A colorful frog, some Hawaiian mollusks and California’s threatened fish are among the endangered species in the news this week. The Frog Extinction Crisis Continues: How much longer until we have to say good-bye to the southern corroboree frog (Pseudophryne corroboree)? The rare Australian amphibian, one of the world’s most colorful and well-known endangered species, [...]

Every year up to two million people visit Haleakalā National Park in Hawaii, the only habitat for the endangered Haleakalā silversword (Argyroxyphium sandwicense macrocephalum), a spectacular and unusual plant that is now threatened by climate change. According to research published January 7 in Global Change Biology, these silverswords have suffered a dramatic population decline in [...]

Endangered Hawaiian monk seals (Monachus schauinslandi) have a bad reputation among some local fishermen, who accuse the 200-kilogram mammals of eating the fish that the humans catch for their livelihoods. A new project aims to find out if that notoriety is deserved and the public—in particular, teens—has a chance to participate. The National Marine Fisheries [...]

Hawaii’s extinction crisis has claimed another victim: the copper-striped blue-tailed skink (Emoia impar), a once-common lizard that has now been declared extinct by the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS). The skink was last seen in Hawaii in the 1960s. Extensive surveys between 1988 and 2008 failed to turn up any sign that it exists in the [...]

Three hundred critically endangered kahuli tree snails (Achatinella mustelina) have a new home this week: a basketball court–size, predator-proof enclosure built for them by the U.S. Army in Hawaii’s Waianae Mountains. The snails, according to the Army, spent the past two years in a lab at the University of Hawaii at Manoa while the new [...]

Here’s something amazing: a new bird species has been discovered in the U.S. for the first time since 1974. Unfortunately, the discovery wasn’t a live bird. It was actually a museum sample collected in 1963, and the scientists who discovered it fear it may already be extinct or threatened with extinction. The specimen was collected [...]

More than 30 years after 50 critically endangered Hawaiian monk seals (Monachus schauinslandi) died of suspected algal toxic poisoning, the presence of ciguatoxins in living seals has finally been confirmed through a new, noninvasive test. Ciguatoxins are produced by dinoflagellates, which live near coral and seaweed. The dinoflagellates are eaten by small fish, which are [...]

Invasive seaweed is putting a deadly choke hold on Hawaii’s coral reefs. In an effort to save them and the fish that rely on coral as a habitat, scientists have started breeding native sea urchins to eat the offending seaweed. The culprits are two seaweed algae called Kappaphycus alvarezii and K. striatum. First brought to [...]

The beautiful yet isolated Hawaiian islands hold a bounty of biodiversity, but many of those unique species are rapidly disappearing. The fast growth of invasive species is pushing native Hawaiian species, many of which are found nowhere else on the globe, into extinction. In fact, hundreds of Hawaiian plant species, along with dozens of mammals [...]

Darn those mosquitoes. First we learn this week that they have adapted to feed on reptile blood on the Galápagos Islands, putting several rare species there at risk. Now we hear that they are also threatening Hawaii’s endangered birds, and may soon be pushing several species closer to extinction. (Not to mention the usual things [...]

Hawaii has been working for more than a year to map out concrete plans to harness the abundant—though unpredictable—winds that blow across the state’s numerous islands. As the state and its utilities draw up plans for wind farms and other green-energy facilities to help meet the goal of pulling 70 percent of power from clean [...]

Today, more than 80% of the energy used in the United States comes from fossil fuels – specifically from petroleum, natural gas and coal. In the transportation sector, this number is even higher with fossil fuels (almost exclusively petroleum) supplying 97% of the total energy used. But, on the electric power side of the equation, [...]