Bardia National Park Tests Non-Lethal Unmanned Aerial Vehicle To Resist Poaching

In Bardia National Park in Nepal, poaching rangers are learning how to operate UAVs (Unmanned Aerial Vehicle), which conservationists plan to use against illegal wildlife poaching. Hopefully, the non-lethal vehicle should catch heavily-armed poachers in the act, and scare others away. Another advantage is that this can keep the park rangers out of harm's way. Nepal is home to tiger, rhino, and  elephant species that are teetering on the edge because of poaching, and, with poaching records reaching new highs, now is the time to take strict action on this subject. I give my sincere thanks to the rangers in various national parks that help make sure this issue is getting attention and, hopefully,is halted.

-PJ

Source & photo: WorldWildlife.org

Romney Reveals Plan to Drill in Alaska Wildlife Refuge

Recently, Mitt Romney revealed his plans to "aggressively" expand offshore drilling in places like Virginia and South Carolina, but, as if things weren't bad enough, what he plans to do if he's elected president just got even worse. He proposes to start drilling smack in the middle of Alaska's National Arctic Wildlife Refuge. I was kind of neutral at first when it came to the presidential debate, but now I'm Obama all the way. The National Arctic Wildlife Refuge is home to everything from wolves to caribou to wolverines to our beloved polar bears, and I just can't stand to see them threatened by Romney's plan to "expand" our oil resources. We all know how the Gulf of Mexico turned out. Let's not let it happen again. As Romney said, "This isn't a 'pie in the sky' sort of thing. We will succeed in expanding our oil resources and making America an independent country when it comes to energy and fuel resources." In other words, he plans to guarantee this chaos will occur...

-PJ

To help the refuge, click the link below:

National Arctic Wildlife Refuge

Source: NPR (National Public Radio)

Conservation Groups cry out Against Dam in Thailand

Recently, three indochinese tigers (a mother and her cubs) were caught on a motion-sensored camera, the mother inspecting the device closely. Unfortunately, this would have been a good thing had the tigers' territory not have been where a proposed hydroelectric dam is proposed to be built soon. Indochinese tigers are a subspecies of tiger that lives in Indonesia and the surrounding areas. Studies show that fewer than 1,500 wild indochinese tigers are alive today. And now, environmental organizations are protesting against a nearly $400 million dollar project that aims to build a hydroelectric dam that could flood over 5,000 acres of valuable land in Mae Wong National Park. The dam including others proposed as part of the same plan, is also expected to reduce the region's fish supply by 16 percent, according to a study by conservation groups. We can only hope that the dam and its counterparts will be halted, because a lot more could be at risk than those three tigers.

-PJ

Source: The World Wildlife Fund/ LiveScience.com 

My Volunteer Work...Plus more Responsibility!

Remember Harry, that gopher snake at The Ogden Nature Center that I exercise as a volunteer? Now I get more of a part in taking care of him instead of just exercising him. I get to change his water, clean his tank, etc., and to top it all off I get to go inside an exclusive room for only volunteers that work with animals. Plus, I finally got my name badge to let everybody know I'm a volunteer and not some random kid walking in and messing around with the snakes. So even though I'm not the most experienced volunteer there, I love my work and will probably continue to do it for a long time. Me and Harry have become brothers. Sort of.

-PJ

Documentary Sheds Light on Little-Known SeaWorld Cetacean Cruelty

We all love SeaWorld parks. Full of aquatic animals of all shapes an sizes. But a new documentary, "A Fall From Freedom", made by Earthviews Productions (View the movie on the link below),  uncovers a controversy going on at SeaWorld parks that mistreats dolphins and orcas, especially during capture where people use explosives to scare orcas and/or dolphins or belugas to shore, and then wrestle them violently to put them on boats, only to be sent on a long, bumpy trip across the country in trucks or airplanes. But this is only the tip of the iceberg on the list of terrible things people have done just to ensure your entertainment during your family trip to San Diego this summer. As many people say in the documentary, SeaWorld should just rescue and then rehabilitate the animals, and that would be the "featured show" for us to enjoy.

-PJ

Click this link to view the documentary:

A Fall From Freedom

World Elephant Day!

Time to embrace the world's biggest land mammal! National Elephant day is tomorrow, August 12. Elephants are under threat because of poaching for their ivory tusks, but this holiday brings new hope for the beautiful mammals. You don't exact;y have to throw a party for the elephants, but just realize how precious they are and, even given terrible human obstacles, are still a species that has hope.

It is also a reminder of the terrible mass killing of elephants that occurred between January and March of this year, and the World Wildlife Fund has just let out video footage of it. Heavily-armed foreign poachers invaded Cameroon and killed over 300 elephants in Bouba N'Djida National Park. Surprisingly, I never heard of the incident until recently, or else I would have made a post about it much, much earlier. But the World Wildlife Fund has just released a video honing in on the incident, made like a mini-documentary.

This video is a reminder of the horrendous incident, and may not be for the weak-of-stomach:

                                               

We can all conclude that in order to save the elephants it's up to us. So donate to an organization that saves elephants, like WWF. Cherish these creatures of majesty, and forever realize there is hope for the elephants. And there's hope for every animal, for that matter.

-PJ

Phoenix's status:

Remember Phoenix, the young golden eagle who almost died in a Utah wildfire at Uintah County?  He recently had a vet check-up on July 31. He's doing well so far, considering nobody thought he was going to survive the blaze. However, there is one small problem. It's not major or anything, just a threat to Phoenix's  healing beak. The Utah Wildlife Rehabilitation Center says that Phoenix is becoming  a little rambunctious, and the bird could damage his own beak, which was softened and damaged by the fire and might take a while to heal up. To help deal with this, Phoenix's caretakers placed pads in the eagle's cage so there's less of a risk to his beak.  So,after going under anesthesia and getting a full check-up, Phoenix is expected to be fine, which is good news in my eyes.

                                                                        -PJ

Source & photo: WRCN facebook page

Some of Phoenix's feathers are still burnt and his beak was softened, but he's expected to be
fine.

                                                                                           

P.S. Please Comment!