News-Sleeping+Beauties

One of Africa’s most [|exquisite] animals, the desert lion, is becoming more endangered each day. Unfortunately, local farmers kill desert lions by setting up traps, shooting, or poisoning them just for the sake of their livestock’s protection. “Sleeping Beauties”, an article published in The Christian Science Monitor (issue 39 2010), brought my attention not only because that I have a love and care for animals, it is also a concern about the world’s nature and circle-of-life. The Earth needs animals like desert lions or otherwise, with the lack of the species, it can negatively affect Africa’s ecosystem. With the lack of population of any wild animal, this can cause a change of the animal’s prey of species or give them nothing to prey on at all. According to KNPB’s article on the desert lions, “Why Save the Desert Lions”, shows an example of a lack of population of nature’s significant species, such as wolves, caused an effect on the ecosystem; a large number of wolves in the 19th Century were kicked out of Yellowstone National Park which caused “changes in prey species, like elk and beavers, and altered vegetation patterns, such as in the aspen trees and willows that grow along stream beds”. Once the wolves returned, the ecosystem went back to its normal routine. In “Sleeping Beauties”, the idea of inserting transmitters into the desert lion’s abdomen is a great way of keeping track where the lions escape so they can be saved from danger immediately. A Desert Lion Conservation website ([|www.desertlion.info]) posts daily news on where lions escape and are discovered by their GPS-like tracking collars. With this idea, lions are being saved everyday and protection from farmers. Communities should have eco-tourism activities not only to learn about or to support just desert lions but for every wild animal out there and to help conserve all species. -Molly Moser