Global decline of large herbivores may lead to an 'empty landscape'

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/05/150501151606.htm


Date: May 1,2015
Source: Oregon State University

Large number of animals such as thinoceroses, zebras, camels,elephants and tapirs are threatened with extinction in grasslands, savannahs, deserts and forests.
"Without radical intervention, large herbivores (and many smaller ones) will continue to disappear from numerous regions with enormous ecological,social and economic costs." -Oregon State. A team of wildlife ecologist led by William Ripple, professor in the College of Forestry, made an analysis of data on the world's largest herbivores, including key threats, endangerment status and ecological consequences.University. Rippie said " I expected that habitat change would be the main factor causing the endangerment of large herbivores." "But surprisingly, the results show that the two main factors in herbivore declines are hunting by humans and habitat changes. They are twin threats." Highest number of threatened large herbivores live in Southeast Asia, India and Africa. Just one endangered large herbivore lives in Europe, that is the European bison. There are none in North America, the author says that " they had already lost most of its large mammals" through hunting and habitat changes.Herbivore hunting happens for two major reasons:meat consumption and te global trade in animal parts.They say that the market for medical uses can be very strong for some body parts, such as rhino horn. Apparently horn sells for more by weight than gold, diamonds or cocaine. Africa's western rhinoceros was declared extinct in 2011.The authors say that if the large herbivores get lost that other parts of wild ecosystems will decrease. Consequences  include: decrease in food for large carnivores such as lions and tigers, more frequent wildfires, "slower cycling of nutrients from vegetation to the soil and changes in habitat for smaller animals including fish, birds and amphibians."

I believe that animals should not be killed by people just so they could sell it, and benefit from it. If people continue to hunt these animals, very soon there wil be no left and then it will be late to find a solution for animal extinction. 

Giraffes, Zebras Face Surprising Top Threat: Hunting

National Geographic
Jane J. Lee
May 1, 2015

Link to article


The safari is one of the few places on earth where you can see animals such as the elephant, giraffe, zebra, lion, hippo, etc. in their wild forms. A popular tourist destination this iconic symbol of Africa is coming under threat. This article is explaining how hunting is now becoming a larger concern to the loss of wildlife in the safari than habitat loss. Most of us have already read about or heard of the hunting of rhinos and elephants for their horns and tusks. These animals are rapidly being poached to extinction. However they are not the only species that are coming under threat. As the article on National Geographic explains, because of increased demand of "wild meat", populations of zebra, giraffe, and the 72 other 100 kilogram plus herbivores are all being over hunted and could soon be faced with extinction. In fact around 60% of these herbivores are already facing extinction, and if the hunting rates do not drop then that number will continue to climb. And with the diminishing number of large herbivores the whole safari will be affected. These large herbivores eat the vegetation, taking away from potential fuel for wildfires. Also because they can cover such large distances their dung transports seeds much further, spreading plants and trees helping to keep the habitats species frequency up. Additionally without large herbivores Africa's famous carnivores such as the lion and the cheetah will start dying out due to loss of their major food source. All this just because some people want a few souvenirs or exotic meats.

Because of this heightened interest in herbivores as a food item they are just as in danger as the carnivores hunted for their pelts. Of course not all the zebras and giraffes and other 100 kilogram plus herbivores are killed just as a exotic thing on a menu. There are those who depend on these animals as a food source, and they are growing in numbers. Between the demand from cities and the increasing numbers of hunters, it is no wonder that these large herbivores may soon be threatened with complete extinction.

Of course, hunting for food is not the only cause of concern. Along with the rhino and the elephant. Animals such as hippos, gorillas, and cervids (deer) are also being over hunted. Hippos for their ivory rich teeth, gorillas for their body parts to be used as decoration, and cervids for their antlers. 

I think that this article raises a lot of concerns on the ethical guidelines when it comes to what we can or can't hunt. One of the major problems with hunting these animals for meat is that their meat is not banned in most places, which means that they are shipped off to places such as the States or China or the UK as specialty items. It gives us a lot of information on whats being hunted, for what purpose, and to what effect which I think makes the article a lot more powerful. The article also encourages us to read from other articles on National Geographic to improve our background knowledge such as the farming of African lions in the US or the farming of Tigers in Southeast Asia. In my opinion there should be stricter rules on trafficking and use of wild animals in restaurants to prevent them from becoming endangered and leave them for the people who depend on them for sustenance.  This would need to be a world wide effort as countries would need to adopt new policies regarding wild animals. However at the end of the article it talked about how National Geographic is trying to pass a bill in the States to sanction countries that allow the import of rhino horns and elephant tusks. This shows that there is still hope for change as long as everyone contributes.



Bibliography
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/05/150501-herbivore-largest-africa-hunting-poaching-conservation-science/
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/content/dam/news/2015/04/30/herbivorethreat_nationalgeographic_1911066.adapt.1190.1.jpg

Elephants, Rhinos and Other Large Plant-Eaters Face Extinction, Study Says

Sam Frizell for Time.com

May 4, 2015

Article

Image 1

Image 2

Will there be safaris in the Future? This is a question that could be asked in this time. A new study has found that the elephants and Rhinos in Africa could soon face their extinction. This means that there will not be any large grazing animals left on the earth in some years. Yet in the past years, the extinction of these types of animals has been increasing over time. This has been caused by excessive poaching for the tusks of these animals, due to that these have a great worth. The ivory from these animals can in total bring more money than even diamonds and gold are worth. Although animals like elephants and rhinos can regrow in their mass, it could still be that too many animals are poached that could eventually cause extinction between these species.

The article also states that eventually this excessive killing of these species could have “enormous ecological and social costs.” This means that if many of the over 100kg animals go extinct, it could mean that the succession in the regions of Africa could not work correctly, for example in the grasslands due to that the plants can grow further the whole time, yet there is no one who can limit the amount of grass that grows in this region. Further the article also states that there has been a decline of more than 62% of the whole elephant population in the time period of 2002 to 2011, this is only 9 years, and more than half of the total elephant population has been killed in this time period. Yet the killing is not the only factor that caused extinction. The overly destruction of forests has also caused the elephants to decline in population. They can’t find enough food anymore, as most of the trees that they have eaten before, are not present anymore.

Due to that no one is currently attempting to solve the problems of the poaching and destruction of habitats, the article critics what is going on, and that no one is trying to solve these problems. The people, who are dependent on poaching these animals or even eating them, actually should not be dependent on this, as it would mean a failing of the politics, which the article states passively. It states directly, that the crisis of the extinction has to be stopped, as otherwise all of these animals could eventually be lost.

Personally, I think that it is quite important for us to keep these animals. It should not be that animals are killed only because of the rich people wanting ivory for themselves. They don’t think about the consequences for the earth and even people who are dependent on these animals in other ways. It is not good to see that there has been a decline in the population of over half in only 9 years, which means that even until 2020, there could eventually be not a single elephant left in the wildlife. Already, to this date, there have been extinctions of certain rhinoceros types. For example, a single rhino is protected by almost a whole army, just because it is the last male left in the world, and other places like zoos only have female rhinos. This really won’t mean any good, if more and more elephants are going extinct, and in the end we could also lose all of them. So in conclusion, we should really not lose all the rhinos and elephants, as these are unique types of species, which should be rescued and not let to die.

Regions at greatest risk for species extinction the least studied

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/04/150430225703.htm

Science Daily: University of Connecticut
Mark C. Urban & Sheila Foran
April 30, 2015


A rising concern regarding the ongoing 6th mass extinction has caught the eyes of researchers, as new predictions supported with recent studies were released. Extinction of species is natural, as each organism had its own background extinction rate. However, as the climate is being worsened by pollution and global warming, this extinction rate is being rapidly increased. This evoked a question among researchers on whether or not, the effect of global warming is greater in particular regions and how the disturbance in species diversity can lead to problems which have a large effect on humans too.

Steady increase
The researchers at University of Connecticut have noticed a correlation, that as the global temperature increases, the extinction rate does as well. Quite common to think, however, it is not a regular increase, but much of an exponential trend. With a current conditions, the predicted rate is at 3% - if there is an increase of 3°C, the rate would also increase to 8.5%. As this trend continues, a 4.3°C would result in a 16% extinction rate, which is expected to occur by 2100. This drastic change is something which should concern many, as exponential growth is one which is difficult to control or decrease. With 16% species becoming extinct within less than a century, researchers continued their investigations to see what other factors could affect the extinction rates.

Climate Ranges
The probability of species becoming extinct is much greater in the Southern Hemisphere near Australia and New Zealand, which are near the ozone hole, as well as South America. When species who were adapted to small temperature changes throughout the year are now exposed to larger changes, they then struggle to survive and are at a higher risk of extinction. Nearly 60% of studies have shown that the southern hemisphere is more prone to species extinction due to the varying climate ranges which have been altered by global warming. This mostly relates to the Emperor Penguins, as their habitat is melting, and is being melted earlier in the season too. Therefore, the extinction of species in the southern hemisphere is sped up in contrast to those of the northern hemisphere.

Effects on society
Some of the mentioned effects of this issue are the dangers which extinction would create to the human population. Despite the fact that we are the ones who have caused the issue - humans and the agricultural and production movement - we are now the ones in danger. Not necessarily complete species extinction, but also species disruption or abundance would effect crop growth, spread of disease and ecosystems. Despite our strong position on the planet, where we have much technology and materials to prevent several ecological issues, it will be very difficult to manage the changes caused by the climate, as all the side effects would create many more problems. "It's hard enough to predict change, but in the end, we have one climate to contend with." The scientists are calling out to the population to take initiative in realising that we have only one climate to manage, and one earth to take care of, with no second chances for a change.

In my personal opinion, I believe that this is an issue which is not regarded too greatly on a more overall perspective. We generally look at issues which directly affect us now - however, these issues will be a large concern to our future generations. As the Earth is shaped by our previous generations, I believe it is our responsibility to take care of it rather than worsen the situation for the future. Global warming will not only affect the species diversity and lead to extinction, but it will become a chain reaction. Once several species are extinct and removed from the food webs, the other species will then become threatened as well. Therefore, species extinction at an exponential trend would lead to large scale effects on the human race, as our agriculture and ecosystem would deteriorate and become unstable. Breaking the equilibrium will lead to the extinction of the last species remaining: Homo sapiens. 

Jovana Curcic

Mrs. Medenica

ESS 11

3/20/2015

Urban Wildlife: when animals go wild in the city

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/mar/08/urban-wildlife-animals-in-city

Have you ever asked yourself that wild animals may actually live and habit in your urban surroundings? Perhaps some kind of fox, coyote, boar, or parakeet is hiding in a bush in a local park or at some abandoned, haunted house waiting for a chance to get food. This may sound strange, however, reading the article I realized that I wasn’t really aware that something like this can actually be true.

For example, London is colonized by red foxes- 2 years ago, in the 72^nd floor of the unfinished skyscraper; a worker has found a fox living on the worker’s food scraps. There is data that shows that there is 14 times more foxes in urban than in rural areas. Another article claims that more than 2000 coyotes roam in Chicago, crossing the street in busy traffic searching for food to feed themselves and their young. Hunting the small rodents and searching for food scraps, coyotes have more food options than in their natural surroundings, but the main problem became more evident when they directly attacked people. (PICTURE OF THE FOX) In this picture, you can see how the officers caught the coyote in a very urban street area of Chicago. The coyotes have also attacked children in playgrounds in the Denver suburb of Broomfield in 2011. In Cape Town, South Africa, baboons can be seen at almost every corner, jumping on cars, searching for easily available food and a safe habitat in which they can live in and survive. This is also a case where monkies of Jaipur, India are protected by the Hindu Religion so the efforts to run them out of cities are pretty tepid. This results in an increase of macaques population in urban areas from 15% in the 1980s to 86% today. Elks can often be seen in some cities of Canada calving their young in safe and green neighborhoods which might be very amusing for people to observe. But the food chain might bring the grizzly bears to hunt the elk and that may result in serious threat to the humans.

Why is this happening? The main cause is, of course, human activities that have destroyed the balance between natural and urban ecosystems and the balance within each of them. People have eradicated the natural habitat of many animals by building their settlements together with all logistics that comes with. That has resulted in climate change and habitat destruction and moved many animals to the closest cities. Searching for easy available foods; garbage and outdoor pet food, wild animals are accommodating to the urban life conditions losing their natural instinct to keep a distance from people most of the time. But this does not lead to pet friendliness… but to conflicts between the humans and the animals sharing the same space. 

Deforestation in Brazil is rising again — after years of decline

http://www.vox.com/2015/3/2/8134115/deforestation-brazil-increasing

Brad Plumer

March 2, 2015

Picture 1

Between 2005 and 2012, the amount of Amazon rainforests cut down each year fell by 70%. The recent increase in deforestation was observed by Imazon, a Brazilian non-profit that is using satellite data to track forest loss. They have estimated that 1,660 square kilometers of rainforests were cleared between August 2014 and January 2015. This is triple the amount that was cleared the year before. . The data shows increase of deforestation all around the country.In the western states Mato Grosso and Rondonia, forests are being burned and cleared away. In the state of Para, illegal logging is rising. On Picture 3, on the map you can see the activity in January 2015, the red dots are deforestation. Tree clearing is a major contributor to the rise of greenhouse-gases causeing global warming, as these trees are burned all the carbon they've stored up goes into the atmosphere. 

Picture 2

Picture 3 

Why deforestation in Brazil is rising again?

Some environmentalists blame the Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. They say, that Rousseff helped weaken the country's "Forest Code", which tells the farmers and companies how much of forest they have to leave on their lands. Rouseff's administration is making new dam projects which will take key forest areas. This is very bad, because many animals and plants will loose their home. 

I believe that it may be the Presidents fault to some extend but I mostly think that it is the people's fault who are logging for example the forests, because even if the government would put laws in there would be people who would still do it. The people who are doing this to the environment maybe do not know how much they are harming the environment and themselves actually. 

Rainforest

Roy Elal

Mrs. Medenica

Environmental Systems and Societies

March 17, 2015

Costa Rica: Kids Saving The Rainforest

      

    Some of Earth's greatest biological treasures are disappearing, just as we start to gain their true value. Rain forests once covered 14% of the Earth's land surface -- while in the present day they cover a mere 6%, and experts estimate that the last remaining rain forests could be extinct in under 40 years from today. In the past years, many of the rain forest in Africa and Asia have been destroyed. Large areas in which the rain forests reside are being destroyed, in fact, rain forests are currently being destroyed at double the rate of all earlier evaluations. Unfortunately, this means that there is a very high rate of destruction, as the wildlife depending on the forest dies alongside them, therefore killing off all the biotic factors that come in to play with each of the rain forests.

People don't have to have all ecocentric worldviews in order to care or see a problem in the environment, and therefore most people can read this and feel something -- whether sympathy for the rain forests, or compassion and even pride for a girl called Janine Licare, this story is something special. After exploring different news articles and ecologically and environmentally-related events that had occurred, I found one determined teenager from Costa Rica who has tried to change the world. She believed that the smallest thing she can do for her environment will help, and maybe one day even grow out and really have made a change, instead of doing nothing like most people because they are too scared. Her name is Janine Licare and she was only nine years old when she decided to take action. She was worried, because the rain forests around her home in Manuel Antonio, Costa Rica were disappearing. The animals and the bird were disappearing too, and for a nine year old that knows nothing about the world and how things work -- she became worried and confused. What Janine went on to do together with a friend, was that she started a campaign to protect her local environment. They called it “Kids Saving the Rain forest.” This organization is one that was started 15 years ago and lives on until today, expanding in size and continuing to help day by day. The aims of KSTR are to teach children about the rain forest and to help the animals that live there, especially the Moko Titi monkey. Janine and the KSTR have achieved substantial amounts of things, making a true impact. They have raised over $50,000, planted over 4,800 trees, found over 250 volunteers to work with her during the whole project, saved many injured animals, started a variety of different projects, including ‘adopt-a-tree’ which has you pay for them to go and plant a tree in your name in the rain forest in order to help for its growth, and most majorly, Janine and the KSTR work with many different schoolchildren around the world, and have developed an environmental library and research center. Janine has an amazing story, giving her all to protect the environment in which she lives in really from the beginning of her life. Janine has appeared in several magazines, and she has appeared on National Geographic to promote her projects and talk about how other people can help.

She has also developed a website: www.kidssavingtherainforest.org , I would suggest for anyone who cares to at least have a look -- just to see what this is all about.

Looking upon Janine's life achievements, which were all out of her own personal interest, time, planning and of course, making the action, is something inspiring. This shows that anyone, with the right mindset, ambition and patience, can make a difference -- even as a 9 year old American girl living in Costa Rica. So if there is something that you care about -- go for it, and when it comes to the environment and the rain forests, you will definitely have the support of Janine Licare! :-)

"It is very important that we save the rainforest. If the rainforest disappears, then so will our planet." Janine Licare     

                         

             

Janine in the forest near her home                 Mono Titi monkey, Costa Rica

Bibliography:

"Costa Rica: Kids Saving The Rainforest." BBC News. BBC, n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2015.

Janine Licare in the Rainforest. Digital image. Wylandfoundation.org. WY Land Foundation, n.d. Web. 16 Mar. 2015.

Mono Tito Monkey. Digital image. Taringa.net. N.p., n.d. Web. 16 Mar. 2015.