New Future

Scientists are finding microplastics everywhere they look for them. A new study finds these tiny plastic particles in sea turtle nests on a remote Malaysian island. Researchers warn that microplastics could alter nest temperatures, potentially skewing the sex ratio of incubating turtles that could further endanger species already facing significant challenges.

Edward Faison, an ecologist, stood quietly in a patch of forest that stretched for miles in all directions. Above him, the needles from white pine trees swayed — common in the Adirondack Forest Preserve in northern New York state.

Hidden within the Amazon Rainforest are rare, carbon-rich ecosystems known as peatlands, a type of swamp forest that’s key to combatting climate change through its capacity to absorb and store carbon. But in the mining hotspots of Peru, these peatland swamps are rapidly disappearing, one study has found.

ANTANANARIVO — In January, severe flooding caused by two cyclones severely damaged Itampolo’s Lavavolo Tortoise Center, located in Ampanihy on the southwest coast of Madagascar. The center is managed by the Turtle Survival Alliance and is dedicated to caring for rescued tortoises.

Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay’s founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives, and story summaries. Vincent van der Merwe, champion of the cheetah, died March 16, aged 42. For a species built for speed, cheetahs have run out of room.

Founder’s Briefs: An occasional series where Mongabay’s founder Rhett Ayers Butler shares analysis, perspectives and story summaries. Few creatures better embody the notion of peaceful coexistence than the manatee. Slow-moving and largely indifferent to human affairs, these aquatic herbivores graze on seagrasses and algae in the shallow coastal waters of the Americas and West Africa.

In a part of the world where throughout history only the pure white of snow and ice could be seen, today green moss and grass are emerging. Fish and penguins have begun to migrate south in search of colder regions.

JAKARTA — Hundreds of Indigenous people and civil society groups in Indonesia are demanding an end to government projects that have seized their lands, fueled violence, and stripped them of their rights.

KATHMANDU — In February this year, Indian media reported the rising number of cases involving tiger bone glue — an illicit sap-like substance made by pressure-cooking tiger bones and sold illegally in China, Vietnam and other countries across Southeast Asia as a supposed remedy for muscle-and-bone ailments and as an aphrodisiac.

COLOMBO — In July 2023, heavy rains continued in southern Sri Lanka for days, soaking the lush greenery of the village of Hapugala in Galle. Amid the downpour, journalist and naturalist Sajeewa Wijeweera received an unexpected call — not from the wild, but from just across his garden.

The Australian government recently promised and then broke its key environmental protection commitments, including the establishment of an environmental protection agency with legal authority to prevent extractive projects from moving forward without strict oversight, and the development of a robust accounting of the nation’s ecological health via an environmental information authority.

There was something almost subversive about David Myers’s approach to conservation. He spoke the language of developers, negotiated like one, and sometimes even thought like one — but his ambitions ran in the opposite direction.

The first roads that cut through rainforests are well-known conduits for deforestation. However, new research finds that secondary roads, those that branch off the primary road, cause far more forest loss than the original roads themselves. The conservation impacts of secondary roads have not been well understood.

KONSO, Ethiopia — As the first light of the morning sun breaks over the hills of Konso, Kawadaya Oldisha, 45, begins his daily routine of inspecting his terraced fields.