Rainforests News

May 9, 2024

Top Headlines

Wildfires in Wet African Forests Have Doubled in Recent Decades

May 2, 2024 — Climate change and human activities like deforestation are causing more fires in central and west Africa's wet, tropical forests, according to the first-ever comprehensive survey there. The fires have long been ...

Oil Palm Plantations Are Driving Massive Downstream Impact to Watershed

May 2, 2024 — The global demand for palm oil -- the most widely consumed vegetable oil on the planet, in everything from instant noodles to lipstick -- is driving worldwide tropical deforestation. While many studies have shown the loss of biodiversity when ...

Artificial Intelligence Enhances Monitoring of Threatened Marbled Murrelet

May 2, 2024 — Artificial intelligence analysis of data gathered by acoustic recording devices is a promising new tool for monitoring the marbled murrelet and other secretive, hard-to-study ...

Hurricanes Jeopardize Carbon-Storing New England Forests

Apr. 24, 2024 — Many American companies are relying on carbon offsets to reduce their carbon footprint, especially those who have pledged to achieve 'net-zero emissions.' Sequestering carbon in forests is an example of a nature-based solution that is being used to ...

Latest Headlines

updated 6:28pm EDT

How Can Forests Be Reforested in a Climate-Friendly Way?

Apr. 29, 2024 — Europe's forests have already been severely affected by climate change. Thousands of hectares of trees have already died due to drought and bark beetles. Scientists have now investigated which trees ...

Deer Are Expanding North, and That's Not Good for Caribou

Apr. 25, 2024 — In the boreal forest of Western Canada, researchers have considered that both changing climate and increased habitat alteration have enabled deer to push farther ...

Tropical Fish Are Invading Australian Ocean Water

Apr. 23, 2024 — A study of shallow-water fish communities on rocky reefs in south-eastern Australia has found climate change is helping tropical fish species invade temperate Australian ...

Unique Field Study Shows How Climate Change Affects Fire-Impacted Forests

Apr. 17, 2024 — During the unusually dry year of 2018, Sweden was hit by numerous forest fires. A research team has investigated how climate change affects recently burnt boreal forests and their ability to absorb ...

Tropical Forests Can't Recover Naturally Without Fruit-Eating Birds

Apr. 15, 2024 — Natural forest regeneration is hailed as a cost-effective way to restore biodiversity and sequester carbon. However, the fragmentation of tropical forests has restricted the movement of large birds ...

New Report 'Braids' Indigenous and Western Knowledge for Forest Adaptation Strategies Against Climate Change

Apr. 10, 2024 — Forests could also be potential bulwarks against climate change. But, increasingly severe droughts and wildfires, invasive species, and large insect ...

Deforestation Harms Biodiversity of the Amazon's Perfume-Loving Orchid Bees

Apr. 10, 2024 — A survey of orchid bees in the Brazilian Amazon, carried out in the 1990s, is shedding new light the impact of deforestation on the scent-collecting pollinators, which some view as bellwethers of ...

Boreal Forest and Tundra Regions Worst Hit Over Next 500 Years of Climate Change, Study Shows

Apr. 8, 2024 — Modelling climate change over a 500 year period shows that much of the boreal forest, the Earth's northernmost forests and most significant provider ...

Four in Five Bird Species Cannot Tolerate Intense Human Pressures

Apr. 5, 2024 — In a recent study, researchers found that 78% of the world's bird species do not thrive in the most modified human-dominated environments. These species are also most likely to have declining ...

Older Trees Help to Protect an Endangered Species

Apr. 2, 2024 — The oldest trees in the forest help to prevent the disappearance of endangered species in the natural environment, according to a new study. This is the case of the wolf lichen -- threatened ...

Manganese Plays a Surprising Role in Soil Carbon Sequestration

Mar. 28, 2024 — A recent study reveals an unexpected link between manganese -- a naturally occurring mineral -- and increased carbon emissions from high-latitude boreal forests. The study uncovers how manganese ...

Seeing the Forest for the Trees: Species Diversity Is Directly Correlated With Productivity in Eastern U.S. Forests

Mar. 25, 2024 — When officials make tough calls on which areas to prioritize for conservation, biodiversity is often their top consideration. But there are several types of diversity, and not all of them overlap ...

Tropical Birds Could Tolerate Warming Better Than Expected, Study Suggests

Mar. 14, 2024 — We expect tropical animals to handle a certain degree of heat, but not wild swings in temperature. That seems to be true for tropical ectotherms, or 'cold-blooded' animals such as ...

Rainforest's Next Generation of Trees Threatened 30 Years After Logging

Mar. 12, 2024 — Rainforest seedlings are more likely to survive in natural forests than in places where logging has happened -- even if tree restoration projects have taken place, new research ...

Herbivores, Displaced by Ocean Warming, Threaten Subtropical Seagrass Meadows

Mar. 6, 2024 — The findings suggest that subtropical seagrasses are less resilient to heavy grazing from marine herbivores, in part because they receive less sunlight relative to their tropical counterparts. As ...

Birds and Bee Lessons as Pacific Field Trips Also Solve 'Michener's Mystery'

Feb. 29, 2024 — Eight new Pacific bee species and new insights into Fijian bird behaviour on Viti Levu Island have been described in new scientific studies. The research highlights the potential for species ...

Reforestation Schemes Are Not Enough to Recover the Carbon Created by Harvesting Wood

Feb. 26, 2024 — Forests have a critical role to play in capturing and storing carbon from the Earth's atmosphere -- but some models exaggerate their carbon removal potential by almost three-fold, according to a ...

Carbon Emissions from the Destruction of Mangrove Forests Predicted to Increase by 50,000% by the End of the Century

Feb. 22, 2024 — The annual rate of carbon emissions due to the degradation of carbon stocks in mangrove forests is predicted to rise by nearly 50,000% by the end of the century, according to a new study. Mangroves ...

Converting Rainforest to Plantation Impacts Food Webs and Biodiversity

Feb. 21, 2024 — Every day, new areas of rainforests are converted into plantations, drastically changing tropical biodiversity and the way the ecosystem functions. Yet, the current understanding of the consequences ...

How Is Deforested Land in Africa Used?

Feb. 15, 2024 — Africa's forested areas -- an estimated 14 % of the global forest area -- are continuing to decline at an increasing rate -- mostly because of human activities to convert forest land for ...

Reforestation Programs Could Threaten Vast Area of Tropical Grasslands

Feb. 15, 2024 — New research reveals the scale of inappropriate reforestation projects across Africa. A new study reveals that an area the size of France is threatened by forest restoration initiatives, such as the ...

Is the Amazon Forest Approaching a Tipping Point?

Feb. 14, 2024 — Global warming may be interacting with regional rainfall and deforestation to accelerate forest loss in the Amazon, pushing it towards partial or total collapse. New research has identified the ...

A Century of Reforestation Helped Keep the Eastern US Cool

Feb. 13, 2024 — Widespread 20th-century reforestation in the eastern United States helped counter rising temperatures due to climate change, according to new research. The authors highlight the potential of forests ...

Global Deforestation Leads to More Mercury Pollution

Feb. 12, 2024 — Researchers find deforestation accounts for about 10 percent of global human-made mercury emissions. While it cannot be the only solution, they suggest reforestation could increase global mercury ...

New Study Sheds New Light on Forests' Role in Climate and Water Cycle

Feb. 7, 2024 — Forests, which cover a third of Earth's land surface, are pivotal in carbon storage and the water cycle, though the full scope of their impact remains to be fully understood. In a new study, ...

Complex Tree Canopies Help Forests Recover from Moderate-Severity Disturbances

Feb. 6, 2024 — Extreme events wipe out entire forests, dramatically eliminating complex ecosystems as well as local communities. Researchers have become quite familiar with such attention-grabbing events over the ...

Tidal Landscapes a Greater Carbon Sink Than Previously Thought

Feb. 1, 2024 — Mangroves and saltmarshes sequester large amounts of carbon, mitigating the greenhouse effect. New research shows that these environments are perhaps twice as effective as previously ...

Scientists Develop Novel Method to Estimate Biodiversity Loss in Singapore Over the Past Two Centuries

Jan. 29, 2024 — Scientists have employed novel statistical methods to reveal the extent of biodiversity loss in Singapore over the past two centuries. The study paints the most accurate picture to date of the ...

Diverse Forests Are Best at Standing Up to Storms

Jan. 25, 2024 — European forests with a greater diversity of tree species are more resilient to storms, according to new ...

Researchers Advocate for Sustainable Logging to Safeguard Against Global Flood Risks

Jan. 24, 2024 — It's time to recognize the power of healthy forests in managing global growing flood risk, and to shift towards more sustainable forestry practices and ...