Oceans are teeming with life and are connected to society through history and culture, shipping and economic activity, geopolitics and recreation.
(Shutterstock)
International law does not meaningfully address biodiversity conservation in the high seas. We risk losing marine species before we have a chance to identify and understand them.
Erik Mandre/Shutterstock.com
A decade of no grazing has demonstrated positive effects on the richness of bird species.
Flickr
Australia has been identified as a hotspot for emerging diseases, which occurs when human activities collide with a richness of animal species.
A school of convict tang (Acanthurus triostegus ) swim on Kiritimati’s dead reefs after the 2015–16 marine heatwave.
(Kevin Bruce)
Reef fish vanish during marine heat waves, but may bounce back quickly on reefs that have few other environmental stressors.
© Magnus Elander
The Baltic crusades had a long term impact on the local environment – 700 years later, the details of this are clear.
The pangolin, one of the most poached animals in the world, could have served as an intermediate host in the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 to humans.
Wahyudi/AFP
Covid-19, like other major epidemics, is not unrelated to the biodiversity and climate crisis we are experiencing.
A barn swallow scoops an insect from the pond’s surface.
Richard Seeley/Shutterstock
Ponds create ‘insect chimneys’ which are a boon for hungry farmland birds.
Herd of Przewalski horses inside Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (Ukraine). September 2016.
Luke Massey (www.lmasseyimages.com)
Wild horses native to the steppes of Asia live now in the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone (Ukraine), with an expanding population, 34 years after the nuclear accident.
A Rosalia longicorn – the chosen insect of 2019 in Hungary by the Hungarian Entomological Society.
EPA-EFE/Peter Komka
The largest study of insect declines to date gives us the best indication of how species all over the world are faring.
Seismic exploration lines cut through boreal forest near Fort McMurray, Alta.
(Scott E. Nielsen)
New research identifies areas where species may take refuge as the climate changes and finds they’re largely unprotected.
Individuals of the European robin tend to be slightly larger in northern France than in the south.
Wikipedia
Climate change is affecting our planet’s biodiversity, yet some species can find ways to adapt. Using citizen-science data, a French research team is studying how birds adjust to local heat levels.
Heath Warwick
“I arrived in Perth and bought a foam mattress for the back of my car – my bed for half of the trip. I stocked up on tinned food, and I headed north in search of these tiny eight-legged gems.”
GettyImages
Abrupt losses of biodiversity from climate change represent a significant threat to human well-being.
Omo Forest, a home for elephants, in Ijebu East and North Local Government Areas, Ogun State, Nigeria
Peter Martell/AFP via Getty Images
Protected areas in Nigeria are generally hampered by limited funds and resources.
Forest in Gunung Leuser National Park.
Junaidi Hanafiah / CC BY-SA
Declaring conservation areas is meant to preserve nature. Why is this approach still failing?
Healesville Sanctuary
Chimbu is a baby tree kangaroo, and he is the latest success in a complex web of international conservation.
PNS Survey
A new method of using camera traps has brought good and bad news for conservationists.
AAP Image/Joel Carrett
COVID-19 is the latest new infectious disease arising from our collision with nature.
Conservation is as much about the critical role of communities as custodians of biodiversity as it is about creating people-free zones.
(Quang Nguyen Vinh/Pexels)
With the 2020 deadline for conserving biodiversity almost past, communities must now play a larger role in conservation.
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Aerial baiting has been Australia’s foremost weapon against pest species for the past 74 years. But at what cost?