India became a signatory to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in 1994. The CBD is a multilateral treaty aimed at conserving biodiversity, its sustainable use and ensuring “fair and…
“Our book is a treasure of wild places, and words.” That is how Prerna Singh Bindra, one of the three editors of Wild Treasures: Reflections on Natural World Heritage Sites…
Five trillion US dollars. That's how much the overall international trade in medicinal plants and their products alone is expected to amount to by the year 2050. Estimates, as far…
The tiny village of Doddamargonahalli in south Karnataka's Tumkur district, less than a three-hour drive from the state capital of Bengaluru, is a predominantly agricultural landscape. On August 31, 2014,…
Grasses that glint like they are studded with tiny diamonds, as the salt crystals on their blades catch the bright sun. A grass species named after how its spiked seeds…
Sixty-year-old Kunjan Kurumban has lived all his life in the village of Pallavur in Palakkad in central Kerala. But the agricultural worker had never seen a peacock in the vicinity…
Off the coast of Red Skin Island in the Andamans, it was a colourful world that marine biologist Vardhan Patankar dived into in the summer of 2016. Here, corals wore…
A helping hand goes a long way, especially for fragmented and disturbed forests. According to a recent study published in Ecosphere, removing weeds and planting native trees in such patches…
It was September 7, barely a month after the floods of 2018 had wrecked large parts of Kerala. Though life was far from normal in Thrissur's coastal Kodungalloor, 48-year-old Jaison…
Turn page 266, the last one of Voice of a Sentient Highland, and you would have transitioned through myriad emotions. Wonder, as author Godwin Vasanth Bosco's knowledge of the land…
Matriarch grandmas, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews: elephants, much like us, have complex social lives. But Asian elephants from southern India could be changing their social lives, to adapt to…
When do plants get invasive? Plants that do not occur naturally in a region but proliferate in the area they have been introduced into, and cause several negative impacts (such…
At first glance, a one-metre tall parthenium plant looks innocuous. Its tiny cream flowers, borne on several frail, pale green stalks, dance in the wind. However, packed in each mature…
Madhya Pradesh's Kanha-Pench landscape is synonymous with the surefire tiger sightings it offers tourists in its national parks. Yet, the 10,000 square kilometers that lie between the Kanha Tiger Reserve…
A gentle breeze nudges the leaves of a solitary mangrove tree struggling to find foothold along the banks of the Kochi backwaters near northern Maradu in Kerala’s port city. It's…
