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Troubled waters: how to stop Australia’s freshwater fish species from going extinct

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Thursday, November 14, 2024

The barred galaxias is already extinct across 95% of its former streams due to trout, bushfires and droughts. Steven KuiterThree-quarters of Australia’s freshwater fish species are found nowhere else on the planet. This makes us the sole custodians of remarkable creatures such as the ornate rainbowfish, the ancient Australian lungfish and the magnificently named longnose sooty grunter. So how are these national treasures faring? To find out, we undertook the first comprehensive assessment of Australia’s freshwater fish species. We examined extinction risks and drivers of decline, before reviewing existing conservation measures. Our results paint an alarming picture. More than one-third (37%) of our freshwater fish species are at risk of extinction, including 35 species not even listed as threatened. Dozens of species could become extinct before children born today even finish high school. The study also reveals Australia has been putting its eggs in the wrong basket for conservation by taking actions that don’t address immediate threats, such as pest species and changes in stream flows. Our research points to more effective solutions if governments are willing to step up their efforts. The Angalarri grunter is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. It is declining due to degraded habitat and water quality caused by livestock and feral animals. Michael Hammer Identifying species at risk Recognising when species are in trouble is the first step in preventing their extinction. Before this study, the extinction risk of most freshwater fish species had never been assessed. The group had never been looked at overall. We evaluated the conservation risks of 241 species using globally recognised criteria (the IUCN Red List for Threatened Species). We began our assessments by gathering a team of 52 Australian freshwater fish experts for a five-day workshop in 2019. These experts came from universities, research organisations, museums, state government agencies, natural resource management, consultancies and non-government groups. Together, we used information from scientific publications, museum databases, Atlas of Living Australia records, government datasets, citizen science data, and our own knowledge of freshwater fish as it applied to the task. We identified dozens of freshwater fish species that were in trouble, but had not been recognised as threatened. This brings the proportion of our freshwater fishes at risk of extinction to a third. Some species have declined to the extent that they could disappear after a single disturbance, such as ash washed into streams after a bushfire or the arrival of an invasive non-native fish such as trout. We also found one New South Wales species, the Kangaroo River perch, is now extinct. Native fish enemy #1. A brown trout caught in NSW. Invasive fish such as brown and rainbow trout are the biggest driver of native fish loss. Lee Georgeson/iNaturalist, CC BY Get them on the list At present, 63 freshwater fish species are on Australia’s national list of species declared as threatened under federal environmental law. We identified 35 more species that should be listed, based on the available evidence. They include: ornate rainbowfish and longnosed sooty grunter (vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, the global list of threatened species) salamanderfish (endangered on the IUCN Red List) the slender carp, Drysdale and Barrow cave gudgeons in Western Australia (critically endangered on the IUCN Red List). The southwest ‘Vic’ blackfish is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. Tarmo Raadik Maintaining an accurate threatened species list is important. When species are in trouble but not listed, they miss out on basic protections and are unlikely to receive any conservation attention. We also identified 17 already listed species that should be reassessed by the government as their risk categories need to be changed. For example, the remarkable freshwater sawfish, found in northern Australian rivers, is listed as vulnerable but all evidence indicates it’s now critically endangered. One sliver of good news is the fact that the Murray cod, a favoured sport fish across eastern Australia, is now doing better and could be assessed to be removed from Australia’s threatened species list. Mapping freshwater fish extinction risk reveals fish are in danger right around Australia. M. Lintermans, N. Whiterod and J. Dielenberg, CC BY-SA Address the causes of decline To prevent species extinctions, you need to address the causes of their declines. That might seem breathtakingly obvious, yet our review found a spectacular mismatch between the major threats to species at risk and the most common conservation actions. The top three drivers of decline are invasive fish (which threaten 92% of threatened freshwater fish species), modified stream flows and ecosystems (82%), and climate change and extreme weather (54%). For example, Australia has 40 galaxiid species, scaleless native fish shaped like slender sausages that grow to less than 15cm. But 31 of these are threatened with extinction – and rainbow and brown trout, two introduced predators, have been the biggest driver of their loss. Australia’s southern states are greatly adding to the problem by releasing millions of trout into waterways each year for recreational fishers. The endangered eastern freshwater cod has dwindled in part due to historic fish kills linked to dynamite blasting and pollution from mines and agriculture. It remains threatened by changes to river flows, removal of woody snags, and other damage to its habitat. The endangered blackstriped dwarf galaxias is being stressed by the changing climate in southwest WA. Warmer and drier conditions are resulting in lower water levels and warmer water. A waterfall has so far saved the critically endangered stocky galaxias from extinction by preventing trout from reaching its last refuge. Tarmo Raadik The other major threats facing native fish are agriculture and aquaculture (38%), pollution (38%), hunting and fishing (19%), energy production and mining (17%), and urban development (13%). For example, the endangered Utchee rainbowfish is struggling due to habitat loss and water pollution from farms surrounding the small number of north Queensland streams where it lives. In contrast, the most common conservation action was simply the fact that the species occurred in a protected area (88%) or conservation area (55%). Sadly, invasive species and climate change don’t recognise or stop at protected area boundaries. Prevention and control of invasive species has occurred for only 21% of affected threatened species, mostly in Tasmania. The Utchee rainbowfish is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. It is struggling due to habitat loss and water pollution from agriculture surrounding the small number of streams where it occurs in north Queensland. ANGFA Qld A blueprint to end extinctions Without a major funding commitment to address the actual drivers of native fish losses, species will continue to decline, and extinctions will soon follow. The most important conservation actions for native freshwater fish are: update the national threatened species list to include all at-risk species tackle invasive species such as trout, gambusia and redfin perch identify, establish and protect additional invasive-fish-free refuge sites for species that currently occur only in a small number of locations and could be wiped out by a single event such as a bushfire halt ongoing habitat loss and improve habitats that have been damaged improve freshwater flows to maintain habitats such as wetlands and streams, improve water quality and give fish the natural cues they need to breed. In 2022, the Australian government made a commitment to end extinctions. Our study provides a blueprint for how to do that for our overlooked native freshwater fish. This waterfall in NSW has protected the native galaxias fish above it from trout. To prevent extinctions we need to find or create more invasive-fish-free refuges for native fish. Mark Lintermans Mark Lintermans was a member of the ACT Scientific Committee and the NSW Fisheries Scientific Committee, a previous convener of the Australian Society for Fish Biology Threatened Fishes Committee, and the Alien Fishes Committee. He now provides research, monitoring and advice for threatened freshwater fish management as director of a small consultancy company. He receives funding from New South Wales and national government departments for threatened fish projects. Jaana Dielenberg was employed by the now-ended Threatened Species Recovery Hub of the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program, which led an earlier stage of this research. She is a Charles Darwin University Fellow and is employed by the University of Melbourne and the Biodiversity Council.Nick Whiterod works for the Goyder Institute for Water Research, Coorong, Lower Lakes and Murray Mouth Research Centre, which is funded by the national government to delivery research in the region. He is a member of the New South Wales Fisheries Scientific Committee.

New research reveals a third of Australia’s freshwater fishes are at risk of extinction. That means 35 species should be added to the national list of 63 threatened species, bringing the total to 98.

Three-quarters of Australia’s freshwater fish species are found nowhere else on the planet. This makes us the sole custodians of remarkable creatures such as the ornate rainbowfish, the ancient Australian lungfish and the magnificently named longnose sooty grunter.

So how are these national treasures faring? To find out, we undertook the first comprehensive assessment of Australia’s freshwater fish species. We examined extinction risks and drivers of decline, before reviewing existing conservation measures.

Our results paint an alarming picture. More than one-third (37%) of our freshwater fish species are at risk of extinction, including 35 species not even listed as threatened. Dozens of species could become extinct before children born today even finish high school.

The study also reveals Australia has been putting its eggs in the wrong basket for conservation by taking actions that don’t address immediate threats, such as pest species and changes in stream flows. Our research points to more effective solutions if governments are willing to step up their efforts.

A light yellow fish with impressive spines and a big dark eye. — The Angalarri grunter is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. It is declining due to degraded habitat and water quality caused by livestock and feral animals. Michael Hammer

Identifying species at risk

Recognising when species are in trouble is the first step in preventing their extinction.

Before this study, the extinction risk of most freshwater fish species had never been assessed. The group had never been looked at overall.

We evaluated the conservation risks of 241 species using globally recognised criteria (the IUCN Red List for Threatened Species).

We began our assessments by gathering a team of 52 Australian freshwater fish experts for a five-day workshop in 2019. These experts came from universities, research organisations, museums, state government agencies, natural resource management, consultancies and non-government groups.

Together, we used information from scientific publications, museum databases, Atlas of Living Australia records, government datasets, citizen science data, and our own knowledge of freshwater fish as it applied to the task.

We identified dozens of freshwater fish species that were in trouble, but had not been recognised as threatened. This brings the proportion of our freshwater fishes at risk of extinction to a third.

Some species have declined to the extent that they could disappear after a single disturbance, such as ash washed into streams after a bushfire or the arrival of an invasive non-native fish such as trout.

We also found one New South Wales species, the Kangaroo River perch, is now extinct.

A fish held up with a river behind — Native fish enemy #1. A brown trout caught in NSW. Invasive fish such as brown and rainbow trout are the biggest driver of native fish loss. Lee Georgeson/iNaturalist, CC BY

Get them on the list

At present, 63 freshwater fish species are on Australia’s national list of species declared as threatened under federal environmental law.

We identified 35 more species that should be listed, based on the available evidence. They include:

ornate rainbowfish and longnosed sooty grunter (vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, the global list of threatened species)
salamanderfish (endangered on the IUCN Red List)
the slender carp, Drysdale and Barrow cave gudgeons in Western Australia (critically endangered on the IUCN Red List).

A long coppery coloured fish with a dark marbled pattern. — The southwest ‘Vic’ blackfish is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. Tarmo Raadik

Maintaining an accurate threatened species list is important. When species are in trouble but not listed, they miss out on basic protections and are unlikely to receive any conservation attention.

We also identified 17 already listed species that should be reassessed by the government as their risk categories need to be changed.

For example, the remarkable freshwater sawfish, found in northern Australian rivers, is listed as vulnerable but all evidence indicates it’s now critically endangered.

One sliver of good news is the fact that the Murray cod, a favoured sport fish across eastern Australia, is now doing better and could be assessed to be removed from Australia’s threatened species list.

A map of Australia showing extinction risk hotspots surrounded by 7 fish. — Mapping freshwater fish extinction risk reveals fish are in danger right around Australia. M. Lintermans, N. Whiterod and J. Dielenberg, CC BY-SA

Address the causes of decline

To prevent species extinctions, you need to address the causes of their declines. That might seem breathtakingly obvious, yet our review found a spectacular mismatch between the major threats to species at risk and the most common conservation actions.

The top three drivers of decline are invasive fish (which threaten 92% of threatened freshwater fish species), modified stream flows and ecosystems (82%), and climate change and extreme weather (54%).

For example, Australia has 40 galaxiid species, scaleless native fish shaped like slender sausages that grow to less than 15cm. But 31 of these are threatened with extinction – and rainbow and brown trout, two introduced predators, have been the biggest driver of their loss.

Australia’s southern states are greatly adding to the problem by releasing millions of trout into waterways each year for recreational fishers.

The endangered eastern freshwater cod has dwindled in part due to historic fish kills linked to dynamite blasting and pollution from mines and agriculture. It remains threatened by changes to river flows, removal of woody snags, and other damage to its habitat.

The endangered blackstriped dwarf galaxias is being stressed by the changing climate in southwest WA. Warmer and drier conditions are resulting in lower water levels and warmer water.

A long sausage shaped pink and black fish with orange fins. — A waterfall has so far saved the critically endangered stocky galaxias from extinction by preventing trout from reaching its last refuge. Tarmo Raadik

The other major threats facing native fish are agriculture and aquaculture (38%), pollution (38%), hunting and fishing (19%), energy production and mining (17%), and urban development (13%).

For example, the endangered Utchee rainbowfish is struggling due to habitat loss and water pollution from farms surrounding the small number of north Queensland streams where it lives.

In contrast, the most common conservation action was simply the fact that the species occurred in a protected area (88%) or conservation area (55%).

Sadly, invasive species and climate change don’t recognise or stop at protected area boundaries.

Prevention and control of invasive species has occurred for only 21% of affected threatened species, mostly in Tasmania.

Two small diamond shaped silver-blue fish with bold red markings. — The Utchee rainbowfish is currently not on Australia’s threatened species list but is recommended for listing as endangered. It is struggling due to habitat loss and water pollution from agriculture surrounding the small number of streams where it occurs in north Queensland. ANGFA Qld

A blueprint to end extinctions

Without a major funding commitment to address the actual drivers of native fish losses, species will continue to decline, and extinctions will soon follow.

The most important conservation actions for native freshwater fish are:

update the national threatened species list to include all at-risk species
tackle invasive species such as trout, gambusia and redfin perch
identify, establish and protect additional invasive-fish-free refuge sites for species that currently occur only in a small number of locations and could be wiped out by a single event such as a bushfire
halt ongoing habitat loss and improve habitats that have been damaged
improve freshwater flows to maintain habitats such as wetlands and streams, improve water quality and give fish the natural cues they need to breed.

In 2022, the Australian government made a commitment to end extinctions. Our study provides a blueprint for how to do that for our overlooked native freshwater fish.

Two fish ecologists marvel at a small waterfall that is protecting native fish upstream — This waterfall in NSW has protected the native galaxias fish above it from trout. To prevent extinctions we need to find or create more invasive-fish-free refuges for native fish. Mark Lintermans

Mark Lintermans was a member of the ACT Scientific Committee and the NSW Fisheries Scientific Committee, a previous convener of the Australian Society for Fish Biology Threatened Fishes Committee, and the Alien Fishes Committee. He now provides research, monitoring and advice for threatened freshwater fish management as director of a small consultancy company. He receives funding from New South Wales and national government departments for threatened fish projects.

Jaana Dielenberg was employed by the now-ended Threatened Species Recovery Hub of the Australian Government's National Environmental Science Program, which led an earlier stage of this research. She is a Charles Darwin University Fellow and is employed by the University of Melbourne and the Biodiversity Council.

Nick Whiterod works for the Goyder Institute for Water Research, Coorong, Lower Lakes and Murray Mouth Research Centre, which is funded by the national government to delivery research in the region. He is a member of the New South Wales Fisheries Scientific Committee.

Read the full story here.

Photos courtesy of

Related News

Scientists say they 'de-extincted' dire wolves. Experts at La Brea Tar Pits are skeptical

Colossal Biosciences, the company that made headlines years back for claims they wanted to revive the woolly mammoth, say they successfully "de-extincted" the dire wolf. Local experts are not so sure.

When news that scientists in Texas had succesfully reintroduced the long-extinct dire wolf to the modern world, more people than just “Game of Thrones” fans took notice.Researchers at the Natural History Museum’s La Brea Tar Pits, where a wall is decorated with hundreds of dire wolf skulls, had questions.Namely, are they really dire wolves? Turns out, it depends on how you define it.“What they have created is basically a genetically engineered gray wolf that has been given genetic traits so they can express morphological or physical traits that more resemble dire wolves,” said Kayce Bell, a terrestrial mammal curator at the Natural History Museum. “The technology and the tools that they are developing with this work are incredible and very powerful, but the terms that are being used to discuss it, I think, are misleading.”Earlier this week, biotechnology company Colossal Biosciences in Dallas announced they had “de-extincted” the dire wolf, sharing the news of the births of three healthy pups. Over 18 months, experts there extracted and sequenced ancient DNA from two dire wolf fossils — a 13,000-year-old tooth from Sheridan Pit, Ohio, and a 72,000-year-old inner ear bone from American Falls, Idaho. With that ancient DNA, scientists identified gene variants specific to dire wolves and then performed multiplex gene editing with a genome from the gray wolf, dire wolves’ closest living relatives. They used domestic dogs as surrogate mothers to birth the three pups. This undated photo provided by Colossal Biosciences shows two pups that were genetically engineered with similarities to the extinct dire wolf. (Colossal Biosciences via Associated Press) Colossal’s chief science officer, Beth Shapiro, said she understands the scientific skepticism that came with the announcement. “I get it,” she said. “It’s frustrating when you work in paleontology and you feel like it’s not effective science communication, and I wish I’d done a bit better.”Though Southern California has a jackpot of dire wolf fossils relative to other sites, extracting DNA from the local samples is difficult. Shapiro said she’s been trying and unable to collect DNA from local samples for 20 years. Among the reasons it’s challenging to collect, experts say, is that L.A.’s urban landscape bakes in the sun, heating up the asphalt, which could degrade ancient DNA buried underneath.La Brea Tar Pits has the highest concentration of dire wolf fossils in the world, with remains from over 4,000 dire wolves found at the site. They lived in the region for at least 50,000 years, disappearing about 13,000 years ago.“There’s no other site on Earth that even comes close to that,” said Emily Lindsey, the associate curator and excavation site director at La Brea Tar Pits.Dire wolves, native to Southern California but not limited to the region, were highly adaptable and had a very wide range of environmental tolerances before the species went extinct about 10,000 years ago, Lindsey said. The three pups — Romulus and Remus, who were born in October, and Khaleesi, born in January — now live on an ecological preserve at an undisclosed location that spans over 2,000 acres and hosts 10 full-time staff members who care for and observe them. The preserve is certified by the American Humane Society and registered with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.Depending on how you look at it, that could be dire wolf territory now.In 2016, the International Union for Conservation of Nature published a report that focused on de-extinction and defined it as “bringing back a proxy of an extinct species that resembles it in some way, phenotypically, physiologically, ecologically,” Shapiro said.But in the end, she said she’s not really hung up on what the animals are called beyond their names, inspired by founders of Rome and the “Game of Thrones” show.“Call it a de-extinct dire wolf that abides by the definition that the scientific community agreed on 10 years ago. Call it Colossal’s dire wolf. Call it a gray wolf with 20 edits that looks and acts like a dire wolf and is a functional replacement for a dire wolf,” Shapiro said.Part of Colossal’s announcement this week included news that they had also successfully created four clones of the endangered red wolf using a new noninvasive cloning technology. Both Lindsey and Bell said they appreciated Colossal’s work on conserving endangered species, but think that focusing on conservation is a more productive use of resources. “There are potentially useful applications of some of these technologies, particularly for preventing highly endangered species from going extinct. I think that would be a far more efficient application of these technologies than trying to bring something resembling an extinct species back to life,” Lindsey said. “I’d hate to have to be trying to de-extinct wolves once they go extinct, right?”Colossal’s Chief Executive Ben Lamm said the company wants to pair their “de-extinction events” with work they’re doing to protect critically endangered species. The company’s other de-extinction hopes include reviving the woolly mammoth, the dodo, and the thylacine, or Tasmanian tiger. To Lamm and Shapiro, de-extinction and conservation can work in tandem.“Conservation and de-extinction are not at odds with each other. The de-extinction toolkit should be part of the increasing number of ways that we have at our fingertips to be able to help endangered species survive,” Shapiro said.Lamm, who held up drawings of dodos and other extinct animals children had sent to the Colossal team during a Zoom interview with The Times, said he thinks the milestone could also inspire more people to pursue careers in related fields.“The world needs a little hope right now, and I think the world needs more science. Hopefully, we’re providing a little bit of both,” he said.And yes, of course “Jurassic Park” quotes and references are tossed Lamm and Shapiro’s way with stunning frequency.“People actually say to us, ‘Don’t you know what happened in Jurassic Park?,’ equating it to, like, Chernobyl,” Lamm said. “ ‘Didn’t you see what happened there?’ Not, ‘Didn’t you watch the movie and learn anything about human hubris from the movie?’ They don’t say that.”Shapiro added: “People are yelling at us that these aren’t real dire wolves. But no one has ever questioned whether the dinosaurs in ‘Jurassic Park’ are real dinosaurs.”While the debate is still open, Lindsey said she invites anyone curious about the creatures to visit La Brea Tar Pits to see some of the “real dire wolves” that they have excavated at the site. “It’s a really cool opportunity — one that you don’t get in almost any other city in the world — to come and really see the incredible diversity of large animals that lived here until very recently,” Lindsey said.

Extinction

Science

Animals

You Might Think of Shrimp as Bugs of the Sea. But a Remarkable Discovery Shows the Opposite: Bugs Are Actually Shrimp of the Land

A recent study suggests that insects branched out from crustaceans on the tree of life

You Might Think of Shrimp as Bugs of the Sea. But a Remarkable Discovery Shows the Opposite: Bugs Are Actually Shrimp of the Land A recent study suggests that insects branched out from crustaceans on the tree of life Riley Black - Science Correspondent April 9, 2025 8:00 a.m. A species of remipede known from the Caicos Islands. The photograph was taken by a member of a multinational team looking for rare species. Remipedes are crustaceans that are close relatives to insects. Jørgen Olesen / Natural History Museum of Denmark, Brett Gonzalez, Karen Osborn, GGI Shrimp look an awful lot like bugs. The exoskeletons, jointed legs and compound eyes of both groups of living things give them more than a passing resemblance to each other, so no wonder some people call shrimp-like crawfish “mudbugs,” and a tattoo reading “shrimps is bugs” became a viral meme for underscoring the resemblance. But the tattoo got the reality backwards. Shrimp are not bugs. Bugs—or, more properly, insects—are technically a form of crustacean. Biologists of many different subdisciplines categorize life in a field called systematics. Living things of all sorts, both extant and extinct, are constantly being compared and evaluated to build what we so commonly think of as the tree of life. The addition of new species and novel analyses are constantly reshaping that evolutionary tree, and sometimes the category changes shift more than just a few twigs but entire evolutionary branches. Birds are now known to be dinosaurs, for example, whales are technically hoofed mammals called artiodactyls, and, thanks to a 2023 study in Molecular Biology and Evolution, insects have been shifted into the same group as shrimp and crabs called pancrustacea. The realization that bugs were close relatives of crustaceans took almost a century of curiosity to uncover. Paleontologist Joanna Wolfe of Harvard University, one of the authors of the 2023 study, notes that researchers noticed some insects and crustaceans had the same structures in their eyes and nervous systems. The resemblance could have been the result of convergent evolution, when two groups independently evolve in the same way, and so the idea that insects are modified crustaceans didn’t catch. But the hypothesis didn’t fully go away, either. In 2013, Wolfe and colleagues found that insects were the sister group, or next closest evolutionary relatives, to crustaceans called remipedes—which live in undersea caves and are the only venomous crustaceans. Remipedes were supposed to be oddballs that were shaped in strange ways due to their lives in caves. Now they were coming out as the closest relatives to the flies, mantises, bees and other insects we see around us on land. “At that time, I was shocked and thought there was something wrong with our results,” Wolfe recalls, only to have additional evidence make the connection between insects and crustaceans stronger. The 2023 analysis, based on genetic data, found insects next to remipedes in the middle of the various crustacean subgroups. Specifically, insects fit within a wide group of crustaceans called allotriocarida that not only includes remipedes, but also other unusual groups such as shrimp-like branchiopods and worm-like cephalopods sometimes called “horseshoe shrimp.” To put it another way, insects are to crustaceans as bats are to mammals—a subset that belongs to a broader group despite seeming so different from their closest relatives. Systematic shifts do far more than simply rearrange who’s related to whom. “Systematics allow us to make sense of the complexity of life,” says Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History paleontologist Advait Jukar. “When we recategorize species into new groups we can look at patterns of how that group might be diversifying and the various environmental and ecological factors.” Insects, like those above, fit right in the middle of the broader crustacean family tree. Richard Ross, The Image Bank via Getty Images When birds were recognized as dinosaurs, the change did more than reshuffle their place on the evolutionary tree. “The change showed us how characteristics that we typically associate with birds today, such as feathers, hollow bones and air sacs, were widely found within Dinosauria,” Jukar says. Paleontologists began finding more feathered dinosaurs and dinosaurs with traits previously associated with birds, such as complex systems of air sacs as part of their respiratory systems, once the connection was made. The newly understood relationship between birds and other dinosaurs has allowed experts to better understand why only birds survived the mass extinction of 66 million years ago. Comparisons between birds and bird-like dinosaurs revealed that adaptations for eating seeds and nuts that some birds developed during the Cretaceous allowed them to survive while bird-like raptors perished. The recognition that whales are hoofed mammals occurred around the same time as birds were found to be dinosaurs. The shift had a deep effect on how paleontologists carried out their research as well as the identity of the blubbery mammals. Prior to the 1990s, the earliest whales were thought to have evolved from carnivorous mammals called mesonychids. The beasts, sometimes called “wolves with hooves” because they looked like canids with hoof-like toes, were some of Earth’s most prominent carnivores around 55 million years ago, the time when amphibious whales such as Pakicetus began swimming in the shallows. But genetic evidence kept grouping whales close to hippos and other mammals with hoofed toes, called artiodactyls. Experts debated the connection, but by 2001 paleontologists uncovered early whale ankle bones that possessed traits only seen among artiodactyls. The recognition shifted where whales fit in the mammalian evolutionary tree and recalibrated what sort of ancestral creatures paleontologists should be looking for, yielding the 2007 discovery that whales most likely evolved from small, deer-like creatures in ancient India. Without the recognition that whales are artiodactyls, the relevance of those ancient, hoofed creatures to the origin of whales would have been entirely missed and paleontologists would still be wondering where orcas and minke whales came from. In the case of the bugs, Wolfe notes, the recognition that insects shared a close common ancestor with remipedes helps narrow down where and how insects originated. “For me, the exciting part for insects is the recognition that they do not come from a terrestrial ancestor,” Wolfe says. Until recently, the ancestors of insects were thought to be more millipede-like and evolved once invertebrates began to live on land. Now, Wolfe notes, the closest relatives of insects are wiggly crustaceans that live in marine caves. The connection doesn’t mean that remipedes embody the exact ancestral form of the first insects, but rather that their close relationship will cause experts to rethink where insects came from and how they evolved. The effort will require tracing the ancestry of remipedes and other crustaceans, as well as searching for insects in the fossil record—both from new fossil sites and perhaps miscategorized fossils already in collections. “There’s a complicated history and still missing pieces,” she notes, but now biologists have a better sense of what to search for. Bugs are crustaceans, and now experts can begin to wonder how that came to be. Get the latest Science stories in your inbox.

Extinction

Science

Have Dire Wolves, Which Went Extinct More Than 10,000 Years Ago, Really Been Brought Back to Life?

Pioneers in the science of "de-extinction," an American company has announced the births of three pups whose genes resemble those of a species that hasn't roamed Earth for millennia

Have Dire Wolves, Which Went Extinct More Than 10,000 Years Ago, Really Been Brought Back to Life? Pioneers in the science of “de-extinction,” an American company has announced the births of three pups whose genes resemble those of a species that hasn’t roamed Earth for millennia Romulus and Remus, pups that the company Colossal Biosciences says are the first dire wolves to roam the planet in several thousand years, are seen at one month old. Colossal Biosciences A researcher holds two snow-white wolf pups as they howl at the top of their adorable little lungs. Their names are Romulus and Remus—in honor of the siblings associated with the mythical founding of ancient Rome—but they’re not any kind of wolf you’ve ever seen. They’re dire wolves… ish. Made popular as the giant pets owned by the Stark children in Game of Thrones, the canine species went extinct more than 10,000 years ago. On Monday, the biotechnology startup Colossal Biosciences—known as the “de-extinction” company—announced the birth of Romulus, Remus and a third dire wolf, a female named Khaleesi (in reference to the Game of Thrones character Daenerys Targaryen). According to the firm’s statement, the dire wolf has just become “the world’s first successfully de-extincted animal.” Given the pups’ genetic similarity to gray wolves, however, some scientists are challenging this claim. Dire wolves roamed the Earth during the Pleistocene, between around 11,700 and 2.6 million years ago. Paleontologists have consistently unearthed their remains in North and South America, and they’re the most common mammal to appear in the La Brea Tar Pits of California. Compared to the modern gray wolf, the species’ closest living relative, dire wolves were larger and had bigger teeth. Since it formed in 2021, Colossal Biosciences has been known for its highly publicized efforts to “resurrect” extinct woolly mammoths, dodos and Tasmanian tigers. But their work with dire wolves had not previously been announced, writes CNN’s Katie Hunt. The First Dire Wolf Howl in Over 10,000 Years The company plans to “bring back” these species by editing the genomes of their living relatives, creating a creature that closely approximates their target. To birth Romulus, Remus and Khaleesi, researchers at Colossal extracted, sequenced and analyzed the dire wolf genome from a 13,000-year-old dire wolf tooth and a 72,000-year-old dire wolf skull. “Getting the genome was really hard, they didn’t live in cold climates, so the DNA wasn’t as well preserved,” Beth Shapiro, Colossal’s chief science officer and a researcher at the University of California at Santa Cruz, tells Bloomberg’s Josh Saul. They then compared it to the genome of a gray wolf, among other living canids. The comparison revealed 20 differences in 14 genes linked to distinct dire wolf traits, including a larger size, wider head, bigger teeth and white fur. The researchers edited gray wolf genes to match those characteristics, then inserted them into the egg cells of a domesticated dog, with the cells’ own DNA removed. The eggs developed into embryos, which were then transplanted into the wombs of large hound mixes, resulting in the births of Romulus and Remus in October, and Khaleesi in January, all via cesarean section. Another female dire wolf was born in January, but she died ten days later from an intestinal infection that Colossal says was not related to the genetic edits. Now, the modern-day dire wolves reside in a fenced-in ecological preserve certified by the American Humane Society in an undisclosed area of the northern United States. They are essentially “living the Ritz Carlton lifestyle of a wolf,” Shapiro tells the New York Times’ Carl Zimmer. Thanks to cameras and drones, “they can’t get a splinter without us knowing about it.” Dire wolf DNA is 99.5 percent identical to that of gray wolves, Shapiro tells New Scientist’s Michael Le Page. But that 0.5 percent difference could consist of millions of base pairs. This raises the question of whether the pups are really dire wolves or just genetically modified gray wolves. Scientists not connected to the initiative point out that dire wolves might have countless other genetic differences that were not accounted for in the 20 changes made by Colossal’s team. “We have a mostly gray wolf that looks like a dire wolf,” Julie Meachen, a vertebrate paleontologist from Des Moines University who was not involved in the project, says to ABC News. Meachen co-authored a paper on the evolution of dire wolves along with Shapiro in 2021, which found that the species is genetically distinct from gray wolves, having diverged from the wolf lineage nearly six million years ago. As for these new creatures, Meachen adds, “I don’t think they are actually dire wolves.” Shapiro tells Wired’s Emily Mullin and Matt Reynolds that “if we can look at this animal and see what it’s doing, and it looks like a dire wolf and acts like a dire wolf, I’m going to call it a dire wolf. And my colleagues who are taxonomists will disagree with me.” Romulus and Remus, pictured at three months old, can run around outside in their enclosure at an undisclosed location. Colossal Biosciences Other scientists point out that the pups might not know how to act like dire wolves. Romulus, Remus and Khaleesi are unlikely to exhibit behaviors typical of wild dire wolves due to being raised in captivity without a pack structure, says Adam Boyko, a geneticist at Cornell University who was not involved in the project, to the New York Times. He adds that since the dire wolves are not consuming the ancient dire wolf diet, they are also not developing their ancestors’ intestinal microbes. Nevertheless, Colossal CEO Ben Lam maintains that “if we are successful in de-extinction, we’re building technologies that can help human health care and conservation,” as he tells Bloomberg. In this spirit, Colossal also birthed two litters of cloned red wolves—the most endangered wolf species in the world. Just last month, the company announced the birth of “woolly mice”, which they say is a critical step in the de-extinction of woolly mammoths. In October last year, they also claimed to have built the most complete ancient genome to date, belonging to the Tasmanian tiger. But some have raised questions about what the conservation purpose of these dire wolves will be, or how “de-extinct” species could be released into the wild ecosystems of today. “In states like Montana, we are currently having trouble keeping a healthy population of gray wolves on the land in the face of amped up political opposition,” Christopher Preston, an environmental philosopher at the University of Montana, tells CNN. “It is hard to imagine dire wolves ever being released and taking up an ecological role. So, I think it is important to ask what role the new animals will serve.” Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Extinction

Science

Climate

Earless dragons were presumed extinct in Australia – now Daisy and Kip have sniffed out 13 of them

Zoos Victoria wildlife detection dogs uncovered the ‘bloody gorgeous’ reptiles in return for treats and cuddles Sign up for climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s free Clear Air newsletter hereWildlife detection dogs successfully sniffed out 13 critically endangered earless dragons in previously unknown burrows in Melbourne’s west, after a training program launched by Zoos Victoria in 2023.The Victorian grassland earless dragon – Australia’s most imperilled reptile – had not been seen for 50 years and was thought extinct before its remarkable rediscovery on privately owned grassland in 2023.Sign up to get climate and environment editor Adam Morton’s Clear Air column as a free newsletter Continue reading...

Wildlife detection dogs successfully sniffed out 13 critically endangered earless dragons in previously unknown burrows in Melbourne’s west, after a training program launched by Zoos Victoria in 2023.The Victorian grassland earless dragon – Australia’s most imperilled reptile – had not been seen for 50 years and was thought extinct before its remarkable rediscovery on privately owned grassland in 2023.Register: it’s quick and easyIt’s still free to read – this is not a paywallWe’re committed to keeping our quality reporting open. By registering and providing us with insight into your preferences, you’re helping us to engage with you more deeply, and that allows us to keep our journalism free for all.Have a subscription? Made a contribution? Already registered?Sign InGiven this “second chance” at survival, Garry Peterson, the zoo’s general manager of threatened species, said the organisation launched intensive training and search efforts the same year.“We’re really lucky to have a second opportunity with this species that was presumed extinct,” Peterson said.But it wasn’t going to be easy to find them. It’s thought there are probably fewer than 200 dragons left in the wild and the short, nuggetty and extremely rare dragons often hid inside wolf spider burrows or under rocks, making them challenging to find using traditional survey techniques.That’s where the zoo’s dogs came in.After a year of training, Daisy, a 6-year-old lagotto romagnolo and Kip, an 8-year-old kelpie cross, had sniffed out a total of 13 of the wild dragons by March this year, in return for treats, cuddles, ball games and praise.Daisy mostly works with wildlife detection dog officer Dr Nick Rutter, who said it was a “career highlight” when she finally found a dragon on her own in May 2024, making him feel “an overwhelming cascade of joy”.The palm-sized reptiles were “bloody gorgeous”, he said, with intricate patterns down their backs and striking colours during the breeding season.Daisy and Kip were chosen for their safe behaviour around small animals, and experience surveying for threatened species, like Baw Baw frogs and freshwater turtles.Each undertook about 80 days of scent-based training and survey work, initially sniffing out a small number of captive animals and graduating to opportunistic lessons in the field when biologists came across a wild dragon.When assessed, the dog-handler teams detected earless dragons with speed and accuracy, according to results published on the National Environmental Science Program’s Resilient Landscapes hub.Wildlife detection dog officer Dr Nick Rutter said it was a ‘career highlight’ when Daisy found her first earless dragon in May 2024. Photograph: Zoos VictoriaEmma Bennett, who has researched the effectiveness of detection dogs in searching for rare species, said dogs provided a scent-based search method that was complimentary to traditional surveys using visual cues.“If something is hidden, or camouflaged, in a burrow, and just difficult to see, it might be easy to smell,” she said.skip past newsletter promotionSign up to Clear Air AustraliaAdam Morton brings you incisive analysis about the politics and impact of the climate crisisPrivacy Notice: Newsletters may contain info about charities, online ads, and content funded by outside parties. For more information see our Privacy Policy. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.after newsletter promotionDetection dogs were being successfully used in Australia, as well as globally, for finding threatened species, searching for invasive viruses and pathogens, and conducting bird and bat surveys at wind farms.Bennett, who has worked with detection dogs for 20 years and was not involved with the zoo project, said success relied on a strong partnership between human and hound.“From the dog’s perspective, the role of the human is to carry the ball around for when they do find something, and then to throw it,” Bennett said.Zoos Victoria also trained two other dogs, Sugar and Moss, to search for dragon scats – droppings roughly the size of corn kernels. While the dogs were effective at finding them, they were limited by how quickly scats were scavenged by ants and other invertebrates in the wild.It’s thought there are probably fewer than 200 Victorian grassland earless dragons left in the wild. Photograph: Zoos VictoriaHistorical records show the Victorian grassland earless dragon was once recorded in St Kilda, Moonee Ponds and Sunbury, habitat that disappeared as housing and farmland expanded. Approximately 0.5% of suitable grassland habitat remains.Dr Jane Melville, senior curator of terrestrial vertebrates at Museums Victoria Research Institute – who named the Victorian grassland earless dragon as a distinct species in 2019 – said its rediscovery was a reminder that animals could still persist, even in places where they hadn’t been seen in decades.“They’ve shown amazing resilience,” she said. “This little dragon has managed to hold on under really difficult circumstances.”

Extinction

Climate

Crisis

Albanese to rush through new laws to protect Tasmania’s salmon industry from legal challenge

Labor will push the contentious bill through parliament next week despite concerns about the extinction of the Maugean skateFollow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastAnthony Albanese plans to rush through contentious legislation next week to protect Tasmania’s salmon industry from a legal challenge over the industry’s impact on an endangered fish species.The future of the salmon industry on the state’s west coast has become a sharp political issue centred on whether it can coexist with the Maugean skate, a ray-like species found only in Macquarie Harbour’s brackish estuarine waters.Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email Continue reading...

Anthony Albanese plans to rush through contentious legislation next week to protect Tasmania’s salmon industry from a legal challenge over the industry’s impact on an endangered fish species.The future of the salmon industry on the state’s west coast has become a sharp political issue centred on whether it can coexist with the Maugean skate, a ray-like species found only in Macquarie Harbour’s brackish estuarine waters.After lobbying by industry leaders and Tasmanian MPs, Albanese wrote to the state’s three salmon companies last month promising the government would change the law to ensure there were “appropriate environmental laws” to “continue sustainable salmon farming” in the harbour.He had expected that would be a commitment for the next term of parliament. But with the election campaign delayed by Tropical Cyclone Alfred, the prime minister plans to introduce a bill on Tuesday that could abruptly end a long-running legal review by the environment minister, Tanya Plibersek, into whether an expansion of the industry in the harbour in 2012 was properly approved.The bill – an amendment to the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act – has been listed to be introduced in the lower house next Tuesday, 25 March, when parliament will largely be focused on the treasurer, Jim Chalmers, delivering the federal budget. It is expected in the Senate the following day.With the Greens and several crossbench senators opposed, it will need the support of the Coalition to pass. Peter Dutton has previously told the industry he would guarantee its future and legislate if elected prime minister.It is understood the legislation will be broader than the salmon industry and will be intended to limit conservation groups’ powers to challenge past decisions that have allowed developments to go ahead.A spokesperson for Albanese said the government would legislate next week “to amend the flawed EPBC Act to secure jobs and local industries… We call on the Coalition to give this legislation bipartisan support to give communities certainty”, the spokesperson said.The proposal has been criticised by environment organisations. Eight conservation councils led by Environment Tasmania wrote to Albanese last month saying they had “grave concern” about his pledge. They said it would undermine Plibersek’s reconsideration of whether a salmon industry expansion 13 years ago should have been allowed without a full federal environmental assessment. The reconsideration process was triggered in 2023 by a legal request by three conservation groups.An environment department document from November 2023, released recently under freedom of information laws, showed officials considered it was “likely” the reconsideration process would lead to the expansion being declared a “controlled action”, a step that would require a full environmental impact assessment. The officials suggested salmon farming in the harbour, a third of which lies in Tasmania’s world heritage wilderness area, would need to stop while that assessment took place.The Australia Institute’s Eloise Carr said the government appeared to be stopping that legal process by “smashing through” legislation while parliamentarians were focused on the budget. “This is not how law reform should happen,” she said. “The situation in Macquarie Harbour … is a perfect example of why Australia needs stronger environment laws, not to water down already inadequate protections.”The Greens’ Sarah Hanson-Young said she was “staggered” the government had adopted and planned to “ram through” through Liberal Party policy and legislation. “This shows Labor cannot be trusted to do the right thing when it comes to the environment,” she said. “Gutting environmental laws, stopping community from being able to raise concerns about what’s going on in their local environment, and ignoring the scientific advice is absolutely shameful.”A government scientific committee last year found that fish farming in the harbour had substantially reduced dissolved oxygen levels and should be scaled back or removed to save the Maugean skate – a species that marine scientists have called the “thylacine of the sea” – from extinction.In his letter to salmon bosses last month, Albanese referred to a new report by the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies that said recent surveys suggested skate numbers, which crashed last decade, were likely to have recovered to 2014 levels. The report stressed the need for continued monitoring.The salmon industry has been under pressure across the state in recent weeks as more than a million fish have died during an bacterium outbreak in the south-east and been dumped at landfill and rendering plants. Fatty chunks of fish have washed up on beaches in the Huon Valley and on Bruny Island, prompting public protests.Both major parties believe the salmon industry may be a crucial election issue in the seat of Braddon, in Tasmania’s north-west, which the Liberal party holds with an 8% margin.Bob Brown, a former Greens leader, said Albanese would be legislating a “death warrant” on the Maugean skate. “Albanese cannot expect thoughtful Tasmanians to vote or preference Labor if he condemns our natural wildlife on the altar of the foreign corporations who run the rotten Atlantic salmon industry,” he said.The chief executive of industry group Salmon Tasmania, Luke Martin, said he had not yet been briefed on the legislation but hoped the issue would be resolved next week.

Extinction

Water

Government

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Noah is so worried about climate change he can't sleep at night. His wife Hali is confident it's all going to be just fine. Should they even have kids?! Should they sell their CA house and move to a colder Alaska? How does one plan for the end of the world...?

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A short movie explaining how sea lice coming from fish farms in British Columbia are harming wild salmon to the brink of extinction.

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Giants of Big Sur: California Condor Stories Part 3: Born During Troubled Times

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The Wisdom To Survive: Climate Change, Capitalism & Community

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Have Dire Wolves, Which Went Extinct More Than 10,000 Years Ago, Really Been Brought Back to Life?

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Cookies help us run our site more efficiently.

Troubled waters: how to stop Australia’s freshwater fish species from going extinct

Identifying species at risk

Get them on the list

Address the causes of decline

A blueprint to end extinctions

Related News

Scientists say they 'de-extincted' dire wolves. Experts at La Brea Tar Pits are skeptical

You Might Think of Shrimp as Bugs of the Sea. But a Remarkable Discovery Shows the Opposite: Bugs Are Actually Shrimp of the Land

Have Dire Wolves, Which Went Extinct More Than 10,000 Years Ago, Really Been Brought Back to Life?

Earless dragons were presumed extinct in Australia – now Daisy and Kip have sniffed out 13 of them

Albanese to rush through new laws to protect Tasmania’s salmon industry from legal challenge

Suggested Viewing

Wildlife in Our Backyard

Anxious

On the Brink

Giants of Big Sur: California Condor Stories Part 3: Born During Troubled Times

The Wisdom To Survive: Climate Change, Capitalism & Community

Join us to forgea sustainable future

sign up for our mailing list to stay informed on the latest films and environmental headlines.

Join us to forge
a sustainable future