Wildwatch Kenya seeks to count, identify and track the giraffes in conservation field sites, along with the other animals that share the habitat, to better understand the behavior, movements, and population numbers of the wildlife found here. Citizen scientists are being called to help researchers look through the tens of thousands of photos taken by trail cameras placed in strategic spots throughout the sites. The information gathered from these photos will help us and the local communities develop plans to help save these magnificent animals.
12 Ekim 2018 Cuma
Zooniverse: Wildwatch Kenya 2
One thing we do know, unfortunately, is that giraffes are in trouble. Across Africa, all giraffe populations have declined by about 40 percent, leading the IUCN Red List in December 2016 to officially list giraffes as “Vulnerable” to extinction. Our project focuses on the reticulated giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis reticulata), and current estimates show that the population of these giraffes has declined by over 70 percent in the past 20 years—from 36,000 to less than 9,000 today. The main drivers behind the decline appear to be habitat loss and fragmentation, land degradation and poaching.
Zooniverse: Wildwatch Kenya
Northern Kenya is a vast, varied and breathtakingly beautiful landscape, home to some of the most spectacular and important wildlife in East Africa. This is a place where wildlife, people, and livestock have co-existed for thousands of years. It’s also where you'll find the "towers of the savanna," reticulated giraffes. They are one of Africa's most popular animals, and yet they are still little studied and not well understood. There is much to learn about these giraffes, but before we have even begun to delve into their mysteries, they are being threatened. It is now clear that they need conservation efforts to keep them from becoming extinct.
Life Advice: Don’t Find Your Passion
As a college professor, I have the privilege of advising young women and men as they make decisions about course selections, major areas of study, and life directions. Like other college students around the country, many of my advisees are searching for content they find interesting and meaningful, for work that is fulfilling and purposeful. Many are eager to “find their passion.”
Surgery in Space: Medicine's Final Frontier
The concept of human space exploration of space has experienced something of a recent revival in the public consciousness. The private SpaceX and Virgin Galactic companies (and their eccentric front men) often make front-page news for their achievements and goals, which ultimately involve traveling to and colonizing distant planets. Though some decry these ambitions as extravagant fantasies, news pertaining to novel developments in extraterrestrial exploration often goes viral over digital media, reflecting genuine public interest in the topic.
Confident Tone Overcomes Accent Distrust
English as-a-first-language Canadian study subjects were less trusting of statements in English spoken with a foreign accent, unless the speaker sounded confident about their assertion.
Huge Iceberg Poised to Break Off Antarctica’s Pine Island Glacier
A newly discovered long and craggy rift is splintering across West Antarctica’s Pine Island Glacier, satellite images show.
The nearly 19-mile-long (30 kilometers) rift started in the middle of the ice shelf, where the ice shelf touches warmer ocean waters that are melting it from underneath, said Stef Lhermitte, an assistant professor in the Department of Geoscience and Remote Sensing at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.