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Endangered Species

Tropical regions are home to many unique species, such as this tiny frog belonging to the genus Dendrophryniscus that lives in the Atlantic Forest of Brazil. A new study finds that removing just a few trees can quickly cause biodiversity in these tropical forests to fall.

New Research

Removing Just a Few Trees Can Lower Tropical Animal Biodiversity

Selective logging can halve the number of species of mammals and amphibians in a forest

No wonder unagi is so popular - this picture looks good enough to eat!

How Will Japan Celebrate Summer Without Unagi

The freshwater eel is now endangered, but who is to blame and what are the best substitutes?

A tiger skin openly for sale at Mong La.

Cool Finds

This Market Along the Burma-China Border Is a Veritable Noah’s Ark of Critically Endangered Animals

Photographer Alex Hofford exposed the extent of the wildlife trade openly taking place at this infamous market

New Research

Borneo Has Lost 30 Percent of Its Forest in the Past 40 Years

Borneo’s tropical forests have fallen at twice the rate as the rest of the world’s felled rainforests

Elusive Indus River dolphins.

New Research

Why Freshwater Dolphins Are Some of the World’s Most Endangered Mammals

In Pakistan, dams and drainage has reduced the endangered Indus River dolphin’s range by 80 percent

Tiger skins confiscated in Yunnan, China.

Cool Finds

China Finally Came Clean About Its Shady Tiger Skin Trade

Whether or not this will improve the situation for tigers, however, remains to be seen

Imperiled survivors: A herd migrates across Chad, once home to tens of thousands of elephants. After a surge in poaching, only about 1,000 remain.

The Race to Stop Africa’s Elephant Poachers

The recent capture of a notorious poacher has given hope to officials in Chad battling to save the African elephant from extinction

University of Sao Paulo researcher Marcio Martins holds one snake while watching another, a deadly venomous snake living only on Queimada Grande Island, Atlantic Forest, Brazil.

This Terrifying Brazilian Island Has the Highest Concentration of Venomous Snakes Anywhere in the World

Brazil’s Ilha de Queimada Grande is the only home of one of the world’s deadliest, and most endangered, snakes

Cool Finds

In Maya Lin’s New Exhibition, a Singing Ring Contains the Sounds of Endangered Worlds

The Sound Ring represents places as diverse as California forests and the Indian Ocean

Cool Finds

Europe Has Its Own Bison Species That Came Back From the Brink of Extinction

Bison were just reintroduced into a stretch of Romania where they haven’t been found for two centuries

New Research

A 20,000-Plus Room Resort Threatens This UNESCO Site in Mexico

For twenty years, conservation efforts have protected the beach and its coral reef; a new development could harm them both

A drawing of the West Indian or Caribbean monk seal based on a specimen collected in Matanzas, Cuba.

New Research

For the First Time in More Than 100 Years, Scientists Discover New Seal Genus

The now extinct Caribbean monk seal shares an evolutionary connection with the endangered Hawaiian monk seal—one more reason to save the species

Cool Finds

France Is Spending 3 Million Euros to Save the Great Hamster of Alsace

There are only a few hundred left!

None

Decades of Political Strife Have Left Myanmar’s Jungles Unexplored and Unchartered

Now as the country opens up, what will happen to its endangered species? A new three-part series on the Smithsonian Channel explores the issue

A bowl of shark fin soup, which is sometimes made with meat from protected species of sharks

Cool Finds

People Caught Eating Rare Animals in China Might Soon Face Jail Time

Eating endangered species was never kosher, but now legitimate punishments can finally be dished out for this crime

A West Indian manatee calf nurses from its mother.

American South

14 Fun Facts About Manatees

These roly-poly herbivores just may be the teddy bears of the sea. But keep an eye out when boating; they don’t move so fast.

The Anguilla Bank skink, a Caribbean species discovered along with 23 others in 2012, is vulnerable to extinction.

How Many Species Can We Find Before They Disappear Forever?

Biologists are in a race to locate and identify new species as habitats become victim to an industrialized world

Cool Finds

Japan Plans to Halve the Number of Young Bluefin Tuna It Catches

Sushi might get more expensive, but tuna populations need the break

A scene from the whale shark processing factory, where the endangered species are turned into meat, medicinal supplements and cosmetics.

Cool Finds

A Factory in China Is Slaughtering Endangered Whale Sharks

A Chinese non-profit wildlife organization exposed what they believe to be the largest whale shark-processing factory in the world

Trending Today

Try to Smuggle an Illegal Elephant Tusk Out of Kenya, Pay a $230,000 Fine

For the first time, Kenya exercised its new, stricter punishments for wildlife trafficking crimes

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