Mongabay Newscast

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 th

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

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

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,

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 medi

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: National parks in Africa shutter over COVID-19 threat to great apes Shell of bioluminescent shrimp not only glows but detects light Seychelles extends protection to marine area twice the size of Great Britain 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.pa

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: Conservationists set the record straight on COVID-19’s wildlife links Record-high global tree cover loss driven by agriculture In Afghanistan, a new national park carries hopes for conservation and peace If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via And

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: China beefs up wildlife trade ban as COVID-19 outbreak intensifies ‘Out of control’: Unprecedented fires ravage Brazil’s Pantanal wetlands Camera traps confirm presence of lowland gorillas in central mainland Equatorial Guinea for first time in over a decade If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe v

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: Jeff Bezos establishes $10 billion ‘Earth Fund’ to combat climate change Deforestation in Brazil continues torrid pace into 2020 Rhino poaching in South Africa declines for fifth straight year 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 fri

Top scientists, authors, and activists appear on the Mongabay Newscast to discuss their latest research, describe new solutions for tough challenges, or to share their views on conservation and the environment: subscribe to this free show via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon, or wherever you get your podcasts.   Mongabay.com is a 25 year-old award-winning nonprofit news service with 5 million monthly readers who consume our daily reporting in 6 languages via 5 international bureaus.   So to stay on top of key trends, new science and fresh thinking on the global environment, find, subscribe and follow the Mongabay Newscast for news and inspiration from nature's frontline.

‘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: Catastrophic Amazon tipping point less than 30 years away: study Dam that threatens orangutan habitat is ‘wholly unnecessary’: Repor

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: 2019 was second-hottest year on record, 2010s hottest decade Indigenous lands hold 36% or more of remaining intact forest landscapes Update to biodiversity treaty proposes protecting at least 30% of Earth One six-week expedition discovered ten new songbird species and subspecies in Indonesia If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subscribe via Android, Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitche

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: Study declares ancient Chinese paddlefish extinct ‘Tainted timber’ from Myanmar widely used in yachts seized in the Netherlands New monkey discovered on “island” amid deforestation in Brazil Episode artwork of a panda keeper in China is courtesy of Ami Vitale. If you enjoy this show, please invite your friends to subsc

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: Tropical forests’ lost decade: the 2010s Central American countries pledge to protect Mesoamerica’s ‘5 Great Forests’ Mountain gorilla census reveals further increase in numbers 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 

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: Revealed: Government officials say permits for mega-plantation in Papua were falsified Hopes dim as COP25 delegates dicker over Article 6 and world burns: critics Newly spotted calves boost Javan rhino population to 72 If you enjoy

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: Malaysia’s last Sumatran rhino dies, leaving Indonesia as the final refuge Indonesia fires emitted double the carbon of Amazon fires, research shows Amazon deforestation rises to 11 year high in Brazil Agroforestry program in Appalachia receives $590,000 in federal funding If you enjoy this show, please invite your fr

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: Controversial dam gets green light to flood a Philippine protected area Emperor pe

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: Violence against indigenous peoples explodes in Brazil Study finds massive reorganization of life across Earth’s ecosystems $85 million initiative to scale up agroforestry in Africa announced Onc

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: Eight ape species, including Tapanuli orangutan, make first appearance on list of most endangered primates Madagascar calls for assistance as fires imperil its protected areas Rare songbird recovers, moves off endangered species list And see all of our coverage of deep sea mining issues here. If you enjoy thi

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: ‘Fu