By Ben Lybarger Back in 2018, I shared a dorm room in Bolivia with a veterinary surgeon from Italy, and at times also a baby macaw or squirrel monkey that he would wake up every couple of hours to feed. His name was Cristian Tirapelle, and we were both working with Comunidad Inti Wara Yassi (CIWY) at […]
Wildlife Conservation
We asked people in Vietnam why they use rhino horn. Here’s what they said
Cover Photo: Malaysia’s wildlife department seized 50 African rhino horns destined for Vietnam last year. EPA-EFE/FAZRY ISMAIL Authors: Vu Hoai Nam Dang, University of Copenhagen and Martin Reinhardt Nielsen, University of Copenhagen Vietnam is one of the world’s largest consumers of rhino horn, contributing to the continued poaching of rhinos in the wild. Last year in Africa […]
Engaging communities to protect orangutans: Interview with Liana Chua
Author: James Fair Conservation efforts have traditionally focused too much on wildlife and not enough on human communities, says social anthropologist Liana Chua. When it comes to orangutans, Chua says indigenous communities in Borneo are unlikely to share the concerns and priorities of international conservation organizations. Killing of orangutans by humans is a major threat to […]
We train Colombian woolly monkeys to be wild again – and maybe save them from extinction
Woolly monkeys are hard to miss in Colombia’s jungles. Now, they face extinction. Top Photo Credit: Mónica Ramírez Authors: Mónica Alejandra Ramírez, Universidad de los Andes ; Manuel Lequerica Tamara, University of Sydney, and Pablo Stevenson, Universidad de los Andes Colombia’s Andes Mountains used to be loaded with wildlife, including South America’s sole bear species, […]
Scientists urge world leaders to scale up ambitions to protect global biodiversity
Research has shown that a sixth mass extinction event is underway and largely driven by human activities. With the global population set to balloon to 10 billion people by 2050, which will more than double the current demand for food and water, scientists are increasingly calling for mankind to set aside sufficient amounts of ecosystems […]
The Voice of Jaguars: Remembering Alan Rabinowitz
Top photo: Alan Rabinowitz, PopTech 2010 by Kris Krüg (CC BY-SA 2.0) By Ben Lybarger Last month Alan Rabinowitz – zoologist, conservationist, and co-founder of Panthera – passed away at the age of 64. When he was just a painfully awkward child locked inside himself by a debilitating stutter, he’d often visit the big cats at the Bronx Zoo. […]