November 2021 – Page 2 – See Animals Wild

November 21, 2021June 29, 2022

Blue whales are returning to Spain’s Atlantic coast after a 40 year absence. What now

The first blue whale sighted in decades from this part of the world, was spotted off Spain’s coast in 2017, a different individual appeared in 2018 and a third in 2019. In 2020 2 returned.

At the end of September another was sighted off the coast of Spain.

It is unsure why they are back. Are they returning because they now feel safe? Or has climate change moved their food? Either way, it is quite something to see these huge animals returning to areas where they were hunted almost to extinction by humans.

Just before the whaling moratorium came into force, an entire generation of whales was wiped out. Now the descendants of the few who survived are returning. Some researchers are concerned that they are being forced north by global warming. Given that blue whales dont seem to cross the equator, if each population is pushed towards the poles, their habitat will be significantly reduced. Furthermore, their dung fertilizes ocean upper waters (areas with little nutrients) allowing phytoplankton to bloom, thereby capturing more carbon – and when I say more carbon, we are talking about 4 times the amount of carbon stored in the Amazon rainforest.

Whale recovery still has a long way to go. Before whaling started, there was estimated to be 4-5 million whales in the planets seas. At the current time, there are 1.3 million or roughly a quarter of pre whaling numbers. Importantly, the blue whale was so mercilessly hunted, that they have not recovered to anywhere near pre whaling numbers: their current population is only thought to be around 3% of historical numbers.

These animals are worth far more alive than dead. I realize that some communities have eaten whale for millennia. However there are several caveats to this. Firstly we have abandoned other environmentally damaging behaviours, why should we allow this. Secondly, few if any of the currently whaling countries rely on whaling to survive. In fact, with many of these communities, whaling is a recent activity. The Faroe islands kill thousands of dolphins and small whales each year, but they do not need all this meat, and this slaughter so colours peoples views that they loose far more in tourism revenue than they gain in the meat.

What ever is decided long-term to do with whale hunting, it is clear that blue whales should be left alone for a very long time more – many blue whale communities are flourishing with their population growing by 7-8% a year. However, given blue whales are at roughly 3% currently, it would take over half a century at current rates for the blue whale population to return to the numbers pre hunting.

Until the arrival of a blue whale off the coast is no longer memorable, there should not be any discussion about any harvesting. Furthermore, if the amount of carbon sequestration done by each whale is as high as it is thought, any meat should be priced high enough to pay for this (if this were to be done whale meat would be too expensive for almost anyone to afford)

November 20, 2021June 29, 2022

Do rich countries need to target aid more carefully?

Air pollution kills more people than Malaria Aids and TB combined, yet it receives just 1% of the aid budget.

Alarmingly, last year, rich countries gave 20% more to fossil fuel projects than to programmes to cut the air pollution they cause. Dirty air, is responsible for roughly 4 million deaths a year.

If comparing the number of years of life lost to each cause of death, HIV receives 34 times as much funding, and. Africa and Latin America have 500,000 deaths a year from air pollution, yet they receive 5% and 10% of the funding respectively.

Now it is true that greening the economies of the world may in the future, eliminate many of these deaths, but we also give more money to fossil fuel projects than we do to green power that might replace it – this is despite the fact that the green project is often cheaper to build and to run and doesnt have the negatives on local people that come with burning things.

November 19, 2021July 1, 2022

Brush-tailed Bettongs reintroduced into South Australia

The Brush-tailed Bettong was almost lost from the whole of mainland Australia, after Europeans introduced cats and foxes from home.

A Brush tailed Bettong credit to Arthur Chapman

As an ecosystem engineer (like the European Beaver in the UK) its absence has caused problems for the greater ecosystem as a whole. Looking like a cross between a rat and a kangaroo it eats a variety of fungi. When they dig up fungi and truffles, they spread fungal spores to the wind, as well as on their feet. without them many fungis may well disapear, leaving soils far less healthy.

40 were translocated, and the move has gone so well, that some of the individuals have already started dispersing into the surrounding area.

November 18, 2021June 29, 2022

Vestas a wind turbine company has created a project which allows turbine blades to be fully recyclable

Given the huge number of wind turbines that are being created, and are eventually going to reach end of their life.

It is therefore odd that it has taken so long for people to start to make the blades recyclable. The thermoset composites are able to be split and then broken down into their initial component parts. These parts can then be reused as though they are raw materials just created. Indeed at the current time, the only part of a wind turbine that could not be recycled was the blades. As a result, wind turbines can become completely green after manufacture.

This destroys one of the few remaining arguments against wind turbines, and should make way for a significant worldwide increase in turbine deployment.

November 18, 2021June 29, 2022

Cop 26: successes and failures

There is much to be pleased about with how the cop26 conference went, unfortunately we are still not at a point where the promises made are going to meet the targets we know we need to hit. It seems that at least for now, the Climate change deniers have now been banned from the room – climate change ‘realists’ who basically claim nothing can be done and it is nothing to do with humans, are unfortunately still being listened to in some places.

Cop 26 brought together many of the world leaders

It is now recognised that while 2 degrees Celsius has been listed as a maximum increase target for some time, warming of this quantity will leave the world in a very poor place.

This is why for a long period, when these gatherings have occurred, the aim has been to reduce carbon emissions by enough to hit 1.5 degrees Celsius rise.

All of the current promises would get us to 1.8 degrees Celsius rise. Now it is encouraging to be that close, however clearly we have not succeeded yet.

There are other significant issues. Most countries promise to phase out the use of coal for electricity generation. This is because it is widely recognised that energy generation from coal is one of the most polluting. Unfortunately China, India, the US and Australia failed to join in this pledge. It should be remembered that Climate change is expected to cause the biggest financial burden on India US and Brazil, so it should be a self preservation move for these countries to help, but as yet this does not seem to be happening.

It should be noted that these countries do not deny the science they nearly aren’t willing to engage in a sensible solution.

November 17, 2021June 29, 2022

A trial of Silvopasture in Devon

I wrote about Silvopasture recently, there is now a trial going on down in Devon. A farmer is now planting huge numbers of trees sparsely across his land. Each row has trees roughly every 6m and each row is roughly 14m apart.

This will produce a patchwork of shade and sun.

Trees being planted are Oak Aspen and Alder – native British species.

Neighbours have suggested that he is mad, and concreting over his land would have the same benefit. Of course common sense would suggest that concreting over the land would leave far less grass than sparsely planted trees but there we are.

5600 trees will be planted across his 165 acre farm. He is taking part in a 12 year trail to see what benefit Silvopasture can have. The expectation is that the environment will benefit, but that there should also be increased productivity for the farmer.

If it can be shown that grazing sheep under sparse woodland increases yield, roughly 63% of agricultural land could have similar treatment. This could amount to hundreds of millions of trees across the country.

Studies elsewhere suggest benefits include reducing flooding increasing drought resilience, improving animal health and weight, as well as boosting biodiversity and sequestering vast quantities of carbon.

November 17, 2021June 29, 2022

More than 126000 gallons of oil have leaked near Huntington beach California

Oil spills are an unfortunate fact of life for as long as we continue to move oil around the planet.

126000 gallons, alarmingly, is a relatively small spill, compared to most oil spills.

Nevertheless this oil still has the capability of killing many thousands of birds along with sea otters and other marine mammals.

Pictures show floating beams, which are used to stop the oil from getting around, and indeed a lot of oil does float on the surface. Unfortunately by no means all and as such much of the oil that leads into the sea will remain and continue to cause damage for decades into the future

November 17, 2021June 29, 2022

South African cheetah to be introduced into India

This Cheetah image feels like an exclusively African view – but it shouldn’t,

There is an impressive wealth of cats living in India. From the Indian tiger (known throughout the world) to the Asiatic lions last home- the gir forests of west india (the asiatic lion once roamed across Asia, throughout southern Europe, across northern and western Africa – therefore there are probably more “Asiatic” lion in Africa than in Asia), 12,000-14,000 leopards remain in the country. The snow leopard also still roams mountains within the country. It also still has a population of clouded leopards. In other words, in terms of big cats, it has all species except Jaguar.

November 16, 2021June 29, 2022

Politicians from across the political spectrum have come together to agree $400 million measures to help save the Florida panther

The money will be used to expand wildlife corridors, which will allow easier gene flow, as well as benefitting all wildlife in the area – including prey which in places is severely lacking.

Currently agreed requirements for the animal to be taken off the endangered list is 3 established populations of a couple of hundred each.

The changes would also benefit key deer, Florida manatee and loggerhead sea turtles.

It is rare that conservation efforts are supported on all side. In other areas Republicans have not been good at supporting Conservation in the last few years – let us hope that this will lead to a change in the wider Republican party.

November 15, 2021June 29, 2022

DNA analysis has demonstrated significant differences between African and Asian leopards

For the majority of people, a leopard is a leopard. Sure there are quite a range of subspecies, but one generally looks rather like the other. Indeed the only significant difference people often notice is one that has not justification – that of the melanistic leopard (or black panther)

In order to disturb wild leopards as little as possible, the study took DNA samples from museum held leopard specimens all over the world.