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Reporting on our catastrophic species loss, and ways to tackle the biodiversity crisis

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The age of extinction

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  • Cargo vessels and crude oil tankers anchored in the Gulf of Oman, awaiting the reopening of the strait of Hormuz.

    Invasive species
    Ships stuck in strait of Hormuz pose ‘super-spreader’ biodiversity threat, scientists warn

    Biologists say cargo ships stranded in Gulf may carry highly potent invasive species around the world as trade resumes
  • A mahogany tree sapling in a nursery.

    Deforestation
    Legal logging and soaring saplings: the ‘green islands’ bucking the trend in central America

    In Guatemala’s Maya biosphere reserve local people are making a living from trees at the same time as increasing forest cover, showing nature is best protected by those who depend on it
  • An AI-generated image depicting a large black bird with bright orange beak sitting on an iceberg with the northern lights in the background. It is a fake image.

    Technology
    AI-altered images on birdwatching forums putting research at risk

  • Dino Martins holding a rainbow locust by the wings

    Nature heroes
    Sex-loving hookworms and other peculiar parasites: one man’s mission to champion nature’s villains

  • Picture 68 Pangolin traffic for Chinese tourists in Laos shop selling pangolin scales to Chinese tourists

    Illegal wildlife trade
    Inside the secret Laos shops selling pangolin scales, bear bile and tiger bones to tourists

  • A black rat gnawing through the large seed of the Melocanna bamboo.

    Biodiversity
    Why India’s flowering bamboo causes a crisis for humans

  • The desert rain frog has been listed as vulnerable on the IUCN red list
    1:09

    Environment
    The ‘little fat froggy’ facing a fight for survival

  • A pile of silvery-scaled dead blackchin tilapia fish with visible eyes and fins

    Blackchin tilapia
    ‘They ate the shrimp, they even ate the crab’: Thai fishers count the cost of a voracious invader

  • Jaguar wearing monitoring collar

    Wildlife conservation
    Can Bolivia’s historic big cat release help change jaguar conservation in the country?

  • A sandy coloured cat with bright green eyes.

    Libya
    ‘No one believed it’: how a YouTube video accidentally proved Libya’s sand cat really does exist

Explore

  • A vaquita skeleton laid out on a black background, showing skull, ribcage, spine, and limbs

    Research
    Skeleton of the world’s rarest marine mammal preserved by digital imaging

    The reconstruction of the vaquita, whose numbers barely reach double figures in the wild, is designed to help research and conservation efforts
  • Colourful, annotated, illustrations of fish.

    Archives
    A bonanza for fans of the natural world: the digital library sharing 64m pages of scientific knowledge with everyone

  • A grey bird with a white throat and long bill standing in shallow water.

    Bird migration
    Tropical heron spotted in UK for first time as more exotic birds arrive to thrill birdwatchers

  • A bee collects pollen from a white apple blossom with pink buds on a branch

    Pollination
    Scientists reveal the hidden human health costs of the world’s disappearing bees

  • An adult tern with grey plumage and black cap sits with a fluffy chick on sandy ground with pebbles

    Tourism
    Big gains for little terns: how Lindisfarne reserve is helping a rare bird survive

  • TTP-Taiwan-20250322-TTP06902 Taiwan Tree Seekers team looking for the tallest tree of Taiwan The Heaven Sword of the Da’an River

    Trees
    A thousand years old and 20 storeys high: tracking down Taiwan’s tallest trees

  • Two men look at a dead elephant

    Environment
    What is killing Sumatra’s elephants? The battle to save one of our rarest animals

  • Someone out of focus lying down and looking at a purple petalled flower with a yellow centre among grass blades

    Soil contamination
    Blossoming among spoil heaps: how 1,000 years of lead mining gave birth to banks of pansies and pennycress

  • Three mountain bongos drink from a trough in a forested grassland.

    Antelope
    ‘Bringing the boys back home’: how mountain bongos Maue, Fitz, Kudu and Bon64 made their way back to Kenya

Explainers

  • Painted lady butterfly

    Insects
    Butterflies crossing oceans, moths navigating by the stars: unravelling insect mysteries

  • Map of the world showing migratory bird paths with two swans flying

    Bird migration
    Patterns are changing. What does this reveal about our planet?

  • Visual guide
    The biodiversity crisis in numbers

  • A bee lands on a purple flower

    Food, soil, water
    How the extinction of insects would transform our planet

Wild world

  • A blue-and-yellow macaw on a wire fence in a forest enclosure

    Rewilding
    ‘A dream come true’: Brazil’s blue-and-yellow macaws return to Rio after 200 years

  • A field of blue flowers next to a body of water and ice-capped peaks

    Nootka lupins
    How the purple flowers made Iceland an Instagram paradise – and caused a crisis

  • An otter pokes its head out of a drain in a concrete wall.

    Wildlife
    Hightailing along city streets and raiding ponds: otters’ revival in Britain

  • Starfish in murky water on a chunk of material on the sea bed

    Germany
    Nazi bombs, torpedo heads and mines: how marine life thrives on dumped weapons

Nature heroes

  • Iroro Tanshi wearing glasses and a headlamp holds a small bat in a blue-gloved hand

    Nature heroes
    The bat that weighs the same as a teaspoon of salt – and the biologist who rediscovered it

  • A group of penguins in a grassy seaside setting

    Nature heroes
    How a kindergarten teacher became the accidental guardian of 200 king penguins

  • A smiling woman

    Nature heroes
    Protecting lions and people: the biologist dedicated to tackling human-wildlife conflict

  • A man wearing a khaki shirt with the Strong Roots logo grins at the camera.

    Nature heroes
    ‘I escaped death a lot of times’: one man’s work protecting gorillas in Congo

Primates

  • A small monkey swaddled in a cloth looks nervously at the camera. There is ointment on its nose and hand.

    Costa Rica
    ‘To them a power line is a line of trees’: the move to protect howler monkeys from electrocution

  • A tiny baby ape wearing a hoodie looks at the camera

    Exotic pet trade
    For sale: one cute baby gibbon – mother probably killed by poachers

  • An orangutan stands on a rope bridge in the forest canopy

    Conservation
    ‘Cries of delight’ as Sumatran orangutan filmed using canopy bridge to cross road for first time

  • A male chimpanzee showing its teeth in an attack on another chimpanzee with its back to the camera.

    Wildlife
    Wild chimpanzees recorded waging ‘civil war’ with coordinated attacks between two groups

Watch, see and listen

  • A newborn mountain gorilla in Bwindi Impenetrable national park, Uganda

    Bwindi Impenetrable national park
    Newborns to silverbacks: counting mountain gorillas in Uganda – in pictures

    Gallery15
  • Biodiversity Workers by Christer Bjorkman - from top left : Åsa Kruys, Mats Thulin, Vivi Vajda; from bottom right: Mats Jonsell, Emma Kärrnäs and Torbjörn Tyler.

    Photography
    In the footsteps of Linnaeus: scientists share their passion for species from tiny wasps to hairy plants – in pictures

    Gallery16

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