It is only in the last couple of decades that genetic research was done to find the forest elephants of Africa are a completely different species to the bush elephants found out on the Savanna – which is the species most people see. Talking about these elephant species, bare in mind that the forest elephant has been shown to be more closely related to the mammoth than to the African Savanna elephant.
Continue reading “Forest elephants make a significant difference to the amount of Carbon that trees hold”Tiger leaves reserve and is found on someone’s bed
Africa and India set up their nature reserves very differently. In Africa reserves that house lions and leopards, and animals such as this, are very large, often covering more than 500 square miles of land. Indeed there are a handful of reserves that are large enough to contain 500 or more wild lions.
Continue reading “Tiger leaves reserve and is found on someone’s bed”Southern African countries Zimbabwe, Botswana, Angola and Namibia are calling for an end to the ban on ivory sales
This group of Southern African countries are once again raising the prospect of them selling the ivory that they have accumulated over the years. In the majority of African countries that have wild elephants it is standard practice when Game Wardens come across dead elephants to remove the tusks. This is because it has been clearly shown that feeding the demand for ivory is a very strong way of increasing demand and to avoid people going looking for dead animals the tusks must be removed.
Continue reading “Southern African countries Zimbabwe, Botswana, Angola and Namibia are calling for an end to the ban on ivory sales”Donald Trump and Andrew Wheeler, the EPA director, are continuing with the destruction of any sensible climate change mitigation laws
The Trump administration, under the direction of Andrew Wheeler (EPA director), have discarded the law which required the electricity generation to emit less CO2 which was going to mean that most coal plants would shut. Many people have argued that this is too hard on the coal plant owners. Nothing could be further from the truth: many of these plants were due to be closed in the near future anyway. Furthermore, this law would not have closed all coal plants, merely the dirtiest of them all. Not that it’s any surprise but this put paid to Trump’s claim of “clean coal”, a phrase that as far as emissions is stupid anyway
Continue reading “Donald Trump and Andrew Wheeler, the EPA director, are continuing with the destruction of any sensible climate change mitigation laws”Uranium mining within a tiger reserve
Nature reserves in India are rather different to what was set up in Africa. In Africa there are six nature reserves or national parks which have enough space to have a population of at least 500 Lions. If humans were to disappear from Africa tomorrow and reappear in 500 years these populations are likely to be big enough that genetic disabilities will have impacted this population.
Continue reading “Uranium mining within a tiger reserve”On the hunt for wild boar in the Forest of Dean
During half term I took my two children, aged 4 and 6, up to the Forest of Dean for a couple of days. As with many parts of Europe this forest is quite old and wonderfully wild. However this wilderness is helped by being far more natural than other forests in the UK. One of the many species that we killed off is highly important for forests as their hunting for food turns the soil and allows for regeneration. I am of course talking about wild boar.
Continue reading “On the hunt for wild boar in the Forest of Dean”Botswana lifted its ban on hunting elephants last month – this argument is more contentious even amongst conservationists than you would think
Botswana house around 135,000 of the 350,000 remaining elephants in Africa. In the past they have made a small but significant amount of money from these elephants by hunting, but a few years ago the president of Botswana stated that if they stopped hunting elephants and concentrated on photographic safaris they could make more money from their wildlife.
Continue reading “Botswana lifted its ban on hunting elephants last month – this argument is more contentious even amongst conservationists than you would think”Angola has committed 60 million dollars to the clearance of landmines within their national parks
During Angola’s long-running Civil War, many parts of the country had minefields put in place. One of these is an area that is going to be a part of the massive Kaza ( Kalahari Zambezi) Transfrontier Park. For Angola to be able to benefit from this massive reserve it needs to be safe for tourists to visit, and this requires the removal of landmines. Unfortunately over the last 10 years international financial support for this important work has declined by 80%, which makes the target is finishing the work by 2025 and extremely optimistic idea.
Continue reading “Angola has committed 60 million dollars to the clearance of landmines within their national parks”Theresa May has stated her walking holiday in the Alps pushed her towards zero CO2 emissions by 2050
The UK Prime Minister Theresa May has come out and informed us that part of the reason she pushed for net zero CO2 emissions by 2050 was the fact that when she went on a walking holiday in the Swiss Alps she could see the retreat of ice everywhere.
Continue reading “Theresa May has stated her walking holiday in the Alps pushed her towards zero CO2 emissions by 2050”