For this last episode of 2019, we take a look back at some favorite bioacoustics recordings featured here on the Mongabay Newscast and play them for you.
As regular listeners will know, bioacoustics is the study of how animals use and perceive sound, and how their acoustical adaptations reflect their behaviors and relationships with their habitats and surroundings. Bioacoustics is a fairly young field of study but it is already being used to study everything from how wildlife populations respond to the impacts of climate change to how entire ecosystems are impacted by human activities.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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We speak with National Geographic writer Chris Fagan about the investigative report he just filed for Mongabay revealing a massive invasion of national parks in the Peruvian Amazon, in an area relied upon by isolated indigenous communities.
Traveling up the Sepahua River with indigenous guides, Fagan counted more than 250 plots of land illegally cleared for cocaine production in recent months. He met some of these growers and describes for us a very 'Wild West' scene that Peruvian officials know little about, in an area that was thought to be largely protected.
Read Chris's full report and see the stunning video and drone footage here:
Here's this episode's top news:
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Photo of Chris Fagan by Jason Houston/Upper Amazon Conservancy.
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Dena Clink is a primatologist studying individuality and variation in Bornean gibbon calls, which she says could aid these primates' conservation. She joins this episode to play some recordings of these fascinating songs & calls she’s made in the course of her research, and explain how they're used and what they may mean to the species.
We’ve featured a wide variety of bioacoustics studies here on the Mongabay Newscast, from whales to bats and birds, but these are usually recordings of species at the population level. Our guest today focuses on how calls vary between each gibbon, and what that can teach us about the animals, and their conservation needs.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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From now until the end of December 2019, donations to Mongabay are being doubled by Newsmatch, making this the best time to support our independent news about conservation science and the environment, visit mongabay.org/donate to learn more.
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Photo of a Mueller's gibbon (Hylobates muelleri) via People Resources and Conservation Foundation.
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Damian Aspinall is chairman of the Aspinall Foundation, a UK charity that works to conserve endangered animals and return them to the wild. Despite his foundation operating two zoos, he's a vocal critic of how zoos are generally run, and feels their focus should be upon breeding rare animals and reintroducing them to the wild, vs keeping them in captivity for public entertainment, as he says.
"European zoos spend at least 15 million pounds a year, at least, on looking after their elephants and rhinos...imagine what you could do with that money in the wild," toward stopping poaching & rebuilding their habitats, he argues on this episode of the podcast.
Aspinall also talks about numerous other ethical problems he sees with 'the zoo-ocracy,' discusses his own program for breeding and reintroducing gorillas, lemurs, gibbons and more, and he shares his vision for a 'zoo-less future' on Earth.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
Listen to our recent conversation with Bronx Zoo director Jim Breheny about zoos' role in conservation on Mongabay's podcast, here.
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Katie Baker is a reporter for the Buzzfeed News team investigating human rights violations committed against local & indigenous people by park rangers paid by the major environmental NGO WWF to protect creatures like rhinos from poachers.
"No one is saying that [WWF's rangers] don't have really difficult jobs...but just because they have a difficult job doesn't mean they can rape and kill and torture with impunity or arrest people without evidence," she tells host Mike G, and adds that the pushback from the NGO has been rather meek: "I have not received any hate mail from [WWF employees] telling me I got it wrong."
Baker discusses the explosive findings of her team's investigative reports, what it took to chase these stories down, and the impacts she’s seen from her reporting.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
Mongabay reported on the effects on local communities as revealed by Baker's reporting here, and here's Mongabay's investigation of harassment, bullying, and retaliation against whistleblowers at another major environmental NGO, Conservation International.
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Plans for ocean floor mining are moving forward globally -- especially around thermal vents that create deposits of metals like gold, silver, copper, manganese, cobalt, and zinc -- but humans have explored less than 1% of the deep sea, so it’s fair to say that we really have no idea what’s at risk.
On this episode we speak with deep sea biologist Dr. Diva Amon about what we do -- and don’t -- know about biodiversity at the bottom of the ocean.
Raised on the shores of Trinidad & Tobago, Dr. Amon's fascination with what lies below the surface has taken her on journeys to great depths, and she shares insights and glimpses of amazing creatures gained there.
Here’s more about this episode’s top news:
And see all of our coverage of deep sea mining issues here.
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Mongabay's adventurous Middle East-based staff writer John Cannon just traveled the length of the Pan Borneo Highway and shares what he discovered on the journey about biodiversity, development, and the natural future of this, the world's 3rd largest island.
It took him 3 weeks to travel the route proposed to connect the rainforest-rich Malaysian states of Sabah and Sarawak as well as the Indonesian part of the island of Borneo--to make commerce and travel easier in a region that is notoriously difficult to navigate--and also to encourage tourists to see the states’ cultural treasures and rich wildlife, from elephants to crocodiles, gibbons and clouded leopards.
But scientists warn that the highway is likely to harm the very wildlife it seeks to highlight, by dividing populations and degrading their habitats.
Here's where you can find John's six-part series and his “top 5 revelations from traveling the Pan Borneo Highway" at Mongabay.com.
These are the episode’s top news items if you want to learn more:
Episode photo: A female Sunda clouded leopard and one of her cubs crossing a road in Sabah, still image from footage shot by Michael Gordon.
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For this episode we speak with Jim Darling, a marine biologist whose team found that the songs of different humpback whale groups can be so similar to each other that the conventional wisdom of these being distinct groups might be wrong. These whales may be sharing and singing each others' songs across groups and regions, he thinks.
Darling joins the show to play recordings of these remarkably similar humpback whale songs and discuss the implications.
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On this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we speak with Reverend Lennox Yearwood about the upcoming UN Climate Summit in New York City and what it’s going to take to pass legislation and policies that can effectively tackle the enormity of the climate crisis.
Undaunted by the challenge, Rev Yearwood rather is "very excited," he says, about the new energy and effective leadership he sees coming from youth, women, people of color, and more, who are all urging the world toward meaningful climate action. He is President and CEO of the Hip Hop Caucus, a non-profit that advocates for social and environmental justice, and is a sought after speaker who also recently addressed the U.S. Congress on the topic of the environment.
Yearwood talks about participating in the week-long Global Climate Strike during the UN meetings; providing a platform for indigenous leaders, people of color, and young people to speak on climate issues that affect them; and his “suites to the streets” approach to climate activism:
"Climate change is a civil rights issue. People have a right to clean air. People have a right to ensure that this planet is safeguarded for future generations."
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For an encore edition during this show's brief hiatus, we replay one of our most popular Field Notes interviews of all time, featuring Australian researcher Anastasia Dalziell who's doing trailblazing work with superb lyrebirds. Listen to her recordings of these songsters and be amazed by these animals, who are so adept at replays themselves.
Host Mike G. explored with her the incredible ability these creatures have to mimic sounds in their environment, ranging from predators and possums to squeaky trees and other songbirds native to their forested habitat: even the clicks of camera shutters and chainsaws are 'replayed' by these animals.
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Image credit: Superb lyrebird in Marysville State Forest, Australia (© Donovan Wilson/500px).
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Talk to you again in two weeks!
Urban pests like rats have been in the news due to the US President calling Baltimore “rat and rodent infested.” He isn’t the first American politician to use this kind of rhetoric to demean communities that are predominantly made up of people of color (while ignoring the fact that policies deliberately designed to marginalize communities of color are at the root of the pest problems), he's just the latest.
Dawn Biehler actually knows what she’s talking about when it comes to rodent infestations in cities: the University of Maryland professor wrote the indispensable 2013 book Pests in the City: Flies, Bedbugs, Cockroaches, and Rats, and has just penned an op-ed in the Baltimore Sun newspaper looking at how racial segregation and funding inequities for urban housing and infrastructure contribute to rat infestations.
Biehler joins this episode of the Mongabay Newscast to discuss how this is an environmental justice issue, and how the problem can be dealt with in an environmentally sustainable manner, starting with investment in urban communities.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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David Quammen is an award-winning science writer, author, and journalist covering the most promising trends in conservation and evolutionary science for the past 30 years. We invited him on the show to discuss his latest feature for National Geographic, where he is a regular contributor, about Gorongosa National Park in Mozambique — once touted by none other than E.O. Wilson in a podcast interview with Mongabay as a place where inspiring restoration efforts are underway and benefitting nature, wildlife, and people. We also discuss Quammen’s most recent book, The Tangled Tree: A Radical New History of Life, which explores the revolution in how scientists understand the history of evolution on Earth sparked by the work of Carl Woese, and his coverage of virology in light of the recent Ebola outbreak. He shares his thoughts on all of this plus what gives him hope that biodiversity loss and destruction of the natural world can be halted.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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Jessica Crance is a research biologist who recently discovered right whales singing for the first time. While some whales like humpbacks and bowheads are known for their melodious songs, none of the three species of right whale has ever been known to sing. Crance led the research team at NOAA that documented North Pacific right whales breaking into song in the Bering Sea, and on this episode of the Mongabay Newscast, she will play recordings of two different right whale song types and discuss what we know about why the critically endangered whales might be singing.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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We speak with Ivonne Higuero, new Secretary General of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora — better known by its acronym, CITES. The first woman to ever serve as Secretary General, we discuss how her background as an environmental economist informs her approach to the job, how CITES can tackle challenges like the online wildlife trade and lack of enforcement of CITES statutes at the national level, and what she expects to accomplish at the 18th congress of the parties (COP) this August.
Here’s this episode’s top news:
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Jim Breheny is the director of the Bronx Zoo in New York City and joins the Mongabay Newscast to discuss the contributions zoos make to global biodiversity conservation. While many question the relevance of zoos in the 21st century, he argues that as humanity's influence extends ever farther and wildlife habitat continues to shrink, zoos are more relevant than ever since they could save a diversity of species like hellbender salamanders, which his institution is helping to breed and repopulate in the wild. He also discusses how zoos support field work to protect species in the wild, and shares their experience telling the story of zoos through its popular Animal Planet TV show ‘The Zoo.’
This episode's top news:
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Gabriel Melo-Santos studies Araguaian river dolphins in Brazil — his work has revealed that the species is much chattier than we’d previously known, and could potentially help us better understand the evolution of underwater communication in marine mammals. He plays some of the recordings he’s made of the dolphins, explains how he managed to study the elusive creatures thanks to their fondness for a certain riverside fish market, and discusses how the study of their vocalizations could yield insights into how their sea-faring relatives use their own calls to maintain social cohesion.
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Ecologist Julian Bayliss used satellite imagery, drones, and technical climbing to make a big discovery last year, an untouched rainforest atop a virtually unclimbable mountain in Mozambique (an “inselberg” or “island mountain”) that contains species new to science. Intriguingly, his team also found ancient human artifacts at its top, perhaps linked to people's prayers for the mountain's continued supply of fresh water to the surrounding lowlands. On this episode Bayliss discusses Mt. Lico's novel species like fish, crabs, and butterflies and shares the technical challenges and frustrations inherent in making a discovery of this kind.
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Kinari Webb founded Health in Harmony, providing healthcare to people to save Indonesian rainforests. She realized that most illegal deforestation happens when villagers have to pay for medical care, because they have little to generate cash with, except timber. The program has reduced infant deaths by more than 2/3 and the number of households engaged in illegal logging dropped nearly 90%. Her story was one of the most-read articles at Mongabay.com in 2017, so now with Webb expanding the program to new regions, we asked her for an update.
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Primatologist Cleve Hicks leads a research team that has discovered a new tool-using chimp culture in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. After 12 years of research, their findings include an entirely new chimpanzee tool kit featuring four different kinds of tools. These chimps also build ground nests, which is highly unusual for any group of chimps, but especially for ones living around dangerous predators like lions and leopards. But these chimps’ novel use of tools and ground nesting aren’t even the most interesting behavioral quirks this group displays, Hicks says on this podcast.
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Dr. Rebecca Cliffe joins us to challenge myths about sloths like the popular perception of them as lazy creatures: moving slowly is a survival strategy that has been so successful in fact that sloths are some of the oldest mammals on our planet. But Dr. Cliffe also warns of a “sloth crisis” driven by deforestation, roadbuilding, and irresponsible tourism including “sloth selfies,” and what you can do to help protect sloths.
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How do you study a marine mammal that lives in waters so murky that it can hide from you in plain sight, even in shallow water? On this episode we speak with marine biologist Isha Bopardikar, a researcher using one technique, bioacoustics, to unlock the hidden behaviors of humpback dolphins on the west coast of India.
Mongabay's India bureau recently published a story about her work, “What underwater sounds tell us about marine life”, which noted that although humanity is making the underwater world even noisier through oil and gas exploration, shipping, and other mechanized vessels, today's research tools can still reveal many of the ocean's mysteries.
Bioacoustics combines the study of sound and biology and is increasingly being used to understand marine mammals, so Bopardikar joins us to discuss how, exactly, and play some recordings she's collected of her mysterious cetacean subjects.
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“The uncontacted and isolated tribes represent a true treasure,” National Geographic writer and author Scott Wallace says in this episode. “Their knowledge of the rainforest, of the medicinal properties of the plants, of all the animals, their spirit world — all of this is an incredibly rich trove of knowledge.”
Wallace's book The Unconquered tells the story of an expedition into remote Amazon rainforests undertaken by the head of Brazil’s Department of Isolated Indians to gather information about an uncontacted tribe known as “the Arrow People” in order to protect the indigenous group from the ever-advancing arc of Amazonian deforestation.
He joins the podcast to share his experiences and to discuss this particularly perilous time for indigenous peoples in the Amazon.
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Episode artwork courtesy of FUNAI.
On this episode we speak with Oliver Metcalf, lead author of a new study using bioacoustics and machine learning (artificial intelligence or "AI") to study a very rare bird in New Zealand. We play some recordings of the beautiful hihi bird that illustrate the success of a last ditch reintroduction effort for this species (and in a place) that are otherwise very difficult to monitor. The findings suggest that bioacoustics can play a key role in assessing the effectiveness of conservation efforts.
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On this episode we hear from Mongabay's Mexico City-based contributor Martha Pskowski who recently traveled to central Mexico during the winter 'high season' when tourists flock to see monarch butterflies covering the trees. Her fascinating report on threats to monarchs in these overwintering grounds was tempered by cheerful news that the number of monarchs wintering in Mexico is up 144% in 2019. Pskowski spoke with locals who rely on monarch tourism for their livelihoods, and she investigated impacts on the monarchs' habitat from agriculture and a proposed mine.
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The IUCN is probably best known for its Red List of Threatened Species, a vital resource on the conservation statuses and extinction risks of tens of thousands of species. But the IUCN does much more than just maintain the Red List, as Inger Andersen, the organization’s director general, explains in this episode [producer's note: just after this episode was published, Andersen accepted the role of director at the UN Environment Program].
The International Union for the Conservation of Nature was founded in 1948 and is neither a government body nor an NGO, but is rather a science-based hybrid of these, with the goal of ensuring nature conservation worldwide.
Speaking from their Swiss headquarters, Andersen shares insights about how the Red List is built, the key role of women in conservation ("Women represent 3.5 billion conservation solutions"), and plans for the next World Conservation Congress in 2020, which will dictate how conservation progresses in the wake of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets of the Convention on Biological Diversity, which sunset that year.
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