You can find shark meat in the United States in certain grocery stores, seafood markets and online — but the type of shark you’re buying might not be what you think it is, according to a new study.
In the study, published Wednesday in the Frontiers in Marine Science journal, researchers found meat from shark species at risk of extinction is commonly available in the U.S. under ambiguous or incorrect labels.
The study sampled 29 shark products: 19 filets purchased in grocery stores or markets in North Carolina, Florida, Georgia and Washington, D.C., and 10 jerky products bought online. DNA barcoding was used to determine the species of each product, which was then compared to the labels it was sold as.
“We found critically endangered sharks, including great hammerhead and scalloped hammerhead, being sold in grocery stores, seafood markets, and online. Of the 29 samples, 93% were ambiguously labeled as ‘shark,’ and one of the two products labeled at the species level was mislabeled,” Savannah J. Ryburn, a researcher at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, said in a news release.
Of the samples, 31% turned out to be from four endangered or critically endangered species: the great hammerhead, scalloped hammerhead, tope and shortfin mako sharks. Other samples were from another seven species, including the vulnerable spinner, lemon, common thresher and blacktip sharks, as well as the near threatened smooth-hound shark and Pacific angelshark.
These sales aren’t just putting the sharks at risk, the study’s authors said, as there could be health implications if consumers are not aware of what they are buying. For example, some of the species found, including scalloped hammerhead, great hammerhead and dusky smooth-hound sharks, are known to contain high levels of mercury and methylmercury, as well as arsenic, which can pose health risks.
“When consumers are purchasing ambiguously labeled or mislabeled shark meat, they have no way to know what species they are consuming and what the associated health risks might be,” the authors wrote.
To help fix this problem, Ryburn said U.S. sellers should be required to provide species-specific names. “And when shark meat is not a food security necessity, consumers should avoid purchasing products that lack species-level labeling or traceable sourcing,” she advised.
Sara Moniuszko is a health and lifestyle reporter at CBSNews.com. Previously, she wrote for USA Today, where she was selected to help launch the newspaper’s wellness vertical. She now covers breaking and trending news for CBS News’ HealthWatch.
Florida authorities have agreed to review the issuing of special permits allowing companies to capture endangered creatures to sell, after an outcry over the netting of a huge manta ray for an aquarium in the Middle East.
The review comes after a viral video released on 12 July showed a boat crew capturing a giant manta ray off a Panama City beach in Florida and on to their boat, sparking outrage among the community. A dolphin tour operator who witnessed and filmed the scene confronted the crew and asked whether they would release the manta ray, but they explained they had a legal permit.
“The manta ray was hooked under the wing, and it was obviously exhausted,” Denis Richard, the founder of the Water Planet US dolphin tour company, who filmed the video, said in a telephone interview on Saturday. “I started telling them that they should be ashamed of themselves,” he added of the men capturing the ray.
It was later confirmed that the crew were contractors working for SeaWorld Abu Dhabi to supply an aquarium there, and the company holding the permit was Dynasty Marine Associates, based in Marathon, Florida. The permit was issued by the Florida fish and wildlife conservation commission (FWC).
The plankton-feeding giant manta ray, the world’s largest ray with a wingspan up to 26ft, is federally listed as an endangered species, with commercial fishing as its greatest US threat. The species is both directly targeted and caught as bycatch. Manta rays are especially valued in specialized commercial circles for their gill plates, which are traded internationally.
After the video went viral, a bipartisan group of Florida lawmakers signed a letter urging Florida’s wildlife agency to revoke the permit that allowed the manta ray to be caught. The letter also called for the suspension of any future “marine special activity licenses” that allow for the limited capture of endangered species, as reported earlier by various Florida media outlets.
“This practice raises fundamental concerns about the FWC’s role in upholding its mission of conservation and wildlife preservation,” reads the letter signed by Republican congressman Brian Mast, independent state senator Jason Pizzo and state house representatives Lindsay Cross, a Democrat, and Peggy Gossett-Seidman and Meg Weinberger, both of whom are Republican.
Dynasty Marine Associates did not immediately respond to a request for comment from the Guardian.
Rodney Barreto, chair of the FWC, replied to the lawmakers’ letter on Friday, confirming that the agency would “revisit” the policies that allows companies to capture federally protected marine species for aquariums. He said the rule hearings will occur in 2026. He also said the agency, since 19 August, stopped issuing the permits that allow the capture of sharks and manta rays listed under the Endangered Species Act.
“We understand both your concerns and those raised by the public following the recent harvest of a giant manta ray,” Barreto wrote. “We are revisiting our policies related to issuing [marine special activity licenses] involving prohibited marine species.”
The move represents progress for marine wildlife advocates such as Richard.
“The manta ray is on the list of protected species, and there is a reason,” he said. “The species is on its way out, like a lot of other species, so they need to be protected. If they’re not, then their number will dwindle, and we’ll see what’s happened with many species that aren’t on this planet any more.”
Two federally endangered fish were found in the Des Moines River earlier this spring.
The Iowa Department of Natural Resources recently announced that two pallid sturgeons were found this spring as part of the DNR’s annual spring sturgeon sampling effort, which has occurred since 2014.
“We were very in-tune and very concerned about our sturgeon species here in Iowa,” Mark Flammang, a DNR fisheries biologist, said. “The pallid sturgeon wasn’t even on our radar because it wasn’t one that we expected to actually find in the Des Moines River.”
Where was the pallid sturgeon found in Iowa?
The two pallid sturgeons the Iowa Department of Natural Resources found in the Des Moines River near Ottumwa, Iowa during the spring of 2025.
The first pallid sturgeon was collected by DNR staff at the end of April, with the second one being discovered less than a week later during the first week of May. They were found in the lower part of the Des Moines River near Ottumwa.
They are “probably decades old,” Flammang said, but relatively young for a sturgeon, as they can live up to 150 years, according to the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. He said when they were collected, they were “very much healthy” and doing “quite well at the time.”
How rare is finding a pallid sturgeon in Iowa?
The pallid sturgeon is one of the rarest and most endangered species in North America. It was placed on the U.S. federal endangered species list in 1990 due to declines in its population.
Flammang said pallid sturgeons are typically found in the Missouri River and are not well known in the Mississippi River north of St. Louis. He also said the two pallid sturgeons were naturally reproduced and not reproduced from a hatchery.
“Not only did we catch a fish we werent expecting, that’s federally endangered, but also that was produced naturally, so it’s kind of a trifecta,” he said. “You can’t get rarer than that.”
He said DNR staff took a fish tissue sample from the two pallid sturgeons and released them both back in the waters.
“It’s imperative that anglers know that they must release these fish back in the river immediately, and that the [Iowa DNR] also follows these rules as well,” he said.
How to identify a pallid sturgeon
According to the Iowa DNR, the Pallid sturgeon can be identified by having a smooth belly, outer barbels that are twice as long as the inner ones, and a ‘U’-shaped barbel base with the inner pair positioned slightly forward.
Cooper Worth is a service/trending reporter for the Des Moines Register. Reach him at cworth@gannett.com or follow him on X @CooperAWorth.
A Wyoming man who allegedly hit a wolf with a snowmobile, taped the wounded animal’s mouth shut and showed it off in a rural bar before killing it has been indicted on an animal cruelty charge by a grand jury nearly a year and a half after the incident.Cody Roberts last year paid a $250 fine for illegal possession of wildlife but avoided more serious charges as investigators struggled to find cooperative witnesses. Wyoming law gives wide leeway for people to kill wolves and other predators by a variety of means in the vast majority of the state.Even so, the 12-person grand jury found enough evidence over the past two weeks to support the charge of felony animal cruelty, Sublette County Attorney Clayton Melinkovich said in a statement Wednesday.Melinkovich had no further comment on the case. Roberts has not commented on the case and did not have a listed working number, nor an attorney on file in state District Court who might comment on his behalf.If convicted, Roberts faces up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine.Widely circulated photos showed a man identified as Roberts posing with the wolf, its mouth bound with tape, on Feb. 29, 2024, in a bar near Daniel, a town of about 150 people about 50 miles south of Jackson.Video clips showed the same animal lying on a floor, alive but barely moving.The light punishment against Roberts led to calls for a Wyoming tourism boycott, to little apparent effect. Yellowstone National Park had its second-busiest year on record in 2024, up more than 5% from 2023.Grand juries in Wyoming are rare. The last one to get significant attention, in 2019, found that a sheriff’s deputy did not commit involuntary manslaughter by killing an unarmed man after a traffic stop.Government-sponsored poisoning, trapping and bounty hunting all but wiped out wolves in the lower 48 states in the 19th and 20th centuries. Starting in the 1990s, a reintroduction program brought them back to Yellowstone and central Idaho, and their numbers have rebounded.Though wolves remain listed as a federally endangered or threatened species in most of the country, they have no such protection in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, where they can be hunted and trapped.Exceptions include Yellowstone and neighboring Grand Teton National Park, where hunting is prohibited and the wild canines are a major attraction for millions of tourists. In 85% percent of Wyoming, wolves are classified as predators and can be freely killed by virtually any means.The so-called predator zone includes Sublette County, where the wolf was killed. Groups including the Humane Society argued that Wyoming’s animal cruelty law could nonetheless apply there.
CHEYENNE, Wyo. —
A Wyoming man who allegedly hit a wolf with a snowmobile, taped the wounded animal’s mouth shut and showed it off in a rural bar before killing it has been indicted on an animal cruelty charge by a grand jury nearly a year and a half after the incident.
Cody Roberts last year paid a $250 fine for illegal possession of wildlife but avoided more serious charges as investigators struggled to find cooperative witnesses. Wyoming law gives wide leeway for people to kill wolves and other predators by a variety of means in the vast majority of the state.
Even so, the 12-person grand jury found enough evidence over the past two weeks to support the charge of felony animal cruelty, Sublette County Attorney Clayton Melinkovich said in a statement Wednesday.
Melinkovich had no further comment on the case. Roberts has not commented on the case and did not have a listed working number, nor an attorney on file in state District Court who might comment on his behalf.
If convicted, Roberts faces up to two years in prison and a $5,000 fine.
Widely circulated photos showed a man identified as Roberts posing with the wolf, its mouth bound with tape, on Feb. 29, 2024, in a bar near Daniel, a town of about 150 people about 50 miles south of Jackson.
Video clips showed the same animal lying on a floor, alive but barely moving.
The light punishment against Roberts led to calls for a Wyoming tourism boycott, to little apparent effect. Yellowstone National Park had its second-busiest year on record in 2024, up more than 5% from 2023.
Grand juries in Wyoming are rare. The last one to get significant attention, in 2019, found that a sheriff’s deputy did not commit involuntary manslaughter by killing an unarmed man after a traffic stop.
Government-sponsored poisoning, trapping and bounty hunting all but wiped out wolves in the lower 48 states in the 19th and 20th centuries. Starting in the 1990s, a reintroduction program brought them back to Yellowstone and central Idaho, and their numbers have rebounded.
Though wolves remain listed as a federally endangered or threatened species in most of the country, they have no such protection in Idaho, Montana and Wyoming, where they can be hunted and trapped.
Exceptions include Yellowstone and neighboring Grand Teton National Park, where hunting is prohibited and the wild canines are a major attraction for millions of tourists. In 85% percent of Wyoming, wolves are classified as predators and can be freely killed by virtually any means.
The so-called predator zone includes Sublette County, where the wolf was killed. Groups including the Humane Society argued that Wyoming’s animal cruelty law could nonetheless apply there.
AUSTIN, Texas, April 1, 2025 (Newswire.com)
– enChoice, a trusted leader in content automation for over 30 years, is deepening its dedication to wildlife conservation through a new partnership with SAFE Worldwide. This collaboration strengthens enChoice’s ongoing Saving the Rhino initiative by providing a direct way for supporters to contribute to the protection of the critically endangered Javan rhino-one of the world’s rarest rhino species.
SAFE Worldwide is an internationally recognized organization devoted to protecting animals facing extinction. Through this partnership, enChoice’s Saving the Rhino program will expand to support conservation efforts in Indonesia’s Ujung Kulon National Park, the only remaining habitat for the Javan rhino. Donations made through SAFE Worldwide will go entirely toward critical initiatives, including anti-poaching operations, habitat preservation, wildlife rescue, and community education programs.
Historically, rhinos faced no natural predators. However, rampant poaching, driven by the illegal wildlife trade, has pushed multiple species to the brink of extinction. enChoice has long been dedicated to leveraging advanced technology to combat poaching threats. Now, by joining forces with SAFE Worldwide, enChoice is taking another step forward in its mission to safeguard these majestic creatures.
“By partnering with SAFE Worldwide, enChoice not only strengthens its commitment to rhino conservation but also expands its ability to protect other endangered species. This marks an exciting new chapter in enChoice’s philanthropic journey – one that leverages innovative technology with dedicated conservation efforts to create a future where endangered wildlife can thrive,” commented Tony White, Chairman at enChoice.
SAFE Worldwide’s commitment to transparency and ethical funding was a major factor in enChoice’s decision to partner. The organization ensures that 100% of donations go directly toward conservation projects, with administrative costs covered by private funding.
Supporters can now contribute to enChoice’s Saving the Rhino program by donating through the SAFE Worldwide website at safeworldwide.org/donate-on-behalf-of-enchoice. Donors can choose to allocate funds to the area of greatest need or specify their contributions for anti-poaching efforts, wildlife rescue, or community education programs.
This partnership builds on enChoice’s existing conservation initiatives, including its pioneering SPARK (Sentinel Protection Against Rhino Killing) program. In collaboration with the Welgevonden Game Reserve in South Africa, enChoice helped implement AI-driven monitoring systems that analyze animal behavior to detect poaching threats before they occur. The program demonstrated remarkable success, significantly reducing poaching rates by utilizing advanced digital tracking and real-time alert systems.
enChoice is a leading provider of intelligent content and process automation solutions, helping organizations fuel their AI journey. For over 30 years, enChoice has been trusted by Fortune 500 companies and public-sector agencies to optimize operations, enhance compliance, and improve customer experiences. Beyond its business mission, enChoice is also deeply committed to giving back, most notably through its Saving the Rhino program, which supports global wildlife conservation efforts aimed at protecting critically endangered rhinos and other threatened species. Visit www.enchoice.com.
About SAFE Worldwide
SAFE Worldwide is dedicated to creating sustainable solutions for the protection of endangered species and their habitats through education, community outreach, and global partnerships with wildlife conservation organizations. When you support SAFE Worldwide, you help save wildlife and their habitat across the globe – and 100% of every donation goes directly to field projects that save wildlife and protect their environments. SAFE Worldwide is a US non-profit 501(c)(3), so your donation is tax-deductible, as permitted by US law (EIN- 81-3680190). Learn more at www.safeworldwide.org.
New Report Highlights Alarming Forest Loss in Madagascar’s Protected Areas, Urges Immediate Global Action to Save Irreplaceable Biodiversity
ANTANANARIVO, Madagascar, December 12, 2024 (Newswire.com)
– The Madagascar Protected Area Consortium released a landmark report revealing that Madagascar – home to some of Earth’s most unique biodiversity – is approaching a critical tipping point as 90% of all primary forest cover has now been destroyed.
The “Madagascar Protected Area Outlook 2024,” the first comprehensive analysis of its kind, documents an alarming trajectory: nearly half of Madagascar’s terrestrial Protected Areas are on track to lose their remaining primary forests within a few decades without immediate intervention.
Key Findings
The assessment of all 109 terrestrial Protected Areas reveals that deforestation has accelerated at an alarming rate in recent years. Critical findings include:
Between 2014-2023, deforestation across Madagascar exceeded an area greater than 1 soccer pitch per minute for ten years.
Only 10% of Madagascar’s original primary forest cover remains.
Projections indicate over half of all remaining forest cover in Protected Areas will be destroyed by 2026.
45% of Protected Areas in Madagascar face serious to extreme forest loss.
A Call for Immediate Action
Solofo Rakotoarisoa, Senior Conservation Officer at Conservation Allies, stated: “This assessment fundamentally changes our understanding of the conservation crisis in Madagascar. We’ve identified the most threatened protected areas and have concrete solutions ready for implementation. What we need now is immediate international support to prevent irreversible losses.”
Madagascar represents an irreplaceable global biodiversity treasure, with over 90% of its wildlife endemic to this isolated island in the Indian Ocean. Endangered species like the Silky sifaka, Aye-aye, and Radiated tortoise – found nowhere else on Earth – cannot survive without these rapidly disappearing habitats. Madagascar’s Protected Areas are the final barrier between thousands of unique species and extinction.
Madagascar Protected Area Consortium partners have identified key and strategic intervention areas requiring immediate support from the donor community:
Strengthening enforcement of Protected Areas
Implementing innovative protection measures
Supporting sustainable community development
Alain Liva Raharijaona, Executive Director of FAPBM (Madagascar Protected Areas and Biodiversity Fund), emphasized: “The window for action is closing fast, but with the right support, we can still preserve these irreplaceable ecosystems. This is a critical moment for the global conservation community to demonstrate its commitment to protecting biodiversity.”
About the Madagascar Protected Areas Consortium
The Madagascar Protected Areas Consortium is a coalition of conservation organizations working to protect Madagascar’s ecosystems. Through sustainable management initiatives and community engagement, the Consortium aims to safeguard the island’s unique biodiversity and combat the rapid deforestation crisis.
In the summer of 2022, I was walking on the beach at Half Moon Bay in California, when I saw the strangest thing approaching on the waves. When it struck the shore and deflated, I knew: it was a dead whale.
But it wasn’t just any whale. It was Fran.
“I knew this whale, and I’m like, Ohhhhh. It just hit my heart, because Fran, at the time, she was the most well-known whale in our entire database,” said Ted Cheeseman, the creator of HappyWhale.com. That’s a database of whale sightings, which includes more than 850 pictures of Fran the humpback whale, identified by her tail markings.
Nobody knows exactly how many whales are ship-strike victims every year, but many whale species on the endangered species list are threatened by cruise and container ship traffic.
CBS News
“She had a big personality,” said Cheeseman. “She was playful around whale watch boats. You know, you’d hear on the radio, ‘Hey, Fran’s over here!’ ‘Oh cool, you know, let’s go hang out with Fran!'”
Fran had a baby, known as Aria, who was now orphaned. “We didn’t know if the calf could survive,” Cheeseman said. “I didn’t think so. I didn’t think it was very likely.”
Fran died from a collision with one of the cruise ships and container ships that make more than 200 million trips a year.
According to Sean Hastings, a policy manager for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), ship strikes and entanglements in fishing gear were the number one and number two threats to whales.
Nobody knows exactly how many whales are ship-strike victims every year, because most of them sink after they’re hit. But blue whales, humpbacks, and fin whales are on the endangered list, and the Northern right whale is just about extinct – only about 350 of them are left on Earth.
“That’s why every whale counts, so that we can bring their populations back and help them recover,” Hastings said.
The good news is that the shipping companies themselves say they care.
“There’s no one in our industry that wants to see any one of these magnificent creatures harmed or killed by anything we do,” said Bud Darr, policy director for the world’s largest shipping company, MSC.
He showed me why ship captains can’t just steer clear of whales. The bow of even one of MSC’s smaller container ships is hundreds of feet away from where the captain sits. And even if you could spot a whale ahead, there’s not much you could do about it.
“The ship is an extremely large object,” said Darr. “It’s moving very fast, and it’s noisy. I mean, you may not know there was impact with a whale at all, if there was. Unfortunately, we’ve had whales that have remained on a bulbous bow of a ship when it’s come in.”
The view from the bridge of a container ship.
CBS News
One obvious solution: Move the shipping routes. Darr said, “Off of Sri Lanka, we realized if we could just move where we operate, about 15 miles further offshore from where that was, you could reduce the risk [of strikes] by 95% or more.”
But the approach channels to most ports don’t have the room for rerouting. So, the second-best Idea is to slow the ships down, from about 18 mph to 12 mph. Hastings said, “By slowing ships down, it gives the whales more opportunity to get out of the way. And in the event that they are struck, there’s a higher likelihood of survivorship. This is much akin to having a slow-speed zone around a school.”
There’s an emissions payoff for the ports, too. “Slower ships emit less air pollution, and reduce the amount of greenhouse gases they emit out of their stacks,” Hastings said.
But rerouting and slowing down both require a key piece of data for the ship captains: Are there whales ahead? And that’s where technology comes in.
At the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute, marine ecologist Mark Baumgartner’s lab operates a fleet of autonomous vehicles called Slocum Gliders that “fly” beneath the waves listening for whale song.
Launching a Slochum Glider autonomous vehicle, which glides under the ocean’s surface to collect data, then transmits it to Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.
CBS News
“Every two hours, the vehicle comes to the surface, uses the antenna to send all that information home to a computer in my lab,” Baumgartner said.
He’s also deploying an array of microphone buoys. The whole point of all these machines is to listen for whale song.
Ship captains receive word of the whale locations from the buoys and gliders so they can slow down. But on the West Coast, slowing down is voluntary.
Buoys from the Benioff Ocean Science Laboratory help collect whale data, to reduce collisions between ships and whales in the Santa Barbara Channel and San Francisco Bay.
CBS News
At WhaleSafe.com, you can see the paths of the ships … the locations of the whales … and letter grades for shipping company compliance. About 30% of them still plow ahead full-speed, ignoring the warnings.
MSC’s Bud Darr can tell you why: “There is some impact on the schedule. There is some impact on cost that probably comes with that. And that takes a lot of sophistication and planning to mitigate that and get that right. But most of these solutions are manageable.”
Compliance is also voluntary on most of the East Coast, so ships continue to kill Northern right whales. NOAA has proposed a regulation that would make the slowdowns mandatory in more areas.
Mark Baumgartner is cautiously optimistic: “If I didn’t have a little bit of hope, I’d just go home and curl up in a ball and be done with it,” he said. “So, it helps keep me going.”
Well, maybe this will cheer him up: Remember Aria, Fran’s baby whale? Whale tracker Ted Cheeseman received a phone call from a naturalist: “He says, ‘Hey, Ted, I think I’ve seen Aria just now. Can you confirm this?’ And then he texts me a photo. I confirmed. I was like, ‘Yes! So exciting! Aria’s alive!
“Hopefully in a few years’ time, she’ll bring a calf here,” Cheeseman said. “And if we protect them from ship strikes, if we continue to protect them from entanglements, if we continue to protect the healthy ocean, you know, happily ever after, I hope.”
David Pogue is a six-time Emmy winner for his stories on “CBS Sunday Morning,” where he’s been a correspondent since 2002. Pogue hosts the CBS News podcast “Unsung Science.” He’s also a New York Times bestselling author, a five-time TED speaker, and host of 20 NOVA science specials on PBS. For 13 years, he wrote a New York Times tech column every week – and for 10 years, a Scientific American column every month.
Here’s some good news to close the workweek on. On Friday, government officials in Indonesia announced the arrival of a new Javan rhino calf within its borders—a female dubbed Iris. Javan rhinos (Rhinoceros sondaicus) are the most endangered species of rhino in the world.
Iris was actually spotted earlier this May in Ujung Kulon National Park, thanks to an ongoing effort by the government’s Ministry of Environment and Forestry to monitor the only remaining Javan rhino population worldwide using camera traps. She was recorded walking alongside her mother, Putri. Since Putri has never been seen with a calf until now, it’s likely that Iris is her first child. Based on the footage, Iris was deemed to be around three to five months old at the time, and she appeared to be in good health.
Javan rhinos are relatively small compared to their rhino cousins, even though the tiniest adults can still weigh 2,000 pounds. Only male Javan rhinos have a (singular) horn, which are also smaller than the horns seen on other species. Around 80 Javan rhinos are estimated to currently exist, making them the most threatened of the five living rhino species in the world. Following the death of the last Javan rhino in Vietnam in 2009, all such rhinos today are thought to live in Ujung Kulon National Park, located on the westernmost tip of Java. So any successful Javan rhino birth is cause for celebration.
While Iris did seem to be doing well, and Javan rhinos in the park are legally protected by the government, these animals still face a precarious life. Since last year, Indonesian authorities have arrested at least six alleged poachers under suspicion of having killed 26 Javan rhinos, though it’s not clear how this hunting has affected the overall population. In addition to illegal hunting, the rhinos are still at risk from diseases, predators, and natural disasters. Their small population numbers also make them more susceptible to genetic disorders caused by inbreeding.
“For that reason, we and all parties who help in the Javan rhino conservation efforts must not be careless and must always anticipate any threats that may emerge,” Ardi Andono, head of Ujung Kulon National Park, told Antara, an Indonesian news outlet.
Iris seems to be the third new Javan rhino calf spotted this year. In April, Ujung Kulon National Park officials publicly announced an earlier calf sighting. Officials could not make out the gender of this calf, though they similarly estimated it to be between three to five months old. This calf was officially designated ID.093.2024, while Iris has been given the designation ID.094.2024. These sightings follow reports of new calves in both 2022 and 2023.
IPSWICH — An endangered species of turtle was caught and released back into the Ipswich River last week after being spotted sitting on the rocks directly below the Ipswich Mills Dam.
Ipswich River Watershed Association staff and MassWildlife investigated the reported sighting to discover a male Northern red-bellied cooter. The seemingly lonesome turtle was then brought into MassWildlife for further assessment and to be microchipped with a VHF radio transmitter so its movements can be monitored over the remainder of the summer.
There was no data to suggest the turtle came from known populations in southeastern Massachusetts. So, MassWildlife and U.S. Fish and Wildlife decided to release him back into the Ipswich River — above the dam, as its behavior suggested it was attempting to move upstream, and it is a freshwater species that’s less suitable for tidal habitats.
“We could not conclusively determine that the male from the dam had originated in southeastern Massachusetts, so it was not clearly the best management decision to release the turtle in that area,” MassWildlife Herpetologist Mike Jones said.
“And because the animal found near Peatfield landing and reported last year was clearly different from the male found at the dam, we would like to better understand the extent and size of this occurrence.”
The cooter sighting was the second ever recorded in the Ipswich River, and the first to be microchipped.
Last year, as the Ipswich Mills Dam removal pursued permitting approval, the Ipswich River Watershed Association submitted photos for review, which happened to capture images of another red-bellied cooter. The discovery is not expected to delay the planned dam removal.
Although the nearest known population of the species is far away in Plymouth, archaeological evidence suggests they inhabited the Ipswich River 1,000 years ago, making this the first confirmed sighting in modern times.
“We’re very excited to be working with MassWildlife to learn more about the red-bellied cooter and what their place in the Ipswich River might be,” IRWA Restoration Program Director Neil Shea said.
“The opportunity to track this animal and learn more about its behavior is very unique and speaks to the incredible biodiversity that we have throughout the Ipswich River.”
Northern red-bellied cooters are listed as endangered on both the Massachusetts and Federal Endangered Species Lists. In the 1980s, the estimated total population of cooters in Massachusetts was about 300, with the next-nearest population being 200 miles away in New Jersey.
Cooters resemble the common Eastern painted turtle, but are significantly larger, weighing up to 12 pounds. The basking turtles have a black to brown upper shell with faint reddish markings, which become more pronounced in males and darker with age.
MassWildlife’s Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program have released 5,000 “head-started” hatchlings into southeastern Massachusetts’ ponds and waterways since the program began 40 years ago.
Through the program, turtle hatchlings are removed from the wild and placed in a warm aquarium environment at educational and scientific facilities across the state for eight to nine months before being released back into the wild, accelerating their growth and protecting them from predators during their first year of life when they are most vulnerable.
MassWildlife and the IRWA will continue to monitor the movements of the released cooter to help determine if there are more than two of the species present in the Ipswich River.
Paddlers are encouraged to keep an eye out for the species along the river, especially in Topsfield and Ipswich, and share photos by email at nheritage@mass.gov
IPSWICH — An endangered species of turtle was caught and released back into the Ipswich River last week after being spotted sitting on the rocks directly below the Ipswich Mills Dam.
Ipswich River Watershed Association (IRWA) staff and MassWildlife investigated the reported sighting to discover a male Northern red-bellied cooter. The seemingly lonesome turtle was then brought into MassWildlife for further assessment and to be microchipped with a VHF radio transmitter so its movements can be monitored over the remainder of the summer.
There was no data to suggest the turtle came from known populations in southeastern Massachusetts. So, MassWildlife and US Fish and Wildlife decided to release him back into the Ipswich River — above the dam, as its behavior suggested it was attempting to move upstream, and it is a freshwater species that’s less suitable for tidal habitats.
“We could not conclusively determine that the male from the dam had originated in southeastern Massachusetts, so it was not clearly the best management decision to release the turtle in that area,” MassWildlife Herpetologist Mike Jones said.
“And because the animal found near Peatfield landing and reported last year was clearly different from the male found at the dam, we would like to better understand the extent and size of this occurrence.”
The cooter sighting was the second ever recorded in the Ipswich River, and the first to be microchipped.
Last year, as the Ipswich Mills Dam removal pursued permitting approval, the Ipswich River Watershed Association submitted photos for review, which happened to capture images of another red-bellied cooter. The discovery is not expected to delay the planned dam removal.
Although the nearest known population of the species is far away in Plymouth, archaeological evidence suggests they inhabited the Ipswich River 1,000 years ago, making this the first confirmed sighting in modern times.
“We’re very excited to be working with MassWildlife to learn more about the red-bellied cooter and what their place in the Ipswich River might be,” IRWA Restoration Program Director Neil Shea said.
“The opportunity to track this animal and learn more about its behavior is very unique and speaks to the incredible biodiversity that we have throughout the Ipswich River.”
Northern red-bellied cooters are listed as endangered on both the Massachusetts and Federal Endangered Species Lists. In the 1980s, the estimated total population of cooters in Massachusetts was about 300, with the next-nearest population being 200 miles away in New Jersey.
Cooters resemble the common Eastern painted turtle, but are significantly larger, weighing up to 12 pounds. The basking turtles have a black to brown upper shell with faint reddish markings, which become more pronounced in males and darker with age.
MassWildlife’s Natural Heritage and Endangered Species Program have released 5,000 “head-started” hatchlings into southeastern Massachusetts’ ponds and waterways since the program began 40 years ago.
Through the program, turtle hatchlings are removed from the wild and placed in a warm aquarium environment at educational and scientific facilities across the state for eight to nine months before being released back into the wild, accelerating their growth and protecting them from predators during their first year of life when they are most vulnerable.
MassWildlife and the IRWA will continue to monitor the movements of the released cooter to help determine if there are more than two of the species currently present in the Ipswich River.
Paddlers are encouraged to keep an eye out for the species along the river, especially in Topsfield and Ipswich, and share photos by email at nheritage@mass.gov
NEW YORK — A fleet of drones patrolling New York City’s beaches for signs of sharks and struggling swimmers is drawing backlash from an aggressive group of seaside residents: local shorebirds.
Since the drones began flying in May, flocks of birds have repeatedly swarmed the devices, forcing the police department and other city agencies to adjust their flight plans. While the attacks have slowed, they have not stopped completely, fueling concern from wildlife experts about the impact on threatened species nesting along the coast.
Veronica Welsh, a wildlife coordinator at the Parks Department, said the birds were “very annoyed by the drones” from the moment they arrived on the beach.
“They will fly at it, they’ll swoop at it, they’ll be vocalizing,” Welsh said. “They think they’re defending their chicks from a predator.”
No birds have been harmed, but officials say there have been several close calls. The drones, which come equipped with inflatable life rafts that can be dropped on distressed swimmers, have yet to conduct any rescues. They spotted their first shark on Thursday, resulting in a closure of most of the beach.
City officials said the “swarming incidents” have been primarily carried out by American oystercatchers. The shorebird, known for its striking orange bill, lays its eggs this time of year in the sand on Rockaway Beach. While its population has improved in recent decades, federal authorities consider the species a “high conservation concern.”
The birds eventually may grow habituated to the devices, which can stretch over 3 feet (nearly a meter) long and emit a loud hum as they take flight, said David Bird, a professor of wildlife biology at McGill University.
But he was quick to raise a far more dire possibility: that the drones could prompt a stress response in some birds that causes them to flee the beach and abandon their eggs, as several thousand elegant terns did following a recent drone crash in San Diego.
“We don’t know a lot about what sort of distance is required to protect the birds,” he said. “But we do know there are birds on this beach that are highly endangered. If they abandon their nests because of the drones, that would be a disaster.”
On Rockaway Beach, a popular summertime destination for New Yorkers, American oystercatchers share their habitat with multiple tern species of waterbirds, as well as piping plovers, a small, sand-colored bird that is the city’s only federally designated endangered species. Local officials closely monitor the plovers each summer, barring beachgoers — and drones — from the stretches of sand where they primarily nest.
After the city’s Emergency Management Department flagged the coastal conflict last month, drone operators, largely drawn from the police and fire department, agreed to fly the devices further from oystercatcher nesting areas.
“We pointed out that there’s a nest here and there’s two angry parents who don’t want you anywhere near their eggs or their babies,” said Natalie Grybauskas, the agency’s assistant commissioner.
Since then, agencies have been holding briefings on the issue, a departure from their usual work on disasters like fires and building collapses.
“It’s rare that you have to learn about the life cycles of baby birds,” Grybauskas said.
But even after the city adjusted its flight range, beachgoers said they witnessed groups of birds rushing at the drones.
New York City is not alone turning to drones to patrol its waters. Following a spate of shark bites last summer, a similar effort was launched by officials on Long Island. Those devices are smaller and quieter and do not have flotation devices. In recent years, lifeguards in Australia also have used drones to monitor sharks and to conduct rescue operations.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a devoted drone enthusiast, has touted the new drone program as a “great addition to saving the lives of those that we lose over the summer,” especially as the city struggles to hire lifeguards to staff its beaches.
Four people have drowned off city beaches this summer, matching the total number of swimming deaths from last year.
After two teenagers disappeared while swimming off a beach adjacent to Rockaway, the NYPD flew its drones as part of the search mission. Both bodies eventually washed up on the shoreline.
The fire department’s drones also have captured footage of lifeguards assisting swimmers on Rockaway Beach struggling in a rip tide.
Christopher Allieri, founder of the NYC Plover Project, a bird protection group, praised the city for taking an innovative approach to water safety. But he stressed additional precautions were necessary to ensure the drones weren’t harming the shorebird population.
“Wildlife in New York is often an afterthought,” he said. “We should be asking ourselves how we can use this technology in a way that works for all New Yorkers, and that includes those with feathers.”
NEW YORK — A fleet of drones patrolling New York City’s beaches for signs of sharks and struggling swimmers is drawing backlash from an aggressive group of seaside residents: local shorebirds.
Since the drones began flying in May, flocks of birds have repeatedly swarmed the devices, forcing the police department and other city agencies to adjust their flight plans. While the attacks have slowed, they have not stopped completely, fueling concern from wildlife experts about the impact on threatened species nesting along the coast.
Veronica Welsh, a wildlife coordinator at the Parks Department, said the birds were “very annoyed by the drones” from the moment they arrived on the beach.
“They will fly at it, they’ll swoop at it, they’ll be vocalizing,” Welsh said. “They think they’re defending their chicks from a predator.”
No birds have been harmed, but officials say there have been several close calls. The drones, which come equipped with inflatable life rafts that can be dropped on distressed swimmers, have yet to conduct any rescues. They spotted their first shark on Thursday, resulting in a closure of most of the beach.
City officials said the “swarming incidents” have been primarily carried out by American oystercatchers. The shorebird, known for its striking orange bill, lays its eggs this time of year in the sand on Rockaway Beach. While its population has improved in recent decades, federal authorities consider the species a “high conservation concern.”
The birds eventually may grow habituated to the devices, which can stretch over 3 feet (nearly a meter) long and emit a loud hum as they take flight, said David Bird, a professor of wildlife biology at McGill University.
But he was quick to raise a far more dire possibility: that the drones could prompt a stress response in some birds that causes them to flee the beach and abandon their eggs, as several thousand elegant terns did following a recent drone crash in San Diego.
“We don’t know a lot about what sort of distance is required to protect the birds,” he said. “But we do know there are birds on this beach that are highly endangered. If they abandon their nests because of the drones, that would be a disaster.”
On Rockaway Beach, a popular summertime destination for New Yorkers, American oystercatchers share their habitat with multiple tern species of waterbirds, as well as piping plovers, a small, sand-colored bird that is the city’s only federally designated endangered species. Local officials closely monitor the plovers each summer, barring beachgoers — and drones — from the stretches of sand where they primarily nest.
After the city’s Emergency Management Department flagged the coastal conflict last month, drone operators, largely drawn from the police and fire department, agreed to fly the devices further from oystercatcher nesting areas.
“We pointed out that there’s a nest here and there’s two angry parents who don’t want you anywhere near their eggs or their babies,” said Natalie Grybauskas, the agency’s assistant commissioner.
Since then, agencies have been holding briefings on the issue, a departure from their usual work on disasters like fires and building collapses.
“It’s rare that you have to learn about the life cycles of baby birds,” Grybauskas said.
But even after the city adjusted its flight range, beachgoers said they witnessed groups of birds rushing at the drones.
New York City is not alone turning to drones to patrol its waters. Following a spate of shark bites last summer, a similar effort was launched by officials on Long Island. Those devices are smaller and quieter and do not have flotation devices. In recent years, lifeguards in Australia also have used drones to monitor sharks and to conduct rescue operations.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a devoted drone enthusiast, has touted the new drone program as a “great addition to saving the lives of those that we lose over the summer,” especially as the city struggles to hire lifeguards to staff its beaches.
Four people have drowned off city beaches this summer, matching the total number of swimming deaths from last year.
After two teenagers disappeared while swimming off a beach adjacent to Rockaway, the NYPD flew its drones as part of the search mission. Both bodies eventually washed up on the shoreline.
The fire department’s drones also have captured footage of lifeguards assisting swimmers on Rockaway Beach struggling in a rip tide.
Christopher Allieri, founder of the NYC Plover Project, a bird protection group, praised the city for taking an innovative approach to water safety. But he stressed additional precautions were necessary to ensure the drones weren’t harming the shorebird population.
“Wildlife in New York is often an afterthought,” he said. “We should be asking ourselves how we can use this technology in a way that works for all New Yorkers, and that includes those with feathers.”
For the first time in 15 years, the Philadelphia Zoo welcomed the birth of a Sumatran orangutan. The critically endangered species is part of a breeding program among zoos intended to ensure the survival of species at risk of extinction.
The infant orangutan was born in late June to 31-year-old female Tua and 28-year-old male Sugi, who live at the zoo’s primate preserve. Zoo staff said they haven’t yet determined the gender of the baby, who’s unnamed for the time being.
“It is a joy to be able to share this wonderful news with the greater Philadelphia region and the world,” Rachel Metz, the zoo’s vice president of animal well-being and conservation, said Thursday. “This critically endangered species is rapidly losing habitat largely due to deforestation as a result of an increased demand for logging, palm oil, and other natural resources located in their habitats.”
The species is native to the forests of Sumatra, part of the Sunda Islands of western Indonesia. They’re one of three species of orangutans, who are the only members of the great ape family to spend most of their time off the ground. They use their long and muscular arms to scale trees and have a diet that consists mainly of fruit, bark and vegetation. They are considered among the planet’s most intelligent non-human species, with recent research suggesting they’re capable of communicating about past experiences to warn each other about predators.
It’s estimated that fewer than 14,000 Sumatran orangutans remain in the wild. The birth of the orangutan in Philadelphia is part of the Species Survival Plan of the Association of Zoos and Aquariums, which strives to maintain genetically diverse populations of threatened animals.
Provided Image/Philadelphia Zoo
Tua, a Sumatran orangutan, is shown carrying her baby at the Philadelphia Zoo after giving birth in late June.
The Philadelphia Zoo was the world’s first to successfully breed orangutans in 1928. There have been 20 born at the zoo since then.
Tua last gave birth in 2009 to a female, Batu, who remained with her parents at the Philadelphia Zoo through 2021. She has since been paired with a male at Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle and is now expecting a baby of her own. Orangutans have an eight-month gestation period. Babies nurse from their mothers for up to six years, but often start to eat solid food at around four months. They reach adolescence between the ages of 7 and 10.
Tua is now bonding with her baby in their indoor habitat at the primate preserve, where they have the choice to enter an area visible to guests or spend time alone in their bedroom. Sugi will be given a chance in the future to reunite with the pair. In the wild, males typically don’t raise their young. Orangutans are usually solitary in the wild but can be social with their peers.
The zoo is planning to hold a dedicated public debut for the baby orangutan in August. Details on the celebration will be released in the near future.
“Our entire zoo community and those that work closest with our orangutans are thrilled to watch Tua become a mother again and watch this baby grow,” said Michael Stern, the zoo’s curator of primates and small mammals.
To save the imperiled spotted owl from potential extinction, U.S. wildlife officials are embracing a contentious plan to deploy trained shooters into dense West Coast forests to kill almost a half-million barred owls that are crowding out their cousins.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service strategy released Wednesday is meant to prop up declining spotted owl populations in Oregon, Washington state and California. The Associated Press obtained details in advance.
Documents released by the agency show up to about 450,000 barred owls would be shot over three decades after the birds from the eastern U.S. encroached into the West Coast territory of two owls: northern spotted owls and California spotted owls. The smaller spotted owls have been unable to compete with the invaders, which have large broods and need less room to survive than spotted owls.
Past efforts to save spotted owls focused on protecting the forests where they live, sparking bitter fights over logging but also helping slow the birds’ decline. The proliferation of barred owls in recent years is undermining that earlier work, officials said.
“Without actively managing barred owls, northern spotted owls will likely go extinct in all or the majority of their range, despite decades of collaborative conservation efforts,” said Fish and Wildlife Service Oregon state supervisor Kessina Lee.
The notion of killing one bird species to save another has divided wildlife advocates and conservationists. It’s reminiscent of past government efforts to save West Coast salmon by killing sea lions and cormorants that prey on the fish, and to preserve warblers by killing cowbirds that lay eggs in warbler nests.
Some advocates grudgingly accepted the barred owl removal strategy; others said it’s reckless diversion from needed forest preservation.
“The Fish and Wildlife Service is turning from protector of wildlife to persecutor of wildlife,” said Wayne Pacelle, founder of the advocacy group Animal Wellness Action. He predicted the program would fail because the agency won’t be able to keep more barred owls from migrating into areas where others have been killed.
The shootings would likely begin next spring, officials said. Barred owls would be lured using megaphones to broadcast recorded owl calls, then shot with shotguns. Carcasses would be buried on site.
The birds already are being killed by researchers in some spotted owl habitats, with about 4,500 removed since 2009, said Robin Bown, barred owl strategy leader for the Fish and Wildlife Service. Those targeted included barred owls in California’s Sierra Nevada region, where the animals have only recently arrived and officials want to stop populations from taking hold.
In other areas where barred owls are more established, officials aim to reduce their numbers but acknowledge shooting owls is unlikely to eliminate them entirely.
Supporters include the American Bird Conservancy and other conservation groups.
Barred owls don’t belong in the West, said American Bird Conservancy Vice President Steve Holmer. Killing them is unfortunate, he added, but reducing their numbers could allow them to live alongside spotted owls over the long term.
“As the old forests are allowed to regrow, hopefully coexistence is possible and maybe we don’t need to do as much” shooting, Holmer said.
The killings would reduce North American barred owl numbers by less than 1% annually, officials said. That compares with potential extinction for spotted owls, should the problem go unaddressed.
Because barred owls are aggressive hunters, removing them also could help other West Coast species that they’ve been preying on such as salamanders and crayfish, said Tom Wheeler, director of the Environmental Protection Information Center, a California-based conservation group.
Public hunting of barred owls wouldn’t be allowed. The wildlife service would designate government agencies, landowners, American Indian tribes or companies to carry out the killings. Shooters would have to provide documentation of training or experience in owl identification and firearm skills.
The publishing in the coming days of a final environmental study on the proposal will open a 30-day comment period before a final decision is made.
The barred owl plan follows decades of conflict between conservationists and timber companies, which cut down vast areas of older forests where spotted owls reside.
Early efforts to save the birds culminated in logging bans in the 1990s that roiled the timber industry and its political supporters in Congress.
Yet spotted owl populations continued declining after barred owls started showing up on the West Coast several decades ago. Across the region at least half of spotted owls have been lost, with declines of 75% or more in some study areas, said Katherine Fitzgerald, who leads the wildlife service’s northern spotted owl recovery program.
Opponents say the mass killing of barred owls would cause severe disruption to forest ecosystems and could lead to other species — including spotted owls — being mistakenly shot. They’ve also challenged the notion that barred owls don’t belong on the West Coast, characterizing their expanding range as a natural ecological phenomenon.
Researchers say barred owls moved westward by one of two routes: across the Great Plains, where trees planted by settlers gave them a foothold in new areas; or via Canada’s boreal forests, which have become more hospitable as temperatures rise because of climate change.
Northern spotted owls are federally protected as a threatened species. Federal officials determined in 2020 that their continued decline merited an upgrade to the more critical designation of “endangered.” But the Fish and Wildlife Service refused to do so at the time, saying other species took priority.
California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending.
Under former President Donald Trump, government officials stripped habitat protections for spotted owls at the behest of the timber industry. Those were reinstated under President Joe Biden after the Interior Department said political appointees under Trump relied on faulty science to justify their weakening of protections.
To save the imperiled spotted owl from potential extinction, U.S. wildlife officials are embracing a contentious plan to deploy trained shooters into dense West Coast forests to kill almost a half-million barred owls that are crowding out their cousins.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service strategy released Wednesday is meant to prop up declining spotted owl populations in Oregon, Washington state and California. The Associated Press obtained details in advance.
Documents released by the agency show up to about 450,000 barred owls would be shot over three decades after the birds from the eastern U.S. encroached into the West Coast territory of two owls: northern spotted owls and California spotted owls. The smaller spotted owls have been unable to compete with the invaders, which have large broods and need less room to survive than spotted owls.
Past efforts to save spotted owls focused on protecting the forests where they live, sparking bitter fights over logging but also helping slow the birds’ decline. The proliferation of barred owls in recent years is undermining that earlier work, officials said.
“Without actively managing barred owls, northern spotted owls will likely go extinct in all or the majority of their range, despite decades of collaborative conservation efforts,” said Fish and Wildlife Service Oregon state supervisor Kessina Lee.
The notion of killing one bird species to save another has divided wildlife advocates and conservationists. It’s reminiscent of past government efforts to save West Coast salmon by killing sea lions and cormorants that prey on the fish, and to preserve warblers by killing cowbirds that lay eggs in warbler nests.
Some advocates grudgingly accepted the barred owl removal strategy; others said it’s reckless diversion from needed forest preservation.
“The Fish and Wildlife Service is turning from protector of wildlife to persecutor of wildlife,” said Wayne Pacelle, founder of the advocacy group Animal Wellness Action. He predicted the program would fail because the agency won’t be able to keep more barred owls from migrating into areas where others have been killed.
The shootings would likely begin next spring, officials said. Barred owls would be lured using megaphones to broadcast recorded owl calls, then shot with shotguns. Carcasses would be buried on site.
The birds already are being killed by researchers in some spotted owl habitats, with about 4,500 removed since 2009, said Robin Bown, barred owl strategy leader for the Fish and Wildlife Service. Those targeted included barred owls in California’s Sierra Nevada region, where the animals have only recently arrived and officials want to stop populations from taking hold.
In other areas where barred owls are more established, officials aim to reduce their numbers but acknowledge shooting owls is unlikely to eliminate them entirely.
Supporters include the American Bird Conservancy and other conservation groups.
Barred owls don’t belong in the West, said American Bird Conservancy Vice President Steve Holmer. Killing them is unfortunate, he added, but reducing their numbers could allow them to live alongside spotted owls over the long term.
“As the old forests are allowed to regrow, hopefully coexistence is possible and maybe we don’t need to do as much” shooting, Holmer said.
The killings would reduce North American barred owl numbers by less than 1% annually, officials said. That compares with potential extinction for spotted owls, should the problem go unaddressed.
Because barred owls are aggressive hunters, removing them also could help other West Coast species that they’ve been preying on such as salamanders and crayfish, said Tom Wheeler, director of the Environmental Protection Information Center, a California-based conservation group.
Public hunting of barred owls wouldn’t be allowed. The wildlife service would designate government agencies, landowners, American Indian tribes or companies to carry out the killings. Shooters would have to provide documentation of training or experience in owl identification and firearm skills.
The publishing in the coming days of a final environmental study on the proposal will open a 30-day comment period before a final decision is made.
The barred owl plan follows decades of conflict between conservationists and timber companies, which cut down vast areas of older forests where spotted owls reside.
Early efforts to save the birds culminated in logging bans in the 1990s that roiled the timber industry and its political supporters in Congress.
Yet spotted owl populations continued declining after barred owls started showing up on the West Coast several decades ago. Across the region at least half of spotted owls have been lost, with declines of 75% or more in some study areas, said Katherine Fitzgerald, who leads the wildlife service’s northern spotted owl recovery program.
Opponents say the mass killing of barred owls would cause severe disruption to forest ecosystems and could lead to other species — including spotted owls — being mistakenly shot. They’ve also challenged the notion that barred owls don’t belong on the West Coast, characterizing their expanding range as a natural ecological phenomenon.
Researchers say barred owls moved westward by one of two routes: across the Great Plains, where trees planted by settlers gave them a foothold in new areas; or via Canada’s boreal forests, which have become more hospitable as temperatures rise because of climate change.
Northern spotted owls are federally protected as a threatened species. Federal officials determined in 2020 that their continued decline merited an upgrade to the more critical designation of “endangered.” But the Fish and Wildlife Service refused to do so at the time, saying other species took priority.
California spotted owls were proposed for federal protections last year. A decision is pending.
Under former President Donald Trump, government officials stripped habitat protections for spotted owls at the behest of the timber industry. Those were reinstated under President Joe Biden after the Interior Department said political appointees under Trump relied on faulty science to justify their weakening of protections.
MADRID — Things are looking up for the Iberian lynx. Just over two decades ago, the pointy-eared wild cat was on the brink of extinction, but as of Thursday the International Union for Conservation of Nature says it’s no longer an endangered species.
Successful conservation efforts mean that the animal, native to Spain and Portugal, is now barely a vulnerable species, according to the latest version of the IUCN Red List.
In 2001, there were only 62 mature Iberian lynx — medium-sized, mottled brown cats with characteristic pointed ears and a pair of beard-like tufts of facial hair — on the Iberian Peninsula. The species’ disappearance was closely linked to that of its main prey, the European rabbit, as well as habitat degradation and human activity.
Alarms went off and breeding, reintroduction and protection projects were started, as well as efforts to restore habitats like dense woodland, Mediterranean scrublands and pastures. More than two decades later, in 2022, nature reserves in southern Spain and Portugal contained 648 adult specimens. The latest census, from last year, shows that there are more than 2,000 adults and juveniles, the IUCN said.
“It’s a really huge success, an exponential increase in the population size,” Craig Hilton-Taylor, head of the IUCN Red list unit, told The Associated Press.
One of the keys to their recovery has been the attention given to the rabbit population, which had been affected by changes in agricultural production. Their recovery has led to a steady increase in the lynx population, Hilton-Taylor said.
“The greatest recovery of a cat species ever achieved through conservation (…) is the result of committed collaboration between public bodies, scientific institutions, NGOs, private companies, and community members including local landowners, farmers, gamekeepers and hunters,” Francisco Javier Salcedo Ortiz, who coordinates the EU-funded LIFE Lynx-Connect project, said in a statement.
IUCN has also worked with local communities to raise awareness of the importance of the Iberian lynx in the ecosystem, which helped reduce animal deaths due poaching and roadkill. In addition, farmers receive compensation if the cats kill any of their livestock, Hilton-Taylor said.
Since 2010, more than 400 Iberian lynx have been reintroduced to parts of Portugal and Spain, and now they occupy at least 3,320 square kilometers, an increase from 449 square kilometers in 2005.
“We have to consider every single thing before releasing a lynx, and every four years or so we revise the protocols,” said Ramón Pérez de Ayala, the World Wildlife Fund’s Spain species project manager. WWF is one of the NGOs involved in the project.
While the latest Red List update offers hope for other species in the same situation, the lynx isn’t out of danger just yet, says Hilton-Taylor.
The biggest uncertainty is what will happens to rabbits, an animal vulnerable to virus outbreaks, as well as other diseases that could be transmitted by domestic animals.
“We also worried about issues with climate change, how the habitat will respond to climate change, especially the increasing impact of fires, as we’ve seen in the Mediterranean in the last year or two,” said Hilton-Taylor.
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — Dale McGinnity has been turning over rocks in Mill Creek to study the endangered Nashville crayfish for a decade. He hopes to learn whether this little crustacean that makes its home mainly in the urbanized area around its namesake city is being harmed by all the development surrounding it. The results are encouraging.
“Things are looking good so far,” said McGinnity, who works at the Nashville Zoo as curator of ectotherms, or cold-blooded creatures. “It’s been a really nice, maybe steady or slightly increasing population over those 10 years.”
But that good news is also potentially bad news. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service proposed removing the Nashville crayfish from the endangered species list in 2019, and that proposal is still being considered. A healthy and robust population could add to the pressure to remove it. But some biologists argue the Nashville crayfish still needs protection because species with very small ranges are more vulnerable to extinction, for a variety of reasons.
McGinnity credits the current healthy population to recent changes to stormwater regulations. Runoff from parking lots, building and other hard surfaces now drains to bioretention areas, where it is slowly reabsorbed into the ground.
“The old guidelines, it was just all a whole bunch of impervious surfaces that ran to the storm drains that went right to the creek. So that means there’s huge flooding. There’s huge amounts of oil and other toxins that get into the water.”
On Tuesday, McGinnity and a crew from the zoo were at Mill Creek for their annual population survey. Sycamores and maple trees shaded the shallow, rippling water filled with the flat limestone rocks that crayfish love to hide under. It did not take long before the group began spotting them.
One of the things that makes the Nashville crayfish unique, McGinnity said, is that they will hang out in open areas in broad daylight during the summer months. Most crayfish — also called crawfish or crawdads, depending on the region — are primarily active at night. The behavior seems as though it would make them vulnerable to predators, and why they do it is one of many mysteries scientists have yet to study, he said.
The Nashville crayfish are also unusually sociable, he said, noting that he has found upwards of 60 together under a single rock.
“There’s still a lot to be learned about Nashville crayfish, and actually all crayfish,” McGinnity said. There’s no better place to study them than Tennessee, or possibly Alabama. The two states vie for title of the most crayfish diversity in the world. Both states have more than 100 species, with new ones still being discovered and described, he said.
Parker Hildreth, a biologist with the Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency, has recently been using genetic testing to help map that diversity. Hildreth said he grew up playing with crayfish in a Tennessee creek and recently discovered that those same crayfish he played with may be an undescribed species.
Asked why the public should care about crayfish, Hildreth offered two thoughts.
“Aquatic organisms are the canary in the coal mine for water quality. So if you’re seeing impacts to our native species, then the same things that are affecting aquatic life can easily affect human life,” he said. The second reason is cultural and goes back to his childhood.
“I think that’s intrinsic to most Tennesseans, that we grew up playing in a creek,” he said. “And I wouldn’t like to live in a world where I wasn’t able to do that.”
It turns out that humans might not be the only species that have individualized identifiers for each other. A new study found that African savanna elephants, an endangered species, have name-like calls for each other that resemble human names — a finding that potentially “radically expands the express power of language evolution.”
Researchers analyzed the rumble — “a harmonically rich, low-frequency sound that is individually distinct” — of African savanna elephants, which are listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List as populations continue to decline, largely due to poaching and land development. Specifically, researchers looked at 469 rumbles of three different types — contact, greeting and caregiving — from female-offspring groups between 1986 and 2022. Using a machine-learning model, they identified the recipients of more than 27% of those calls.
These elephants are known for traveling with family units of about 10 females and their calves, and several family units will often combine to form a “clan,” according to the World Wildlife Fund, with males only coming around during mating.
The researchers also looked at the reactions of 17 wild elephants to call recordings that were addressed to them or another elephant. The elephants who heard recordings addressed to them had quicker and more vocal responses than those who heard recordings addressed to other elephants, researchers found.
And what they found is that the elephants — the world’s largest terrestrial species, according to the World Wildlife Fund — do indeed have individual vocal identifiers, “a phenomenon previously known to occur only in human language.” Other animals known to use vocal labels, like parakeets and dolphins, solely do so through imitation, researchers said in the study, which was published Monday in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution.
Videos shared by researchers show how the elephants respond to call recordings addressed to them. In one, an elephant named Margaret appears to almost immediately perk up to a rumble recording addressed to her. In the video caption, researchers said she “immediately raises her head and then calls in response after a few seconds.” A separate video shows Margaret raising her head to a call addressed to another elephant, but not responding.
Another elephant named Donatella shows the animal issuing a call response after hearing her name and approaching the recording.
More research on these observations is needed, the study authors said, particularly to better understand the context surrounding the calls. But so far, these results have “significant implications for elephant cognition, as inventing or learning sounds to address one another suggests the capacity for some degree of symbolic thought,” they said.
African savanna elephants are found across nearly two dozen countries, including Botswana, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Kenya, Namibia, Zambia and South Africa. In 2021, this species, as well as its close relative, the African forest elephant, received degraded conservation status.
According to the IUCN, the forest elephant species was demoted to critically endangered, while the savanna elephant was listed as endangered, whereas before, both species were “treated as a single species” that was classified as vulnerable. The new status came after findings that forest elephant populations had declined by more than 86% over the course of 31 years, while savanna elephants declined by at least 60% in a half-century.
“With persistent demand for ivory and escalating human pressures on Africa’s wild lands, concern for Africa’s elephants is high, and the need to creatively conserve and wisely manage these animals and their habitats is more acute than ever,” assessor and African elephant specialist Kathleen Gobush said at the time.
Li Cohen is a senior social media producer at CBS News. She previously wrote for amNewYork and The Seminole Tribune. She mainly covers climate, environmental and weather news.
An annual snake survey in Ohio revealed an unexpected find – an eastern Massasauga rattlesnake, an “increasingly rare” snake in the state that is considered threatened.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources said one of its officers in Huron County found the rattler in May. Officials captured the snake, recorded its measurements, and then released it back into the wild.
Huron County wildlife officer Matthew Smith found a rare rattlesnake during an annual survey with the Ohio Department of Natural Resources in May 2024.
Ohio Department of Natural Resources/Facebook
Eastern Massasaugas are “small snakes with thick bodies, heart-shaped heads and vertical pupils,” according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. They only grow to be about 2 feet long and have gray or light brown skin with “chocolate brown blotches on the back.” Those considered melanistic appear as all black. They’ve been found in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
They’ve also been found in more than 30 counties in Ohio, but according to Ohio State University, Massasaugas have “become increasingly rare” – both through the state and its range as a whole. They’ve only been seen in nine counties since 1976. Extensive farming significantly reduced their populations in the state, though many of their colonies continue to exist in bogs, swamps and wet prairies, according to the Ohio Division of Wildlife’s reptile field guide.
Eastern massasauga rattlesnakes have been found in Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Ohio, although in Ohio, they are becoming “increasingly rare.”
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Otherwise known as “swamp rattlers” or “black snappers,” Massasaugas are not the most active of snakes. According to the Division of Wildlife, they are typically “very sluggish and make little or no attempt to bite unless thoroughly provoked.” Their diet mostly consists of small rodents, but they will also eat frogs and other snakes.
And that is a good thing, as their venom “is highly toxic,” the division said. A typical Massasauga bite doesn’t deliver a high enough quantity of venom to be fatal to healthy adults, but officials warned that “this is still a venomous snake…and should be treated with utmost caution and respect.”
The species is considered threatened under the Endangered Species Act, according to U.S. Fish and Wildlife, and is one of only three venomous snake species in Ohio.
Li Cohen is a senior social media producer at CBS News. She previously wrote for amNewYork and The Seminole Tribune. She mainly covers climate, environmental and weather news.
