International Union for Conservation of Nature Archives

World Rhino Day: Powerful beast still faces existential threat

September 24, 202411 min

Saturday was World Rhino Day. The rhinoceros, a powerful, majestic creature that is found in parts of southern Asia and Africa, is still threatened with extinction, impacting the stability of the five keystone species that play a crucial role in keeping our ecosystem and environment safe, according to a press release from luxury watchmaker Hublot, sponsor of Save Our Rhinos Africa and India, or SORAI, founded by former international cricketer Kevin Pietersen in 2018. According...

by Staff Reporter

Flying Club Wild & Wonderful

China, Japan teamwork reviving crested ibis population

August 4, 20246 min

The crested ibis (scientific name Nipponia nippon), also known as the Asian or Japanese crested ibis, or toki, is a species cherished by the peoples of northeast Asia, who consider it the “bird of good fortune”. That belief did not, however, help the large bird with the distinctive red head and white plumes on the nape of the neck, and by the late 1970s, the crested ibis was practically extinct in its former range of...

by Staff Reporter

Flying Club Wild & Wonderful

20 critically endangered vultures bred in captivity ready for release in tiger reserves

July 9, 20247 min

Twenty critically endangered vultures—10 long-billed, the rest white-rumped—bred in captivity at a conservation facility in Haryana are set to be released into the wild at two tiger reserves in Maharashtra, the website News18.com reported. “This is the first such release of captive-bred, critically endangered vultures in Maharashtra,” the report quoted Kishor Rithe, director, Bombay Natural History Society, as saying. “We brought 20 birds from the Vulture Conservation Breeding and Research Centre at Pinjore, Haryana, early...

by Staff Reporter

Flying Club Wild & Wonderful

Rare dragonflies thrive at U.K.’s Wicken Fen nature ‘hot spot’

July 4, 20244 min

A low, flat wetland near Ely in Cambridgeshire, eastern England, has been named the U.K.’s 23rd dragonfly hot spot by the British Dragonfly Society, the BBC reported. Wicken Fen National Nature Reserve is also the first National Trust reserve to be named a dragonfly hot spot. In May, the reserve marked 125 years of being cared for by the trust. It has been recognized for its continuing conservation efforts to create ideal conditions for the...

by Sandy Pawpaw

Grounded Wild & Wonderful

Bornean elephant, world’s smallest, endangered; only about 1,000 left

June 30, 20246 min

Last week TheSnout.in reported the encouraging story of how the Iberian lynx has made a comeback from the brink of extinction. Now, halfway around the world in Southeast Asia, the Bornean elephant, the world’s smallest, has been assessed as “endangered”, with barely 1,000 individuals remaining in the wild as human activities in its habitat rise rapidly, according to the latest update to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List of Threatened Species. This...

by Staff Reporter

Grounded Wild & Wonderful

Iberian lynx makes a comeback from brink of extinction

June 26, 20246 min

The Iberian lynx, once the world’s most endangered cat, has made a remarkable recovery from the brink of extinction, thanks to extensive and coordinated conservation efforts in Spain and Portugal, The Associated Press reported. In the early 2000s, the population of the lynx, scientific name Lynx pardinus, had dwindled to 62 mature individuals in the wild. Habitat loss, a precipitous decline in the population of European rabbits, their primary prey, from disease, and expanding human...