[LauraMJ]

jaye944, I've removed your last two posts, lets try not to deliberately pick a fight, 'kay?

[poochee]

Climate Change Brings Risk of More Extinctions

By David A. Fahrenthold
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, September 17, 2007; Page A07

BLACKWATER NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE, Md. -- Third in a monthly series

What has gone missing here is almost as spectacular as the 8,000 acres of swampy wilderness that remain. And that makes it Chesapeake Bay's best place to watch climate change in action.

Visitors can see ospreys gliding overhead, egrets wading in the channels and Delmarva fox squirrels making their unhurried commutes between pine trees.

But then the road turns a corner, and Blackwater's marsh yields to a vast expanse of open water. This is what's missing: There used to be thousands more acres of wetland here, providing crucial habitat for creatures including blue crabs and blue herons. But, thanks in part to rising sea levels, it has drowned and become a large, salty lake. "If people want to see the effects" of Earth's increasing temperature, refuge biologist Roger Stone said, "it's happening here first."

But not just here. Around the world, scientists have found that climate change is altering natural ecosystems, making profound changes in the ways that animals live, migrate, eat and grow. Some species have benefited from the shift. Others have been left disastrously out of sync with their food supply. Two are known to have simply disappeared.

If warming continues as predicted, scientists say, 20 percent or more of the planet's plant and animal species could be at increased risk of extinction. But, as the shrinking habitat at Blackwater shows, the bad news isn't all in the out years: Some changes have already begun. "This is actually something we see from pole to pole, and from sea level to the highest mountains in the world," said Lara Hansen, chief climate change scientist at the World Wildlife Fund, a private research and advocacy group. "It is not something we're going to see in the future. It's something we see right now."

Excerpt from: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews

[poochee]

updated 9:01 a.m. EDT, Sun September 23, 2007
Federal report shows declining loggerhead turtle populationsStory

HighlightsU.S. nestings have dropped almost 7 percent in the Gulf of Mexico in recent years
Report: Marked decrease from the number of loggerheads found in the 1990s
Expanding commercial fishing operations are to blame, some researchers say
Advocates say federal agencies have responded slowly to decline

WASHINGTON (AP) -- After encouraging gains in the 1990s, populations of loggerhead sea turtles are now dropping, primarily because of commercial fishing, according to a federal review.

The report stops short of recommending upgrading the federally threatened species to "endangered" status. But scientists and environmentalists say it should serve as a wake-up call about the future of loggerheads, which can grow to more than 300 pounds and are believed to be one of the oldest species.

"We are very concerned," said Mark Dodd, a wildlife biologist for the state of Georgia. In 2006, the state counted the third lowest loggerhead nesting total since daily monitoring began in 1989.

"As a biologist you're always trying to find that point at which we really have to start doing something drastic if we want to maintain loggerhead populations on our beaches."

The state is not there yet, he said, but it has increased protections for the turtle under its own endangered species law.

The Southeast -- Florida in particular -- is one of the two largest loggerhead nesting areas in the world; eggs are laid and hatched along beaches from Texas to North Carolina. The other major nesting area is in the Middle Eastern nation of Oman.

According to the federal report, U.S. nestings have dropped almost 7 percent annually in the Gulf of Mexico in recent years. Numbers in south Florida are down about 4 percent annually, while populations in the Carolinas and Georgia have dropped about 2 percent per year.

Excerpt from:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science....ap/index.html

[ekim68]

Sushi craze threatens Mediterranean's giant tuna

BARBATE, Spain (Reuters) - Fishermen like Diego Crespo have trapped the giant tuna swarming into the warm Mediterranean for over 3,000 years, but he says this year may be one of his last.

Japanese demand for its fatty flesh to make sushi has sparked a fishing frenzy for the Atlantic bluefin tuna -- a torpedo-shaped brute weighing up to half a tonne that can accelerate faster than a Porsche 911.

Now a system of corralling the fish into "tuna ranches" has combined with a growing tuna fishing fleet to bring stocks dangerously close to collapse, warn scientists from ICCAT -- the body established by bluefin fishing countries to monitor the stock.

http://www.reuters.com/article/scien...42343020071001

[poochee]

India's tigers need miracle to survive
Sun Sep 30, 2007 10:58pm EDT
By Nita Bhalla

NEW DELHI (Reuters) - India's dwindling tiger population will never recover and it will take a miracle to save those left from habitat destruction and poaching, a renowned expert said on Wednesday.

Failure by authorities to understand the needs of tigers and provide protection has led to numbers falling to 1,300 now from around 3,700 in 2001/02, Valmik Thapar told Reuters ahead of the Reuters Environment Summit next week.

"I believe that the government of the day failed the tigers of India and we cannot recover this population ever again," said Thapar, who has spent the past three decades documenting the behavior of tigers and crusading for their survival.

"A miracle is required to save the Indian tiger. But I don't believe in miracles, as the commitment to save tigers is non-existent."

India has half the world's surviving tigers, but their populations have suffered, driven by a demand for tiger skins and bones in China for traditional medicines.

"What is happening now is a great tragedy," he said. "No one understands the needs of tigers. Committees set up to look after tigers are filled with people who know nothing about the tiger."

Thapar, 55, has written 15 books about tigers and presented around 20 documentaries for broadcasters and channels such as the BBC, National Geographic, Discovery and Animal Planet.

His close relationship over six or seven years with a tigress called "Macchli" -- meaning fish in Hindi due to a fish-like marking on her cheek -- is widely documented in his films.

Excerpt from: http://www.reuters.com/article/Globa...25820720071001

[lotuseclat79]

The 10 Rarest Animals in the World
Article here with pics.

-- Tom

[ekim68]

Why Are Huge Numbers Of Camels Dying In Africa And Saudi Arabia?

Science Daily — More than 2000 dromedaries -- Arabian camels -- have died since August 10 in Saudi Arabia. Various theories have been put forward to explain the numerous deaths. For several years, the Sahel and the Horn of Africa have also seen similar numbers of deaths. In 1995-1996, CIRAD worked on a fatal epizootic disease affecting dromedaries in Ethiopia.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1009083359.htm

[poochee]

Originally Posted by ekim68

Why Are Huge Numbers Of Camels Dying In Africa And Saudi Arabia?

Science Daily — More than 2000 dromedaries -- Arabian camels -- have died since August 10 in Saudi Arabia. Various theories have been put forward to explain the numerous deaths. For several years, the Sahel and the Horn of Africa have also seen similar numbers of deaths. In 1995-1996, CIRAD worked on a fatal epizootic disease affecting dromedaries in Ethiopia.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1009083359.htm

[poochee]

Poaching and Population Threaten India's Tigers
Development, New Law on Tribal Rights Add to Pressure

By Emily Wax
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, October 16, 2007; Page A12

PHALODI QUARRY, India -- With homemade muskets, Lakhan and his brothers tracked one of India's endangered Bengal tigers as it slunk along the forested trails and lakes of Ranthambhore National Park, not far from Lakhan's village. Then, under cover of night, one of them fired a bullet into the chest of the howling cat.

"Hunger," said the wiry Lakhan, pointing to his concave stomach, which was covered by a white lungi, or skirt-like wrap. "That's why I did it. That scenario hasn't changed much. My heart pounds when we kill a tiger. But we have pressures."

Excerpt from: www.washingtonpost.com

[poochee]

A petition you may be interested in.

Protect Polar Bears from Extinction!

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takea...?z00m=10587714

[lotuseclat79]

Fossil record supports evidence of impending mass extinction
Article here.

Global temperatures predicted for the coming centuries may trigger a new ‘mass extinction event’, where over 50 per cent of animal and plant species would be wiped out, warn scientists at the Universities of York and Leeds.

-- Tom

[poochee]

Originally Posted by lotuseclat79

Fossil record supports evidence of impending mass extinction
Article here.

Global temperatures predicted for the coming centuries may trigger a new ‘mass extinction event’, where over 50 per cent of animal and plant species would be wiped out, warn scientists at the Universities of York and Leeds.

-- Tom

[ekim68]

Good article Tom...Did you ever watch the movie, "When Worlds Collide"? Just a late night analogy...

[lotuseclat79]

Hi ekim68,

Not sure whether I watched it or not. Was it Sci-Fi? Then maybe. Analolgies are the tapestries of methphors!

-- Tom

[ekim68]

Actually I agree, 'analogies are the tapestries of metaphors'...

But, it was a movie about what to do in case another planet collided with earth..
There was only so much time, and the only technology, and so, the choice of who should go.
A neat story..