Mongabay News

• ‘Let’s understand the value of the forest’ says Liberia’s Silas Siakor

  Rainforests have long played a central role in Liberia. Home to hundreds of thousands of people, they’re a source of sustenance, a site for cultural practice and habitat for forest elephants, western chimpanzees, and pygmy hippos. Massive rubber plantations carved out of them dominated the country’s economy for decades, and during the country’s civil war […]

• New bat species described from Western Himalayas

  Researchers reviewing the diversity of bats in the Western Himalayas in India recently confirmed a new-to-science species from Uttarakhand state. Named the Himalayan long-tailed myotis (Myotis himalaicus) in a new study, the bat boasts a tail nearly as long as its body. Rohit Chakravarty, a bat researcher and conservationist with the nonprofit Nature Conservation Foundation, […]

• Liberia has a new plan to protect its rainforests. Can it work?

  Around half of West Africa’s remaining rainforests are in the small coastal nation of Liberia. They’re home to species like western chimpanzees and pygmy hippos, valuable stands of hardwood — and hundreds of thousands of people. Despite years of logging reforms backed by foreign aid, Liberia lost more than 38,000 hectares (94,000 acres) of humid […]

• How scientists unmask climate change’s role in extreme weather

  How do scientists determine whether climate change is driving extreme weather events like the floods, heat waves and droughts that we’re experiencing today? To find out about the science of attribution, Mongabay’s Kristine Sabillo recently interviewed environmental statistician Clair Barnes of World Weather Attribution (WWA), a global network of researchers that has been analyzing the […]

• Nepal looks to Cambodia’s breeding model as Bengal florican numbers plunge

  KATHMANDU — Debate is growing in Nepal over moves to start breeding the Bengal florican, a critically endangered bird, in captivity. A 2024 government plan that proposes captive breeding in zoos and aviaries has been held up as key to boosting the bird’s population in the wild, but conservationists say long-term protection of the species’ […]