Rhett Ayers Butler
In Nagaland, edible spiders are not a novelty. They are part of a local food tradition. A new study in Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems documents the consumption of two orb-weaver spiders, Nephila pilipes and Trichonephila clavata, both known in the Lotha Naga language as siyankyü. The study, based on interviews with 33 people with [Continue reading]
In conservation, absence is often the first sign of trouble. A bird not seen for years may still persist in some overlooked corner of its range. Or it may already be gone. The “lost birds” list was created for this gap, marking species that have slipped from view but not yet into extinction. The latest [Continue reading]
Near Brazil’s Belo Monte dam, one of the world’s largest hydropower projects, the promise of abundant electricity has proved uneven. A household survey of 500 families in Altamira found that 86.8% experienced higher electricity costs after the plant began operating in 2016. Many riverside residents still endure outages, pay steep tariffs, or rely on diesel [Continue reading]
The Turtle Survival Center sits far from the places where most turtles are lost. That distance is part of its purpose. The facility, run by the Turtle Survival Alliance, exists to buy time for species that no longer have much of it. Founded in 2013 in South Carolina, the center functions as a high-security refuge [Continue reading]
Tree planting has become a favored response to environmental loss. Governments, companies, and philanthropies announce large targets with reassuring round numbers. Forests, after all, store carbon, shelter wildlife, and support livelihoods. Yet the details matter. Planting the wrong species, or planting trees where forests did not exist, can undermine both biodiversity and climate goals. That [Continue reading]
Anyone who looks at a social media feed with any regularity is likely familiar with the deluge of fabricated images and videos now circulating online. Some are harmless curiosities (other than the resource use). Others are more troubling. Among the most consequential are AI-generated depictions of wildlife, which are beginning to distort how people understand [Continue reading]
For Isabel Esterman, journalism’s influence is often cumulative. It comes from staying with a subject long enough for the evidence to become harder to ignore. “It’s not one story,” she says. “It’s this collective body of reporting, and staying on it has been significant.” That idea runs through her work at Mongabay, where she has [Continue reading]
For most of Peru’s scientific history, Indigenous knowledge has existed outside the formal record. It shaped how forests were used, how species were managed, and how risk was understood, but rarely appeared in journals or policy. The boundary is shifting. One of the researchers bringing community knowledge into the scientific literature is Richar Antonio Demetrio, [Continue reading]
Every year brings its small revisions to what humans think they know about animals. 2025 was no exception. Here are some examples compiled by Shreya Dasgupta. Waterfall climbing catfish In Brazil, thousands of bumblebee catfish were seen climbing waterfalls. The fish gathered at the base of cascades on the Aquidauana River, then edged their way [Continue reading]
Every year, science adds names to the living world. The tally is never small. Hundreds of species are formally described, often after years of slow, meticulous work, and often long after the organisms themselves were first seen. Biologists estimate that perhaps only a tenth to a fifth of Earth’s species have been documented. Even among [Continue reading]
Extinction is rarely a moment. It is a process that unfolds offstage, marked by missed sightings, thinning records, and the slow reassignment of hope to footnotes. This year, a small group of species crossed a final bureaucratic threshold. Following new assessments, they were formally listed as extinct on the IUCN Red List. For science, the [Continue reading]
When Truphena Muthoni stepped up to a royal palm in Nyeri and wrapped her arms around its trunk, few expected her to stay there for three days. Even fewer thought the gesture would spark a national conversation. She is 22, softly spoken, and practiced in environmental advocacy. Yet her 72-hour embrace, now awaiting verification by [Continue reading]