A Review of the Year's Wildlife and Conservation News
The year 2007 brought with it a wide range of wildlife headlines. There were fascinating discoveries—a new species of snow leopard in Indonesia and a new type of hummingbird in the cloud forests of Colombia. There were poignant losses—the disappearance of the Yangtze river dolphin and the loss of seventeen endangered whooping cranes. And there were conservation victories—the cleanup of Osborne Reef and the reintroduction of Rimatara lorikeets to the wilds of Atiu Island.
January 2, 2007. Snow leopards (Panthera uncia) are a unique species of cat that inhabits the mountains, semi-arid scrublands, grasslands and steppe habitats throughout central and southern Asia. Despite their vast range—which includes countries such as China, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Nepal, Pakistan, Russian Federation to name a few—these cats live in narrow corridors of habitat and isolated patches. Scientists estimate that there are fewer than 2,500 mature breeding individuals and the species is on the decline.
January 7, 2007. The Grenada dove (Leptotila wellsi) is set to lose a large portion of its dry-forest habitat as plans take shape to build a luxury hotel in what is now Grenada's Mount Hartman National Park. The Grenada Government is preparing to sell off the national park to the Four Seasons Hotels and Resort Group who intend to construct a 150-room hotel, 300 luxury villas, and a golf course on the site. The Mount Hartman National Park, also called 'The Dove Sanctuary', is located in the southwest region of Grenada.
February 2, 2007. The world-famous groundhog 'Punxatawny Phil' emerged from his den today, Groundhog Day, to proclaim he was unable to see his shadow. As the tradition goes, no groundhog shadow means an early spring is on the way. The official Groundhog Day forecast, read at Gobbler's Knob in Phil's home town of Punxatawny Pennsylvania proclaimed that spring was just around the corner and also made mention of El Nino and global warming.
February 5, 2007. Seventeen juvenile whooping cranes were killed in severe storms that swept across central Florida last week. At the time of the storm, the endangered cranes were being housed inside an enclosure at the Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge. The young cranes were among those trained in 2006 by Operation Migration conservationists to follow an ultralight aircraft. The training had led the birds from a refuge in Wisconsin to Florida's Chassahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge earlier this year.
March 8, 2007. A little brown bird in Thailand has a lot of ornithologists celebrating its rediscovery, 139 years after its original identification. In 1867, a single specimen of a Large-Billed Reed-Warbler (Acrocephalus orinus) was collected in the Sutleg Valley near Rampoor, Himachal Pradesh, India. In many ways, this new reed-warbler resembled other better-known reed-warblers. It had drab brown upper-parts and creamy colored under-parts. But in a few ways, the specimen was distinct.
March 15, 2007. Scientists have discovered that the clouded leopards that prowl the islands of Sumatra and Borneo are very different to those that inhabit mainland southeast Asia. Recent genetic analysis shows that they are so different, in fact, that they should be classified as a separate species. The study revealed that the leopards of Sumatra and Borneo diverged from the mainland cats over one million years ago. Since then, they have developed dozens of genetic differences.
April 8, 2007. BirdLife International today announced that 101,000 hectares of Sumatra's dry lowland rainforest are to be protected and restored by a coalition of conservation organizations. The area, recently named the Harapan Rainforest, is home to the critically endangered Sumatran tiger whose numbers have fallen to between 100 and 300 individuals. The forest also provides habitat for Asian elephants, Malayan tapirs, gibbons, sun bears, and more than 267 species of birds (71 of which are endangered).
April 9, 2007. The Bosphorus Strait is a narrow ribbon of water that connects the Black Sea to the Sea of Marmara. It is among the world's busiest shipping lanes, bisecting the Turkish city of Istanbul, home to more than 10 million people. It is also the permanent home of several species of dolphins that brave the shipping traffic and pollution to feed on the fish that are funneled into the narrow mouth of the strait.
April 16, 2007. Under the still-chilled dirt of northern Illinois, a brood of cicada nymphs is starting to stir. In less than a month, what is known as the Northern Illinois Brood of cicadas, will start to emerge. There are at least three species of periodical cicadas (belonging to the genus Magicicada) and most are either on a 13-year or 17-year cycle. Scientists group the cicadas into 'broods' based on the year they emerge. Of all the known broods, the largest is believed to be the 17-year Northern Illinios Brood.
May 14, 2007. A new species of hummingbird has been discovered in the montane cloud forests of south-west Colombian. The gorgeted puffleg (Eriocnemis isabellae) is named for its brilliant, bicolor throat patch (of iridescent blue and green feathers) and the white tufts of feathers above its legs. The bird was first sighted in 2005 by ornithologists Alexander Cortés-Diago and Luis Alfonso Ortega during a survey of the Serrania del Pinche region. In 2006, researchers returned to the area to gather more information.
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