International Union for Conservation of Nature Archives

Return of the Persian onager: An Arabian success story

December 6, 20247 min

The Prince Mohammed bin Salman Royal Reserve has announced the successful reintroduction of the Persian onager to Saudi Arabia, marking the return to the kingdom of the Asian wild ass subspecies after an absence of more than a century. Seven Persian onagers, scientific name Equus hemionus ssp. onager, were translocated from the Royal Society for the Conservation of Nature’s Shaumari Reserve in Jordan to the Prince Mohammed bin Salman Royal Reserve in April, establishing the...

by Sandy Pawpaw

Curious Tales Grounded Wild & Wonderful

Long-tailed macaques get no help from U.S. wildlife agency

November 9, 202412 min

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service last month declined to accept petitions filed by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals and other advocacy groups, including Born Free USA and Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, as well as renowned primatologists Jane Goodall and Biruté Mary Galdikas, to list long-tailed macaques (scientific name Macaca fascicularis) and southern pig-tailed macaques (Macaca nemestrina) under the Endangered Species Act, according to a press release from the National Association for...

by A Correspondent

Wild & Wonderful

Japan sends 16 crested ibises to China after 8 years

November 5, 20246 min

A total of 16 precious Japan-born crested ibises, offspring of birds sent from China, arrived in China last week following an event that unfolded on Sado island, Niigata Prefecture, Japan. The event marked not just a rare species exchange between China and Japan, but also a significant milestone in the longstanding ecological conservation collaboration between the two countries, according to reports in the Chinese daily Global Times and the Japanese news agency Kyodo. Representatives from...

by A Correspondent

Wild & Wonderful

Saudi Arabia’s ibex reserve in elite IUCN Green List

October 20, 20247 min

The Saudi National Center for Wildlife announced last week that the International Union for Conservation of Nature has included the Ibex Protected Area, to the south of the capital Riyadh, in its exclusive Green List of Protected and Conserved Areas. The ibex reserve, managed by the National Center for Wildlife, became the first in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to meet all the criteria and indicators required to join the elite list. According to the...

by Staff Reporter

Wild & Wonderful

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...