The Asiatic Cheetah

The Asiatic Cheetah

The very last place on the planet where this species still exists, five decades of poncing around and possibly only a few more years until it's finally gone. This disaster was allowed, if not willfully caused by the US. Government, the Iranian Government who didn't exactly do too much to help, the US. nut growers, the nut retailers and by no means least the WWF. who has not done much to prevent this from happening.

There are those who have worked tirelessly to keep this species going but sadly this was never going to be enough. What should've happened but never did, was a large swathe of land fenced off, wardened and with a captive breeding programme initiated. The surviving animals live trapped or darted and placed into this enclosure where numbers could've built up to a sustainable population.

Another but not unrelated issue I'd tried to get across, only to have it fall on deaf ears at every turn, was Pistachios, once a $multibillion industry operating right across the entire region from the Bosporus in Turkey, Iran, right over to the foothills of the Himalayas in Afghanistan. Providing these countries with wealth and the locals with employment, giving the trees economic value and affording the native forests protection from all of the horrors such as felling, farming or nibbling from goats etc.

Without a world-market for Pistachios these forests are being shipped off to the saw-mills.

Wild Pistachios, Almonds, Olives and Pomegranates are all indigenous in this part of the world, the once thriving industries that protected the forests they are now all but gone and as a direct result the entire region is now open to desertification. The vast swathes of habitat that once covered the area are now severely fragmented and this has had a knock on effect for the insects, various Shrikes, Wild Hogs, Wolves and Bears, as well as being the last stronghold of the highly endangered Asiatic Cheetah.

For years now it has been almost impossible to buy Iranian Pistachios or Syrian Almonds from the shops. The US. having started wars or disagreements in most of these countries together with trade sanctions and everything else, were now busy, very busy as it happens, sealing the deal by flooding the nut market with their own homegrown Pistachios and Almonds literally pushing these original countries out of the world market.

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Only two female Asiatic cheetahs remain in wild in Iran

Conservationists say only two female Asiatic cheetahs are known to be alive in the wild in Iran, which hosts the last surviving population.

Asiatic cheetahs, also known as Iranian cheetahs, are a subspecies of the fastest animal on earth and classified as critically endangered, with fewer than 40 believed to remain in Iran.

As part of efforts to raise the animal’s profile, in the past decade cheetahs have been displayed on the national football team’s kit and on stamps, but it has become increasingly imperilled.

Tuesday was Iran’s national cheetah day, marking an event more than two decades ago when a cub named Marita survived an attack by a group of villagers in which his mother and two siblings were killed. Marita became a national symbol.

Morteza Eslami, head of the Iranian Cheetah Society (ICS), a Tehran-based NGO, said camera traps in areas with the most Asiatic cheetahs had seen just two females in recent months.

“The situation is very critical,” he said. “We have been monitoring the situation closely in the past five years and the population of female Asiatic cheetahs has significantly dropped.”

Delaram Ashayeri, an independent conservationist, said: “Unfortunately the number of female cheetahs has been dwindling.

In areas where camera traps have been operating for a long time … we are not seeing many female cheetahs or we’re seeing only carcasses.”

In the past 15 years, 48 cheetahs are believed to have died, seven from natural causes, 21 at the hands of farmers, 15 in car accidents and five as a result of hunting.

Of the two female cheetahs believed to be still alive, one is in Turan national park and the other in the nearby Miandasht reserve.

“In some of our other environmental areas we haven’t had any reports of female cheetahs for at least two years now, including in an area near the city of Yazd where only four male cheetahs survive,” Eslami said.

Two Asiatic cheetahs – a male, Koushki, and a female, Delbar – are held in captivity at Tehran’s Pardisan Park research centre. They have not yet successfully mated.

Eslami said the fate of Asiatic cheetahs was important because two other big cats, the Caspian tiger and Persian lion, had become extinct in Iran. The Caspian tiger is extinct worldwide; a small population of Persian lions remains in India.

ICS has launched an online petition calling on the president, Hassan Rouhani, to intervene, including to prevent the construction of new roads and mines close to the natural habitats, erect fences around existing roads, increase the number of conservationists and encourage greater participation of indigenous people.

Eslami said despite last year’s nuclear agreement which resulted in the removal of sanctions, Iranian conservationists still had limited access to international funding and equipment.

“I don’t want to sound pessimistic because if it wasn’t for the past work of conservationists, cheetahs would have become extinct by now, but despite the critical situation, we still have hope today,” Eslami said. “But more needs to be done.”

Focusing on Wildlife. http://focusingonwildlife.com/news/only-two-female-asiatic-cheetahs-remain-in-wild-in-iran/

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“More needs to be done,” they ain't kidding there.

The effects this had on the US.' own ecology is not without problems. The need to ship in truckloads of bees from one coast to the other on an annual basis. Their farming systems are now in such disarray with all the pesticides and GMO. crops, they're now having to carry their ecology around on the backs of trucks.

In an almond orchard in California's Central Valley, bee inspector Neil Trent pried open a buzzing hive and pulled out a frame to see if it was at least two-thirds covered with bees. Trent has hopped from orchard to orchard this month, making sure enough bees were in each hive provided by beekeepers. Not enough bees covering a frame indicates an unhealthy hive — and fewer working bees to pollinate the almond bloom, which starts next week across hundreds of thousands of acres stretching from Red Bluff to Bakersfield. "The bloom will come and go quickly," said Trent, who works for the Bakersfield-based bee broker Scientific Ag Co. "The question is, will the almond seeds get set? It depends if you have enough of a workforce of bees." That has growers concerned as nomadic beekeepers from across the country converge on the state with their semi-trucks, delivering billions of bees to the orchards for the annual pollination. Most almond trees depend on bees to transfer pollen from the flower of one tree variety to the flower of another variety before fertilization, which leads to the development of seeds.

California's orchards provide about 80 percent of the global almond supply. And with almond acreage increasing steadily in recent years, the bees must now pollinate 760,000 acres of trees. The number of bees needed is expected to increase as almond demand grows and orchards continue to expand. Already, more than half of the country's honeybees are brought to California at the end of February for almond pollination, which requires about 1.5 million hives from out of state, and another 500,000 from elsewhere in the state. Honeybees are preferred for commercial-scale pollination because they are social, build larger colonies than other bees, and their hives can easily be moved.

Bee brokers, beekeepers and almond growers around the state say there's a shortage of healthy honeybees for this year's pollination, especially after colony collapse disorder took a higher toll this winter. The disorder, in which honey bees suddenly disappear or die, wipes out thousands of colonies each year. The shortage has some growers scrambling for bees — even sub-performers — as trees are about to bloom, driving up bee prices again this year, to an all-time high of more than $200 per colony.

"There's definitely a shortage of strong bee colonies," said Joe Traynor, owner of Scientific Ag, which connects growers with beekeepers. "There is a problem covering all the acres of almonds in the state." Since it was recognized in 2006, colony collapse disorder has destroyed colonies at a rate of about 30 percent a year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Before that, losses were about 15 percent a year from pests and diseases. No one has determined its cause, but most researchers point to a combination of factors, including pesticide contamination, poor nutrition and bee diseases.

This year, experts say, the die-off has been as high as 40 to 50 percent for some beekeepers.

"We have smaller populations in the hives and higher winter losses," said Eric Mussen, a bee specialist at the entomology department of University of California, Davis. "Bees across the country are not in as good a shape as last year. When you stress them far enough, the bees just give in." This year, Mussen said, many bees did not get enough nutrition because a Midwest drought reduced forage. Conversion of pasture land to corn production for ethanol also reduced the number of flowers producing nectar. To compensate for forage loss, beekeepers fed bees more high-fructose corn syrup and other supplements. But such substitutes don't provide all the nutrients pollen does, Mussen said, malnourished bees are more susceptible to diseases.

Traynor, the bee broker, said he's been fielding phone calls from desperate beekeepers and growers who are short several thousand colonies — but he has no more good bees to offer them. The shortage will only get worse in the future, he said, as almond acreage grows. Having strong hives is critical, Traynor said, especially during rainy seasons, because bees have a short period of flight time when it's dry enough to pollinate. Fewer bees may not be able to reach all the blooms in time.

In recent years, the Almond Board of California, which represents more than 6,000 growers, has poured $1.4 million into bee health research. The group also worked on alternatives to reduce growers' reliance on honeybees, said Bob Curtis, associate director of agricultural affairs. One is the so-called "self-compatible" almond tree, which can set nuts using pollen transferred among its own flowers, thereby needing fewer bees.

The group also is urging growers to plant forage to help sustain bees before and after almond pollination. And it's exploring using blue orchard bees, which are solitary bees that do not live in hives but nest in small cavities, to augment the honeybee workforce. But building up those alternatives will take time. "It's tenuous right now," Curtis said. "We've got fewer bees.

And if something goes wrong with the weather, some growers could be in trouble MSN News

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Iran Urged By UN To Respect Environment Activists After Wildlife Campaigner's Death Officials say Kavous Seyed Emami used endangered Asiatic cheetah surveys as pretext for spying, but no evidence has been cited

The judiciary said Iranian-Canadian professor Kavous Seyed Emami was a Mossad agent who killed himself in prison, though his family dispute this. Photograph: AFP/Getty Images UN officials have urged the Iranian government to respect the work of environmental activists following the death in custody last week of wildlife campaigner, Kavous Seyed Emami.

Emami was buried on Monday, but several members of the organisation he founded, the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation, remain in jail and the deputy head of the Environmental Protection Organisation, Kaveh Madani, was detained for 72 hours over the weekend.

The judiciary said the Iranian-Canadian professor was a CIA-Mossad agent who killed himself in prison, though his family dispute this and have filed a complaint. The Canadian government has also pressed Iran for answers about the death of one of their dual-national citizens.

Officials say he and his associates used surveys of endangered Asiatic cheetahs as a pretext for spying in strategically sensitive areas.

No evidence for these allegations has been presented, prompting concerns that the revolutionary guard may have targeted the wildlife group because many of its members are binational figures who were educated in the west and have connections with international conservation groups.

“Environmental rights are human rights, and we all have an obligation to protect them. We are closely following these cases in Iran and urge that the work of environment defenders – both in Iran and around the world – be promoted and respected,” said UN Environment head, Erik Solheim.

Among those who have been detained for the past few weeks is Niloufar Bayani, who was research fellow with the Wildlife Conservation Society and supported UN Environment projects in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sudan and Haiti. She returned to Iran, her birthplace, last June to join the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation.

Another is US-Iranian businessman Morad Tahbaz, who was a CEO of the group.

One of the group’s core activities was to protect the Asiatic cheetah, which is one of the world’s most endangered species with only 50 left alive. This is a global conservation priority, but for hardline Iranian commentators, it is cause for suspicion.

Under a column headlined “Iranian Cheetah or Spy?”, the editor of Kayhan, Hossein Shariatmadari (who was appointed to his job by supreme leader Ali Khamenei) asked: “Why is the cheetah becoming such an important issue? Why are too many foreigners entering Iran for this? What are the real identities of US/European experts coming to Iran? And why are they so keen to search the deserts all day and night?”

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The Asiatic cheetah, which is one of the world’s most endangered species with only 50 left alive. Photograph: Vahid Salemi/AP Adding to the general mood of suspicion towards environmentalists, senior military adviser Hassan Firouzabadi said western intelligence agencies had a track record of using science, conservation and tourism as a cover for espionage. In one previous case, he claimed the country’s nuclear programme had been monitored using lizards that “could attract atomic waves”.

But others were doubtful. Gary Lewis, the former head of the UN mission in Iran tweeted that Emami was a “good man who loved #nature, and Iran. He was my friend and he will be missed.”

Sources who previously worked with Emami said the wildlife group may be a victim of Iran’s political turbulence as the environment rises up the political agenda and becomes a focus of feuding between rival power groups.

Concerns about drought were a trigger for a recent nationwide wave of protests that morphed into demands for an end to the political influence of clerics in Iran.

Government officials have also come under pressure. On Sunday, outspoken Iranian MP Mahmoud Sadeghi tweeted that Kaveh Madani, deputy head of Iran’s environmental protection agency, was among those detained at the weekend.

The sequence of events surrounding Madani’s detention and whether he is still under restriction is unclear. On Monday he posted a tweet calling for “an end to narrow-mindedness”, which appeared to confirm the news about him being targeted, but also signalling that had since been released.

Madani’s agency posted an image on Twitter that day which showed him participating in his department’s meeting with the German ambassador, and he separately later appeared on a live Instagram stream. But some have cast doubt, saying it is not clear if the authorities have entirely freed him.

His detention deals a blow to the administration of Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, which last year plucked him from his position at Imperial College London for the government job in a bid to show that it is opening up space for Iranians living abroad. The intelligence apparatus and the judiciary, which act independently of Rouhani’s government, on the other hand, are highly suspicious of such figures and have attempted to thwart the president’s efforts. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/15/iran-urged-by-un-to-respect-environment-activists-after-wildlife-campaignerdeath?CMP=share_btn_fb

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Five Wildlife Conservationists Held By Iran Could Face The Death Penalty Up to five conservation researchers accused of spying by the Iranian government could face the death penalty if convicted, according to multiple media reports.

Conservationists Niloufar Bayani, Taher Ghadirian, Houman Jowkar, Sepideh Kashani and Morad Tahbaz work with the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation on the conservation of different wildlife species in Iran, which includes monitoring animals such as Asiatic cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus venaticus) with camera traps.

The country’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which reports to the country’s supreme leader, alleges that the team used camera traps to collect information on Iran’s missile program, Science magazine reported Oct. 30.

The eight environmentalists from the PersianWildlife Heritage Foundation currently being held in Iran on charges related to espionage. Image © #anyhopefornature.

The five are among a group of eight — which also includes Amir Hossein Khaleghi,Abdolreza Kouhpayeh and Sam Rajabi from the same organization — being held in custody, according to The Guardian newspaper and other media reports. A sociologist and manager of the Persian Wildlife Heritage Foundation, Kavous Seyed Emami, who was arrested in early 2018, died under suspicious circumstances in February while in custody, observers said according to a report in The New York Times.

“This is a very bizarre charge to bring against environmental activists,” Tara Sepehri Far, a researcher with Human Rights Watch (HRW), told Science.

After months of confinement, five of the eight conservationists were charged with the crime of “sowing corruption on Earth” in early October, The Guardian wrote. (Science reported that only four of them — Bayani, Ghadirian, Jowkar and Tahbaz — were charged with the capital offense.)

“Nine months of pre-trial detention with no clear charges and no access to a lawyer is an unusually long time even by Iran’s dismal due process standards. It’s hard not to conclude that the authorities are struggling to gather enough evidence to charge them with any recognizable crime,” Sepehri Far wrote in a post for the Atlantic Council, a think tank, before the revelation of the charges.

The Asiatic cheetah, likely numbering fewer than 50 individuals, is found only in Iran. Image by Tasnim News Agency via Wikimedia Commons (CC 4.0).

She said an investigation at the behest of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani did not find that the accused environmentalists were spies, which put them at the center of a “domestic power struggle” with hard-liners in the judiciary and the Revolutionary Guard.

If convicted, the environmentalists could face sentences ranging from six months up to the death penalty.

7 “It is hard to fathom how working to preserve the Iranian flora and fauna can possibly be linked to conducting espionage

against Iranian interests,” a group of experts calling on the Iranian government to have the charges dropped said in a statement from the United Nations Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.

Jon Paul Rodríguez, a biologist at the Venezuelan Institute for Scientific Research and chair of IUCN Species Survival Commission, highlighted the value of the work that the researchers had been doing.

“As far as I am aware, practically the only information we have on the Asiatic cheetah comes from camera traps,” he said.

Asiatic cheetahs likely number fewer than 50 individuals, based on a 2017 study co-authored by Jowkar, one of the people charged in this case, and the IUCN has considered the subspecies critically endangered since 1996.

Because cheetahs live at low densities, the traps represent a much more efficient and economical tool to get an accurate picture of their population. In Botswana in southern Africa, scientists have used camera traps to demonstrate to ranchers that a cheetah on their property isn’t as dangerous to their livestock as they might think.

The detentions and the charges leveled have rattled the international scientific community.

“IUCN is deeply alarmed by the charges,” Rodríguez said. First reported by Science, hundreds of scientists have signed a letter asking Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, to ensure a fair and “transparent” trial for the eight researchers. https://focusingonwildlife.com/news/five-wildlife-conservationists-held-by-iran-could-face-the-death-penalty/

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