KATHMANDU — On the afternoon of Sept. 10, wildlife photographer Milan Tamang was passing by a stretch of the Rapti River in Nepal’s Chitwan National Park when he noticed something…
If humans went extinct tomorrow, who would rule the world? Beavers. Well, at least in the Northern Hemisphere. These tree-felling, water-slowing, wetland-creating rodent engineers have a massive impact wherever they…
Balkan countries contain a large number of mostly wild and free-flowing rivers, which are home to impressive biodiversity but which have become threatened by a wave of hydroelectric dam proposals…
With their bright orange tails and elongated snouts, redtail garras are a popular aquarium fish. Yet while these fish have graced aquariums for decades, information about their biology has been…
DHAKA — Studies on the hazards of microplastics have tended to focus on their presence in the food chain and risks to human health. A new study now shows they…
OASI DI CANNEVIÉ, Italy — In the early morning haze, Luca Bellini steered his green boat through the web of canals and lagoons of the Po River Delta. He had…
One of Bangladesh’s two Ramsar sites, wetlands of international importance, is slowly losing some of the waterbirds that seek respite at this key migratory pit stop, a new study says.…
Sometimes, our current mass extinction crisis can be represented by the loss of a single individual. On April 21, locals spotted a 93-kilogram (205-pound) body in the waters of Dong…
Every year, 22 million sockeye salmon begin life some 420 kilometers, or about 260 miles, inland from the Alaskan coast, in plastic bins. They’re at the Gulkana hatchery, the largest…
In 2005, fishers in northern Thailand captured a Mekong giant catfish of gargantuan proportions. Tipping the scales at 293 kilograms (646 pounds), the critically endangered Pangasianodon gigas raised a question…
As a field biologist, Keith Perchemlides has often watched flames dance around tiny ponds that mark the remains of a vast wetland that once covered a large part of southwestern…
Paul Van Damme and Fortuna Vargas Mejía met 28 years ago in Puerto Villarroel, a village in the Bolivian department of Cochabamba. Van Damme was a Belgian marine biologist who…
PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Lithan, 68, grew up eating fish caught from the rivers and freshwater swamps near his village in Ogan Ilir district, near the southern tip of the island…
Encountering his first paiche was such a surprise for Víctor Peñaloza Lurici that he can still recall the event back in 2016. He was 16 years old at the time.…
Considering the invasive nature of the species, Bangladesh has finally banned the cultivation, breeding, transportation, sale and conservation of suckermouth catfish (Hypostomus plecostomus), as it gradually encroaches on local water…
DHAKA — As Bangladesh authorities prepare to declare the country’s largest freshwater wetland a Ramsar site, its two other designated wetlands of international importance, including the Sundarbans, continue to come…
New research suggests travel between increasingly separated terrestrial and aquatic habitats may impact tropical amphibian microbiomes and immunity, leading to more disease, though more research is needed.
The indiscriminate use of gillnets by fishers in Bangladesh has become a major threat to the two freshwater dolphin species found there: the Ganga River dolphin (Platanista gangetica) and the…
JAKARTA — One of the most threatened population of Irrawaddy dolphins in Asia is set to get a much-needed reprieve as officials in Indonesia roll out a ban on unsustainable…
The asprete, a ray-finned freshwater fish species that lives only in Romania, has long captured Mircea Marginean’s imagination. He remembers hearing about the species in 2011, when he was a…
KATHMANDU — In 2002, the black softshell turtle was declared extinct in the wild — not a difficult assessment to make, given that, back then, the only known population of…
DHAKA – Khalilur Rahman, 65, has been fishing in a tributary of the old Brahmaputra River in Kishoreganj for 50 years. Nowadays, he often returns home empty-handed. “The river has…
"It might be the highest density of trout species on Earth," says podcast guest Ulrich Eichelmann of Balkan countries' riverine legacy, which has become threatened by a tsunami of hydroelectric…
NDJI, Cameroon – Batchenga, 65 kilometers (40 miles) northeast of Cameroon’s capital Yaoundé, is slowly reopening. After serving as a ramp at the start of a national road linking the…
In 2006 and 2010, Congolese researcher Raoul Monsembula collected catfish and other species from the rivers in Salonga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Then he hopped…
KATHMANDU — They can dig burrows during extreme weather events, run on land, and will eat just about anything. These traits, among others, make mugger crocodiles (Crocodylus palustris) a versatile…
STUNG TRENG, Cambodia — A long-dormant plan to build a mega dam on the mainstream of the Mekong River in Cambodia’s northeastern Stung Treng province appears to have been revived…
BUJUMBURA — The squeal of passing bikes fills the air in the center of a newly created wetland on the outskirts of Burundi’s main city and largest urban settlement on…
England’s Itchen River and other chalk rivers have been dubbed the nation’s coral reefs due to high biodiversity, but like small watersheds worldwide, they’ve gotten little attention, despite threats. That’s where Janet Marsh steps in.
KATHMANDU — Something occurred to Phoebe Griffith as she observed gharial and mugger crocodiles in and around Nepal’s Chitwan National Park, she recalls. Both crocodiles live in the same environment,…
