From Birds to Fishes: Consequences of Species Extinction

Extinction of species, Credit, Reuters

In 2022, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) listed 31 animal species as extinct, while IUCN's red list put 44,000 species as threatened with extinction, amphibians 41 percent, mammals 26 percent, and confers 34 percent.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service declared 21 species extinct last year, the delisting finalized in November after two years of study, eight of the delisted species birds from Hawaiian forests, the birds having vanished from the wild, along with eight freshwater mussels in the southeast.

In the decade 2010 to 2019, the IUCN declared the extinction of 160 species, including mammals such as the desert beltons, including Barbados Racer, observed last in 1963, going extinct probably due to the introduction of Mongooses, cars, and rats into its habitat.

About 99 percent of species that ever existed have gone extinct, but with the figures given by the IUCN and the US Fish Wildlife Service, as well as other organizations, the nature of the present extinction presents unique features, because the activities of humans largely drive the unfortunate event.

Over the last century, the surface temperature of the earth rose by about 10 degrees Fahrenheit, with the past nine years the warmest since record keeping began in the 1880s, the higher latitudes having heated up faster than the equatorial regions, and last year seen by many as the warmest one ever.

Heat sources apart from the sun, according to experts, caused last year to be seen as the warmest year ever, and they point accusing fingers at the amount of carbon dioxide poured into the atmosphere through human activities, the annual rate over the past 60 years increasing at about 100 times faster than previous natural increases, such as those that happened at the last ice age 11,000-17,000 years ago.

Just like what happened 17,000 years ago, ocean temperatures rose globally during the 20th century, with sea surface temperatures hotter in the past 30 years than at any time since the late 1880s, while sea levels subsequently rose at a rate of roughly six-tenths an inch per decade since 1880, the rate of increase accelerating in recent years to more than an inch per decade.

According to experts, the combination of rising sea levels, the increasing amount of carbon dioxide pouring into the atmosphere through human activities, as well as the rising surface temperature of the earth per decade exemplify climate change, which contributes in many ways to an unfortunate situation whereby the rate of the present extinction of species presents a unique case of human activities driving the entire process.

The Western honey bee for example produces an estimated 1.6 million tonnes of honey annually, from about 80 million hives, this allowing a third of the world's food production to become possible, along with high-quality foods such as honey, royal jelly, and pollen.

Birds such as the evening grosbeak  provided biological control worth $1,820 per square kilometer during the outbreak of Spruce Budworm, an example of the important role played by the creature, so efficient that nest boxes became a pest control method, a practice that takes place in many parts of the world. 

Livestock products account for about 30 percent of the global value of agriculture, 19 percent of the value of food production, 34 percent of protein, and 16 percent of the energy consumed in human diets, just as the global demand for meat products increased six fold since the 1960s, with the Food and Agriculture Organization

 (FAO) forecasting the amount of meat produced to be around 364 million tonnes by the end of last year.

Fish serves as the main source of vital nutrients such as Omega-3s in our diets, with 89 percent or 157 million tonnes of the creature reserved for human consumption, 20 million tonnes destined for non-food uses, and 16 million tonnes or 81 percent utilized for the production of mainly fishmeals and fishoil.

Climate change, as well as factors such as deforestation, over-population, habitat loss, and others, threatened to make humans lose the critical functions other species play in day-to-day activities, through a situation whereby the rate of the present extinction rate presents a unique case of human activities driving a process that leads to the destruction of mammals, birds, bees, and livestock, to the ultimate loss of humans.

Conservation activities prevented 21-32 bird and 7-16 mammal extinctions since 1993, 9-18 bird and two to seven mammal extinctions since 2010, with the extinction of known threatened species improved upon and sustained by 2020.

A commitment to protect diversity ended up in the passing of the US Endangered Pecies Act, which has been credited with saving 99 percent of listed species from extinction, including the bald eagle, the Kirtland warbler, and others.

Concerted efforts led to species making a comeback from the brink of extinction, such as the return of black-footed ferrets to around 300 animals across North America, the black rhino  to increase its population in Namibia, and the mountain gorillas in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of Congo now residing in large swathes of protected forests.

Conservation measures will increase the area of protected forests, and save humans from losing the critical functions played by other species in our day-to-day activities, because the measures will reduce the pace of climate change and  the rate at which carbon dioxide pours into the atmosphere, ultimately slowing down the speed of species extinction.

What to Eat

Vegan food from Namibia, Credit, X.com