Good morning,
Today’s forecast for Whitewater calls for a sunny day with a high temperature of sixty-nine degrees.
Over at Wired, there’s a hopeful story entitled, “Third of ‘Extinct’ Mammals May Still Be Alive.” Mammals supposed extinct from habitat loss are more likely to have survived than mammals presumed extinct due to invasive species or hunting. Brian Switek writes that
Categorizing a mammal species as extinct has rested upon two criteria: It has not been seen for more than 50 years, or an exhaustive search has come up empty….
In order to determine how often extinct species had been rediscovered, University of Queensland scientists Diana Fisher and Simon Blomberg created a dataset of 187 mammal species that have been reported extinct, extinct in the wild, or probably extinct since 1500, as well as those which have been rediscovered. They also looked at historical data on the threats that caused species to become extinct — or brought them close to it — including habitat loss, introduced species and overkill by humans.
It turns out that rumors of the extinction of more than a third of these species have turned out to be premature, the scientists report in Proceedings of the Royal Society B Sept. 29. At least 67 species — a little more than a third of those presumed to be extinct — were later found again. And in most cases, these were animals that had been hardest hit by habitat loss.
