 |
| Say a big Hi and a Thank You to all our Rangers today |
I was going to cover write more about the animals – e.g. Marine creatures such as Whales and Sharks, The Elephants, Primates and Reptiles, who’ve all had special days recently, but iwhereever you look the story is much the same, extinction is happening before your eyes, not that there aren’t heroic efforts underway around the world to prevent it. We shall take these up again from time to time, but let’s celebrate World Ranger Day today, if you are east of the international dateline, yesterday if to the west, and give a big shout out to those at the front lines.
Being a ranger is even deadlier than being a journalist these days. One thousand one hundred and twelve have died in the line of duty since 2009. While those who challenge poachers in Africa and Asia have been most at risk, others have died through encounters with wild animals, through drowning, motor vehicle accidents and fire. Over the past year Covid 19 has also contributed to the death toll.
Many of these deaths were unavoidable but there are also those which could have been prevented with more support. See the Thin Green Line Organisation for ways to help internationally with things like training and equipment and for families left behind. Many rangers are now also without income because of the loss of tourism due to the pandemic so they would appreciate help here too, if you can. In the end we’ll lose all our animals if we don’t look after our rangers and their habitat. Instead of erecting memorials, perhaps adequate water supplies would be a start. Many of our walking tracks, huts and even some seats in our national parks are dedicated to the rangers who have helped to preserve them, so that’s might be another positive way to commemorate their work.
Meet Kenya’s fantastic female rangers
Don't forget your local rangers either. For Aussies click here and don’t forget to thank our indigenous rangers as well who not only have vast areas of natural landscape to protect, but indigenous cultural sites too.
I’ll be doing my tax over the next couple of weeks so I thought you might like to hear from some people far better qualified than I am talking about upcoming concerns.
The first article is by Hannah Cloke, Professor of Hydrology, University of Reading. It talks about why Europe and especially Germany wasn’t better prepared for its recent floods.
The second is by Mark Gibbs, Principal Engineer, Reef Restoration at the Australian Institute of Marine Science, talking about why we should expect worse to come, and what we can do about potential flooding in our coastal cities.
Small update:
Ecosia is now far more responsive to my searches and has so far planted 194 trees on my behalf. As far as the solar panels go, it’s mid -winter here and we are heating a lot so the savings aren’t great, but my tree count there has increased to 42, Co2 emissions saved .77 t, Coal not burned .31t As the days get longer again this will get much better.
Comments