Female California condors, an endangered species, are able to reproduce without male partners, in a process known as parthenogenesis.
© Claudio Contreras, Nature Picture Library

Even after years of study, the California condor is still surprising researchers. Recently, two of the giant birds were discovered to have been born through parthenogenesis, a form of reproduction in which an unfertilized egg still hatches. Parthenogenesis is a type of asexual reproduction. Human beings and almost all other animals reproduce sexually, through mating between a male and a female. In asexual reproduction, a new organism (living thing) develops from parts of, or parts produced by, one organism. This example of parthenogenesis is particularly noteworthy because the condor is a critically endangered species. At its lowest population in 1982, only around 20 California condors were alive, in the wild and in captivity.

In 1982, researchers launched a program to save the condors, and over the next few decades, the population grew to over 500. The researchers also studied the condors in captivity. They were able to collect DNA samples from feathers and eggshells and could pay close attention to the birds’ reproductive habits. They discovered that two of the male condors did not have any genetic indication of having been fathered by the other condors in captivity. Despite having only one parent, the condors were not clones (genetically identical copies) of the mother. Rather, through fusion between the unfertilized egg and another reproductive cell in the mother’s body, the offspring end up with a unique mixture of the mother’s genetic material. Female condors can only produce male offspring through parthenogenesis, due to the way sex is determined by chromosomes among birds.

While parthenogenesis is fairly rare, it is not unheard of, even in birds. Some species of turkey and domestic pigeons also have been known to reproduce in this way. Additionally, birds are far from the only animals that can undergo parthenogenesis. Parthenogenesis has been seen in species of sharks—including the hammerhead and bamboo shark—as well as some species of snakes and lizards. Some insects, like aphids and stick insects, can also reproduce asexually. However, parthenogenesis has not been documented in mammals.

Most scientists thought that parthenogenesis only happened in populations that lacked males. For example, a female shark recently surprisingly gave birth after living 10 years in an Italian aquarium where no male sharks were kept. But the female condors had males in captivity with them. Other female condors nested and produced chicks after mating with the local males.

California condors are the largest flying land birds in North America, with a wingspan of 8 to 9 1/2 feet (2.4 to 2.9 meters). They weigh up to 23 pounds (10.4 kilograms). In the wild, condors spend much of the day resting on high perches. Condors do not build nests. Instead, their eggs are laid in caves, in holes, or among boulders. A female California condor lays just one egg every two years. Condors are powerful, graceful fliers. They can soar and glide for long distances, flapping their wings an average of only once an hour. They may search the ground for food as they fly. Like other vultures, condors eat the remains of dead animals.

The growth of urban areas has posed a major threat to condor survival. The condor’s way of life requires vast areas of open, hilly country, and urban growth destroys such habitat.

Aerial photo taken on June 7, 2021 shows wild Asian elephants napping in Jinning District of Kunming, southwest China’s Yunnan Province.
Credit: © Xinhua/Alamy Images

A wild elephant herd has captured global attention and baffled, well, everyone. Fifteen elephants, including three calves, have been on a mysterious trek across their native China. Traveling for over a year, the migration has taken them more than 300 miles (500 kilometers) from home. Their natural habitat is thought to be the Mengyangzi Nature Reserve in Xishuangbanna, Yunnan. Reserves are areas of land set aside to protect the habitats of elephants and other wild animals. China only has about 300 wild elephants. Most live in the south of the Yunnan province.

The traveling herd gained fame in China despite trampling crops, damaging property, and occasionally poking a trunk through someone’s window. The elephant’s padded feet enable them to walk and run with surprisingly little noise. Elephants normally walk at a speed of 3 to 6 miles (5 to 10 kilometers) an hour. When making a long journey, a family walks at about 10 miles (16 kilometers) an hour.

The elephants might have been looking for a new habitat, though they wouldn’t find one among millions in the city Kunming. Paths were cleared and food was provided as towns moved to protect the elephants.

Safety is a high priority for the endangered Asian elephant. Local government launched drones and mobilized hundreds of people to protect the herd’s migration. People attempted to steer the elephants in the southwest direction, back toward the reserve. However, the herd may have decided to head home all on their own.

Elephants are extremely strong and highly intelligent. There are two kinds of elephants, African elephants and Asian elephants, also known as Indian elephants. Asian elephants live only in southern and southeastern Asia. They are found in forests and jungles of Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Today, wildlife experts agree that elephants are in great danger and need human protection to survive. The number of wild elephants has greatly declined because people kill elephants for their ivory tusks. Farming and industry threaten the natural resources needed by elephants to survive. In Asia, human population growth and habitat destruction have severely reduced the number of wild elephants. Scientists estimate that only about 40,000 Asian elephants survive in the wild.

An adult Asian bull stands from 9 to 101/2 feet (2.7 to 3.2 meters) tall at the shoulder and weighs up to 8,000 pounds (3,600 kilograms). Asian cows stand about 8 feet (2.4 meters) tall and weigh about 6,600 pounds (3,000 kilograms).

Most Asian elephants have light gray skin and may have pink or white spots. Most Asian bulls have tusks that grow from 4 to 5 feet (1.2 to 1.5 meters) long. However, some Asian males, called makhnas, have no tusks, and many Asian females have none. Other Asian females have extremely short tusks called tushes.

Black-footed ferret in the wild
© Kerry Hargrove, Shutterstock

Have you ever wanted to clone yourself? Maybe you thought, “While I play video games, my clone can do all my chores!” Well, if you are a black-footed ferret, it’s your lucky day. (But, we’re pretty sure black-footed ferrets don’t play video games.)

In December 2020, the weasel world welcomed a cloned black-footed ferret named Elizabeth Ann. She became the first of any endangered native North American species to be cloned. In a few years, Elizabeth Ann might have siblings. The successful cloning is promising, because it offers hope that cloned animals could help save species from extinction. Extinction occurs when every member of a species of a living thing has died.

In the past, black-footed ferrets lived throughout much of the Great Plains. They depended on hunting prairie dogs for food and lived in the prairie dogs’ underground burrows. Since the late 1800′s, however, ranchers have eliminated prairie dogs from much of the Great Plains because they consider the animals to be pests. The black-footed ferret has become rare as a result of the decline in prairie dogs. Disease and the loss of rangeland to agriculture have also reduced the ferret’s numbers. Scientists once thought black-footed ferrets were extinct.

In 1981, ranchers in Wyoming discovered a population of more than 125 black-footed ferrets. Over the next several years, many of these animals died of a disease called distemper. To keep them from dying out completely, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Wyoming Game and Fish Department captured the remaining animals. Scientists have successfully bred the ferrets in captivity. In 1991, they began releasing captive-bred ferrets into western grasslands that were home to prairie dog populations. The ferrets began reproducing again in the wild.

The black-footed ferret is not the first animal to be cloned. Scientists used a technique called nuclear transfer to clone such amphibians as frogs and salamanders as early as the 1950′s. In 1996, a group led by the British scientist Ian Wilmut used the procedure to clone a sheep. The sheep was the first mammal cloned from a donor cell from an adult mammal. They named the clone “Dolly.” Since the cloning of Dolly, scientists from many countries have used a similar technique to produce clones of mice, cattle, cats, and other mammals.

August 12, 2019

Late last month, on Sunday, July 28, a southern white rhinoceros calf was born at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park in southern California. The baby rhino, named Edward, marks the first instance of a successful artificial insemination (pregnancy induced by other than natural means) birth of a southern white rhino in North America. Artificial insemination of southern white rhinos, which were once endangered, has rarely been successful. Just two other southern white rhinos have been born this way prior to Edward’s joyful appearance. But baby Edward may soon have company. A second artificially inseminated southern white rhino is due to give birth at the safari park later this year.

One-day old Edward shelters beneath his mother, Victoria, at the Nikita Kahn Rhino Rescue Center at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park on July 29, 2019. Credit: © San Diego Zoo

Edward’s mother, Victoria, was artificially inseminated on March 22, 2018, following hormone-induced ovulation. White rhino gestation (the period of pregnancy) is normally around 485 days—but Victoria carried her calf for 493 days. That’s more than 16 months! The San Diego Zoo Safari Park, a center for the preservation and display of endangered species, has naturally bred southern white rhinos before. But the artificial insemination and Edward’s successful birth represented an important step in increasing white rhino as well as other rhinoceros populations that are critically endangered—particularly the northern white rhino, a subspecies of the southern white rhino.

Only two northern white rhinos remain on Earth, and both are female and beyond breeding age. The last male died in March 2018. Scientists have access to frozen reproductive material of the northern white rhino, however, and they hope to use artificial insemination or in vitro fertilization (IVF) to allow a southern white rhino to act as a surrogate mother. In IVF, an embryo is created in a laboratory and then transferred to a surrogate mother. Scientists hope to achieve a northern white rhino birth within the next 10 years. Without some form of assisted reproduction, the animals will soon be extinct.

Southern white rhinos, too, once stood on the brink of extinction. In the early 1900′s, overhunting and habitat loss had reduced Africa’s southern white rhino population to fewer than 50 animals. Protections and conservation measures allowed the population to rebound, however, and today thousands of animals live both in the wild and in parks and zoos around the world.

The white rhino is the largest of all rhinoceroses. It stands about 5 to 6 feet (1.5 to 1.8 meters) tall. In some cases, it may be over 6 feet (1.8 meters) tall and 15 feet (4.6 meters) long. It weighs up to 4 tons (3.6 metric tons). The animals face grave threats from habitat loss and poachers, who illegally kill rhinoceroses and sell their horns and skin. In some Asian traditions, the powdered horn of the rhinoceros is believed to have healing qualities. Rhinoceros skin, blood, and urine are also sometimes used in traditional medicine.

September 7, 2017

The pangolin, a reclusive, unusual insect-eating animal, is the world’s most trafficked (illegally traded) mammal. These armored but endangered animals live in tree hollows or dense thickets in remote forests and scrublands of Africa and Southeast Asia. Shy and largely nocturnal, the cat-sized animals are hard to find—which is a lucky thing. The pangolin is prized for its meat and the medicinal properties of its scaly armor. Were pangolins easier to find, they would have disappeared from the Earth long ago. As people continue to hunt them, however, and as deforestation shrinks their natural habitats, the pangolin’s days may still be numbered.

Pangolins are famous for their scaly armor and the habit of rolling up in a ball when threatened. Credit: © Shutterstock

Pangolins are slow-moving mammals that resemble anteaters and armadillos. However, they are not closely related to either, and, instead of the coarse hair of anteaters, pangolins have coats of overlapping brown scales. Like rhino horn, pangolin scales are largely composed of keratin, the same protein found in human hair and fingernails. Like anteaters, pangolins are toothless and have long, narrow snouts, long tails, and sticky, ropelike tongues that they thrust far out to catch ants, termites, and other tasty insects. Their large, strong foreclaws are used for ripping into tough ant and termite mounds and nests.

Pangolins are perhaps best known in popular culture for their unique defense mechanism. When threatened, they roll themselves into a tight, armored ball. With the exception of humans, few animals can harm pangolins. They are harmless animals, but they can also lash out with their scaly tails or emit a foul-odored scent like a skunk.

Pangolins and other illegally trapped wildlife suffer in cages in a market in Mong La, Myanmar, on the Chinese border. Credit: Dan Bennett (licensed under CC BY 2.0)

All eight pangolin species are threatened, and international laws and treaties protect their populations on paper. But the lucrative illegal trade powers on, and pangolins are being smuggled in record numbers. Poachers capture or kill hundreds of thousands of pangolins every year. And most of the animals—alive, maimed, or dead—are destined for China, where the meat is considered a delicacy and the scales are used in traditional medicine. Customs officials seize thousands of pangolins—often cruelly packed in tiny cages or boxes—and hundreds of pounds of pangolin scales each year. Despite its illegal nature, pangolin trafficking is often out in the open, even advertised. In June 2017, an Internet search revealed numerous traders on several websites selling pangolin scales, pangolin meat, and live pangolins. There is also an illegal trade in pangolin blood, and stuffed pangolins are unlawfully sold as souvenirs. Pangolins—like many wild animals—are also threatened by deforestation. They live in an ever-shrinking environment, leaving them with fewer places to hide from poachers.

And there is still more bad news for pangolins: they do not take well to captivity. Some animal populations can be saved or even restored in refuges, reserves, or zoos, but captured pangolins often simply die. They also do not reproduce in captivity, which prevents commercial breeding to supply China’s legal domestic medicinal trade. The only way to save these animals is to stop pangolin trafficking and preserve their natural homes.

Later this year, pangolins will be one of the topics at the Conference for the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in Geneva, Switzerland. The goal is to list all pangolin species in Appendix I of CITES, which includes only species threatened with extinction. (Currently, two pangolin species are listed as critically endangered, and the others rank as vulnerable.) CITES is a treaty that aims to control trade in wild animals and plants, their parts, and products derived from them. Such a listing will draw more attention to the plight of pangolins, and it may encourage more people to help protect these humble creatures.

September 1, 2017

On remote Deserta Grande Island in the eastern Atlantic Ocean, a very rare and endangered spider is fighting for survival. A single valley on the island is home to the Deserta wolf spider (Hogna ingens), a stout and hairy burrowing spider found nowhere else on Earth. Deserta Grande is a small island among Portugal’s Madeira Islands. Deserta Grande once had a large population of these unique spiders, but habitat loss has reduced their numbers to an estimated 4,000 in the wild—a shockingly small population for an entire species of invertebrates (animals without backbones). The island, uninhabited by people, has fallen victim to an invasive grass that binds the soil so tightly that the spiders cannot burrow into it. This deprives the spiders of home and shelter, and their numbers have been greatly reduced. Help is on the way, however. At Bristol Zoo Gardens in the United Kingdom, Curator of Invertebrates Mark Bushell has begun raising his own Deserta wolf spiders, and he is part of a wider plan to replenish the spiders’ numbers on little Deserta Grande.

Mark Bushell shows off a tiny Deserta wolf spiderling at Bristol Zoo Gardens in the United Kingdom. Credit: © Bristol Zoo

In 2016, Bushell and Bristol Zoo veterinarian Richard Saunders traveled to Deserta Grande, where they collected 25 of the impressive black-and-white wolf spiders. The spiders are quite large, measuring up to 4 ¾ inches (12 centimeters) across, with a body size of 1 ½ inches (4 centimeters). Bushell and Saunders brought the spiders back to the zoo and have since successfully bred them. Tiny spiderlings, about 3/20 of an inch (4 millimeters) wide, emerged from tiny eggs, and the original 25 spiders have now multiplied to more than 1,000. The young spiders are incredibly delicate, however, and require committed and faithful care. In early 2018, Bushell will begin returning some of the spiders to their native island. Other young Deserta wolf spiders will go to other zoos to set up further safety net populations.

A conservation strategy to restore the native habitat on Deserta Grande is also in the works, a collaborative effort of the Bristol Zoo, the Instituto das Florestas e Conservação de Natureza of Madeira, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature in Switzerland. Working with local park rangers, the aim is to control or eradicate the invasive grass and restore the full breadth of the spider’s habitat. The Deserta wolf spider is listed as critically endangered, but it is not yet protected by any legislation.

February 2, 2017

Move over, Luke, there’s a new Skywalker in town! A new species (kind) of gibbon, the Skywalker hoolock gibbon, has been found living in the tropical rain forests of southwestern China and northeastern Myanmar. Gibbons are the smallest of the apes. The scientific name of this new species, Hoolock tianxing, describes a hoolock gibbon with “heaven’s movement” or, loosely, as a “skywalker.” The name refers to the gibbons’ graceful swinging through the treetops as well as the traditional Chinese view of these animals as mystical beings. Also, the scientists who studied the newly defined gibbons are huge Star Wars fans. (In case you didn’t know, Luke Skywalker is one of the heroes of the movie franchise.)

An adult female Skywalker hoolock gibbon contemplates the universe from its treetop home in southwestern China. Credit: © Fan Peng-Fei, Zoological Society of London

Researchers from Sun Yat-sen University in Guangzhou, China, along with experts from the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) in the United Kingdom, have been studying these gibbons since 2008. But only recently did the scientists realize that this hoolock gibbon was different from the two known species—eastern and western hoolocks. Skywalker hoolock gibbons have slightly different eyebrows and beards than their relatives, and they have their own unique calls.

Gibbons are small primates with long arms. They weigh from 10 to 20 pounds (5 to 9 kilograms) and stand 15 to 36 inches (38 to 91 centimeters) high. Adults typically range in color from black to light tan, with males often darker than females. Their long arms help them brachiate (swing from branch to branch) through the treetops where they live. They eat fruits and leaves and rarely come to the ground. Most gibbons inhabit the forests of such Southeast Asian nations as Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, and Thailand. The rare hoolock gibbon has been spotted as far west as India.

Unfortunately, all gibbons, including this new species, are threatened in the wild. Scientists believe there are only 200 Skywalker hoolock gibbons left in their native habitat. Human beings have greatly reduced gibbon populations by destroying the animals’ forest homes and by capturing young animals for food or for sale as pets.

January 18, 2017

For the first time in the continental United States, a wild bee has been designated as an endangered species. What was once a thriving bee in 28 states and 2 Canadian provinces, the rusty patched bumble bee is now weakly carrying on in scattered populations in just 13 states and the province of Ontario. In the past 20 years, the insect’s population has dropped 87 percent because of habitat loss, disease, pesticides, and climate change. In 2013, the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation filed a petition for the rusty patched bumble bee to be listed as an endangered species, but it took until last week to make it happen.

The rusty patched bumble bee (Bombus affinis) was listed as an endangered species in January 2017. Credit: © Rich Hatfield, The Xerces Society

The bumble bee is a large, burly bee that often has mostly black-and-yellow coloring. Bumble bees may be seen flying among flower blossoms during spring, summer, and fall. The rusty patched bumble bee lives only in the upper Midwest and northeastern United States and in Ontario. Like most bumble bees, rusty patched bumble bees have black heads, but workers and males have a rusty reddish patch on their backs.

Bumble bees are among farmers’ best friends, and protecting them is important. They pollinate (help fertilize) numerous wild plants and such food crops as blueberries, cranberries, clover, and tomatoes. The agriculture industry leans heavily on such native pollinators as bumble bees.

Now that the rusty patched bumble bee is listed under the Endangered Species Act, the Fish and Wildlife Service must assess, protect, and help restore the insect’s population and habitat.

By protecting the environment, people can help save the rusty patched bumble bee. On an individual level, you can help simply by growing a garden. A garden of plants native to your region will attract and nurture native pollinators. Bumble bees love lupines (such as peas), colorful asters, and, as its name implies, bee balm (flowers that also attract nectar-loving butterflies and hummingbirds). Choose a variety of colorful plants that flower at different times, providing nectar and pollen throughout the growing season. Limiting or avoiding the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers also helps, because they can kill or seriously harm bumble bees.

September 9, 2016

Once teetering on the brink of extinction, the rare island fox of California’s Channel Islands has made the quickest recovery yet for a North American mammal in the history of the Endangered Species Act. In 2000, only 55 island foxes lived on Santa Cruz Island, and another 15 of the animals lived on the chain’s two northern islands. In 2004, the island fox was formally listed as endangered and was given a 50 percent chance of becoming extinct within a decade. An intense recovery program, however, achieved the difficult feat of recovering the species. The program included breeding the island fox in captivity, vaccinating the foxes, removing feral pigs from the islands, and relocating a number of golden eagles, which are invasive predators from the California mainland. The conservation efforts restored the Channel Islands’ fox population to more than 4,100, and the animal was removed from endangered species protection in August 2016.

California’s island fox was recently removed from the endangered species list. Credit: National Park Service/U.S. Fish & Wildlife Services

The island fox is closely related to the common gray fox of the southern United States. Like the gray fox, the island fox has gray coloring on the back, rust coloring on the sides, and is white underneath. The face has distinctive black, white, and reddish-brown patterns. The island fox weighs just 3 to 5 pounds (1.4 to 2.3 kilograms) and stands about a foot (30.5 centimeters) tall. It is one of the smallest canid species in the world. The Canidae family includes coyotes, foxes, jackals, wolves, and the domestic dog. Island foxes exist only on six of the eight Channel Islands off the southern California coast. The only carnivore unique to California, island foxes feed on beetles, crickets, earwigs, mice, and the occasional crab. They also eat the fruits of cactus, manzanita, saltbush, and other plants.

The Endangered Species Act of 1973 protects endangered and threatened wildlife and plants in the United States from hunting, collecting, and other activities that harm them or their habitats. Since this law was enacted, the numbers of such endangered animals as alligators, bald eagles, and peregrine falcons have recovered enough to be reclassified as threatened or removed from the endangered list altogether. Prior to the speedy recovery of the island fox, Steller’s sea lion was the quickest species to recover under the Endangered Species Act. Steller’s sea lion spent 23 years on the endangered list; the island fox took just 12 years to recover.

Thanks to the intensive efforts of the Nature Conservancy, the Institute for Wildlife Studies, and the Channel Islands National Park (plus hundreds of individual volunteers), the island fox has been saved from extinction—and in record time. The fox-saving efforts also had a side benefit: The removal of feral pigs allowed many rare plants native only to the Channel Islands to gain strength as well.

August 3, 2015

In New York City, large images of endangered species (in this photo, a whale) were projected on the south side of the Empire State Building on August 1, 2015. The large-scale projections were produced, in part, by filmmakers of an upcoming documentary on wildlife, Racing Extinction. Credit: © Craig Ruttle, AP Photo

For three hours last Saturday, August 1st, visions and videos of endangered animals danced on New York City’s iconic Empire State Building. Two artists created this exhibition using 40 projectors to showcase the plight of endangered animals and to spark conversation about mass extinction. Cecil, the beloved lion from a Zimbabwe national park who was killed in a poaching incident last month, was honored along with 160 endangered species beamed onto the New York landmark as part of the event.

The display, dubbed by the artists as a “weapon of mass instruction,” served as a sky-high reminder of the harm—whether through habitat destruction, poaching, pollution, deforestation, or other damaging choices—that humans continue to inflict on the planet’s many endangered creatures. The display also aimed to foster the idea that conservation of these species, and all species, is in great need. The 2014 edition of the Living Planet Report, released by the WWF (formerly the World Wildlife Fund) in September of last year, claimed that the populations of amphibians, birds, fish, mammals, and reptiles have dropped by more than half since 1970. Conservation of endangered species, and in fact of all species, is an immediate priority if these animals are to survive the next 100 years.