Stories

Often thought of as a reptile, pangolins are actually mammals. They are covered in distinctive scales that ward off predators in the wild. 

In one of the most climate-vulnerable countries on Earth, an unprecedented development project is building a model for adapting to climate change on a massive scale—working one village at a time.

According to a new report, the world’s most rare marine mammal is growing closer to extinction with a population drop of 50% in the last year alone.  

In Simjung, a village of 900 houses, only a few remained standing after the earthquake. Today, however, the community is the picture of healthy recovery.

The accelerating pace of change around us challenges our ability to navigate, adapt, and survive along with all the other species we cherish. It will require our best big-picture thinking.

For many of us, each new year marks a chance for renewal, and 2017 is no exception. Every story in this issue speaks to challenge, opportunity, and the transformative power of hope.

Wild panda numbers are finally rebounding after years of decline. In September, the International Union for Conservation of Nature announced that pandas have been upgraded from “endangered” to “vulnerable.”

More than 4 million people call Nepal’s Gandaki River Basin home.

Asser Ndjitezeua and Carter Roberts talk about community conservancies, tough love, and the importance of finding your passion.

In Kingdom, Austin-based photographer Randal Ford’s captivating portraits shine the spotlight on a variety of species from across the animal world.

On a safari in Botswana, we saw a leopard emerge with a tiny, spotted cub held gently in her mouth. It was so young its eyes weren’t even open—likely no more than two or three days old.

At least 2,000 years ago, people in the Americas began cultivating the cocoa tree for its dark, bitter beans, which they brewed into a drink spiced with hot peppers. Today, we blend the beans with milk and sugar and call the stuff chocolate.

WWF is partnering with the Kenyan Wildlife Service and Narok County Council to collar matriarch elephants in the Maasai Mara reserve to track them as they move inside and outside of the reserve, in order to better understand how to mitigate human wildlife conflict and to maintain vital wildlife corridors.

Hundreds of thousands of sea turtles are accidentally killed by fishing gear—caught on dangling hooks or entangled in nets—every year.

The innovative tool, known as Project Finance for Permanence, has provided a brilliant approach to cover the costs associated with maintaining protected areas in Brazil.

Dan and Jean Farabee are concerned about loss of habitat on a global scale. To help find solutions, they joined WWF's Legacy Circle— a group devoted to protecting the future of nature.

Board member Larry Linden worked on large-scale conservation projects in Canada and Costa Rica, as well as Brazil, the model that has come to be known as Project Finance for Permanence.

Launched in 2015, Oceans X Labs is a joint initiative of WWF and Conservation X Labs that, drawing on the venture tech model, aims to support and encourage innovators as they develop new approaches to addressing some of the ocean’s biggest problems.

People run for different reasons. Some hit the trails for the health benefits. Nicole Bennion runs for a cause.

Every year, trillions of gallons of rainfall and snowmelt pour into the grasslands of the Northern Great Plains. But the role the grasslands play in capturing all that liquid is often poorly understood. Enter the rainfall simulator.

Taking a trip inevitably has some impact on our planet and on the communities we visit. But that doesn’t mean you have to skip your next trip.

The Iberian lynx is one of the world’s most endangered cat species. Once found in Spain, Portugal, and parts of France, this small, short-tailed carnivore is now mostly confined to a few regions of Spain.

Claiming more than 600,000 marine mammals each year, bycatch especially affects small cetaceans that get caught and drown in fishing nets.

Conservationists have been working in the Dawna Tenasserim Landscape—which spans the Thailand/Myanmar border—for years. Rarely, though, do they get to see this magnificent wilderness area from the air.