Indholdsfortegnelse for January 2026 i BBC Wildlife Magazine

SPANISH RESEARCHERS have discovered that disused bearded vulture nests can preserve layers of bones, eggshells and even human-made objects for hundreds of years. The study, led by Antoni Margalida and published in Ecology, shows how these longabandoned abodes act as natural archives of both bird behaviour and human history. The bearded vulture is Europe’s most threatened vulture species, with fewer than 800 breeding pairs surviving, according to Rewilding Europe (the Vulture Conservation Foundation puts the figure closer to 500). Though it became locally extinct in southern Spain more than 70 years ago, many of its nests remain intact. Unlike most vultures, which carry food to their young in their crops, bearded vultures deliver meals in their beaks or talons. This means that well-protected nests in caves or sheltered by overhangs…

ONCE ON THE BRINK OF EXTINCTION the green turtle has been downgraded from Endangered to Least Concern on the IUCN Red List. The species’ comeback is the result of decades of conservation work – including the protection of females and their eggs at nesting sites – hatchling releases and efforts to reduce accidental capture in fishing nets.…

THE ADÉLIE PENGUIN IS NAMED AFTER a slice of Antarctica called Adélie Land. This is itself a reference to the wife – Adèle – of the French explorer Jules Dumont d’Urville, who discovered the species to science in 1840 (though it’s now considered an unfashionable practice to name a species after any one person). Along with the emperor, the Adélie is one of only two species of penguin to make the Antarctic continent its true home, though honourable mentions must also go to the chinstraps, gentoos and macaronis breeding on the decidedly less harsh tip of the Antarctic Peninsula. Considered middling in size within the penguin world, the Adélie combines a black head, back and throat with snowy white underparts and a conspicuous white eye-ring surrounding a black iris. With…

I LOOKED DOWN AT MY hands, shielded in red mittens, and flexed my fingers. They were badly blistered from frostnip, and I winced. It was early March and, despite the azure sky above, it was a bone-chillings-50°C. Beside me stood wildlife guide Adam Reimer. Born and bred in the Canadian bush, this willow-slip of a 20-something had a seemingly genetic indifference to the temperatures and an intrinsic understanding of tracking. On this particular day, we had already been riding our snowmobiles for seven hours, with the last 12km spent following the rambling tracks of some of the world’s most elusive and charismatic predators: grey wolves. More specifically, we were on the trail of the extraordinary Opoyastin pack, a 13-strong family unit that roams the Kaska Coast on the southern side…

CONSIDER A PLASTIC BOTTLE BOBBING on the ocean’s surface, thousands of miles from the nearest coastline. To the naked eye, it appears lifeless – just another piece of discarded waste adrift on an endless sea. But, peer closer, and this fragment of human negligence reveals itself as a thriving metropolis. Bacteria cluster in dense colonies across its weathered surface. Algae paint it green with photosynthetic films. Tiny invertebrates graze on the microbial lawns, while goose barnacles cement themselves to its edges. Welcome to the plastisphere, an entirely new ecosystem born from our refuse. The term, coined by marine microbiologist Linda Amaral-Zettler more than a decade ago, describes the unique communities of life that colonise plastic debris in our oceans. It’s a concept that challenges our understanding of both pollution and…

ABSURD LITTLE BIRDS ACROSS THE world lay their eggs in the nests of other species, leaving the hapless parents to raise a changeling at the expense of their own offspring. The majority are cuckoos – of the 150 Cuculidae species, 64 are brood parasites. Brood parasitism has evolved multiple times, testifying to its utility as an evolutionary strategy. A range of other birds also engage in this sneaky behaviour, from honeyguides to cowbirds and even one species of duck. Most birds that foist their young off on other species have no alternative – they simply do not know how to care for them. Their genetic programming seems to have deleted the impulse to build a nest or incubate an egg or bring food to a voracious nestling. They would not…

SLEEP IS A MYSTERIOUS THING. FOR A long time, we weren’t sure why we do it. Now we know that sleep has evolved for multiple reasons – to allow the body to heal and to clean our brains of toxins, for example. We also know that animals sleep for the same reasons. But why exactly do we dream, and do animals dream, too? Dreams help to strengthen memory. The more we dream, the better our memories are. But it is also thought that dreams ‘train’ us how to respond to different situations – not just situations we’ve already been exposed to, but also those that we might one day face. By experiencing new situations in our dreams, we apply what we’ve learnt in our everyday lives to new contexts, and…

How did your career in wildlife photography start? When I was ten years old. Having always been a keen naturalist and birdwatcher, photography became a natural progression of my passion for the outdoors. I wanted to capture lasting memories that reflected my experiences in nature. Which of your wildlife images has meant the most to you? A hen harrier in the Cairngorms mountains. Photographing this iconic yet increasingly rare species in such a wild and dramatic landscape was truly special. Watching this male “grey ghost” hunt gracefully across the moorland was an unforgettable experience. What has been your most memorable encounter with wildlife? My first close meeting with a black bear in Algonquin Provincial Park, Canada. I was walking along a trail and suddenly we came face to face. We…

Sixty-three years ago this month, Armand Denis launched the magazine that evolved into the one you’re reading now. Since then, we’ve been reporting on a changing world and have responded to meet the challenges this presents. In this issue we bring you the latest science on how plastics are changing the face of our oceans (p70), and examine the complex world of koala conservation in Australia (p62). And while we never shy away from the harsh realities at play, we always try to find hope. That hope usually comes in the guise of the rangers, scientists, writers, photographers, guides and conservationists who dedicate their lives to the natural world. On which note, I want to let you know about our new podcast, Wild Lives, in which we meet these people…

FRINGE-LIPPED BATS IN THE FORESTS OF Panama use a similar hunting strategy to the lions of the Serengeti – and implement it more efficiently, a Current Biology study reveals. One of nine known species of carnivorous bats, fringe-lipped bats weigh as much as a standard bag of crisps. Because they are so little, researchers expected they would target prey much smaller than themselves. Not so. Scientists fitted 20 wild bats with mini ‘biologger backpacks’, which enabled them to eavesdrop on the animals’ nocturnal activities. The bats spent 89 per cent of their time stationary, conserving energy. Then, when they did attack, it was targeted and quick. The average hunting flight lasted just eight seconds and instead of little frogs, the bats took down relative giants, including frogs that weighed two…

THE MOOSE IS A charismatic animal that inhabits the circumpolar boreal, temperate broadleaf and mixed forests of the northern hemisphere. It is to be found contiguously from Alaska and Canada to Fennoscandia, the Baltic states and east into Russia. My first sighting of a moose – the largest, tallest and heaviest of the world’s deer – was only a couple of years ago in Estonia. It is referred to as an elk in Europe, but I realised that moose and elk were indeed one and the same species. Interestingly, there is also another ‘elk’ in North America, but it is the alternative name for the wapiti, a completely different deer species. The moose is the classic large animal of densely forested remote areas, with the largest population densities in Canada…

THE FENNEC FOX IS THE SMALLEST fox in the world, with a body length that can be as little as 24cm. The canid’s range is North Africa, throughout the Sahara Desert, and east to the Sinai and Arabian Peninsulas. The species is particularly recognisable by its huge ears (the largest relative to body size in the Canidae family), which can reach up to 15cm in length. The ears radiate body heat, helping to keep these little mammals cool in the desert, and are used to track prey beneath the sand. Where do fennec foxes live? According to the IUCN, the fennec fox is widespread in the sandy deserts and semi-deserts of northern Africa, ranging from the western Sahara to northern Sinai. The species is native to Algeria, Chad, Egypt, Libya,…

ACROSS 1 Canadian term for the earthworm (3,4) 5 Plant also known as love-in-a-mist (7) 9 Equine mammal (5) 10 Fruit-bearing plant in the genus Syzygium, related to myrtles (4,5) 11 ___ shark, long-lived predatory fish (9) 12 Bedfordshire town, home to the RSPB (5) 13 Wader that may be sacred or scarlet (4) 15 Bask (8) 18 Gulls or auks, say (8) 19 Cougar (4) 22 Australian cockatoo (5) 24 Palearctic butterfly, Celastrina argiolus (5,4) 26 Large seabird of the Americas (5,4) 27 Inner ___ Estuary, protected marine region of western Scotland (5) 28 Pigeon genus (7) 29 ___ National Forest, woodland reserve in southern Illinois (7) DOWN 1 ___ Veluwe, Dutch nature reserve near Arnhem (2,4) 2 Infertile female in a hive (6,3) 3 Vast saltwater habitat (5)…

Renowned for its extraordinary speed, the cheetah has suffered a dramatic decline in the past century, now roaming less than 10 per cent of its historical range. Yet thanks to a holistic and modern conservation approach that has been unfolding over the past 15 years, this fleet-footed cat is starting to make a remarkable recovery across southern Africa.…

FIRE DANCERS White-tailed tropicbirds normally nest on sea-cliffs, but on Hawaii Island they nest on volcanoes, including Halema‘uma‘u Crater. “Nobody can explain why they are attracted to lava fountains, like moths to a flame, nor how they survive the heat and toxic gases that are emitted,” says photographer Doug Perrine. HIGH LIVING The silky sifaka spends almost all its time in trees, feeding on leaves, seeds, fruit and flowers, resting and socialising. One of the world’s rarest mammals, this large lemur is found only in upland forests such as Marojejy National Park, Madagascar. Hunting and habitat loss continue to threaten its numbers.…

IN 1961, A FOUR-HECTARE FIELD ON THE southern edge of an ancient woodland called Monks Wood in Cambridgeshire produced its last crop of barley. Having originally been cleared of trees during the Roman occupation, it was then abandoned to nature. In the intervening 60 years, that field has changed beyond recognition. Today, it’s a mature, closed-canopy woodland with oak, maple and ash trees, as well as berry-bearing shrubs such as hawthorn and brambles. Its “structural characteristics”, according to a study published in the renowned science journal PLOS One in 2021, are “approaching those of neighbouring ancient woodlands”. That’s some recovery in a little over half-a-century – with no money spent and no human effort required. “The slow rate of natural regeneration is part of the point, providing scrub habitats that…

The scar of Africa A vast geological trench, the Great Rift Valley spans 11 countries in Africa, from Ethiopia in the north to Mozambique in the south. It is one of the continent’s most striking features, with towering mountains, deep valleys and vast lakes, inhabited by a diversity of wildlife (here, a gelada monkey in Ethiopia’s Simien Mountains) and millions of people. Known as the ‘cradle of humankind’, the Great Rift Valley is considered the birthplace of humanity and has yielded a dizzying wealth of fossils over the years, including ‘Lucy’. “The Rift is the greatest treasure trove of clues to our origins and the strongest link to who we are,” says Shem. “No other geographical feature has influenced the world as much.” Flamingo frenzy Shem first glimpsed the Great…

IT’S 2AM AND Grandpa Boofhead is feeling frisky, his bellows echoing through the moonlit eucalyptus trees around my house in the Adelaide Hills, South Australia. It’s early spring, the breeding season, and those calls will carry for kilometres. Grandpa Boofhead – the name given to him by my children – is the southern koala type. All koalas are the same species (Phascolarctos cinereus) but he’s twice the size of his northern cousins, sporting darker, shaggier fur. We met Grandpa Boofhead in 2007, when we moved into his neck of the woods. We regularly see him, usually at night, ambling between trees. He bellows now from his favourite perch, metres away from our bedroom window, signalling his readiness to mate. Things can get a little rowdy when his girlfriends, Elvira and…

THERE WAS THE TIME HUNDREDS OF snakes came out of hibernation early before a devastating 7.3 magnitude earthquake in the Chinese city of Haicheng in 1975. Then there were the golden-winged warblers that flew 700km from their breeding grounds in Tennessee, USA, ahead of a swarm of tornadoes in 2014, despite having just arrived from their 5,000km migration. Examples abound of animals appearing to predict natural disasters, with anecdotes dating back as far as Ancient Greece, when the historian Thucydides wrote of rats, weasels, snakes and dogs deserting the city of Helice before an earthquake in 373 BC. With natural disasters hitting us by surprise, it’s appealing to entertain the notion of animals as crystal-ball gazers. Even today, while meteorological forecasting can give advance notice of weatherrelated events like hurricanes…

Sunshine state On a walk round Knole Park, Kent, we wandered off our usual path into the long grass where I photographed this fallow deer basking in the evening sun, unfazed by all the flies buzzing around. John Price, Petersfield, West Sussex Moths to a flame At Diwali, my grandmother had strings of LED lights hanging inside. These teak defoliator moths flew to the window, where I got this shot using multiple exposures. The moths look like spaceships. Aishwarya Sridhar, Mumbai, India Strike a pose The tiny firecrest’s restless search for food makes it tricky to photograph but a burst of shots yielded this portrait on an evergreen. Ian Howarth, Rickmansworth, Hertfordshire Up to scratch During a morning safari at Kanha Tiger Reserve, Madhya Pradesh, I captured this youngster learning…

I WAS RECENTLY FOLLOWING THE 27S POD of orcas down the coast of Orkney with some fellow whale-watchers, when the pod pulled into a bay close to Burwick and stayed for around an hour. There was blood in the water, so they had made a kill. Then they started behaving quite strangely by swimming backwards from a head-down position. Apparently, this is quite rare, and experts think it may be the family group dividing a kill. It is called ‘orca moonwalking’ and has previously been recorded in Canada but never in Orkney, as far as I’m aware. Roger Houghton, Orkney A visiting robin Robins are regular visitors to my garden, especially when the air turns crisp in autumn and winter. This little character has become a familiar face, hopping around…

IT WAS EARLY DECEMBER 2016 and the beginning of the hot, dry season in Kenya. I was driving with my friend, Patricia, cross-country through the Ol Pejeta Conservancy, a 36,000ha converted cattle ranch, home to the largest rhino population in East Africa. Back then, I was working on a project based at Ol Pejeta that aimed to halt the illegal trade of great apes. I had lodgings and a car, and enjoyed off-road privileges not accorded to visitors. Ol Pejeta hosts the Sweetwaters Chimpanzee Sanctuary, where some of our work was based. Patricia was here to witness the arrival of Manno, a trafficked chimpanzee we had just rescued from a private zoo in Iraq. Afterwards, we visited Sudan, Najin and Fatu, the last northern white rhinos on Earth, then hit…