Kathmandu, June 4 -- Four years ago, teenager Anish Magar saw a pangolin being killed close to his home in Yangshila, in the forested Chure Hills of eastern Nepal. He rushed to the office of KTK-BELT and Namuna Permaculture Learning Grounds (NPLG), demanding that they take action.

But NPLG Chair Kumar Bishwakarma advised the team not to go to the police. Instead, he urged the youngster to actively try to save the rare and elusive animals, the most trafficked mammal in the world.

"We must raise community consciousness about why it is important to conserve pangolins, and then they will not poach them again," Bishwakarma told them.

Anish Magar then became the local leader of the save-the-pangolin effort, and the team went from village to ...