Rhino poachers sink to new lows

I came across another disturbing news article on Wildlife South Africa's website about Rhino poaching. Again in Johannesburg, Poachers have resorted to using poison to kill the Rhinos located on the game farm in Mookgophong. The Wildlife Ranching SA Operating Manager, Reinhardt Holtzhausen, found 14 cabbage halves sprinkled with either Curaterr or Albicarap. Three out of the five species of Rhino are listed as critically endangered, and not only do all these wildlife conservation groups and efforts have to worry about barely traceable amounts of poison being put on everything that the Rhino would eat but the also have to worry about other animals that could potentially eat them. Entires ecosystems could crash if the introduction of poison into them, even if these poachers only care about the Rhino. Something has to be done to stop this from not only stop this from happening in game parks but also in the wild.

http://www.wildlifesouthafrica.com/wildlife-news-articles.php

How to control Brown Tree Snake populations - Poison filled mice

I came across this article on National Geographic's website and it is about an attempt to control populations of the invasive Brown Tree Snake in Guam. The purpose of this experiment was to control/eradicate populations of the Brown Tree Snake in the U.S. Pacific territory. This invasive species from Australia has been the cause of the extinction or severe depletion of the islands native species. The experimental program  consist of air dropping about 200 dead mice in the jungle canopy. These mice are filled with 80 mg of Acetominophin, though harmless to us, will disrupt the oxygen-carrying ability of the snake's hemoglobin blood proteins. The snake will slowly be induced into a coma and then dies, but it takes nearly 60 hours for the snake to die.

My first reaction was how could they drop all of these poisonous mice into the jungle and not expect other species of snake or any animal for that matter not to eat them as well. They said that the Brown Tree Snake is the only snake species in the Guam jungle that is a scavenger and will eat something that it did not kill. I still feel that there is a possibility that other animals could eat the mice and maybe not die, but have detrimental side effects. I also find it somewhat disturbing that these snakes have to slither around half alive for upwards of two and a half days before they die. This is the second attempt at eradicating these snakes by the USDA and is only one of few different strategies such as snake traps, snake detecting dogs and nighttime spotlight searches. I guess if the attempts have been made in the past then they obviously have researched it and know that the Brown Tree Snake will be the only snake species that will eat the dead mice. I am curious if there would be any objections from wildlife conservation groups or if there are any wildlife policies that would protect the Brown Tree Snake from these attempts at eradication.

Here is the link to the article
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/09/100924-science-animals-guam-brown-tree-snakes-mouse-tylenol/

Rhino Poaching: An Ongoing nightmare

Hello Everybody..
Iam back with some pretty heavy wildlife news, well its not really news because its been happening at an alarming rate for sometime now. The poaching of Rhinos has seen a surge recently and over 210 wild Rhinos have been illegally taken in 2010 alone, and most simply for their horns.

I discovered an article thats part of a constant news thread about the poaching of Rhinos in South Africa on Wildlife South Africa's website. This latest article was about the capture of two veterinarians in Johannesburg, who have been involved in the poaching of Rhinos for their horns. The arrest were made by the combined efforts of the Civil Aviation Authority, SANParks and The Department of Nature Conservation and The National Prosecuting Authority. The Endangered Wildlife Trust was extremely overjoyed to hear that their capture means a couple Rhinos will be spared but unfortunately poaching doesnt seem like its going to end anytime soon. Check back for more updates on the situation.

http://www.wildlifesouthafrica.com/wildlife-news-articles.php

Mass Goose Kill

I came across this article from The New York Times online, and I was kinda perturbed after reading about a mass goose kill in Prospect Park of Brooklyn, New York. Resident's discovered that the wildlife authorities had rounded up the 400 resident geese and lethally gassed them. The most horrible fact about this is that they cant even get their story straight. One reason could possibly have some validity and that is they killed the geese that live within 7 miles of the La Guardia and Kennedy airports. Apparently they have been slowly killing off geese since 2009, when some geese caused Flight 1549 to emergency land in the Hudson River. The other reason is that they were scaring away potential property owners near the park. The residents and some wildlife activists expressed their thoughts and concerns but no action followed. I wonder what wildlife policies(ie. migratory bird act) could have protected the birds from this unfair fate?

Here is the article
http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/08/17/where-geese-were-thinned-their-population-thickens/?scp=5&sq=wildlife&st=cse

Michael McCarthy and Biodiversity

The name of the class is Wildlife Policy and the game is how these policies can be used to protect and keep wildlife safe from extinction. I found an article on a website called The Independent Commentators and it was about this guy and his explanation of how the term "Biodiversity" is used in the context of Conservation.
He says that biodiversity is a word that most people dont understand and because of this, efforts to promote conservation of different species (whether it'd be plant, animal or other) are often times overlooked or disregarded by the general public. It is a fancy word for wildlife but in a new scientific journal called "Conservation Biology: Challenges Beyond 2010" states that biodiversity is "the variety of genes, species and ecosystems that constitute life on earth". He mentions wildlife policy in his definition of biodiversity, "it is the currency in use in the policy making debate about the future of the natural world"
The Policy Making Debate that has led to 133,000 sites around the globe that have an conservation plan in effect and also the global conservation treaty, The 1992 Convention On Biodiversity.
The strongest point in the article was that he feels that biodiversity needs to be incorporated into all political, social and economic decision making, and I totally agree with his views. The remainder of the article talks about his personal experiences with how some countries overlook biodiversity. I wonder what your thoughts are on ways to bring biodiversity into all aspects of policy making?

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/michael-mccarthy-its-time-i-embraced-the-word-biodiversity-2075220.html