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Forests

Canada Is Now Home to the World’s Largest Stretch of Protected Boreal Forests

The province of Alberta has announced the creation of four new protected parks

Trending Today

The EPA Declared That Burning Wood Is Carbon Neutral. It’s Actually a Lot More Complicated

Here are five things to know about the controversial change

Once common along highland streams in Costa Rica and western Panama, the variable harlequin frog, Atelopus varius, is now endangered throughout its range, thanks in large part to a disease caused by the amphibian chytrid fungus.

These Captive-Bred Frogs Are Facing Predators and the Chytrid Fungus to Make It in the Wild

Scientists in Panama release 500 harlequin frogs, some wearing transmitters, in a first attempt to reintroduce the endangered species

Aerial view of the Amazon Rainforest near Manaus, the capital of the Brazilian state of Amazonas.

Cool Finds

Brazil Begins Effort to Plant 73 Million Trees in the Amazon

The experiment in reforestation involves spreading native seeds instead of planting saplings

In an era of rapid change, the managers of our nation's wild spaces are asking: What counts as natural anymore?

The National Parks Face a Looming Existential Crisis

Political uncertainty and a changing climate converge to forge the park system’s biggest challenge yet

Scientists can study stress in these petite primates with simply a few strands of their hair.

New Research

Stress Is Killing These Teeny Lemurs, and The Story Is In Their Hair

Sampling the fur of Madagascar’s gray mouse lemurs reveal a bevy of environmental pressures

Costa Rica's Guanacaste region is among the country's many beautiful ecological zones—and the waste from local juice company is helping keep it that way.

Costa Rica Let a Juice Company Dump Their Orange Peels in the Forest—and It Helped

How a controversial experiment actually bore fruit

Caribou herd mountain crossing in Alaska Range.

New Research

How Killing Moose Can Save Caribou

Conservation often requires difficult decisions

New Research

How the Silk Road Created the Modern Apple

A genetic study shows how wild Kazakhstan apples dispersed by traders combined with other wild species to create today’s popular fruit

Ampelopsis brevipedunculata, or porcelainberry originated in China, Korea, Japan and Russia, but is a vigorous invasive in the United States.

The Innovative Spirit fy17

Scientists Are Using This Collection of Wood Samples to Combat Illegal Logging

Archie F. Wilson loved wood enough to amass the country’s premiere private collection. Now scientists are using it as a weapon against illegal logging

A view from within the Tyson Forest Dynamics Plot in Missouri.

New Research

Why Do We See More Species in Tropical Forests? The Mystery May Finally Be Solved

Surveying 2.4 million trees showed that predators may help keep the trees at sustainable levels

Mateo-Vega (derecha) muestra a los compañeros Emberá y Kuna cómo tomar medidas forestales. De izquierda a derecha, los técnicos indígenas Edgar Gariboldo, Chich Chamarro, Baurdino López, Evelio Jiménez, Alexis Solís. (Sean Mattson / Smithsonian)

Future of Conservation

Cómo Los Científicos y Grupos Indígenas Pueden Aliarse Para Proteger Los Bosques y el Clima

Cool Finds

Endangered Balkan Lynx Kitten Photographed for the First Time in a Decade

There are less than 50 of these critically endangered cats left in the wild

Compared with the trees, lianas are able to put more energy into the production of leaves and seeds and less towards growing a trunk.

Tarzan’s Favorite Mode of Travel, the Liana Vine, Chokes Off a Tree’s Ability to Bear Fruit

With lowered fruit production, fewer seeds are dispersed to grow new trees

Aspens are one of the American tree species moving northwest.

New Research

American Trees are Shifting West

For 86 common species, northwest seems to be best. But why?

This forest in Guatemala was burned to make way for agricultural development. A new study suggests that drug traffickers contribute to rainforest loss by laundering money with agriculture in forest lands.

New Research

Cocaine Is Destroying Forests in Central America

Once-forested lands are being used in money laundering operations

Mateo-Vega (right) shows Emberá and Kuna colleagues how to take forest measurements. From left to right, indigenous technicians Edgar Garibaldo, Chicho Chamorro, Baurdino Lopez, Evelio Jiménez, Alexis Solís.

Future of Conservation

How Scientists And Indigenous Groups Can Team Up to Protect Forests and Climate

A collaboration between Smithsonian researchers and the Emberá people of Panama aims to rewrite a fraught narrative

Deforestation threatens natural world heritage sites.

New Research

Humans Threaten Over 100 Precious Natural Heritage Sites

Forest loss and humans’ footprint are endangering the very sites humans want to preserve

Several armed guards accompanied Luiz Rocha and his colleagues throughout their work in Somaliland.

Meet the Researchers Who Scour the World’s Most Dangerous Corners in Search of Biological Riches

Militants, malaria and pirates are just some of the challenges these scientist-explorers face in their quest to map the world’s diversity

In Mexico's Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve, America's most beloved native insect faces threats from illegal loggers and avocado growers.

New Research

The Best Way to Protect the World’s Forests? Keep People in Them

Instead of kicking indigenous groups out, let them continue to manage these lands effectively, argues a new report

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