Lion Conservation: Five Easy Ways To Help Lions

In the 1940s, there were an estimated 450,000 lions in the wild, worldwide.  Until recently, the estimate was between 100 and 200 thousand.  Now, shockingly, the number has been rumored as small as 20,000 lions in the wild.  This is due to the war that these animals constantly fight against the people living near them.  Lions account for a small fraction of livestock deaths, and yet the large majority of the blame falls on their shoulders.  The farmers' response to livestock killings is poisoning the meat of the carcasses.  When the lions eat the meat, they are poisoned and die.  There has also been a rise in poaching of lions.  During the 2010 World Cup of Soccer in South Africa, many a tourist came home to America with a lion trophy.  In response to all of this horrible news, many organizations have ignited efforts to save the big cats.  I am asking the readers of this blog to please do your part in the conservation effort for these amazing great cats.  Do not think that you have to go hunting for a place to do this though.  Listed below are some easy ways that you can do your part to help save lions.

1. Watch The Last Lions trailer on youtube.com.  This is a completely free way to help lions.  For every view of the video, National Geographic is donating ten cents for the Big Cat Initiative.  Here is the link to the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PoAcNdeEf_Y

2. Donate.  This can be in large or small amounts, and in many different ways.  You can adopt an animal from the World Wildlife Fund.  This can be done in $25, $50, and $100 allotments.  Based on what you donate, you receive a fitting gift.  The link to the adoptions can be found here: http://www.worldwildlife.org/gift-center/gifts/Species-Adoptions/Lion.aspx.

3. Another great place to donate is the charity found at http://www.lionconservation.org/photos.html  This is a group called Living With Lions, and it is dedicated to strengthening the relationship between the local African people and the lions that live nearby. 

4. The Lion Conservation Fund supports many different projects "that will determine the distribution and abundance of African lions in areas of great global conservation importance."  These projects are described in detail here: http://www.lionconservationfund.org/projects_home.html  On the website you can adopt an individual lion, sponsor an entire pride of lions, simply donate, or purchase a gift certificate.

5. The Kilimanjaro Lion Conservation Project is a fantastic project that tracks and collars lions in order to monitor their behavior patterns.  They are a division of Wildlife Direct, and you can donate to either the whole or the division on the website: http://kilimanjarolion.wildlifedirect.org/tag/lion-conservation/

These are five wonderful and easy ways to help the regal lions of the world.  Please take part in the conservation efforts on their behalf.  They are incapable of helping themselves, with the vast majority of human involvement in their lives being negative contact.  We are in charge of taking care of our beautiful planet, and part of that charge is taking care of the beautiful animals that inhabit it.  I urge you all to listen carefully, and you will hear the king's roar.

 

Photos from http://kilimanjarolion.wildlifedirect.org/tag/lion-conservation/

Photo of the Week: July 17, Ocelot

This is the Ocelot, one of the many great cats of the world.  The ocelot can be as long as three feet, and as tall as a foot and a half off of the ground.  They are solitary animals, usually only meeting up with each other to mate.  Although the meetings are somewhat rare, territorial disputes often produce fierce fighting which can be to the death.  The diet of the ocelot mainly consists of small mammals, such as rodents, rabbits, and opossums.  The natural habitat of the ocelot lies in Central and South America, but the cats have been seen as far north as Texas.  One famous ocelot was named Babou, and was the pet of the well known surrealist painter Salvador Dali.  

Photo from nationalgeographic.com

First Wild Fish Seen Using Tool

The fish seen above is the Blackspot Tuskfish.  These fish can be found off of the coast of Australia, and are named such due to their tusk-like front teeth.  This particular fish, however, was seen carrying cockles (a variety of shellfish) to a nearby rock, where it would repeatedly crack the shell in order to eat the fleshy parts inside.  The picture was taken in 2006 by professional diver Scott Gardner, but was just now published with the findings of the research on the fish.  Reviewers argued back and forth whether or not the fish was actually using a tool, since the classic definition of tool use was based on humans and chimpanzees.  If the research holds up, it would show that fish possess some since of cognitive thought.  Other animals to use tools include chimpanzees, dolphins, crows, and octopuses.  It is amazing to me to discover how truly intelligent many animals are.  Many times in the media, the human race is portrayed as being much more developed than our animal counterparts, but stories such as this prove that many different species of animals use the same methods in order to survive.  Perhaps our use of tools is more developed than bashing a shellfish against a rock, but in the end, both the human and the blackspot tuskfish are using tools. 

As this is the first post, I am open to suggestions about how to improve.  Also, any stories that you believe should be posted can be emailed to us at realmoftheconscious@gmail.com.  Thanks for reading, send on the suggestions and stories, and be sure to comment! 

Photo taken by Scott Gardner, found on nationalgeographic.com
Story found on nationalgeographic.com

Welcome

Welcome to the Realm of the Conscious, a blog designed to share current stories from the animal kingdom. These stories will include the latest in animal medicine, the discovery or rediscovery of species, breaking news in animal behavior, and any other article pertaining to the conservation, well-being, or care for animals. Many of these stories will appear on such websites as National Geographic and Discover. We hold no claim, in whole or in part, to these stories, and give full credit to the original authors. We also plan to have at least one Photo of the Week, and we also hold no claim to any of these, unless otherwise specified that the picture was taken by us. We are lovers of animals. We are conservationists. We are dog people, cat people, mammal people, fish people, bird people, reptile people. We are animal people. We are....United in the animal kingdom.