Wildlife

"Hundreds of snow leopards are killed illegally every year in remote mountains from China to Tajikistan, further endangering the big cats that number only a few thousand in the wild, a report said on Friday."

"Tasmanian devils have developed a natural immune response to the deadly facial tumour disease, confirming research that suggested the animals were rapidly evolving in response to the overwhelming threat."

"New Jersey's first expanded black bear hunt in more than three decades ended Saturday, just days after lawmakers advanced a measure that would remove the animals from a list of game species."

A little-noticed court settlement in Nevada requires the federal government to re-evaluate its program for killing predatory animals at the request of farmers and ranchers. Two years from now, when the re-evaluation is done, the program could be drastically changed.

"Relentless poaching is decimating Africa’s elephants. But the world’s largest land mammal could have a powerful, new champion if Hillary Clinton becomes president of the U.S."

"A remote village on Alaska's northwest coast has begun a reverse tourism campaign. Residents want visitors to stay away. Pacific walrus by the thousands in recent years have come ashore in early fall near the Inupiat village of Point Lay, including about 6,000 last week, and people have dropped in, hoping to see a marine mammal phenomenon brought on by climate change and disappearing summer sea ice in the Chukchi Sea."

"Nearly 90 years have passed since North Atlantic right whales became a protected species following their devastation by whalers, but their populations have yet to recover. A new report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine lays out some of the reasons why."

"Evidence of what scientists are calling the planet’s Sixth Mass Extinction is appearing in San Francisco Bay and its estuary, the largest on the Pacific Coast of North and South America, according to a major new study."

"PARIS - Invasive insects cause at least $77 billion (69 billion euros) in damage every year, according to a study released Tuesday that says this figure is 'grossly underestimated' because it covers only a fraction of the globe."