Nearly one-third of primates in danger of extinction, conservationists say

[Praxius]

Nearly one-third of primates in danger of extinction, conservationists say

Almost a third of all apes, monkeys and other primates are in danger of extinction because of rampant habitat destruction, the commercial sale of their meat and the trade in illegal wildlife, a report released Friday said. Of the world's 394 primate species, 114 are classified as threatened with extinction by the World Conservation Union. The report by Conservation International and the International Primatological Society in Hainan, China, focuses on the plight of the 25 most endangered primates, including China's Hainan gibbon, of which only 17 remain. "You could fit all the surviving members of the 25 species in a single football stadium; that's how few of them remain on Earth today," said Russell Mittermeier, president of Conservation International. "The situation is worst in Asia, where tropical forest destruction and the hunting and trading of monkeys puts many species at terrible risk," said Mittermeier, who is also chairman of the World Conservation Union's Primate Specialist Group, which prepared the report with the International Primatological Society. The 25 most endangered primates include 11 from Asia, 11 from Africa and three from South and Central America. The list includes well-known primates like the Sumatran orangutan of Indonesia and the Cross River gorilla of Cameroon and Nigeria, as well as lesser known species, such as the greater bamboo lemur from Madagascar. Newly endangered species Six species are in the report for the first time, including a recently discovered Indonesian tarsier that has yet to be formally named and the kipunji from Tanzania, which was discovered in 2003. "Some of the new species we discover are endangered from the get-go," Mittermeier said. "If you find a new species and it's living in an area heavily impacted by habitat destruction and hunting, you recognize it's in trouble." Habitat loss because of the clearing of tropical forests for agriculture, logging and fuel wood continues to be the major factor in the declining number of primates, according to the report. In addition, climate change is altering the habitats of many species, leaving those with small habitat ranges even more vulnerable to extinction, it said. Hunting for subsistence and commercial purposes is another major threat to primates, especially in Africa and Asia. Capture of live animals for the pet trade also poses a serious threat, particularly in Asia, the report found. Hunting threatens primates in Vietnam Four primates on the list from Vietnam have been decimated by hunting for their meat and bones, according to Barney Long, a conservation biologist based in Vietnam for the WWF Greater Mekong Program. "All four species are close to extinction," Long said of the Delacour's langur, golden-headed langur, grey-shanked douc and Tonkin snub-nosed monkey. "The key populations have been stabilized. But there needs to be a lot more law enforcement and work to persuade local communities to support conservation for those numbers to increase." The news is not all bad. Nine primates from the last report in 2004 were taken off the list, mostly because of bolstered conservation efforts to save their populations. Among them are the eastern gorilla from Africa, the black-faced lion tamarin and the buffy-headed tufted capuchin from Brazil and the Perrier's sifaka from Madagascar. "If you invest in a species in a proper way and do the conservation measures needed, you can reduce risk of extinction," Mittermeier said. "If we had resources, we would be able to take every one of the species off the list in the next five or 10 years."

Ok.. so what do you do to solve the problem?

Do you even bother to solve the problem?

Survival of the fittest they say. Who is to say certain species are not supposed to become extinct to open up for new ones?

Like how other similar divisions of a species ended up dieing off due to a stronger one, what if all the other primates were branches of us and we were all suppose to evolve and the best one makes it? Apparently we won the evolutional trial compared to them, so are they still required to be saved from extinction?

The world doesn't stay the same forever.

[Jack]

Here's a discussion that might add to this:

Of all species that have existed on Earth, 99.9 percent are now extinct. Many of them perished in five cataclysmic events. According to a recent poll, seven out of ten biologists think we are currently in the throes of a sixth mass extinction. Some say it could wipe out as many as 90 percent of all species living today. Yet other scientists dispute such dire projections. As our panelists debate the issue, they also consider how one species -- Homo sapiens -- may be triggering a modern mass extinction.

Evolution: Extinction: A Modern Mass Extinction?

[Milton Bradley]

This is why I'm no longer a nature show lover, all the news is bad, and all the blame is coming this way.


For the record, I'm not extincting animals, so don't look to me for answers.

[Praxius]

The funny thing that I have noticed, is that throughout time, the creatures of Earth have always had to adapt to their enviroments.

Now humans are adapting the enviroment to our needs.... and instead of the rest of the animals trying to adapt to nature, they now have to adapt to the Nature in which we are creating.

[Osborn F Enready]

WE can prevent extinction, but we can't necessarily maintain existing population numbers, or ever put them back into their natural enviroment.

This could be seen as the "humanz wuz here!" grafitti on the proverbial wall of shame, but things could change if people en masse, actually woke up.

Its easier than ever to wake up, thanks to the internet, but people still are figuring out how to use it to do just that.

[xyzer]

A simple statement is appropriate? Which should give way the bark beetle or the human who also needs the bark for pulp? In a round about way that explains the problem. I read somewhere(Wicki) that.....
A typical species becomes extinct within 10 million years of its first appearance, although some species, called living fossils, survive virtually unchanged for hundreds of millions of years. Only one in a thousand species that have existed remain today.
It seems that "nature" (climate change, competition for resources and space, etc) rules.
Obviously humankind with its capacity for reason has an advantage in the struggle for species existence. But should we curtail our needs to accomodate other species? Should we not use timber because the spotted owl nests in the forest?

[Jack]

Too often humans don't just use, we abuse. We give no thought to sustainability. We denude forests without reforestation, then the soil washes away during subsequent rains. We have no connection to the planet (I say thanks to our superstitions that place us above nature instead of realizing we're a part of it) so we don't consider or don't understand how we impact it.

[Technosoul]

Cows, chickens, and domestic pets are clearly not in danger of vanishing, because humans become dependant upon them (for food or other reasons).

If the monkey is used for food or other marketing purposes the best way to insure it's survivial is by teaching people how to raise them in farming situations, hopefully with the proper environments for the farming projects being included in the program, in a controlled farming situations the keepers would make sure that enough reproduce in order to insure a continued supply for the furture of that business.

However if those monkeys remain unlawful to market then the less logical underground 'black market" takes over and they are more distructive because they do not plan nor insure breeding and reproduction in thier activities, as we now do for cattle, horses, and other such species of animals.

The minks in Amreica nearly vanished due to the use of their fur to make expensive fur coats. But then people started mink farms where they raise minks for marketing purposes, soon no one bothered to go to the touble to hunt or trap them in the wild anymore, and now those that survived in the wild have become common place again and are no longer endangered, due to private sector interests and activities.

Those who grow and harvest pine trees do the same thing by planting new trees for future crops. Especially relative to Christmas Trees.

One of the most important reasons to preserve the rainforested areas of the world is because they contain many plants that we have not even fully discovered nor tested for their potential medical uses in curing illnesses. If the major drug companies of he world were smart they would get on the bandwagon to buy up rainforests and to support their preservation to safeguard furture discoveries of cures contained in the saps, herbs, and so forth that those forested areas surely contain. As the current uses for that landspace or the wood is less important because we can recycle and can use plastics or other materials for furnature and so forth.

Governments should get involved in the land managment and conservation of such areas so that the private sector can mastermind programs intelligently where things do not vanish but are allowed to reproduce so that future supplies do not become lost simply for temporary purposes. Nature is like our "bank account" or family budget, and if we get overdrawn we cannot survive economically.

Control of climate changes due to over useage is very important to many areas and the banking industry knows this and they have even taken steps to promote such conservation of forested areas.

The spotted owl by the is learning to survive by using man made structures for nesting, but we must remember that bugs are part of the food chain and so forth, and so eco-systems must be preserved as much as possible via intelligent harvesting procedures.

Humans got brains and should use them to promote wisdom and not just charge ahead totally motivated by greed for a fast buck, such foolishness is a threat to the future of our own speicies.

We cannot overfish the oceans and expect it to continue to supply us with needed things in the future, we must allow for natural refreashing of that resource. If we are wise and not stupid. And our only biological abilty for survival depends on how we use our intelligence, and wisdom and thinking ahead of the game is paramount to that process.

It is foolish for the envirnomentalists to just try to block the private business sector, we must educate them and get them on our side by showing them the logic of including conservation in the mix, because it makes good business sense to do so.

It is a matter of humans learning to adapt to their own progress and population growth by learning about the importance of protecting the eco-systems they need to continue that progress. It just makes sense, as an anology you do make sure you have enough gas in your car to make it home, and so we should likewise make sure we do not run out of rainforests in our journey through time. Wisdom, that is all we are asking for when it comes to dealing with the environment.