Wildlife

"The much anticipated results of the largest ever continent-wide wildlife survey, the Great Elephant Census, will be released tomorrow at the World Conservation Congress in Hawaii. The worrying finding: Africa now has 352,271 savanna elephants left in 93 percent of the species’ range."

"Wildlife agents authorized to eradicate a group of 11 wolves for repeated attacks on cattle in Washington state have hunted down and killed six animals from the condemned pack and are searching for the rest, a state game official said on Monday."

"One of the world’s smallest ethnic groups is finding its cultural traditions on the wrong side of Mongolian law, putting its very existence in peril."

"Populations of a rabbit-like animal known as the American pika are vanishing in many mountainous areas of the West as climate change alters its habitat, according to findings released Thursday by the U.S. Geological Survey."

"A drop in the food supply this summer, possibly tied to warmer Gulf of Maine waters, leads to the worst survival rate ever tracked on Machias Seal Island."

"Federal regulators are proposing to ban swimming with dolphins in Hawaii, a move that could imperil one of the Aloha State's most popular tourist delights and the industry that has sprung up around it."

"Scientists working with sophisticated DNA sequencing technology think they may have solved a 20-year-old mystery of what has caused thousands of Alaska’s wild birds to be afflicted with deformed, twisted beaks."

"Once abundant throughout the Pacific Northwest, Oregon silverspot butterflies have dwindled because of habitat loss and extended drought. Zookeepers have been lending the species a hand."

"The world’s longest-studied wolf pack may have been wiped out, wildlife officials fear amid an escalating battle between federal and state authorities in Alaska over the aggressive hunting of predators such as wolves and bears."

"Many species of shorebirds that migrate to the Arctic each year to breed their young will lose substantial amounts of their summer habitat to climate change, and the biggest losses in the coming decades will be in Alaska and neighboring parts of Russia, new research concludes."