Wildlife Conservation and Protection

What’s new: A recent study has identified 16 new-to-science species of grasshoppers living in the deserts of the U.S. and Mexico. One of the grasshoppers was named after the Mexican painter Frida Kahlo, while others reference actors from shows like Star Trek.

The study: Desert diversification: revision of Agroecotettix Bruner, 1908 (Orthoptera, Acrididae, Melanoplinae) with descriptions of sixteen new species from the United States and Mexico

cross-posted from: https://rss.ponder.cat/post/115585

For more than two decades, researchers knew of just a single, male individual of the greater mouse-eared bat that would repeatedly hibernate in an unused railway tunnel in Sussex, U.K. This male bat became known as the “loneliest soul in Britain” since he was without a companion.

But researchers have now found that he isn’t alone after all: they’ve confirmed two individuals of the greater mouse-eared bat (Myotis myotis) hibernating in the U.K.

Munn added the find shows the importance of preserving heritage sites, which have become a refuge for many species, especially bats that need to hibernate undisturbed.

More than 1,100 dead olive ridley turtles have washed ashore on the beaches of Tamil Nadu state in southern India this month. Most were found near the state capital, Chennai. “I never heard [of] such large numbers of turtles stranded at any beaches of Tamil Nadu at least in the last three decades,” K. Sivakumar, an ecology professor at Pondicherry University, told Mongabay.

Once the epicenter for deadly human-elephant conflict, an eastern Nepal village along the Indian border has transformed into a model of coexistence.

Villagers, once fearful, have adopted elephant-resistant crops and beekeeping, and through a rapid response team, they safely guide elephants away.

Government policies, conservation efforts and shifting community attitudes have significantly reduced fatalities, with no deaths reported in the area since 2015.

While Bahundangi offers a model for coexistence, villages along the migratory routes for elephants have become hotspots for human-elephant encounters, requiring the need for conservation corridors and education to mitigate conflicts.

The beautiful toki have become a local point of pride.

A quarter of freshwater animals, including crustaceans, fish and insects, face extinction risks from threats like pollution, farming and dams.

• Pangolins, the world’s most trafficked mammals, frequently appear in wildlife seizures, yet there is no universal system for tracking or identifying individual animals.
• Researchers proposed what they call the Pangolin Universal Notching System (PUNS), a standardized way to assign unique identification numbers to up to 15,554 individuals.
• PUNS combines marking techniques used for turtles and hoofed mammals by gently drilling holes in selected scales along a pangolin’s back for permanent, minimally invasive identification.
• Conservationists say the proposed system could improve pangolin traceability and disrupt trafficking networks but note some limitations and challenges in achieving global adoption.

The best of this week’s wildlife photographs from around the world

Populations of the tiny crustacean - a key food source for whales and dolphins - have declined by 80% since 1970 due mainly to demand for omega-3 health supplements