More than 14,000 species are listed as endangered or critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature. Some scientists have called for naming the present geologic epoch the Anthropocene, or “human era,” after the main source of startlingly rapid rates of species extinction and other environmental perturbations.
Understanding the biology of the species that are most at risk from this disturbance is a critical prerequisite to developing effective strategies to conserve them. But scientists who survey endangered animals have to grapple with a number of special challenges alongside the traditional research pressures of publishing and grant writing.
For a start, there are the problems of finding organisms that are, by definition, relatively rare and may also tend to be elusive, nocturnal, or otherwise difficult to observe. Then, there’s the risk of researchers exacerbating the very issues contributing to a species’ or population’s demise—for example, by increasing human contact ...
