Koalas may be extinct in 50 years: WWF.
The koala has become a symbol of Australia’s sad record of species decline and could be extinct within 50 years, conservationists say. A study of dwindling species in the Indo-Pacific region paints a bleak future for the koala. The 2012 Living Planet Report, by the conservation group WWF, says species in the region have declined by 64 per cent since 1970 - the worst of all the world’s regions. WWF Australia ecologist Dr Martin Taylor says that if the rate at which koalas are vanishing is not curbed, they could be extinct within 50 years.
(Photo by TheCameraTrap)
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Source: sexyactionplanet
Endangered Black footed Ferrets at the NBFCC
From a small acorn grows a mighty oak. From those 18 captured ferrets in 1987 grows the possibility of saving a species. The captive breeding program has been successful with over 7,100 kits produced at the captive breeding facilities since 1986.
Many thanks to these participating zoos in the captive breeding program: National Zoo’s Smithsonian Conservation …Biology Institute (VA), Louisville Zoological Garden (KY), Toronto Zoo (Ontario, Canada), Cheyenne Mountain Zoo (CO) and the Phoenix Zoo (AZ).Thanks to all the people, past and future, who share their time and effort in putting black-footed ferrets back where they belong…on the prairie wild and free!
Find Out More: http://www.facebook.com/pages/National-Black-footed-Ferret-Conservation-Center/
(photo: Photo Credit: KT (FWS))
Source: rhamphotheca
Endangered-species truce faces big test from little sand dunes lizard - The Washington Post
It wasn’t too hard for the Fish and Wildlife Service to decide the fate of 92 freshwater snails, or 17 dragonflies, or indeed more than 500 species over the past year. But when it comes to the dunes sagebrush lizard, trouble looms. The small spiny reptile seeks refuge from the hot sun and potential predators in the shinnery oak dunes of southeastern New Mexico and West Texas. Ranchers have been clearing the oak shrubs, and oil and gas companies are drilling in the dunes. If the lizard is designated as an endangered species, some of those activities could be in jeopardy. The lizard’s future is among the first in a series of wrenching tests threatening what has been a year-long cease-fire in the fight over endangered-species listings.
Source: tartantambourine
The giant golden-crowned flying fox (Acerodon jubatus), also known as the golden-capped fruit bat, is a rare megabat and one of the largest bats in the world. The species is endangered and is currently facing the possibility of extinction because of poaching and forest destruction. It is endemic to forests in the Philippines
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Source: iamthewalrustoned
Northern Hairy-nosed Wombat (Lasiorhinus krefftii)
CRITICALLY ENDANGERED
The northern hairy-nosed wombat, also known as the yaminon, is one of three species of wombats. It is one of the rarest large mammals in the world and is critically endangered. Its historical range extended across New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland as recently as 100 years ago, but it is now restricted to one place, a 3 km² range within the 32 km² Epping Forest National Park in Queensland. In 2003 the total population consisted of 113 individuals, including only around 30 breeding females.
The northern hairy-nosed wombat is nocturnal, and has been known to share burrows. Its diet is made up of coarse grass and various types of roots. Its habitat has become infested with African buffel grass, which out-competes the native grasses the Yaminon prefers to feed on. One young is born, often during the wet season. It stays in the pouch for 6-9 months, leaving its mother after a year…
(read more: Wikipedia) (painting by Ego Guiotto)
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Find out more:
http://www.edgeofexistence.org/mammals/species_info.php?id=9
Source: rhamphotheca
Fighting A Last-Ditch Battle To Save the Rare Javan Rhino
by Rhett Butler
April 26, 2012
From the article: Rhinoceroses worldwide are under siege as their habitat shrinks and poachers slaughter hundreds annually for their valuable horns. Now, in Indonesia, conservation groups are engaged in a desperate struggle to save the last 40 Javan rhinos on earth.
Read the whole article.
Source: reasonstobevegan
Is Rare Albatross Colonizing Hawaii?
by ABC staff
Maybe ten rare Short-tailed Albatrosses showing up at several Hawaiian Islands doesn’t count as a new population, but those sightings are still causing a buzz in the conservation and birding worlds.
“This is a bird that was once thought extinct and even now inhabits only a very small geographic area in Japan. The fact that it is now showing up in Hawai‘i in double-digit numbers around breeding season is huge news and potentially a major development in the efforts to protect this species from extinction,” said Dr. George Wallace, VP for Oceans and Islds at American Bird Conservancy. Wallace said that three birds have been seen on Kure Atoll, five on Midway Island, one on Laysan Island, and one on Tern Island.
The Short-tailed Albatross was once the most abundant of the North Pacific albatross species, numbering more than a million birds. It was decimated by feather hunting at the turn of the 20th Century, and by the late 1940s was thought to be extinct. In the early 1950s, ten pairs were discovered breeding on the island of Torishima, Japan. The population has now reached 3,000 individuals, with most still on Torishima…
(read more: American Bird Conservancy) (photo: Evan L.)
Source: rhamphotheca
Biodiversity Crisis: Goals will not be met
At the moment Global Warming and Climate Change have taken over the environmental concern scene -however these two elephants in the room draw the eye away from other important and pressing concerns in the global environment.
The UN had established goals to decrease the rate of extinctions happening across the globe by 2010 - here we are in 2012 and these goals still have not been met. In the midst of one of the largest extinctions in world history a clear concern for the world’s endangered biodiversity exists.
Previously conservation efforts were managed on a protected areas level, in which pieces of land were set aside to remain as habitat for wildlife - however these efforts are not enough.
While protected areas do set aside room for wildlife there are several flaws in their use for protection of biodiversity. If these areas are not large enough, do not interconnect to allow immigration and emigration, and are too disturbed by human activity or runoff they may not be conducive to supporting diverse communities and protecting endangered species.
Different animals have different habitat requirements, and simply because we are increasing protected areas does not mean that these areas contain the habitat needed for different natural communities to exist. More over human pollution and disturbance can have a large effect on even some of the more remote and large swaths of protected land making habitat less suitable for life.
Last but not least connecting these protected areas to encourage immigration and allow for gene flow between different populations is vital as an isolated population can quickly loose genetic diversity and slowly die away due to genetic drift and inbreeding.
Protected areas are important. We can’t save or restore our biodiversity without somewhere to put it. However the way that we are defining protected areas, and our management of them as a global community must be assessed. Without action everyday we are loosing entire species, the result of millions upon millions of years of genetic evolution -gone.
The solution is better management on local levels. Integration of science into the political process to assure that wildlife and wildland management are being preformed efficiently in order to get the most out of our efforts for conservation.
Source: http
Video) Meet Arkive, an initiative of Wildscreen. It’s mission:
Promoting the Conservation of the World’s Threatened Species, Through the Power of Wildlife ImageryIt reminds me of the International League of Conservation Photographers
Source: youtube.com
Reuters: Hundreds of Orangutans in Indonesia’s Aceh forest may die out in weeks
“Forest fires and land clearing by palm oil firms could kill off within weeks about 200 orangutans in a forest in western Indonesia, an environmental group said on Wednesday.
The orangutans, part of a population of around 6,600 on Sumatra island, used to live in a lush forest and peatland region called Rawa Tripa on the coast of Indonesia’s Aceh province. But more than two-thirds of the area has been divided up into palm oil concessions, said the Coalition to Save Tripa.
Graham Usher, a member of the coalition and a landscape protection specialist, said satellite images showed forest fires had been burning in Tripa since last week, and if allowed to continue they could wipe out orangutans already forced onto the edge of remaining forests.
“If there is any prolonged dry spell, which is quite likely, there’s a very good chance that the whole piece of forest and everything in it, so that’s orangutans, sun bears, tigers, and all the other protected species in it, will disappear in a few weeks and will be gone permanently,” he told a news conference.
The palm oil industry has expanded to make Indonesia the world’s top producer and exporter of the edible oil, used to make good ranging from cooking oil and biodiesel to biscuits and soap to feed growing Asian consumer demand.
Deforestation has threatened animals like the Sumatran tiger and Javan rhino and pushed up carbon dioxide emissions. The Bali tiger and the Java tiger have disappeared in the last 70 years.
A two-year moratorium on new permits to clear primary forests came into effect in Indonesia last year, part of a $1 billion deal with Norway to cut emissions and slow expansion of plantations. But the moratorium was breached in Aceh on its first days, an environmental group has said.
The last Aceh permit for palm oil was issued by former Aceh governor Irwandi Yusuf in August last year to PT Kallista Alam, prompting environmental group Walhi to file a legal suit against Yusuf. A court verdict is expected next week.”
More at Reuters.
(via other-stuff)
Source: climateadaptation
100 Years Later, Endangered Millerbirds Breed Once Again on Laysan Island
media release, ABC
(Washington, D.C., March 16, 2012) - Endangered Millerbirds, recently reintroduced to Hawai‘i’s Laysan Island after a 100-year absence, are now breeding there, a major step forward in efforts to save the species from extinction.
In September of 2011, 24 of the tiny songbirds were relocated from their last remaining holdout on remote Nihoa Island to Laysan Island. In a bold effort, birds were transported 650 miles northwest by sea to initiate a second population and minimize the risk of extinction. Biologists monitoring the birds have just reported that some of the birds have laid eggs, and some of these eggs have now hatched—an encouraging sign that the birds will thrive in their new home.
Shortly after they arrived last fall, the Millerbirds made an unsuccessful out-of-season breeding attempt. Now the birds are entering their first proper breeding season with promising early results. Nest building activity was first observed on Valentine’s Day. The first complete nest of the season was discovered the last week of February, and the first eggs on March 8. Since then, birds from a total of eight pairs have been seen carrying nest material, building nests, or exhibiting other breeding behavior.
As of March 15, two pairs are incubating eggs, and one pair is feeding nestlings. The project team now waits with bated breath for the first Millerbird chicks to fledge. This first-ever opportunity to observe Millerbird breeding from start to finish and collect behavioral and life-history data throughout the season is a significant advance in the study of this endangered species…
(read more: American Bird Conservancy) (photo: R. Kohley)
Source: rhamphotheca
World's rarest ducklings Madagascan pochards hatch [+ VIDEO]
The ultimate aim is to release captive-bred pochards into the wildEighteen Madagascan pochards - the world’s most endangered duck - have hatched in a captive breeding centre.
This brings the world population of the ducks to just 60.
The Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust and Durrell Wildlife Conservation Trust, the groups leading the captive breeding programme, say this “builds hope that the bird can be saved from extinction”.
The precious pochards are being reared at a specially built centre in Antsohihy, Madagascar.
The ducks were thought to have become extinct in the late 1990s, but were rediscovered in 2006, when conservationists on an expedition spotted just 22 birds at a single site - Lake Matsaborimena (or Red Lake), in northern Madagascar.
Click title to read more and watch the video.
Source: shychemist
World's Smallest Dolphin Down to Just 55 Individuals
March 23, 2012 From the article: The planet’s smallest dolphin, which typically measures just a meter and a half in length, is now on the verge of extinction, with only 55 mature individuals alive in the world, according to a new survey on their population.The child-sized Maui’s dolphin, also endearingly called the “popoto”, is a subspecies of the Hector’s dolphin and can only be found along the west coast of New Zealand’s North Island.
