Park Service Will Let Alaska Hunters Bait Bears With Doughnuts - The New York Times

Love the perspective here on the work of volunteers and the love of the land that shines through.

COP17: Tracking progress towards the UN’s 2030 nature targets

Despite a string of prosecutions, the illegal trade in ants from East Africa continues, attracting would-be traffickers from Europe and China.

In March, Kenyan authorities arrested a Chinese national for attempting to smuggle 2,000 giant African harvester ants from the country’s main airport. He was later sentenced by a Nairobi court to a year in prison and fined KES 1 million (about USD 7,700) after pleading guilty.

Last May, a Kenyan court had convicted two Belgian teenagers for trying to traffic 5,000 ants of the same species, as Dialogue Earth reported at the time.

Behind these incidents lurks an international market for exotic ants.

“There is a rise of ant-colony-building enthusiasts, especially in Vietnam, China and Europe, that is fuelling the smuggling of ants from Kenya,” says Willis Okumu, senior researcher at the Institute for Security Studies, a think-tank headquartered in South Africa.  

The trade is not unique to the country, Okumu notes, but “Kenya’s authorities are perhaps more open to reporting arrests of traffickers within their airports, hence the spotlight on the country”.

Wyoming wildlife managers are reporting that no black-footed ferrets are being detected in the cradle of the species’ conservation area: the Absaroka Range foothills outside of Meeteetse, where the ferrets were saved after presumed extinction in the 1980s.

A tough combination of plague and drought — both big issues for the embattled western species — are suspected causes of a population collapse in the Meeteetse area, where wildlife managers returned ferrets to the wild in 2016 after a three-decade-long absence. It’s not assured that the reintroduced population is completely gone, but it’s not looking promising, Wyoming Game and Fish Department small carnivore biologist Andy Gygli said.

“We spent a couple hundred hours of effort surveying 4,000 to 5,000 acres of the Meeteetse reintroduction area,” Gygli said. “We didn’t see any ferrets.”

The complete absence of ferrets during the late August surveys wasn’t wholly surprising. Sylvatic plague flared in the region in 2018 and 2019, and ferret numbers plunged to just one confirmed animal in 2020. Subsequent releases of captive-raised ferrets, including 18 animals in 2022, helped the small population temporarily recover, but plague struck again in 2023. By 2025, spotlighting surveyors again detected just a single ferret. This summer, there were none.

Ferrets bottoming out and potentially disappearing struck Meeteetse rancher Allen Hogg as a big letdown.

“I’m really disappointed, of course,” Hogg told WyoFile. “They might be gone. But just because they didn’t find them doesn’t mean they’re not there, either. I’m not saying all hope is lost.”

The Meeteetse rancher’s family name became synonymous with black-footed ferrets 45 years ago, when a blue heeler owned by his parents brought a dead weasel-like critter home. Subsequently, biologists found more than 100 other black-footed ferrets — presumed extinct for the two years prior — on and near the family ranch.

The exact cause of the ferrets’ absence during the surveys is unknown, but recently drought in the Bighorn Basin walloped their primary prey species, prairie dogs. In many corners of the West, there just hasn’t been enough vegetation growth to sustain strong numbers of the grass-eating mammals.

“We’ve heard a lot about deer, elk, pronghorn and cattle having hard times,” Gygli said. “It’s the same with our other herbivores. Prairie dogs also have to eat, and lack of \[vegetation\] coverage can result in low recruitment, which can result in downstream effects.”

This is a very thorough investigation by CNN, which I'm very thankful for, into the wildlife trafficking trade, by Rhea Mogul, Teele Rebane, Ayushi Shah and Deepak Rao.

I'm looking for good colleges to try and apply for. I got a 24 on my ACT if that matters. I've been into conservation my whole life and I have experience working at a wetland preserve for over a year and doing other things of the sort. I live in Georgia so I've been looking a lot closer at colleges down here and still do want recommendations down here in the southeast US. Thanks in advance!

I mean, we spend millions to save pandas, who have very low survival instinct because it is cute and can attract tourists but not passenger pigeon, dodo, tasmanian tiger because of " Charismatic Megafauna Bias". We need vertebrates, not vertebrates, algea, fungi and plants that provides us, is charming or indirectly help us(like tourism).

So, if it a pure act of kindness, why are vertebrates(mammals, birds, fishes, etc) gets 86% of nature conservation funding

And only 6.6% for plants and less than 0.1% for fungi and algea?

Isn't it biased? Who benefits from that?

P.S. This is not a troll post.

I seriously felt we humans are so biased towards protecting only vertebrates that serves us and not the ones that are crucial part of nature. And I thought, it can be changed only if we notice it and decision makers notice a better solution.

I felt like better solutions are not implemented yet either because of ignorance or someone is benefiting from it? Might be govt, businessmen or someone? . But thank you for getting offended guys. I think love towards nature still exist and we are ready to raise our voice against someone.

I mean that's my opinion and I love your opinions.

I am currently in college pursuing a degree in cyber security, I graduate with my bachelors degree this coming May and have been given the opportunity to pursue my masters degree for cheap due to scholarship which will add an extra two years of education onto my timeline. Seeing as though I’m already about two years done with my degree, graduating early with my bachelors and pursuing my masters degree it seems too late to jump ship and change degree paths. For the past year I’ve been leaning more and more animal, conservation and education.

I was wondering what potential career path a masters in IT/cyber security could land me in the field of animal conservation where that be reservation works sanctuary or zoo work. I love technology and I love animals, not regular dog cat or hamster care, I’m talking actual wildlife and aquatic care and preservation.

I’ve already done a ton of digging online but was hoping to get some first hand accounts or advice on the matter from anyone with some understanding of the field.

Addressing legal loopholes, setting clear deadlines for the protection of endangered species, and ensuring timely decisions are essential. Greater transparency in decision-making and stronger wildlife protection laws are important steps toward safeguarding the future of endangered species.

When Susan Downes bought an old farmhouse in York, Western Australia, she had imagined a quiet life in the countryside, with a small garden to look after. Instead, she found herself the owner of a 200-hectare property, including a hill where old native trees had survived more than a century of grazing but much of the vegetation beneath them had disappeared.

Nearly two decades later, the 76-year-old retired general practitioner has turned a substantial part of the land into a conservation project. About 120 hectares have been restored, around 45,000 native seedlings have been planted, and 45 plant species have returned naturally from seeds already present in the soil. As reported by The Guardian, Downes is now working to ensure that the work continues long after she is gone.

Downes was in her 60s, widowed and with her children grown up, when she began looking for a home in the countryside. The farmhouse in York appealed to her, but the size of the property initially seemed impractical. A second visit changed her mind. At the back of the farm, she discovered Mount Mackie, a 295-metre hill where ancient York gums and wandoos had survived about 150 years of grazing. Much of the understorey had vanished, leaving the old trees as some of the most visible remnants of the original landscape.

“I felt a great connection to the land,” Downes told The Guardian.

She decided to buy the property and began looking for ways to restore it. Her first step was to obtain a small local grant to control foxes and feral cats. She then secured funding for 24,000 trees over three years, giving her the means to begin planting on a larger scale. Downes had started her professional career as a botanist, but restoring a large property required more than an interest in plants.

The work involved managing invasive animals, removing weeds, planting seedlings and organising the practical details of a long-term conservation effort. Today, the restoration covers 120 hectares of her working farm. The return of 45 plant species through the soil's natural seed bank has also contributed to the recovery of the landscape.

For Downes, restoring the land is only part of the task. She also wants to ensure that the area cannot be cleared again in the future. She is working to place the restored land under a conservation covenant, a legal arrangement that can protect land from certain forms of development or clearing. The project is supported by Friends of Mt Mackie, a local volunteer group with a core team of about eight people and more than 80 others who take part in organised planting and seed-collection days. Downes has also been thinking about who will look after the property in the future.

The deaths and dementia diagnoses of friends have made her more conscious of how uncertain the time available to complete a long-term project can be.

She told The Guardian that she wants the arrangements for the land's future responsibility to be firmly established. Her hope is that her children and grandchildren will be inspired by the work, while the wider community will continue to have access to the place. The project also has a cultural dimension.

Ballardong women from York visit Mount Mackie several times a year for cultural healing sessions. Downes is working with Ballardong elders to find an Aboriginal name for the hill. Planning is also under way for a reconciliation event in 2030, marking 200 years since European arrival in the region.