"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has." Margaret Mead, American anthropologist, 1901-1978
Today is Earth Day – and today that means a chance to TREBLE your impact to protect this one planet we have.
The Sierra Club are working to do the following (and I quote from their email):
Keep our wild places wild by making the Roadless Rule permanent
Protect endangered animals from extinction by protecting the Endangered Species Act from attacks by the Trump administration and Congress
Ensure everyone has access to clean air and water by resisting attacks on the safeguards keeping toxic pollution out of vulnerable communities.
Make a gift to support our work right now and it will go THREE TIMES as far towards helping the Sierra Club fight to protect our vulnerable communities, clean air and water, precious public lands and wildlife—in the courts, in Congress, and in the grassroots. Rush your Earth Day gift before midnight and it will be TRIPLED by the Club’s generous donors up to $300,000. The Club will also send you their Insulated Cooler Tote Bag, Free.
The Sierra Club’s 3.5 million plus strong community have helped it achieve some incredible victories:
They’ve got 119 cities to commit to 100% clean energy from San Diego to St Petersburg
They’ve retired 287 dirty coal plants – this can only improve the health and wellbeing of everyone
They’ve got anti-environmental officials such as Interior Department Secretary Ryan Zinke and Environmental Protection Agency Secretary Scott Pruitt out of office.
They’ve countered the Trump administration over and over again, helping to block oil and gas drilling on iconic lands and offshore, helping pass legislation to protect wild places, and continuing to shut down dirty coal-fired power plants and coal mines.
They must keep fighting. So please make a gift to support the Sierra Club as it fights to protect vulnerable communities, clean air and water, precious public lands and wildlife—in the courts, in Congress, and in the grassroots.
Researchers doing some photo monitoring in the Vorontsov Land of the Leopard National Park have identified 91 adult leopards, as well as 22 cubs!
As a rule, a qualitative increase is possible when the population has at least twice as many females as males. The high percentage of cubs too is good news.
The new trend amongst Far Eastern Leopards suggests stabilisation of this rare cat’s population. They are also known as Amur Leopards.
The Land of the Leopard National Park accounts for about 70% of the leopard’s natural habitat. This was a key decision: it means that the Far Eastern Leopard can now live safely on an area of almost 2,800 square kilometres.
To count the wild cats, national park employees went through nearly a million camera trap images. About 10,000 of them had leopards on them!
To complete the picture, experts from the Russian national park are eagerly waiting for the results that their Chinese colleagues are producing; they too have been monitoring photos.
These data are vital now that the Land of the Leopard has become a “birth centre” for the spotted cats; many young leopards move to the Chinese borders to look out new territories. Some return, but a certain number stay in China – and that means that the leopard population can grow!
Far Eastern Leopards is an autonomous non-profit organisation. Far Eastern Leopards’ mission is “to protect and restore the Far Eastern Leopard population in its historical habitat in the Russian Far East.
It supports the photo monitoring at Land of the Leopard and the Kedrovaya Pad Nature Reserve. About 360,000 hectares are being monitored in the national park. 400 automatic camera traps can be found in the national park, so it’s the largest camera trap network in Russia!
Camera trap images enable scientists to do several things:
to determine the size of the animal population
to monitor changes in their life cycle
to estimate their physical condition
to determine their behavioural traits.
Find out about Far Eastern Leopards here – there’s lots of information on Far Eastern Leopards and also the organisation trying to protect and restore the species.
Reasons for the very low numbers of these leopards are:
Reduced feeding supply – the prey they live off have been dying out because of poaching and deforestation
Habitat destruction and infrastructure development – forest fire risks have increased because of deforestation and mining; roads make the areas more accessible to humans
Poaching – leopard skin and body parts are used in oriental medicine
The petition is calling for world leaders to forge a new agreement such that at least 50% of our lands and oceans must be protected and restored.
A global study has just found that every insect on the planet is on track to be wiped out – causing life on Earth to collapse – and that includes humans.
The petition says:
To world leaders:
"We global citizens are deeply concerned by scientists warning that ecosystems critical to sustaining life on Earth could collapse in our lifetimes. We call on you to meet existing targets to protect biodiversity, forge a new agreement so that at least 50% of our lands and oceans are protected and restored, and ensure our planet is completely sustainably managed. This must take into consideration the needs of human development and have the active support of indigenous peoples. This long-term goal for nature can restore harmony with our home."
Nature has never needed such a strong voice and scientists are offering a way to defend nature and people too – put half the planet under protection. At the moment, France, Germany, Canada and other countries are about to hold talks to look at the idea before a global summit on extinction.
This is all happening at the time Sir David Attenborough’s programme Our Planet streams on Netflix, hoping for an audience in 190 countries. It could be over ONE BILLION people watch it – that’s one in seven (give or take a few) on the planet.
The petition calls on these leaders to back protection for half the earth.
Did you know there’s research being undertaken to find out how badly school children are affected by pollution every day?
The Daily Mail reports that 250 pupils in schools across London are gathering data for one week. They are carrying pollution sensors made by Dyson in lightweight backpacks. The sensors only weigh just over 1kg and take one pocket, so the rest of the space in the backpack can be used for books etc.
The sensors can measure both particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) levels and will enable the researchers to gain a better understanding of which pollutions are the most harmful.
The study is being run by King’s College London and it’s hoped that the findings will discover at which points and on which routes youngsters are most exposed to toxic pollutants.
As I’m so fond of saying, you can’t expect to be healthy if your environment isn’t healthy too.
If we can improve the air for people, it will help animals as well.
There’s some fantastic television to watch on the BBC this week (starting Sunday 24 March 2019), with Blue Planet programmes in abundance.
Pick of the Week, according to The Sunday Times (Culture Section) is Blue Planet Live. It’s on Sunday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings on BBC1 at 8pm.
This short series sets out on a mission to explore the health of the oceans. An aquadynamic team will be broadcasting live from different marine locations during the week.
Chris Packham examines the well being of whales in Mexico; this includes mother-and-calf arrivals in the largest whale nursery in the world.
Steve Backshall is in the Bahamas and sees sharks and shipwrecks.
Liz Bonnin is at the Great Barrier Reef. She is meeting baby turtles and shearwater chicks and she checks up on the coral itself.
Blue Planet UK looks at the UK side of marine life. There’s reports on Yorkshire seabirds, kayak clean-ups and shark science with Gillian Burke, Steve Brown and Chris Packham.
Blue Planet UK is on just after 4pm on BBC1 on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Don’t miss it!
