Uncategorized – See Animals Wild

April 1, 2025April 1, 2025

African elephant populations have stabilized in their Southern African homes

African elephant populations have risen and fallen incredibly fast over the last few centuries. It is estimated that as much as 20 million Savanah elephants roamed Africa in the year 1800, but in 1979 just 600,000 remained, and in 2016 just 415,000 live in Africa. At that point, over 100,000 had been poached in the previous decade.

Unfortunately, it is not merely a case of making more parks. Elephants are incredibly intelligent, but so called fortress reserves, are not good enough. Indeed, less well protected reserves, that are linked together by migration corridors, are far better for the elephant population, than the aforementioned fortress reserves.

These corridors have multiple benefits, from allowing elephants to leave overpopulated areas, to being able to move to places where food and water are available. It also means that the elephants can leave areas of heavy poaching, for instance the Virunga national park, where elephants virtually disappeared in the 1990s, but have started to return from Queen Elizabeth national park in Uganda, across the border.

Where animals cannot move, one often has a boom and bust kind of population dynamic. Now, it should be noted, that this is not always easy, as migration corridors are rarely completely empty of humans, so there is more conflict in these areas, never-the-less, it is clear that these corridors are essential, if these elephant populations are to survive into the long-term. Of course, it also leads to an interesting situation, where virtually all of the huge ecosystems in Africa are along borders, as this allows more than one country to share the cost.

Of perhaps greater worry, this population of 415,000 is both the African savannah and African forest elephant. Yet these two are completely separate species, African forest elephants are nicknamed the gardeners of the forest, and it is questionable whether it can survive as effectively in the long-term without their recovery. The African forest elephant had a population of 26 million in 1800, it is unclear how many are left, but what is clear, is that their population has collapsed in the last few decades.

March 26, 2025March 25, 2025

A natural reservoir that formed in the Peruvian Andes behind a glacier, in 1941 broke its bank and killed thousands – climate change is making a repeat more likely

It is estimated that 15 million people live in areas which would be flooded, should glacial lakes collapse. As global warming increases the temperatures in these areas, these glacial lake collapses are only going to get more common.

In 1941, lake Palcacocha (which sits high in the Cordillera Blanca range of the Peruvian Andes) broke its banks. The city of Huaraz lies beneath it, and when it collapsed 10 million cubic meters of water was dropped on the city. Apart from changing the areas geography permanently, at least 1800 people died, and possibly as high as 4500.

We are making the collapse of these glacial lakes more likely as time goes by, by our increasing of carbon in the atmosphere – clearly it is not only low lying settlements which are in danger from climate related flooding.

March 3, 2025February 26, 2025

Shrinking trees, and tuskless elephants – what other effects are humans having?

Humans are causing trees to grow smaller, as big trees are more likely to be harvested. In the same way, elephants are being born in some reserves without their tusks, as this means that they are less likely to be hunted (and therefore, those born without tusks tend to survive better and have more young).

Snails are developing lighter shells, in order to cope with heat better, and swallows are developing shorter wings as this is easier to avoid being hit by cars, are just some of the large number of effects that humans are having on the natural world.

The problem is if these impacts mean that the species is less capable of surviving (do tuskless elephants live as long?). Are humans becoming the primary threat for many species?

If so, we need to change that and fast.

February 27, 2025February 25, 2025

Male dominance is perhaps less the default than thought amongst primates, a new study has found

Even before the study was started, it was known that some species are not male dominated. Above is a family of Bonobos, and these great apes live in a female dominated society.

Given our assumption that on male dominance, it is perhaps surprising, that only 58% of primate species have dominant males. Perhaps not surprising, as a result, every major primate group had at least one species which was female (or co-dominant) structures.

Indeed, with the gibbons (or lesser apes on this website, to check them out, click here to visit the home page, and then expand the species database, and click on lesser apes) all 5 species examined (there are a total of 20) have been classed as non-male dominant.

Amongst primates, this likelihood is (according to Lewis, the head of the study) relatively easily predicted, as tends to occur in the species, where there is little difference between the size of male and female members.

An example here, is clear: while a male gorilla can weigh twice that of a female, siamang gibbons only have males a couple of kg heavier than females – not surprisingly, while male gorillas are dominant, this is not the case with siamang gibbons.

It should be noted, therefore, that while 4 out the 5 species of great apes are male dominated (we assume this in humans as well, though, in the modern day, it would be hard to argue that we are not more of a co dominant species. Given that likely all the lesser apes (the gibbons) are more or less co-dominant, it follows, that even just looking at the apes, more are female dominant or co-dominant.

February 26, 2025February 25, 2025

Could flooding wetlands, be the next big carbon capture method?

The Nywaigi people of Australia have found that by doing this, this behaviour can sequester carbon, boost biodiversity and create jobs.

It is thought that peatlands, store twice as much carbon as rainforests, so their protection and recovery is essential if we are to maintain the wonderful climate that has allowed the human race to flourish.

In this instance (not the place that the video comes from) just 1 decade ago, the area was bad. Much of it was freshwater pasture, with a load of invasive weeds that were choking both the land and the waterways. This was caused by a ‘bund’, an earth wall build 50 years ago, to block off incoming seawater, in order to transform the area into freshwater ponded pasture (to be used for cattle pasture). You can find a video on this project to restore this area, and the bottom of this article.

February 25, 2025February 25, 2025

The odd job of a pangolin carer

Have you heard of a pangolin? Would you recognize one? For many people, the pangolin is unfortunately known, only as a family of species, which have been poached for their scales (made of keratin, and with no medicinal basis) such that of the 8 species, half are endangered and the other half critically endangered. Click on any of the mentions of pangolin on this page to be taken to our pangolin family species page. This poaching is so extreme, that some estimate that this family of species are the most trafficked in the world.

Pangolin are very hard to take care of, which is why there are so few in zoos around the world. Indeed, the vast majority of even wildlife guides in somewhere like the Kruger have never seen a pangolin, even if they are known to exist in the park. A pangolin carers job, is to look after a pangolin, take it into the bush, and find places with many ants and termites, and generally get it ready to return to the wild.

An incredibly rare sighting of a pangolin within the Kruger national park

January 24, 2025January 24, 2025

‘Sky islands’ in Africa are producing more new species than anywhere else

Sky islands like this one Mount Lico in Mozambique

Sky islands are found across much of Africa. Our experience of sky islands, occurred within the Udzungwa national park in Tanzania. This national park protects a large portion of the Eastern arc mountains. – a chain of mountains which run across Eastern Tanzania.

Africa started drying out around 5500 years ago, and much changed at this point, including a great expansion of the Sahara. However, what is relevant here, is that in many parts of the continent, this caused the rainforests to retreat. More rain falls on higher ground, so you were left with a situation where the tops of hills and mountains remain forested, but the valleys become savannahs. Perhaps one of the most notable effects of this, was to split the worlds mountain gorillas into two populations, one in the Bwindi impenetrable forest in Uganda and the other in the Virunga ecosystem. At their closest point, these two protected areas are only 20km apart (though driving between the two are likely to take longer, as visitor facilities are not at these points). Unfortunately, this space between the two areas has a large human population. This means that the two mountain gorilla populations were stuck on their respective mountain homes, relatively close together, but with no way to cross the gap between.

Not researched until recently, there is a strip of mountains that runs from northern Mozambique to Malawi’s Mount Mulanje. As with the eastern arc mountains, rainforest was preserved on these peaks. These were finally given scientific attention by an internatiional team in the South East Africa Montane Archipelago study. While archipelagos are usually used to refer to a group of islands, it seems apt here. Among these mountains, there are around 30 fragmented pockets of grasslands and evergreen forests that have been largely cut off from each other.

This is perfect for housing unique collections of species, that have found themselves cut off from other habitat that they once roamed. This study, identified 90 species from amphibians(11), reptiles(22), birds(3), mammals(4), butterflies(39) and freshwater crabs(6), alongside 127 species of plant, not found anywhere else on earth. These sky islands are even being considered for their own ecoregion.

Big or small, it is important to protect these little ecological islands, and it should be possible to have tourists visit to give an extra income to locals.

January 23, 2025January 21, 2025

Norway has released an engine that runs on hydrogen – does this end electric cars future?

Unfortunately, this is an article that does not need much work. Unless we find an insane quantity of hydrogen buried under the ground somewhere (and it would have to be infinite to really count), the question is, how much electricity does it take to make 1kg of hydrogen and how far can the car drive on it? If this is more than an electric car, then perhaps Norway has a point.

January 23, 2025January 21, 2025

So-called experts are claiming that the first ultra-compact engine which has just been unveiled, will be the end of EVsTransport roundup: cleaner cars and planes

Who are these so called experts? What is there expertise in, and do other experts agree? Their expertise does not appear to have much backing it.

This engine weighs just under 11kg, and they believe that, as it delivers better efficiency and emission control, all within a sleek design. In the literature, so much is made of the efficiency of this engine, but that misses the point. They suggest that this efficiency closes the gap between combustion engines and electric ones.

This misses the point: electric cars are zero carbon at use. Therefore, the cleaner the grid gets, the lower the carbon will be. As such, it is all very well to compare electric cars now, to an experimental engine that will be in cars in a generation or two. However, in 2 generations, it is thought that most countries will have further greened their grid, leaving the electric car still ahead.

We drive an electric car, and as we pay our electricity company for 100% clean electricity, our carbon emissions are essentially zero (particularly, as we bought the car second hand). One could, quite rightly, argue that not all the electricity that we use comes from zero carbon electricity – instead, we use whatever electricity is being created at the time. But that is the point- our supplier buys enough zero carbon electricity to cover all our use, therefore, if they were supplying everyone in the country a 100% zero carbon electricity, they would have to buy enough green electricity for everyone. That could only be done by all the electricity in the country being green.

So, in short – suggesting an uber efficient small ICE engine used 10-20 years in the future is more efficient than an electric car driven on the grid now, is not a fair comparison. It is like comparing the price of apples now, to the price of futures in oranges next year. Do not buy into it. If every person in the UK drove an electric car, carbon emissions would be far lower, than if everyone drove the most efficient ICE car that has, or ever will be made (this seems pretty obvious, do not get hoodwinked).

January 22, 2025January 21, 2025

Electrical and heat battery news roundup

In Finland, a so-called sand battery (it is actually full of crushed soapstone) has been built, which is capable of storing around 100MW of heat. The crushed soapstone is a by protudct of a fireplace production factory nearby. It is true that this heat battery is large, with a height of around 13m and width of 15m, but it can in theory be buried in the ground. It takes 2000 tonnes to fill this heat battery, but this is just 40 waste trucks worth.

It will serve as a thermal battery, with pipes running through it. It can be heated in the Summer when there is cheap or even free power, and then water run through pipes in the material can extract the energy in winter, powering a district heating network – greatly reducing the emissions from heating houses in the whole area (it is estimated that it will reduce emissions by 70%)

The Soapstone leftover, was a wasted product, and before was just thrown away, so this is a far better use. This “sand” battery can hold heats of around 500 degrees for months if required, and is thought to completely eliminate the need for oil in the network heating system. it equates to roughly 1 month of heating requirements in summer, and 1 week in winter. Costing around $200,000, compared to $1,600,000 for the equivalent lithium battery, it is a good deal. While it is true that it would take around 30 of these to keep the town going for a year and it only supports 100 houses and a public swimming pool, but there is huge quantities of similar waste created around the globe, and therefore is capable of doing far more than one would think.

Simulations of the same idea, in Seoul have suggested at up to 39% savings. It is thought, that as the deployment of solar increases, there will be huge amounts of excess power to be pumped into things like this. Some countries have wonderful quantities of excess electricity in the summer, and while we need to ramp up the quantity of solar wild and other zero carbon electricity, this gives us a route to a zero carbon world.

UK scientists created the worlds first diamond battery, capable of giving power for thousands of years. It is made from synthetic diamonds, which contain a radioactive element called carbon 14. The battery makes electricity from this radiation, much in the way that solar panels work. This battery would still be at 50% power after 5000 years. From devices that need powering in your body, to deep in the sea or in space.

At the end of their lives, these batteries can go back to the manufacturers to be recycled. There is much work being done on this, not least looking at other radioactive elements, to increase the power output.

Carbon nanotubes store triple the energy of lithium batteries. New research shows that twisted nanotubes can store high densities of energy – triple that of lithium weight for weight. It is thought that these could power things like medical implants. Of course, this is great, though only adds to the potential long list of things that nanotubes can do if we can learn to reliably create them in the future. In bigger sizes, it is calculated that these carbon nanotubes can store 15,000 times more per unit mass, than steel springs.

These are both areas which I write on, regularly, so check back for more news. I should also note, that these roundup articles should allow a return to focusing on wildlife rather than clean tech soon.

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