The Endangered Species Act is one of the most powerful laws on Earth when it comes to saving species from extinction. But what happens when animals and plants who need help don’t get it in time? In the newest episode of our Sounds Wild podcast, host Mike Stark talks with Noah Greenwald, co-director of our Endangered Species program, about how the Act works, why it’s so hard for some species to get the protection they need, and what can be done.

Jaguars once roamed the Americas from Argentina to Arizona. Hunting, government killing programs and conflicts with the livestock industry forced them out of much of their home territory a century ago. But in northern Argentina, they’re back — and the same could happen in the southwestern U.S. In the newest episode of our Sounds Wild podcast, host Vanessa Barchfield talks with Sebastián Di Martino, conservation director of Rewilding Argentina, about the return of jaguars in his country and what it would take to bring them back in the U.S. This episode features the song La Danza de los Jaguares from the band XIXA.

Red wolves are the rarest canids on the planet – and at one point it looked like they might disappear forever. But their story is still being written and they’re now clawing their way back from the brink thanks to a renewed effort from conservationists, local tribes and government officials. In the newest episode of our Sounds Wild podcast, host Mike Stark talks with Will Harlan, our Southeast director, about the magic of red wolves, their future in North Carolina and the legacy of individual wolves like Airplane Ears and Blaze.

Few places on Earth tell the story of the extinction crisis like Hawaii. Dozens of birds, plants, insects and mollusks are already gone, and every day is a battle to save species that are barely holding on. On this episode of Sounds Wild, we talk with Maxx Phillips, the Center’s Hawaii director, about what’s been lost, the daring work to protect what remains and the deep cultural ties between endangered species and the Indigenous peoples who have lived on these islands for eons.

No one knows exactly how many plants and animals are vanishing from the world around us, but a rough estimate is that we lose one species every hour. Humans have never witnessed an extinction event like the one we’re living through right now – one that's wiping out wildlife all around us, from birds to bears, plants and insects. Tierra Curry lays out the extinction crisis, what’s been lost, how wildlife declines affect us in ways we don’t notice and what can be done.