Mountains Gorillas now “endangered” instead of “critically endangered”
 

Before she died in 1985, Dian Fossey predicted the species could go extinct by 2000.

Numbers have risen from 680 a decade ago to just over 1,000 today

“[The] Switzerland-based International Union for Conservation of Nature [has] changed the status of mountain gorillas from “critically endangered” to “endangered,” an improved if still-fragile designation, reflecting new survey data.

“It wouldn’t have happened without an intervention some biologists call “extreme conservation,” which has entailed monitoring every single gorilla in the rainforest, periodically giving them veterinary care — to clean infected wounds, for instance — and funding forest protection by sending money into communities that might otherwise resent not being able to convert the woods into cropland.”

https://apnews.com/71df4e97bcba43769bcaaa7c125e2cec

Nice article includes reporting about funding, tourism, local jobs, veterinary care.

I think the topic of discussion could be to highlight how multiple strategies and genres of knowledge create environmental, economic, and social change.

To raise the tension it might be worth mentioning that I saw this story from AP first thing on Facebook posted by Leonardo di Caprio (or by a social media admin of his page). :)

Well I'll be a monkey's ape's uncle...good news for a change

She was an odd unit, old Fossey.

Big ups for the love of the animals, but the rest was a bit nutty.

Who knew access to healthcare was so instrumental in preventing needless death?

I think I've read that Fossey said some superstitious things that later caused harm, but I can't recall what. Also might be conflating things with Rachel Carson. I think one was against GMOs (and used the anti-GMOer's traditional Argument from Ignorance), and the other was against chemicals and particularly DDT, and the reduction of the use of DDT in areas saw increases in deaths from malaria outbreaks where malaria had been eradicated.

I can't imagine what you would think was nutty in the article about Gorilla numbers increasing.

I think cullennz was applauding Fossey's gorilla preservation work but was also pointing out that Fossey was a violent racist alcoholic. She allegedly beat a poacher's testicles with stinging nettles and also kidnapped a local child for a time. In other words - she got along better with gorillas than she did with her fellow humans. That would be considered by most people as being "nutty".

Trump certainly doesn't.

The researchers need to identify the buck-toothed hick gorillas and prevent them from breeding. If they don't do that it's going to be trailers and dirt track racing up on the mountain.

:D

Very very good news. Every species is a treasure of the natural world, but as one of our closest relatives, with complex emotional lives, the extinction of Mountain Gorillas would be a particular tragedy, and they came so close.

They aren't out of the woods yet, but it's good to see that the situation has been improving due to the hard work of conservationists.

I see what you did there. :)

Ah, yep, thanks, looking back it doesn't appear to be a comment on the article.

It was a good article, and I was hoping he'd read it.

I hope not. Isn't that their natural habitat?