As you may be aware, not only is this week the 16th meeting of the Conference of the Parties of CITES, it is also Climate Week in the UK. The biggest climate change campaign in Britain, Climate Week aims to inspire us to create a more sustainable future through a range of activities.

Throughout the course of the week schools, businesses, charities, councils and many other organisations will run over 3,000 events attended by around half a million people interested in finding out more about the future of climate change and what we can do to safeguard against its impacts.

With such a wide range of events on offer there is bound to be something for everyone so do try to attend if you can. Not only will it be informative, by the sounds of it you will also have a lot of fun. Activities include test driving electric vehicles, growing your own food in community allotments, a green building show with a Climate Week Pledge Wall, swapping clothes, books, toys and DVDs, developing a Community Energy Plan and even an event at Manchester United hosted by none other than England football coach Gary Neville. There are too many to list but more information can be found on the Climate Week website.

Polar bears are dependent on sea ice for its survival, but climate change is causing drastic reductions in the extent of ice cover

If you are unable to attend any events near you (or, alas there are no events in your proximity), we’ll do our best in this blog to give you an overview of climate change and why it is so important for us to safeguard our wildlife and environment against it.

About climate change

Without wanting to be too accusatory, there is no doubt that climate change is caused by man-made impacts on our planet. You may have heard it referred to as ‘global warming’, due to the steady rise in the Earth’s temperature that is occurring. Both terms are correct, however they actually refer to different phenomena. Climate change refers to the changes in climate which arise as a result of the increasing global temperature. These can include changes in precipitation patterns, increased incidence of drought, heat waves and other extreme weather conditions. In essence, global warming does not mean that we will all have increasingly warmer weather; the planet’s steadily rising temperature will be associated with changes across the world in climate pattern, and more extreme and unpredictable weather. Some places may well become hotter, but some will become colder, and others wetter or drier.

Antarctic krill die due to ocean acidification

These changes in climate may not sound like much, but they are creating huge problems on a global scale for both wildlife and people. The severity of storms and floods are increasing, and ruthless droughts are on the rise. The acidity of our seas is rising, affecting species such as coral and krill and destroying marine food chains that ultimately maintain the balance of life in the oceans. The lack of arctic ice in the summer creates a dire situation for polar bears as well as compounding global warming because the ice would usually serve to deflect sunlight away from the planet. The increased heat absorbed due to the absence of this natural deflection in turn causes permafrost to thaw, releasing trapped methane gas. This gas, along with carbon dioxide released by the process of deforestation and the warming oceans both serve to increase what is known as the greenhouse effect; some gases trap and retain the sun’s heat giving rise to this phenomenon.

Rising sea levels could wash away hawksbill turtle nests and decrease nesting habitat

As we can see, this process is not pretty, and we’ve only scratched at the surface of what is happening in this blog. Mass extinction of wildlife is predicted in the near future, including species such as polar bears and emperor penguins that will lose their habitat to melting ice and rising sea levels. Colourful corals such as the Acanthastrea coral will die as a result of ocean acidification. Also affected are species that live and breed on low-lying remote islands, for example marine turtles like the giant South American, hawksbill and leatherback turtles. There are too many to name here, but you can check out more species that will be affected by climate change on ARKive.

Climate change is already having measurable impacts on coral reefs worldwide

So, even if it’s just spreading the word on climate change, will you do your bit this Climate Week?

Find out more about climate change, the species it affects and what we can do to mitigate the effects on our Climate Change topic page.

Download Climate Week resources from the Climate Week website.

Kaz Armour, ARKive Text Author

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The most accurate assessment yet of the consequences of commercial shark fishing estimates that around 100 million sharks are killed every year.

shark killed by fishermen, lying on beach

Shark warning

Ahead of the 16th meeting of the Convention on the International Trade in Endangered Species that runs from the 3rd to the 15th of March this year, researchers are again warning that sharks are in need of better protection. A new report, published in the journal Marine Policy, estimates the annual number of sharks killed by commercial fishing to be around 100 million, although the actual number could be anywhere between 63 million and 273 million.

The large range in these estimates is due to the poor quality of data available. However, the median estimate of 100 million is by far the most accurate to date. It is extremely difficult to gauge the actual level of shark fishing globally as many sharks are killed at sea and their bodies discarded without being included in official reports.

The oceanic whitetip shark is classified as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List and its fins are highly prized in international trade

Unsustainable exploitation

Commercial shark fishing is driven mainly by high demand for shark fin soup which is considered to be a delicacy in Asia. Sharks are often ‘finned’, which means their fins are removed, and the dead carcasses discarded at sea. However, they are also killed for sale of their meat, liver oil, cartilage and other body parts.

Although a ban on shark finning is in place in the European Union, Canada and the USA, it has not had the desired effect in terms of protecting vulnerable shark species. Fisheries have responded to the ban by no longer finning sharks at sea, instead keeping the carcasses, other parts of which can also be sold. The number of sharks killed has barely changed, the root cause of the problem has yet to be solved, and finning is still widely unregulated in many parts of the world.

The current rates of exploitation are vastly unsustainable and a number of vulnerable shark species are in decline. Sharks are slow to grow and reproduce; Boris Worm, one of the report’s authors from Dalhousie University in Halifax, says, “Biologically, sharks simply can’t keep up with the current rate of exploitation and demand. Protective measures must be scaled up significantly in order to avoid further depletion and the possible extinction of many shark species in our lifetime.”

Dead sharks are often discarded back into the sea once their fins have been removed

Calls for increased protection

Previous attempts to increase the protection of some species of shark have failed, but scientists are hopeful that this time increased trade controls will be introduced for species such as porbeagle, hammerhead and oceanic whitetip sharks. Proposals at this year’s CITES meeting suggest the listing of five shark species on Appendix II of the Convention, including three species of hammerhead shark, which would mean that international trade in these species should be carefully regulated.

Elizabeth Wilson, Manager of conservation charity Pew Environment says, “A simple vote ‘yes’ to support their listing could turn things around for some of the world’s most threatened shark species. Countries should seize this opportunity to protect these top predators from extinction.”

Proposals suggest increased trade restrictions on five shark species, three of which are hammerheads

The number of sharks caught between 2000 and 2010 has not changed significantly, and as a result there are fears that some shark populations will crash as commercial fisheries continue to meet demands. Trade in manta ray species is also increasing, which has led to a decline in the numbers being recorded and is also having an effect on the tourism industry. Divers pay large sums of money to view manta rays in the wild, and their decline could have massive impacts on the tourist industry in places such as Mozambique, where there has already been an 86% decline in manta rays.

Trade has increased in manta ray species, causing population decline

“We want to see better protection for sharks and will be pushing for this strongly at CITES next week. I am keen to see trade controls introduced for vulnerable and endangered species like porbeagle, hammerhead and oceanic whitetip sharks and manta rays,” says the UK environment minister, Richard Benyon.

 Read more on this story at BBC – Shark kills number 100 million annually, research says, and The Guardian – 100 million sharks killed each year, say scientists

View photos and videos of porbeagle, hammerhead and oceanic whitetip sharks on ARKive.

Kaz Armour, ARKive Text Author

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Ctenella coral (Ctenella chagius)

Species: Ctenella coral (Ctenella chagius)

Status: Endangered (EN)

Interesting Fact: Ctenella chagius is the only coral species in the Meandrinidae family to occur in the Indian Ocean rather than in the Caribbean Sea.

Ctenella chagius forms hemispherical colonies which are green, cream or light brown and have wavy ridges across their surface. As in other corals, the colonies of this species are composed of numerous small, anemone-like animals known as polyps. The polyps secrete a hard skeleton which over many generations helps to form a coral reef. Ctenella chagius is found only in the Chagos Archipelago in the western Indian Ocean, where it lives on reef slopes and in lagoons at depths of up to 45 metres.

Like other corals, Ctenella chagius is threatened by climate change, which is likely to cause increased sea temperatures and more frequent, damaging storms. Rising carbon dioxide levels are also making the ocean more acidic, making it harder for corals to produce their hard skeleton, while other threats to corals include human development, overfishing, pollution and invasive species. Fortunately, much of the range of Ctenella chagius is now protected in the world’s largest marine reserve, the Chagos Archipelago Marine Protected Area. This area now needs to be effectively enforced, and further research is needed into Ctenella chagius and the threats it faces.

Find out more about conservation in the Chagos Archipelago at the Chagos Conservation Trust.

Find out more about coral conservation at Reef Check and The Coral Reef Alliance.

See images of Ctenella chagius on ARKive.

Corals feature in ARKive’s new online game – play Team Wild here!

Liz Shaw, ARKive Text Author

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The leatherback turtle is disappearing from its most important nesting sites in the western Pacific, according to a new study.

Female leatherback turtle on nesting beach

The study found that the number of leatherback turtle nests in the Bird’s Head Peninsula of New Guinea has dropped by a staggering 78% in the last 30 years. These beaches account for three-quarters of the western Pacific’s nesting leatherback turtles, meaning this decline could have serious consequences for the future of the species in the Pacific Ocean.

“Sea turtles have been around about 100 million years and survived the extinction of the dinosaurs but are struggling to survive the impact of humans,” said Thane Wibbels, one of the researchers.

Fishermen holding a dead, captured leatherback turtle

Leatherback threats

The leatherback turtle is the largest of the world’s turtles, and is listed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List. Like all sea turtles, this species faces a range of threats, including entanglement in fishing gear, boat strikes, harvesting of its eggs by humans, and predation of its eggs by feral dogs and pigs. In addition, the leatherback turtle also accidentally consumes plastic bags, mistaking them for its jellyfish prey.

Climate change is also a serious threat to the leatherback turtle. Rising sea levels and increasingly frequent and violent storms may erode nesting beaches and destroy nests, while changing ocean currents are likely to affect the turtle’s prey.

Feral dogs are a threat to leatherback turtles, digging up and eating their eggs

The gender of leatherback turtle hatchlings is determined by the temperature at which the eggs are incubated, so warmer sand is likely to produce more females, skewing the species’ sex ratio. In addition, warmer temperatures have been known to cause abnormalities in hatchlings, and to affect the health and development of the young turtles.

In comparison to the Atlantic Ocean, where several nesting populations of leatherback turtles have increased in recent years, the status of the species in other oceans is of greater concern.

“The leatherback is one of the most intriguing animals in nature, and we are watching it head towards extinction in front of our eyes,” said Wibbels.

Leatherback conservation

Conservationists have begun programmes to move leatherback turtle nests to more sheltered and shaded areas, where the eggs will be cooler, in the hope of increasing the success rate of hatchlings.

Leatherback turtle hatchlings face many perils, and very few survive to adulthood

The leatherback turtle is legally protected throughout most of its range, and a variety of other conservation measures are underway to help save this impressive marine reptile. For example, the attachment of Turtle Excluder Devices (TEDs) to fishing nets to reduce bycatch of turtles has been recommended.

However, much still needs to be done to save this marine giant. According to the researchers, a range of conservation measures need to be implemented at nesting beaches and in national and international waters if the decline of the Pacific’s last remaining leatherback stronghold is to be reversed.

Read more on this story at Mongabay – Leatherback sea turtles suffer 78 percent decline at critical nesting sites in Pacific.

Read about our recent Twitter turtle takeover.

View photos and videos of turtles on ARKive.

Liz Shaw, ARKive text author

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The world’s oldest known wild bird, a Laysan albatross known as ‘Wisdom’, has surprised scientists by producing a chick at 62 years old.

Laysan albatross pair with chick

Scientists had thought that female albatrosses, like other birds, became infertile and stopped producing chicks in later life. However, Wisdom hatched a healthy chick on 3rd February, and may have produced as many as 35 chicks in her long lifetime. Most Laysan albatrosses only live to around half her age.

“It blows us away that this is a 62-year-old bird and she keeps laying eggs and raising chicks,” said Bruce Peterjohn, chief of the Bird Banding Laboratory at the U.S. Geological Survey Patuxent Wildlife Research Center. “We know that birds will eventually stop reproducing when they’re too old. The assumption about albatrosses is it will happen to them, too. But we don’t know where that line is. That, in and of itself, is pretty amazing.”

Like other albatrosses, the Laysan albatross mates for life

It is possible that some of the other albatrosses on the Midway Atoll are 60 years old or more, as their tracking bands have sometimes fallen off and left researchers unable to identify them. Albatrosses mate for life, and it is likely that Wisdom has had to find a new, younger mate at some point in her life.

To the moon and back

Wisdom nests on Midway Atoll in the Pacific Ocean, and incredibly is likely to have flown up to 4.8 million kilometres since she was first given a leg tag by scientists monitoring the birds in 1956.

The U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), which is performing the monitoring, said that this astonishing distance equates to “four to six trips from the Earth to the moon and back again with plenty of miles to spare”.

Laysan albatrosses in flight

Albatrosses under threat

Wisdom is one of the lucky ones – albatrosses face a variety of threats and many are threatened with extinction. Laysan albatrosses were heavily exploited for their feathers in the first half of the 20th century, but one of the main threats to albatross species today is being caught and drowned in long-line fisheries.

Many species are also under threat from introduced predators such as cats and rats, which prey on the adult birds as well as their eggs and chicks.

Plastic debris is an additional threat to these large marine birds, and is often accidentally swallowed. Shockingly, an estimated 4,500 kg of plastic is thought to be mistakenly fed to albatross chicks by their parents each year. The plastic debris does not kill the chick immediately, but instead stops it from eating.

Watch ARKive’s Human Impacts video to find out more about the impacts of plastic waste on the Laysan albatross.

Dead Laysan albatross with plastics in its stomach

Read more on this story at The Guardian – Albatross astonishes scientists by producing chick at age of 62.

Find out more about albatross conservation at Save the Albatross and WWF – Albatross.

View photos and videos of albatrosses on ARKive.

Liz Shaw, ARKive Text Author

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