Conservation News: Elephants, Cheetahs, and Birds

China Announces the Details To Ban the Ivory Trade by the End of 2017

Earlier this month, China stated that they will finally implement plans to ban the ivory trade. State media reported last Friday that China will ban all domestic ivory trade and processing by the end of 2017, setting a deadline. Thereby, shutting the door to the world’s biggest end-market for poached ivory.

“China will gradually stop the processing and sales of ivories for commercial purposes by the end of 2017,” the official Xinhua news agency said, citing a government statement, and will affect “34 processing enterprises and 143 designated trading venues.” The State Council also mentioned that the first batch of factories and shops will need to close and hand in their licenses by March 31, 2017.

Photograph: AFP/Getty Images

People with ivory products previously obtained through legal means can apply for certification and continue to display them in exhibitions and museums, the government announcement said. The auction of legally obtained ivory antiques, under “strict supervision”, will also be allowed after obtaining authorisation. It also mentioned that the government will also crack down on law enforcement and boost education.

China’s announcement follows Beijing’s move in March to widen a ban on imports of all ivory and ivory products acquired before 1975 after pressure to restrict the trade, which more than 20,00 elephants are killed annually for.

Conservation groups applauded the ban, with WildAid’s wildlife campaigner Alex Hofford calling it “the biggest and best conservation news of 2016”.

And Aili Kang, executive director of the Wildlife Conservation Society in Asia, praised the announced in a statement. “This is great news that will shut down the world’s largest market for elephant ivory. “I am very proud of my country for showing this leadership that will help ensure that elephants have a fighting chance to beat extinction. This is a game changer for Africa’s elephants.”

WWF Hong Kong’s Senior Wildlife Crime Officer Cheryl Lo said the bold timeline “shows determination to help save Africa’s elephants from extinction”.

But he also calls on Hong Kong to bring forward a plan to end its ivory trade by 2021. “With China’s market closed, Hong Kong can become a preferred market for traffickers to launder illegal ivory under cover of the legal ivory trade,” he explains.

China to Ban Domestic Ivory Trade by End of 2017

China to ban ivory trade by the end of 2017

Cheetahs No Longer Safe, Latest Census Suggests Possible Extinction

A cheetah family rests together in Masai Mara National Reserve in Kenya. Photo By: Frans Lanting

The world’s fastest land mammal is racing toward extinction, with the latest cheetah census suggesting that the big cats, which are already few in number, may decline by an additional 53% over the next 15 years.

“That’s really perilous,” says Luke Hunter, president and CCO for Panthera, the global wild cat conservation organization. “That’s a very active decline, and you have to really step in and act to address that.”

According to a new study, which appeared this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, there are just 7,100 cheetahs left in the wild. That’s down from the estimated 14,000 cheetahs in 1975, when researchers made the last comprehensive count of the animals across the African continent, Hunter says.

In addition, the cheetah has been driven out of 91 percent of its historic range—the big cats once roamed nearly all of Africa and much of Asia, when the global population numbered over 100,000. Since 1900, the feline has gone extinct in more than 20 countries and their population is now confined predominantly to six African countries: Angola, Namibia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, South Africa, and Mozambique. The species is already almost extinct in Asia, with fewer than 50 individuals remaining in one isolated pocket of Iran.

“Given the secretive nature of this elusive cat, it has been difficult to gather hard information on the species, leading to its plight being overlooked,’ said Sarah Durant, the report’s lead author and researcher at the Zoological Society of London and the Wildlife Conservation Society says in the press release.

“Our findings show that the large space requirements for the cheetah, coupled with the complex range of threats faced by the species in the wild, mean that it is likely to be much more vulnerable to extinction than was previously thought. Governments are often required to monitor their wildlife inside protected areas, but not outside them,” Durant continues. “And monitoring is harder to do outside, because cheetah are shy and their densities are lower. We have no data.”

An Asiatic cheetah crosses the Miandasht Wildlife Reserve in Iran. Photo By: Frans Lanting

Based on these results, the study authors and the organizations supporting the study – Zoological Society of London, Panthera, and Wildlife Conservation Society – are calling for the cheetah’s status to be upgraded from “vulnerable” to “endangered” on the IUCN Red List.

“These large carnivores, when they are declining at that sort of rate, then extinction becomes a real possibility,” Hunter comments.

Perhaps unsurprising, humans are the man reason that cheetahs are in peril. Like other carnivores, cheetahs face habitat loss driven by conversion of wilderness areas into managed land dedicated to agriculture or livestock. In addition, illegal poaching and the trafficking of cheetahs as exotic pets as well as humans overhunting their prey for bushmeat have all driven the cheetahs out of 91% of their historic range across Africa and Asia.

“Cheetahs are facing a double whammy: They are getting killed directly, and then also their prey species are getting killed in these savannah areas, so the cheetahs having nothing to subsist on,” Hunter argues.

Furthermore, according to the study, 77% of cheetahs live outside of non-protected areas, which are more vulnerable to human threats. This is due to the animals need to have room to roam; individual cheetahs can have a range as large as Manhattan. Because many live in non-protected areas, they often come into conflict with humans and their livestock, which will lead to retaliation and hunting of cheetahs.

“We can’t have any more cheetahs in [current] protected areas … the density is already the maximum it can be,” Durant says. “The key to the survival of the cheetah is its survival outside of protected areas.”

A cheetah and two cubs gaze across the landscape in Kenya. Photo By: Frans Lanting

Hunter adds that it is likely too late to grow and protect the species in areas like West or Central Africa, where these big cats have long been on the decline. But, there is enormous potential for the population to rebound quickly in other areas. With a new conservation status, the cheetahs would have a platform for conservation groups to try and reverse the trends affecting cheetahs. For instance, such a change can create openings for funding streams that are available only to endangered species, and they might allow for conversations with African governments about cheetah conservation programs.

“What we are really hoping,” Durant says, “is this will catalyze action to start thinking outside the box for cheetah and landscape conservation, to start looking beyond the protected-area system and looking at how we can get communities engaged in and supportive of conservation, and make sure we have the policy and financial policy framework in place so that they will benefit from conservation.”

Cheetahs Are Dangerously Close to Extinction

Cheetah Populations Plummet as They Race Toward Extinction

Cheetahs are dropping fast and are in danger of extinction

Research Reveals that Climate Change Might Be Driving Birds to Migrate Early

Migrating birds are responding to the effects of climate change by arriving at their breeding grounds earlier as global temperatures rise, research has found.

The University of Edinburgh study, which looked at hundreds of migratory species across five continents, found that birds are reaching their summer breeding grounds on average about one day earlier per degree of increasing global temperature. The researchers also examined records of migrating bird species dating back almost 300 years, drawing upon records from amateur enthusiasts and scientists, including notes from the 19th century American naturalist Henry David Thoreau.

The main reason that birds take flight is changing seasonal temperatures and food ability. So the time they reach their summer breeding grounds is significant. If the birds arrive at the wrong time, even by a few days, this may cause them to miss out on vital resources such as food and nesting places. This in turn will affect the timing of offspring hatching and their chances of survival.

It is the hope of the researchers that their study, published in the Journal of Animal Ecology and supported by the Natural Environment Research Council, would help scientists to better predict how different species will respond to environmental changes. Long-distance migrants, which are shown to be less responsive to rising temperatures, may suffer most as other birds gain advantage by arriving at breeding grounds ahead of them.

Climate change driving birds to migrate early, research reveals

STUDY – Temporal shifts and temperature sensitivity of avian spring migratory phenology: a phylogenetic meta-analysis

Conservation News: Giraffes, Elephants, and Mongooses

Giraffe’s “Silent Extinction” No Longer Going Unnoticed

Even the world’s most beloved animals cannot escape the threats that lead to extinction. Last week, IUCN declared the giraffe as “vulnerable to extinction.” The world’s tallest mammal is widespread across southern and eastern Africa, with smaller isolated subpopulations in west and central Africa has been moved from “least concern” due to its decline. From an approximate of 151,702 to 163,452 individuals in 1985 to 97,562 in 2015, that is an almost 40% decline for this iconic species.

Conservation News: Elephants, Pangolins, and Groupers

With Poaching at an All Time High, Elephants are Fleeing to the Last Stronghold in Africa

With ivory poachers hunting elephants in neighboring countries Namibia, Zambia, and Angola, these large pachyderms are fleeing in astounding numbers to Chobe National Park of Botswana where illegal hunting is mostly kept in check.

“Our elephants are essentially refugees,” says Michael Chase, founder of the Botswana-based conservation group Elephants Without Borders, which works to create transboundary corridors for elephants to travel safely between countries.

While it has become a safe haven, offering some protection, the Chobe is not the most welcoming stronghold. The Kalahari Desert’s dry ecosystem is not capable of supporting so many elephants, which each can eat up to 600 pounds of food daily. Chase describes the environment as a “seemingly endless terrain of desiccated trees and brush” with “only a few spots of green.” Forced to eat bark, some elephants have already died from blocked intestinal tracts. Water resources for the elephants are also scarce in the parched land. The animals settle for remote watering holes around the park, instinctively steering clear of rivers where the risk of poachers catching them off guard is likely.

“The irony of elephants seeking refuge in the Kalahari Desert, an environment not compatible to sustaining these numbers of elephants, is a tragedy,” Chase declared. “Unfortunately, this time of peace was not to last.”

Elephants in Botswana’s Chobe National Park race down a dry, dusty hill toward the Chobe River. The animals regularly cross the water to reach the richer vegetation of Namibia. Photo By: Christine Dell’Amore

Due to poaching and rapid development, African elephant numbers have plummeted by 30% in recent decades, according to the 2016 Great Elephant Census. Once ranging from the coastal plains of Cape Town to the foothills of Mount Kilimanjaro, the species has fallen from 1.3 million in the 1970s to about 352,000 today. Because of this sudden decrease, the International Union for Conservation of Nature listed the African elephant as vulnerable to extinction on the Red List. Approximately 130,000 of the survivors now live in Botswana as the biggest elephant population in any country.

But as elephants fleeing to Botswana, the poachers are following. Already 55 have been killed illegal in Chobe National Park in recent months, according to Chase.

“These animals are highly intelligent,” he says. “They know where they’re persecuted.”

George Wittemyer, scientific chair of the Kenya-based nonprofit Save the Elephants, and his colleagues have found that elephants can identify and navigate what ecologists call “a landscape of fear.” As in Botswana, Kenyan elephants can discern boundaries of protected areas such as Samburu National Reserve and Amboseli National Park without the aid of fences or other markers.

In a recent study, Wittemyer and his colleagues found that elephants living in a patchwork of protected and human-dominated land will shift their circadian rhythm to rest more during the day, which they’ve learned means fewer encounters with people. In such places, the animals will also choose less populated areas to rest, even if they are farther away from water. Then, under the cover of darkness, the elephants make a beeline for the water holes, quickly passing through places where people or poachers may lurk. However, in protected areas, elephants will switch this behavior and hang out at water holes all day.

“It’s been remarkable to see the way they will identify areas they see as safe and move rapidly through areas they don’t see as safe,” says Wittemyer.

The herbivores’ evasive skills are due in large part to their highly sophisticated spatial memory.

Satellite data from collared elephants in Namibia’s Etosha National Park show that the animals travel the fastest, most direct route possible to water holes, according to a 2015 study co-authored by Wittemyer. Their ability to take the most efficient path to water sources regardless of where they are starting from suggests that they maintain detailed, wide-ranging maps in their heads.

The elephants’ intelligence also includes their communication skills. Joyce Poole, cofounder of the conservation group ElephantVoices, has studied elephants in the wild for 41 years and has identified hundreds of posture and gestures that reveal the creatures capability to consciously make decisions and act on them. Experiments and studies have shown that elephants can distinguish different languages and discern one people group as more dangerous than another.

Wittemyer also adds that “elephants can smell chemical stress levels in other elephants’ dung and feces, which could communicate which areas are safe.”

“Elephants use their cognitive and sensory abilities to avoid poachers as well, but they aren’t always successful, especially when poachers use sophisticated equipment,” says Poole. “How do we protect these elephants and not end up with refugees running from one tiny safe haven to another? We’ve got to stop the demand for ivory.”

But, poaching shows no sign of stopping. Illegal killing for ivory is so intense that in ten years scientists expect to lose 50% of Africa’s remaining elephants, Chase says.

Even if anti-poaching and park management improved, in some cases, there’s not much left for the elephants to return to. Across much of Africa, ill-maintained parks have become overrun with domestic livestock that have denuded the land. And countries are expected to double in population by 2050, leaving less space for wildlife and fueling the growth of large-scale development, fragmenting suitable habitat.

There have been some victories worth celebrating. Uganda, Namibia, and Gabon have stable or recovering elephant populations. And in Botswana, ecotourism is the second largest foreign exchange earner. Which Chase describes as “reaping the rewards of successful conservation.”

Perhaps most importantly, “the world is listening to the plight of elephants,” he says, citing the growth of wildlife documentaries like Savage Kingdom as one example. “We’ve shocked people out of apathy and into action.”

Elephant Refugees Flee to Last Stronghold in Africa

Tragedy: Nowhere to Go, Elephants Seek Refuge at the Kalahari Desert

The Largest Ever Release of Rescued Pangolins Give Them a Second Shot

A pangolin waiting to be released. Photo By: Rachel Nuwer

On Monday, 46 pangolins rescued from traffickers were put back into the wild at a reserve on the Vietnam-Laos border, unidentified to preserve secrecy. But while it is worth celebrating, there is no guarantee that some, if not all, will fall victim again to poachers and end up back in the illegal wildlife trade in the wildlife.

“I feel very good about the release, but we know that no place is 100 percent safe from poachers,” says Thai Van Nguyen, founder and executive director of Save Vietnam’s Wildlife, the nonprofit organization that undertook the release. “That animals can wind up back in the trade is always a concern for us,” he said. “If pangolins are just trapped again, then it doesn’t mean anything if we rehabilitate and release them.”

Most of the pangolins Nguyen and his colleagues set free this week were discovered in September, packed in boxes of ice on the back of a truck in northern Vietnam. Of the 61 the police confiscated, 12 died from trauma and injuries and several are still recovering at Nguyen’s facility, the only rehab center in Vietnam capable of caring for those animals.

But they represent barely a drop in the total illegal trade. More than a million pangolins are estimated to have entered into the black market during the past decade, making the species the most trafficked mammal in the world.

In September, pangolins were given the highest level of global protection under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES), the body of nations that regulates the international wildlife trade. Vietnam’s legislation also strictly protects pangolins, yet the country remains a hub for both pangolin consumption and trafficking to China.

“We are aware of our roles and responsibility in controlling the illegal wildlife trade,” Dang Thi Ngoc Thinh, Vietnam’s vice president, said yesterday in Hanoi at the start of a two-day conference on illegal wildlife trade. The meeting, hosted by Vietnam’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, drew delegates from more than 40 countries, including Prince William from the U.K. “Without responsible actions to be put into practice right now, our future generations will no longer have the chance to see diverse wildlife,” she said.

A newly released pangolin clings to Thai Van Nguyen’s leg, possibly mistaking it for a tree trunk. Photo By: Rachel Nuwer 

Vietnam has long professed in words and writing its commitment to tackle wildlife crime, but action on the ground has lagged. According to case reviews from 2010 to 2016 conducted by the Hanoi-based nonprofit group Education for Nature-Vietnam (ENV), the country has yet to arrest or prosecute a single high-level wildlife criminal, despite widely available evidence indicating who these alleged traffickers are.

These shortcomings were heard at the public hearing in November held by the Wildlife Justice Commission, an NGO made up of criminal justice experts, which highlighted Vietnam’s failure to follow through on its commitments to crack down on the trade. The group’s year-long investigation, mainly conducted at Nhi Khe, a town near Hanoi, revealed significant amounts of illegal wildlife products for sale such as ivory and tiger products. According to the findings, corruption and lack of political will are the primary factors allowing this illegal commerce to continue.

Minimal action has followed. Vietnamese officials declined invitations to attend the hearing and instead a single Vietnamese observed attended.

“There have been declarations aplenty this year, but pledges must be backed by action on the ground,” says Olivia Swaak-Goldman, the commission’s executive director. “Do remember that while the Hanoi Illegal Wildlife Trade conference is taking place, just 20 kilometers away is Nhi Khe, one of the world’s worst wildlife-trafficking hubs.”

Pangolins Released Into Wild May Be Recaptured and Eaten

Scaling the Odds at Vietnam’s Pangolin Rehab

A Clash of Interests Over the Protection of the 800-Pound Groupers

Not all hold such a reverential view of the Atlantic goliath grouper. Fished to near extinction in its western north Atlantic habitat by 1990, U.S. states and the federal government banned catching the gigantic fish. Since then, the population has been making a comeback and scientists are celebrating.

However, some Florida fishermen have been frustrated, arguing that the groupers have been eating too many fish and stealing from them. Several videos online show the goliath grouper’s antics, which, includes a grouper dragging a fisherman and stealing his catch.

Via Lak-ai Blogspot

“There are a lot of spots we don’t go to anymore because you won’t catch anything,” says Brice Barr, a charter boat skipper and president of the Key West Charter Fishermen’s Association. “The goliaths will catch every single fish that you hook. They hear the sound of our boats and that’s the dinner bell. They know they are going to get fed.”

Barr and others also blame the groups for decimating fish stocks on the Florida reef, including snapper and smaller grouper species. “If you ask most fishermen, they say we need to get rid of the goliath. These top predators are becoming so protected, they are starting to prey more and more on the rest of the fish.”

But Chris Koenig, a retired University of Florida marine biologist who has studied goliaths for decades, fights back. “People make up all kinds of reasons why the fish must be destroyed. This is a native species. They were part of the natural environment. They have been here for millions of years, much longer than we have.” He and his wife refuted claims and clarified the groupers’ dining habits and biology with a paper online.

“We’ve been trying to knock down these arguments for years,” Koenig says. “People think because it is big, it has to eat a lot. But in the Gulf of Mexico, the snapper fishery has been below sustainable levels for 20 years.”

Nor is the grouper especially ferocious.

“The longest teeth in their mouth are an eighth of an inch. Sure, they are sharp, but you have to provoke them, and then, the worst they can do is give you a rash,” Koenig says. “Sharks, will take your hand off. Goliath suck their prey, they have such a weak bite.”

Instead, Koenig says the push to lift the ban on catching goliath grouper has more to do with sports. Among trophy fish caught in the Florida Keys historically, the goliath grouper has long held special distinction because of its large size. Growing up to eight feet, it stands taller than the catcher. Catching one is the ocean equivalent of hunting big game. Only sharks, which are rarely caught, are bigger.

© Walt Stearns

The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has conducted three population counts – in 2004, 2010, and 2015 – in the past in an effort to determine if the grouper has recovered enough to lift the fishing ban. Each time, the counts have not convinced the officials to repoen the goliath grouper fishery so far. And Amanda Nalley, the commission’s spokesperson adds that there are no plans currently to reconsider the status.

Dan DeMaria, a commercial diver who used to hunt goliaths when they were plentiful, now supports ecotourism, believing that the fish are worth more alive than dead. “One fish can be seen hundreds of times,” he says.

Koenig agrees. “Nowhere else in the world can you swim up to a fish that is the size of a small Volkswagen and pet it on the face and see about 30 of them around you,” he says. “That is a thrilling thing.”

But ecotourism can only help so much. Groupers are still being killed illegally and left to sink to the bottom to avoid being fined. Koenig suggests a plan for reopening the juvenile goliath grouper to fishing on a limited, sustainable basis which might better protect the goliath.

“If you come to some kind of compromise where the fishing group gets their piece of the pie and the diving group gets their piece of the pie, and we don’t see any changes in the population density, everybody’s happy.”

800-Pound Groupers Making a Comeback—But Not Everyone’s Happy

Conservation News: Bats, Hunting, and Elephants

Bats for the Future Fund to Slow the Spread of White-Nose Syndrome

Photo By: Anthony Delmundo

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS) and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (NFWF) announced the creation of the Bats for the Future Fund on October 27, 2016. It is a competitive grant program that will fund the development of treatments for white-nose syndrome (WNS) to promote the survival of bats in North America. USWF has pledged $1 million to seed the fund in hopes of fighting the disease that is decimating bat populations across the country.

Conservation News: Ivory Trade Ban and Lion Protections

Pro-Ivory Trade Botswana Change of Heart Led to the Failure to Revive the Trade

Botswana’s Okavango Delta has been a safe haven for herds of elephants. Photo By: Frans Lanting

During the CITES meeting, a heated debate sparked over the proposal to ban the trade, presented by 12 other African elephant range states and Sri Lanka, by listing all elephants under CITES’ Appendix I, which prohibits any and all trade in ivory and live animals. Namibia and Zimbabwe retaliated by proposing to keep their elephant populations under Appendix II, where the species are currently listed, and suggested to adopt a mechanism for a future trade in ivory.

It was at this time that Botswana, the country with the largest remaining number of wild elephants (130,000 according to the Great Elephant Census), announced its support behind the proposal to end trading elephant ivory for food. Which was a surprise because prior to its announcement, Botswana was a clear supporter for a sustainable ivory industry.

Conservation News: Orcas, Atlantic Monument, Ivory Trade

New California Law Bans Orca Breeding and Showings

In 2013, the documentary “Blackfish” casted SeaWorld in harsh light for raising captured young orcas in dark, cramped conditions. It also recounted the 2010 death of veteran SeaWorld trainer Dawn Brancheau by a killer whale named Tilikum. Since then, stock and attendance fell at the world’s largest marine park: SeaWorld.

Because of the public outcry, SeaWorld San Diego pledged in March to stop breeding its orcas and discontinuing their shows in 2017. Now, it’s the law.

Conservation News: Giant Clams, Elephants, Predator Control

Giant Clams Being Poached, South China Sea Being Destroyed

A volunteer rearranging young clams at the Bolinao marine laboratory in an effort to restock the species in the region. Photo By: Adam Dean

Biologist Ed Gomez at the University of Philippines Marine Science Institute received a call 25 years ago from a broker whose client wished to buy young giant clams his team were culturing. However, the Bureau of Fisheries does not allow the export of giant claims, and despite applying for permits, Gomez and his team were denied.

He had hoped to be able to figure out how to breed the clams in captivity so that the Filipino fishermen could supplement their income by growing it themselves rather than poaching it.

A couple of weeks later, the institute’s clams started disappearing by the hundreds within several weeks. “They were stolen,” Gomez says.

Conservation News: Lions, Elephants, and Otters

A Year After Cecil the Lion, Report Reveals Legal and Illegal Lion Bone Trade

Cecil (lying down) and Jericho (standing) Photo By: Brent Stapelkamp

Ever since the illegal killing of Cecil the lion, it sparked a global outcry against lion trophy hunting, bringing light to the dark practice. However, trophy hunting is not the only threat lions face. Over the past two decades, African lion populations have declined by at least 42%. The 20,000 or fewer lions remaining face pressures from poaching, bushmeat trade, habitat loss, and conflict with humans.

Conservation News: Ivory Trade and Bear Behavior

EU Joins in the Global Fight Against the Ivory Trade

European countries carry out a third of all ivory seizures worldwide Photo By: L. Vigne

After the recent events of several countries like Kenya and the United States taking action against the ivory trade and market, some conservationists argue that the European Union (EU) has been “dragging its feet”.

“The global shift against the trade is evident, and the EU’s failure to put its own house in order will place it in an increasingly isolated position,” says Sally Case of the David Shepherd Wildlife Foundation.

Conservation News: Kenya Against Ivory Trade

Kenya’s Fight Against the Ivory Trade

Today, on April 30, the government of Kenya burned 105 tons of seized elephant ivory and 1.35 tons of rhino horns, the biggest ever burning of wildlife contraband. Government officials have been assembling the ivory from an estimate of 6,000 to 8,000 poached elephants and horns from 450 rhinos into a dozen pyres. These captured tusks have been gathering dust but authorities decided to destroy them as a message to poachers.

President Kenyatta gave a statement on the burn, summarizing its purpose: “For us, ivory is worthless unless it is on our elephants”.