Amphibians in U.S. Declining at “Alarming and Rapid Rate”
May 23rd, 2013 |
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A new study finds that frogs, toads, salamanders and other amphibians in the U.S. are dying off so quickly that they could disappear from half of their habitats in the next 20 years. For some of the more endangered species, they could lose half of their habitats in as little as six years. The nine-year [...]
Keep reading »Deadly Snakes, Ugly Critters, Leonardo DiCaprio and Other Links from the Brink
May 18th, 2013 |
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A deadly but critically endangered snake, one of the world’s rarest birds and a heavily guarded flower are among the endangered species in the news this week. A New Snake with a Sad Story: A gorgeous but extremely dangerous new snake species has been discovered in Honduras. The new palm pit viper has been named [...]
Keep reading »Desperately Seeking Cichlid: Fish Species Down to Last 3 Males, No Known Females

The last three males of an all-but-extinct fish species would really, really, really like to meet a female. Once upon a time the Mangarahara cichlid (Ptychochromis insolitus) lived in a single habitat: a river in Madagascar from which the species gets its name. That river has now been dammed and the habitat has dried up. [...]
Keep reading »After 13-Year Quest, Clouded Leopards Confirmed Extinct in Taiwan

Thirteen years, 1,500 infrared cameras, hundreds of catnip-baited hair traps and an almost incalculable number of hours in the field have confirmed what scientists have long feared: the Formosan clouded leopard (Neofelis nebulosa brachyura) is in all likelihood extinct. The subspecies, endemic to Taiwan, was wiped out by poaching, trade in its pelts during the [...]
Keep reading »Satellite Reveals Possible Habitats for Rare Apes in China and Vietnam

Fan Peng-Fei of China’s Dali University was worried the first time he entered the forest habitat of the critically endangered cao vit gibbon (Nomascus nasutus). The isolated forest, skirting the China–Vietnam border, had been heavily degraded by years of agricultural development, firewood collection and charcoal production. What little forest remained provided poor habitat for the [...]
Keep reading »The 6 Most Endangered Feline Species
April 10th, 2013 |
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Poaching, habitat loss, inbreeding and hybridization. These are just a few of the threats faced by many wild feline species around the globe. Here are six of the world’s most endangered feline species and subspecies—some of which may not survive into the next century. 1. Amur leopards Let’s start with the good news: The population [...]
Keep reading »Who Will Save the Last Hoolock Gibbons? [Video]

Primates that spend their entire lives in trees tend not to survive after those trees are cut down. Sadly, that’s what’s happening in northeast India, where the forest habitats for one of the world’s rarest apes are rapidly disappearing. The western hoolock gibbon (Hoolock hoolock) has lost an estimated 90 percent of its population over [...]
Keep reading »Illegal Pet Trade Wiping Out Yellow-Crested Cockatoos
March 21st, 2013 |
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The population of critically endangered yellow-crested cockatoos (Cacatua sulphurea) in the Indonesian province of West Nusa Tenggara has reached an all-time low of 107 individual birds, according to a recent report from The Jakarta Post. The cockatoos are protected by international and Indonesian law, but they are also highly valued in the illegal pet trade, [...]
Keep reading »Google Earth Inspires Rediscovery of Lost Butterfly Species
March 14th, 2013 |
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A South African butterfly species that lepidopterists feared had gone extinct more than a decade ago has been rediscovered after a search on Google Earth revealed a habitat much like the insect’s former home. That tip refocused a stalled search for the lost species that had not been seen since the mid-1990s. The Waterberg copper [...]
Keep reading »3 British Moths Extinct; Most Other Species in Decline

Three moth species have disappeared from the U.K. in the past decade and two thirds of the species that remain have suffered dramatic population crashes according to new research from the organizations Butterfly Conservation and Rothamsted Research. The news is published in the new report “The State of Britain’s Larger Moths 2013″ (pdf), which covers [...]
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![journal.pone.0065275.g001 Figure 1. Plot of the locations of the languages in the sample. Dark circles represent languages with ejectives, clear circles represent those without ejectives. Clusters of languages with ejectives are highlighted with white rectangles. For illustrative purposes only. Inset: Lat-long plot of polygons exceeding 1500 m in elevation. Adapted from Figure 4 in [8]. The six major inhabitable areas of high elevation are highlighted via ellipses: (1) North American cordillera (2) Andes (3) Southern African plateau (4) East African rift (5) Caucasus and Javakheti plateau (6) Tibetan plateau and adjacent regions. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0065275.g001](http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/anthropology-in-practice/wp-content/blogs.dir/8/files/2013/06/journal.pone_.0065275.g0011.png)



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