It is important that we educate ourselves on the animals that are being made extinct due to human activity. By becoming aware of how we can change our behaviours to prevent unnecessary loss of animals, we can help to protect thousands of species that should remain on this planet.
Animals are going extinct across the globe every single day, often due to humans contributing to climate change, habitat destruction, or poaching.
The International Union for Conservation, or the IUCN, uses a scale to consider how endangered a species is, which looks like the following:
The Black-Footed Ferret is an animal that fits on the endangered species list.
During the 1900s, the Black Footed Ferret was believed to be globally extinct due to the loss of habitat and also exotic diseases such as plague that threatened their species. In 1986, only eighteen Black-Footed Ferrets existed in captivity.
There have since been more efforts made for conserving their species using zoos, conservation organisations, as well as Native American tribes. Black Footed-Ferrets need to survive in a North American location where they have grassland as well as access to Prairie Dogs, a species that make up their diet as carnivores. They are nocturnal and live underground.
Thanks to conservation efforts, there are now almost 400 Black-Footed Ferrets in North America today- a huge difference to the number that existed only in captivity thirty years ago!
Unfortunately, diseases and habitat loss continue to be a threat to this species today and it is only with human prevention that we can protect these animals and increase their numbers so that the do not go extinct as many other animals have.