The Colossal Foundation Name Seven Species for the Second Cohort of Their Species Reintroduction Fund

The Colossal Foundation and Re:Wild have named the second cohort of their Species Reintroduction Fund: seven threatened species across four continents. The class spans a banteng airlifted into a Cambodian sanctuary; brown howler monkeys returning to a Rio national park where the last was recorded by Charles Darwin in 1832; black-footed ferrets, every living survivor descended from just seven animals, bound for a 148,000-acre South Dakota bison ranch; and the sunflower sea star, coaxed back to a Pacific seafloor a wasting disease had emptied of an estimated 99 percent of the species.

The announcement is anchored by a success: the Sihek, a Guam kingfisher declared extinct in the wild in 1988, was released onto a remote, snake-free atoll in 2024. Eighteen months later, all nine birds are alive and have laid the first wild Sihek eggs in a generation. The Fund is sending a second cohort of nine out this year.

This story is based on original reporting by Green Matters Staff for Green Matters. Read the full feature on Green Matters → https://www.greenmatters.com/big-impact/nobody-told-these-seven-species-they-were-supposed-to-stay-gone