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In the half a century running up to the year 2002, there are only 8 recorded fatalities from wolf attacks across the whole of Europe and western Russia. Also when thinking about this number we need to remember that the majority of these sorts of occurred in parts of the world where there are many wolves such as Western Russia.
With incredibly cold weather hitting Texas (for instance the beach is covered in snow), Fox News has been making a big thing of the fact that some of the wind turbines are not turning supposedly because they froze – and that this is the cause of the blackouts.
This is factually incorrect. According to data from the Texas government wind turbine shutdowns accounted for less than 13% of the total outage. A bigger problem is freezing of oil and gas equipment throughout the state.
Continue reading “Foolish attacks on renewable energy – Texas blackouts cannot be blamed on green energy”The current president of Tanzania is starting that the country has eradicated Covid-19 and is dismissing the need for vaccines.. Why am I writing about this in a wildlife blog? The way that governments react to science is a good indication of the way that they will react to the natural world within their borders.
Continue reading “Anti vaxxers are not limited to the developed world”When David Cameron entered 10 Downing Street, he talked about it being the greenest government ever. While they have had to be in coalition for much of the period that the have been in power, it is clear that much of the negative effects on the environment has been pushed through by the conservatives not their partners.
Continue reading “The Conservatives record on the environment”
Cape Leopards are a fascinating part of the leopard population of South Africa. It is estimated that there are as many as 1000 cape leopards living throughout the western cape. Now the western cape covers roughly 50,000 square miles so it is a rather large area, and they are spread across a few national parks. What is interesting about this group is that they are significantly smaller than any other group of leopards with females weighing around 20kg and males 35kg (generally leopards weigh between 60 and 70kg). Continue reading “Cape leopards”
In Africa it is becoming increasingly common for national parks to be declared on both sides of a border. This allows the protected area to be vastly larger than either country could succeed in, on its own. This is important because many of the mammals that live in Africa need a lot of space and live at low densities. Without transfrontier parks it would be too expensive to protect a large enough area to support populations of animals such as wild dog and cheetah. In an ideal world this is a relatively simple solution, however as with everything it isn’t often that simple. With war and famine and other problems the animals could suddenly become less secure in one country than another. Continue reading “Transfrontier parks – allowing wildlife to exist closer to how it did before humans arrived”
If we are to be able to continue to live on planet Earth we are going to need to stop releasing large amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. It is unfortunate that at the current time, this simple fact is not looked on as a fact by some of the big world leaders.
One of the difficult things to look at is that some of the publicised success the UK has had in the last couple of decades is false. When looking carefully you can see that we have exported the emissions, by having things manufactured in India or China for example. This makes it clear that much of the pressure on manufacturers must come from consumers rather than governments. Continue reading “Greening the western lifestyle”
Even in the current age where many species such as elephants and lions are facing steep declines in population and range, there are still many countries where it is legal to go and hunt them and other species. Unlike many conservationists I am not inherently against hunting, however the way it is done in many places baffles me. I realise with many people it is essentially “the bragging rights” that they are looking for. Shoot an animal and mount its head on your wall at home. One hundred years ago, when there were more animals left I could understand this idea, but nowadays, when we are likely to have to explain to our grandchildren if not children why these animals no longer live in the wild I don’t want one stuck to my wall! Continue reading “Does hunting pay its way?”