Climate change parches Puerto Rico and Jamaica in rare early wet season drought (September 1, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/09/climate-change-parches-puerto-rico-and-jamaica-in-rare-early-wet-season-drought/
A severe drought that has parched the Caribbean since May 2026 was fueled by human-induced climate change, according to a recent study. The rapid analysis was released by World Weather Attribution (WWA), a global network of researchers who analyze the influence of climate change in extreme weather events. In the Caribbean, the wet season runs […]
The world’s reefs are disappearing. Coral trafficking is booming (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/the-worlds-reefs-are-disappearing-coral-trafficking-is-booming/
- There are more than 1,300 documented cases since 2000 of live coral smuggling, with many cases sourcing coral from Southeast Asia, including the Philippines and Indonesia, according to data from the wildlife trade watchdog TRAFFIC.
- The cases involve at least 43 countries around the world, with the U.S. by far the biggest importer of corals.
- The cases include 3.15 million pieces of coral, with many shipments intentionally mislabeled as toys, clothes, or food to get endangered species past customs inspectors.
- Experts say there are solutions, including farm-raised coral substitutes and dyeing farmed coral to document that it was not grown in the wild, making it easier for authorities to spot illegally harvested varieties.
Growing Indigenous food trees in East Africa fights malnutrition and biodiversity loss (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/growing-indigenous-food-trees-in-east-africa-fights-malnutrition-and-biodiversity-loss/
- In East Africa, many communities are experiencing both malnutrition and a loss of biodiversity due to deforestation.
- Despite this, tree-planting programs frequently focus on fast-growing, non-native species that can be utilized for timber, rather than food-bearing native trees.
- A recent workshop in Malawi provided landscape restoration workers with a tree-planting guide for local species and gathered information about what organizations and communities need to plant these trees more frequently.
- These findings are summarized in a new paper.
Gulf of Mexico’s unique Orca Basin shouldn’t become a carbon dump (commentary) (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/gulf-of-mexicos-unique-orca-basin-shouldnt-become-a-carbon-dump-commentary/
- Deep in the Gulf of Mexico, an ecosystem exists in water so salty and lacking in oxygen that its marine life is unique and virtually unstudied.
- Called the Orca Basin, it’s now the focus of a corporate effort to profit from fighting climate change by dumping tons of organic waste into its depths, a deep-sea biologist explains in a new op-ed.
- “The Orca Basin is not a waste repository waiting for a use. It is a living system that has been developing for thousands of years, hosting organisms we have barely begun to characterize, preserving a chemical and biological record we have barely begun to read,” the author argues.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the author, not necessarily of Mongabay.
Indigenous rangers pull killer ‘ghost nets’ from Australia’s northern coast (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/indigenous-rangers-pull-killer-ghost-nets-from-northern-australias-coast/
- Indigenous ranger groups across northern Australia are removing tons of ghost nets and other marine debris from some of the country’s most remote coastline, where abandoned fishing gear kills turtles, dugongs and sharks long after it is lost.
- The nets ride ocean currents into the Gulf of Carpentaria from Southeast Asia, and removing them is slow and dangerous work, though rangers are now using drones and AI to find nets faster than before.
- After funding for the patrols nearly lapsed, the Australian government committed AU$25 million ($18 million) over four years, most of it to continue the cleanups, and AU$4.5 million ($3.2 million) to stop nets from reaching the ocean in the first place.
- Rangers and advocates say the fix is not to blame any single country, but to address the problem at its source and keep supporting the Traditional Owners who care for this coastline.
Coastal Texas and Louisiana warned of tropical storm as a potential hurricane moves toward Hawaii (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/coastal-texas-and-louisiana-warned-of-tropical-storm-as-a-potential-hurricane-moves-toward-hawaii/
MIAMI (AP) — The National Hurricane Center issued a tropical storm warning on Monday for the Gulf of Mexico coast from the Galveston and Houston, Texas, area to the western parishes of Louisiana. As of late Monday morning, the potential tropical cyclone was centered about 120 miles (195 kilometers) south-southeast of Morgan City, Louisiana, and 230 miles […]
Singapore spending billions to adapt to climate change, but deforestation continues (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/singapore-spending-billions-to-adapt-to-climate-change-but-deforestation-continues/
- Singapore is preparing its first national climate adaptation plan as temperatures and extreme rainfall increase, but the city-state is also clearing forests for housing.
- The planned development of Maju Forest and Gillman Barracks has triggered rare public protests, with residents arguing that Singapore’s environmental impact assessments fail to account for forests’ role in climate adaptation.
- Scientists say forest loss could increase heat and flood risks, while Singapore is spending billions on engineered climate defenses such as drainage, seawalls and heat-resistant paint.
- The conflict puts Singapore’s “city in nature” vision under scrutiny, as conservationists question whether tree planting and managed greenery can compensate for the loss of forests.
Environmental crimes don’t stop at borders. Neither can the reporting (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/environmental-crimes-dont-stop-at-borders-neither-can-the-reporting/
- Daniela Quintero is a Colombian journalist and sociologist who develops and edits cross-border investigations as investigations editor at Mongabay Latam.
- Her work combines field reporting with official records, environmental databases, satellite imagery, scientific literature, and legal documents.
- Quintero has reported on glass-eel fishing in the Dominican Republic and the smuggling and laundering of illegally mined Amazonian gold through Venezuela.
- Quintero spoke with Mongabay founder and CEO Rhett Ayers Butler in the Colombian Amazon in July 2026 about her career, investigative methods, and interest in environmental journalism.
Gold miners breach a crucial refuge for rescued Sumatran orangutans (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/gold-miners-breach-a-crucial-refuge-for-rescued-sumatran-orangutans/
- New analysis by Indonesia’s largest environmental pressure group shows illegal goldminers have encroached Indonesia’s Jantho forest reservation, a vital reintroduction site for the charity workers and state biodiversity officials trying to save the critically endangered Sumatran orangutan from extinction.
- Global investors have rushed to buy gold to maintain wealth against inflation and political instability, exacerbated by the Trump administration and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
- The total area damaged by goldminers in Indonesia’s Jantho reservation according to satellite analysis exceeds 14 hectares (around 35 acres), equivalent to approximately 20 football pitches.
- A traditional administrator for the Jantho area in Aceh, a semiautonomous province of Indonesia, said 13 local villages had united against mining in the area, and had reported the miners to local authorities.
This rare wild cow is making a comeback (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/this-rare-wild-cow-is-making-a-comeback/
Thailand’s banteng (Bos javanicus) population has declined dramatically across much of its range. But inside Huai Kha Khaeng Wildlife Sanctuary, this rare wild cattle species is making a comeback. Anti-poaching efforts and community-led ecotourism have allowed banteng to return to the forests, benefiting both wildlife and local livelihoods.
Superb fairywrens disappearing in Australia’s capital: Conserving insects could help save them (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/superb-fairywrens-disappearing-in-australias-capital-conserving-insects-could-help-save-them/
- A three-decade study of Australia’s beloved superb fairywren revealed a substantial decline in what was previously considered a common species in the capital, Canberra. This population could disappear within decades.
- Researchers say this is part of a worrying trend of declining woodland birds and insects in Australia and across the globe, mainly driven by loss of habitat, pesticides and changing climate.
- The study highlighted the “catastrophic cumulative effect” that multiple small impacts from climate change can have on wildlife.
- Through collaborative efforts between ornithologists, entomologists and local communities, Australia could reshape its urban environments and better monitor the health of its birds: creating insect-friendly gardens and protecting and restoring bushy habitat could help slow its decline.
Scientists use satellites to track whale strandings in remote places from space (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/scientists-use-satellites-to-track-whale-strandings-in-remote-places-from-space/
- In the early 2000s, attempts to track cetaceans from space yielded only unidentifiable dark blobs; now, very high-resolution satellite imagery allows researchers to pinpoint specific whale species from orbit.
- This optical satellite technology provides access to remote parts of the world’s oceans, helping scientists establish vital baseline data on whale mortality trends, sea surface temperatures and ocean currents.
- Researchers emphasize that satellites will supplement, not replace, traditional field-work, as data quality remains vulnerable to environmental limitations, including cloud cover and heavy winds, and to satellite availability.
- Scientists are building global networks to improve consistency in data collection and are advocating for increased access to satellite data to better understand causes of whale strandings around the world.
Recording a rainforest before Indonesia’s new capital changes it (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/recording-a-rainforest-before-indonesias-new-capital-changes-it/
Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives and story summaries. In the forests around Pemaluan in East Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo, researchers led by Wendy Erb at the Cornell K. Lisa Yang Center for Conservation Bioacoustics in the U.S. have placed audio recorders on mountains, beside caves, and among […]
‘You can’t protect what you don’t know:’ Interview with marine scientist Loyiso Dunga (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/you-cant-protect-what-you-dont-know-interview-with-marine-scientist-loyiso-dunga/
- The Great African Seaforest is one of the only expanding kelp forests in the world. To better understand this important ecosystem, and why it should be conserved, marine biologist Loyiso Dunga set out to map the entire forest for the first time ever in 2016 using satellite imagery.
- Dunga now works on kelp forest conservation across the globe with both the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the Kelp Forest Alliance.
- As a member of an Indigenous community in South Africa, Dunga is sensitive to how conservation measures were employed during the country’s apartheid-era to expel coastal communities, and makes sure that other scientists include coastal communities in their work.
- “There is so much knowledge that is documented within coastal communities but is outside of science,” Dunga says. “I try to spend a lot of time understanding that, which also enriches my science.”
‘Lost’ for 170 years, rare plant recorded in Sri Lanka (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/lost-for-170-years-rare-plant-recorded-in-sri-lanka/
Researchers have a population of an extremely rare plant species, last recorded in Sri Lanka in 1855, growing in a lowland forest fragment along the Sitawaka Ganga River. Documenting the finding in a recent study, researchers write that the plant, Indianthus virgatus, while officially listed as critically endangered in Sri Lanka, was presumed possibly […]
For 50 years, Philip Fearnside has calculated the costs of losing the Amazon (August 31, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/for-50-years-philip-fearnside-has-calculated-the-costs-of-losing-the-amazon/
- Philip Fearnside has spent 50 years studying the practical limits of Amazon development, beginning with the agricultural settlements built along Brazil’s Trans-Amazonian Highway. His work repeatedly asked who benefits from projects and who bears their longer-term costs.
- He produced influential research on deforestation, forest carbon, tropical dams, and the wider effects of roads, often challenging official assumptions about emissions and economic viability. He later contributed to the IPCC’s work on climate change.
- Fearnside has paired research with public engagement, publishing in Portuguese, writing for Amazônia Real and Mongabay, speaking to journalists, and testifying on projects including the BR-319 highway. That role has also made him a target of hostility, including at a 2021 public hearing where his microphone was cut.
- Former students and colleagues credit him with generous, exacting mentorship and an unusual command of the scientific literature. At a recent tribute at Brazil’s National Institute for Amazonian Research, he rejected any suggestion of a farewell: he intends to keep working.
Turning the tables on invasive lionfish: How Honduran divers are fighting back (August 29, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/video/2026/08/turning-the-tables-on-lionfish-how-honduran-divers-are-fighting-back/
TELA, Honduras — Mario never set out to become a lionfish hunter. An engineer by training and founder of the local dive center Tela Divers, he simply wanted to do something about the growing number of invasive lionfish appearing on the reef where he learned to dive. Native to the Indo-Pacific and thought to have […]
Siraya language, deemed ‘extinct’ over a century ago, finds its voice again in Taiwan (August 29, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/siraya-language-deemed-extinct-over-a-century-ago-finds-its-voice-again-in-taiwan/
- A family of Siraya activists in Taiwan is a major driving force behind the revival of their ancestral language — more than a hundred years after it was last spoken.
- The work to revitalize the Siraya language, which began more than 20 years ago, helped secure the community’s legal recognition as Taiwan’s 17th Indigenous group.
- The story of the Siraya language’s revitalization began as a love story between Siraya activist Uma Talavan and Filipino musician Edgar Macapili.
- While she could not understand a Dutch missionary’s Siraya translation of the Gospel of Matthew, her husband recognized similarities between the Siraya language and his mother tongue, Bisaya, both of which belong to the Austronesian language family.
7 Indigenous Guarani killed after loose grain trailer hits car in central Brazil (August 29, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/short-article/2026/08/7-indigenous-guarani-killed-after-loose-grain-trailer-hits-car-in-central-brazil/
Seven Indigenous Guarani, including two children and a prominent community leader, were killed Aug. 14 in a crash with a grain cargo trailer that reportedly broke loose from the truck pulling it in central Brazil. All seven were from Kalipety village in the Tenondé Porã Indigenous Territory in São Paulo state. A fisher who witnessed […]
First Nations in Canada call for emergency order to protect southern mountain caribou (August 29, 2026)
https://news.mongabay.com/2026/08/first-nations-in-canada-calls-for-emergency-order-to-protect-southern-mountain-caribou/
- Southern mountain caribou are a type of caribou found in mature forests of western Canada, where they subsist on lichen as a winter food.
- Habitat loss — primarily driven by logging — has transformed their mature forest habitat, upsetting the predator-prey balance and leading to caribou declines.
- In the past 20 years, 15 of 40 southern mountain caribou herds in British Columbia and Alberta have winked out, including a transboundary herd that once ranged into the U.S. states of Idaho and Washington.
- In June, the Syilx Okanagan Nation asked the Canadian government to issue an emergency order to protect caribou, with a spokesperson calling provincial efforts insufficient to stop logging of caribou habitat within Syilx Okanagan traditional territory; the Xatśūll First Nation joined the petition in July.