Too many people think of elephants as just some animal that have an exhibit at the local zoo. What we fail to realize is their importance in our ecosystem and their declining population. Today's elephants are forced to face two growing threats: habitat loss and ivory trade.
It seems that nowadays the only people who see the value in elephants are poachers. Poaching is the illegal killing, capturing, or hunting of an animal. These poachers are after the ivory from the elephant’s tusks to make jewelry, or they’re even just competing with other hunters to see who can capture the biggest elephant to win a "friendly" bet, which is honestly sickening if you just think about it. The poachers are in it in order to make some big bucks. Nowadays, poachers will smuggle the ivory from the elephant's tusks through the same networks used to smuggle other highly illegal drugs. All and all, these growing practices are truly just fueling
organized crime and insecurities. The Save The Elephant Foundation has actually found out that the elephant population is at a declining rate of
2-3% a year; however, let's put that in perspective. Just from the years 2012-2013, an estimated
100,000 elephants were murdered solely for their ivory, which then leaves a remaining
500,000 elephants.
You would think with statistics like this, it would be easy to convince the people to stop killing, right? Wrong. There are actually organizations out there such as Hunters Against PETA who support the poaching. They believe that hunting is a right that our forefathers died for. I do believe that we have the right to hunt, at least when it comes to hunting for a source of food, although hunting
animals that are endangered for game is completely different and just out-right wrong.
But it gets even better, and by better, I really mean worse. Not only do these elephants get threatened with ivory trade, but we’re also pushing them off their habitats. We humans invade their homes to use their land for farming and infrastructural development. We force them into small, disconnected patches of land, while separating them from their families at the same time. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad we’re able to use this land for advancements in farms, roads, railways and pipelines; however, we are forcing these elephants into fragmented habitats where they go for long periods of time with
limited amount of food and resources. This soon causes soil erosion due to overgrazing, and we’re minimizing the amount of breeding opportunities along with the genetic diversity throughout the population.
Like I said at the beginning of this article, elephants do actually perform an important role in their ecosystem. During dry seasons, elephants are able to dig for water, which not only provides them with some drinking water, but other animals in their habitat as well. Then there are forest elephants that create gaps in vegetation whenever they eat, which creates pathways for smaller animals and allows new plants to grow in place. Elephants are also key to when it comes to helping trees disperse their seeds–there are even certain tree species that depend primarily on elephants to disperse their seeds. When these elephants leave behind piles of feces, these piles soon become deposited and the seeds from the vegetation they’ve earlier consumed become sewn and grow into grasses, bushes and trees. This actually helps boost the country's economy and the biodiversity or their ecosystem.
Due to both habitat loss and ivory trade alone, the elephant population has depleted by a total of 90% in the past 50 years. Thankfully we have organizations such as Save The Elephant Foundation, SOS Elephants, SAFE and Ivory Ella who are working toward protecting the wildlife conservation of elephants. There are plenty of projects you’ll be able to help out with by simply spreading the word and sending in donations as well; below are some links for you guys to check out all of their pages to read up on their different campaigns!
Save The Elephant: http://savetheelephants.org/
SOS Elephants: http://www.soselephants.org/
SAFE: http://saveafricaselephants.com/
Ivory Ella: http://ivoryella.com/
Due to both habitat loss and ivory trade alone, the elephant population has depleted by a total of 90% in the past 50 years. Thankfully we have organizations such as Save The Elephant Foundation, SOS Elephants, SAFE and Ivory Ella who are working toward protecting the wildlife conservation of elephants. There are plenty of projects you’ll be able to help out with by simply spreading the word and sending in donations as well; below are some links for you guys to check out all of their pages to read up on their different campaigns!
