The Iberian lynx, once the world’s most endangered cat, has made a remarkable recovery from the brink of extinction, thanks to extensive and coordinated conservation efforts in Spain and Portugal, The Associated Press reported. In the early 2000s, the population of the lynx, scientific name Lynx pardinus, had dwindled to 62 mature individuals in the wild. Habitat loss, a precipitous decline in the population of European rabbits, their primary prey, from disease, and expanding human...
In what may yet come to be considered the rescue of the year, Oceanografic de Valencia, Georgia Aquarium, and SeaWorld collaborated with Kharkiv’s NEMO Dolphinarium to carry out a heroic evacuation from the embattled industrial city in northeast Ukraine. Two beluga whales, Plombir and Miranda, were rescued from Kharkiv and transported to the Oceanografic aquarium in Valencia, Spain. The complex, high-risk operation was necessitated by the growing threat to the city from Russian artillery fire,...
Health authorities in Europe have advised monkeypox patients who have pets, particularly rodents, to have them isolated in government laboratories or, as a last resort, euthanized. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) warned that such pets could become a reservoir of monkeypox, leading to the disease becoming endemic in Europe. The isolated animals are to be tested by PCR for exposure to monkeypox before their quarantine ends. “Rodent pets should ideally be...
