Mongabay Newscast

Can we right the wrongs of 'fortress conservation?' May 30, 2023

Since the colonization of the Congo Basin by Europeans, many Indigenous communities have been denied land they once relied on in the name of conservation under a contentious conservation model.

The central concept of “fortress conservation” remains popular with some Central African governments, however experts say it is based on a false premise of a "pristine wilderness" devoid of humans. However, Indigenous leaders and conservation experts say it's time for a change. One that includes Indigenous communities and puts them in the drives seat of conservation initiatives.

On this episode of Mongabay Explores the Congo Basin, Cameroonian lawyer and Goldman Prize winner Samuel Nguiffo, Congolese academic Vedaste Cituli, and Mongabay features writer Ashoka Mukpo detail the troubling history of fortress conservation in Central Africa, its impact, and ways to address the problems it has created.

For more Congo exploration coming soon, find & follow/subscribe to Mongabay Explores via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Please also enjoy the first three seasons of Explores, where we dove into the huge biodiversity and conservation challenges in Sumatra, New Guinea, and more.

Episode Artwork: Kahuzi-Biega National Park rangers standing in formation in the park in October 2016, by Thomas Nicolon for Mongabay.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro: The call of a putty-nosed monkey (Cercopithecus nictitans). This soundscape was recorded in Ivindo National Park in Gabon by Zuzana Burivalova, Walter Mbamy, Tatiana Satchivi, and Serge Ekazama.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for Mongabay.

Climate change is no joke for Australians May 23, 2023

Australia suffered catastrophic bushfires in 2019 - 2020, followed by intense rain and flooding from an ensuing La Niña which experts say may be linked to those bushfires. Despite the pleas of scientists to halt development, some governments, such as in the Northern Territories, continue to greenlight massive fossil fuel infrastructure projects.

All of this is 'demoralizing' says award-winning podcast host of 'A Rational Fear,' Dan Ilic. He joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss climate change policy in Australia, recent victories from Indigenous communities, and how comedy provides coverage and catharsis for citizens concerned about the climate crisis. Ilic, who previously made headlines for comedic billboards satirizing Australia's lack of action on climate policy, speaks with host Mike DiGirolamo in person in Sydney.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

Related Reading:

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Image Caption: A mother koala and her joey who survived the forest fires in Mallacoota. Australia, 2020. Photo by Jo-Anne McArthur / We Animals

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Deep sea discovery shocks and delights scientists May 17, 2023

Scientists have discovered a series of hydrothermal vents in the Mid-Atlantic ridge spanning hundreds of miles and teeming with life adapted to scorching plumes of hot water like shrimp, crabs, mussels, anemones, fish, gastropods, and more.

This discovery, 40 years in the making, adds another layer of consideration to where deep sea mining can occur, which experts argue should not happen in these diverse underwater ecosystems, in part because they store vast amounts of marine genetic resources, besides their biodiversity.

Listen to the new report from Elizabeth Claire Alberts: Seafloor life abounds around hydrothermal vents hot enough to melt lead.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for Mongabay.

Image caption: A squat lobster perches atop a bubblegum coral in the deep sea. Image by Schmidt Ocean Institute (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening

The world's second-largest rainforest is at a turning point May 02, 2023

This week we're sharing the first episode of a new season of Mongabay Explores, a deep dive into the Congo Basin which begins with the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), which contains 60% of central Africa's forest, but which also aims to open up protected areas and forested peatlands to oil and gas development.

This is big because the Congo Basin contains the world’s second-largest rainforest, a staggering 178 million hectares, containing myriad wildlife and giant trees plus numerous human communities: it is also one of the world's biggest carbon sinks.

We speak with Adams Cassinga, a DRC resident and founder of Conserv Congo, and Joe Eisen, executive director of Rainforest Foundation UK, about the environmental and conservation challenges and opportunities faced by the DRC & the Congo Basin in general.

For more Congo exploration coming on episode 2, find & follow/subscribe to Mongabay Explores via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Until episode 2 airs, please also enjoy the first three seasons of Explores, where we dove into the huge biodiversity and conservation challenges in Sumatra, New Guinea, and more.

Episode Artwork: A female putty-nosed monkey. Image by C. Kolopp / WCS.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro: The call of a putty-nosed monkey (Cercopithecus nictitans). This soundscape was recorded in Ivindo National Park in Gabon by Zuzana Burivalova, Walter Mbamy, Tatiana Satchivi, and Serge Ekazama.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for Mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Guyana gets Drilled: Acclaimed podcaster Amy Westervelt on the latest oil boom Apr 18, 2023

The South American nation of Guyana, whose economy has traditionally relied on tourism, agriculture, and fishing, has begun doing business with oil giant ExxonMobil to build a massive offshore oil drilling project along its coast.

The president has argued that the profits could pay for the nation's clean energy transition, while others argue that the nation's traditional economic models, biodiversity, and coastal population are at risk of severe environmental impacts from the project.

Award-winning journalist and podcast producer Amy Westervelt joins the Mongabay Newscast to share details of the situation, which is the focus of the 8th season of her acclaimed podcast series Drilled, and she opines about the power of podcasting and the current state of the global effort to tackle climate change:

“What a total failure of international climate negotiations that Global South countries [are] in this position of having to use oil money to pay for climate adaptation. That’s ridiculous,” Westervelt says.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

Related Reading:

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image: Series artwork for "Drilled" Season 8 by Matt Fleming.

Mongabay Reports: Breeding new hope for African penguins at De Hoop Nature Reserve Apr 11, 2023

Recent breeding success at a nature reserve in South Africa has given conservationists hope for the survival of Africa's only resident penguin species, whose population has dropped by nearly 65% since 1989.

Researchers are having success boosting breeding colonies near abundant food sources with the help of simple interventions like building nest boxes that mimic their guano burrows which keep the birds cool and safe in a world whose climate is becoming hotter and less predictable.

Listen to the popular article from Ryan Truscott here:

Breeding success raises hopes for future of endangered African penguin

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for Mongabay.

Image caption: African penguin. Image by Alberto Ziveri via Flickr (BY-SA 2.0)

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Conservation technology just keeps on growing Apr 03, 2023

Conservation technology is a rapidly growing field with exciting potential. From eDNA to bioacoustics and AI, there's a lot to keep track of in an ever-changing environment.

Here to discuss it on the Newscast this week is new Mongabay staff writer Abhishyant "Abhi" Kidangoor who's joined our newsroom to focus on this quickly growing field: he shares details of his current conservation tech reporting projects and ones our readers can look forward to in the future.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find and follow Mongabay on all the social media platforms.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image caption: Conservation technology and wildlife manager, Eleanor Flatt, installs a GSM camera trap in the Costa Rican forests protected and managed by Osa Conservation. Image by Marco Molina.

Mongabay Reports: What's in the historic new U.N. High Seas treaty? Mar 27, 2023

More than 15 years in the making, the United Nations has finally reached an agreement on a landmark, legally binding treaty to protect international waters, where a myriad of wildlife big and small live.

Why did it take so long, and what happens next?

Hear all about it by listening to this audio reading of the popular article by Elizabeth Fitt:

As U.N. members clinch historic high seas biodiversity treaty, what’s in it?

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Image caption: A humpback whale in Antarctica. Image by Christopher Michel via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Journalist Tom Philpott on how agriculture impacts the environment & agroecology alternatives Mar 21, 2023

The American approach to food production is negatively impacting the environment and depleting natural resources like topsoil and groundwater at an alarming rate. Top agriculture author, journalist, and Johns Hopkins Center for a Livable Future research associate Tom Philpott highlights these problems on this episode first by discussing two regions where such impacts are acutely felt, the Central Valley of California and the Great Plains, and then explains how these problems are spreading to the rest of the globe.

But the author of Perilous Bounty: The Looming Collapse of American Farming and How We Can Prevent It, Philpott also says there's hope via sustainable practices like agroecology and agroforestry, new land tenure models, and more.

A former food reporter and editor for Mother Jones and Grist, he discusses steps that can be taken to reform our food systems for a healthier and more sustainable future at this moment as a new growing season is about to begin in the Northern Hemisphere.

“We don’t have to have an agriculture that consumes the very ecologies that make it possible, and leads to this catastrophic loss of species that we’re in the middle of right now,” our guest says.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image caption: Corn is a common food and fodder crop of the Great Plains, and has also long been used to make ethanol. But its most common cultivation methods lead to massive soil erosion, pollution of waterways, and heavy use of chemical herbicides and pesticides. Image courtesy of Tyler Lark.

Mongabay Reports: Monarchs make a comeback Mar 13, 2023

In 2022, the population of western monarch butterflies reached its highest number in decades, 335,000, according to the annual Western Monarch Count in California and Arizona, marking the second year in a row for a positive tally of the species numbers.

While that count is celebrated by conservationists, they also point to the need to protect monarchs' overwintering sites in North America, which continue to suffer degradation and destruction each year.

Read the popular article by Liz Kimbrough here: Western monarch populations reach highest number in decades

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Image caption: A monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus). Image by John Banks via Pexels (Public domain).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Indigenous ecological knowledge: National Geographic photographer Kiliii Yuyan talks TEK Mar 06, 2023

This week, National Geographic photographer Kiliii Yuyan joins the show to discuss his visits to five Indigenous communities and the value of traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) for protecting the world’s biodiversity, which is the subject of his new project, "The Guardians of Life: Indigenous Stewards of Living Earth."

An effort in collaboration with previous guest Gleb Raygorodetsky and with support from the National Geographic Society and the Amazon Climate Pledge, the project takes Yuyan to five different Indigenous communities across the world.

Yuyan shares insights on the TEK of the Indigenous communities he’s visited and his own reflections as a person with Indigenous ancestry doing this work, plus what he wishes more journalists would do when sharing the stories and unique knowledge of Indigenous communities.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image Caption: Larry Lucas Kaleak listens to the sounds of passing whales and bearded seals through a skinboat paddle in the water. Image (c) Kiliii Yuyan.

Mongabay Reports: Can you fund reforestation by cutting trees down? Feb 27, 2023

As the world pursues reforestation on an expanding scale, a recurring question is: how do we pay for it? One emerging solution is to grow and harvest timber on the same land where reforestation is happening, as exemplified in Brazil's Atlantic Forest. Another approach is to grow timber trees and natural forests on separate plots of land, with a portion of the profits from timber harvests supporting the reforestation.

However, some experts worry that relying too much on timber revenues could harm ecosystems and existing forests, resulting in additional harvesting. Can we balance the need for funding with the need to preserve native ecosystems?

On this episode, listen to the popular Mongabay article by Gianluca Cerullo that discusses all this: Dollars and chainsaws: Can timber production help fund global reforestation?

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Image caption: Native regeneration under 50% dead standing eucalyptus trees in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest. Image courtesy of Paulo Guilherme Molin/Federal University of São Carlos.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Pulitzer Prize-winner Elizabeth Kolbert on humanity's 'solution problem' Feb 21, 2023

Modern society is constantly crafting mega solutions to problems it has created, many of which come with even more problems, and no guarantee of solving the issue, long term.

Whether it's injecting reflective aerosols into the atmosphere to combat climate change (literally turning the sky white), or gene-editing invasive species, “we seem incapable of stopping ourselves,” argues journalist and Pulitzer-prize winning author Elizabeth Kolbert.

She joins the Mongabay Newscast to talk about her latest book, “Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future,” which explores many of these machinations in detail and why she urges readers to be skeptical of them.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image: The cane toad (Rhinella marina). Native to South and Central America, the toxic species was deliberately introduced in Queensland, Australia, in 1935 and today it is considered an invasive pest, poisoning native fauna. Image by Paul Williams/Iron Ammonite Photography. Creative Commons (CC BY-NC 2.0).

Mongabay Reports: Cheetahs bring vultures back from the brink in Malawi Feb 14, 2023

In a national park in southern Malawi, the reintroduction of cheetahs (and lions) is bringing four critically endangered vulture species back to the skies, after a 20-year absence: the big cats' kill sites have increased the food supply, encouraging the birds to return in a conservation 'win-win.'

A project of African Parks and the Endangered Wildlife Trust begun in 2017, the team has since observed tagged vultures in parks outside Malawi, too.

Read or share this popular article by Ryan Truscott here:

Cheetah reintroduction in Malawi brings vultures back to the skies

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts from, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes and past ones.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: A cheetah. Image by Rhett Butler for Mongabay.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Epic struggle for Ecuador's biodiversity is having success Feb 08, 2023

The Intag Valley in Ecuador is one of the world's most biodiverse places, its dense cloud forests bursting with plant and animal species.

But the world's largest copper company wants to build a mine amidst its riches, so local leaders are organizing a conservation campaign: Mongabay's associate digital editor Romi Castagnino recently visited the area and joins this episode to discuss what she and staff writer Liz Kimbrough reported, and how that article sparked key support from one of Hollywood's top environmentalists, Leonardo DiCaprio.

Click 'play' to hear what she saw, and read Mongabay's full report from the valley here:

In Ecuador, communities protecting a ‘terrestrial coral reef’ face a mining giant

This is the first feature in Mongabay's new series, Conservation Potential:

Mongabay’s Conservation Potential series asks: Where do we need to protect biodiversity?

Here's an update on the effort:

Ecuador court upholds ‘rights of nature,’ blocks Intag Valley copper mine

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image: A silk eyed moth photographed on the arm of Liz Kimbrough. Image by Romi Castagnino for Mongabay.

Mongabay Reports: Protecting forests on a budget? Here's how. Jan 31, 2023

It's tough to fund conservation, and deciding exactly how (and where) funding gets used is even trickier. However, researchers recently identified where and when to “get the most bang for our buck,” in a newly published study.

Many of the highest-conservation-priority areas identified fall within lower-income tropical countries. While substantial international funding is likely needed to conserve and restore forests, securing Indigenous peoples' land rights could be a low-cost, and equitable solution, since 80% of the planet's biodiversity lies within Indigenous peoples' territories.

Listen to the popular article from Liz Kimbrough: Protecting global forests with a limited budget? New study shows where and when to start

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Tiger Leg Monkey Tree Frog (Phyllomedusa hypochondrialis). Image by Rhett Butler.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Are botanists disappearing just when we need them the most? Jan 24, 2023

A decline in botany degree programs, paired with a growing lack of general plant awareness, has scientists concerned about society's ability to tackle existential threats like biodiversity loss and climate change, so Leeds University Ph.D. researcher Sebastian Stroud is our guest on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast.

While humans depend upon plants for many critical everyday needs, our ability to identify them seems to be decreasing as fewer educational programs continue to study them. Stroud joins us to discuss a recent study he co-authored about this and how we can combat the lack of plant awareness.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, from Apple to Spotify, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Image: Orange orchid with magenta spots. Torajaland, Sulawesi, Indonesia. Photo by Rhett Butler.

Mongabay Reports: Amazon's tallest tree threatened by deforestation Jan 16, 2023

The Paru State Forest is the world's 3rd-largest sustainable-use tropical forest reserve, and is home to a tree standing 30 stories tall.

But in October of last year, its home state of Pará was the 5th-most deforested in Brazil, alarming experts and environmentalists that its giant trees (including the massive red angelim) are at risk.

Listen to the popular article from Sarah Brown, Amazon’s tallest tree at risk as deforestation nears, by clicking the play button.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to gain instant access to our latest episodes.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: The Amazon’s tallest tree grows in the Paru State Forest and is one of several giant trees in the region. Each one can sequester up to 40 tons of carbon, nearly as much as a hectare (2.4 acres) of typical forest. Image © Havita Rigamonti/Imazon/Ideflor.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

UN Biodiversity Conference an 'important step' toward conserving nature Jan 11, 2023

In December, Mongabay's Montreal-based editor Latoya Abulu attended the 15th meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity, where the historic Kunming-Montreal Biodiversity Framework was signed by nearly 200 countries.

While the agreement was lauded by scientists, advocates, and Indigenous leaders, others say that there are some concerning omissions from the text, and worrying inclusions of "biodiversity credits" sought by corporations. Click play to hear Latoya share details from her time in the conference halls, what was included in the final text of the agreement, and what was left out.

Related reading:

Episode Artwork: A deep-sea coral, Paragorgia johnsoni, with a large, brisingid sea star on its base, pictured in the New England Seamount chain. Image © The Mountains-in the Sea Research Team, IFE, URI-IAO, and NOAA.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and feedback! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Agroforestry is climate-positive and profitable, investors say Sep 27, 2022

What's a climate-friendly and profitable way to farm? Some investors (and many farmers) say it's agroforestry, which combines trees & shrubs with annual crops for mutual benefits: shade-grown coffee or bird-friendly chocolate, for instance.

So why have the agriculture sectors of the U.S. and E.U. largely ignored it? That's a question Ethan Steinberg and his partners at Propagate Ventures sought to answer, and then raised $1.5 million in seed funding to help farmers in eight U.S. states transition from conventional agriculture to agroforestry.

Hear more about this growing trend in sustainable agriculture by listening to this audio reading of the popular article Investors say agroforestry isn’t just climate friendly — it’s also profitable by Stephanie Hanes on this latest episode of Mongabay Reports.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: A model rubber agroforestry forest garden, incorporating animal husbandry (silvopasture). Illustration courtesy of Kittitornkool, J. et al (2019).

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Could Brazil's election decide the fate of the Amazon? Sep 20, 2022

Tropical forest news is coming fast lately, and we've got a top expert to discuss it with, beginning with the deforestation rate of the Brazilian Amazon in 2022 which is on pace to match the dismal heights of 2021; however, the upcoming Brazilian presidential election between incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and former president Luis Inacío Lula da Silva (Lula) could change forest conservation prospects.

Mongabay's CEO and sought after tropical forest news commentator, Rhett Butler, joins the Mongabay Newscast to share his analysis of how former president Lula could (once again) significantly decrease deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon, like he's done in the past.

Rhett also shares his insight into a historic legislative move by the European Parliament to block 14 commodities linked to deforestation from entering the EU. The bill places the onus on the buyer to prove any 'dirty commodities' entering the EU are not linked to deforestation, whether legal or illegal. Rhett also discusses the renewed REDD+ agreement between Indonesia and Norway, which was canceled in 2021 when Norway failed to issue payment.

Episode artwork: Two Grauer’s gorillas in Kahuzi-Biega National Park, DR Congo. Grauer’s gorillas are the world’s largest primates, and highly threatened, their population having declined close to 80% in just a few decades. Image by Marcus Westberg

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Can bugs take a bite out of climate change? Aug 16, 2022

Cricket One is one of the world's largest cricket farms, and it's serving up an impressive palette of insect protein. Vietnam-based reporter Mike Tatarski reports on companies cashing in on the insect protein wave: coupled with the fact that insects (like crickets) use far less feed than cattle, and produce no methane, there is potential for the industry to replace animal-based protein sources.

Could delicacies such as the scorpion skewers served at Bugs Cafe in Cambodia make their way to the West?

This episode of Mongabay Reports features the popular 2020 story as read by Mike DiGirolamo. Find the full article here:

From scorpion skewers to cricket flour, bug protein is becoming big business

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Bugs Cafe in Siem Reap aims to turn insects into artfully presented cuisine, like this scorpion skewer. Image by Rishabh Malik for Atmos/Mongabay.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Bitcoin, blockchain, and burgeoning energy use Aug 09, 2022

Blockchain is an increasingly popular technology with quite a few applications and iterations, such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Non-fungible tokens (NFTs), but can they aid conservation? The answer is complicated. Some conservation groups are trying to use them for fundraising. Other conservationists are exploring the technology for the ability to track and trace payments for ecosystem services. However, downsides abound and depending on which form of the technology you use, they can be impractical, environmentally damaging, or both.

Author, Brett Scott, joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss these complicating factors, some of which he writes about in his new book Cloudmoney: Cash, Cards, Crypto and the War for our Wallets. Also joining the Newscast is journalist Judith Lewis Mernit, who reported on the Bitcoin mining surge in the US state of Texas and the rising energy prices pushed on to consumers.

Episode artwork: Flowering rainforest tree in the Colombian Amazon. Photo by Rhett A. Butler for Mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Chimpanzee tool innovation reveals cultural evolution Aug 02, 2022

Sonso Chimpanzees in Uganda began using a new method to drink water pooled in logs, 'moss-sponging.' Previously known to use balled-up leaves, the chimps began using this new technique with moss, researchers believe, because it is more effective at getting water into their mouths.

But then, the technique spread to a neighboring community of chimps, leading researchers to believe that this is evidence of cultural evolution in chimpanzees, a behavior previously only thought to exist in humans. Researchers published their findings in a study in Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences back in 2018.

This edition of Mongabay Reports is based on the popular article, Tool innovation shows cultural evolution at work among chimpanzees, by Nina Finley.

To also read & share the story, go here: https://news.mongabay.com/2019/02/tool-innovation-shows-cultural-evolution-at-work-among-chimpanzees/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Karibu, a member of the Sonso chimpanzee community in Uganda, uses a moss-sponge she made to sip water from a small rainwater pool. Scientists say the recent emergence and spread of this socially learned behavior is evidence of cultural evolution in chimpanzees. Image by Cat Hobaiter

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Mexico's Maya Train chugs forward, but at what cost? Jul 26, 2022

A multi-billion dollar, 958 mile-long, railway project known as the 'Maya Train' threatens to displace locals and degrade or destroy habitats across five states in the Yucatán peninsula of Mexico. Despite the many legal roadblocks the project has run into, the Mexican government is pushing it through, citing its eventual benefits for tourism and cargo transportation.

This week we speak with Mongabay's Mexico City-based staff writer Max Radwin about the project and the impacts it could have on habitats and the lives of locals. We also speak about the legacy of large infrastructure projects that President Andrés López Manuel Obrador is leaving in Mexico.

‘What’s lacking is respect for Mayan culture’: Q&A with Pedro Uc Be on Mexico’s Tren Maya

Episode artwork: Forest clearing in the municipality of Solidaridad in Quintana Roo for construction of the Maya Train. Image by Fernando Martínez Belmar.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: New Guinea has the most plant species of any island Jul 19, 2022

A report published in the journal Nature concludes that New Guinea is the most floristically diverse and speciose island on the planet. In addition to being the second largest island in the world, New Guinea is the world's largest tropical island. More than two-thirds of its 13,634 plant sepecies are endemic, occurring nowhere else in the world.

New Guinea is not without its conservation challenges. If you are a regular listener of the Mongabay Explores Podcast you'll recall our third season, which explains the historical context, challenges, and drivers of deforestation on the island over seven episodes. Despite these challenges, New Guinea still retains 80% of its original forest cover, making it the final frontier of tropical species discovery and also the third largest rainforest on the planet, just after the Amazon and Congo basin.

To also read & share the story, go here: https://news.mongabay.com/2020/08/new-guinea-has-the-most-plant-species-of-any-island/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Image by Rhett Butler.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

'Water always wins' but 'slow' solutions to water scarcity are growing in popularity Jul 12, 2022

Human-made 'gray' infrastructure is crumbling, causing some urban areas to lose up to 40% of this precious resource: several major cities across the globe now regularly run out of water or have shortages. Yet our pervasive attempts to control water have actually made accessing it harder, especially as humanity faces the silmultaneously occurring biodiversity, climate and water crises.

Author and journalist Erica Gies joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss her new book 'Water Always Wins: Thriving in an Age of Drought and Deluge.' She covers non-invasive solutions ('slow water') that could help humanity not just mitigate our water problems, but also restore biodiversity that's been degraded by 'gray' infrastructure.

Cities such as Chennai, India, are already embracing these slow water practices, many of which are rooted in traditional hydrological knowledge, while other areas like coastal Louisiana contemplate managed retreat from rising water. Solving water access and water infrastructure design isn't a simple one-size-fits-all solution, but there are many measures socieities could take today, and on a local level, to make things easier for us in the future.

Beyond boundaries: Earth’s water cycle is being bent to breaking point

Episode artwork: A person in an inflatable boat paddles down flooded Highway 610 in the Houston area as rains associated with Hurricane Harvey continue to fall in the area. Image by Mannie Garcia/Greenpeace.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Will the vaquita vanish? Jul 05, 2022

This week the world marks Save the Vaquita Day.

Our featured article examines a threat to this critically endangered marine mammal (Phocoena sinus), a small porpoise that lives only in the Upper Gulf of California, and of which only 8 remain in the wild.

Mongabay reports that a recent CITES decision lifting a prohibition on the export of captive-bred totaoba fish from Mexico could paradoxically spell disaster for vaquitas--which drown in nets that are set to capture the fish illegally, to feed a black market which will likely continue to thrive if a legal trade in farmed totoaba is established.

To also read & share the story, go here: https://news.mongabay.com/2022/06/experts-fear-end-of-vaquitas-after-green-light-for-export-of-captive-bred-totoaba-fish/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: An illustration of a vaquita. Image courtesy of Greenpeace.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

How marine conservation benefits by blending Indigenous knowledge and western science Jun 28, 2022

We discuss the effectiveness of combining traditional Indigenous ecological knowledge and Western science for conservation and restoration initiatives on this episode.

Our first guest is Dr. Gary Paul Nabhan, an ethnobotanist at the University of Arizona, who discusses an ancestral food of the Comcaac people in the state of Sonora in Mexico: eelgrass.

Nabhan explains how eelgrass is making a big comeback thanks to the people's restoration work, and is retaking its place at the table as a sustainable source of food for the Comcaac community while gaining international culinary attention in the process.

Host Mike G. also speaks with Dr. Sara Iverson, a professor of biology at Canada’s Dalhousie University, about a research project called Apoqnmatulti’k that aims to better understand the movements of lobster, eel, and tomcod in two important ecosystems on Canada’s Atlantic coast.

Iverson explains why those study species were chosen by the Mi’kmaq people and why it’s so important that the project combines different ways of knowing, including Western science and traditional Indigenous knowledge, which a Mi’kmaq elder dubbed 'two-eyed seeing.'

Further reading about Apoqnmatulti’k here:

• “In Canada, Indigenous communities and scientists collaborate on marine research”

Listen to episode #145 (June 1, 2022) of this podcast to hear about related Indigenous aquaculture traditions via your favorite podcast provider, or here:

• “Podcast: Indigenous, ingenious and sustainable aquaculture from the distant past to today”

Episode artwork: A conservationist working on a seagrass restoration project. Image courtesy of Seawilding.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: 'Lost' Amazonian cities reveal sustainability secrets Jun 22, 2022

Our featured article this week examines archaeological research revealing details of a massive, Pre-Columbian urban settlement in the Amazon, 4,500 square kilometers in size, that provides valuable insights into how humanity could develop sustainable cities without degrading their environments.

To also read & share the story, go here: https://news.mongabay.com/2022/06/lost-amazonian-cities-hint-at-how-to-build-urban-landscapes-without-harming-nature/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Incachaca archaeological site in Bolivia. Image courtesy of Greg Keelen on Unspash.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

New whale calls and dolphin behaviors discovered with bioacoustics Jun 15, 2022

Host Mike G. dives into new discoveries from the exciting field of marine bioacoustics research that are helping us better understand the lives of whales and dophins, and we feature fascinating recordings from that research.

His first guest is Erin Ross-Marsh, the lead researcher on a study of humpback whales at the Vema Seamount in the South Atlantic off the coast of South Africa. Ross-Marsh tells us about the study’s finding that these humpbacks were making gunshot calls, a type of non-song call that was previously unknown in these particular whales, and plays some humpback songs, non-song calls, and gunshot calls for us to listen to.

He also speaks with Sarah Trabue, a research assistant with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) who is the lead author of a recently published paper detailing the findings of a bioacoustic study of bottlenose dolphins in and around New York Harbor.

Trabue discusses what the study reveals about dolphin behavior in the highly trafficked waters around New York City and plays for us some of the dolphin vocalizations recorded as part of the study.

Further reading:

• Mongabay: “What’s popping? Humpbacks off South Africa, new acoustic study finds”

• WCS: “The New York – New Jersey Harbor Estuary is a Dining Hotspot During Summer and Autumn Months for Bottlenose Dolphins”

Episode artwork: humpback whales off the coast of Hawaii. Photo Credit: Ed Lyman/NOAA.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Palm oil investigation with BBC and Gecko Project exposes corporate theft from communities Jun 07, 2022

Our featured article this week summarizes a joint investigation Mongabay recently conducted with BBC News and The Gecko Project, uncovering how companies have cut local & Indigenous communities out of the profits from Indonesia's palm oil boom, despite being legally required to share those profits.

Major brands including Kellogg's, Johnson & Johnson, Pepsi, and numerous others have sourced palm oil from these plantations.

To also read & share the story, go here: 'A hidden crisis in Indonesia's palm oil sector: 6 takeaways from our investigation.' https://news.mongabay.com/2022/05/a-hidden-crisis-in-indonesias-palm-oil-sector-6-takeaways-from-our-investigation/

Read the responses from consumer goods firms to our plasma investigation: https://thegeckoproject.org/articles/responses-from-consumer-goods-firms-to-our-plasma-investigation/

Read the full investigation here: 'The promise was a lie': How Indonesian villagers lost their cut of the palm oil boom. https://news.mongabay.com/2022/05/the-promise-was-a-lie-how-indonesian-villagers-lost-their-cut-of-the-palm-oil-boom/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: A bag of oil palm fruitlets gathered by the Suku Anak Dalam. Image by Nopri Ismi.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Indigenous and ingenious aquaculture from the distant past to today Jun 01, 2022

Coastal cultures have often enjoyed abundant lifestyles thanks to the wide array of food, fiber, and other useful resources provided by the world's seas, sounds, estuaries and oceans. Indigenous peoples have also developed strong marine conservation traditions and ingenious methods of ensuring sustainable long-term harvests through practices commonly called 'aquaculture' today.

On this episode we hear from Nicola MacDonald about Kōhanga Kūtai, a project in New Zealand that aims to replace the plastic ropes used by mussel farmers with more sustainable alternatives. MacDonald tells us about the project's basis in blending traditional Maori knowledge with Western science.

We also speak with Dana Lepofsky, a professor in the archaeology department at Simon Fraser University in British Columbia, Canada. Lepofsky tells us about her research into clam gardens on the Pacific coast of North America, some of which have been found to be as much as 3500 years old.

These clam gardens are such a reliable and sustainable source of food that there’s a movement afoot today to rebuild them.

Resources & reading:

• ‘We have a full pharmacopoeia of plants’: Q&A with Māori researcher Nicola Macdonald

• The Clam Garden Network website

Hear our conversation with Dune Lankard of the Native Conservancy about their kelp aquaculture project in Alaska on episode #137 or here:

• "Podcast: Kelp, condors and Indigenous conservation"

Episode artwork: Green-lipped mussels are endemic to New Zealand and are commonly grown in aquaculture operations. Image courtesy of Adrian Midgley via Flickr (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0).

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Can celebrities ‘rewrite extinction’? May 25, 2022

'Rewriting Extinction' is a new conservation funding group trying to reach fresh audiences that has so far raised $180,000 for projects in Europe, Asia and Latin America.

Critics of the organization say 'Rewriting Exctinction' has made exaggerated claims about what it can, or has, achieved. Some experts say the effort should still be applauded.

This episode features the popular article "Can celebrities and social media influencers really 'rewrite extinction'?" by James Fair: https://news.mongabay.com/2022/05/can-celebrities-and-social-media-influencers-really-rewrite-extinction/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Art for Rewriting Extinction created by mxvisoor.

Please send feedback to submissions@mongabay.com, and thank you for listening.

Vandana Shiva on the agroecology solution for climate change, the biodiversity crisis, and hunger May 18, 2022

Agroecology applies ecological principles to agriculture, and it's a key strategy for mitigating--and adapting to climate change--which also boosts biodiversity and food security--and it is the focus of a special series at Mongabay.

Joining us first to discuss agroecology as a science, a practice, and a movement is Dr. Maywa Montenegro, an assistant professor of environmental studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz.

Then host Mike G. speaks with iconic Indian scientist, activist and Right Livelihood Award winner Dr. Vandana Shiva, whose brand new book, Agroecology and Regenerative Agriculture: Sustainable Solutions for Hunger, Poverty, and Climate Change, synthesizes decades of agroecology research and implementation. She's also the founder of Navdanya, which is both an agroecology center and a global food sovereignty movement.

Dr. Shiva shares how agroecology is an effective solution not just to climate change but also for a host of other ecological crises we’re facing, such as water scarcity, land degradation, nutrition and biodiversity loss.

Further reading:

• ”From traditional practice to top climate solution, agroecology gets growing attention” by Anna Lappé

• "Transitioning to sustainable agriculture requires growing and sustaining an ecologically skilled workforce," Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems, 96. doi:10.3389/fsufs.2019.00096

Episode artwork: Dr. Vandana Shiva, photo by Kartikey Shiva.

If you enjoy the Mongabay Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage, news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores: She's here! A Sumatran rhino is born May 11, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe.

On March 24th, Indonesia's Ministry of Environment and Forestry announced the birth of a new female Sumatran rhino calf at the SRS captive breeding facility at Way Kambas National Park in Indonesia's Lampung province.

For this bonus episode of Mongabay Explores, we speak with senior staff writer for Indonesia, Basten Gokkon. He explains the significance of this event, the difficulty in breeding Sumatran rhinos, and what this birth means for the future of this critically endangered species.

If you missed the ten part series of Mongabay Explores Sumatra, you can find them via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Related Reading:

It’s a girl: Super rare Sumatran rhino born in captive-breeding center

Episode Artwork: Rosa and her child. Image courtesy of Indonesia's Environment and Forestry Ministry.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Wonder on wings: the fierce nature and enduring beauty of birds May 04, 2022

It's a really busy time of year for birds all over the world as they migrate and prepare for a new breeding season, so on this episode we discuss the amazing fierceness and beauty of birds, why they deserve your interest and attention, plus some recent research and avian conservation trends in Nepal.

We welcome back the incomparable and award-winning author Sy Montgomery, whose most recent books are all about our avian friends: The Hawk’s Way: Encounters With Fierce Beauty, which is now in stores, and also 2021's The Hummingbird’s Gift: Wonder, Beauty, and Renewal On Wings.

In her signature & wonder-rich way, Montgomery shares some of the truly amazing things learned from personal experiences with falconry and hummingbird rehabilitation, and discusses why we find birds so fascinating.

Host Mike G. also speaks with Mongabay staff writer Abhaya Joshi about the birdlife in his country of Nepal, a new bird-counting app that’s sparking newfound interest there, and some of the most recent conservation actions being taken in the country to protect birds.

Hear Sy Montgomery's previous appearance on this show here (or search for episode #37 in your podcast app):

“Podcast: Exploring the minds and inner lives of animals”

Further reading about Nepal's birdlife by Abhaya Joshi:

Episode artwork: Fiery-throated hummingbird at Paraiso del Quetzal, Costa Rica, by Joseph C Boone via Wikimedia Commons.

If you enjoy the Mongabay Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage, news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: Community empowerment and forest conservation grow from the galip nut Apr 27, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe.

By 2025, the edible nut industry will be worth an estimated $2 billion globally. In Papua New Guinea (PNG), a traditional and plentiful staple, the galip nut (Canarium indicum), holds the promise of tapping into that demand.

Its familiarity and the ease with which it can be grown together with coffee and cocoa is adding up to a new source of income for thousands of small scale farmers across PNG while preserving forest cover.

On this episode of Mongabay Explores, we speak with Dorothy Devine Luana, an entrepreneur from the province of East New Britain, whose company grows galip nuts using agroforestry, a farming technique rooted in traditional knowledge that grows multiple cash crops alongside woody perennials.

We also speak with Nora Devoe, research program manager for a special project focused on the galip nut at the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR). This project has been funding more than a decade of research seeking to understand the viability and potential of the galip nut to drive the canarium industry in PNG and foster new markets for entrepreneurs and locals like Dorothy to sell the crop.

If you missed the first six episodes of Mongabay Explores New Guinea, you can find them via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode Artwork: Tinganagalip Women Cooperative Group Chairwoman Caroline Misiel holds a handful of galip nuts. Image by Conor Ashleigh.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Convention on Biological Diversity: progress, hope and hard work ahead Apr 20, 2022

After many delays due to the pandemic, final negotiations on the UN Convention on Biological Diversity are happening this year in Kunming, China, and preparations for it just ended in Geneva, so we are pleased to speak with Assistant Secretary General of the United Nations & Executive Secretary of the Convention on Biological Diversity, Elizabeth Mrema, about the outcomes in Switzerland, why the world failed to meet the previous Aichi Biodiversity Targets, and how COP15 can provide a roadmap to actually halting biodiversity loss and safeguarding nature.

Because the roles and rights of Indigenous communities are widely agreed to be key to its success, we also speak with Jennifer Tauli Corpuz, a member of the Indigenous Caucus at the Convention on Biological Diversity and senior global policy and advocacy lead for Nia Tero.

Jennifer provides the Indigenous perspective on what’s currently in the draft biodiversity framework, what changes are needed to better support Indigenous land rights, and the overall importance of Indigenous leadership toward preserving Earth’s biodiversity.

Related reading:

If you enjoy the Mongabay Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage, news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Red-eyed tree frog. Photo Credit: Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: Who is destroying these rainforests? The Tanah Merah mystery. Apr 13, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe.

The Tanah Merah project sits in the heart of New Guinea covering 2,800 square kilometers (1,100 square miles). Roughly twice the size of Greater London, it threatens not only dense, primary, tropical rainforest and Indigenous land, but also could release as much carbon as the U.S. state of Virginia emits by burning fossil fuels for an entire year.

However, the true owners of the project have been hidden by a web of corporate secrecy for more than a decade. We speak with Philip Jacobson, senior editor at Mongabay, and Bonnie Sumner, investigative reporter at the Aotearoa New Zealand news outlet Newsroom, to discuss the project from inception to present day, the involvement of a New Zealand businessman, and where the project could go next.

Related Reading:

If you missed the first five episodes of Mongabay Explores New Guinea, you can find them via the podcast provider of your choice, or locate all episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode Artwork: Rainforest in Boven Digoel. Image by Ulet Ifansasti for Greenpeace.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Outstanding in the field: researchers head out for a new season Apr 06, 2022

It's the start of field research season in many regions--and some scientists haven't gotten afield since the pandemic started--so we're checking in with a couple researchers to hear what they’re planning to work on, out there in the bush.

Our first guest is Meredith Palmer, a post-doctoral researcher at Princeton University whose field work this season is testing new conservation technologies like the BoomBox, an open‐source device that attaches to commercially available camera traps and turns them into an automated behavioral response systems.

Also on the show is Ummat Somjee, a researcher based out of the Smithsonian Tropical Institute in Panama. He uses insects as models to understand the evolution of extreme structures in animals, like the tusks of elephants or the horns of antelopes.

Here are their studies mentioned in this episode:

• Palmer, M. S., Wang, C., Plucinski, J., & Pringle, R. M. (2022). BoomBox: An Automated Behavioural Response (ABR) camera trap module for wildlife playback experiments. Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 13(3), 611-618. doi:10.1111/2041-210X.13789

• Somjee, U., Powell, E. C., Hickey, A. J., Harrison, J. F., & Painting, C. J. (2021). Exaggerated sexually selected weapons maintained with disproportionately low metabolic costs in a single species with extreme size variation. Functional Ecology, 35(10), 2282-2293. doi:10.1111/1365-2435.13888

If you enjoy the Mongabay Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Degraded forests still provide immense value Mar 30, 2022

A recent study conducted in Malaysian Borneo shows that degraded forests can still provide immense value. The study details five key ecological services provided by degraded forests to Indigenous communities.

Yet a government effort aims to convert degraded forests in Malaysian Borneo into timber plantations, despite the fact that researchers say these ecological services cannot be replaced with plantations.

This episode features the popular article, "Even degraded forests are more ecologically valuable than none, study shows," by Sheryl Lee Tian Tong:

https://news.mongabay.com/2022/02/even-degraded-forests-are-more-ecologically-valuable-than-none-study-shows/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast via Apple Podcasts or wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Rainforest rainbow in Sabah. Photo credit: Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay

Indigenous peoples: the world's top conservationists Mar 23, 2022

There’s growing recognition of how vital Indigenous-led conservation practices are to protecting the planet. Because of this, there’s a growing global movement to secure Indigenous land rights, toward safeguarding the Earth’s future. And there’s plenty of science to support it, such as a World Bank study which found that although Indigenous lands account for less than 22% of the world’s land area, their territories protect 80% of the world’s biodiversity. This protection is not passive: in fact, Indigenous-led preservation projects are a vital part of the conservation movement across the world and in the United States. On this pre-Earth Day episode, we speak with two guests: the director of the Native American Fish and Wildlife Society – Julie Thorstenson, a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe – about how America’s 574 tribes manage more than 140 million acres of land, and which have scientists working to reintroduce and protect endangered or declining wildlife, from bison to condors, salmon, and ferrets. We also discuss the history of Indigenous-led conservation in North America with award-winning author Michelle Nijhuis, whose latest book “Beloved Beasts” – about the history of the modern conservation movement told through the lives and ideas of the people who built it, including Native Americans – is now out in paperback. Related reading at Mongabay.com, featuring Dr. Thorstensen:

"Underfunded but passionate, Native American conservationists call for more support"

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts like Apple Podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

Episode artwork: Endangered black-footed ferrets have benefited hugely from the conservation work of multiple Native American communities. Image courtesy of Kimberly Fraser/USFWS.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: 'Ghosts of the rainforest' Mar 16, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe.

New Guinea's dense tropical montane forests are home to 12 of 14 tree kangaroo species. Over the past couple of decades, conservationists have leveraged these charismatic, intelligent marsupials to spearhead community development, conservation efforts, and the establishment of protected areas.

In Papua New Guinea, the Torricelli mountain range is home to three species of tree kangaroo, including the critically endangered tenkile. This mountain range sits in the crosshairs of a road project threatening to encroach upon the region; however, the government is in the process of reviewing a draft proposal to have it officially declared a protected area.

For this episode of the podcast, we speak with Jim Thomas of the Tenkile Conservation Alliance and Lisa Dabek and Modi Pontio of the Tree Kangaroo Conservation Program. They detail the successes and challenges of working for nearly two decades in PNG to conserve these intelligent marsupials and the lands they inhabit.

If you missed the first four episodes of Mongabay Explores New Guinea you can find them via the podcast provider of your choice or find all the episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode Artwork: A tree kangaroo, photo courtesy of Tom Jefferson/Greenpeace.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores via Apple Podcasts or wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Are 'nature based solutions' the best fix for climate change? Mar 09, 2022

On this episode we discuss mangrove restoration and other "nature based solutions" (NBS) to climate change.

Now promoted as the best strategy to slow climate change--and encompassing an array of solutions from reforestation to ecosystem restoration--critics point out that they also have numerous pitfalls that must be guarded against.

Mangrove restoration and other 'blue carbon' projects are a common NBS program one hears about, so host Mike G. speaks with Alfredo Quarto, co-founder of the Mangrove Action Project, who shares why mangrove forests are so globally important & what successful restoration projects look like.

Norah Berk also joins the show: she's a policy advisor on climate change and forests at the Rainforest Foundation UK, who explains that NBS have, in many cases, been co-opted by corporations that are using them as carbon offset schemes, and discusses why she thinks land titling for Indigenous and local communities is a better solution to climate change which the world should be focusing on.

Further reading:

• “At a plantation in Central Africa, Big Oil tries to go net-zero”

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts like Apple Podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

Episode artwork: Mangrove trees growing on a beach. Photo via Pixabay.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: A long and winding road Mar 02, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe. Subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts and stay tuned for subsequent episodes in this season.

Spanning over 4,000 kilometers (2,500 miles) and being built over the course of decades, the Trans-Papua Highway cuts across the entire length of Indonesian New Guinea’s two provinces, including 7 key protected areas.

While the project is nearly complete, experts warn it will cost billions annually to maintain, and threaten to open up untouched rainforest to palm oil expansion contributing an additional 4.5 million hectares of deforestation by 2036.

For this episode, we interviewed David Gaveau, founder of The TreeMap and Bill Laurance, distinguished professor, and director of the Center for Tropical, Environmental, and Sustainability Science at James Cook University in Australia.

Both experts explained the environmental, financial, and social costs of the project, which runs through Indonesia’s Lorentz National Park, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

If you missed the first three episodes of Mongabay Explores New Guinea you can find it via the podcast provider of your choice or find all the episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode Artwork: Tearing up trees to expand the road for the Trans West Papua highway. Daniel Beltrá/Greenpeace

Editor's Note: Bill Laurance, is a Distinguished Research Professor at James Cook University in Cairns, Australia as well as the founder and director of ALERT (Alliance of Leading Environmental Researchers & Thinkers) and a member of Mongabay’s advisory board.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Hippos, manatees, and how the sounds of African wildlife aid their conservation Feb 23, 2022

A new study reveals that bioacoustics is an underutilized wildlife study tool on one of the world's most biodiverse continents: Africa.

On this episode we discuss this gap by highlighting two new bioacoustics studies of hippos and African manatees - and we of course play recordings of their squeals, squeaks and 'wheeze honks' which can now aid their conservation.

Dr. Nicolas Mathevon joins the show to share the results of a study which showed that vocal recognition is used by hippos, and we welcome Clinton Factheu, a PhD student in Cameroon who recently co-authored a study revealing the first recorded African manatee vocalizations.

Episode artwork: A hippo in the Chobe River, Botswana, by Joachim Huber via Wikimedia Commons.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: Protecting paradise Feb 16, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe. Subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts and stay tuned for subsequent episodes in this season. New Guinea is home to the third-largest tropical rainforest in the world—of which 80% is still intact. The two-nation island also contains 44 species of unique birds-of-paradise and dense biodiverse regions unlike anywhere else on the planet. Because of its one-of-a-kind biodiversity, and relatively undeveloped landscape, New Guinea is in a unique position to conserve its forest cover as part of an economy that serves its local inhabitants, rather than extracting from and deforesting these communities.

For this third episode of the New Guinea season, Mongabay interviews Bustar Maitar, CEO of EcoNusa, and biologist Edwin Scholes from the Cornell Lab of Ornithology about the diverse and charismatic birds-of-paradise and the potential for New Guinea to harness ecotourism to power a sustainable economy.

If you missed the first two episodes of Mongabay Explores New Guinea you can find it via the podcast provider of your choice or find all the episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode Artwork: A Cendrawasih (bird of paradise) on a tree in Malagufuk village, located in the rainforest in Kalasou valley, Sorong, West Papua. Copyright: Jurnasyanto Sukarno/Greenpeace

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Kelp, condors and Indigenous conservation Feb 09, 2022

Join us for a dive into two ambitious Indigenous-led conservation initiatives on the U.S. West Coast on this episode.

Host Mike G. speaks with Dune Lankard, founder and president of The Native Conservancy, who discusses their work to create a regenerative economy for Alaska’s Prince William Sound--based on conservation and restoration-- via projects like kelp farming.

We also speak with Tiana Williams-Claussen, she's the director of the Yurok Tribe’s Wildlife Department and shares their efforts to bring condors back to the tribe’s territory in Northern California, which is set to culminate in the first four birds being released into the wild in April 2022.

Articles mentioned:

Episode artwork: A condor in southern California by B W via Flickr, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 Creative Commons license.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: 'Carbon cowboys' and illegal logging Feb 01, 2022

Since 2014, Papua New Guinea has been the world’s largest tropical timber exporter: more than 70% of that is considered illegal. Timber companies continue to possess land originally owned by local Indigenous communities through legal loopholes: while the carbon market has gained popularity as an alternative source of revenue for Indigenous communities, it suffers from some of the same land rights abuses as timber extraction. For this episode of Mongabay Explores we interview Gary Juffa, governor of Oro province in Papua New Guinea, and investigative journalist, Rachel Donald.

If you missed episode one of Mongabay Explores New Guinea you can find it via the podcast provider of your choice or find all the episodes of the Mongabay Explores podcast on our podcast homepage here.

Episode artwork: Loggers from Turama Forest Industries cut down a tree with a chainsaw in the 'Turama extension' logging concession, Gulf Province. These forests are being felled by Turama Forest Industries - a group company of Malaysian logging giant Rimbunan Hijau. Photo by Jeremy Sutton-Hibbert for Greenpeace.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

The 411 on forests and reforestation for 2022 Jan 26, 2022

What are the main global forest conservation trends for 2022? Though deforestation is declining, how much forest is the world still losing? Host Mike G. speaks with Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler about the year in forests, forest-related storylines to watch, and Mongabay’s expanding coverage of topics like these all around the world.

He also speaks with Swati Hingorani, a senior program officer at the IUCN and Global Coordinator for the Bonn Challenge, one of the world's most important reforestation programs.

Hingorani discusses reforestation trends and the Bonn Challenge’s newly revamped and relaunched Restoration Barometer that tracks ecosystem restoration progress being made by countries around the world.

Related reading:

Two related podcast episodes mentioned in this episode include episode #133 (December 9, 2021), "What do two giant land deals mean for the future of Southeast Asia's forests?" and "Natural forest regeneration’s critical role in reforestation goals" from November 10, 2021 (episode #131).

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

Episode artwork: Evergreen forest in California via drone, image by Rhett Butler for Mongabay.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Mt. Pinatubo's 'eruption-proof' mouse Jan 18, 2022

With the huge Mt. Tonga volcanic eruption in the news, here's a reminder of the resilience of life:

20 years after the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 that leveled natural old-growth forests, scientists have discovered one endemic mouse has become the dominant rodent species. First discovered in 1956, it wasn't seen again until 2011 when scientists returned to Pinatubo to survey the area.

While endemic tropical island species are typically seen as the most vulnerable, Apomys sacobianus bucks the trend. A study published in the Philippine Journal of Science calls the species a "disturbance specialist," noting its resilience to the cataclysmic event.

Experts speculate that as the forests around Pinatubo continue to develop and recover, other species requiring more forest cover may move in, dethroning the mouse. However, it's still very possible for ap. sacobianus to continue living in conditions with low leveles of disturbance.

This episode features the popular article, "On a Philippine volcano, an eruption proof mouse rules the roost," by Leilani Chavez

https://news.mongabay.com/2021/02/on-a-philippine-volcano-an-eruption-proof-mouse-rules-the-roost/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Mount Pinatubo erupting via Wikipedia.

Who will lead the conservation movement now? Jan 12, 2022

Both E.O. Wilson and Tom Lovejoy were major figures in the conservation field and passed away in late 2021 -- both also appeared on this show, so we play some clips of those conversations and talk with two guests about their legacies, but also where to look for new conservation leadership. Do we need new figures like them, or is this conservation's post-icon era? What about the great diversity of new scientists coming up via programs like STEM, and whole communities like Indigenous ones who have their own scientists, plus rich traditional ecological knowledge (TEK)? We discuss this with two guests: Rebecca McCaffery, who is Society of Conservation Biology's president for North America, and Mongabay staff writer Liz Kimbrough, who interviewed E.O. Wilson just 2 months before his passing.

Both of these women hold conservation science PhDs and share expansive views on what's next for leadership in the field.

Update 2/2022: In late January, correspondence found among the late E.O. Wilson’s papers connected him with J. Phillipe Rushton, whose research in the 1980s and 1990s has been linked with white supremacy. The E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation has now issued a statement.

Related listening from the Newscast:

Tom Lovejoy on episode #51: The ‘Godfather of Biodiversity’ on why it’s time to manage Earth as a system
Wilson on episode #56: E.O. Wilson discusses Half-Earth and conservation solutions

And here's Liz Kimbrough's late 2021 print interview of E.O. Wilson & friends for Mongabay.com:

Half-Earth, conservation, and hope: An interview with E.O. Wilson, Paula Ehrlich and Sir Tim Smit

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

Episode artwork: A moray eel in the Daymaniyat Islands, Oman. Image by Warren Baverstock / Ocean Image Bank.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores New Guinea: Protecting unparalleled biodiversity Jan 05, 2022

Mongabay Explores is an episodic podcast series that highlights unique places and species from around the globe. Subscribe to the show wherever you get podcasts and stay tuned for subsequent episodes in this season.

New Guinea is one of the most most biodiverse regions on the planet and also the world's largest tropical island. It makes up less than 0.5% of the world’s landmass, but is estimated to contain as much as 10% of global biodiversity.

To unpack the vast biodiversity of New Guinea, conservation policy, and NGO efforts to protect land, culture and Indigenous rights, we spoke with Rodrigo Cámara-Leret, of the Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental Studies at the University of Zurich, Charlie Danny Heatubun, head of the research and development agency of the provincial government of West Papua, and Miriam Supuma of Synchronicity Earth.

In this third season of the podcast, we take a look at what makes New Guinea unlike any other place in this world, the contributing environmental impacts that threaten its culture and biodiversity, and what is being done to protect it.

Listen to the previous 2 seasons of Mongabay Explores via the podcast provider of your choice or find them at our podcast homepage here.

Episode artwork: (Casuarius unappendiculatus) is one of the majestic birds that New Guinea is famous for. Image by Rhett Butler for Mongabay.

Sounds heard during the intro and outro include the following: rusty mouse-warbler, growling riflebird, raggiana/lesser bird-of-paradise, superb fruit-dove, long-billed honeyeater, little shrike-thrush, brown cuckoo-dove, black-capped lory. Special thanks to Tim Boucher and Bruce Beehler for identifying them.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to Mongabay Explores wherever they get podcasts. If you enjoy our podcast content, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and TikTok by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

In search of wild spectacles and river journeys with Janisse Ray and Jordan Salama Dec 21, 2021

It’s a perfect time to pick up a great book, and this episode's got recommendations for you!

We welcome to the show Janisse Ray, award-winning author of "Wild Spectacle: Seeking Wonders in a World Beyond Humans," detailing her search for “heart-pounding flashes of wild spectacle.” Ray shares stories of the places she's traveled and explains why she did all that travel without getting on a plane.

We also welcome Jordan Salama, whose new book is called "Every Day the River Changes: Four Weeks Down the Magdalena." He discusses 4 weeks spent traveling down Colombia's Magdalena River, which Colombians speak of with “an almost religious fervor,” and what he hopes people can take away from his book.

These two share some great adventures but also counsel seeking such enlightening journeys close to home, as well!

Further reading:

• ”Hope old and new: COP26 focused on two largely unsung climate solutions”

• “‘Standing with your feet in the water’: COP26 struggles to succeed”

• ”Do forest declarations work? How do the Glasgow and New York declarations compare?”

• ”COP26 Glasgow Declaration: Salvation or threat to Earth’s forests?”

• ”$1.7 billion pledged in support of Indigenous and local communities’ land tenure”

Episode artwork via Twitter.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Earth Defenders Toolkit strengthens Indigenous voices Nov 17, 2021

The Earth Defenders Toolkit is a collection of apps that support local autonomy of Indigenous lands, giving communities ownership of critical data and reducing the need for outside support.

The toolkit, which includes mapping apps like 'Mapeo,' keep the needs of Indigenous communities at the forefront, overcoming barriers inherent to technology, like participation and security.

This episode features the popular article, "Sharing solutions: How a digital toolkit is strengthening Indigenous voices," by Caitlin Looby:

https://news.mongabay.com/2021/08/sharing-solutions-how-a-digital-toolkit-is-strengthening-indigenous-voices/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Members of the land patrol from the Kofan community of Sinangoé, Ecuador, test Mapeo Mobile as part of the design process. Image courtesy of Digital Democracy.

Caitlin Looby is the 2021 Sue Palminteri WildTech Reporting Fellow, which honors the memory of Mongabay Wildtech editor Sue Palminteri by providing opportunities for students to gain experience in conservation technology and writing. You can support this program here.

Editor’s note: This story was supported by XPRIZE Rainforest as part of their five-year competition to enhance understanding of the rainforest ecosystem. In respect to Mongabay’s policy on editorial independence, XPRIZE Rainforest does not have any right to assign, review, or edit any content published with their support.

Let it grow: Natural forest regeneration's amazing reforestation power Nov 10, 2021

Initiatives to plant billions and even trillions of trees have been popping up like seedlings after a rainstorm.

These are important in tackling climate change and biodiversity loss, but what about using natural regeneration, where one allows a forest to regrow using its native seedstock, in such efforts?

On this episode we discuss the amazing power of letting forests regrow, and when tree-planting is necessary, plus what we know about the differences between planted and naturally regenerated forests with two guests:

University of California professor Karen Holl describes the conditions that are conducive to natural regeneration of forests and shares inspiring examples ranging from current experiments to historical events like in Costa Rica and the Northeast United States.

And researcher/restoration consultant Robin Chazdon discusses the decision-making process that goes into successful reforestation projects, and whether today’s tree-planting campaigns are likely to be beneficial in the long run.

Related resources:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Lost chameleon reappears Nov 03, 2021

The rare Champman's pygmy chameleon has been missing in the wild for over two decades. First described in 1992, it was finally seen in a dwindling patch of rainforest in the Malawi Hills in 2016. Researchers say there are likely more. However, they are unable to travel the long distances between the shrinking patches of their forest home. Scientists' findings of the rare chameleon call for conservation of the chameleon's habitat, which has seen an 80% deforestation rate over the past 40 years.

This episode features the popular article, "Rare pygmy chameleon, lost to science, found in dwindling Malawi forest," by Liz Kimbrough:

https://news.mongabay.com/2021/08/rare-pygmy-chameleon-lost-to-science-found-in-dwindling-malawi-forest/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Chapman’s pygmy chameleon by Krystal Tolley

Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay. Find her on Twitter: @lizkimbrough_

Indigenous bioacoustics: listening to the land for conservation and tradition Oct 27, 2021

Indigenous-led conservation initiatives are being aided by the growing field of bioacoustics, with many communities around the world creating listening networks that monitor their lands and help them advocate for their conservation.

We speak with two Indigenous leaders and scientists on this episode -- Stephanie Thorassie of the Seal River Watershed Alliance in Manitoba, and Angela Waupochick, a researcher of forested wetlands for Menominee Tribal Enterprises in Wisconsin -- about their projects and how bioacoustics techniques are aiding them.

We hear sound clips of bears and birds shared by Waupochick and also Jeff Wells of the National Audubon Society, which partners with the Seal River Watershed Alliance to study the region’s importance to wildlife toward establishing a new, 12-million-acre Indigenous Protected Area.

Further reading:

• ”Indigenous-managed lands found to harbor more biodiversity than protected areas”

• Canada working towards new future for Indigenous-led conservation (Indigenous Protected Areas)

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Polar bears at the mouth of the Seal River. Photo by Jordan Melograna of the Indigenous Leadership Initiative. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: New species of North America's rare spotted skunks discovered Oct 19, 2021

Researchers analyzed spotted skunk DNA and found that rather than the four skunk species previously recognized by science, there are actually seven.

Referred to as the “acrobats of the skunk world” these small carnivores use impressive handstands to warn predators that a noxious spray is coming their way.

The plains spotted skunk (included among them) is in significant decline, but figuring out the different species lineages may inform and aid conservation efforts.

This episode features the popular article, "In search of the 'forest ghost,' South America's cryptic giant armadillo," by Liz Kimbrough:

https://news.mongabay.com/2021/09/pepe-le-new-meet-the-acrobatic-spotted-skunks-of-north-america/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Western spotted skunk (Spilogale gracilis). Image by Robby Heischman courtesy of the Field Museum.

Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay. Find her on Twitter: @lizkimbrough_

Extracted, exported and forgotten: the global race for resources and the DRC Oct 14, 2021

The world economy demands clean energy and cheap commodities and these are being extracted at a furious rate in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

So the DRC is benefiting from all this activity, right?

Though extremely rich in natural resources, thanks to political instability plus a centuries-long legacy of commercial and colonial resource extraction, the value mainly accrues to the country's east and west, where corporations and governments benefit the most.

Joining the show to discuss are Anuradha Mittal, executive director of the Oakland Institute, who describes how Western investors like university pension funds and corporations profit from oil palm plantations where human rights violations and environmental abuses are common.

Then Christian-Geraud Neema Byamungu, a Congolese researcher who focuses on natural resource governance, tells us about how the growing demand for cobalt to make electric-car batteries has led to increased mining, the Chinese companies that dominate the DRC's mines, and why the contracts between those companies and the DRC are being called into question.

Further reading:

• ”As energy needs drive demand for minerals, forests face greater threats” • ”Pension and endowment funds linked to conflict-plagued oil palm in DRC”

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: palm oil production in Yalifombo village © Oskar Epelde via Oakland Institute. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: In search of the ‘forest ghost,’ South America’s giant armadillo Oct 05, 2021

Since 2010, the Giant Armadillo Project has been researching the world’s largest armadillo, an animal that despite its size and range across almost every country in South America, is one of the world’s least recognized animals.

These researchers have made key findings, like the fact that their burrows, which can be up to 5 meters long, serve as shelter for at least 70 other species, including birds, reptiles and mammals.

The species is categorized as vulnerable to extinction, especially due to the advance of agribusiness.

This episode features the popular article, "In search of the 'forest ghost,' South America's cryptic giant armadillo," by Suzana Camargo:

https://news.mongabay.com/2020/09/in-search-of-the-forest-ghost-south-americas-cryptic-giant-armadillo/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit: Peering inside a giant armadillo burrow, image courtesy of the Giant Armadillo Project.

The key role of Indigenous rights for the future of biodiversity conservation Sep 29, 2021

Two top guests join this episode to discuss the importance of Indigenous rights to the future of biodiversity conservation and efforts to build a more sustainable future for life on Earth.

Victoria Tauli-Corpuz is the former UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, and is the current executive director of the Tebtebba Indigenous Peoples’ International Centre for Policy Research and Education, based in Manila.

Tauli-Corpuz who is a member of the Kankana-ey-Igorot people of the Philippines describes the Global Indigenous Agenda released at the IUCN World Conservation Congress, why it calls for Indigenous rights to be central to conservation efforts, and what she hopes to see achieved at the UN Biodiversity Conference taking place in Kunming, China next year.

We also speak with Zack Romo, program director for the Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon Basin (COICA) who was in Marseilles for the Congress and helped pass the motion to protect 80% of the Amazon by 2025. The rights-based approach that Amazon protection plan calls for, and what the next steps are to making the plan a reality, are discussed.

Here’s further reading and listening:

• ”‘The tipping point is here, it is now,’ top Amazon scientists warn”

• ”As COP15 approaches, ’30 by 30’ becomes a conservation battleground”

• ”‘Join us for the Amazon,’ Indigenous leaders tell IUCN in push for protection”

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Participants at the IUCN World Conservation Congress in 2021, image via IISD. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: As Gabon gets paid to conserve its forests, will others follow? Sep 21, 2021

Gabon recently received the first $17 million of a pledged $150 million from Norway for results-based emission reduction payments as part of the Central African Forest Initiative (CAFI).

Gabon has 88% forest cover and has limited annual deforestation to less than 0.1% over the last 30 years, in large part possible due to oil revenues supporting the economy.

With oil reserves running low, Gabon is looking to diversify and develop its economy without sacrificing its forests by building a sustainable forest economy supported by schemes such as CAFI.

Will other countries follow suit?

This episode features the popular article, "Gabon becomes first African country to get paid for protecting its forests."

https://news.mongabay.com/2021/07/gabon-becomes-first-african-country-to-get-paid-for-protecting-its-forests/

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy this series, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo Credit Elephants in Longue Bai, Gabon, by Jefe Le Gran via Flickr (CC BY 2.0).

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jefelegran/857116478

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

Are tuna recovering well, like news reports say? It's complicated. Sep 15, 2021

We look at some of the biggest news from the recent IUCN World Conservation Congress, like the upgraded conservation status of 4 tuna species, including Atlantic bluefin.

Is it really OK to eat such tuna now, as some media outlets reported? Are bluefin no longer endangered, but a species of 'least concern?' Well, it's complicated.

Mongabay staff writer Elizabeth Claire Alberts was at the event and discusses important news and motions that passed, like Indigenous peoples' role in conservation and a resounding rebuke of deep sea mining, for instance.

Then, Pew Charitable Trusts’ senior officer for international fisheries Grantly Galland discusses the reassessments of tuna extinction risks released by the IUCN during the event, and he shares why species-level assessments don’t tell us the whole story about tuna populations.

Articles and podcast eps mentioned during the show:

• ”‘Global Indigenous Agenda’ for land rights, conservation launched at IUCN congress” by Ashoka Mukpo

• ”Podcast: Two tunas and a tale of managed extinction” (episode 118 of the Mongabay Newscast)

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Atlantic bluefin tuna. Photo by Richard Herrmann/Pew. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Can climate-friendly agroforestry transform farming in the U.S. Midwest? Sep 08, 2021

Monocultures of corn and soybeans carpet 75% of the U.S. Midwest, leading to soil erosion, water pollution, and massive greenhouse gas emissions.

However, a new wave of farmers is breaking the monocrop monotony by growing these annuals between long rows of perennial shrubs like American hazelnuts, which keep soils intact while harboring beneficial bugs and sequestering CO2 from the atmosphere.

Hazelnuts are a huge market internationally and have big potential in the U.S. either as a snack or an oilseed, since the fatty acid profile is very similar to olive oil.

Listen to an April 2021 report published at Mongabay.com about this news via this episode of Mongabay Reports, which shares evergreen articles from Mongabay.com, read by host Mike DiGirolamo.

This episode features the popular article, "Nuts about agroforestry in the U.S. Midwest: Can hazelnuts transform farming?"

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Hazelnuts. Photo by George Hodan, CC0 Public Domain

Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

What makes conservation projects succeed, or not? Sep 01, 2021

The scientific evidence for what kinds of nature conservation programs actually work is always changing, and the use of such evidence should be standard practice when creating new programs, our two guests on this episode argue.

Hiromi Yamashita & Andrew Bladon with the Conservation Evidence Group join us to discuss their massive new “What Works In Conservation 2021” report, which evaluates scientific evidence for the success of conservation initiatives.

Yamashita shares her work on how traditional and local knowledge benefit conservation initiatives--especially around coastal conservation projects--while Bladon provides a broad overview and details about the newest sections added to their latest report, like the evidence for mammal conservation project successes or failures:

What Works in Conservation, 2021

Also discussed is Mongabay’s Conservation Effectiveness series, which looks at the scientific evidence for a number of strategies, from forest certification to marine protected areas and payments for ecosystem services:

Mongabay/Conservation Effectiveness series

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to get access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: NGO staffers are deeply involved in programs aimed at species conservation. Photo by Rhett A. Butler / Mongabay. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: ‘Extinction denial’ is the latest anti-science conspiracy theory Aug 19, 2021

There’s a growing refusal by some to acknowledge the ongoing global extinction crisis being driven by human actions, conservation scientists say.

These views are pushed by many of the same people who also downplay the impacts of climate change, and go against the actual evidence of widespread species population declines and recent extinctions.

Listen to a September 2020 report published at Mongabay.com about this news via this episode of Mongabay Reports, which shares evergreen articles from Mongabay.com, read by host Mike DiGirolamo.

This episode features the popular article, "Biologists warn 'exctinction denial' is the latest anti-science conspiracy theory."

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: The golden lion tamarin is an endangered species native to Brazil’s Atlantic Forest. Photo via Toronto Zoo. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

What can seashells tell us about the oceans' health? Aug 10, 2021

Environmental journalist Cynthia Barnett joins this episode to discuss her fascinating new book, "The Sound of the Sea: Seashells and the Fate of the Oceans," about the many ways humans have prized seashells for millennia, using them as money, jewelry, and art, plus how seashells help us examine the challenges marine environments are facing today.

We’re also joined by Mongabay's Philippines-based staff writer Leilani Chavez, who describes the incredible marine biodiversity found in the Philippines' waters (among the best in the world) and why there’s a movement to expand conservation efforts beyond the extensive coral reef systems.

View Leilani's recent report about Philippines’ MPAs and links to related coverage, here:

• With growing pressures, can the Philippines sustain its marine reserves?”

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: A selection of gastropods via Wikimedia Commons. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Optimism for elephants fuels effective Indigenous conservation effort Jul 28, 2021

Top conservation photographer Ami Vitale rejoins the show to discuss the work of an Indigenous-owned elephant sanctuary in Kenya, where she has shot a wonderful, new, heart-melting film called Shaba. We discuss the Samburu people's inspiring and 'stubborn optimism' for the species, what they are acheiving at Reteti Sanctuary, and new things they're learning about this intriguing, super intelligent, and endangered species.

Then, for this World Elephant Day special, we speak with Duke University researcher John Poulsen about forest elephants of Central/West Africa: why this species is special, how they're key to the health of its rainforest home, and what his research team is learning about their conservation.

Want more? Listen to episode 85 (January 2020) to hear Ami discuss how meeting and photographing the last northern white rhino changed her life, and episode 95 (May 2020) features amazing recordings of forest elephant communication, shared by Elephant Listening Project researcher Ana Verahrami. This episode is our most popular one to date, download-wise.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Orphaned savanna elephant calves recuperate at Reteti Sanctuary before their eventual release, photo courtesy of Ami Vitale. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Two new Javan rhino calves spotted in the species’ last holdout Jul 22, 2021

Indonesia recently announced exciting news, the sighting of two Javan rhino calves in Ujung Kulon National Park, the last place on Earth where the critically endangered species is found.

The new additions bring the estimated population of the species to 73; conservationists have recorded at least one new calf a year joining the population since 2012.

Listen to a June 2021 report published at Mongabay.com about this news via this episode of Mongabay Reports, which shares evergreen articles from Mongabay.com, read by host Mike DiGirolamo.

This episode features the popular article, "Two new Javan rhino calves spotted in the species’ last holdout."

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: A Javan rhino calf spotted on camera trap in Ujung Kulon National Park on March 27, 2021. Image courtesy of the Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

Reforestation done right, from Haiti to Honduras and Ho Chi Minh City Jul 14, 2021

Often called a panacea, 'tree planting' is a hot topic but it can fail when too little thought goes into it, so the guests on this episode reframe the practice, saying that 'tree growing' ought to be the focus of reforestation programs.

'Right tree, right place, right community” is the approach taken by Trees for Climate Health that guest Erin Axelrod directs, whose approach ensures that the dozens of projects it is implementing currently (and its overall goal to grow over 10 million trees by 2025) are appropriate to the areas, likely to succeed and survive, and benefit local communities.

We also speak with freelance environmental journalist Mike Tatarski who recently filed a story about Vietnam’s plan to plant a billion trees by 2025. Tatarski tells us about the impetus and goals of this nationwide effort, Vietnam’s long history of supporting tree planting, and more.

Articles discussed:

• ”How to pick a tree-planting project? Mongabay launches transparency tool to help supporters decide”

• ”‘Drastic forest development’: Vietnam to plant 1 billion trees — but how?”

Look for episode 119 of the Mongabay Newscast to hear our discussion of reforestation trends and issues with Mongabay staff writer Dr. Liz Kimbrough, who helped develop the new Reforestation Directory and app that rates such projects: Reforestation.app.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Girls from Pine Ridge Indian Reservation planting ponderosa pines in South Dakota, image courtesy of Trees, Water, and People. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Reconnecting kids and ourselves to the planet with author Richard Louv Jun 30, 2021

During the past year's pandemic and lockdowns, spending time outdoors has been soothing for many--whether found outside our homes, in parks, or via nature documentaries--and in some ways it was a meaningful reset.

Both human health and conservation benefit when we spend time in nature, so today we're discussing reconnection for kids and adults: what we know about its beneficial effects, how a movement to connect with nature is growing globally, and what this means for conservation.

Our first guest is author Richard Louv, who coined the phrase ‘nature deficit disorder’ and wrote the 2005 book that introduced the concept, Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder, in order to facilitate discussion of the human cost of alienation from the natural world. Louv discusses the international movement kicked off by the book, what the latest research says about the connection between nature deficit disorder and a variety of physical and mental ailments, and how the pandemic shifted the public's views on nature.

We also welcome to the show educator Megan Strauss, co-editor of Mongabay Kids, which provides kids, families, and educators with content that helps raise awareness of environmental issues and fosters an appreciation of plants, wildlife, and wild places. She shares the philosophy behind the site and the great variety of activities available there, plus her point of view on nature connection from her home region of Australia.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Boy and butterfly by Ryan Hagerty via the Creative Commons. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Reports: Camera traps in trees reveal a richness of species in Rwandan park Jun 24, 2021

Wildlife researchers often use motion-sensing cameras, also known as camera traps, to study animals in the wild. However, these are usually positioned at ground level, leaving a diverse world of animals unexamined: those that dwell in the trees above.

Camera traps set in trees in Rwanda’s Nyungwe National Park captured 35 different mammal species over a 30-day period, including a rare Central African oyan, a small catlike mammal that had not previously been documented there.

Mongabay Reports is a new series that shares evergreen articles like this from Mongabay.com, read by host Mike DiGirolamo. This episode features the popular article, "Camera traps in trees reveal a richness of species in Rwandan park."

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: A L’hoest’s monkey photographed in the park, which is listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List. Photo courtesy of WCS Rwanda. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

With billion dollar boost, bioacoustics is set to soar Jun 16, 2021

“This is an incredibly exciting time to be part of the field of bioacoustics,” our guest on this episode says, and she's right: if you care about wildlife conservation, or really like technology and interesting solutions to big challenges, this episode is for you.

Laurel Symes is assistant director of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology's bioacoustics lab, which was founded in the 1980s to study whale songs and elephant rumbles, and it just received a massive $24 million gift and changed its name to the K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics.

The Cornell program is therefore about to expand this field in many ways, from technology development to implementation, so we discuss their plans and the implications with this repeat guest, who previously joined the show to discuss her own fascinating work on the soundscapes of rainforests (episode 86).

Many bioacoustics researchers like her have been featured by this show, so after discussing Laurel's exciting news, we feature some of our most popular acoustic ecology segments: get ready for an absorbing crash course on what people are learning about animal behavior and ecosystem health with these increasingly affordable and ubiquitous listening devices!

If you want to hear any of the episodes featured in full, look up the episode numbers listed here in your podcast app of choice, or click its link to hear it via the Mongabay website:

Elephant Listening Project, episode 95
Indri lemur choruses, episode 107
Gibbon songs, episode 82
Humpback whales sharing songs, episode 77
Right whales discovered singing for the 1st time, episode 72
Rainforest frogs, episode 54

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Topher White of Rainforest Connection installing a bioacoustics device in the forest canopy. Image by Ben Von Wong. Please share your thoughts and ideas! submissions@mongabay.com.

Can Biden's 30x30 plan put the U.S. back on a positive conservation track? Jun 03, 2021

The U.S. has been M.I.A. on many environmental issues for the last few years, but the new Biden Administration has been announcing positive policies regularly.

Among the most important is the “America The Beautiful” plan, laying out a vision for conserving 30% of its lands and waters by 2030, making it the latest country to release what’s called a 30×30 plan.

But is it enough? Despite a lack of specifics, many are celebrating renewed American leadership on this front, which can encourage other countries to get aboard the 30x30 bandwagon, in addition to other green policy objectives.

Joining us to discuss is Joe Walston, executive vice president of global conservation for the Wildlife Conservation Society--we talk about how the plan has been received, the most important details of the plan needing to be fleshed out, the important role of Indigenous people and farmers it advocates for, and why the U.S. joining the 30×30 movement could have sweeping global impacts.

Other conservation initiatives are also afoot that aim to make profound changes in the way Americans live on the planet. One is through agricultural solutions to the climate crisis, so we're also joined by science writer Sarah Derouin, who recently covered agroforestry programs in the U.S Midwest and Pennsylvania for Mongabay.

Derouin shares the goals and accomplishments of these programs, the vision of trees becoming integral to farming even in areas dominated by monocultures, and how agroforestry can factor into the U.S. meeting the 30×30 targets.

Articles discussed during this episode:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: The Grand Tetons in Wyoming. Photo credit: Rhett A. Butler for Mongabay. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

Mongabay Reports: How many trees are on the Earth? May 26, 2021

When it comes to the world’s forests, two commonly asked questions are “How many trees are on Earth?” and “How many are cut down each year?” A study in the journal Nature proposed answers: 3 trillion and 15.3 billion.

Mongabay Reports is a new series that shares evergreen articles like this from Mongabay.com, read by host Mike DiGirolamo. This episode features one of our most read stories of the last several years: "How many trees are cut down every year?" Though it was published in late 2015, the information is quite relevant today.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Redwood trees in California, photo by Rhett A. Butler. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

Reforestation vs deforestation: Forest losses and gains this past year May 20, 2021

On this episode we discuss how newly released data shows deforestation rose in 2020, even while tree planting initiatives took root all around the planet.

Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler joins us to discuss the 2020 deforestation data, how that fits into broader trends affecting the world’s forests, and what good news there is to take from last year’s deforestation numbers.

We also welcome Mongabay staff writer Dr. Liz Kimbrough to the program to discuss our new database of hundreds of reforestation projects from around the world she helped assemble that aims to help donors find the most effective tree-planting initiatives to support.

Find this new Reforestation Directory and app to learn about tree planting projects you might want to study or support at Reforestation.app.

Articles discussed in this episode:

• “Global forest loss increased in 2020” (31 March 2021) • “A Madagascar-sized area of forest has regrown since 2000” (12 May 2021) • “Is planting trees as good for the Earth as everyone says?” (13 May 2021) • “How settlers, scientists, and a women-led industry saved Brazil’s rarest primate” (14 May 2021) • “How to pick a tree-planting project? Mongabay launches transparency tool to help supporters decide” (17 May 2021)

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: A man carries trees during a reforestation project in Tanzania. Image courtesy of One Tree Planted. Please share your thoughts! submissions@mongabay.com

Two tunas and a tale of managed extinction Apr 23, 2021

Are international groups that manage declining tuna populations doing too good a job? Two guests on our show this week illustrate how these managers aren't aiming for sustainability, but rather enable maximum extraction of the 'tuna resource' that graces peoples' dinner plates.

Author Jennifer Telesca calls the Atlantic bluefin tuna program one of 'managed extinction' while Mongabay staff writer Malavika Vayawahare discusses how the European Union controls the Indian Ocean yellowfin tuna fishery to such a degree that developing nations like the Seychelles that actually border those waters enjoy too little benefit from the fish's formerly extensive population.

Telesca's book "Red Gold: The Managed Extinction of the Giant Bluefin Tuna" was published in 2020 and Vayawahare's two April articles for Mongabay elicited strong support from the nation of The Seychelles and a stern riposte from the EU:

Are the allegations of a “neo-colonial” plunder of developing nations' resources accurate? Should a small number of highly profitable industrial fishing companies be allowed to hunt iconic wildlife like bluefin tuna to extinction?

Listen and let us know your thoughts, submissions@mongabay.com

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: Atlantic bluefin tuna, courtesy of NOAA

As humanity exceeds key 'planetary boundaries' many solutions are on the horizon, too Apr 08, 2021

Climate change & loss of biological diversity are just two of the 9 planetary boundaries scientists say humanity is currently pushing the limits of.

How long can we sustain society if we keep pushing these limits?

We explore this question -- and some leading solutions -- with two guests: Dr. Claire Asher is a freelance science communicator and author who joins us to discuss a recent article she wrote for Mongabay that describes the boundaries, the 4 we are already exceeding, and the opportunities we’ll have in 2021 to transform the way we live on this planet and restore equilibrium to Earth’s vital ecological systems, from sustainable design and agriculture to key international meetings.

"We don't have to give up the nice things to have a planet that is habitable, but we have to start to invest now," Asher says.

Then Andrew Willner discusses his recent Mongabay article “New Age of Sail” that would transform the global shipping industry, a major source of CO2 emissions that are shifting the climate. Willner shares how cutting edge technologies are deployed on ships right now to decrease their fuel consumption, including a number of modern types of sails that are once again harnessing the wind to power the ships moving our goods around the world.

Related reading:

Claire Asher: The nine boundaries humanity must respect to keep the planet habitable
Andrew Willner: New age of sail looks to slash massive maritime carbon emissions

Episode artwork: view of Earth imaged during ISS Expedition 46, courtesy of NASA.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

New investigation in the Amazon documents impact of palm oil plantations on Indigenous communities Mar 24, 2021

Palm oil plantations look likely to become a new cause of deforestation and pollution across the Amazon: though companies say their supply chains are green and sustainable, critics in Brazil--including scientists & federal prosecutors--cite deforestation, chemical pollution, and human rights violations. Mongabay's Rio-based editor Karla Mendes investigated one such project in Para State and joins us to discuss the findings of her new report, Déjà vu as palm oil industry brings deforestation, pollution to Amazon. Beside the health toll of chemical sprays on Indigenous people whose land it encroaches, Mendes studied satellite imagery to disprove claims that the company only plants on land that's already been deforested. Also joining the show are a scientist who's documented contamination of water sources and related health impacts, Sandra Damiani from the University of Brasília, plus a federal prosecutor in the Amazon region, Felício Pontes Júnior, who is trying to hold palm oil companies accountable for polluting Indigenous communities. Palm oil is used in a huge array of consumer goods sold in most countries--from snacks to ice cream & shampoo---and is a main cause of rainforest loss in Africa and Southeast Asia. Now, the industry sees the Amazon as prime new ground. Episode artwork: Fresh palm oil fruit, West Kalimantan, Indonesia. Photo courtesy of Nanang Sujana for CIFOR.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Solutions and optimism that drive conservation Mar 17, 2021

'I'm amazed how resilient, adaptable and optimistic the people of Sumatra are,' conservationist and HAkA Sumatra founder Farwiza Farhan says in the first moments of this episode about the women and communities she works with during the final episode of Mongabay's special series on Sumatra.

The giant Indonesian island of course faces many environmental challenges, but there is also tremendous hope and good progress thanks to the work of people like her and educator Pungky Nanda Pratama, who also joins the show to describe how his Jungle Library Project & Sumatra Camera Trap Project are opening the eyes of the next generation to the need for protecting their fabulous natural heritage.

Host Mike DiGirolamo shares the effectiveness of their efforts, what they are hopeful for, their biggest challenges, and the role of grassroots organizing in protecting and revitalizing the land, wildlife, and people of Sumatra.

More about these guests' work:

Listen to the previous 9 episodes of Mongabay Explores Sumatra via the podcast provider of your choice or find them at our podcast homepage here.

Episode artwork: Pungky with the biggest flower on Earth, Rafflesia arnoldii. Photo by Alek Sander.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Can agroecology feed the world? Mar 10, 2021

Agroecology is a style of sustainable farming spreading quickly around the globe, transforming the way food is grown.

Industrial agriculture requires chemicals like fertilizers and pesticides that harm natural systems and people alike, but by working with (and even enhancing) ecosystems, agroecology provides an alternative that encompasses many familiar practices--from composting to organic gardening and seed saving--and many less widely implemented ones, like agroforestry, while bringing modern technology like mobile apps and SMS to bear.

And studies show that it can indeed feed the world's people: food systems expert and author Anna Lappé joins the show to discuss why the idea that it's a “low yield” practice is a myth and how the adoption of agroecological practices around the globe is key to a sustainable future.

And behavioral scientist Philippe Bujold of Rare Conservation’s Center for Behavior & the Environment discusses his organization’s program that employs behavioral science to encourage farmers in Colombia to adopt agroecology in the face of changing climate conditions, like drought and heat, which are causing traditional growing methods to fail.

Episode artwork: Vegetable farmer watering plants at an organic farm in Boung Phao Village, Lao PDR, via Flickr.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store or in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Restoration for peat's sake Mar 03, 2021

Once drained for palm oil or other agricultural uses, Indonesia's peatlands become very fire prone, putting people and rich flora and fauna--from orchids to orangutans--at risk.

Over a million hectares of carbon-rich peatlands burned in Indonesia in 2019, creating a public health crisis not seen since 2015 when the nation's peatland restoration agency was formed to address the issue.

To understand what is being done to restore peatlands, we speak with the Deputy Head of the National Peatland Restoration Agency, Budi Wardhana, and with Dyah Puspitaloka, a researcher on the value chain, finance and investment team at CIFOR, the Center for International Forestry Research.

Restoration through agroforestry that benefits both people and planet is one positive avenue forward, which Dyah discusses in her remarks.

For more on this topic, see the recent report at Mongabay, "Indonesia renews peat restoration bid to include mangroves, but hurdles abound."

Episode artwork: Haze from fires in a peatland logging concession pollutes the air in Jambi Province, Indonesia. Image courtesy of Greenpeace Media Library.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Rewilding, restoration, and real hope for the future Feb 24, 2021

Landscape rewilding and ecosystem restoration are likely our last/best chances to maintain life on Earth as we know it, the guests on this week's show argue.

The UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration just began, so we invited author Judith Schwartz to discuss her new book The Reindeer Chronicles and Other Inspiring Stories of Working with Nature to Heal the Earth, which documents numerous restoration projects around the globe and highlights how the global ecological restoration movement is challenging us to reconsider the way we live on the planet.

We’re also joined by Tero Mustonen, president of the Finnish NGO Snowchange Cooperative, who tells us about the group’s Landscape Rewilding Programme which is restoring & rewilding Arctic and Boreal habitats using Indigenous knowledge and science.

He previously joined us to discuss the 'dialogue' between Indigenous knowledge and western science for a popular episode in 2018, a theme we also explored with David Suzuki for another popular show about how Indigenous knowledge is critical for human survival.

Episode artwork: Reindeer calf at Lake Inari in northern Finland © Markus Mauthe / Greenpeace.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: where are the rhinos? Feb 17, 2021

The Sumatran rhino is a ridiculously cute but cryptic species that teeters on the brink: with an estimated 80 individuals left in the wilds of its super dense rainforest home, experts are also divided on *where* they are. With conflicting and sometimes misleading data on their whereabouts, it is exceedingly difficult to track them down, and to therefore protect them.

To discuss this 'rhino search and rescue' as she calls it, host Mike DiGirolamo contacted repeat guest Wulan Pusparini, who studied them as a species conservation specialist with the Wildlife Conservation Society before pursuing her Ph.D. in Environmental Conservation at Oxford University.

Articles discussed in this episode:

Episode artwork: Rosa is the wild-born female Sumatran rhino noted by Wulan during the interview who now lives at the Sumatran Rhino Sanctuary in Way Kambas National Park. Image courtesy of Terri Roth/Cincinnati Zoo.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts. We also offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, providing instant access to our latest episodes and previous ones.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all of our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Climate solutions or delusions? Burning trees and damming rivers for energy, discussed Feb 10, 2021

Two technologies being promoted as climate solutions, biomass and hydropower, actually have big environmental consequences and might not be sustainable at all. Can we burn and dam our way out of the climate crisis?

We speak with Justin Catonoso, a Wake Forest University journalism professor and Mongabay reporter, who describes the loopholes in renewable energy policies that have allowed the biomass industry to flourish under the guise of carbon neutrality, even though the burning of trees for energy has been shown to release more carbon emissions than burning coal.

We also talk to Ana Colovic Lesoska, a biologist who was instrumental in shutting down two large hydropower projects in her Balkan country’s Mavrovo National Park. This recent Goldman Environmental Prize winner says there is a tidal wave of 3,000+ other hydropower projects still proposed for the region, and discusses whether hydropower can be a climate solution at all, at any scale.

Articles mentioned in this episode:

Read all of Mongabay's coverage of biomass here and hydropower here.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever they get podcasts, or download our free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store to have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Omens and optimism for orangutans Feb 02, 2021

The Sumatran orangutan is a lowland species that has adapted to life among this Indonesian island’s highlands, as it has lost favored habitat to an array of forces like deforestation, road projects, plus the trafficking of young ones to be sold as pets, so this great ape is increasingly in trouble.

On this episode, Mongabay speaks with the founding director of Orangutan Information Centre in North Sumatra, Panut Hadisiswoyo, about these challenges plus some hopeful signs.

His center is successfully involving local communities in this work: over 2,400 hectares of rainforest have been replanted by local women since 2008, creating key habitat for the orangutans, which also provides the villagers with useful agroforestry crops, for instance.

Related reading:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify or Audible, or wherever they get podcasts.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Episode artwork: a critically endangered Sumatran tiger (Panthera tigris sondaica). Image courtesy of the Zoological Society of London.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Cerrado solutions: Creative conservation for Brazil's massive savanna Dec 09, 2020

On this episode we look at how the largest and most biodiverse tropical savanna on Earth, Brazil's Cerrado, may finally be getting the conservation attention it needs.

We’re joined by Mariana Siqueira, a landscape architect who’s helping to find and propagate the Cerrado’s natural plant life, and who is collaborating with ecologists researching the best way to restore the savanna habitat.

Arnaud Desbiez also joins the show: he's founder and president of a Brazilian wildlife research NGO who describes the Cerrado as an important part of the range for the giant armadillo, an ecosystem engineer which creates habitat for many other species. So conserving their population will have positive effects for the savanna's overall biodiversity, he argues.

Read more about the Giant Armadillo Conservation Project here & view all of our recent coverage of the Cerrado here.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Episode artwork: A giant armadillo (Priodontes maximus), photo courtesy of Giant Armadillo Conservation Program.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Will the world's newest great ape species face a dammed future? Dec 03, 2020

North Sumatra is home to 1 of only 8 known great ape species in the world, the newly described Tapanuli orangutan, first classified in 2017 after its habits and DNA proved them to be unique. As with many animals in Sumatra, they are amazing creatures that are critically threatened, with a maximum of 800 individuals estimated to be living in an increasingly fragmented habitat.

Now a hydroelectric dam proposed for the center of the animals' tiny territory further challenges this special species' chances of survival, as well as that of 23 other threatened species which also live in the area.

To understand what's interesting about this animal and how the proposed Batang Toru dam would impact it, we speak with a biologist who helped discover its uniqueness, Dr. Puji Rianti of IPB University in Bogor, and Mongabay staff writer Hans Nicholas Jong in Jakarta, who has been covering the controversy over the project, as it's been called into question by activists and funders alike and faces numerous delays.

The saga is definitely not over, and this episode explains why.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify or Audible, or wherever they get podcasts.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Land rights, and wrongs: How Indigenous and local communities are fighting to gain title to their territories Nov 25, 2020

We're taking a look at the importance of securing Indigenous & local communities’ land rights -- and the global push for privatization that can deprive such people access to their territories -- with two guests on this episode.

A 2018 study found that Indigenous Peoples steward about 38 million km2 of land in 87 countries, that's more than a quarter of the world’s land surface, making them the most important conservationists on the planet, you might say. But governments and corporations increasingly want access to these lands, too, so the issue of land rights and titles is heating up.

To discuss the issue and learn how people are gaining title to their lands, we welcome Daisee Francour, a member of the Oneida nation of Wisconsin (U.S.) who is also director of strategic partnerships and communications for the NGO Cultural Survival, plus Anuradha Mittal who's executive director of the Oakland Institute, a think tank that recently released a report titled Driving Dispossession: The Global Push To Unlock The Economic Potential Of Land.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Episode artwork: In Zambia, a resident displays a map of her village's land. Villagers confirm that individual plots of land are accurately depicted and will be given a certificate conferring rights to farm and use the land. Photo courtesy of Sandra Coburn/Oakland Institute.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Deforestation demystified Nov 18, 2020

Sumatra contains some of the largest tracts of intact rainforest left in the world, but it's at the center of a complicated web of deforestation drivers, many of which began during the Dutch colonial era and are now spurred further by corruption and the global demand for cheap palm oil used in a wide range of consumer products.

To understand the rapid expansion of industrial-scale agribusinesses that market both palm oil and pulp & paper to the global market from this, the largest island in the Indonesian Archipelago, podcast host Mike DiGirolamo speaks with Nur “Yaya” Hidayati and Philip Jacobson.

Hidayati is the national executive director of Walhi, the largest and oldest environmental advocacy NGO in Indonesia, while Jacobson is a contributing editor at Mongabay who has been covering Indonesia for six years.

They discuss what causes the massive deforestation in Sumatra in particular and Indonesia in general, why it’s so difficult to control, what exacerbates efforts to stop it, and what can be done globally and locally to slow or stop the expansion of continued land exploitation.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Lemur love and award-winning plant passion in Madagascar Nov 11, 2020

We have amazing recordings of indri lemur songs (click for the choruses, stay for the roars) and the award-winning architect of protected areas that house Madagascar’s rich plant life on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast.

Mongabay has a special tie to this biologically-rich East African country--our name comes from an island just off its shores--so we're thrilled to return for this episode.

Jeannie Raharimampionana is a Malagasy botanist who identified 80 priority areas for conservation of plant life there, 11 of which have now been protected: this achievement recently won her the National Geographic Buffett Award for Leadership in Conservation in Africa and the title of National Geographic Explorer.

We also speak with Valeria Torti from University of Turin who researches critically endangered indri lemurs in the protected forests of the Maromizaha region. Torti tells us about the threats indris are facing and plays for us a number of wild recordings of their calls.

Episode artwork is of an indri lemur in the Analamazaotra Special Reserve, photo by Charles J Sharp.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra: Saving the singing rhino Nov 05, 2020

Sumatran rhinos are unlike anything else in this world: small in stature and docile by nature, they sport a coat of fur and sing songs reminiscent of a dolphin. In other words, this ancient species surprises and enchants anyone lucky enough to encounter it.

But Sumatran rhinos are also one of the most endangered large mammals on the planet. While its population is difficult to pinpoint, experts estimate there could be as many as 80 – or as few as 30 – still in the wild, leaving their future in doubt.

To understand the wonder and worry associated with this species, Mongabay Explores podcast host Mike DiGirolamo speaks with two guests, Wulan Pusparini and Jeremy Hance, about the unique challenges of conserving them, what is being done for them currently, and what needs to happen in order to save them from extinction.

Pusparini studied them as a species conservation specialist with the Wildlife Conservation Society before pursuing her Ph.D. in Environmental Conservation at Oxford University, while Hance is Mongabay’s senior correspondent who’s traveled Sumatra extensively to cover the species (and is the author of a new book about such travels, “Baggage“).

To learn more, see Mongabay's twin series authored by Hance on the conservation efforts and the scientific advances made in their captive breeding, here:

Music heard during this episode is by Sorbatua Siallagan, chief of the Dolok Parmonangan Indigenous community. The song is called "Gondang tu Mulajadi," where Gondang means ‘music’ and also ‘prayer,’ and Mulajadi means God. This kind of music is typically performed when Indigenous communities in Batak areas of Sumatra conduct rituals. Series theme music heard at the beginning and end is called “Putri Tangguk” and was licensed via Pond5.

Sounds of Sumatran rhinos heard during the show courtesy of Save the Rhino International.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Amazon defenders, especially women, are set to get new protections Oct 28, 2020

Women are key leaders in Amazon conservation, and we're taking another look at this issue with a discussion of an international agreement that could help protect environmental defenders — of all genders — in Latin America, one of the most dangerous places in the world to be an environmental activist, especially as a woman. Joining us to discuss is Osprey Orielle Lake, founder and executive director of the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network (WECAN), who talks about the Escazu Agreement and some of the inspiring indigenous female conservationists whose work and safety would be supported by it.

We also speak with journalist Nicolas Bustamente Hernandez about a young Colombian conservationist whose work he recently chronicled for Mongabay, Yehimi Fajardo, who is founder of the Alas Association, which is helping people in her rainforest region of Putumayo in Colombia become bird watchers and forest stewards.

Read more about these women leaders at Mongabay.com:

Patricia Gualinga (regarding her pursuit of environmental justice in the face of threats on her life)
Sonia Guajajara (about her run for Vice President of Brazil)
Nemonte Nenquimo (who was just named to Time Magazine's 100 most influential people list)
Yehimi Fajardo (founder of Alas Association in Colombia)

Mongabay covered the Escazu Agreement here in 2018 & an update can be viewed at its official UN website here.

Episode art: Photo of Nemonte Nenquimo, Waorani leader of the Ecuadorian Amazon by Mitch Anderson/Amazon Frontlines.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores Sumatra, Episode 1: A land like no other Oct 22, 2020

"Sumatra is like a fossil relic of rare species...a giant, rhino horn-shaped island blanketed in the richest rainforest you can imagine...there's nothing like it," one of our guests declares.

The 6th largest island in the world and the 2nd largest economy in Indonesia, Sumatra is the only place in the world where you can you find tigers, elephants, rhinos and orangutans all living together in an incredibly rich landscape of rainforests that, until recently, were largely untouched by human activities.

But that's changing rapidly, and this new biweekly series from Mongabay Explores dives into what's special about Sumatra, its amazing biodiversity heritage, and what's at stake as forests fall for uses like oil palm plantations, mines, and hydropower dams. We'll also discuss positive trends for conservation and solutions that meet human and nonhuman needs.

Host Mike DiGirolamo speaks with two guests: Rudi Putra, a biologist who won the Goldman Environmental Prize for his inspiring conservation work in Sumatra and who now serves as chairman of the Leuser Conservation Forum, plus Greg McCann, a biologist and Assistant Professor at Taiwan's Chang Gung University, whose People Resources and Conservation Foundation team is exploring and documenting the incredible richness of Sumatra so that it can be better conserved.

View all of Mongabay's news coverage from Sumatra here, visit Rudi Putra's organization Leuser Conservation Forum's website to learn more about their work, and Greg McCann's organization PRCF has multiple projects in Indonesia described here (and details on the project in Dolok Simalalaksa/ Hadabuan Hills he discusses are here).

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Series theme song "Putri Tangguk" is inspired by traditional Indonesian gamelan music and licensed via POND5.

Episode artwork: Sunset over Sumatran rainforest by Rhett Butler/Mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Gorilla Radio: innovation in conservation of super rare great apes Oct 14, 2020

The Cross River gorilla is one of the world’s rarest great ape subspecies, with only 300 individuals estimated to be living in Nigeria's Cross River State, but creative efforts to conserve their population and habitat there are changing their fortunes and reduce human-gorilla conflict.

Joining the show is Hillary Chukwuemeka, host of the radio program “My Gorilla My Community” that is heard by nearly 4 million listeners in communities on the frontlines of gorilla conservation there. Chukwuemeka talks about why it's an effective means of community engagement, and the impacts he’s seen among local communities.

We also speak with Inaoyom Imong, program director for the Cross River landscape with Wildlife Conservation Society-Nigeria and a member of the IUCN Primate Specialist Group. Inaoyom discusses the major threats to Cross River gorillas, barriers to their conservation, and why community-based conservation measures are so important in this context.

Here are some recent Mongabay articles referenced in this episode:

• Gorilla radio: Sending a conservation message in Nigeria

• For the world’s rarest gorillas, a troubled sanctuary

• Camera snaps first ever glimpse of a troop of the world’s rarest gorilla

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Can the oceans support a renewable energy transition? Sep 30, 2020

Slowing climate change will require a massive increase of renewable energy assets while reducing use of fossil fuels. And who wouldn't like to have a quiet, clean, electric car?

But renewable energy technologies from wind turbines to solar panels and rechargeable batteries to power your Tesla Roadster require large amounts of mined metals and minerals.

That's a problem because mining creates significant environmental impacts on land, and now, there’s a concerted effort to open up vast areas of the ocean floor to mining for this purpose.

On this episode speak with journalist Ian Morse and MiningWatch Canada's research coordinator Catherine Coumans about the overarching implications of mining things like metallic nodules and vents on the sea floor to huge areas of Indonesia for nickel used in rechargeable batteries. Our guests also explain how recent improvements to recycling of existing mined metals could supplant the need for risky projects like deep sea mining.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork: an electric car charging station in South Korea by hssbb79, CC BY-SA 3.0.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Great ape forest gardeners of Africa benefit from big conservation victory Sep 16, 2020

Conservation of great apes in Africa relies on forest protection, and vice versa: on this episode we discuss a campaign in Cameroon to protect the second-largest rainforest in the world and its incredibly diverse (and mysterious) ape inhabitants, and share an intriguing tale of forest gardening by chimps.

Ekwoge Abwe is head of the Ebo Forest Research Project in Cameroon, and shares how he became the first scientist to discover chimpanzees there use tools to crack open nuts. He also discusses ongoing efforts to safeguard Ebo Forest against the threats of oil palm expansion and logging, against which it just won a surprise reprieve.

We also speak with Alex Chepstow-Lusty, an associate researcher at Cambridge University who shares the incredible story of how chimpanzees helped Africa’s rainforests regenerate after they collapsed some 2,500 years ago, by spreading the forests seeds (a phenomenon known as 'zoochory') and why that makes chimps important to the health of forests like Ebo Forest both today and into the future, as well.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

In the Amazon, women are key to forest conservation Sep 02, 2020

Women everywhere are key voices for conservation, and an increasing body of research now recognizes the direct link between gender equality and environmental protection.

Mongabay has published a number of stories lately focused on successful Amazonian conservation initiatives led by women activists and scientists, and we wanted to highlight the issue on this episode of the podcast.

Sarah Sax recently wrote about the Women Warriors of the Forest, an all-female indigenous group that is employing new tactics and building new alliances to protect the forests they call home. Sax joins us to discuss the Women Warriors and some of her other recent reporting that has centered on women conservation leaders in the Amazon.

We’re also joined by Dr. Dolors Armenteras, who was the subject of a recent profile published by Mongabay. Armenteras is known as a pioneer in the use of remote sensing to monitor Amazon forests and biodiversity, and has been named one of the most influential scientists studying forest fires.

Despite her prominence, Armenteras has faced discrimination as a woman scientist, and shares with us how she has navigated that and how she supports the next generation of women scientists to overcome such biases.

Episode artwork of Maisa Guajajara at the march of Indigenous women in Brasilia, 2019, courtesy Marquinho Mota/FAOR.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Singing cetaceans: New whale & dolphin recordings intrigue researchers Aug 19, 2020

Bioacoustics studies help scientists discover things never before known about all kinds of animals, but especially marine life -- on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast we go under the waves to share new recordings of cetaceans (whales and dolphins) from southern Africa and hear from researchers what they think the sounds & songs may mean.

Dr. Tess Gridley's team recently discovered that humpback whales sing in South Africa’s False Bay, and she plays some brand new recordings they just captured.

Sasha Dines also joins the show to share her PhD studies of Indian Ocean humpback dolphins, which focuses on these animals' signature whistle calls.

*Turn up the volume to fully appreciate these songs, roars, growls and whistles!

Host Mike G. also discusses the upcoming African Bioacoustics Community conference with his guests, this is a virtual event aimed at bringing more researchers into the acoustic sphere to better understand the continent's incredible natural heritage.

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

From parks to payments, which conservation methods work best? Aug 04, 2020

For the 100th episode of the Newscast, we revisit Mongabay's groundbreaking Conservation Effectiveness series which asked a simple question:

How can we know if conservation methods are working if we don't test their effectiveness? From marine protected areas to parks and certification schemes like 'green' labels on lumber, our team reviewed published studies and evaluated the evidence for each method. On this episode we speak with Mongabay's founder and editor-in-chief Rhett Butler about the Conservation Effectiveness series & the ongoing need to test conservation outcomes, and with Sven Wunder, a principal scientist at the European Forest Institute in Barcelona, who is also a senior associate at the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), about the effectiveness of several of these conservation methods, like "payments for ecosystem services." Review all the features from the series here, https://news.mongabay.com/series/conservation-effectiveness/

We now offer a free app in the Apple App Store and in the Google Store for this show, so you can have access to our latest episodes at your fingertips, please download it and let us know what you think via the contact info below!

If you enjoy the Newscast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep the show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 6: Hellbenders and super spreaders Jul 29, 2020

Hellbenders are North America’s largest salamanders, living in rivers and growing to an incredible length of over two feet. Eastern newts are tiny and terrestrial, but both are susceptible to a fungal pathogen called Bsal. While Bsal has yet to make an appearance in the global hotspot of salamander diversity that is North America, it has wreaked havoc on populations in Europe, so biologists worry its impact could be even worse if it does.

Eastern newts' susceptibility to Bsal coupled with their notable mobility mean they could act as “super-spreaders” of Bsal if the fungus ever gets to North America. For hellbenders, which are already listed as endangered and suffer from habitat degradation, a new pathogen is hardly good news.

On this episode we speak with Dr. Becky Hardman from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville, and Dr. Anna Longo of the University of Florida about these fascinating and unique species, and discuss what is being done to prepare for a Bsal invasion that experts say is inevitable.

More resources on this topic:

On the hunt for a silent salamander-killer Scientists are racing to stop a pandemic before it starts – but will they find it in time?
Mongabay's special series on 'Bsal' is here
United States Bsal Task Force website

To hear Part 1 of this special salamander series, see bonus episode #94, "Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 1: Are we ready?" -- Part 2 (bonus episode #95) discussed the amazing diversity of salamanders, "Why are salamanders so diverse in North America?" Parts 3 & 4 are also helpful in understanding the threats and opportunities presented by Bsal.

Based on a multi-year project Mongabay.com published about Bsal at the site (link above), episodes of this special podcast series delve further to learn what's known about this issue, now.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Does trophy hunting support or hurt conservation? Years after Cecil the Lion was killed, debate continues Jul 08, 2020

On this episode we take a look at the ongoing debate over trophy hunting 5 years after the killing of Cecil the Lion sparked global outrage: he was a famous attraction for tourists and photographers visiting Hwange National Park in Zimbabwe, but in July 2015, an American dentist and recreational hunter killed Cecil just outside the park.

To what degree does trophy hunting support conservation and local communities where iconic wildlife live? What happens to animal populations who've lost members to hunters? Does trophy hunting support or harm scientific inquiry or conservation goals?

To discuss questions like this and what's changed (or not) in the debate since 2015, we hear from four experts who share a diversity of information and opinions that may change the way you think about this important issue:

Iris Ho of Humane Society International
conservation icon Jane Goodall
Amy Dickman, founder of the Ruaha Carnivore Project
Maxi Pia Louis, director of NACSO, a Namibian organization that works with local communities to support conservation efforts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

And please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Android, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 4: The 'Bsal battalion' Jul 01, 2020

North America (and the US in particular) is the world’s hotspot of salamander diversity, hosting about 1/3 of all species. Researchers think that about half of these may be susceptible to a deadly fungus called Bsal, and believe it's a matter of time before it gets to North America. If and when it does, it could mean devastation and maybe extinction for a massive amount of amphibians.

To head off the threat, scientists created the Bsal Task Force in 2015 and in this fourth "Mongabay Explores" bonus episode, host Mike DiGirolamo interviews the group's Dr. Jake Kerby who is also the associate chair of biology at the University of South Dakota.

Dr. Kerby details the working relationships their 'Bsal battalion' has with federal entities in Canada, the US, and Mexico and how they are working together to manage and mitigate the damage of this potential pandemic.

He also discusses what citizens can do to help protect North America's amazingly diverse salamander species.

More resources on this topic:

On the hunt for a silent salamander-killer Scientists are racing to stop a pandemic before it starts – but will they find it in time?
Super-spreaders: How the curious life of a newt could ignite a pandemicTheir susceptibility to Bsal coupled with their mobility mean eastern newts could act as “super-spreaders” of Bsal if the fungus gets to North America.
Mongabay's special series on 'Bsal' is here
United States Bsal Task Force website

To hear Part 1 of this special salamander series, see bonus episode #94, "Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 1: Are we ready?" -- Part 2 (bonus episode #95) discussed the amazing diversity of salamanders, "Why are salamanders so diverse in North America?"

Based on a special series Mongabay.com published to its website in 2018-19, the next couple episodes of this special podcast series made possible in part by our Patreon supporters will delve further into this topic to learn what's known about this issue, now.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Animals have culture, too, and for some it's crucial to their survival and conservation Jun 23, 2020

Animal societies have culture, too, as science keeps showing us ever since Dr. Jane Goodall first pointed it out, and on this episode we explore the culture and social learning of sperm whales, scarlet macaws, and chimpanzees with author Carl Safina and whale culture researcher Hal Whitehead.

Safina examines how these species are equipped to live in their worlds by learning from other individuals in their social groups — which he argues is just as important as their genetic inheritance — in his new book, Becoming Wild: How Animal Cultures Raise Families, Create Beauty, and Achieve Peace.

In the book, he calls Hal Whitehead “the pioneering sperm whale researcher” who has studied social learning in whales and dolphins for decades. A professor at Canada’s Dalhousie University, he was one of the first scientists to examine the complex social lives of sperm whales and their distinctive calls known as codas, and appears on the podcast today to play some recordings of them and tell us about sperm whale culture and social learning.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, please visit the link above for details.

And please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on Android, the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 3: On the Hunt Jun 11, 2020

Reporter Benji Jones and wildlife disease ecologist with U.S. Geological Survey, Daniel Grear, join this special edition of Mongabay's podcast to discuss the hunt for Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal) in North America, which Benji has described as “searching for a needle in a haystack except the needle is invisible and the hay stretches for thousands of miles.”

Host Mike DiGirolamo talks with Jones and Grear about the search, the difficulty in finding it, and what we can expect if the disease ever makes its way to U.S. shores.

This third bonus episode of the podcast tackles these important questions with Senior Editor Morgan Erickson-Davis, who produced Mongabay's series on this topic for the website last year.

For the next several episodes, this special podcast series (made possible by our Patreon supporters) called Mongabay Explores will dive into this topic to learn what's known about this issue, now.

More resources on this topic:

On the hunt for a silent salamander-killer Scientists are racing to stop a pandemic before it starts – but will they find it in time?
Super-spreaders: How the curious life of a newt could ignite a pandemicTheir susceptibility to Bsal coupled with their mobility mean eastern newts could act as “super-spreaders” of Bsal if the fungus gets to North America.
Mongabay's whole series on 'Bsal' is here
United States Bsal Task Force website

To hear Part 1 of this special salamander series, see bonus episode #94, "Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 1: Are we ready?" -- Part 2 (bonus episode #95) discussed the amazing diversity of salamanders, "Why are salamanders so diverse in North America?" If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Conservation leaders create community & opportunity amid current crises of violence and viruses Jun 10, 2020

On this episode we look at how current environmental crises intersect with two others: the pandemic and the systemic racism and police brutality that have sparked protests around the U.S. and world in recent weeks, with guests Leela Hazzah, founder and executive director of Lion Guardians, and Earyn McGee, a herpetologist and science communicator who just helped organize the first-ever Black Birders Week, a celebration of black birders and nature lovers.

McGee tells host Mike G. how Black Birders Week came together so quickly and why it's necessary to celebrate black nature lovers, and Egyptian conservationist Hazzah discusses what she sees as opportunities for transformative change in conservation due to the pandemic, like for instance that conservation has been named an "essential service" during the health crisis by the Kenyan government, plus the fact that more female and African representatives have been present at important conservation meetings lately, now that they're all virtual.

"I hope that we continue using these virtual tools so we can continue to have more diverse voices at important meetings," Hazzah says, while also reducing our carbon footprints, she adds.

And as McGee says, diversity is important, and people want to be part of the conservation movement as her group's event proved: "The interest is there...we want to do this work, but there are barriers in our way."

Episode artwork photo of Leela Hazzah © Philip J. Briggs.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

And please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on Android, the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 2: Great diversity and danger Jun 03, 2020

Why are salamanders so incredibly diverse in the United States? Among other things, a fluke of geography contributed to making it the global hotspot of salamander diversity.

But now, another pandemic is on the march toward the U.S., and this time it's got salamanders in its sights. In this second special episode about salamanders, we'll give you the full context.

How big a role do these ubiquitous animals play in the environment, and what would it mean to forest biodiversity, climate change, and forest food chains to lose whole populations of salamanders?

This second bonus episode of the podcast tackles these important questions with Senior Editor Morgan Erickson-Davis, who produced Mongabay's series on this topic for the website last year.

For the next several episodes, this special podcast series (made possible by our Patreon supporters) called Mongabay Explores will dive into this topic to learn what's known about this issue, now.

More resources on this topic:

On the hunt for a silent salamander-killer Scientists are racing to stop a pandemic before it starts – but will they find it in time?
Super-spreaders: How the curious life of a newt could ignite a pandemicTheir susceptibility to Bsal coupled with their mobility mean eastern newts could act as “super-spreaders” of Bsal if the fungus gets to North America.
Mongabay's whole series on 'Bsal' is here
United States Bsal Task Force website

To hear part 1 of this special salamander series, see bonus episode #94, "Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 1: Are we ready?" If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Rumbles in the jungle: Listening to elephants to conserve rainforests May 27, 2020

The Elephant Listening Project is a bioacoustics research effort that aims to preserve rainforests of Central Africa--and the biodiversity found in those forests--by listening to forest elephants, and on this episode we hear those animals' calls, rumbles, and trumpets with ELP researcher Ana Verahrami.

Verahrami has spent two field seasons in the Central African Republic collecting behavioral and acoustic data vital to the project & joins us to explain why forest elephants’ role as keystone species makes their survival crucial to the wellbeing of tropical forests and its other inhabitants, and to play some of the fascinating recordings that inform the project’s work.

Helping frame the discussion is Terna Gyuse, Mongabay's Cape Town-based Africa Editor.

ELP is part of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, whose bioacoustics research team we’ve featured several times in the past, listen to these episodes for more fascinating bioacoustics studies that feature the calls, songs, and sounds of diverse animals what they may mean for them and for conservation:

• How listening to individual gibbons can benefit conservation

• What underwater sounds can tell us about Indian Ocean humpback dolphins

• The superb mimicry skills of an Australian songbird

• The sounds of tropical katydids and how they can benefit conservation

Photo of forest elephants at Dzanga bai in Central African Republic © Ana Verahrami, ELP.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

And please invite your friends to subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast on Android, the Google Podcasts app, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, via Pandora or Spotify, or wherever they get podcasts.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Explores the Great Salamander Pandemic, Part 1: Are we ready? May 20, 2020

Another pandemic is currently on the march, and it's got salamanders in its sights. You may not have heard about 'Bsal' before, but it nearly wiped out a population of salamanders in Europe, and scientists worry it could invade the United States--the home of the world's greatest diversity of salamanders--next.

Is the U.S. ready for Bsal, and can a pandemic in this global salamander hotspot be prevented, unlike the one that's currently crippling human societies globally? What's being done, and what would it mean to lose salamanders on a landscape-wide level in North America?

This first bonus episode of the Mongabay Newscast tackles these important questions, just as spring and salamanders emerge in the North.

For the next couple months, this special series made possible by our Patreon supporters called Mongabay Explores will dive into a recent project our writers and editors produced on the topic, to learn what's known about this issue now.

More reading from Mongabay on this topic:

On the hunt for a silent salamander-killer Scientists are racing to stop a pandemic before it starts – but will they find it in time?
Mongabay's whole series on Bsal is here
United States Bsal Task Force website

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonprofit media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Forest fire season 2020: what will it look like and what can we do? May 13, 2020

Australia’s fire season may have just ended, but most of the world’s tropical forest regions will soon enter their own.

We look at what’s driving the intense fires in the Amazon, Indonesia, and elsewhere in recent years with three guests, who discuss what we can expect from the 2020 tropical fire season while sharing some solutions to this problem, which has huge effects on biodiversity, indigenous peoples, forests, and climate change.

Joining us are Rhett Butler, Mongabay’s founder and CEO, who provides a global perspective; scientist Dan Nepstad, who worked in the Brazilian Amazon for more than three decades; plus Aida Greenbury, an Indonesian sustainability consultant for projects like the High Carbon Stock Approach to forest protection.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

More reading from this episode:

Rhett Butler for Mongabay: "Rainforests in 2020: Ten things to watch," December 2019 "Amazon deforestation increases for 13th straight month in Brazil," May 2020

Dan Nepstad for the New York Times, "How to help Brazilian Farmers Save the Amazon," December 2019

See all our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

How to photograph wildlife ethically and why that’s so necessary Apr 28, 2020

At a time when so many people are trying to make photographs of wildlife -- to break the pandemic lockdown blues, or to share on social media -- we speak with two guests about how to do this without harassing, exploiting, or harming them.

Internationally renowned wildlife photographer Suzi Eszterhas shares her experiences and advice, saying that the most important practices are both better for wildlife and capture the most compelling images.

This is “kind of a win-win,” Eszterhas says, because "we’re treating the animals with kindness and respect and we’re not affecting their lives in a very negative way" while delivering superior photos.

Also joining the discussion is environmental journalist Annie Roth, who recently wrote an in-depth article for Hakai Magazine exploring how wildlife pay the price when humans get too close in order to snap a few pics that they hope will score them likes on social media.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to listen and subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Episode artwork of jackal pups courtesy of Suzi Eszterhas.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Inspiration for the 50th anniversary of Earth Day amid a global pandemic Apr 14, 2020

What does it mean to celebrate the 50th Earth Day amidst a pandemic? Our guests for this episode provide options and inspiration to mark this important anniversary in the face of a global virus outbreak, which ironically has roots in the destruction of nature.

We speak with Trammell Crow, the founder of the largest Earth Day event in the world, EarthX, which has big plans with National Geographic for a virtual celebration, and Ginger Cassady, the executive director of the Rainforest Action Network, an environmental advocacy group that works to end deforestation and respond to the climate crisis.

They share stories of inspiration, challenge, and triumph as we mark 50 years of Earth Day with an eye on what comes next.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps! Supporting at the $10/month level now delivers access to Insider Content at Mongabay.com, too, visit the link above for details.

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

The link between pandemics and the destruction of nature, with John Vidal Mar 31, 2020

Acclaimed environmental journalist John Vidal joins the show to discuss the current pandemic's links to the wildlife trade and the destruction of nature.

We speak about his recent Guardian/Ensia feature on what we know about the origins of the outbreak, what he’s learned while reporting from similar outbreak epicenters in the past, how the destruction of nature creates the perfect conditions for diseases to emerge, and what we can do to prevent future outbreaks.

See related Mongabay podcast episode: How studying an African bat might help us prevent future Ebola outbreaks

Here’s this episode’s top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Songs and sounds of Bering Sea whales and seals reveal a story of change Mar 17, 2020

The songs, calls, clicks, and bumps of beluga whales, bearded seals, bowhead whales, ribbon seals, and walrus are the stars of this episode, which also features the co-author of a recent study that used bioacoustics to assess how variation in sea surface temperature and sea ice extent affects these animals' populations in the northern Bering Sea.

Dr. Howard Rosenbaum is the director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Ocean Giants Program, and his team is creating an acoustic baseline for how marine noise pollution and climate change are affecting large mammals in this area of the Arctic.

Learn more about Dr. Rosenbaum's team's study here and press play to hear the fascinating sounds they captured.

Here's this episode's top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

New technologies deliver cutting edge conservation, discussion with Shah Selbe Mar 05, 2020

Shah Selbe is a rocket scientist who put his engineering skills into building a lab that uses open-source technologies to empower local communities to solve conservation challenges.

His team has been deploying technologies like drones, sensor networks, smartphone apps, and acoustic buoys to monitor protected areas, wildlife, and biodiversity.

But their big news is the launch of the open-source hardware and online platform FieldKit that anyone can use to deploy a local sensing network and mesh that with remote sensing data for real-time ecosystem monitoring: he joins us to discuss its potential plus the conservation tech he’s currently most excited about.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Conservation is a growth industry for Africa, Fred Swaniker says Feb 19, 2020

Fred Swaniker is the founder of the African Leadership University, which recently launched a School of Wildlife Conservation to help young Africans develop the skills and knowledge necessary to “own and drive” the conservation agenda on the African continent.

Swaniker sees Africa's natural heritage as a strategic advantage for the continent, and argues on this episode that the immense young workforce can be engaged in its conservation in many ways, from management to filmmaking, science communications and technology. He also shares highlights from ALU’s recent "Business of Conservation Conference" in Kigali, Rwanda.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Learn more about African Leadership University's School of Wildlife Conservation at its website, www.sowc.alueducation.com.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Mongabay Newscast trailer Feb 10, 2020

Top scientists, authors, and activists appear on the Mongabay Newscast to discuss their latest research, describe newly discovered animal species, or share their views on conservation and the environment: subscribe to this free show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever you get your podcasts. We recommend listening to the most recent shows first, for the freshest news.

Mongabay is a 20+ year-old nonprofit news service with 40+ million readers who consume our daily reporting in 9 languages via 5 international bureaus.

See our latest news from nature's frontline at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Galina Angarova on the indigenous relationship to land, conservation, and the sacred feminine Feb 05, 2020

‘Without the land, indigenous people cannot exist’ the new leader of Cultural Survival, Galina Angarova, tells host Mike G. in this new episode. Raised in a Buryat community in Siberia, she's had a number of top roles through the years, but her recent appointment to this key indigenous rights organization is perhaps the most important one yet.

She grew up eating wild berries, mushrooms, nuts, wild garlic, deer, and more on the shores of Lake Baikal, and therefore has a strong sense of relationship to the land and how important it is that indigenous peoples like her community are allowed to keep stewarding these places: it's been proven that indigenous communities are the best stewards of land, waters, forests, and animals.

Angarova joins the show to discuss this plus the power of indigenous radio programs, and her idea of the sacred feminine.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Learn more about Galina and the work of Cultural Survival at their website, culturalsurvival.org.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

How the sweet sounds of tropical katydids can benefit rainforest conservation Jan 22, 2020

Laurel Symes is a biologist who uses bioacoustics to study tropical katydids in Central America, and she joins us to play some of her hypnotic rainforest recordings and say how tracking these insects' interesting sounds can aid rainforest conservation.

Based on the Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica, she uses machine learning to detect and identify these creatures, which are grasshopper-like insects that are important to the rainforest food web, because they eat a lot of plants and are in turn eaten by a lot of other species, including birds, bats, monkeys, frogs, and more.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Top conservation photographer Ami Vitale discusses rhinos, pandas, hope and more Jan 07, 2020

Ami Vitale is an award-winning war correspondent turned conservation photographer, and her iconic images of animals like Sudan the Rhino adorn the pages of National Geographic and other top outlets often. But she's so much more than a woman with a camera, rather, she's a force of nature helping create change and grassroots conservation all over the world through her work, words, and advocacy.

She joins the podcast to talk about the most inspiring and heartbreaking moments from her recent projects (don't miss the beautiful story at the end about the behavior of elephant orphans) and she shares where she finds her seemingly boundless energy and optimism.

Here's this episode's top news items:

Episode artwork of a panda keeper in China is courtesy of Ami Vitale.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Best animal calls and songs of 2019 Dec 23, 2019

For this last episode of 2019, we take a look back at some favorite bioacoustics recordings featured here on the Mongabay Newscast and play them for you.

As regular listeners will know, bioacoustics is the study of how animals use and perceive sound, and how their acoustical adaptations reflect their behaviors and relationships with their habitats and surroundings. Bioacoustics is a fairly young field of study but it is already being used to study everything from how wildlife populations respond to the impacts of climate change to how entire ecosystems are impacted by human activities.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Cleared for coca: Chris Fagan on his new investigation from Peru's rainforest Dec 12, 2019

We speak with National Geographic writer Chris Fagan about the investigative report he just filed for Mongabay revealing a massive invasion of national parks in the Peruvian Amazon, in an area relied upon by isolated indigenous communities.

Traveling up the Sepahua River with indigenous guides, Fagan counted more than 250 plots of land illegally cleared for cocaine production in recent months. He met some of these growers and describes for us a very 'Wild West' scene that Peruvian officials know little about, in an area that was thought to be largely protected.

Read Chris's full report and see the stunning video and drone footage here:

https://news.mongabay.com/2019/12/coca-farms-close-in-on-protected-areas-isolated-tribes-in-peruvian-amazon/

Here's this episode's top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo of Chris Fagan by Jason Houston/Upper Amazon Conservancy.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Haunting gibbons' songs could aid their conservation Nov 26, 2019

Dena Clink is a primatologist studying individuality and variation in Bornean gibbon calls, which she says could aid these primates' conservation. She joins this episode to play some recordings of these fascinating songs & calls she’s made in the course of her research, and explain how they're used and what they may mean to the species.

We’ve featured a wide variety of bioacoustics studies here on the Mongabay Newscast, from whales to bats and birds, but these are usually recordings of species at the population level. Our guest today focuses on how calls vary between each gibbon, and what that can teach us about the animals, and their conservation needs.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

From now until the end of December 2019, donations to Mongabay are being doubled by Newsmatch, making this the best time to support our independent news about conservation science and the environment, visit mongabay.org/donate to learn more.

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Photo of a Mueller's gibbon (Hylobates muelleri) via People Resources and Conservation Foundation.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

All zoos should put themselves out of business, Damian Aspinall argues Nov 13, 2019

Damian Aspinall is chairman of the Aspinall Foundation, a UK charity that works to conserve endangered animals and return them to the wild. Despite his foundation operating two zoos, he's a vocal critic of how zoos are generally run, and feels their focus should be upon breeding rare animals and reintroducing them to the wild, vs keeping them in captivity for public entertainment, as he says.

"European zoos spend at least 15 million pounds a year, at least, on looking after their elephants and rhinos...imagine what you could do with that money in the wild," toward stopping poaching & rebuilding their habitats, he argues on this episode of the podcast.

Aspinall also talks about numerous other ethical problems he sees with 'the zoo-ocracy,' discusses his own program for breeding and reintroducing gorillas, lemurs, gibbons and more, and he shares his vision for a 'zoo-less future' on Earth.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Listen to our recent conversation with Bronx Zoo director Jim Breheny about zoos' role in conservation on Mongabay's podcast, here.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Buzzfeed's Katie Baker details their explosive investigation of WWF Oct 29, 2019

Katie Baker is a reporter for the Buzzfeed News team investigating human rights violations committed against local & indigenous people by park rangers paid by the major environmental NGO WWF to protect creatures like rhinos from poachers.

"No one is saying that [WWF's rangers] don't have really difficult jobs...but just because they have a difficult job doesn't mean they can rape and kill and torture with impunity or arrest people without evidence," she tells host Mike G, and adds that the pushback from the NGO has been rather meek: "I have not received any hate mail from [WWF employees] telling me I got it wrong."

Baker discusses the explosive findings of her team's investigative reports, what it took to chase these stories down, and the impacts she’s seen from her reporting.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Mongabay reported on the effects on local communities as revealed by Baker's reporting here, and here's Mongabay's investigation of harassment, bullying, and retaliation against whistleblowers at another major environmental NGO, Conservation International.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Deep sea diva: A dive to the ocean floor with biologist Diva Amon Oct 16, 2019

Plans for ocean floor mining are moving forward globally -- especially around thermal vents that create deposits of metals like gold, silver, copper, manganese, cobalt, and zinc -- but humans have explored less than 1% of the deep sea, so it’s fair to say that we really have no idea what’s at risk.

On this episode we speak with deep sea biologist Dr. Diva Amon about what we do -- and don’t -- know about biodiversity at the bottom of the ocean.

Raised on the shores of Trinidad & Tobago, Dr. Amon's fascination with what lies below the surface has taken her on journeys to great depths, and she shares insights and glimpses of amazing creatures gained there.

Here’s more about this episode’s top news:

And see all of our coverage of deep sea mining issues here.

If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is always welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Hitting the highway in Borneo to assess diversity and development Oct 01, 2019

Mongabay's adventurous Middle East-based staff writer John Cannon just traveled the length of the Pan Borneo Highway and shares what he discovered on the journey about biodiversity, development, and the natural future of this, the world's 3rd largest island.

It took him 3 weeks to travel the route proposed to connect the rainforest-rich Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak as well as the Indonesian part of the island of Borneo--to make commerce and travel easier in a region that is notoriously difficult to navigate--and also to encourage tourists to see the states’ cultural treasures and rich wildlife, from elephants to crocodiles, gibbons and clouded leopards.

But scientists warn that the highway is likely to harm the very wildlife it seeks to highlight, by dividing populations and degrading their habitats.

Here's where you can find John's six-part series and his “top 5 revelations from traveling the Pan Borneo Highway" at Mongabay.com.

These are the episode’s top news items if you want to learn more:

Episode photo: A female Sunda clouded leopard and one of her cubs crossing a road in Sabah, still image from footage shot by Michael Gordon.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Are humpback whale groups sharing their songs? Sep 12, 2019

For this episode we speak with Jim Darling, a marine biologist whose team found that the songs of different humpback whale groups can be so similar to each other that the conventional wisdom of these being distinct groups might be wrong. These whales may be sharing and singing each others' songs across groups and regions, he thinks.

Darling joins the show to play recordings of these remarkably similar humpback whale songs and discuss the implications.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

"I'm excited!" Climate action star Rev Yearwood on the UN, youth and women's leadership & more Sep 04, 2019

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we speak with Reverend Lennox Yearwood about the upcoming UN Climate Summit in New York City and what it’s going to take to pass legislation and policies that can effectively tackle the enormity of the climate crisis.

Undaunted by the challenge, Rev Yearwood rather is "very excited," he says, about the new energy and effective leadership he sees coming from youth, women, people of color, and more, who are all urging the world toward meaningful climate action. He is President and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus, a non-profit that advocates for social and environmental justice, and is a sought after speaker who also recently addressed the U.S. Congress on the topic of the environment.

Yearwood talks about participating in the week-long Global Climate Strike during the UN meetings; providing a platform for indigenous leaders, people of color, and young people to speak on climate issues that affect them; and his “suites to the streets” approach to climate activism:

"Climate change is a civil rights issue. People have a right to clean air. People have a right to ensure that this planet is safeguarded for future generations."

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news from nature's frontlines at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Feedback is welcome: submissions@mongabay.com.

Return of the amazing superb lyrebird Aug 13, 2019

For an encore edition during this show's brief hiatus, we replay one of our most popular Field Notes interviews of all time, featuring Australian researcher Anastasia Dalziell who's doing trailblazing work with superb lyrebirds. Listen to her recordings of these songsters and be amazed by these animals, who are so adept at replays themselves.

Host Mike G. explored with her the incredible ability these creatures have to mimic sounds in their environment, ranging from predators and possums to squeaky trees and other songbirds native to their forested habitat: even the clicks of camera shutters and chainsaws are 'replayed' by these animals.

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify, Pandora, or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Talk to you again in two weeks!

Baltimore, urban rats, and environmental justice Aug 06, 2019

Urban pests like rats have been in the news due to the US President calling Baltimore “rat and rodent infested.” He isn’t the first American politician to use this kind of rhetoric to demean communities that are predominantly made up of people of color (while ignoring the fact that policies deliberately designed to marginalize communities of color are at the root of the pest problems), he's just the latest.

Dawn Biehler actually knows what she’s talking about when it comes to rodent infestations in cities: the University of Maryland professor wrote the indispensable 2013 book Pests in the City: Flies, Bedbugs, Cockroaches, and Rats, and has just penned an op-ed in the Baltimore Sun newspaper looking at how racial segregation and funding inequities for urban housing and infrastructure contribute to rat infestations.

Biehler joins this episode of the Mongabay Newscast to discuss how this is an environmental justice issue, and how the problem can be dealt with in an environmentally sustainable manner, starting with investment in urban communities.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps!

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Celebrated author David Quammen on inspiring ecological restoration, evolutionary science, and more Jul 23, 2019

David Quammen is an award-winning science writer, author, and journalist covering the most promising trends in conservation and evolutionary science for the past 30 years. We invited him on the show to discuss his latest feature for National Geographic, where he is a regular contributor, about Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique — once touted by none other than E.O. Wilson in a podcast interview with Mongabay as a place where inspiring restoration efforts are underway and benefitting nature, wildlife, and people. We also discuss Quammen’s most recent book, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life, which explores the revolution in how scientists understand the history of evolution on Earth sparked by the work of Carl Woese, and his coverage of virology in light of the recent Ebola outbreak. He shares his thoughts on all of this plus what gives him hope that biodiversity loss and destruction of the natural world can be halted.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps.

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Right whales discovered singing for the first time: new recordings Jul 09, 2019

Jessica Crance is a research biologist who recently discovered right whales singing for the first time. While some whales like humpbacks and bowheads are known for their melodious songs, none of the three species of right whale has ever been known to sing. Crance led the research team at NOAA that documented North Pacific right whales breaking into song in the Bering Sea, and on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, she will play recordings of two different right whale song types and discuss what we know about why the critically endangered whales might be singing.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps.

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

New CITES boss discusses reining in online wildlife trafficking, the next COP, and more Jun 25, 2019

We speak with Ivonne Higuero, new Secretary General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora — better known by its acronym, CITES. The first woman to ever serve as Secretary General, we discuss how her background as an environmental economist informs her approach to the job, how CITES can tackle challenges like the online wildlife trade and lack of enforcement of CITES statutes at the national level, and what she expects to accomplish at the 18th congress of the parties (COP) this August.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps.

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Zoos are more key to conservation than ever, Bronx Zoo director says Jun 12, 2019

Jim Breheny is the director of the Bronx Zoo in New York City and joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss the contributions zoos make to global biodiversity conservation. While many question the relevance of zoos in the 21st century, he argues that as humanity's influence extends ever farther and wildlife habitat continues to shrink, zoos are more relevant than ever since they could save a diversity of species like hellbender salamanders, which his institution is helping to breed and repopulate in the wild. He also discusses how zoos support field work to protect species in the wild, and shares their experience telling the story of zoos through its popular Animal Planet TV show ‘The Zoo.’

This episode's top news:

Please invite your friends to subscribe to this show via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep this show growing, Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet and all support helps.

See our latest news at Mongabay's homepage: news.mongabay.com or find us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram by searching for @mongabay.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

What can talkative river dolphins teach us about their marine relatives? May 28, 2019

Gabriel Melo-Santos studies Araguaian river dolphins in Brazil — his work has revealed that the species is much chattier than we’d previously known, and could potentially help us better understand the evolution of underwater communication in marine mammals. He plays some of the recordings he’s made of the dolphins, explains how he managed to study the elusive creatures thanks to their fondness for a certain riverside fish market, and discusses how the study of their vocalizations could yield insights into how their sea-faring relatives use their own calls to maintain social cohesion.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and say what you like about the Mongabay Newscast, and how we can improve. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

How to discover an untouched rainforest May 14, 2019

Ecologist Julian Bayliss used satellite imagery, drones, and technical climbing to make a big discovery last year, an untouched rainforest atop a virtually unclimbable mountain in Mozambique (an “inselberg” or “island mountain”) that contains species new to science. Intriguingly, his team also found ancient human artifacts at its top, perhaps linked to people's prayers for the mountain's continued supply of fresh water to the surrounding lowlands. On this episode Bayliss discusses Mt. Lico's novel species like fish, crabs, and butterflies and shares the technical challenges and frustrations inherent in making a discovery of this kind.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and say what you like about the Mongabay Newscast, and how we can improve. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Paying for healthcare with a healthy rainforest Apr 30, 2019

Kinari Webb founded Health in Harmony, providing healthcare to people to save Indonesian rainforests. She realized that most illegal deforestation happens when villagers have to pay for medical care, because they have little to generate cash with, except timber. The program has reduced infant deaths by more than 2/3 and the number of households engaged in illegal logging dropped nearly 90%. Her story was one of the most-read articles at Mongabay.com in 2017, so now with Webb expanding the program to new regions, we asked her for an update.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge a dollar or more to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and say what you like about the Mongabay Newscast, and how we can improve. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Unusual tool-using chimp culture discovered in the Congo Apr 16, 2019

Primatologist Cleve Hicks leads a research team that has discovered a new tool-using chimp culture in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After 12 years of research, their findings include an entirely new chimpanzee tool kit featuring four different kinds of tools. These chimps also build ground nests, which is highly unusual for any group of chimps, but especially for ones living around dangerous predators like lions and leopards. But these chimps’ novel use of tools and ground nesting aren’t even the most interesting behavioral quirks this group displays, Hicks says on this podcast.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Sloths' amazing survival skills create a challenge for their survival Apr 02, 2019

Dr. Rebecca Cliffe joins us to challenge myths about sloths like the popular perception of them as lazy creatures: moving slowly is a survival strategy that has been so successful in fact that sloths are some of the oldest mammals on our planet. But Dr. Cliffe also warns of a “sloth crisis” driven by deforestation, roadbuilding, and irresponsible tourism including “sloth selfies,” and what you can do to help protect sloths.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Studying secretive humpback dolphins through sound Mar 19, 2019

How do you study a marine mammal that lives in waters so murky that it can hide from you in plain sight, even in shallow water? On this episode we speak with marine biologist Isha Bopardikar, a researcher using one technique, bioacoustics, to unlock the hidden behaviors of humpback dolphins on the west coast of India.

Mongabay's India bureau recently published a story about her work, “What underwater sounds tell us about marine life”, which noted that although humanity is making the underwater world even noisier through oil and gas exploration, shipping, and other mechanized vessels, today's research tools can still reveal many of the ocean's mysteries.

Bioacoustics combines the study of sound and biology and is increasingly being used to understand marine mammals, so Bopardikar joins us to discuss how, exactly, and play some recordings she's collected of her mysterious cetacean subjects.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Amazon explorer Scott Wallace: Uncontacted indigenous peoples are a true treasure Mar 05, 2019

“The uncontacted and isolated tribes represent a true treasure,” National Geographic writer and author Scott Wallace says in this episode. “Their knowledge of the rainforest, of the medicinal properties of the plants, of all the animals, their spirit world — all of this is an incredibly rich trove of knowledge.”

Wallace's book The Unconquered tells the story of an expedition into remote Amazon rainforests undertaken by the head of Brazil’s Department of Isolated Indians to gather information about an uncontacted tribe known as “the Arrow People” in order to protect the indigenous group from the ever-advancing arc of Amazonian deforestation.

He joins the podcast to share his experiences and to discuss this particularly perilous time for indigenous peoples in the Amazon.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Episode artwork courtesy of FUNAI.

How sound can save a rare bird with an AI assist Feb 20, 2019

On this episode we speak with Oliver Metcalf, lead author of a new study using bioacoustics and machine learning (artificial intelligence or "AI") to study a very rare bird in New Zealand. We play some recordings of the beautiful hihi bird that illustrate the success of a last ditch reintroduction effort for this species (and in a place) that are otherwise very difficult to monitor. The findings suggest that bioacoustics can play a key role in assessing the effectiveness of conservation efforts.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Good news from Mexico monarch reserve despite looming threats Feb 05, 2019

On this episode we hear from Mongabay's Mexico City-based contributor Martha Pskowski who recently traveled to central Mexico during the winter 'high season' when tourists flock to see monarch butterflies covering the trees. Her fascinating report on threats to monarchs in these overwintering grounds was tempered by cheerful news that the number of monarchs wintering in Mexico is up 144% in 2019. Pskowski spoke with locals who rely on monarch tourism for their livelihoods, and she investigated impacts on the monarchs' habitat from agriculture and a proposed mine.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the app that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Thank you! And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

We need nature more than nature needs us: IUCN's Inger Andersen Jan 23, 2019

The IUCN is probably best known for its Red List of Threatened Species, a vital resource on the conservation statuses and extinction risks of tens of thousands of species. But the IUCN does much more than just maintain the Red List, as Inger Andersen, the organization’s director general, explains in this episode [producer's note: just after this episode was published, Andersen accepted the role of director at the UN Environment Program].

The International Union for the Conservation of Nature was founded in 1948 and is neither a government body nor an NGO, but is rather a science-based hybrid of these, with the goal of ensuring nature conservation worldwide.

Speaking from their Swiss headquarters, Andersen shares insights about how the Red List is built, the key role of women in conservation ("Women represent 3.5 billion conservation solutions"), and plans for the next World Conservation Congress in 2020, which will dictate how conservation progresses in the wake of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets of the Convention on Biological Diversity, which sunset that year.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We also love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the program that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so that we can find new listeners. Thank you!

Also, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

And please send thoughts, questions, or feedback about this show to submissions@mongabay.com.

Sound can save forests and major rainforest trends to watch with Mongabay's founder Jan 08, 2019

Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett A. Butler joins the podcast to discuss the biggest rainforest storylines to watch in 2019, and a major new paper he co-authored in Science that looks at how bioacoustics can monitor forests for greater assessment of conservation goals and corporate responsibility commitments.

This year marks the 20th anniversary since Rhett founded Mongabay, and subscribers to our new Insider Content already know the story of how it happened after travels to places like Madagascar, Ecuador, and Borneo.

So overseeing this global environmental news service has provided him with a wealth of insight into the science and trends that are shaping conservation, and he appears on the podcast to discuss his recent articles looking at the top rainforest stories of 2018 and the tropical forest trends to watch in 2019.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We also love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the program that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast, so we can find new listeners. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

How 96 rare sea turtle hatchlings survived a NY City summer Dec 11, 2018

On this episode, the largely untold [and very heartwarming] story of how 96 critically endangered sea turtle hatchlings survived this past summer in New York City—with help from dedicated scientists and a cozy office closet.

In July, Big Apple beachgoers spotted a Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle laying eggs on West Beach. Two of them called a 24-hour wildlife hotline to report it, which very likely saved 96 tiny, precious lives.

This was by far the farthest north a Kemp's has ever been known to nest. But it soon became clear that unusually high tides would swamp the nest, which would have meant disaster for the developing embryos, so an unusual plan was hatched to save them.

We speak with scientists and conservationists who cared for the nest and answer questions such as whether it's a good sign that a Kemp's Ridley came all the way to NYC to nest.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps.

We also love reviews, so please find the reviews section of the program that delivers your podcasts and tell the world about the Mongabay Newscast. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Bill McKibben is down on COPs but bullish on climate action Nov 27, 2018

On this episode, we check in about the upcoming international climate summit (COP24, early December 2018) with top American author and climate activist Bill McKibben, to discuss its prospects and the movements that could spur the world to action on global warming: in light of recent developments he says, "I think meaningful action probably isn't going to come now at the UN," adding he does not have high hopes for specific outcomes, but that we need to look to other sources of meaningful climate action, and "happily there are some," which he is happy to share.

As an author, journalist, and activist, Bill McKibben is on the frontlines of this fight, having written the first book about climate change for the masses in the 1980s and being arrested numerous times over inaction on the issue. Listen for his personal take on movements like 350.org (which he co-founded) and new exciting ones like the Sunrise Movement on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast.

If you enjoy this show, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

E.O. Wilson discusses Half-Earth and conservation solutions Nov 13, 2018

On this episode we share a progress report on the Half-Earth Project (an ambitious effort to set aside half the world for nature) direct from legendary conservation biologist E.O. Wilson.

In this return visit to the podcast, Dr. Wilson discusses their effort to map the world's 6,000 bee species, his enthusiasm for the new science of understanding ecosystems, and interesting ties with the business community. Host Mike Gaworeck met Dr. Wilson at Half-Earth Project's recent event at the American Museum of Natural History which featured the launch of a new educational initiative and live discussion between Wilson, musician Paul Simon (listen to Paul Simon discuss why he supports the Half-Earth Project on a March 2017 episode of the Mongabay Newscast), and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Chasing penguins, a dispatch from Antarctica Oct 30, 2018

In a dispatch from Antarctica’s McMurdo Station, Mongabay friend Dr. Michelle LaRue discusses her sixth deployment to the icy continent to document emperor penguin populations, a species that is an important indicator of the Southern Ocean’s health. Skype was down at the station so we spoke with her by phone about what she is looking for and what it's like to work in Antarctica. LaRue and team fly in helicopters and planes to make high-res photos of penguin colonies which allow them to verify the population size, though a general lack of favorable conditions for flying is a daily obstacle.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Racing to save the world's amazing frogs Oct 18, 2018

On this episode, we discuss the global outbreak of chytrid, which is probably the largest global wildlife disease event in recorded history, with an expert on the front lines fighting its spread. Our guest is National Geographic Explorer Dr. Jonathan Kolby, who founded the Honduras Amphibian Rescue and Conservation Center to study and save sick frogs. He also plays song recordings of the amphibians he studies and shares some positive news of disease resistance in certain populations and age classes of frogs. Plus we round up recent top news.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spotify or wherever they get podcasts.

Bats and Ebola: studying fruit bats to prevent future outbreaks Oct 02, 2018

Sarah Olson is a researcher for the Wildlife Conservation Society and joins us at a moment when Ebola virus is very much in the news due to a recent outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo. A primatologist, Olson has lately been studying hammer-headed fruit bats to understand how Ebola is transmitted to apes and also humans — research which could potentially control or prevent future outbreaks of the deadly disease — beside revealing new details on the behavior of this fascinating species. Plus we round up recent top news.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Getting social for science and conservation Sep 18, 2018

We take a look at how the social sciences can boost conservation efforts with guest Diogo Verissimo, one of the top researchers focused on adapting marketing principles for conservation. A Fellow with the University of Oxford and the Institute for Conservation Research at the San Diego Zoo, he designs and evaluates programs that aim to change human behavior to combat issues like the illegal wildlife trade.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, so all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

'Godfather of biodiversity' says it's time to manage Earth as a whole system Sep 05, 2018

Dr. Thomas Lovejoy coined the term “biological diversity” in 1980 and his work since has helped establish the preservation of global biodiversity as one of the most important conservation issues of our time. We discuss this and some of the most important environmental issues we currently face and why he believes the next decade will be the last decade of real opportunity to address those issues:

“We really...need to think about managing the entire planet as a combined physical and biological system,” he says.

Dr. Lovejoy is a conservation biologist, a Senior Fellow at the United Nations Foundation, and director of the Center for Biodiversity and Sustainability at George Mason University. In the late 1970s, he helped launch one of the longest-running landscape experiments in the Brazilian Amazon to examine the consequences of fragmentation on the integrity of tropical forests and the biodiversity they harbor.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and all support helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

The amazing song skills of the superb lyrebird Aug 21, 2018

Sir David Attenborough says the superb lyrebird has one of “the most elaborate, the most complex, the most beautiful song[s] in the world.” In this episode we explore the incredible ability these creatures have to mimic sounds in their environment, ranging from predators and possums to squeaky trees and songbirds they compete with for forest habitat. Ornithologist Anastasia Dalziell joins us to discuss her trailblazing work with lyrebirds, and she plays amazing recordings of these spellbinding songsters.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and everything helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Beavers, our brilliant ecosystem builders Aug 07, 2018

You might not think of beavers as remarkable, but they are actually brilliant ecosystem engineers whose dams mitigate flooding, improve water quality, and boost groundwater levels, and they also provide habitat for species like salmon, moose, and mink. Environmental journalist Ben Goldbarb joins us to discuss his fascinating new book putting a bright shine on beavers, Eager: The Surprising, Secret Life of Beavers and Why They Matter.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and everything helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

How dark money and shadow companies deforest Indonesia and derail its democracy Jul 24, 2018

On this episode we explore the latest revelations about “shadow companies” and dark money associated with the palm oil sector, and how they factor into Mongabay’s ongoing investigation into the corruption fueling Indonesia’s rainforest destruction and land rights crises (plus how these factors derail democracy in this huge country). Host Mike Gaworecki speaks with guest Phil Jacobson, Mongabay's Indonesia editor.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and everything helps. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

How to use drones without stressing wildlife Jul 10, 2018

On this episode of the podcast we discuss the increasing use of drones by wildlife lovers, researchers, and businesses, how these uses might be stressing animals out, and how drone users can make a meaningful contribution to science while avoiding wildlife harassment.

Our guest is Alicia Amerson, a marine biologist, drone user ("pilot"), and science communicator. She tells us why it’s critical to have best practices for drones in place not only to guide hobbyists making videos of whales or birds, but especially before companies like Amazon.com deploy fleets of drones in our skies.

Episode artwork of falcon and drone courtesy of Shane Keena Photography.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and all donations help. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Indigenous knowledge and climate science Jun 26, 2018

Traditional indigenous knowledge and climate change is this episode's topic, with Snowchange Cooperative's Tero Mustonen: “Often in the past, science has been seen as quite [a] colonial tool by indigenous peoples,” he says. “We are trying to say that we are co-researching, and these knowledge-holders in remote communities are scientists of their own kind.” We also hear about Snowchange’s ecological restoration and solar power projects, the latter of which empower women and kids in remote indigenous communities.

If you enjoy this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep it growing. Mongabay is a nonproft media outlet, and all donations help. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Image courtesy of Nathaniel Wilder, nathanielwilder.com.

What can soundscapes tell us about animals and their home landscapes? Jun 12, 2018

In this episode, professor Anne Axel of Marshall University makes the case for a new field of bioacoustics research: soundscape phenology, the study of cyclical life events of plants and animals via sound recordings. She'll be keynoting the biennial Ecoacoustics Congress in Brisbane, Australia later this month on the topic, and gives us a preview while playing just a few of the recordings that have informed this research from the forests of Madagascar.

We'd be very glad to have your support for this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Mexico’s community forests find sustainability by including women and youths May 30, 2018

On this episode, a special report on community-based conservation and agroforestry operations known as ejidos in Mexico. Ejidos have proven to be effective at conserving forests while creating economic opportunities for the local rural communities who live and work on the land, but have also faced a threat to their own survival over the past decade as younger generations, seeing no place for themselves in the rigid structure of ejido governance, have left in large numbers. A lack of inclusion of women has also posed a challenge. But some ejidos are changing all that, and host Mike Gaworecki visited several of them and spoke with ejidatarios and youths plus outside experts.

We'd be very glad to have your support for this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Renowned marine biologist Sylvia Earle on acting for the oceans May 15, 2018

Legendary oceanographer and marine biologist Sylvia Earle, often called "Her Deepness," is a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence and former chief scientist at the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). She's a fierce champion for ocean conservation in general and marine protected areas in particular. "The ocean has given us everything, life itself, now it's time to give back," she says in this wide ranging conversation with Mongabay. Despite difficult trends, she also reports being 'seriously optimistic.'

We'd be very glad to have your support for this podcast, please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Seabird secrets revealed by bioacoustics in New Zealand Apr 30, 2018

Megan Friesen is a conservation biologist using bioacoustics technology to examine the breeding behavior of a secretive Pacific seabird called Buller’s shearwater, which breeds on the remote Poor Knights Islands, off of northern New Zealand.

In this Field Notes segment, Friesen explains why bioacoustics techniques are critical to the research she's doing with the Northern New Zealand Seabird Trust, and she plays recordings of the birds from both of the main islands where it breeds.

If you like what you hear, we'd be very glad to have you as a supporter, so please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

And please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or listen via Spotify.

Exploring Brazil’s biodiverse Cerrado region and the impacts of agriculture Apr 17, 2018

On this episode we discuss the impacts of agriculture on Brazil’s Cerrado region, an incredibly biodiverse savannah supporting more than 10,000 plant species, 900 kinds of birds, and 300 different mammals. But it has long been overlooked by scientists and environmentalists alike, and as protecting the Amazon Forest became more of a priority, much agricultural production in Brazil has moved from the rainforest to the vast Cerrado. Mongabay sent two reporters there to learn about the effects of agriculture, and they join us to discuss this 'upside down' forest.

If you like what you hear, please subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or look it up on Spotify, and tell a friend about the show.

We'd also be very glad to have you as a supporter, so please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

Maroon 5 guitarist James Valentine on stopping illegal rainforest wood from becoming guitars Apr 03, 2018

On this episode we speak with James Valentine, the multiple-Grammy-winning guitarist for Maroon 5 about his work to keep illegal and unsustainable rainforest wood out of musical instruments, and efforts to make concert tours more environmentally friendly. He has been to Peru and Guatemala to see the effects of illegal logging there, and he talks with us about his motivations for stopping this destructive trade.

If you like what you hear, please subscribe via Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or Spotify and tell a friend about the show.

We'd also be very glad to have you as a supporter, so please visit www.patreon.com/mongabay to pledge any amount to keep this show growing. Thank you!

Exploring our deep connection to water, plus the sounds of Sandhill crane migration Mar 20, 2018

On this episode, we discuss humanity’s deep connection to water and hear sounds of one of the most ancient animal migrations on Earth, that of the Sandhill crane. Our first guest is marine biologist and sea turtle conservationist Wallace J. Nichols, the author of Blue Mind: The Surprising Science That Shows How Being Near, In, On, or Under Water Can Make You Happier, Healthier, More Connected, & Better at What You Do. Then we speak with a team using bioacoustics to document the ecology and phenology of Sandhill cranes on the Platte River in the U.S. state of Nebraska, as the birds make a stopover during their annual northward migration.

We play their spellbinding recordings of this amazing scene, plus we round up the recent top environmental & conservation science news!

If you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about the show.

And please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

How effective is environmental restoration? Mar 06, 2018

How effective is environmental restoration? On this episode, we seek answers to that question with Claire Wordley of Cambridge University, which has just debuted a much needed new project collecting the evidence, and examples of restoration from around the globe. We also speak with Becky Kessler, editor of Mongabay’s ongoing series that examines how well a range of other conservation efforts work, about what this project has revealed.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental & conservation science news!

If you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about the show.

And please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

Exploring the minds and inner lives of wild animals Feb 19, 2018

On this episode we discuss the amazing minds and lives of animals — their memories, how even electric eels dream, the fact that some creatures like to get drunk (and why) — and we’ll hear all about Mongabay's newly launched bureau in India.

Author Sy Montgomery teamed up with her friend and fellow animal writer Elizabeth Marshall Thomas to write Tamed and Untamed: Close Encounters of the Animal Kind. Sy is the author of numerous other fascinating animal behavior titles, including "The Soul of an Octopus," which was a National Book Award finalist in the U.S.

We also speak with Sandhya Sekar, she is Programme Manager for Mongabay's newest bureau, Monbabay-India, and she shares some fascinating stories that they're already covering.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental & conservation science news!

If you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about the show.

And please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

New eyes in the sky monitor Earth systems like never before Feb 06, 2018

On this episode we dive into cutting-edge remote sensing technologies invented by Heinz Award-winner Greg Asner, the Carnegie Airborne Observatory, which his team uses to monitor ecosystems like rainforests and coral reefs. This airborne laser-guided lab can even see underwater to map reefs, find record-breaking individual rainforest trees that have escaped detection, and more.

We also listen to bioacoustic recordings that are used to analyze species richness in tropical forests with a researcher from the University of Puerto Rico, Dr. Mitch Aide.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental & conservation science news!

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about the show!

David Suzuki on why indigenous knowledge is critical for humanity's survival Jan 23, 2018

On today’s episode we feature a conversation with iconic Canadian scientist, author, television presenter, and activist David Suzuki.

Suzuki is a biologist who’s just as well known for his outspoken views on the need to protect nature. He is the author of more than 50 books and the host of the long-running science program The Nature of Things. He’s also the founder of the David Suzuki Foundation and the Blue Dot Movement, which aims to enshrine the right to a healthy environment in the Canadian Constitution.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental & conservation science news!

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about this show!

Climate lessons from indigenous peoples, plus the mysterious night parrot Jan 09, 2018

On the first episode of 2018, we speak with the author of a new book about the resilience of indigenous peoples in the face of climate change, and a researcher shares recordings of Australia's elusive night parrot.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental news!

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about this podcast!

Massive Amazonian medicine encyclopedia gets an update, and Madagascar conservation efforts examined Dec 12, 2017

We speak with Christopher Herndon, a medical doctor who as co-founder and president of Acaté Amazon Conservation, has been helping indigenous Matsés people document their traditional healing and plant knowledge in a massive 1,000 page encyclopedia, and in creating living pharmacies for the future.

Also on the show is Mongabay contributor Rowan Moore Gerety, the writer behind our recent series on the effectiveness of conservation projects in Madagascar. The island nation has been a global conservation priority for decades, receiving hundreds of millions of dollars in conservation funds from international donors — but rising deforestation, commercial exploitation of wildlife, and degradation of critical habitats suggest that these conservation investments may not be reaching their full potential. Mongabay hired Gerety, a veteran radio and print journalist, to examine the factors that contribute to or hinder success with the aim of informing future conservation efforts.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental news!

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about this podcast!

Margaret Atwood talks about birds, ecology, and her graphic novel series Nov 28, 2017

Award-winning iconic writer Margaret Atwood recently tackled a medium she is not as well-known for: comic books. Her superhero series Angel Catbird "was a conservation project from the get-go," she tells us in this edition of the podcast, being an effort to shine a light on the plight of wild birds and the house cats who love to stalk them, plus other ecological themes. We also discuss her smash hit "The Handmaid's Tale" and other 'possible futures,' as she calls them.

Then we speak with Tyler Gage, a co-founder of the beverage company Runa and author of "Fully Alive," a new book detailing the lessons he learned in the Amazon that led to the launch of Runa and its mission to partner with indigenous communities in business via plant medicine and agroforestry.

Plus we round up the recent top environmental news!

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about this podcast!

Jane Goodall on being proven right that animals have personalities, and more Nov 15, 2017

Mongabay is lucky to have Jane Goodall on its Advisory Board, and just before founder and CEO Rhett Butler was scheduled to speak with her most recently, research came out that vindicated her contention, which she’s held for nearly 60 years, that animals have personalities, so we recorded her thoughts about that for the Mongabay Newscast. “Quite honestly I think almost everybody recognized that animals have personalities, whether they were in the wild or whether they weren't,” she says. Other topics discussed include trophy hunting, activism, and hope for the future (a full transcript will be available at Mongabay.com on 11/17/17).

Our second guest is reporter Justin Catanoso, who is covering the UN Climate Change conference (COP23) for Mongabay this week, and he joins us from the event in Bonn, Germany.

Plus we round up the top environmental news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please subscribe and tell a friend about this podcast!

Gas drilling vs wildlife in Peruvian Amazon and a Goldman Prize winner on mercury contamination Nov 01, 2017

In this episode we discuss new science on the impacts on birds and amphibians of drilling for natural gas in the tropics with a Smithsonian researcher, and a Goldman Prize winner discusses her ongoing campaign to rid mercury contamination from the environment, which is (still) having alarming human health effects.

Plus we round up the top environmental news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please tell a friend about this podcast!

Bat calls from the Amazon plus how Indonesia's rainforests became palm plantations Oct 18, 2017

Mongabay editor Phil Jacobson joins the Newscast to discuss a new investigative reporting project in collaboration with The Gecko Project called “Indonesia For Sale” about the land deals — and the powerful politicians and businessmen behind them — that have converted vast areas of Indonesian rainforest to industrial palm oil plantations for personal profit.

Then we speak with Adrià López-Baucells, whose acoustic studies of bats in the central Amazon reveal the effects of Amazon forest fragmentation on bat foraging behavior. In this Field Notes segment, López-Baucells plays some of the recordings he captured and also explains how this audio led to some species being found in the central Amazon for the first time.

Plus we round up the past two weeks' top news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please tell a friend about this podcast!

Javan rhino calls and an analysis of 'green' forest certification Oct 03, 2017

On this week's show we speak with Princeton University's Zuzana Burivalova about whether forest certification schemes like the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) are actually achieving their environmental, social, and economic goals. Whether they do or not has massive implications for forest conservation worldwide, and while the evidence is hard to find, this tropical forest ecologist has interesting findings to share.

Our second guest is Steve Wilson, who has just written a new paper on Javan rhino vocalizations. He plays some recordings of these fascinating sounds and discusses what they mean.

Plus we round up the past two weeks' top news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

And if you like what you hear, please tell a friend about this podcast!

Legendary musician Bruce Cockburn on music, activism, and hope Sep 19, 2017

Bruce Cockburn is well known for his outspoken support of environmental and humanitarian causes, and his multi-decade career has yielded 33 records, including his latest, Bone On Bone. This week, he will be inducted into the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame alongside another outspoken icon, Neil Young. We spoke with Cockburn about how he came to his ecological worldview, why he wrote iconic songs like "If a Tree Falls" and "If I Had A Rocket Launcher," as well as similar songs on his new record, and we also discuss where he finds hope for the future.

Our second guest is Amanda Lollar, founder and president of Bat World Sanctuary, a wildlife rehabilitation center in Texas. Lollar discusses the efforts of a number of dedicated wildlife rehabbers who took action in the wake of Hurricane Harvey to rescue wild animals in Houston and other impacted areas.

Plus we round up the past two weeks' top news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

If you like what you hear, please tell a friend about this podcast.

Photo courtesy of the Office of the Lieutenant Governor of Ontario.

From AI to remote sensing, tech and conservation a powerful combo Sep 06, 2017

On this episode we take a look at the role technology plays in conservation efforts. First we speak with Topher White of Rainforest Connection, which deploys used cell phones in tropical forests around the world to provide real-time monitoring of forests and wildlife. Its network alerts local communities when illegal logging activities are taking place and can then be stopped, for example.

Then we speak with Matthew Putman, he's the CEO of Nanotronics and an applied physicist with a keen interest in conservation. We discuss some of the technologies that he sees making the biggest contributions to the way we approach conservation, and why he believes these advances can help turn the tide against environmental degradation.

Plus we round up the past weeks' top news.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

Thanks, and we also hope you will tell a friend about this podcast!

New Madagascar mine worries locals and lemurs; plus, banjo frogs and whistling ducks in Australia Aug 22, 2017

Our first guest for this edition of the Mongabay Newscast is Eddie Carver, a Mongabay contributor based in Madagascar who recently reported about a troubled company that is hoping to mine rare earth elements in Madagascar’s Ampasindava peninsula, to make electronic gadgets. This is a highly biodiverse region that is home to numerous endangered lemur species, some of which live nowhere else on Earth.

Then we speak with Jo Wood, an Environmental Water Project Officer in Victoria, Australia. In this Field Notes segment, Wood plays for us the calls of a number of indicator species like whistling ducks and "pobblebonks" (also called "banjo frogs") which appear when her team floods their dried up wetland home -- this audio evidence helps her assess the overall success of the "rewetting program" and the health of the wetlands ecosystem.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

Thanks, and we also hope you will tell a friend about this podcast!

Speaking from the heart on climate change with Katherine Hayhoe Aug 08, 2017

“It was a complete breakthrough for me to realize that sharing from the heart, which is the opposite of what we’re taught to do as scientists, was the way for me to connect with people,” Katharine Hayhoe, an atmospheric scientist, tells us in this episode of the Mongabay Newscast. She is an acclaimed climate communicator and a professor at Texas Tech University and last year, she teamed up with her local TV station to write and produce a web series called "Global Weirding," which tackles common questions, misconceptions, and myths around climate science, politics, and religion.

We check in with Hayhoe right as she’s in the midst of shooting Season 2 of "Global Weirding."

We are also joined by Branko Hilje Rodriguez, a PhD student from Costa Rica, where he’s studying the soundscapes of different successional stages of the tropical dry forest in Santa Rosa National Park, the largest remaining remnant of tropical dry forest in Mesoamerica.

In this Field Note segment, Hilje Rodriguez plays for us a number of the recordings he’s made in the park, allowing us to hear the sounds of the dry forest during different stages of regrowth and different seasons, as well as some of the iconic bird species that call the dry forest home.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it. Thanks!

Taiwan's natural soundscapes and a critique of the global hydropower building boom Jul 25, 2017

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast we speak with Sarah Bardeen, the communications director for the NGO International Rivers. Bardeen wrote a commentary for Mongabay recently after attending an international gathering of river defenders, who face harassment, intimidation, and worse for their opposition to massive hydropower projects.

We also speak with Yannick Dauby, who has been making field recordings throughout the small country of Taiwan. In this Field Notes segment, Dauby plays a recording of his favorite singer, a frog named Rhacophorus moltrechtpi, the sounds of the marine life of Penghu, the calls bats, and more.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it. Thanks!

A wildlife DJ and a children’s book author inspiring the next generation of conservationists Jul 12, 2017

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we take a break from our usual science reporting to look at some of the ways nature inspires people to create art — and how they in turn use that art to inspire others to protect the natural world and its inhabitants.

Our first guest is Ben Mirin, aka DJ Ecotone, an explorer, wildlife DJ, educator, and television presenter who creates music from the sounds of nature to help inspire conservation efforts. He'll explain the art and science of his recordings and play several songs he composed. We also speak with Cleve Hicks, author of a new children’s book called A Rhino to the Rescue: A Tale of Conservation and Adventure, not only to express his love of nature but to raise awareness of the poaching crisis decimating Africa’s rhino population.

If you'd like to share your acoustic ecology work with us during a future edition of the show, log on to Twitter and send us a link to a recording you made and any info about the science the clip conveys using the hashtag #Sciencesoundslike.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it!

Indonesia’s Leuser Ecosystem under threat, plus tracking bird movement in Puerto Rico Jun 27, 2017

On this episode we welcome Gemma Tillack, agribusiness campaign director of the Rainforest Action Network, which has been very active in the global campaign to protect Indonesia’s Leuser Ecosystem, one of the richest, most biodiverse tropical forests on the planet that is at risk of being turned into oil palm plantations. Tillack explains just what makes Leuser so unique and valuable and how consumers can help decide the fate of the region.

And in the latest Field Notes segment, research ecologist Marconi Campos Cerqueira discusses a recently completed a study that used bioacoustic monitoring to examine bird ranges in the mountains of Puerto Rico, which appear to be shifting related to climate change, and he’ll share some of his recordings with us.

Please help us improve the Mongabay Newscast by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it.

Amazon Reef discovery discussed plus environmental journalism hits milestone in Latin America Jun 13, 2017

On this episode, we welcome John Hocevar, a marine biologist and director of Greenpeace USA’s oceans campaigns. John was on the Greenpeace ship Esperanza to document the newly discovered Amazon Reef, and he talks about the uniqueness of the discovery, what it’s like to be one of a few people on Earth who have ever seen it with their own eyes, and what the opposition to drilling for oil near the reef will look like, should BP and Total try to move forward.

Then we welcome two staffers from Mongabay-Latin America which just celebrated its one-year anniversary recently, so we spoke with them about what it’s like covering the environment in Latin America, what some of the site’s biggest successes are to date, and what we can expect from Mongabay-Latam in the future.

Please help us improve this show by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it. Thanks!

Why forests, why now? How tropical forests can survive and thrive May 31, 2017

On this episode we speak with Frances Seymour, lead author of a new book Why Forests? Why Now? The Science, Economics and Politics of Tropical Forests and Climate Change, which she co-authored with Jonah Busch.

Seymour argues that tropical forests are key to climate change mitigation, and that it's up to rich countries to invest in their protection. She shares her thoughts on why now is an important moment for such forests, whether or not the large-scale investment necessary to protect them will materialize any time soon, and which countries are leading the tropical forest conservation charge.

We also welcome Mongabay editor Glenn Scherer back to the program to answer a question from a Newscast listener about which 'good news' stories are worth talking about in these tough times for environmental and conservation news. Mongabay has a long and very inspiring series of stories tagged 'happy upbeat' that you can view here.

Please help us improve this show by leaving a review on its page at Android, Google Play, iTunes, Stitcher, TuneIn, or wherever you subscribe to it. Thanks!

Singing seals and a discussion of the “infrastructure tsunami” sweeping the planet May 17, 2017

In this episode we feature Dr. Bill Laurance of James Cook University in Cairns, Australia, talking about his team's work documenting the planetary infrastructure boom and the need for more positive, less 'doom and gloom' science communication, and then we welcome Dr. Michelle LaRue to the program. She is a research ecologist with the University of Minnesota’s Department of Earth Sciences, and her current work is focused on using high-resolution satellite imagery to study the population dynamics of Weddell seals in Antarctica. You have to hear these seals' calls to believe them!

Please write a quick review of the Mongabay Newscast in the Apple Podcasts app, iTunes store, Stitcher page, or wherever you get your podcasts! Your feedback will help us improve the show and find new listeners. Simply go to the show's page on whichever platform you get it, and find the 'review' or 'rate' section. Thanks!

Deep dive into marine wildlife study with bioacoustics May 03, 2017

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we speak with Leah Barclay, a sound artist, acoustic ecologist, and researcher with Griffith University in South East Queensland, Australia. We discuss the ever broadening field of acoustic ecology, the many ways that marine bioacoustics is growing in importance, and she describes the new spectrogram app she's developing plus the creative ways she uses her interactive soundscape art to get kids excited about engaging with nature via hydrophones connected to cell phones. Plus we round up the week's top news and hear some of her recordings of marine life, ranging from whales to shrimp and even insects.

Please share a review of the Mongabay Newscast in the Apple Podcasts app, iTunes store, Stitcher page, or wherever you get your podcasts from! Your feedback will help us improve the show and find new listeners. Simply go to the show's page on whichever platform you get it from, and find the 'review' or 'rate' section. Thanks!

Eyes in the skies for forests, plus mangrove finches on the rebound Apr 18, 2017

On this episode we speak with Crystal Davis, the director of Global Forest Watch, a near-real-time forest monitoring system. GFW uses data from satellites and elsewhere to inform forest conservation initiatives and reporting worldwide. Davis shares her thoughts on how GFW's being used and the ways Big Data is changing how we approach conservation.

We also speak with Francesca Cunninghame, Mangrove Finch Project Leader for the Charles Darwin Foundation for the Galapagos Islands. In this Field Notes segment, we’ll listen to the call of a mangrove finch, one of the rarest birds in the wild, and hear about how its population seems to be growing, finally.

Please share a review of the Mongabay Newscast in the Apple Podcasts app, iTunes store, Stitcher page, or wherever you get your podcasts from! Your feedback will help us improve the show and find new listeners. Simply go to the show's page on whichever platform you get it from, and find the 'review' or 'rate' section. Thanks!

Tech solutions for conservation and a chat with Harvard researchers Apr 04, 2017

During this episode we speak with Sue Palminteri, editor of Mongabay’s WildTech site which highlights high- and low-tech solutions to challenges in conservation. She shares with us some of the most interesting technologies and trends that she sees as having the biggest potential to transform the way we go about conserving Earth’s natural resources and wildlife.

Also on the program we feature a live-taped conversation with Jonathan Thompson and Clarisse Hart, two scientists with the Harvard Forest, a long-term ecological research station belonging to Harvard University, which has made a number of important discoveries.

If you enjoy this podcast, please write a review of the Mongabay Newscast in the Apple Podcasts app, iTunes store, Stitcher page, or wherever you get your podcasts! Your feedback will help us improve the show and find new listeners. Thanks.

Musician Paul Simon discusses his new environmental concert tour Mar 21, 2017

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we’re thrilled to feature a conversation with the one and only Paul Simon, who's just announced a tour in support of the environment. The 12-time Grammy-winning musician recently announced on Mongabay.com that he is embarking on a 17-date US concert tour, with all proceeds benefitting Half-Earth, an initiative of the E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Foundation.

We play parts of the interview with Paul Simon as he discusses his long-time friendship with E.O. Wilson, the power of optimism, and why Dr. Wilson’s Half-Earth idea inspired him to get involved.

Also on the program, we round up the top conservation news and feature another Field Notes segment, this time with Zuzana Burivalova, a conservation scientist at Princeton University who has recorded the soundscapes of over 100 sites in the Indonesian part of Borneo. We listen to a variety of those recordings, each made in a different type of habitat, from protected rainforest to an oil palm plantation, and Burivalova explains what we’re hearing — and in some cases, what we’re not hearing.

If you enjoy this podcast, please write a review of the Mongabay Newscast in the Apple Podcasts app, iTunes store, Stitcher page, or wherever you get your podcasts! Your feedback will help us improve the show and find new listeners. Thanks.

Almost Famous Animals - plus the songs of galagos Mar 07, 2017

On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we welcome contributing editor Glenn Scherer to the program, who is responsible for Mongabay’s “Almost Famous Animals” series, which just wrapped up its second year with a focus on little-known Asian wildlife.

Many conservationists argue that protecting charismatic species like tigers, rhinos, and orangutans will also lead to the protection of less widely known species such as pangolins and langurs, but that has not always been the case. Many lesser known species often fall through the cracks, so this series aims to raise their profiles.

And in the Field Notes segment, Luca Pozzi discusses a new genus of galagos, or bushbabies, found in southeastern Africa that he helped discover. We'll play some calls made by galagos in the wild, and Luca explains how those recordings aid in our scientific knowledge about this kind of wildlife.

Author and climate historian Naomi Oreskes on why scientists should speak out Feb 21, 2017

With so much uncertainty around the new Trump Administration's environmental priorities, especially its energy and climate policies, this episode is dedicated to trying to answer some of the biggest questions. We welcome three guests: firstly, Harvard professor, climate historian, and noted author Naomi Oreskes talks about what stories she’s worried will get lost in the media’s hyperfocus on the chaos surrounding the new Trump Administration, and she makes an evidence-based case for why scientists should be speaking out about their work in public.

Then Bobby Magill joins us, he's a senior science writer for Climate Central and the president of the Society of Environmental Journalists, which recently released a special report entitled “Turbulent Prospects on Environment-Energy Beat Likely in Trump Era.”

Finally, Jeff Ruch, executive director of the non-profit service organization Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility shares what he’s hearing from employees of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency about their concerns with the Trump Administration’s environmental policies.

Want to stay up to date on all of Mongabay’s coverage of the issues you follow most closely? You can get email alerts when we publish new stories at Mongabay.com on specific topics that you care most about, from forests and oceans to indigenous people's rights and more. Visit alerts.mongabay.com and sign up to keep on top of all your top issues. Please leave a review of the show wherever you hear this podcast, it will help us improve and find new listeners!

If you don't subscribe to the show but would like to, find the Mongabay Newscast via Stitcher, TuneIn, iTunes, Google Play, or other apps.

Reporter Sue Branford on journalism from the Amazon that makes a difference Feb 07, 2017

This week we speak with journalist Sue Branford, a regular contributor to Mongabay who has been reporting from Brazil since 1979 for the BBC and others.

Branford is one of the writers behind a hard-hitting new series in English and Portuguese that Mongabay.com is producing with The Intercept-Brasil exploring the many impacts of massive dam development projects in Brazil’s Tapajos Basin. The reports have already resulted in a federal investigation being opened over official misconduct.

Read all the features and watch the powerful videos Sue and her team have produced for the series here.

Branford: "Sometimes your reporting has an impact that you don't actually realize...These reports that we're doing for Mongabay, we may discover such an impact...the Brazilian prosecutor is asking for compensation for this indigenous community, but there may also be other impacts that we only discover years later.

"We journalists sometimes feel we just go on reporting and don't really change very much, but now and again you come up with cases where you very definitely have changed things, and it makes you feel like, OK, it really was worthwhile."

We begin the show by talking about some of the latest top conservation news, from Hong Kong's amazingly resilient (and endangered) tree frogs to Norway's new financial commitment to stem deforestation around the world.

E.O. Wilson talks about global biodiversity, Trump, Half-Earth, and hope Jan 24, 2017

On this episode, we feature excerpts from a conversation with author and biologist E.O. Wilson, one of the greatest scientists of the last 100 years, who was recently interviewed by Mongabay senior correspondent Jeremy Hance about the Half Earth biodiversity initiative, the Trump Administration, and how he maintains hope for the future.

We also welcome back Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler, who answers a listener question about the natural sounds heard in the background at the start of every episode of the Newscast (the image that illustrates this episode is from the spot where that recording was produced, in Indonesia).

Yaks, curassows, and other cool species overlooked by conservation efforts Jan 10, 2017

This week we’re joined by Joel Berger, a professor at Colorado State University and a senior scientist with the New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society, who recently wrote a commentary for Mongabay arguing that there are too many large mammals like yaks and Saiga antelope living in remote regions (so-called “edge species”) that are wrongfully overlooked by conservation initiatives. Then from Peru, Dr. Andrew Whitworth, a conservation and biodiversity scientist with the University of Glasgow, shares rare recordings he recently made in the field of a critically endangered bird called the Sira Curassow.

Top new species discoveries of 2016, and how fig trees can save rainforests Dec 27, 2016

This being the last Mongabay Newscast of 2016, we’re bringing you the top new species discoveries of the year. Here at Mongabay we report on a lot of environmental science and conservation news. It’s not always the most cheery subject matter, especially when we’re reporting on endangered or extinct species. But it’s important to remember that we’re also discovering new species all the time.

Mongabay staff writer Shreya Dasgupta rounded up all of the top new species discovered in 2016, including 13 new dancing peacock spiders, a crab that was discovered in a pet market, a new species of whale, a tarantula that shoots balls of barbed hair at its enemies, and one bird that is now 13 distinct species.

We also speak with author Mike Shanahan, whose new book Gods, Wasps, and Stranglers: The secret history and redemptive future of fig trees looks at this tropical species’ biology and key ecological role, as well as its deep cultural (and spiritual) place in human history. If listening to this episode of the Newscast leaves you wanting to hear more from Shanahan, Mongabay editor Erik Hoffner interviewed him back in November. “Wild fig trees are magnets to biodiversity. Plant them and other species, both plant and animal, soon follow,” Shanahan said then.

Undiscovered Sumatran rhinos in the wilds of Malaysia? Maybe, or maybe not. Dec 13, 2016

On episode seven of the Newscast we talk with Mongabay contributing editor for Southeast Asia Isabel Esterman, who is based in Cairo, Egypt, about the plight of Asian rhinos. Potential new evidence recently emerged that suggests there might be some undiscovered wild Sumatran rhinos in Malaysia, where they were declared extinct in the wild last year — though not everyone is convinced the new evidence is all that compelling.

We also speak with Richard Bowden, a professor of environmental science at Allegheny College, to answer a question from a Mongabay reader and geography student at the University of Hamburg in Germany, who wrote in to ask: “What are the effects of climate change on phenology, primary production, carbon sequestration, and biotic interactions?”

If you’ve got a question about environmental science and conservation, we’d be happy to answer it for you! Just drop us a line at submissions@mongabay.com and we’ll answer your question in a future episode of the Mongabay Newscast.

We’d also like to thank the first ever sponsor: Lauten Audio, maker of professional studio microphones praised by everyone from Grammy-winning to novice producers, engineers, and musicians around the world. Thanks for your support Lauten Audio!

Carl Safina discusses marine conservation under a Trump administration, and Rhett Butler shares the origins of Mongabay Nov 29, 2016

Noted ecologist and author Carl Safina appears on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast to discuss the current state of marine conservation and its future under the Trump presidency. His latest book is "Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel," which is now out in paperback.

We also welcome to the show Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Butler, who fills us in on the origins of Mongabay and where it’s going in 2017. (There are many more answers to questions you might have about Mongabay here.)

Report from the Climate Talks in Marrakesh and Salamander Conservation in Michoacan, Mexico Nov 15, 2016

On this week's Newscast we hear from writer Justin Catanoso who's at the COP22 climate talks in Marrakech, Morocco filing reports for Mongabay.com. He shares his latest observations from this important UN conference and the mood of the delegates following the shocking U.S. election result favoring Donald Trump. Read his reports from the UN conference here.

We also hear from Mongabay editor and Newscast producer Erik Hoffner who answers a reader question about salamander conservation in Mexico, with the help of an expert from Michoacan University.

Subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast via iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, TuneIn, or wherever you get your audio content.

Andrea Crosta of Elephant Action League on “The Ivory Game” and orangutans under threat in Indonesia Nov 01, 2016

Andrea Crosta of the Elephant Action League (EAL), one of the stars of the new Netflix documentary The Ivory Game, discusses how Chinese demand is driving the multi-billion dollar trade in ivory, as well as EAL’s project WildLeaks and the undercover investigations in mainland China and Hong Kong that have helped expose the illegal ivory being laundered through legal ivory markets. The Ivory Game premieres on Netflix on November 4.

We also speak with Borneo Futures founder Erik Meijaard about his new feature for Mongabay entitled "Company poised to destroy critical orangutan habitat in breach of Indonesia’s moratorium." The article details the plans of an Indonesian company to cut down a forest that is home to between 750 and 1750 orangutans, the third-largest population in the province of West Kalimantan. The forest is slated for conversion to an industrial tree plantation.

And as usual we'll round up some of the top environmental news from around the world.

Crucial conservation votes at CITES and the future of socio-ecological research Oct 18, 2016

Mongabay’s India-based staff writer Shreya Dasgupta appears on this episode of the Newscast to discuss key votes held at the seventeenth congress of the parties to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, also known as CITES CoP17.

Representatives from more than 180 countries gathered in Johannesburg, South Africa for CITES CoP17, which closed on Oct 5. One of the largest environmental agreements regulating the international trade in wildlife, CITES currently regulates more than 5,600 species of animals and 30,000 species of plants. Decisions were made regarding pangolins, African gray parrots, elephants, and rosewood at the recent meeting.

Also appearing on the show is Steven Alexander of the University of Maryland's National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center and the Stockholm Resilience Center. Alexander answers a question submitted by Mongabay reader Duncan Nicol: “What areas or questions in socio-ecological research need the most attention over the next decade?” But first, he explains what socio-ecological research actually entails, and provides a few examples.

If you’ve got a question, send it to submissions@mongabay.com and we’ll get you an answer on a future episode of the Mongabay Newscast.

The Mekong, Earth’s most climate-sensitive river delta, plus conservation in conflict zones Oct 04, 2016

On this episode of the Newscast, Mongabay’s Indonesia-based editor Phil Jacobson makes an in-studio appearance to talk about a new series launched this week focusing on the Mekong Delta.

No other delta region in the world is more threatened by climate change than the Mekong Delta, which is why the first installment of the series, asks: “Will climate change sink the Mekong Delta?”

Three more articles by Mongabay correspondent David Brown, who traveled extensively in Vietnam to report these stories, will be coming out over the next couple weeks, and Phil shares a preview of those, too.

We also speak with Mongabay’s Israel-based forests editor, Genevieve Belmaker, who answered a question submitted by a PhD Scholar in the Department of Ecology and Environmental Sciences at Pondicherry University in Puducherry, India: “I want to ask you, how can a person living in a conflict zone contribute to environmental conservation?”

Mongabay Newscast #1: Panama's Barro Blanco Dam Sep 16, 2016

For Mongabay Newscast #1, host Mike Gaworecki rounds up the week in top conservation news from around the world and then speaks with Mongabay.com editor Rebecca Kessler about the environmental impacts of the Barro Blanco Dam in Panama on indigenous communities, biodiversity, sacred sites, and the wider watershed. Mongabay has been covering this 28 MW hydro project for three years. The indigenous Ngäbe and Buglé indigenous groups maintain that they were not properly consulted about the project, yet the reservoir is currently filling as the dam undergoes a "test flooding." Read the story here. Reservoir photo by Oscar Sogandares.

Our TOPPODCAST Picks

Follow Us

Stay Connected

Related Podcasts

Links

Stay Connected