Okay to hunt elephants?

photo coutesy of Brian Snelson  

Successful conservation efforts are resulting in new problems as the swelling number of elephants may exceed what parks can support.  The South African government recently lifted the ban on killing elephants as a last resort in controlling the population.  According to an article in the Guardian

Amid words of protest and expressions of relief environment minister Martinus van Schalkwyk announced the elephant had been a victim of its own success with numbers growing from 8,000 to nearly 20,000 in national parks and private reserves in just over a decade.

 Supporters of culling point to growing difficulties in managing elephants in the country’s biggest and most famous game reserve, Kruger National Park. It has more than 12,500 elephants, 5,000 more than is sustainable, according to park officials. Ecologists say the animals’ huge appetites and fondness for “habitat re-engineering” - reducing forests to flatland by uprooting trees and trampling plants as they feed and roam - threaten the park’s biodiversity. 

However, elephants endear a lot of support from South Africans and the rest of the world because of their perceived gentle nature and the strength of their social bonds.  Some conservation groups, and animal rights advocates oppose lifting the restriction and approaching the situation as a numbers game.

Michele Pickover of Animal Rights Africa, which has threatened to urge a tourist boycott if culling goes ahead, said there was no scientific proof that the killing of elephants was necessary or even effective in controlling the population.

“This is a sad day for the country. Elephants are being treated as commodities by the government and game managers,” she said.

This article from National Geographic in 2004 gives more background on the debate, which has been going on for years and has included the voices of many different groups:  parks managers, game rangers, academics, community leaders, and the representatives of animal rights groups.  

Wolf population management

After the gray wolf is delisted, responsibility for population management transfers from the U.S government to individual states like Wyoming, Montana and Idaho.

An excerpt from the Idaho Wolf Conservation and Management Plan:

IDFG is charged by statute with the management of Idaho’s wildlife (Idaho Code §36-103(a): “All wildlife, including all wild animals, wild birds, and fish, within the state of Idaho, is hereby declared to be the property of the state of Idaho. It shall be preserved, protected, perpetuated, and managed. It shall be only captured or taken at such times or places, under such conditions, or by such means, or in such manner, as will preserve, protect and perpetuate such wildlife, and provide for the citizens of this state and, as by law permitted to others, continued supplies of such wildlife for hunting, fishing and trapping.”). This plan will enable the transition of the management of the gray wolf back to the IDFG as either a big game animal, furbearer, or special classification of predator that provides for controlled take after delisting. This classification will enable IDFG to provide protection for wolves as well as consider the impacts of wolves on other big game species, those sectors of the economy dependent upon sport hunting, livestock, domestic animals, and humans.

Animal testing

The morality and usefulness of animal testing is a hotly debated issue with a lot of misinformation being offered as fact along the way.  

However, one advantage of the debate is increased accountability and oversight of researchers who use animals.  By and large, most researchers  recognize that animals should be cared for humanely and aim to provide the best care for the animals used in their research. 

Another advantage is increased resources devoted to developing effective alternatives to animal testing, like computer modeling.

“The EPA and the National Institutes of Health announced a toxicity testing agreement that will allow the EPA to use NIH Chemical Genomics Center’s high-speed, automated screening robots to test suspected toxic compounds, using cells and isolated molecular targets instead of laboratory animals, the EPA said Thursday in a release,” according to a United Press International article on Friday

This is not to say that animal testing should be abandoned altogether.  Research using animals has provided many significant medical advancements, vaccines for example. With all the recent advancements in technology, it is a good idea to consider how research using animals could be refined or replaced when practical.

Protection of smelt - impact on SoCal

Image courtesy of http://www.delta.dfg.ca.gov

Until the droughts in Georgia last summer, I was not aware that water reservoirs and supplies were affected by protections for aquatic animals.

In Georgia’s case, Congressman John Linder was upset that water was being diverted from Lake Lanier that supplies over 3 million residents with water to support a federally protected species of mussel in Florida, according to an article in USA Today.

“We’ve learned from this what a blunt weapon the Endangered Species Act has become,” said state Rep. John Linder. “We need to understand this lake was created not for mussels but for people.”

The first step towards declaring the longfin smelt an endangered or threatened species was taken last week, according to an article in the LA Times.

The California Fish and Game Commission voted 3 to 0 to adopt protection for longfin smelt. The tiny fish makes its home in the delta, which serves as headwaters for the state and federal canals that send water to Southern California.

Those aqueducts, which deliver water to 25 million people and 2 million acres of farmland, have seen exports decline more than 40% in recent weeks because of court-ordered restrictions intended to save another diminutive fish, the delta smelt.

The addition of the longfin smelt to the protected list could affect water exports even more because its life cycle and breeding season are different from delta smelt, prompting restrictions that might begin earlier each year and end later.

Like its aquatic cousin, the longfin smelt has seen its population plummet in recent years. In 2007, it hit a record low along with several other types of delta fish, in what is considered a broad decline in the environmental health of the state’s biggest estuary.

It is unclear exactly how global warming and climate change will affect drought conditions in different parts of the United States, but there is little doubt that it will have an impact.

Examples like these illuminate the broader struggle to protect threatened species while maintaining sufficient resources to support human populations. Clearly these issues will warrant more attention and research.

NRDC fights Bush administration

The NRDC put out a press release on Tuesday concerning a law suit they filed under the freedom of information act against the Bush administration.  The group charges that the government is purposely covering up research by the Minerals Management Service finding the dangers of allowing drilling in the Arctic Ocean.

“This opposition has highlighted that, among other concerns, there are no methods proven effective for cleaning up oil spills in the Arctic Ocean. This is especially troubling because the federal Minerals Management Service admits that oil spills are likely in the Chukchi Sea if it is opened to oil and gas development.”

The NRDC would like to protect the habitats of polar bears, endangered bowhead whales, gray whales, Pacific walrus, seals, threatened eider, and other marine birds and fish. 

Polar Bear = Endangered Species?

The U.S Fish and Wildlife Service is expected to make a decision soon on whether the polar bear should be listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.  The proposal was initiated over a year ago due to concerns that melting ice is threatening polar bear habitat and their ability to hunt for food.

 ”A species can be listed under the Endangered Species Act under one of two categories, endangered or threatened. An endangered species is likely to go extinct within all or a significant portion of its range in the foreseeable future. The polar bear was petitioned to be listed as a threatened species, defined as a species likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future,” according to F&WS - Alaska

Administration says drilling not a threat to polar bears

The leasing of the Chuckchi Sea sale is necessary step towards increasing the domestic supply of energy, wrote the director of the Minerals Management Service on the government agency’s Web site.

Among their primary arguments is that oil drilling can occur while protecting the habitats of polar bears and other animals.

  “Our decision comes down to the bare necessities:  Where do we want to get our energy?  Having a domestic supply is far more reliable and secure than relying upon foreign sources. Can we develop domestic supplies and provide protection for the environment and wildlife, including polar bears?  Yes, we can and should.”

The director says that oil spills are extremely unlikely, and that any drilling plans undergo rigorous scrutiny before being implemented.  He also notes that Congress did not take any actions to disapprove of the proposed plans.

It will be very interesting to see where this goes from here and what new information comes from the lawsuit.  This is one component of a long standing struggle between environmental groups and the Bush administration who already faces a great deal of criticism about his lack of action on environmental issues.

Alaska’s protected areas

For most of Bush’s presidency, there has been some debate over what should be done with protected forests in Alaska.  Conservationists would like to protect these areas to maintain wildlife habitats and keep roads from being built for loggers.  Other interest groups would like to see increased opportunities for logging and for oil drilling to help these industries and some say, support communities whose economy relies on these jobs.

 According to a Natural Resources Defense Council press release, “The Bush administration’s just-released management plan for the Tongass National Forest in Alaska puts millions of pristine acres in this ancient rainforest on the auction block to the timber industry, yet will raise no revenue for the U.S. government, as the U.S. taxpayers themselves will have to pay to build the roads the timber companies need to access the forest. The Tongass is the largest national forest in the country.”

 According to an article in the L.A. Times, “At 17 million acres, roughly the size of West Virginia, the Tongass National Forest in southeastern Alaska is the country’s largest national forest and the world’s largest intact coastal temperate rain forest. It contains grizzly and black bears, wolves, eagles and five species of wild Alaskan salmon.

Under the new plan, about 3.4 million acres of the forest would be open to logging and development. Of this acreage, about 2.4 million is in roadless areas, and about 663,000 acres is considered to have trees valuable for timber production.”

This post is to provide a little background on a complex issue, that I will continue to address in future posts.