Rewilding is an exciting, new narrative of recovery and hope
by Prerna Singh Bindra on 8 February 2019

• Rewilding is the reintroduction of missing, locally extinct plants and animals to a landscape, which has the potential to restore ecosystems.
• A recent conference in the U.K. discussed the various aspects of rewilding with an aim to set a visionary roadmap inspired by stories and messages of hope from diverse geographies and a spectrum of projects.
• For rewilding to be successful on a large scale, there has to be consensus in its favour, and the process needs to be consultative, inclusive and transparent with government and policy support.
• In her commentary on rewilding, Prerna Singh Bindra compares stories from different regions and India and opines that India must continue its protection of wildlife and indeed take the lead in conservation.
  

“But without bringing in predators how do you control the deer population – which at over 1.5 million is believed to the highest since the Ice Age in the United Kingdom?” The question was posed at the recent Rewilding Conference held in Cambridge, England in a talk by author Isabella Tree on the successful rewilding of the 3,500-acre family estate Knepp in West Sussex.
Paradoxically, in a conference to bring back nature, the answers to contain the deer, which is degrading landscapes by overgrazing meadows and consuming young trees, were anthropogenic — culling, hunting and consumption of venison.

Not predation by the carnivorous cat, lynx, that once lived wild in the U.K. about 1,300 years ago, or wolves, that were hunted out by around the 17th century. But without introducing predators, who naturally check overpopulation of herbivores and shape the landscape, is it rewilding in the truest sense of the term?
At the conference, author and environmentalist, George Monbiot addressed, literally, the elephant in the room, by announcing, “We, in Britain, live in an elephant adapted ecosystem,” and that “I want them back, even if the response (to this) is shall we say, muted.”

Astounding as it may seem, 40,000 years ago, not very long in geological terms, straight-tusked elephants — closely related to the Asian elephants in India — were part of the European ecosystem. In fact, if your London itinerary included the popular Trafalgar Square, it might interest you to know that you likely walked over the bones of now-extinct elephants, lions and hippos (the kind that still live in Africa), which were unearthed when Trafalgar Square was excavated in the 19th century.

Elephants need vast landscapes and as forests shrink, they increasingly cross paths with humans, which sometimes results in conflict. For instance, in India some 400 people are killed annually by elephants, which, in turn, are routinely chased, harried, injured and killed in retaliation for loss of crops, life – or for their presence in human habitation.

Elephants are not really part of the vibrant rewilding debate in Europe. On a viability scale of 10, Monbiot rates it a low ‘2’ for reintroduction in the U.K., but they raise vital questions: What are the animals we seek to rewild, and further, is our vision limited to only rewilding animals we want to? How far back in time do we go when we are considering rewilding locally extinct animals? Is rewilding feasible in degraded, destroyed ecosystems, and in a crowded, hungry planet? Does it conflict with interests of local communities and the current paradigm of development and growth? Indeed, what is rewilding?



A 2006 image of deer on the Knepp Estate in Sussex. Photo by Shazz/Wikimedia Commons.

Rewilding has been described as reintroducing the missing, locally extinct plants and animals to a landscape, restoring ecosystems. It is also about “abandoning the ethos of human dominion over nature,” as feminist icon, author and conservationist Germaine Greer noted in her keynote address at the conference.
It is about reversing damage to ecosystems, restoring nature. It is certainly not merely planting trees, or the futile notion of “compensating” the loss of old growth forests by planting new trees, which seems to be the way of the world, including in India where destroying forests for infrastructure and industry is legally permissible when ‘compensated’ with planting a new forest.

Rewilding is setting aside the clock and abiding by nature’s time. It demands patience. The Knepp farm in Sussex took seed 17 years ago, while on the other side of the world, at the edge of the Thar desert in Jodhpur, India, the ecological restoration of the Rao Jodha Desert Rock Park was initiated in 2006. Both projects are ongoing. Rewilding cannot heed government deadlines. The stupendous effort to restore the ecology of the denuded Aravalis, one of the world’s most ancient mountain ranges, in the Aravali Biodiversity Park in urban Gurgaon in northern India has had to battle with impatient bureaucrats who prefer “fast growing trees”— even if exotic — which would yield rapid results, in time to meet annual targets, and the next budget.

Rewilding projects may take decades, or even have a 250-year vision, like the project to restore keystone species in the Scottish Caledonian forest, that transcends generations. The seeds, though, must be sown now, to breathe life into damaged, dying ecosystems. In the era of the Sixth Extinction and the bleak landscape of conservation, rewilding is an exciting, new narrative of recovery and hope.

The two-day conference organised by Cambridge Conservation Forum discussed many such issues, sparked contentious debates, set a visionary roadmap and offered an interesting mix of remarkable stories and messages of hope from diverse geographies and a spectrum of projects. The pioneering Knepp project transformed an intensively aggressively farmed land to a hotspot for nightingales and rare turtle doves, nesting peregrine falcons, wild boar, deer; and has the U.K.’s biggest breeding population of purple emperor butterflies and all of its owl species.

The reintroduction of one of the largest birds of prey—the Golden Eagle in southern Scotland, where populations are precariously low at two to four breeding pairs.  Founder of ‘Trees for Life’, Alan Watson told his inspiring story of rewilding 10,000 acres of Dundreggan in Scotland, part of a landscape scale project to restore the beleaguered Caledonian Forest to its former glory. This is part of an ambitious network Rewilding Europe, which has projects across eight landscapes and 10 countries including those that transcend borders such as the effort to rewild the Oder Delta across Poland and Germany.

Not all projects need to be on a grand scale. Germaine Greer’s U.K. project—she has also restored 70 acres of Gondwana Rainforest in Australia—The Mills, is a small, a three-acre site in Great Chesterford, Essex. In India, conservationists Poonam and Harsh Dhanwatey invested in a degraded seven-acres land in the village Ghosri, that formed a vulnerable stretch connecting two parts of the Tadoba Tiger reserve, Maharashtra, and dedicatedly restored it, working with the locals to secure the area. That was in 2000, and today, it is a lush forest that provides safe passage to tigers, bears, leopards, sambar deer, wild dogs and other wild animals.

Not all projects were lavishly funded either. Projects like the one in Ghosri, or a restoration programme in the 100-acre Jabarkhet Nature Reserve, in the lower Himalayas, close to Mussoorie, where the hills have been ravaged by real estate and other development, are driven by the urge to conserve and heal the land. They were initially self-funded before business models like low-impact tourism were developed to sustain it. Many individual efforts are done without expectations, motivated, as Greer says, “to give what wildlife needs most — space.”

Therein lies the crux of the rewilding debate: Is there room to rewild? Does it have wide support? In the case of predators the answer, most times, is “no”, more so in the U.K., which Monbiot points out has been “particularly anomalous, even as we have lost more of our large mammals than most countries.”  In fact, the U.K. ranks an abysmal 189th out of 218 countries assessed for “biodiversity intactness.”

In Ireland, rewilding backfired badly. Tragically. The first white-tailed eagle fledgling to be released – as part of a reintroduction effort – was shot dead. A survey, explained David Bavin of the Vincent Wildlife Trust, to asses people’s attitudes to the introduction of pine martens, who may predate on poultry and game birds, revealed a clear, univocal voice of opposition. The good news is such attitudes can change and vital to any reintroduction effort is engagement with local stakeholders. The pine marten project saw eventual success, with evidence of breeding in the population in Wales.

In any reintroduction effort, the anticipated human-predator conflict is the most difficult challenge. For instance, in Scotland the efforts to introduce the Eurasian lynx have been long-resisted due to fears of it preying on livestock, though these situations are rare.

Quote: The 200-odd lynx in Switzerland, for instance, may cause the loss of 20-50 livestock animals, but by preying on over 12,000 deer annually, it allows the regeneration of meadows and woodlands.

As apex predators, wolves have enormous benefits, their presence triggers ‘trophic cascades’— stimulating the growth of several other animal species, enriching biodiversity and ecosystems, as the famous Yellowstone National Park project showed.

There is no ecological reason why wolves can’t live in the U.K. – there is enough habitat and wild prey.  Yet, the idea of bringing back wolves is bad PR for rewilding. So, the much-maligned, misunderstood canid has taken matters in its own hands and has begun to rewild itself! With the protective cover of the European Union’s legislation, the gray wolves are returning to their ancient haunts: Portugal, Sweden, Italy, France and Germany.

Interestingly, the opposition is not only the genuine concerns of farmers for livestock-even stronger is the hunting lobby which fears the off-take of game by predators. The U.K., and much of Europe’s reluctance to welcome predators in their landscape puts into perspective the situation of countries like India (and others in Asia and Africa) where the poorest of populations bear the brunt of escalating human-wildlife conflict—depredation of crops, loss to livelihood and life.

Quote:India has 52 of the 226 carnivores on earth plus mega-herbivores like rhinos and elephants.

There is an uncomfortable whiff of the “NIMBY” (Not In My Backyard) syndrome: we want to conserve predators, but not in our backyard. India must continue its protection of wildlife, indeed take the lead in conservation, but the developed world must follow suit.

Evidently, for rewilding to be successful, to move beyond individual action, there has to be a consensus in its favour, and the process needs to be consultative, inclusive and transparent. It needs government support and needs to be part of local, national and international policy.


Native plants nursery in Rao Jodha Desert Rock Park, Jodhpur. Photo by T.R. Shankar Raman/Wikimedia Commons.

An Oxford University professor, E. J. Milner-Gulland outlined such a strategy calling for “Biodiversity loss to be treated with the same seriousness as climate change, and the need for a new global deal for nature; that is equitable and adaptive to different countries.”

Policy support at the local level is important.  For instance, points out Greer, “If a six-lane superhighway were to skirt The Mills, its wilderness will be destroyed. Rewilding cannot be in isolation.”  It reminds one of Panna Tiger Reserve in central India, where tigers went extinct in 2009. In a remarkable effort by the government, tigers were translocated here, strictly protected and monitored and today it has over 40 tigers that are now populating the "Panna" landscape. Similar is the Sariska Tiger Reserve Story.

The tragic irony is, the same government is now planning to construct a dam inside the reserve as part of the national river-linking project, which will destroy a third of the area— drowning its own efforts and possibly wiping out the tigers.

Quote:Papikonda National Park (Papi Hills) which is a Tiger reserve is located in East Godavari and West Godavari districts of my Andhra Pradesh state, covering an area of 1,012.86 km2 (391.07 sq mi). The Polavaram irrigation project once completed will submerge the national park.  It is an Important Bird and Biodiversity area and Tiger Reserve home to endangered species of flora and fauna. No part of Papikonda remains outside East and West Godavari districts after 2014 and after the construction of Polavaram Dam. Papikonda national park was initially notified as a wildlife sanctuary in 1978. It was upgraded to a national park in 2008. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papikonda_National_Park]

The vital ingredient for rewilding is not just the physical space that the animals need for their survival, it is room in the human heart.
Before we rewild the country and the continent, we need to rewild our hearts.

It needs commitment, and there is no better story to illustrate this than that of Jadav Molai Payeng, an unschooled Mishing tribal. Distressed by the severe denudation of the riverine island – Aruna Sapori – where he lived, adjacent to Assam’s Kaziranga National Park, Payeng at 16 started to plant grasses, shrubs and trees, native to this region, favoured by wildlife.

Three decades later, the island is a dense 500 hectares forest and a refuge to rhinos when the lowlands flood, elephants stranded in human habitation, and the occasional tiger, among other animals. Payeng stated that protecting and planting forests is the key to prevent damage and erosion from the increasingly frequent floods. “If we all do it, no more global warming”, he said.

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Quote:Read the Mongabay piece on Jadav Payeng’s incredible Mulati Kathoni “people’s forest”.

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His words are echoed in the Babbage Theatre in Cambridge by Monbiot, presenting the most pressing case for rewilding: an effective solution for climate change, “It is imperative to revive thriving ecosystems—it offers hope where hope is missing in the face of catastrophic ‘Climate Breakdown’,” a term he prefers to use as against the “feeble” ‘Climate Change’.

‘”Wildlife biodiversity is the key to a healthy, thriving forest. For example, elephants shape ecosystems, they are crucial distributors of seeds, regenerating forests, which sequester carbon; other large herbivores do similar services. Natural climate solutions — conserving existing ecosystems, improving the ecological quality of existing forests, grasslands, wetlands, mangroves, can deliver up to 37 percent of the emission reduction targets by 2030.”

Wildlife conservation, rewilding, restoring wild habitats should be at the centre of the climate talks, not at the margins. Rewilding, is not about us saving wild species, restoring wild lands, it is about the wilds saving us.

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Quote:Read more in Mongabay-India about efforts in India to bring back populations of animals like the pygmy hog, sangai deer and gharials from the brink of extinction.

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Banner image: The last wild population of sangai deer in Manipur. Photo by M. Ningombi.
Article published by Aditi  
Biodiversity, Conservation, Wildlife

https://india.mongabay.com/2019/02/08/co...-and-hope/


Likewise, Cheetah and Lion Reintroduction "must" be done in India.

Black leopard in Africa after 100 years!



To read full post with link to video footage by @Pckts on Bigcats News:

Any info on this guy...more so than what the video tells us???  you can hit the CC for the close captioning....has it in english

Thread for posting on Bovines & Antelopes who got no specific thread. 

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The view!

Photo by @ragulankathirnathan
I went to india without any expectation except capturing a nilgiri tahr standing on the cliff, got it and this nilgiritahr tahr just had the deep valley in front stil he was courageous to stand on the cliff.
Ps. White spots on the pics are rain drops.

The Nilgiri tahr (Nilgiritragus hylocrius) known locally as the Nilgiri ibex or simply ibex, is an ungulate that is endemic to the Nilgiri Hills and the southern portion of the Western Ghats in the states of Tamil Nadu and Kerala in Southern India. It is the state animal of Tamil Nadu. Despite its local name, it is more closely related to the sheep of the genus Ovis than the ibex and wild goats of the genus Capra.

Post stuff, pics and vids about Bovids......

There used to be regular updates on lion activity at the different parks and surrounding areas, and the prides/coalitions and their stories. Now there's only discussions about the size of lions in certain areas, which is not that interesting quite frankly.

Post data and media about only Deer family of Artiodactyla Order and genera... (not any post about antelopes which are similar in habit or appearance of Bovidae family with some differences)

Ok, I'll start with this video:

Yeah! Deers are friendly and Safe. right?

Hell No. They can be tough and defensive or aggressive sometimes with their hoofed front legs thrashing or beating to death by stampeding or goring with their large antlers...

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World wide distribution or range map of these ungulates...



chevrotains of tropical African and Asian forests are not usually regarded as "true deer" and form their own families: Moschidae and Tragulidae, respectively. Africa has only one native deer, the Barbary stag, a subspecies of red deer that is confined to the Atlas Mountains in the northwest of the continent. However, fallow deer have been introduced to South Africa.
Barbary stag like cervids and sus genus members evolved and entered from Europe's Iberian peninsula into North Africa. 





A Barabary Stag...
Australia has six introduced species of deer that have established sustainable wild populations from acclimatisation society releases in the 19th century. These are the fallow deer, red deer, sambar, hog deer, rusa, and chital. Red deer introduced into New Zealand in 1851 from English and Scottish stock were domesticated in deer farms by the late 1960s and are common farm animals there now. Seven other species of deer were introduced into New Zealand but none are as widespread as red deer.

https://teara.govt.nz/en/1966/mammals-in...ed/page-10


Deer live in a variety of biomes, ranging from tundra to the tropical rainforest. While often associated with forests, many deer are ecotone species that live in transitional areas between forests and thickets (for cover) and prairie and savanna (open space). The majority of large deer species inhabit temperate mixed deciduous forest, mountain mixed coniferous forest, tropical seasonal/dry forest, and savanna habitats around the world. Deer constitute the second most diverse family of artiodactyla after bovids. Differ from bovids in having antlers which shed and living instead of horns which are dead in tissue and permanent. Sexual dimorphism is quite pronounced – in most species males tend to be larger than females, and except for the reindeer, only males possess antlers.

Deer are also excellent jumpers and swimmers. Deer are ruminants, or cud-chewers, and have a four-chambered stomach. Some deer, such as those on the island of Rùm, do consume meat when it is available and most other deers eat bird eggs and chew on carcasses even of humans especially bones to meet their mineral requirements like calcium.


https://news.nationalgeographic.com/2017...mposition/



Deer are believed to have evolved from antlerless, tusked ancestors that resembled modern duikers and diminutive deer in the early Eocene, and gradually developed into the first antlered cervoids (the superfamily of cervids and related extinct families) in the Miocene. Eventually, with the development of antlers, the tusks as well as the upper incisors disappeared. Thus evolution of deer took nearly 30 million years. Biologist Valerius Geist suggests evolution to have occurred in stages. There are not many prominent fossils to trace this evolution, but only fragments of skeletons and antlers that might be easily confused with false antlers of non-cervid species. [Geist, V. (1998). Deer of the World: Their Evolution, Behaviour and Ecology (1st ed.) Mechanicsburg, Goss, R. J. (1983). Deer Antlers Regeneration, Function and Evolution]

*This image is copyright of its original author

Leptomeryx

*This image is copyright of its original author

Cervocerus novorossiae


The subfamily Capreolinae consists of 9 genera and 36 species, while Cervinae comprises 10 genera and 55 species. Hydropotinae consists of a single species, the water deer (H. inermis); however, a 1998 study placed it under Capreolinae. The following list is based on molecular and phylogenetic studies by zoologists such as Groves and Grubb.

SMALLEST: The Pudu Genus. (especially, Northern Pudu it reaches merely 32–35 centimetres (13–14 in) at the shoulder and weighs 3.3–6 kilograms (7.3–13.2 lb) followed by "Southern Pudu" species Pudu puda [Molina, 1782] lives in Chile, Chiloe Prov.)
Southern Pudu:

Body Length: 85 cm / 2.8 ft.
Shoulder Height: 35-38 cm / 14-15.2 in.
Tail Length: 8 cm / 3.2 in.
Weight: 9-15 kg / 20-33 lb.
Life span: 8-10 years.
Family group: Solitary.
Diet: Leaves, twigs, bark, buds, fruit, seeds.
Main Predators: Cougar, Magellan fox, Andes fox, small cats, eagle owl.
Simple spiked antlers which grow7-10 cm / 2.8-4 inches long, and are shed annually in July.


A southern pudu's fawn born May 12 at the Queens Zoo in New York City


LARGEST: (Extant) The moose (North America) or elk (Eurasia-don't confuse with wapiti) Alces alces is a member of the New World deer subfamily and is the largest and heaviest extant species in the Deer family. (especially, [i]Alces alces buturlini-[/i]-Chukotka moose or east Siberian moose matches, and maybe even surpasses, the Alaskan moose (A. a. gigas)--820 kg (1,808 lb), as the largest of the races and thus the largest race of deer alive. Bulls can grow up to 2.15 m (7.1 ft) tall and weigh between 500 and 725 kg (1,102 and 1,598 lb); females are somewhat smaller.


East Siberian Moose...



Alaskan Moose
                   (Extinct) The Irish Elk or Giant Deer †Megaloceros [i]giganteus[/i] Species (700 kg). Many scientists contend that the Irish elk succumbed to starvation and went extinct during the most recent ice age; however, fossils of M. giganteus uncovered in Siberia have been dated to approximately 7,000–8,000 years ago, a period characterized by warm temperatures.

This is just a brief summary. Read full details here:
https://www.un.org/press/en/2019/sc13677.doc.htm

Massive Displacement, Greater Competition for Scarce Resources Cited as Major Risks in Security Council Debate on Climate-Related Threats

REPORT from UN Security Council
Published on 25 Jan 2019

Quote:Climate change poses risks to international peace and security through massive displacement of people and increased competition for scarce natural resources, speakers told the Security Council today while expressing divergent views on what the 15-member organ can do about it.

Rosemary DiCarlo, Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, said the risks associated with climate-related disasters do not represent a scenario of some distant future but are already “a reality today for millions of people around the globe”.

Briefing during an open debate in which more than 80 Member States participated, she explained that climate change has heightened competition for diminishing land, forage and water resources in certain countries, fuelling tensions between herders and farmers, compounding socioeconomic exclusion and raising the chances of youth being recruited into armed groups.

Looking ahead, the United Nations will invest in certain actions, she said, noting that the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), in collaboration with practitioners from across and beyond the Organization, are developing an integrated risk-assessment framework to analyse climate-related security risks.  The Organization is also working to ensure that such analysis is better reflected in mandated reports and seeks to strengthen the evidence base to support the development of climate risk prevention and management strategies in the field.

Briefing via audio teleconference from Davos, Switzerland, UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner emphasized that climate-related disasters, conflict and insecurity all have catastrophic impacts on people and societies.  Noting that the World Economic Forum’s annual Global Risks Report has just been released in Davos, he said that it spotlights climate change mitigation measures as one of the world’s top priorities today.

Describing climate change as a risk multiplier that exacerbates already existing challenges, he warned that without swift action to address it, more than 140 million people in sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America and South Asia will be forced to migrate within national borders by 2050.  The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals provide a chance for countries to leverage actions leading to real change, he added.

Pavel Kabat, Chief Scientist of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), spoke on behalf of that body’s Secretary-General, highlighting findings from the newly published Global Risks Report 2019, which indicate that extreme weather, natural disasters, climate change and water crises are the top four existential threats to the planet, demonstrating significant links with other shocks and impacts on peace and security as well as sustainable development.  
Noting that it has been about 4 million years since the Earth last experienced a concentration of carbon dioxide comparable to the current record levels, he cited WMO findings that the previous four years have been the warmest, characterized by high-impact weather events bearing the hallmark of climate change, he said climate change affects security in a multitude of ways, rolling back gains in access to food, heightening the risks of wildfire and increasing the potential for water-related conflict.

Expressing hope for closer collaboration with the Security Council, he said WMO stands ready to provide authoritative information for decision-making, adding that the agency also supports the Council’s diplomatic business in areas appropriate to the understanding and analysis of peace and security threats.  As such, WMO is increasing its support to help the United Nations Operations and Crisis Centre provide expert information and assist the leadership in making informed, strategic decisions, he said.

Lindsay Getschel, a research assistant with the Stimson Center’s Environmental Security Program, said the Security Council can take three concrete steps to reduce the security impacts of climate change.  First, it should adopt a resolution formally recognizing climate change as a threat to international peace and security.  Secondly, deployed United Nations missions should assess how climate change will impact local youth and how young people can be involved in building resilience and sustainability.  Third, missions must transition to using clean energy in the field.

Following the briefings, speakers exchanged views on the Council’s role in addressing climate-related security threats.  Belgium’s Deputy Prime Minister said it is high time the Council considers climate change as part of its regular work programme, while also incorporating it into country-specific discussions and the renewal of peacekeeping mandates.  He went on to propose the creation of an institutional focal point, such as a clearing house, which could pull together expertise from across the United Nations system to provide information to the Council.

Indonesia’s Foreign Minister said that the Council must consolidate efforts to better respond to the security impacts of climate change, including by equipping peacekeepers with a capacity to undertake military operations other than war, such as “climate peace missions”.  She added:  “Our homework in the Council is to better define what falls under the ambit of climate change itself and what constitutes security dimensions of climate-related effects.”

The Russian Federation’s representative was among several speakers arguing that the Security Council is not the appropriate forum in which to address climate change.  Reiterating his country’s long-standing opposition to the “securitization” of climate change, he emphasized that considering it in the Council is both excessive and counter-productive.  Such discussions also undercut the division of labour within the United Nations, he added.  Moreover, climate change is not a universal challenge and should not be considered as such, he stressed, cautioning that doing so might lead to the false assumption that climate change always leads to conflict.

India’s representative said that research findings on the generalized links between climate disasters and security remain ambiguous, recalling that the fifth assessment report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states:  “The evidence on the effect of climate change and variability on violence is contested.”  A securitized approach to climate change risks pitting States in competition whereas cooperation is more productive in tackling the threat, he said, adding that thinking in security terms usually engenders overly militarized responses.  It is also questionable to shift climate law-making from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to a structurally unrepresentative institution with an exclusionary approach decided in secretive deliberations.

Widely representing the views of small island developing States, the Foreign Minister of Maldives said climate change will eventually take his entire country.  “Climate change is not only an everyday fact for the Maldives, but an existential threat,” he emphasized, predicting that the man-made two-metre rise in sea levels will result in a situation whereby the entire nation is virtually submerged.  Deploring the fact that Maldivian lakes are drying up while the Council discusses which United Nations forum is best suited to address climate change, he demanded:  “What is a bigger security threat to us than this?”

Sudan’s delegate said that his country has suffered from climate change and the resulting outbreaks of conflict, including the violence in Darfur, which began in 2003.  He explained that tensions among Darfur’s largely agriculture-dependent population erupted because of competition for limited resources, fed by the spread of weapons from neighbouring countries.

The observer for the European Union said that further efforts are required to ensure that relevant climate and environmental risks are appropriately included in risk assessments that form the basis of the Council’s decisions.  They should take into account the greater risks, burdens and adverse impacts on women and girls during and following disasters, including the heightened risk of gender-based violence.

Speaking in his national capacity, the Foreign Minister of the Dominican Republic, which holds the Council’s presidency for January, said it is time for the Security Council to reach a consensus on how it will integrate climate change into its work.  He suggested that all proposals raised today should be collected and provided to the Secretary-General.  The proposals included the appointment of a special representative on climate change and security, and representation of small island developing States on the Security Council.

Also speaking today were representatives of Kuwait, Germany, Poland, United Kingdom, China, Côte d’Ivoire, Peru, France, United States, Equatorial Guinea, South Africa, Guatemala, Hungary, Philippines, Haiti, Canada, Fiji, Nicaragua, Norway, Estonia, Liechtenstein, Japan, Greece, Latvia, Italy, Pakistan, Republic of Korea, Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, Barbados (for the Caribbean Community), Portugal, Turkey, Switzerland, Australia, Sri Lanka, Colombia, Papua New Guinea, Sweden, Bangladesh, Ecuador, Kenya, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Ireland, Chile, Nauru (for the Pacific Island Forum), Brazil, Trinidad and Tobago, Viet Nam, Iran, Iraq, Morocco, Uruguay, Finland, Uzbekistan, Romania, Qatar, Costa Rica, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Slovakia, Netherlands, Belize (for the Alliance of Small Island States), Tuvalu, Algeria, United Arab Emirates and Mauritius.

I'm planning for traveling to America this year in July, and I would like to go to California or Texas, who want to come with me? now I'm ready for earning enough money so that I can pay for my oversea travel, who want to come withe me?

Post any data, film, photographs on this much hated canid of North America

I have seen several video over YouTube, Facebook and some other places where Lion and tiger fight with each other to an serious extent. Many of us have strong desire to know what happen when these 2 supreme carnivora fight with each other. In wild it is not possible but many zoos, circus and other human built encoulser keep them in same place. We have seen so many images and videos of them playing together and little bit skirmishes between them.

In this thread we will try to place all videos and images which clearly show fights between them.

Before you write here, read these rules:
1. No hypothetical vs debate. Strictly neutral observations.
2. Talk only about captive animal in unnatural environment & enclosed habitats. Don't take out conclusion on wild counterparts.
3. Keep in mind that these are captive animals and we don't know the condition or background of individuals

So, lets fill this thread with these type of videos and Images.