It is my belief that we do not have a fundamental right to pilfer and plunder our natural world, and that what we do have is a fundamental responsibility to do what we can to protect our planet's waters, soils, air, and the diverse wildlife that we share these resources with. The former does not ensure economic prosperity for all; the latter does. When one learns that certain actions have consequences--say, that morning coffee ritual from a business that heavily uses styrofoam cups, a product that simply and effectively trashes the earth--is there not only one ethical and moral thing to do? To start buying coffee from a business that does more for the environment? Change is necessary if we care about all the generations behind us--human and wildlife alike. But change is a complicated thing.

Therein lies the conundrum.

My pledge: to embrace change, and to find solutions to the conundrum.


Monday, February 23, 2009

Just Another Day in (Paved) Paradise

4 million = Miles of roads in the United States.

226 million = Number of vehicles registered in the United States.

23 trillion = Vehicle miles traveled in the United States in 2002.

6.3 million = Number of automobile accidents annually in the United States.

253,000 = Number of animal-vehicle accidents annually.

50 = Estimated percentage of vehicle-large animal collisions that go unreported.

90 = Percentage of animal-vehicle collisions that involve deer $2,000.

$2000 = Average minimum cost for repairing a vehicle after a collision with a deer

1 million = Number of vertebrates run over each day in the United States (a rate of one every 11.5 seconds).

200 = Number of human deaths annually resulting from vehicle-wildlife collisions.

6 = Number of bears killed last year by vehicles in Yellowstone National Park.

1,559 = Number of animals killed on Yellowstone National Park roads from 1989-2003. Figure includes 556 elk, 192 bison, 135 coyotes, 112 moose, 24 antelope and 3 bobcats.

2,349 = Number of large animals killed on New Mexico roads in 2001. Figure includes 30 black bears, 160 elk and 600 deer.

51,000 = Number of vertebrates killed in and around Saguaro National Park by automobiles each year. Figure includes 1,400 birds, 6,500 mammals, 26,000 reptiles and 17,000 amphibians.

25,000 = Number of "Roadkill Bingo" games sold by the Colorado company that invented the game.

93 = Percentage by which desert tortoise roadkill was reduced after fencing and culverts were installed on one 15-mile stretch of Mojave Desert highway.

40 = Percentage by which deer-vehicle collisions were reduced after installation of a deer crosswalk system in northeast Utah.

HR3550 = Number of House transportation bill that would require states to plan for wildlife crossings when improving or constructing highways.

Above info provided by High Country News, http://www.hcn.org/issues/291/15268. Sources for statistics on pages 9, 11, 12: U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Highway Administration; Wildlands CPR; Wildlife Crossings Toolkit ( www.wildlifecrossings.info/beta2.htm ); National Park Service; New Mexico Department of Game and Fish; Defenders of Wildlife; and the U.S. Humane Society.
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Monday, February 16, 2009

Rhino Crisis in India


In the first month of 2008, 4 rhinos were poached for their horns.  In one case a female and her calf were viciously killed. The poachers, who first shot her, brutally quaged her horn out while she was still alive, but only after they killed her calf.

http://www.topnews.in/rhino-poaching-increase-assam-s-kaziranga-park-216954

Is it any wonder I loathe the human race?

2011 Update: A total of 16-18 rhinos were slaughtered in 2008, and another 14 in 2009.  In 2010, still more were killed.

Useful articles:
http://www.lawisgreek.com/animal-rights-rhino-poaching-in-assam/
http://www.rhinoconservation.org/2010/12/13/two-rhino-poachers-killed-in-kaziranga-national-park/
http://www.rhinoconservation.org/2010/05/13/indias-rhino-poaching-gangs-a-closer-look/
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