Volunteers try to keep alive some of the hundreds of stranded pilot whales after one of the country's largest recorded mass whale strandings, in Golden Bay, at the top of New Zealand's south island, February 10, 2017. Volunteers in New Zealand managed to refloat about 100 surviving pilot whales on Saturday, February 11, 2017 and are hoping they will swim back out to sea after more than 400 of the creatures swam aground at a remote beach. (Photo by Ross Wearing/Reuters)

Saintsetseg Jambaldorj, a member of the Tsaatan ethnic minority, one of the last remaining groups of nomadic reindeer herders in East Taiga, Mongolia, wearing a traditional deel, on July 5, 2016. (Photo by Madoka Ikegami/Barcroft Images)

In this September 9, 2018 photo, a diver holds onto his catch of lobsters during a fishing journey in the Miskito coast near Cay Savannah, Honduras. A diver makes 75 lempiras ($3) per pound of lobster. An average 10-pound daily haul of lobster is a windfall for people in one of the most impoverished regions of the Americas, so many take the risk, and many suffer for it. (Photo by Rodrigo Abd/AP Photo)

Pedestrians look at “doll” model Lulu Hashimoto standing on the street during a photo opportunity for Reuters in Tokyo, Japan August 23, 2017. (Photo by Kim Kyung-Hoon/Reuters)

Nicki Minaj attends the 14th Annual CFDA Vogue Fashion Fund Gala at Weylin on Monday, November 6, 2017, in New York. (Photo by Splash News and Pictures)

Sumo wrestlers in their women's match at the 2021 Russian Sumo Championship at Ak Bars Wrestling Palace in Kazan, Russia on February 14, 2021. There are over 6,000 sumo wrestlers in Russia. (Photo by Yegor Aleyev/TASS)

A group of students sit on top of a bus at Kemusu street in Boyolali, Central Java of Indonesia, March 20, 2015 in this picture taken by Antara Foto. (Photo by Yusuf Nugroho/Reuters/Antara Foto)

“Cassowaries are large, flightless birds related to emus and (more distantly) to ostriches, rheas, and kiwis”, writes Olivia Judson in the September issue of National Geographic magazine. How large? People-size: Adult males stand well over five foot five and top 110 pounds. Females are even taller, and can weigh more than 160 pounds. Dangerous when roused, they’re shy and peaceable when left alone. But even birds this big and tough are prey to habitat loss. The dense New Guinea and Australia rain forests where they live have dwindled. Today cassowaries might number 1,500 to 2,000. And because they help shape those same forests – by moving seeds from one place to another – “if they vanish”, Judson writes, “the structure of the forest would gradually change” too. (Photo by Christian Ziegler/National Geographic)