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Will elephants still roam earth in 20 years?
CNN ^

Posted on 04/30/2013 8:42:17 AM PDT by chessplayer

(CNN) -- At the start of the 1980s there were more than a million elephants in Africa. During that decade, 600,000 were destroyed for ivory products. Today perhaps no more than 400,000 remain across the continent, according to Samuel Wasser of the University of Washington, who is widely recognized as an authority on the subject.

If this level of killing continues, if elephants continue to be slaughtered for trinkets and statuettes, in 10 years' time most of Africa's elephants will be gone and an ineffable symbol of majesty and wonder -- and the linchpin in the ecology of an entire continent -- will have been consigned to oblivion.

(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: alarmism; elephants; everybodypanic; extinction; gaiaworship; junkscience; ohnoes
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Utterly tragic. Elephants have existed for a very long time in one form or another. Mastodons, wooly mammoths, todays elephants. Incredibly sad knowing that they will very soon be obliterated and will never again walk this planet. At least 25 thousand were slaughtered in 2012, and the rate of slaughter this year is even greater. And the more money more people in Asia get, the greater the demand for ivory. Elephants are very intelligent and understand the concept of mortality, and even understand the genocide being waged against them. An NPR special thinks 20 more years is far too optimistic and believes elephants will be extinct in less than 7 more years.
1 posted on 04/30/2013 8:42:17 AM PDT by chessplayer
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To: chessplayer

I guess ivory would be a good investment then.


2 posted on 04/30/2013 8:44:21 AM PDT by humblegunner
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To: humblegunner

No, they’ll fly like in Roger Dean posters.


3 posted on 04/30/2013 8:46:44 AM PDT by massgopguy (I owe everything to George Bailey)
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To: chessplayer

This is PETA horse-hockey. Elephants are like fleas in many places.

The best thing for elephants is to controllably hunt them. This means that there are ample funds to stop poachers (the real threat), and that herds are culled appropriately.

Economic freedom and property rights in Africa would help greatly.


4 posted on 04/30/2013 8:48:12 AM PDT by Atlas Sneezed (Universal Background Check -> Registration -> Confiscation -> Oppression -> Extermination)
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To: chessplayer

The GOP will be extinct by then, so they’re will be no need of that mascot....


5 posted on 04/30/2013 8:48:22 AM PDT by G Larry (Darkness Hates the Light)
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To: chessplayer

The GOP will be gone before elephants.


6 posted on 04/30/2013 8:48:37 AM PDT by bmwcyle (People who do not study history are destine to believe really ignorant statements.)
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To: chessplayer

“If this level of killing continues, if elephants continue to be slaughtered for trinkets and statuettes, in 10 years’ time most of Africa’s elephants will be gone”


Classic alarmist junk science.


7 posted on 04/30/2013 8:49:33 AM PDT by Atlas Sneezed (Universal Background Check -> Registration -> Confiscation -> Oppression -> Extermination)
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To: chessplayer

Republicans? Nope, they’ll be gone much sooner than 20 years.

Oh... the animal? They’ll be in zoos. It’s sad, but beyond my control. The animals I need... dogs for companionship, fish, chicken, pigs and cows for food, are all plentiful.


8 posted on 04/30/2013 8:49:39 AM PDT by brownsfan (Behold, the power of government cheese.)
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To: chessplayer

Sorry, it wasn’t NPR. It was National Geographic on PBS.

“If you watched the National Geographic special Battle for the Elephants on PBS, you’re probably concerned about the fate of one of Africa’s greatest natural treasures—and with good reason. Last year was devastating for elephants across Africa, with poaching-related deaths estimated to be at least 25,000. A rate that some experts say, if left unchecked, could lead to the extinction of the African elephant by 2020.”

http://www.care2.com/causes/will-african-elephants-be-extinct-in-ten-years.html

“Battle for the Elephants”

“The film tells the ultimate wildlife story — how the Earth’s most charismatic and majestic land animal today faces market forces driving the value of its tusks to levels once reserved for precious metals.”

http://www.pbs.org/programs/battle-elephants/

In Tanzania alone, 30 elephants are being slaughtered every day.


9 posted on 04/30/2013 8:52:26 AM PDT by chessplayer
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To: chessplayer
Will elephants still roam earth in 20 years?

I'll take "where my taxes are going for $1000"

is it bad that this is first thing that occurs to me when I see a title like this one?

10 posted on 04/30/2013 8:52:43 AM PDT by NativeSon ( Grease the floor with Crisco when I dance the Disco)
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To: chessplayer
Will elephants still roam earth in 20 years?

Only cyborg/zombie elephants.

11 posted on 04/30/2013 8:52:58 AM PDT by SIDENET
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To: chessplayer

As long as there’s no more RINOs...


12 posted on 04/30/2013 8:53:24 AM PDT by swampthang77
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To: chessplayer

Oh, fer pete’s sake! Trade in elephant ivory has been outlawed for how long now? Are we supposed to believe that roving hordes of ivory poachers are still decimating elephant populations?

Alarmist twaddle.


13 posted on 04/30/2013 8:53:30 AM PDT by IronJack (=)
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To: SIDENET

With frikkin’ laser beams.


14 posted on 04/30/2013 8:53:36 AM PDT by SIDENET
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To: brownsfan

Repubs/elephants are already gone. What we are left with is a RINO party.


15 posted on 04/30/2013 8:53:40 AM PDT by GrandJediMasterYoda (Someday our schools will teach the difference between "lose" and "loose")
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To: chessplayer

Ok, so do you pursue the present course which means criminalizing the ivory trade which makes it a rarity, pushing up the price and demand for a rarity.

Or does on try a supply side solution which would involve “elephant farms” where you breed them like cattle, increasing the supply, driving down prices and eliminating the cache of having a rare item ?


16 posted on 04/30/2013 8:54:29 AM PDT by staytrue
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To: chessplayer

This reminds me that I need to score some ivory grips for my Colt Python.


17 posted on 04/30/2013 8:54:51 AM PDT by SIDENET
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To: chessplayer

18 posted on 04/30/2013 8:55:11 AM PDT by Corporate Democrat
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To: chessplayer

I don’t know.......How old is Candy Crowley?


19 posted on 04/30/2013 8:56:24 AM PDT by GreenHornet
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To: chessplayer

Honeybees are carrying elephants off to their secret megahive in Antarctica but you didn’t hear it from me.


20 posted on 04/30/2013 8:58:59 AM PDT by cripplecreek (REMEMBER THE RIVER RAISIN!)
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