New research shows about a quarter of animals living in rivers, lakes and other freshwater sources are threatened with extinction.

A new United Nations report says nearly half of the world's migratory species are in decline.

Monarch butterflies are now listed as endangered because of fast dwindling populations in North America.

A comprehensive new assessment of thousands of reptiles species has found that 21% are considered endangered, critically endangered or vulnerable to extinction.

A new United Nations report finds roughly a sixth of the planet’s land and freshwater area now lies within protected or conservation areas.

In 2010, more than 150 countries agreed to goals to protect nature, but the new United Nations scorecard found that the world has largely failed to meet 20 different targets to safeguard species and ecosystems. Reducing "everything on the planet to single scores” obscures the fact that the picture may look different in different places, he said. But Mrema and lead author David Cooper said the world should think about a different poster animal: humans. One of the challenges in meeting global biodiversity targets is a mismatch between countries with abundant natural assets — such as large tracts of intact tropical forests — and those with money to enforce protections. Dalhousie University marine biologist Boris Worm, who also wasn’t part of the report, said the world is at a crossroads.

Although scientists have long focused on the worlds predators, a massive new study finds that herbivores, critters that eat plants, are the animals most at risk of extinction. (AP Photo/Ben Curtis, File)Although scientists often worry most about the loss of the worlds predators, a comprehensive new study finds that plant-eating herbivores are the animals most at risk of extinction. Scientists even examined the presumed diets of more than 2,000 species no longer alive and found that herbivores again had the highest extinction proportion. Extinction causes invasive species, climate change and habitat loss hit herbivores harder than animals with other diets, Atwood said. Size may be part of the reason herbivores are more at risk, the ecologist said.