, replaced by sustained periods of low humidity and drought. The alternating dance of these cycles demonstrates how the interrelated effects of global warming reinforce each other in an accelerating cascade of consequences.

According to climate scientists, a warming atmosphere also disrupts the normally stable flow of the polar jet stream. A “wobbly jet stream” can result in the back-to-back juxtaposition of high- and low-pressure systems that generate ever-stronger winds, like the extraordinary gusts of up to 80 miles an hour that whipped through the California southland last week. - Nathan Gardels, Noema Editor-in-Chief

You probably remember this photo from last year when Cody Roberts brought a wolf he had run over with his snowmobile into the bar in Daniel, WY.

The livestock industry has pushed to keep snowmobiling over animals legal. “I’ve talked with a number of livestock producers across the state — in particular, sheep producers — who have said that they view it as one of their most effective tools,” Wyoming Stock Growers Executive Vice President Jim Magagna told WyoFile last year. Magagna’s lobbying was effective while the “Treatment of Predators Working Group” was working up the legislation that became HB 3. Gov. Mark Gordon even intervened, telling the ad hoc panel to, “Punish unacceptable behavior and deter acts of animal cruelty without interfering with the ability to manage predators.”

So, ranchers think it's great to run over animals on purpose, and the Wyoming Governor thinks that is "management".

Hunting laws contribute to be a problem when they support the killing of one species and prohibit the killing of another even when the two look alike. In 2021 in Cooperstown, New York, a hunter shot what he thought was a large coyote—but which genetic testing proved was a Great Lakes wolf. This tragic error has occurred many times across the Northeast, where it’s legal to kill unlimited numbers of coyotes 24/7 and all year round (New York State limits the season to six months).

At the same time, wolves are classified as endangered and killing them is currently prohibited by law. State wildlife agencies nationwide have chosen not to fine or prosecute hunters who kill wolves, instead adhering to the “McKittrick Policy,” which stipulates that only when someone intends to kill an endangered species can they be held accountable.

This controversial stance contradicts wildlife agencies’ position that hunters should be able to distinguish between look-alike species such as wolves and coyotes. Observed side by side, the animals have obvious differences—but what about a single animal seen at a distance under field conditions that can include rain, snow, pale dawn and dusk light, and the dark of night?

It doesn’t help when agencies offer limited and confusing information to the public. For example, the New York Department of Environmental Conservation tells hunters that coyotes stand “less than 2 feet tall at the shoulder” but wolves measure “over 2 feet tall at the shoulder.” Similar fuzziness applies to lynx, a protected species classified as threatened, and bobcat, a species that is widely hunted and trapped. According to the Maine Department of Fish and Wildlife, the ear tufts of bobcat are “generally less than 1 inch” but those of lynx are “generally greater than 1 inch.”

It’s also problematic if agencies use photos of smaller western coyotes, not larger eastern ones, to compare with wolves (see the DEC chart below).

Such distinctions could blur even more going forward. The revelations of recent genetic research and the forces of evolution make clear that coyotes and wolves have long been sharing and swapping genes and can have similar looks and behaviors, particularly in the eastern U.S. Such convergence could also mark the future of lynx and bobcat as climate change and human development shift the species’ prior ranges, as indicated by documentation of hybridized animals.

For their part, hunters bear responsibility for properly sizing up what they’re aiming for and not pulling the trigger when unsure. Recent high-profile cases of hunters shooting family dogs they claimed looked like coyotes—even when the animals wore a vest while walking with the owner or were a black lab, shorthaired pointer, or German shepherd—indicate room for improvement. Hunters and trappers could also share more information with wildlife agencies about what they’re seeing.

A bill recently introduced in New York would require hunters and trappers to report when they kill large coyotes so the DEC can conduct a DNA sample, critical to understanding the mix of wild canids roaming the state. The Rewilding Institute and its partners in the Northeast Wolf Recovery Alliance have called on agencies across the region to adopt this policy, prohibit the hunting of coyotes at night (when the risk of misidentification is highest), and limit how many coyotes can be killed and when.

We are also pushing agencies across the Northeast to list top carnivores, in particular wolves and cougar, as “Species of Greatest Conservation Need” under State Wildlife Action Plans. Doing so will provide guidance and accountability for agencies to better understand, protect, and restore native species. Such measures are critical for the sake of wolves making their way to the Northeast now and in the future. They will also help coyotes, a wild neighbor with a key ecological role to play and with which people can certainly learn to coexist.

Carnivores need room to roam across the Northeast and are critical to rewilding now and forever. Claims of mistaken identity should not be allowed to get in their way. - Nadia Steinzor is an environmental consultant. She has developed and managed projects to investigate the oil and gas industry’s impact on the climate and communities, secure governmental protections for air, water, land, and wildlife, and engage the public in advocacy efforts. Nadia works with the Rewilding Institute to ensure that wolves and other carnivores thrive and roam in the Northeast and beyond. Nadia holds an M.S. in environmental policy from the Bard College Center for Environmental Policy.

North Branch Nature Center and the Northern Forest Atlas Project are pleased to announce a Traveling School of Botany and Ecology, to take place in Vermont and northern New York, on six weekends between May and September 2025. The school will be part course and part seminar: We will teach plant identification through classes and fieldwork, and study ecology as a group by exercises and discussions. Our field sites will be about a dozen wild Northern Forest habitats: rich woods, ledges, fertile coves, rich and poor fens, cedar swamps, boreal forests, granite hills, a large acid bog and a giant raised one, a river delta and swamp forest, and a dry-rich ledgy hill. It will be staffed by a rotating pool of five instructors—the best botanists in the north woods.

Field Sites in Adirondacks & Vermont
Six Weekends, May to September
Instructors: Jerry Jenkins, Grace Glynn, Brett Engstrom, Matt Peters & Patti Smith
Course size: 10 students
Register for the full program or “a la carte” weekends if space remains
Generous financial support is available
Learn more and register here.

We are excited to launch the second edition of the HEALTHY PUBLIC LANDS CONFERENCE in Salt Lake City, May 28-30 at the University of Utah Law School. The June 2022 Healthy Public Lands Conference was the inaugural event organized by the Healthy Public Lands Project, a coalition of environmental organizations. In 2025 this conference will once again bring together conservation groups, advocates, and experts focused on improving the management of livestock grazing on public lands to protect watersheds and wildlife habitats.

Please see the conference website here: https://www.hplconference.org/, with descriptions of the 2025 speaker/discussion panels, which will cover topics ranging from vegetation treatments on public lands, to wild horse management, to “imagining the ideal” — examples of rewilding and managing healthy landscapes in the absence of livestock grazing. A notable feature of the conference will be a field trip on the third day, where participants will visit an active grazing allotment and learn how to assess the health of public lands, and providing valuable insights into federal land management processes.

The conference is designed to promote a collective vision for prioritizing healthy ecosystems across our public lands, with sliding-scale registration to ensure accessibility for all participants. We hope you can join us in Salt Lake City this spring!

At the behest of the oddly named Nature Conservancy, the BLM approved a massive construction project to create more than 7 miles of new roads and 13 new reservoirs within the Indian Creek allotment on the Bear's Ears National Monument.

The BLM claimed that bulldozing the Monument protected the Monument, including all the objects, including the landscape itself, that they are mandated to protect and restore under the Presidential Proclamation.

I won't say the BLM has fully plumbed the depths of its corruption, but this is a pretty good example of how deep it is. Sage Steppe Wild appealed the decision and petitioned for a stay to disallow the bulldozing to start until the case was ruled on. Three days before the bulldozing was set to go ahead, the court ruled strongly in our favor.

You can find the background and details of the claims in the case here. For our response to the BLM's opposition to a stay, you can get it here. For the court's order, read it here.

In a healthy environment, plants and their mycorrhizal partners can find each other on their own. But when ecosystems are too degraded and the native mycorrhizae have all but vanished, researchers have to play plant-fungus matchmaker. Such is the case with the tallgrass prairie ecosystem that once blanketed the American Midwest before the landscape’s transformation into the Corn Belt. In the last few decades, as conservationists try to return these overprocessed croplands to something more like their ancestral states, they’ve discovered that simply planting tall grasses can’t restore natural biodiversity.

Plant ecologist Jim Bever's mycorrhizae efforts started with a rather primitive experiment in 1998. His team salvaged a patch of pristine prairie and sprinkled some of its fungus-containing soil onto tallgrass seedlings in experimental plots of prairie grass. Encouraged by the vigorous seedling growth, the team scaled up their efforts to larger tracts of land across multiple Midwestern states. Over the years, mycorrhizae doubled the amounts of prairie grass foliage and tripled the plants’ survival rate.

But using native soil to inoculate swaths of former prairie isn’t scalable, because that soil is as rare as the few remaining islands of prairie. So Bever’s group cultures the mycorrhizal fungi for their spores. The team stocks a growing collection of around 60 species for cooking up cocktails with which to inoculate plants, and makes them available to anyone interested in restoration, from land managers to farmers to private companies wanting to start their own inoculant stock.

Most mycorrhizal fungi worm their filamentous bodies inside the root cells of plants, but one kind — called ectomycorrhizal fungi — lurks outside the cells, usually close to the root surface. These fungi, which prefer to associate with trees from temperate and boreal forests, may be a last-ditch solution for ancient black oaks in the cloud forests of Colombia. Black oak (Trigonobalanus excelsa) is a relict species that populated the Northern Hemisphere for millions of years; today it grows only in fragmented patches of forest due to logging for timber and clearing for cropland. - Full Article

The U.S. Geological Survey Land Management Research Program and the Great Basin Fire Science Exchange are teaming up to bring you updates in sagebrush, fire, and wildlife related research. Join us for this webinar series over five Thursdays beginning on Jan 30th at 10:00 PST/11:00 MST. These presentations will be recorded and posted to our website.

This registration page allows you to join all five webinars with one registration (you don't have to attend all five). Each 90-min webinar starts at 10 PST/11 MST):

3/6 – Climate, carbon, and more for presentation details, please see the webinar event page at: https://greatbasinfirescience.org/events/.

Hellbenders, affectionately nicknamed "mountain alligators" or "snot otters," have lived in eastern U.S. rivers for millions of years. The largest of all North American amphibians, these slippery salamanders can grow up to 2 feet long and weigh as much as 4 pounds. And they're close to getting the safeguards they desperately need.

After 15 years of delay, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service just proposed Endangered Species Act protection for all eastern hellbenders. That’s a critical step toward saving them: Hellbenders rely on clean, cold water to survive — and habitat loss and pollution have devastated their freshwater homes. The remaining populations now face extinction.

Hellbenders are a sentinel species. Their health reflects the water quality of the rivers they live in. Safeguarding these fascinating critters will help keep water clean for thousands of other species too — including people.

Most of those visitors who come to Chicago Basin for the scenic beauty and quiet solitude of the wilderness are unaware that the trail they’re traversing crosses several privately owned inholding properties where that experience is not guaranteed. Without the protections of the surrounding wilderness, these properties could be developed with cabins, resorts, or mining and timber operations. Suddenly their wilderness experience could be dominated by the buzz of chainsaws, the thwomp of landing helicopters, or even the trail blocked and closed to the public. This lingering threat to public access, as well as the integrity of the fragile, high alpine ecosystem has driven our work in the Weminuche, along with wilderness areas across the county.

The Trust recently protected our 15th property in the Weminuche Wilderness with the acquisition of a 30-acre private inholding property with both Needle Creek and the Needle Creek Trail running through it. With flat, buildable stream-side sites the property was at risk of development. Now protected, public access on the trail to Chicago Basin has been ensured for future generations to enjoy. Needle Creek is an important tributary to the Animas River. This water source, along with vibrant aspen groves that stretch from the creek up the slopes of the Needle Mountains, create habit for a wide range of wildlife. The Needle Creek property scores high for climate change resilience, biodiversity, and landscape connectivity, all important conservation values that will be protected as wilderness.

Now that the property has been acquired by the Trust, we will begin restoration work this summer to remove the remnants of a hunting camp left by a previous owner to restore it to its wilderness character prior to transfer to public ownership and addition to the wilderness. This project builds off the nearby 7-acre Emerald Lake property that the Trust acquired in 2018 and transferred to be added to the wilderness area in 2023. - The Wilderness Land Trust

The Kelly parcel is just 1 square mile of rolling hills and aspen groves at the doorstep of one of America’s great national parks, Grand Teton in Wyoming. But don’t be fooled by the sagebrush: This piece of property is something special. It’s an essential wildlife habitat for elk, moose, bison, mule deer and big horn sheep, as well as grizzlies and wolves. It’s the starting point for the Path of the Pronghorn, the longest land migration in the Lower 48, according to the National Park Service, a route that sees hundreds of pronghorn antelope running through. “In short, the Kelly Parcel is an elemental part of the surrounding Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, which is facing ever increasing threats from development, recreation and a warming climate,” author Ted Kerasote wrote in 2023 in a New York Times opinion piece that called for the Kelly parcel’s protection.

And until this week, it was also the largest remaining piece of unprotected land in Grand Teton National Park.

On Monday, the Department of the Interior and Grand Teton National Park announced the purchase of the 640-acre Kelly parcel from the state of Wyoming. The property is a “picturesque landscape known for mountain views and world-class wildlife habitat within Grand Teton National Park,” read a National Park Service statement announcing the purchase.

“Today marks an incredible milestone, decades in the making, to permanently protect an essential wildlife migration corridor and treasured landscape within Grand Teton National Park,” Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland said in the statement.

State environmental agencies across the Northeast insist that wolves are extirpated or gone from the landscape. Yet every once in a while, a wolf turns up in the region, usually because a coyote hunter shot it. These unfortunate events point to the possibility that wolves are returning to the Northeast, as well as the new reality—borne out by recent genetic studies—that wolf-coyote mixes are evolving. Nadia Steinzor, Northeast Carnivore Advocate for the Rewilding Institute, discusses these issues and the implications for policy and ecology on From the Forest, a podcast of the Catskill Forest Association in New York State.

On behalf of Wild Fish Conservancy and The Conservation Angler, I’m sharing our press release about a lawsuit challenging the federal government for failing to protect Olympic Peninsula steelhead under the Endangered Species Act.

Despite clear evidence of the species' threat of extinction, NOAA Fisheries is now 536 days overdue in issuing its legally required determination on whether the species warrants protection. This lawsuit seeks to ensure that NMFS complies with its duty to make a timely decision, enabling critical recovery efforts to protect this iconic species from extinction.

Costasiella sea slugs, or Costasiella kuroshimae — nicknamed “leaf sheep” or “sheep slugs” — are tiny, shell-less gastropod mollusks who indirectly perform photosynthesis. Costasiella Sea Slugs

They spend much of their time grazing on marine algae. But instead of digesting it normally, their bodies separate out the algae’s chloroplasts — plant organelles that convert sunlight into chemical energy — and embed them in the leaf sheep’s own tissues.

With their little dark eyes and wavy horn-like “rhinophores” poking from the tops of their heads, they're surely the cutest photosynthetic animals out there.

Fifty years ago bighorn sheep had disappeared from the Colorado National Monument, wiped out in much of the Southwest by hunting and livestock diseases. They were reintroduced to the monument in the 1980s. Then, during the pandemic, their populations soared without people around to disturb them.

In a beautiful, biodiverse corner of southeast Oklahoma live dozens of species, from mussels and bats to reptiles and fish, writes the Center’s Tara Zuardo with Oklahoman Seth Willyard in The Oklahoman. - Article

But this unique place is threatened by a hydropower project that would flood 1,500 acres of habitat, imperil protected species, and harm local communities — despite the objections of state, local, and Tribal leaders. The project would likely even wipe out the Ouachita rock pocketbook mussel, a species dear to the Choctaw Nation.

Last week the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission rejected the study proposal behind the project, citing its many deficiencies. That’s the first step in defeating the project. Now the company backing it has until Feb. 7 to file a new study proposal — or the project can’t advance. We’ll keep the pressure on.

MARIN COUNTY, CA — A new round of grants is available to support local nonprofits that support nature and wildlife education in Marin County.

This year registered nonprofit organizations can seek grants of up to $5,000 to help fund educational and habitat restoration projects. Last year, 13 organizations received a combined $36,263 in grant money, which supported work by the River Otter Ecology Project, WildCare, the California White Shark Project and others.

New this year is a $3,500 scholarship available to students who are interested in careers in fish and wildfire conservation, habitat preservation, or natural resource management. The scholarship is named in honor of longtime Novato resident Ed Schulze and applications can be submitted online via UCCE Marin.

The Center for Biological Diversity and allies just signed a momentous agreement with the National Park Service and livestock operators, retiring all dairy ranches and three-quarters of private commercial beef cattle operations at California’s Point Reyes National Seashore, home to majestic native tule elk. The Park Service has revised its Point Reyes management plan to prioritize conservation and let tule elk roam freely, multiplying without a population cap.

We’re on a roll defending these charismatic, antler-crowned ungulates. The agreement comes only weeks after our last major tule elk victory: freeing Point Reyes’ largest herd from a 2-mile fence that was causing mass deaths.

“I’m looking forward to the improved management approach for natural ecosystems that this agreement can usher in,” said the Center’s Jeff Miller. “This is a historic opportunity to expand elk herds, restore coastal prairie habitats, and protect endangered species.”

Despite a devastating die-off, this week the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service rejected our petition to upgrade Florida manatees’ Endangered Species Act status from threatened to endangered. Over the past few years, more than 2,000 Florida manatees have starved to death as water pollution decimated their seagrass supply. The Service initially announced it might increase their protection — but its new decision reverses course.

The good news? In that same decision, it did propose to protect Puerto Rico’s Antillean manatees as endangered.

In 2017 the Service ignored conservation groups’ warnings and “downlisted” West Indian manatees — manatees in both Florida and Puerto Rico — to threatened. We’ll keep fighting to get the Florida subspecies properly protected. - Center for Biological Diversity

Thanks to years of tireless work by Tribal advocates — with the backing of allies like the Center and you supporters — President Biden just created two new national monuments in California, preserving diverse landscapes that are important habitats for critically endangered wildlife.

In Northern California the Sáttítla Highlands National Monument covers a landscape of forests and waterways sacred to the Pit River Tribe and home to Pacific fishers and northern spotted owls.

In Southern California Chuckwalla National Monument includes lands sacred to five groups of Native peoples that harbor wildlife the Center has defended for decades — including bighorn sheep, desert tortoises, desert kit foxes, and the monument’s namesake lizards.

Report: Sprawl in Fire-prone Areas Endangers Californians, Increases Damages, Fire-suppression Costs

‘Built to Burn’ Calls for State Law to Limit Construction in High Fire-risk Wildlands

LOS ANGELES— As California lawmakers consider a bill that would limit sprawl development in blaze-prone areas, a new report highlights how rampant construction in high fire-risk wildlands is putting more people in harm’s way and contributing to a dramatic increase in costs associated with fire suppression and damages.

Built to Burn, released today by the Center for Biological Diversity, notes that if current land-use practices continue, between 640,000 and 1.2 million new homes could be built in the state’s highest wildfire-risk areas by 2050. Nearly all contemporary wildfires in California are caused by human sources such as power lines and electrical equipment, and development increases that threat.

“Sprawl development in California’s blaze-prone wildlands increases ignition risk, puts more people in danger and harms ecosystems and wildlife,” said Tiffany Yap, a senior scientist at the Center. “After last year’s devastating fires, state lawmakers need to take a hard look at the science and take strong action on construction in high fire-risk areas.”

Costs in areas managed by Cal Fire were $23 billion during the 2015-2018 fire seasons — more than double the wildfire cost for the previous 26 years combined after adjusting for inflation. Fifteen of the 20 most destructive California wildfires have occurred in the past five years.

Since 2015 almost 200 people in the state have been killed in wildfires, more than 50,000 structures have burned down, hundreds of thousands have had to evacuate their homes and endure power outages, and millions have been exposed to unhealthy levels of smoke and air pollution.

Today’s report notes that local officials continue to greenlight massive new developments offering mostly mid- to high-income homes in areas that have repeatedly burned in wildfires. For example, multiple wildfires have occurred on the project site for the 3,150-home Northlake development approved by L.A. County in 2019, and several wildfires have burned on the site for the 3,000-home Otay Village developments approved by San Diego County in 2019 and 2020.

“When local officials approve more development in fire-prone areas instead of focusing on increasing affordable housing near city centers, we all pay the price,” said Yap. “Californians suffer from unsustainable firefighting and recovery costs, degraded ecosystems and smoky air. And firefighters literally put their bodies on the line when these developments are threatened by wildfire.”

Wildfires are a natural and necessary process in many of California’s ecosystems. But in California chapparal and sage scrub ecosystems, increasing fire frequency due to development is converting these shrublands into non-native grasses that burn more easily, leading to a dangerous “feedback loop” of increasing fire and degraded ecosystems.

In addition to the economic damage and human loss of life caused by fires, wildlife is also harmed. Unnaturally frequent wildfire in native shrublands can harm vulnerable native species already reeling from the impacts of habitat loss and fragmentation. Several Southern California mountain lions in the genetically compromised Santa Monica and Santa Ana populations have died in recent wildfires because they were unable to escape to safety due to surrounding roads and development. And post-fire landslides threaten already-imperiled amphibians and fish, such as the mountain yellow-legged frog and unarmored threespine stickleback.

State Sen. Stern recently introduced Senate Bill 55 to help keep Californians safer from wildfire. The bill would prohibit new development that would increase ignition risks in very high fire-hazard severity zones and state responsibility areas.

The new year brought more tragic news for endangered gray wolves. First came reports that a wolf had been illegally killed in Washington state — the third in three months. And in Colorado, it was announced that the adult father of the Copper Creek pack had died from gunshot wounds. The Copper Creek wolf was among the first reintroduced in Colorado. He fathered five pups last spring, but he and most of his pack were captured after reports of livestock conflicts.

The father was found in poor condition — suffering after being shot — and died shortly after. Targeting protected wolves is an immoral act of violence on the wild. And unless poachers are held accountable, the killings will continue. That's exactly what's happening in Washington. Since 2022, at least 22 wolves are known or suspected to have been poached in multiple parts of the state, including in places where wolves are federally protected. The latest victim was an adult male near Trout Lake in mid-December. Shot and grievously wounded, he dragged himself to a water source and died an agonizing death. Two other adult wolves were poached in late September and October.

The Center for Biological Diversity is contributing to rewards for information leading to an arrest and conviction of these wolf poachers. Wolves throughout the lower 48 are still trying to recover. They can again flourish in the wild — but only if left to live with their packs in safety and peace. The Center will never stop fighting for wolves and other species targeted by those who view the animals we love as expendable. Wolves are icons of the wild, and we won't stand for them to be gunned down. - Kierán Suckling, Executive Director, Center for Biological Diversity

At 08:46 on the morning of December 17th, one of my Danish lawyers, Julie Stage called me in the prison to tell me that the Danish Attorney General has made the decision to not extradite me to Japan. The Greenlandic Court had made their decision to extradite. This was countered by the Danish Minster of Justice Peter Hummelgaard who made the political decision to overrule the Greenlandic Court.

I was free. The Japanese whalers, the Japanese government and the Faroese whalers were furious. On January 12th, the Japanese Foreign Minister Takeshi Iwaya held a meeting with the Danish Ambassador-designate to Japan Jarl Frijs-Madsen at the Foreign Ministry in Tokyo. Mr. Iwaya was not happy. The Foreign Minster scolded Jarl expressing his profound regret that Denmark had failed to deliver me as a prisoner to the Japanese authorities.

The Japanese failed in their attempt to get their revenge for the embarrassment that our TV show Whale Wars caused by exposing their illegal whaling activities to the world. The five months that I spent in a Greenlandic prison served as an excellent opportunity to focus international attention on Japan’s continued illegal whaling operations with the added benefit of focusing attention on the continuing unlawful slaughter of pilot whales and dolphins in the Danish Faroe Islands.

The Japanese failed once again to capture me and at the same time advertised to the world that they continue to be a renegade whaling nation in violation of the International Whaling Commission and the International Court of Justice. There are so many people to thank for the powerful movement of support that contributed to the decision by Denmark to not turn me over to Japan.

The newest vessel M/V BANDERO, is a 64-meter former Japanese Fisheries Patrol vessel stationed in Australia, acting as a sentinel to thwart any attempts by Japan to resume whaling in the Southern Ocean Whale Sanctuary.

“Antarctic whaling season runs from December-March, and although Japan did not head south with harpoon ships this year, with a new factory vessel, the Kangei Maru, long term intentions are clear: Japan may allow its Antarctic whaling fleet to resume as soon as next season.” ~ Captain Locky, CPWF. During this time M/V BANDERO is on call to head South if needed. In the off-season, a new campaign conducting marine plastic recovery missions in the Pacific Ocean and protecting whale migration routes is in the works.

Last week, 53 dolphins perished in the first grindadráp of the year. Local reports suggest the use of night vision goggles, further proving that these killings are far from traditional.

The fight continues with the upcoming premiere of Far Away Island, a groundbreaking documentary available at the end of the month on-demand. This film will shine a global spotlight on the grindadráp, amplifying calls for immediate action.

As part of our efforts, we're launching #FaroesFree - a bold initiative aimed at applying economic pressure on the Faroe Islands. CLICK HERE to join the movement and learn how you can help.

Seven years ago, Tahlequah captured the world’s attention when she carried her dead calf for 17 days and over 1,000 miles, a heartbreaking display of grief that revealed the profound emotional lives of orcas. Tragically, she is now facing heartbreak once again. In late December, scientists spotted Tahlequah with a new calf, a glimmer of hope. But by Wednesday, that hope was shattered when researchers confirmed the baby whale had passed. Now, Tahlequah is once again pushing her calf’s lifeless body.

“We share our coastal waters with this iconic tribe of intelligent, self-aware beings that struggle to survive in a world ecologically impoverished by humanity.” ~ Captain Paul Watson

The Southern Resident Orcas of Puget Sound, including Tahlequah’s pod, are facing extinction - starving to death due to the combined effects of overfishing and the continued use of dams that block critical salmon spawning routes. If you are based in Washington State, please join us on January 15th at 11:30 AM at the Washington State Capitol as we demand stronger protections for orcas. CLICK HERE FOR EVENT INFO

Wildfire smoke can carry thousands of living microorganisms, like bacteria and fungi, across long distances. Some of them could potentially infect humans. W