Category Archives: Endangered species

Letting grass grow long boosts butterfly numbers, UK study proves

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Analysis of 60o gardens shows wilder lawns feed caterpillars and create breeding habitat

Good news for lazy gardeners: one labour-saving tweak could almost double the number of butterflies in your garden, according to a new scientific study – let the grass grow long.

In recent years nature lovers have been extolling the benefits of relaxed lawn maintenance with the growing popularity of the #NoMowMay campaign. Now an analysis of six years of butterfly sightings across 600 British gardens has provided the first scientific evidence that wilder lawns boost butterfly numbers.

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300,000ha Queensland cattle station bought for conservation after $21m donation

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State government and Nature Conservancy jointly purchase Vergemont station, which contains habitat for endangered night parrots

A Queensland outback cattle station the size of Yosemite national park which includes key habitat for the elusive night parrot has been acquired for conservation after an anonymous donation of $21m.

Vergemont station, 110km west of Longreach, was acquired in a joint purchase by the Queensland government and the Nature Conservancy, which brokered the deal. The group said it is likely the single largest philanthropic contribution to land protection in Australia.

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Top environmental groups say some of Labor’s new laws could take conservation backwards

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Alliance says there’s not enough ambition in proposed laws to prevent extinctions, as promised by the environment minister

The Albanese government is backing away from a promise to substantially transform how nature is protected in Australia and is planning some changes that would make things worse, according to eight of the country’s top environment groups.

The conservation organisations said they were concerned the government planned to break up promised legislation for new environmental laws and defer some difficult reforms until after the next election, if it wins a second term.

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Include a “call-in” power that allowed the minister to take over a decision from a proposed environment protection agency (EPA) “at any time and for any reason”.

Allow developers to make payments to a new “restoration contributions” fund to compensate for damage their projects caused to the environment. This would remove a requirement that environmental offsets provide a “like-for-like” replacement for ecosystems or species affected by a development.

Fail to give the new EPA the “teeth” it needed to be an independent and effective environmental regulator.

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House sparrow tops Big Garden Birdwatch charts for 21st year in a row

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Blue tits, starlings, wood pigeons and blackbirds next most sighted in RSPB survey involving 600,000 participants

A friendly if slightly tuneless chirp is the most ubiquitous birdsong in British gardens with the house sparrow topping the Big Garden Birdwatch charts for the 21st consecutive year, according to the annual RSPB survey.

Blue tits, starlings, wood pigeons and blackbirds were the next most-sighted birds by more than 600,000 participants in the world’s largest wildlife garden survey.

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Tanya Plibersek rejects Toondah Harbour project over impact on globally significant wetlands

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Walker Corporation had proposed 3,000 apartments, marina and shops for the site, which is a critical habitat for the endangered eastern curlew

• Toondah Harbour: should a wetland home to endangered birds become $1.3bn worth of shops, high-rises and a marina?
• To the moon and back with the eastern curlew

The environment and water minister, Tanya Plibersek, has announced she will reject an apartment and retail development on an internationally important wetland at Queensland’s Moreton Bay.

Plibersek said on Tuesday she would refuse Walker Corporation’s Toondah Harbour project – first proposed eight years ago and opposed by a long-running community campaign backed by scientists and conservationists – because it would have an unacceptable impact on the Ramsar site.

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Nile crocodiles and Burmese python among rare species seized in Spain

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Other endangered animals rescued in 2023 included a burrowing parrot, an African spurred tortoise and a blood-eared parakeet

Specialist wildlife police in eastern Spain have rescued an exotic list of endangered animals over the past year, including a pair of Nile crocodiles, an African spurred tortoise weighing 25kg and a 2-metre Burmese python.

The Seprona division of the Guardia Civil said in a statement on Sunday that its officers recovered “numerous examples” of species protected by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora during 2023.

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Reported plan to move Rosehill racecourse to endangered bell frog habitat surprises conservationists

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Horse racing industry insiders said to be pushing for Sydney track to be relocated to former brickpit in Olympic Park – a sanctuary to an unlikely urban survivor

Conservations have expressed surprise at reported plans to move Sydney’s Rosehill racecourse to a historic brickpit at Olympic Park, which is home to a colony of endangered green and golden bell frogs.

The plan has reportedly been devised by racing bosses, alongside the deal between the Australian Turf Club and the New South Wales government to redevelop the famous track into new housing, as well as two additional metro stations.

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France’s appetite for frogs’ legs is endangering species in Asia, say campaigners

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Scientists and vets are urging the president to afford the world’s most traded species better protections

France’s hunger for frogs’ legs is “destructive to nature” and endangering amphibians in Asia and south-east Europe, a group of scientists and vets have warned.

More than 500 experts from research, veterinary and conservation groups have called on Emmanuel Macron, the French president, to “end the overexploitation of frogs” and afford the most traded species better protections.

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Sydney’s 90m-year-old climbing galaxias fish may have been wiped out by school building works

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The species can climb waterfalls and reaches back to Gondwanaland – but there are fears polluted runoff has proven fatal

A “miracle fish” may have been snuffed out in its Sydney habitat by bungled construction work at a nearby government high school, local environmentalists fear.

The climbing galaxias (Galaxias brevipinnis) belongs to a species line reaching back to Gondwanaland. It was only identified in the Manly Dam region in Sydney’s north – the fish’s most northerly known location in Australia – in 1998.

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Greater glider put on path to extinction by NSW environmental watchdog, experts say

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Ecologists condemn watchdog decision, accusing it of making reckless changes to allow easier logging of state forests containing glider habitat

NSW’s environmental watchdog has put the endangered greater glider on a fast track to extinction by watering down logging protections, experts say.

Ecologists from WWF-Australia and Wilderness Australia have condemned the watchdog, accusing it of making reckless changes so Forestry Corporation can more easily log state forests.

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Court orders temporary halt to logging in Tasmanian forest ahead of swift parrot case

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Bob Brown Foundation wants logging banned in area of forest south of Hobart, claiming it is breeding habitat for endangered bird

Conservationists have won a temporary injunction to stop logging in an area of forest south of Hobart they say is breeding habitat for the critically endangered swift parrot.

The Tasmanian supreme court granted the injunction on Wednesday afternoon pending a hearing of the legal challenge brought by the Bob Brown Foundation.

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Just two northern white rhinos remain. An IVF breakthrough could save them from extinction

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The first successful embryo transfer in a southern white rhino paves the way for the technique to save their rarer northern cousins

The critically endangered northern white rhino could be saved from the brink of extinction after scientists performed the first successful embryo transfer in white rhinos.

After the last male northern white rhino, Sudan, died in 2018, the disappearance of the species looked imminent. Just two infertile female northern white rhinos – Fatu and Najin – remain, and are under 24-hour armed protection at a conservation reservation in Kenya. But a new scientific advancement means the mother and daughter may not be the last of their kind.

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‘The pigs have disappeared’: swine fever threatens food source for millions as disease hits wild herds

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Scientists call for urgent intervention, as bearded pig populations are devastated by the deadly virus on islands such as Borneo

Populations of wild pigs are crashing due to the spread of African swine fever (ASF), threatening the livelihoods of millions who depend on them for food, researchers warn.

With a fatality rate of almost 100%, ASF has swept across Asia, Europe and Africa, devastating domestic and wild pig populations over the past 10 to 20 years. The impacts are especially significant in Borneo, in south-east Asia, where bearded pig numbers have declined by between 90% and 100% since it arrived on the island in 2021, researchers said.

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More than 160 elephants die in Zimbabwe, with many more at risk

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Drought in Hwange national park was the cause of most of the deaths, and wildlife experts fear the climate crisis could make such events look normal

At least 160 elephants have died as drought conditions hit Zimbabwe, and with hot, dry weather likely to continue, conservationists fear there could be more deaths to come.

The elephants died between August and December last year in the 14,651 sq km Hwange national park, which is home to endangered elephants, buffalo, lions, cheetahs, giraffes and other species. At least six other elephants have recently been discovered dead outside the park in suspected poaching incidents.

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Birds of prey in Africa experiencing population collapse, study finds

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Several species have vanished across swathes of the continent – and scientists say their disappearance holds unknown risks for humans

Africa’s birds of prey have experienced a widespread population collapse that risks unforeseen consequences for humans, according to a new study.

Tropical raptor species including the martial eagle, the bateleur and the dark chanting goshawk have vanished from swathes of the African continent over the past 40 years, new analysis shows, as many wild areas were converted to farmland. Several African birds of prey are on track to become locally extinct in many countries this century.

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Alleged spearing of beloved blue groper in Sydney sparks outrage

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Department of primary industries investigating after protected fish species allegedly killed in Cronulla

The alleged spearing and killing of a protected fish species in Sydney over the weekend is being investigated.

According to local reports, onlookers were left outraged after an endangered blue groper (Achoerodus viridis) was allegedly speared and killed at Oak Park in Cronulla on Saturday.

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No sheep’s clothing needed: Colorado reintroduces five gray wolves

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Wolves are the first part of a plan to reintroduce the endangered species into the state after it was eradicated in the region

In an effort to restore an endangered species, Colorado just released five gray wolves in the western part of the state.

On Monday, Colorado parks and wildlife released two female and three male wolves on to remote public land. The predators were captured and brought over from Oregon, after Wyoming, Idaho and Montana refused to share their wolves citing interstate migration and financial concerns.

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Wayward wolf gets help in finding mate after odyssey across two US states

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A female Mexican gray wolf that was part of reintroduction efforts for the endangered species has been recaptured by officials

A match made in the wilds of New Mexico?

An endangered Mexican wolf captured last weekend after wandering hundreds of miles from Arizona to New Mexico is now being readied for a dating game of sorts as part of federal reintroduction efforts.

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‘Stop the rapid loss of nature’: Labor warned to clamp down on biodiversity offsets in environment law overhaul

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Biodiversity Council says offsets should be a last resort and only used for ‘nature that we can replace’

The federal government should significantly constrain the use of biodiversity offsets under its environmental law reform agenda and stop them being used for critically endangered wildlife, according to a report by a partnership of 11 universities.

The Biodiversity Council also called on the Albanese government to define its so-called “nature positive plan” in law and set targets for what it will mean in practice, warning that without a clear mandate in legislation the term “will simply become another political slogan”.

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Back from the brink: sand-swimming golden mole, feared extinct, rediscovered after 86 years

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Border collie Jessie sniffs out elusive species last seen in 1937 among dunes of South Africa

An elusive, iridescent golden mole not recorded since before the second world war has been rediscovered “swimming” in the sand near the coastal town of Port Nolloth in north-west South Africa.

The De Winton’s golden mole (Cryptochloris wintoni), previously feared extinct, lives in underground burrows and had not been seen since 1937. It gets its “golden” name from oily secretions that lubricate its fur so it can “swim” through sand dunes. This means it does not create conventional tunnels, making it all the harder to detect.

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