BRONX, N.Y. — January 16, 2025 — Who needs roses and chocolates for Valentine’s Day when you can have a cockroach? Today, the Bronx Zoo announced that the popular, annual Name-a-Roach tradition returns this Valentine’s Day season to allow donors to symbolically name a Bronx Zoo Madagascar hissing cockroach after a loved one, or a not so loved one. The zoo’s cockroaches are located in the Madagascar! exhibit. For a $15 donation, guests will receive a digital certi...

(Pictured above, one of the two last known Swinhoe’s softshell turtles (Rafetus swinhoei). This photo was taken in May of 2022 in Dong Mo Lake, Vietnam.) NEW YORK, January 15, 2025 – Scientists have developed and validated a, first-of-its-kind, portable environmental DNA (eDNA) test to help detect the world’s rarest turtle, the Swinhoe’s softshell turtle (Rafetus swinhoei), which is teetering on the brink of extinction. Two of these turtles are curr...

NEW YORK, NY, January 8, 2025—Advances in data availability and accessibility have resulted in a groundbreaking new study on wild animal hunting in African tropical forests. It suggests that the commercial trade in wild-sourced meat is increasing, and highlights the urgent need for countries to develop robust frameworks to ensure hunting and trade is sustainable in a growing commercialized sector. The study, published in Nature Sustainability by lead authors Daniel Ingram (Durrell Insti...

New York, Jan. 6, 2025 – The following statement was released by the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) upon President Biden’s announcement today protecting waters off New York and New Jersey, including the Hudson Canyon, located about 100 miles off the coast of New York, and the remaining portion of the Northern Bering Sea Climate Resilience Area in Alaska. In all, the announcement calls for protecting 625 million acres of US waters from oil and natural ...

NEW YORK, NY (December 23, 2024) – New science from WCS has mapped coral reefs across the Western Indian Ocean, uncovering unexpected pockets of climate-resilience that could offer hope for conservation efforts in the region. By combining AI models with data from 1,000 field studies, researchers have identified reefs that may withstand climate change better than once feared, opening new doors for protecting the most biodiversity-rich ecosystems in the ocean. "Past models have be...

New York, December 20, 2024 – The Wildlife Conservation Society releases its ten favorite wildlife images of 2024, highlighting amazing wildlife stories. Five of the images come from WCS’s zoos and aquarium in New York, and five images are from WCS Global taken by WCS staff working around the world. WCS operates five wildlife parks in New York City, the Bronx Zoo, New York Aquarium, Central Park Zoo, Prospect Park Zoo, and Queens Zoo, and works in over 50 countries saving wildl...

New York, Dec. 19, 2024 – The following comments were issued by Boo Maisels, a conservation scientist at the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) and a contributing author to a new study on bonobos, an Endangered great ape only found in Congo. The study was published in the International Journal of Primatology and can be found HERE. The research was led by the Max Planck Institute of Animal Behavior (MPI-AB), including first author, Mattia Bessone, a postdoctoral researcher; and Barba...

WASHINGTON, D.C., Dec. 18, 2024—The following statement was released today by the Wildlife Conservation Society upon the passage of the bipartisan U.S. Foundation for International Conservation Act and the WILD Act. Both were part of the National Defense Authorization Act headed to the president for his signature. Wildlife Conservation Society’s Executive Vice President for Public Affairs John F. Calvelli said: “It was a great bipartisan win for wildlife conservation in W...

New York, December 11, 2024 -- Conservationists have succeeded in restoring tiger populations in a region where they were virtually absent for more than 50 years in Russia. This restoration took place from 2012-2021 in the Pri-Amur region of Russia. The techniques used to restore the tiger population are highlighted in a new study in the Journal of Wildlife Management which can be found HERE. In addition to highlighting this Russian success story, the study outlines a pathway for...

New York, December 6, 2024 – An Atlantic puffin chick hatched this summer has now been fully integrated with the rest of the colony in the Central Park Zoo Polar Zone.   Weighing just 2 ounces at hatching on August 11, the chick, known as a puffling, has joined 11 adult Atlantic puffins in the exhibit. The puffling is now the size of an adult bird but has not fully attained its adult plumage. It currently weighs more than 11 ounces. With black-and-white feathers and a large, m...