Tag: South America

Tierarten mit weniger als 50 Individuen
Some of the rarest animal species in the world: from the nearly extinct vaquita to the red wolf, the Yangtze giant softshell turtle, the Okinawa spiny rat, and the northern white rhino. These species now survive only in tiny populations.

Fewer than 50 individuals: These animal species have almost disappeared

There are animal species worldwide whose populations have now shrunk to just a few dozen or even only single individuals. Many of them stand on the brink of extinction and survive only in small refuges or through elaborate conservation programs. The main cause of their decline is humans, for example

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Tokara-Laubsänger / Tokara leaf warbler (Phylloscopus tokaraensis)
A singing male Tokara leaf warbler (Phylloscopus tokaraensis). The species is restricted to a few islands of Japan's Tokara Archipelago south of Kyushu. Such island endemics often occupy only very small habitats and are therefore especially vulnerable to environmental change. Image: Per Alström, Uppsala University, CC BY, via EurekAlert!

Hidden diversity: Four newly recognized bird species from 2026

Even today, new bird species are still being discovered and described, although birds are among the comparatively well-studied animal groups. In many cases, however, these are not completely unknown animals, but species that were overlooked or misclassified for a long time. Only modern methods such as genetic analyses and bioacoustic

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Vom Aussterben bedrohte Tierarten
Extremely rare species: northern sportive lemur, Devils Hole pupfish, and cherry-throated tanager (© Wikimedia Commons – Lemur: Edward E. Louis, Jr, CC BY-SA 4.0 / Fish: Olin Feuerbacher, Public Domain / Bird: Jens Bokelaar, CC BY-SA 4.0)

Which animals are threatened with extinction? These 8 species have fewer than 100 individuals

Species extinction is rarely an abrupt event. In many cases, the decline stretches over decades until only small, isolated remnant populations remain. Some of these species now survive with fewer than 100 individuals worldwide. Such extremely small populations are especially vulnerable to chance events, genetic impoverishment, and ongoing habitat loss.

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Wiederentdeckung von Anolis laevis in der Region San Martín in Peru
The Río Huallaga in the San Martín region in northeastern Peru. The smooth or swordsman anole (Anolis laevis) was rediscovered in the surrounding montane forests of this river system—a habitat now under severe pressure from deforestation and settlement. (© Josue Hermoza, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Peru: Lizard with nose extension rediscovered after more than 150 years – Anolis laevis

In 1876, the American naturalist Edward Drinker Cope described a small lizard from the montane forests of northeastern Peru. What stood out most was an unusual appendage at the tip of its snout—a feature that set it apart from most other species. Cope originally described the species under a different

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Floreana-Riesenschildkröte
Illustration of the Floreana giant tortoise — once one of the most distinctive giant tortoises of the Galapagos Islands, today probably extinct in its original form.

Floreana giant tortoise: From extinction to return

A subspecies of the Galapagos tortoise When the Floreana giant tortoise was still alive, it was part of the extraordinary tortoise fauna of the Galapagos Islands. Hardly anywhere else on Earth did a comparable diversity of giant land tortoises evolve—adapted to different islands, volcanoes, climate zones, and food resources. Today,

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Wiederentdeckung: Killifisch Moema claudiae
Tiny, vividly colored and almost lost: Moema claudiae — shown here as a male (top, 3.8 cm) and a female (bottom, 3.6 cm) — was rediscovered in 2024 after more than 20 years. This killifish species grows to only about four centimeters and survives in temporary rainy-season pools of the Bolivian Amazon region. (© Drawert & Litz (2025), Nature Conservation, CC BY 4.0)

“Lost Beauty”: Fish thought extinct rediscovered after 20 years

When researchers examined an inconspicuous, shallow pond on the edge of a remote remnant forest in Bolivia in spring 2024, they had no idea that right there—beneath leaves, gray mud and surrounded by vast agricultural land—they would find a species many already believed to be extinct: Moema claudiae, a seasonal

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Osterinsel (Rapa Nui) – Wie Pazifische Ratten die Insel entwaldeten
A single moai in front of the Ahu Tongariki platform on Rapa Nui: the iconic stone statues now stand in a largely treeless landscape—a stark contrast to the dense palm forests that once covered the island before invasive rats and human use fundamentally changed the ecosystem.

Easter Island: How Introduced Rats Made Rapa Nui’s Forests Disappear

When the Dutch navigator Jakob Roggeveen reached the coast of a remote island in the South Pacific on Easter Sunday in 1722 as the first Western European to do so, he must have been surprised. Before him lay a subtropical volcanic island—but instead of the dense forests one would expect

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Früher Allobates olfersioides, nun Teil der Gattung Dryadobates
This fingernail-sized frog, once considered widespread, was listed under the name Allobates olfersioides—but we now know that there were at least twelve species. The animal shown here probably belongs to a surviving species of the new genus Dryadobates. Three other species from this group are now considered extinct. (© Renato Augusto Martins, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Museum DNA reveals: Three frog species from the Atlantic Forest have long been extinct

A recent study shows that three Brazilian amphibian species are now considered extinct—decades after their disappearance. A formal assessment by the IUCN is still pending, but the genetic and historical evidence leaves little doubt about the loss of these species. Published in the Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural

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Alsodes vittatus - Wiederentdeckung
Alsodes vittatus with a dorsal stripe, photographed during the rediscovery. (© Correa, Riveros-Riffo & Donoso 2025, ZooKeys)

Alsodes vittatus: Rare frog species rediscovered in Chile after 130 years

For more than a century it was considered lost, but now it is back: Alsodes vittatus, an endemic amphibian species from Chile, has been rediscovered in the Región de La Araucanía. There had been no confirmed sightings of this rare frog species for around 130 years. Its rediscovery could not

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rediscovered in Peru: Sira barbet and Peruvian solitaire
The Sira barbet, which had not been documented for twelve years, was tracked down during an expedition in July 2024. Its striking red breast band and contrasting plumage make it an unmistakable inhabitant of Peru’s Sira Mountains. (© Michael G. Harvey/Cornell University, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons)

Two lost birds rediscovered in Peru: Sira barbet and Peruvian solitaire

The Search for Lost Birds project has set itself the task of tracking down “lost” bird species that have not been documented in the wild for more than a decade. These species—without recent genetic or photographic evidence and without ex situ populations—are often considered lost to science. According to a

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