Let’s start at the beginning: what’s a dhole? It’s not a giant fruit corporation. It’s not Homer Simpson’s catch phrase. It’s not welfare payment by a government. Dholes are actually wild canids, efficient predators and communal pack hunters. These rust-coloured carnivores roam the jungles and montane forests of Central and East Asia filling the humid […]
Tag: endangered
Lion among 23,000 species threatened with extinction
The mighty lion, reclusive cave crabs and the world’s rarest sea lion are among nearly 23,000 species at risk of dying out, a top conservation body warned on Tuesday. In an update to its “Red List” of threatened species, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) hailed some clear advances in saving endangered […]
Iberian lynx: back from the brink of extinction … and run down by cars
The world’s most endangered feline species, the Iberian lynx, is making a comeback in Spain after being pushed to the brink of extinction. But the costly efforts to reintroduce the spotted cat into the wild face an unexpected enemy – cars. The number of lynx killed by collisions with vehicles has soared since Spain’s economic […]
Earth enters new extinction phase
The Earth has entered a new period of extinction, a study by three US universities has concluded, and humans could be among the first casualties. The report, led by the universities of Stanford, Princeton and Berkeley, said vertebrates were disappearing at a rate 114 times faster than normal. The findings echo those in a report […]
Cash prizes offered for solutions to wildlife poaching crisis
In a recent stand to help reduce hunting of endangered wildlife, first South African Airlines and now Emirates have banned the transport of all hunting trophies from their flights. Stopping the illegal hunting and trafficking of endangered wildlife will require more innovative strategies and participation from a cross-section of society, to not only avoid buying […]
Eastern quolls, extinct on mainland, to be reintroduced in NSW national park
Eastern quolls are set to be released on the Australian mainland, 50 years after they were wiped out by a combination of habitat loss and the spread of foxes and feral cats. The quolls, which once spread from the southern reaches of South Australia up to Brisbane, have not been seen on the Australian mainland […]
Why would anyone want to shoot a sea otter?
Every time he hunts, Peter Williams sends a silent message to his prey before he squeezes the trigger: “Please give me your life. I’ll eat some of your meat, and I’ll make something beautiful out of your hide.” On a cold afternoon in mid-January, Williams, who is 33, was kneeling on the barnacle- and birdshit-encrusted […]
30 illegal orangutan pets seized in West Kalimantan
Thirty orangutans being kept as household pets in Indonesia’s West Kalimantan province have been seized and placed in a rehabilitation center, local conservation authorities report. Sustyo Iriyono, head of the province’s Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA), said he was relieved that the push to save the creatures, conducted jointly with International Animal Rescue (IAR), was […]