Roughly a decade ago, a marine heatwave in the northeastern Pacific Ocean caused a dramatic decline in populations of forage fish and krill, the base of the marine food chain. A recent study found that the Hawaiian humpback whale population, which feeds on krill and small fish, also declined sharply during the 2013-16 heatwave and has not yet recovered. Humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae) in the North Pacific feed in cold Alaskan and Canadian waters during the summer months before traveling roughly 4,800 kilometers (3,000 miles) to Hawaii to breed and give birth over the winter. To understand the impact of the 2013-2016 marine heatwave, researchers analyzed more than 27,000 photos of whale sightings between 2002 and 2023 across the main Hawaiian islands. The photos came from Happywhale, a citizen science platform where anyone can upload images of whale flukes (tail fins) that scientists use to identify individuals. “Their flukes are a bit like a fingerprint for each individual humpback whale,” study co-author Shannon Barber-Meyer, formerly with Pacific Whale Foundation, told Mongabay in a video call. The researchers found the Hawaiian humpback whale population declined by 37% between the 2014-2015 breeding season and the 2021-2022 season. Adult survival rates also fell sharply. Before the heatwave, roughly 99% of adult whales survived year over year, but during the heatwave, adult survival was estimated at just 68%. “It’s a very precipitous drop, and that’s not something you normally see in adult survival of long-lived mammals,” Barber-Meyer said. During the heatwave, researchers documented an unusual mortality event…This article was originally published on Mongabay

A U.S. federal court recently ruled that residents of Jackson, Mississippi, don’t have a constitutional right to truthful information from public officials, nor the right to municipal drinking water that is free of lead, a neurotoxin. “The Constitution does not provide redress for every governmental wrongdoing,” Judge Kurt D. Engelhardt of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, who was appointed by U.S. President Donald Trump, wrote in the majority opinion. The case was brought by a group of Jackson residents in 2022 who alleged that the city allowed lead to enter the municipal water system and then lied to residents saying the water was safe, though they knew it was not. “Knowing what is in our water is fundamental to protecting public health,” Caroline Leary, general counsel at the U.S.-based nonprofit Environmental Working Group, told Mongabay by email. Jackson is home to roughly 150,000 people. Nearly a quarter of them are children under 18 who are particularly vulnerable to the potentially life-long toxic impacts of lead exposure including seizures, lowered IQ, impaired brain development and even death. The plaintiffs alleged that several of their children have been diagnosed with lead poisoning and now require special educational, medical, sociological, occupational and disability services. The plaintiffs also argued that exposure to contaminated water and the failure to be informed about the risks violated their 14th amendment due process right to bodily integrity. A November 2025 ruling by a three-judge panel of the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals allowed…This article was originally published on Mongabay

Ocean ecosystems are under extreme stress on several fronts including overfishing, ocean acidification, climate change and marine warming. While ocean conservation efforts often tend to focus on creating marine protected areas, researchers recently stressed the need to move beyond protection toward active recovery using a different approach: Marine rewilding. In a new perspective paper, the researchers laid out eight key principles that can guide such rewilding. The concept of “rewilding” is usually applied to terrestrial ecosystems, where the goal is to restore ecological processes and create resilient, self-sustaining ecosystems with minimal human interventions. Gavin Stark, a post-doctoral researcher with the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research, and his colleagues, write that one important principle of marine rewilding is that people can’t simply be fenced out of the process. “You cannot really separate people from the rewilding process inside the marine ecosystems,” Stark told Mongabay in a video call. Another key principle of marine rewilding is restoring food webs, which may include reintroducing top predators such as sharks. In 2024, for example, Mongabay reported on a project where eggs of the endangered Indo-Pacific leopard shark (Stegostoma tigrinum) raised in an aquarium in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S., were shipped to nurseries in Raja Ampat, Indonesia. So far, the project has released more than 60 young sharks into the protected waters of Raja Ampat with the goal of restoring balance to the region’s coral reef ecosystem.  The authors note that along with restoring food webs, strengthening connectivity between ecosystems is also a pillar…This article was originally published on Mongabay

Cities can become dangerously hot during extreme heat events, making it increasingly important for urban planners to find ways to reduce temperatures and protect people from heat exposure. Woodlands, grasslands, lakes and rivers can create significantly cooler microclimates, offering one potential way to reduce urban heat, a new study finds. The study focused on Guildford, a town in southeast England with a variety of green-blue infrastructure (GBI) types. GBI are land and water-based features integrated with each other and the built environment to provide mutually beneficial services, including wildlife corridors, flood mitigation and cooling. In Guildford, researchers collected data from six sites — a woodland, grassland, lakeside, vegetated green wall, small pocket park and riverside — and compared how effective they are in cooling the areas around them. They compared each site with a built-up location. The team established sensors at each site and recorded temperatures at one-minute intervals, from June 2023 till the end of August 2025. These sensors recorded temperatures through both normal climatic conditions and several extreme heat events. The researchers also used satellite data over the same timeline to get a more robust picture of the conditions in each location. The team found that all six GBI sites were cooler by 1.81-2.49° Celsius (3.26-4.48° Fahrenheit) than their built-up comparison site. The cooling was more pronounced during extreme heat events. The woodland site was upward of 6°C (almost 11°F) cooler than the built environment on the hottest days. The riverside and pocket park were cooler by 3.5°C…This article was originally published on Mongabay

Long-tailed macaques, monkeys native to Southeast Asia, have been listed as endangered on the IUCN Red List since 2022 after their populations declined by at least 50% over 30 years. Yet, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) has twice now declined to consider protecting the species under the domestic Endangered Species Act. The most recent decision was announced on July 14, 2026. Such a listing would have restricted the primate’s import for biomedical research, one of the biggest threats to its population. Mongabay asked FWS for comment but did not receive a response by publication. Long-tailed macaques (Macaca fascicularis) can live in a wide variety of habitats, from riverbanks and mangroves to rainforests and, even, cities. Despite their adaptability, populations of the medium-sized primates have declined sharply due to habitat loss, climate change, hunting and trade, primarily for biomedical research, according to the IUCN, the global wildlife conservation authority. A 2025 study found that macaques poached from the wild are likely supplementing the breeding farms in Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam that supply laboratories abroad. Lisa Jones-Engel, chief scientific advisor for primate experimentation with People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), said trapping macaques for medical testing is the biggest factor in their population decline. “Because habitat change, climate change — these animals are so fabulously adaptable, they could roll with that,” Jones-Engel told Mongabay in a video call. She said entire troops of long-tailed macaques are captured from the wild, including infants and breeding females, and sold to breeding…This article was originally published on Mongabay

In celebration of World Mangrove Day on July 26, the U.S.-based Mangrove Action Project (MAP) has announced the winners of its 12th annual photography awards. “Mangroves are the underdog. They will never be as glamorous as the Amazon rainforest or coral reefs. But through photography we can change that narrative, and intrigue people by showing them their beauty, diversity and fragility,” Leo Thom, creative director with MAP told Mongabay in an email. Mangroves cover just 0.1% of the surface of the Earth but are essential ecosystems; they stabilize coastlines and provide habitat for diverse wildlife including fish, reptiles, amphibians, birds, primates and, even, big cats such as tigers. Mangroves also store three to five times more carbon per acre than tropical forests. Scientists estimate that more than half of all mangrove ecosystems are at risk of collapse by 2050, mostly from sea-level rise and severe storms associated with climate change. Gaurav Patil/Mangrove Photography Awards (MPA)  The 2026 overall winning photograph features another threat to mangroves — ghost nets, fishing nets that are discarded or lost at sea. This photo was taken near Nandgaon village, south of Mumbai, India. At sea, such fishing gear can entangle wildlife including sea turtles, birds and whales. Less understood is how problematic ghost nets are for mangroves. “I have been watching ghost nets getting trapped in mangroves for the last several years,” photographer Gaurav Patil from India, said in a press release. Michol Sanchez/MPA A “highly commended” photo in the threats category of the contest…This article was originally published on Mongabay

The U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration recently finalized a rule that narrows what qualifies as “harm” under the Endangered Species Act. Under the new definition of harm, only actions that directly harm or kill endangered species will be prohibited. Until recently, the definition of harm also included damaging the habitat endangered wildlife depend on for food and shelter. “This rule change is ludicrous. A kindergartener could explain that destroying an animal’s home will harm the animal,” Tierra Curry, endangered species co-director with the U.S.- based nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity, told Mongabay in an email. The Endangered Species Act is a bedrock U.S. environmental law established more than 50 years ago. The law prohibits any person to “take” endangered species. “Take” has widely been interpreted to prohibit both directly killing or harming endangered species and damaging the habitat that is essential for their survival. That interpretation was upheld by a 1995 Supreme Court case involving spotted owls which ruled that harm also includes “significant habitat modification or degradation where it actually kills or injures wildlife.” The new rule abandons that longstanding interpretation. “Actions that directly injure or kill listed wildlife will continue to be prohibited,” the U.S. Department of Interior and the Department of Commerce said in their announcement. However, “[t]he final rule will reduce unnecessary permitting, cut compliance costs, and eliminate confusion for landowners, small businesses, energy producers, farmers, ranchers and local governments,” it stated. Tawny Bridgeford, the general counsel and senior vice president of the National Mining Association, an…This article was originally published on Mongabay

On June 11, U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive proclamation to open additional commercial fishing grounds in remote areas of the Pacific. The proclamation says restoring access to these areas “will promote economic opportunity.” However, local groups warn it will open the door to overfishing in a crucial marine habitat and sacred cultural site. The proclamation, “Restoring American Commercial Fishing in the Pacific,” comes a year after a similar proclamation in April 2025 that opened up commercial fishing in the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument (PIH). Formerly the Pacific Remote Islands Marine National Monument, the PIH covers nearly 1.3 million square kilometers (500,000 square miles) of Pacific Ocean. The June 2026 proclamation includes portions of three additional marine national monuments — Rose Atoll, Mariana Trench, and Papahānaumokuākea —  which together include nearly 1.8 million km2 (690,000 mi2) of coral atolls, deep-sea trenches and remote islands. Image courtesy of NOAA Fisheries The new proclamation would roll back protections for roughly 1.3 million km2 (500,000 mi2) of the area to allow industrial fishing. Such commercial fishing could include kilometers of baited hooks, known as long lines, and purse seine nets more than 2,000 meters (6,600 feet) long. Both types of fishing gear are highly effective at catching tuna, the target species, as well as other marine life as bycatch. Conservationists say opening the Pacific monuments to industrial fishing is a significant concern for many species in the area, including threatened sea turtles, whales, dolphins, seabirds, sharks and fish; many are endemic, found…This article was originally published on Mongabay

U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration recently repealed the 2024 Public Lands Rule, which established that conservation should have equal priority with industry when it comes to accessing leases for U.S. public land. That shift in priorities will apply to 245 million acres (99 million hectares) of public land managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). That’s roughly 10% of U.S. land that the agency leases for a multitude of private uses including grazing, mining, energy development and, until recently, conservation. In the federal register the Department of the Interior (DOI) said, “[b]y rescinding the 2024 Rule, the BLM eliminates mechanisms — such as restoration and mitigation leasing — that threatened to restrict productive use of the public lands.” An example of the decision’s impact can be found in the state of Montana. Roughly 950 American bison (Bison bison) have grazed on 63,000 acres (25,495 hectares) of federal land there since 2022. However, the DOI, which oversees BLM, revoked that grazing permit on May 8, just days before repealing the Public Lands Rule. Interior secretary Doug Burgman said that according to federal grazing laws, public land leases can only be given to animals, “intended for use primarily for their meat, milk, or other animal products.” He added that “considerable evidence” suggests the bison are intended for “for some other purpose, such as conservation.” Before western settlement, upwards of 100 million bison roamed the plains, serving as “ecosystem engineers shape[ing] healthy and diverse ecological communities,” the DOI acknowledged in its 2020 Bison Conservation…This article was originally published on Mongabay

When invasive rats are removed from islands, the ecological benefits can ripple across both land and sea more quickly than scientists expected, according to recent research. Scientists have long assumed that meaningful recovery after the predators are eradicated would take decades. However, researchers with the U.S.-based NGO Island Conservation conducted a rat-removal experiment on Ulong Island in Palau, which provides the first experimental evidence that ecosystems can rebound far more quickly than previously expected. Until recently, rats, which are typically nocturnal, were so abundant on Ulong Island that they were regularly seen during the day. They were a nuisance to campers and deadly for wildlife. As opportunistic omnivores, rats readily prey upon seabird eggs and chicks, devastating nesting colonies on tropical islands. As a result, there were “very few nesting seabirds that we would find,” Coral Wolf, the conservation science program manager at Island Conservation, told Mongabay in a video call. To measure the effects of rat eradication, Wolf designed an experiment in which all the rats were removed from Ulong, while the rats on nearby Ngeruktabel Island remained, serving as a control site. Before the eradication, researchers collected baseline biodiversity data. On land, they recorded bird calls and took soil samples. In the surrounding water, they measured indicators like fish biomass and coral cover. One year after rats were removed, the team repeated the survey and found a dramatic improvement in the biodiversity. Freed from rat predation, seabird activity on the island surged. Detections of bridled tern (Onychoprion anaethetus) calls rose by…This article was originally published on Mongabay