Posts for the ‘species’ topic
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In the Field with Cybertracker
Back in October, we posted a story about a new technological tool called Cybertracker that is being used by indigenous San communities in southern Africa to track and monitor wildlife. Last week, Botswana’s largest daily newspaper published another story on the CI-funded project, providing new insight into the lives of the trackers as they deal with long treks, staggering temperatures and potentially dangerous animals on a daily basis. The life of a tracker is difficult, but its benefits outweigh the challenges. The Cybertracker project provides a rare employment opportunity for local people, encouraging them to continue the millennia-old cultural tradition of animal ... -
Nature’s Cures
[caption id="attachment_2490" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Rosy periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus) - Madagascar plant from which cancer cures are derived."][/caption] Across the globe, ecosystems, plants and animals are rapidly disappearing. As these wild lands, waters and species are destroyed, vast libraries of organic compounds potentially useful to medicine are also lost forever. Almost all survivors of cancer and other serious illnesses have natural compounds from rainforest plants and other wild species to thank for their recovery. As a member of the Alliance for Global Conservation, CI is dedicated to spreading the word about the immeasurable benefits that biodiversity provides for human health–for both today and ... -
Saving the Whales: In the Philippines, a Quick Response
Several years ago, CI conducted a seminar on marine mammal and sea turtle rescue training in the Philippines' Verde Island Passage. When a beached whale was found in the region this past December, Jessie de los Reyes, a graduate of the seminar, helped mobilize the community's response. Corina Bernabe, the communications coordinator for CI-Philippines, recounts the experience. Village patrolman Hernan Reyes was conducting a routine patrol along the shores of Nasugbu, in the Philippines’ Batangas province, when he met with an unusual sight: a 29-foot whale stranded in the shallow waters. It was 3 AM. A series of phone calls ... -
In the News: Will Dolphins Help Us Cure Disease?
We often hear about new medicines being discovered in inconspicuous frogs, plants or deep-sea mollusks, but here comes a story that shows that even big creatures that have been right under our noses for ages can still hold interesting (and useful) surprises. In a recent BBC News article, scientists found that bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus)—the back-flipping, front row-splashing, always-smirking denizen of many aquariums around the world—may hold potential insights to finding cures for type 2 diabetes which affects millions of people worldwide. Now think about this for a minute: dolphins are big and photogenic and pretty well-studied, yet we’ve only just discovered ... -
New Publication Highlights World’s Most Threatened Primates
[caption id="attachment_2413" align="aligncenter" width="598" caption="Russ Mittermeier with lemur at publication launch event"][/caption] I remember when I was living in Tanzania in 2008, I stopped by the Wildlife Conservation Society office in Mbeya to learn more about their programs. I was surprised to hear that an entirely new species of monkey (the kipunji—Rungwecebus kipunji) had been discovered in the nearby Southern Highlands only five years before. At the time of my visit, the researchers were just beginning to familiarize the animals with their presence. [caption id="attachment_2435" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="kipunji"][/caption] But despite the kipunji’s remote habitat and how little we know about them, the ... -
Through the Magnifying Glass
[caption id="attachment_2262" align="aligncenter" width="600" caption="© CI/Piotr Naskrecki"][/caption] As the saying goes, it’s the little things in life that really matter. Literally. I’m talking about the millions of tiny creatures that go unnoticed each day by most of us. Dr. E.O. Wilson and David Liittschwager’s recent article in the February issue of National Geographic Magazine, “Within One Cubic Foot,” really brings these creatures to life for us. The close-up photos of hundreds of colorful and spectacular species bring this microscopic world to our eyes. In just one cubic foot, Liittschwager documented an incredible array of biodiversity: more than 600 individual organisms in a coral ... -
Hiroshima, the Cold War, and the Giant Salamander of Hope
[caption id="attachment_2191" align="alignright" width="250" caption="Rob McNeil and a giant Japanese salamander"][/caption] Last week I was in Japan looking for giant salamanders (Andrias japonicus), and for two days I stayed in the charming and bustling city of Hiroshima. Visiting Hiroshima for the first time is a peculiar experience. As a 36 year-old who grew up in fear of nuclear Armageddon during the 1980s, the word Hiroshima evoked two frightening images for me: a mushroom cloud and the shattered dome of the one building that still stood after the attack. The human horrors that those images captured were so frightening that I experienced them ... -
Pollinators in Peril
As the global extinction crisis continues, we are constantly discovering new ways in which the world’s many species interact with our own lives, even if we don’t realize it. The loss of one species can have consequences far beyond the simple absence of one kind of ant or frog. Case in point: the global decline of wild pollinators—bees, butterflies, and other insects. Survival of wild, native insect pollinators is not just a matter of concern for insect lovers like me; it’s also an issue for food production worldwide. Pollinators are in decline for a wide variety of causes, including loss of ... -
Support for Species
The most recent version of the IUCN Red List (published in November 2009) revealed that species extinction continues at a dangerous rate. More than 17,000 species—36 percent of the total of number of species assessed—are currently threatened with extinction, a startling number which underscores the need for immediate action. This week in Paris, the United Nations is holding one of several celebrations and conferences to launch the International Year of Biodiversity, drawing attention to the escalating plight of the world’s species as countries prepare for the Convention on Biological Diversity’s October meeting in Nagoya, Japan—a meeting which will set new ... -
Stopping Extinctions: Immediate Targets and Expanded Partnerships
As the climax of the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity, the world's governments* will meet in Nagoya, Japan, in October, to agree on a global biodiversity target. What might this target look like? Writing in the prestigious scientific journal "Nature" this week the President of IUCN, Dr Ashok Khosla, and the Director-General of IUCN, Julia Marton-Lefèvre, argue that the target must be an ambitious one. Khosla and Marton-Lefèvre propose that in the short-term, the world's governments must bring a stop to the loss of biodiversity – "in particular, by setting an intermediate target to prevent further extinctions", because extinctions are irreversible – once ...
