Today is World Animal Day, and the state of animals on our planet is not good. Only 7,000 cheetahs are left in the wild. There is only ONE male Northern White Rhino left on our planet. He is being guarded with armed guards. along with the two female Northern White Rhinos. The species depends upon his ability to mate with the females. Their horns have been removed so there is no point for poachers to kill them. Scientists say we are entering the sixth mass extinction of earth, but it is not a “natural” extinction event, it is caused by humans. What is really at stake here is the survival of humans on earth.
I do not understand why our species is so cruel to every other species! There is evidence now that the Black Rhino is “officially” extinct in the wild. Humans seem to think we are special, somehow “above” the other life on our planet. If things continue the way they are going, in the next 50 years we will have no reefs, no apex predators in the ocean so very few fish, no rhinos, no sharks, and water rising everywhere. At that point will we wise up? I hope we wise up much sooner than that. Conservation means saving our own species…once we ruin all of the ecosystems that support life on this planet, we won’t last long, either. Today’s photographs are of animals headed toward extinction. Let’s not let it happen. Everyone….listen to Jane Goodall:
“If all of us would go through our lives thinking about the little choices we make each day as to what we buy, what we eat, what we wear – and how those choices might impact the environment, might impact child slave labor in other countries, might impact cruelty towards animals, we start making small changes… Billions of small changes around the world can lead to the kind of change we need if we care about future generations.” – Jane Goodall (http://www.animalplanet.com/tv-shows/jane-goodall/photos/jane-goodall-birthday/)
Please. Start small, but start!
We need to wake up to the danger we are in by putting these animals at risk, by stressing the planet and causing it to warm, to plastic trash everywhere….to cutting down rainforests, etc etc. Or we are lost.
I do totally agree that we need to do all we can to help preserve all of the animal varieties on the earth. Making decisions about where we throw our waste and what products we buy is totally within our power. I’m not sure I believe global warming has anything to do with humans, however. The earth has always gone through cyclical climate changes.
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Yes it has. But not like it has in the last 130 years, since industrialization. Take a look at the temperature charts, and every single year we are hitting new average temp highs. Storms are getting more and more intense, ice is melting. The ocean has warmed alarmingly…29% of the Great Barrier Reef DIED last year. It is as if the ocean has a long term fever, life cannot survive with a fever. I believe in science. Did you know that just this year they proved Einstein’s theory of gravitational waves? It took 80 years for the technology to mature to a point where it could be proved. The scientists won the Nobel Prize in Physics for it. The earth doesn’t have 80 years for us to catch on though. Obviously I feel strongly, and I have studied this for many years. I have seen with my own eyes the damage. If each one of us could just make small adjustments, whether or not they believe it is happening, it would do a great deal to turn it around. Thanks for commenting.
Excellent reminder to us all. Thank you for your post about extinction and our duty to these animals!
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Thank you.
Thank you for always educating and reminding us of the part we can play in either aiding our environment/planet or destroying it. I hope more folks pay attention to what you have to say. I always listen, and it helps me be a better resident of our planet. Keep the good work up.
Thank you so much!