study: lion ranges, populations dropping in africa

[xchrom]

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AF_AFRICA_LIONS?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-12-04-06-35-41

JOHANNESBURG (AP) -- The lions that roam Africa's savannahs have lost as much as 75 percent of their habitat in the last 50 years as humans overtake their land and the lion population dwindles, said a study released Tuesday.

Researchers at Duke University, including prominent conservationist Stuart Pimm, warn that the number of lions across the continent have dropped to as few as 32,000, with populations in West Africa under incredible pressure.

"Lion numbers have declined precipitously in the last century," the study, published Tuesday by the journal Biodiversity and Conservation, reads. "Given that many now live in small, isolated populations, this trend will continue. The situation in West Africa is particularly dire, with no large population remaining and lions now absent from many of the region's national parks."

Fifty years ago, nearly 100,000 lions roamed across the African continent. In recent years, however, an ever-growing human population has come into the savannah lands to settle and develop. That has both cut down the amount of land lions have to roam, as well as fragmented it, researchers said.

[no_hypocrisy]

1. And the surviving lot is at risk from hunting by rich dilettabtes and commerical hunting trips.

[stuntcat]

2. ditto^ and also by their little girls:

I'm ashamed of being this species. No matter how great some of us are, music and science, all that fantastic stuff, we are a collective mega-FAIL. Nothing we do to impress one another makes up for the deadly virus we are to ALL the rest of the life on this planet.

[Nihil]

3. Shame that we can't feed that little shit to the remaining lions ...

... and stake out the two small-dick morons in the previous photo for the ants.