Ulu Masen forest, Aceh, Indonesia photo credit:Abbie Trayler-Smith CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
The Leuser ecosystem is one of the most biodiverse in the world, and is the only place where tiger orangutans elephants and rhino can all be found in the same place (and this ignores various special species such as bears and gibbons among many others, which still call this ecosystem home).
This deforestation, carried out to create palm oil plantations, is even occurring within a national park – somewhere where the rules means that a plantation cannot be given a licence. 2 new palm oil processing mills have sprung up near the deforesting concessions: keeping these supplied may well, now be driving further deforestation. Below is a 219 second documentary on this fascinating ecosystem.
The quiet bays in the Melanesian archipelago are perfect for the sea grass meadows, which in turn means that it is fantastic for dugongs – animals also known as sea cows. Just a few years ago, these animals were a regular sight. Growing up to 4m long and 400kg, just a few years ago, it would not be an unusual day when you would see one of these animals in both the morning and afternoon. Now they are rarely seen.
Officially, they are only classed as vulnerable (one of the lowest forms of endangered), but given how long it has been, it is unclear how the population is doing. However, unfortunately, given fishermen (and other people on the wate), are encountering them so rarely, it is likely to have got worse. Dogongs in this area behave differently to Australia where they have huge seagrass meadows, so this full survey is certainly required.
It would be another area, where a growth in the ecotourism industry (ethical – not damaging the animals or stressing them) could be fantastic. Many surveys done on sea mammals, take on tourists to reduce their cost. Personally, I will always look for a research boat, as they want to be there, and will not go out if there is no chance of sightings.
The next-door population of New Caledonia was recently downgraded to endagered, and the east African population is classed as critically endangered.
Globally, the threats to these animals include gill-net fishing, boat traffic, coastal development and even hunting. Unfortunately, climate change is also a threat – rainstorms are becoming far more common, and these are damaging the seagrass, alongside cyclones.
Currently, it is estimated that the world looses 7% of its seagrass meadows each year. This should be concerning, as sea grass has a roughly equal ability to draw down carbon dioxide to land rainforests – so the more we loose the harder it will become to halt global warming. It should also be noted, seagrasses grow more healthily with dugongs present – help keep seagrass beds healthy by grazing on them, which controls their growth and disperses their seeds. This process is called “cultivation grazing”. The benefits on seagrasses include growth control (rapid growth can be bad for the long-term survival of the seagrass), disperse seeds (often with some ‘fertilizer’, which can help the seeds grow particularly well- and like various plants and elephants, seeds that have gone through a dugongs digestive tract is more likely to grow than those that do not), Improve genetic diversity (dugongs move between areas of the meadow, and take seeds with them) and help recovery after cyclones (by connecting areas of the meadow, reseeding meadows in danger from elsewhere where they are doing alright).
Unfortunately, this makes the dugong a keystone species – therefore, its loss would have a very negative impact on the whole ecosystem. Other species that rely on seagrass including sea turtles, manatees, a wide array of fish, many sharks are born in the seagrass, including lemon sharks nurse sharks, and bull sharks. A wide array of birds are similarly reliant.
I have talked about about wolf hunts in Sweden in the past. They recently reduced the required minimum population from 300 wolves down to 170 – given that the 300 was worked out scientifically (and most people believe that this population is way too small anyway).
The current population is 374, with a target kill this year of 30. The intention is to kill 5 families. However, this number of wolves is certainly not good. Sweden is a country of similar size to France, and much of the country is wild so a far larger population would be capable of not impacting humans.
Campaigners are claiming that this is illegal (and it is hard to argue them) as the Berne convention states that protected species cannot be caused to have their population fall below sustainable numbers – 170 is well below this level, and indeed 300 is likely only healthy long-term, because of wolves crossing over the border from Russia.
I have been lucky enough to see 2 Swedish wolves, one from a bear hide, and the other while watching a group of Elk. Well structured, the wolves in Sweden could be a huge positive for the country, particularly tourism and one would think would be important as Sweden has positioned itself as an ecotourism hotspot.
Without a change, they will destroy this early market which is good for the country.
Wildcats are native to the UK, but have been pushed to the brink of extinction by hybridisation with native cats – which come from the wildcats from places like Israel in the middle east. As a result of this, as well as trying to remove the feral domestic cats, and their descendants, they are trying to create pockets of Scotland, which would allow these cats to recover.
The natural behaviour of a British wildcat when meeting a feral cat, is to kill it. However, as these animals become rarer, even rare breeding events, can threaten the survival of the whole species. This behaviour also means that with careful planning, we should be able to reintroduce them into other parts of the country. There are a range of other wild predators lost over the last couple of millennia – and I hope to see the others return, but it is thrilling to know that a wildcat is once again living and breeding in its native habitat of the Scottish mountains.
These wildcats are thought to be the first born wild in Scotland for 5 years, after 19 wildcats bred in the Highland wildlife park, were released into the Cairngorms national park.
A small herd of 170 bison, released into a 20 square miles area of Tarcu mountains in Romania, are estimated to allow the land to capture 59,000 tones of carbon each year.
Big animals like this, stimulate the soil and plant growth, allowing the soil and plant growth to take up far more carbon than without them. Although Romania is one of the wildest countries in Europe, the European Bison was lost around 200 years ago. Between 2014 and 2021, 100 bison were reintroduced into the area, and that population has naturally grown such that there are now 170.
Scientists estimate that the lands carbon storing potential is as much as 10 times greater with the bison (they suggest that it is between 5 and 15 times more carbon.
Large parts of Australia look like the above photo, beautiful in a rugged way, but quite useless for the survival of many of Australia species. Australia has a wide range of habitats, which means that there are many areas which need to be protected.
The problem is, according to this study, declaring an area protected appears to be having little change on what is happened.
1/3 of all land that is set aside for restoration and conservation, has got worse rather than better. Given the fact that so many species are just hanging on to existence, this could be very bad news.
In one area that was studied, the majority of the area was cleared paddock – a serious problem for the koala and grey-headed flying fox which called the area home.
In particular, the idea of this scheme is so called biodiversity offsetting – if you are to clear wildlife habitat, you protect a similar sized area elsewhere.
There has been much discussion about the history of elephants in Borneo, and whether their loss is a problem
The origin of elephants in Borneo is unknown. Known for hosting the smallest elephants in the world, there are 2 theories as to how the elephants got to the island. The first is that they were released by a ruler in the 17th century (The most rapid population growth ever seen was 7,1% after the end of poaching in a reserve in Tanzania, a population of 30 elephants could become 1000 in just 50 years) – if this was the case, then their loss would not be bad; and the second is that actually the elephants arrived on the islands hundreds of thousands of years ago (as high as 300,000 years).
It is increasingly agreed that the second one of these ideas is likely to be correct. Though having said this, genetic analysis suggests that the whole population started with just 28 elephants.
Just 1000 are found on the island at the current time.
All wildlife on Borneo is at threat, as the palm oil industry continues to demand increasing quantities of prime rainforest be cut down. As this happens, elephants are forced into human areas, in their search for food, and then into conflict.
The Borneo elephant has only recently been assessed by the IUCN red list as a separate subspecies, but it is hoped that this recognition might increase tourism on this species as well as conservation dollars to save this species from its slow slide towards extincion
It is hard to believe that habitats like this could possible have previously held rainforest which produces enough soft fruit for monkeys like this. Just 10,000 years ago crops were a new thing, in the same way that cows and other livestock farming. Before this, we had to hunt for virtually everything.
The reason that they can work out what monkeys ate, is because they have seen the teeth, and they were not chipped at all, as a result of soft diet. There are thought to have been roughly 5 species of this small monkey family living at the time (30 million years ago). This is new, as formerly it was thought that early primates ate some fruit but also harder foods – clearly they specialized in fruit earlier than we thought.
Wentworth Group of concerned Scientists estimate that for just $7.3 billion a year for 30 years, most extinctions could be avoided as well as repairing soil and restoring rivers. That sounds like quite a lot? Well, invasive species cost the Australian government $24.3 billion a year now.
Recovery of some of the endangered species, could well save more than they cost to save, in reducing this invasive species bill. This would also improve agricultural output, as a result of improved soil health.
The Siamese crocodile is recovering in Cambodia, with 60 hatched babies this year – more than at any time this century. Five nests were found by locals at the end of June with the eggs that resulted in these crocodilians. Thought extinct, until being rediscovered in Cambodia they have made an impressive recovery since 2012 when the project started, with 196 of this species returned to the wild in the last dozen years.
Local community wardens regularly cross the mountainous area, to check on them. In recent times, they have been observed in new territory, suggesting that their population is growing again naturally.
