A couple of years ago I wrote about the extinction of the Baiji — or Yangtze River Dolphin — and now, as the BBC reports, it looks like another large inhabitant of the Yangtze is on the verge of following it, if it hasn’t already done so.
One of only two extant species of Paddlefish, the Chinese Paddlefish (Psephurus gladius,) which, with reported sizes up to 7m long, may also be the world’s largest freshwater fish has not been detected at all on a recent survey. The team do admit that it’s quite possible for isolated individuals to have escaped detection due to the sheer size of the area surveyed, but point out that the environment can no longer support a viable breeding population, and that unless some specimens can be caught in time to begin a captive conservation programme the species is doomed.
It’s depressing to be writing about the extinction of another large, ecologically important species so soon after the Baiji — doubly so since it was native to the same river system — and it’s no comfort at all to know that there will have been plenty of other, less-visible (but no less tragic) extinctions in the same period, or that this is unlikely to be the last.
Comments
There was this book written in the 90's called "Last Chance to See" by the late great Douglas Adams and Zoologist Mark Carwardine where they went and visited soon to be extinct animals one of which was the Baiji
it was fascinating and done in Adams typical style with scatterings of completely random stuff like for one animal, I forget which, he spent a good couple of pages thinking about how he could calculate the volume of their vaguely conical with the tip cut off shaped nests.
I understand the BBC has done a recent remake this year with Stephen Fry taking Adams' place
It was an interesting introduction for the young lad that I was back then to the whole concept of conservation with out the usual "You should be ashamed this is all your fault! Technology is teh evil! We must all go back to farming!" guilt trip jabbing you sometimes get just fascination with these wonderful and unfortunately rare animals and the potential loss seen through the lens of human knowledge.
They have the original radio series that the book was written from available to listen to on the BBC website http://www.bbc.co.uk/lastchancetosee/sites/radio/
I was going to say I had the audio book (which is fantastic) but that's easier