Christmas Bilby

Photo from Ipswich Nature Centre 

A baby bilby boy has been born in time for Christmas at the Ipswich Nature Centre in Queens Park, Queensland.  The Bilby is a symbol of Hope in Australia.

The Bilby and its struggle for survival is symbolic of the plight of many of Australia’s small native animals. It has been suggested that Australia adopt the Bilby as the wildlife symbol of Easter in Australia.  Hence chocolate Bilbies are around at Easter time.  See this link here.

The World Wildlife Fund says:

The bilby is an important ecosystem engineer. It’s an excellent digger and so many other species reap the rewards of its hard work. When bilbies aren’t living in their complex burrows, which can be up to three metres long and two metres deep, other animals like insects, reptiles, birds and small mammals take up residence. The burrows provide vital shelter from predators and high summer temperatures.

Bilbies might be small but they punch well above their weight. They can shift more than 1.5 tonnes of soil per kilogram of body mass in a single year as they construct and maintain their subterranean homes.

https://www.wwf.org.au/what-we-do/species/bilby#gs.0NLKAHI

For more information and photos of this Bilby (who is yet to be named) please go to the Ipswich Nature Centre website.

Bilbies, or rabbit-bandicoots, are desert-dwelling marsupial omnivores; they are members of the order Peramelemorphia. At the time of European colonisation of Australia, there were two species.  Bilbies now occupy only about 15% of Australia’s landmass. There were originally two species but the Greater Bilby (Macrotis lagotis) is now commonly referred to simply as ‘the Bilby’ as the Lesser Bilby (Macrotis leucura) is thought to have become extinct in the early 1950s.

Class: Mammalia

Order: Peramelemorphia

Family: Thylacomyidae; Bensley, 1903

Genus: Macrotis

Species: lagotis

Did you know: Previously more widespread, the bilby is now only found in remote parts of western Queensland, the Northern Territory and Western Australia.   savethebilbyfund.com

Good information about Bilbies can be found at the webpage below.

https://www.bushheritage.org.au/species/bilby

For information about the Vulnerable status of this mammal, by the IUCN, click on the link below.

https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/12650/21967189

Polar Bears are Starving

National Geographic has released heart-breaking video of a polar bear about to die of starvation.   I am sorry to have to post this and these scenes make me physically ill, as do the scenes of the big cats being abused ……..  HOWEVER  perhaps this will galvanise at least one person reading this into action —   to  address   CLIMATE CHANGE.

CLICK ON THE LINK BELOW

video.nationalgeographic.com/video/news/171207-polar-bear-starving-iceless-land-vin-spd

 

READ THE FULL STORY HERE

WHAT CAN YOU DO??

1. Research Climate Change

2. Write to as many influential people as you can about this – need an urgent Solution

3. Discuss this with people

4. Join organisations that campaign for Climate Change awareness and real immediate Solutions –  just google or search  Climate Change Groups  and find some to join.

5.  Read relevant books, e.g. Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” and “An Inconvenient Sequel – Truth to Power”

6.  Pray

Harambe – a rallying cry for tolerance

‘Harambe” is said to be an African chant, a rallying cry for unity and co-operation, used in Kenya.

Harambe is also the name for a rare & endangered 17 Year Old Western lowland silver-back Gorilla that was moved to Cincinnati Zoo back in 2014 from the Gladys Porter Zoo in Brownsville.

He was sadly killed on May 28th, 2016 at Cincinnati Zoo in Ohio.

He was killed due to a young unattended child falling into his holding area due to a negligent inattentive parent.

The zoo director, Thane Maynard, confirmed the gorilla did not appear to be attacking the child, but he described it as ‘an extremely strong animal in an agitated situation’.

‘You’re talking about an animal that’s over 400 pounds and extremely strong. So no, the child wasn’t under attack but all sorts of things could happen in a situation like that. He certainly was at risk.’

Given time and the right ( calm ) environment, some animal behaviour experts say, that Harambe would have handed over the child.  I think that Homo sapiens or human beings excel at not trusting or having faith in what they can do, and instead they stereotype the situation “big animal, we can’t control him, the boy may be hurt by the big strong animal, let’s kill the Gorilla, rather than try to subdue the situation and try a little longer to rescue the boy, while keeping the gorilla alive”.

During a press conference on Monday, Maynard said Harambe was ‘behaving erratically’, before adding: ‘The child wasn’t just being endangered, but dragged around by the ankle and hurt.’  The gorilla is or was intelligent and dragged the boy away from screaming on-lookers to protect the boy.  Anyone can see in the stills that the Gorilla did not intend to purposely harm the child.  The child, of course, was hurt when he fell in.

News reports say the zoo will review whether the enclosure is secure enough, and the Zoo Director has said “what do you expect from a 4 year old child”, when the real issues are the enclosure was not doubled up to prevent this from happening  AND  the parents took their eyes off the boy.  The parents thank God for keeping their child safe and for having the right people there at the right time – which is pretty ironic –  as they were there too and supposed to be actually keeping a close hold of their four year old.

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Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3616453/New-video-footage-Harambe-shows-400-pound-gorilla-HOLDING-HANDS-four-year-old-boy-fell-zoo-enclosure-witnesses-say-animal-acting-protectively.html#ixzz4ACHsbC8K

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Soon all the fuss will die down, Harambe whom grew up in captivity, will be missed by his primate family.   Another rare and endangered animal willfully destroyed, because of careless parents and short-shortsightedness with not having the enclosure child proof.

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The parents had 4 children and could have been looking after the youngest properly, especially because he had said he wanted to play in the water, and the Zoo or someone in the Public could have asked sometime before 28 May 2016, for the enclosure to be made more secure.   A quick acting zoo visitor could have scaled the fence and grabbed the boy.

On the day of Harmabe’s death, someone clear headed about having a calm environment with the situation at the zoo ( yes it is possible ) could have cleared the area away from shouting panicking on-lookers.

Yes, so many COULDS or SHOULDS, with the moral of this story being for the Cincinatti Zoo to do the right thing regarding its responsibilities toward its captive animals welfare and toward the zoo visitors.  Issues around whether we should have Zoos at all will arise, for example, why not just have them as Conservation Centres not even open to the public?

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I for one don’t want to go to a “Zoo” to stare at animals.

The End  ( of Harmabe’s short life – Gorillas can live to 60 years of age )

Rare Tortoise taken from Perth Zoo

Now the unthinkable and I am really mad.  What is going on??  A friend’s senior cat was chased by big dogs right off her porch just a few days ago, in the cold climate of the eastern USA and never returned home.  I felt devastated  ….  and now this!

Please see the information on the Perth Zoo website at the Link below.

http://ht.ly/XVjjE

READ THE NEWS ARTICLE AT THE LINK BELOW

Juvenile Radiated tortoise stolen from Perth Zoo

 

CLICK   HERE   FOR A LINK TO  MY VIDEO  OF

A BEAUTIFUL RADIATED TORTOISE AT THE  ZOO

Some pictures taken at the Perth Zoo on 29 November 2015 of the Radiated tortoise enclosure.  You can see it is not difficult for someone under cover of darkness to slip into the Enclosure.  The tortoise below is an Adult, the one stolen on Monday was a male sub-adult ( or Juvenile ) with a 15 cm diameter Shell.

The Zoo said someone must have somehow circumvented their Security System.  In 2011 two tortoises were stolen, and now another!

 

 

 

If I get my hands on you if you stole this Tortoise,  watch out …..

Sea-lions Starving – please Help

California sea lion (Zalophus californianus)

Monterey Bay, California, USA
by Kevin Schafer, Seattle, Washington, USA

Jenna Ushkowitz was recently filming on a free-diving trip with Oceana at Santa Barbara Island off of Southern California.

She says:

At our dive spot, we saw cliffs known for being covered in sea lions. They were barren.

While I was in the water, a young sea lion pup came up to our boat. It was so skinny. You could see its ribs. It was truly heart breaking.

That starving pup was an undeniable example of the problems sea lions and other ocean animals face – there’s simply not enough forage fish to go around.

Excessive fishing and a combination of ocean conditions have driven down sardine and anchovy populations to such low numbers that sea lion mothers can’t find these fish. With support from the public, Oceana took action and helped win a short-term solution: closing the Pacific sardine fishery last April through next June.

But more sea lion pups will starve if we don’t find a long-term solution.

The United States fishes the same population of Pacific sardines as Mexico and Canada, yet the sardine catch limits do not accurately account for this fact. We must update this calculation to ensure we harvest a responsible share of fish and don’t contribute to international overfishing.

I subscribe to OCEANA’s Newsletters.  Oceana is an excellent organisation that helps marine life worldwide.  Please help them to help our wildlife.

Add your name before October 14 to help save thousands of sea lion pups and restore the abundance of our oceans >>

Thank you

 

Australian government on “probation” – to save the Great Barrier Reef

In June 2015 the UNESCO World Heritage Committee made a historic decision for the Great Barrier Reef that put the Australian government on probation until the Reef’s health improves.  The Australian Government now has until 2016 to show that its rescue plan is working and until 2019 to demonstrate it has stopped the decline of the Reef. The most significant features of the decision are:

• The World Heritage Committee expressed concern that the outlook for the Reef is poor and key habitats and species have continued to decline, and listed climate change, poor water quality, and coastal development impacts as the major threats.
• The Committee will continue its vital role as a watchdog to ensure Australia “rigorously implements all of its commitments”.
• An acknowledgement that the existing financial commitment to the Reef 2050 plan is an ‘initial’ amount – a clear indication the Committee recognizes that the plan is underfunded.
• If the Reef’s World Heritage values continue to decline, then an ‘in-danger’ listing will almost certainly be delivered at the 2020 meeting.

Just 12 months ago, the Australian Government had approved plans to dump millions of tonnes of dredge spoil from mega-port expansions into the Great Barrier Reef’s waters. On 1st July, that approval was overturned and WWF expects a ban on dumping from new port development in the Reef’s World Heritage waters to be in force within months. Read more   HERE The Great Barrier Reef (GBR) stretches 2,300 kilometres along the Queensland coast and includes over 2,900 reefs, and around 940 islands and cays. The Great Barrier Reef Marine Park is 345,000 square kilometres in size, five times the size of Tasmania or larger that the United Kingdom and Ireland combined! The reef is immensely diverse. It is home to more than 1,500 species of fish, 411 types of hard coral, one-third of the world’s soft corals, 134 species of sharks and rays, six of the world’s seven species of threatened marine turtles, and more than 30 species of marine mammals, including the vulnerable dugong. Add to that stunning marine suite as many as 3,000 molluscs and thousands of different sponges, worms and crustaceans, 630 species of echinoderms (starfish and sea urchins) and 215 bird species, of which 22 are seabirds. The GBR is listed under all four natural World Heritage criteria for its outstanding universal value.

READ MORE AT THE   WORLD WILDLIFE FUND WEBSITE

GET YOUR COPY OF AUSTRALIA’S   “REEF 2050 PLAN”    HERE

Click on the “Reef 2050 Long-Term Sustainability Plan” link – to download the FULL plan

Help save Sudan, northern White Rhino

The ultimate solution is to stop the demand for Rhino & Elephant tusks/products

 

With only 5 individuals remaining, the survival prospects for the northern white rhino seem bleak.

Ol Pejeta Reserve in East Africa is home to three of the world’s last five northern white rhinos, including Sudan the last male, and also to 106 critically endangered black rhinos, and 20 southern white rhinos. It is the largest black rhino sanctuary in East Africa, and a centre for innovation in conservation and wildlife protection.

43 year old Sudan and some female rhinos were transported from a Zoo to the Reserve, in the hope that they would breed to help continue the line of the Northern White Rhino.  Sudan needs around the clock protection from human beings, and has had his horn removed in a bid to deter poachers from taking him.

Please click on the link below, to get information and see photos of Sudan.

Save SUDAN the Rhino

The Reserve he lives on is susceptible to poachers, and you can contribute toward Sudan’s protection through a donation via “crowdfunding”.

Please if you have a conscience and want to contribute toward stopping all of our non-human Animal species from being wiped out, share this Post and have people including yourself, click on the LINK BELOW, in order to contribute $1 or $2 or any amount –  to help keep Sudan safe.  Thank you from Sudan.

http://www.gofundme.com/olpejeta

Ol Pejeta is a  90,000 acre wildlife preserve 330km north of Nairobi, Kenya.  While it is a tourism attraction, gaining revenue from vehicle drives through the roads in the Reserve, it is well managed.  However, because of its size, it is a continual challenge to protect all of the animals within it.

For animal symbolism of the RHINO,   click  HERE.

 

 LINKS OF INTEREST

Demilitarised Drones to be used to Protect animals in Ol Pejeta Reserve

Visitor Reviews of Ol Pejeta Reserve

What to do during your Stay at Ol Pejeta Reserve

Agricultural Development Corporation joins with Ol Pejeta to conserve Animals

 

Conservation status
Critically Endangered (IUCN 3.1)[2]
Scientific classification
Kingdom:	Animalia
Phylum:	Chordata
Class:	Mammalia
Order:	Perissodactyla
Family:	Rhinocerotidae
Genus:	Ceratotherium
Species:	C. simum

Can a Horse feel Guilt ?

Well, I believe that all animals have Souls and that non-human animals also have intelligence, and in fact, some have more intelligence than some human beings.  I also believe that some non-human animals can also feel emotions and feelings – emotions being feelings that are expressed physically.

If you are at all interested or drawn to communicating with animals, please pursue that interest, as the World would benefit, I think, from Homo sapiens or human beings genuinely connecting with their animal companions and the animal world at large.

There are plenty of resources for this, excellent books, and Animal Communicators, that run courses in communicating with animals, and / or who will connect with your special Animal friend as a service they run, and give you messages from them, or relay questions from your animal companions.

A load of “bunkum”, some of you say?  “That’s strange” or “I don’t understand that” others may decry.  Well, consider this – communication is universal.  The spoken language had to start somewhere.  It is made up.  Communication also exists as mental images and concepts which are on the “air-waves” or which are conveyed by the intention of the sender, as frequencies of energy which an open and devoted receiver can pick up.

I have personally experienced it myself.  It’s called telepathy.  Once a baby human being telepathically spoke to me, and if Homo sapiens can pick up telepathic messages from other human beings, why can’t they pick up telepathic messages from non human beings?   Please visit the page below to explore further.

Talk to the Animals

Now, to answer the Question that is the Title of this Post,
the answer is YES.

Click on the Link below to read the true story of a racehorse that felt guilt over a little girl.

The Unhappy Racehorse

Animals are not lesser beings.  They may serve a purpose to some human beings, but should be treated with respect, as David Attenborough says.  We use tools, don’t we, like knives & forks, and computers, but don’t say they are lesser things than us.

In my “books” or viewpoint,  ALL LIFE  is sacred in terms of, yes, some of us may eat animals, and I have heard that some animals are aware of this purpose or relationship and accept it, but let’s not go over-board and take more than we need, or out-rightly abuse various animal species as just commodities, for our own pleasure or profit.   Farming animals uses an enormous amount of land that could be used to grow & harvest plants for human consumption.

Remember the following, that we all came / come from the “primoridal soup” or from the hot ocean vents, and the predecessors/ancestors of Homo sapiens and other Animals are the same – bacteria !!  This is according to scientists, like Professor Brian Cox, and the point is that just because we human beings CAN “conquer” or farm and trap non-human animals, CAN is not a good reason for actually doing so – to the extent that we are being cruel to animals and degrading our Earth.

We CAN eat with our fingers but in the so-called civilized countries, we DON’T.  It’s our CHOICE what we do with this beautiful and fascinating World that we live in.

Mitakuye Oyasin  –

we are  ALL  related