Posts tagged conservation
Gorilla Smiling — With Reason: The world’s population of mountain gorillas has increased to 880, up by at least 100 since 2006, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society.
Japanese Public on Whale Meat: ‘Meh’:
“The majority (of the Japanese public) - 55 percent - said they were neither for whaling nor against it, a collective shoulder shrug that appears to belie the insistence by the country’s officials that continued whaling is a matter of great national pride and import.”
EU calls an end to the cruel practice of shark finning:
The European parliament on Thursday called a definitive halt to shark finning, the long contested practice of fishermen slicing off fins and throwing the live body overboard to drown.
World’s Largest Preserve Forming in Africa
Elephants have no respect for lines on a map, especially the artificial national boundaries established by Europeans after carving up Africa into colonial empires. But national boundaries have kept elephants and many other animals cooped up in southern Africa.
The nations of Angola, Botswana, Namibia, Zambia and Zimbabwe agreed to ease some of their own border controls in order to create what will be the world’s largest conservation area, reported PRI’s Living on Earth. A chunk of land the size of California will include a variety of habitats and allow wildlife to migrate to greener pastures in the dry season and keep their feet dry during the wet season.
Africa’s iconic wildlife — elephants, lions, crocodiles, leopards, rhinos, hippos, and buffalo — are expected to bring in tourist dollars. Without the incentive of tourist revenues encouraging conservation, the animals were just a danger and a pest to locals, who had to fear elephants raiding their crops and lions stalking them at night, without the legal right to hunt problem animals.
Madagascar is one of the poorest countries on Earth yet has proposed to create more than 1 million hectares (3,861 square miles) of protected areas to provide for the long-term conservation of its marine resources, including coral reefs and mangroves.
Areas of particularly high biodiversity value on islands, reefs and bays are in jeopardy.
Image Credit: Corbis
First Gray Wolf Seen in California Since 1924
image: Gray wolf at the Oregon Zoo (Cacophony, Wikimedia Commons)
There’s a turtle baby boom in the Philippines.
The eggs were laid on Baguan Island, which is protected as a turtle sanctuary.
