Revealed: first mammal species wiped out by human-induced climate change

[Eugene]

Source: The Guardian



Revealed: first mammal species wiped out by human-induced climate change

Exclusive: scientists find no trace of the Bramble Cay melomys, a small
rodent that was the only mammal endemic to Great Barrier Reef

Michael Slezak
Tuesday 14 June 2016 04.44 BST

Human-caused climate change appears to have driven the Great Barrier Reef’s only endemic mammal species into the history books, with the Bramble Cay melomys, a small rodent that lives on a tiny island in the eastern Torres Strait, being completely wiped-out from its only known location.

It is also the first recorded extinction of a mammal anywhere in the world thought to be primarily due to human-caused climate change.

An expert says this extinction is likely just the tip of the iceberg, with climate change exerting increasing pressures on species everywhere.

The rodent, also called the mosaic-tailed rat, was only known to live on Bramble Cay a small coral cay, just 340m long and 150m wide off the north coast of Queensland, Australia, which sits at most 3m above sea level.

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Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jun/14/first-case-emerges-of-mammal-species-wiped-out-by-human-induced-climate-change

[madaboutharry]

1. Thank you for posting.

[riversedge]

2. and so it begins.

[mountain grammy]

3. I remember a chapter in "The Weather Makers,"

describing the extinction of the golden frog. It was heartbreaking and completely climate change related. That book was written 15 years ago, and now we move on to mammals.

[certainot]

4. and we allow these universities to endorse 270 limbaugh stations

which do denial all day long and elect deniers

from republiconradio.org

ALABAMA 8 Auburn 3, Alabama 2, Southern Alabama 2, Troy 1
ARIZONA 2 Arizona St. 1, Arizona 1
ARKANSAS 3 Arkansas 3
CALIFORNIA 5 San Jose State 2, USC 2, Fresno St. 1
COLORADO 4 Air Force 2, Colorado 1, Colorado State 1
CONNECTICUT 1 Connecticut 1
FLORIDA 20 Florida 10, Florida St. 4 Miami 2, South Florida 2, Central Florida 2
GEORGIA 14 Georgia 7, Georgia Tech 5, Georgia Southern 2
IDAHO 7 Boise St. 4, Idaho 3
ILLINOIS 7 Illinois 7
INDIANA 11 Notre Dame 6, Purdue 4, Indiana 1
IOWA 5 Iowa 4, Iowa St. 1
KANSAS 4 Kansas St. 2, Kansas 1, Wichita St. 1
KENTUCKY 3 Louisville 2, Kentucky 1
LOUSIANA 3 LSU 2, La.-Monroe 1
MARYLAND 2 Maryland 2
MASSACHUSETTS 1 Boston College 1
MICHIGAN 19 Michigan St. 11, Michigan 7, Western Michigan 1
MINNESOTA 4 Minnesota 4
MISSISSIPPI 6 Mississippi St. 3, Mississippi 2, Southern Miss 1
MISSOURI 6 Missouri 6
NEBRASKA 6 Nebraska 6
NEVADA 1 Nevada 1
NEW JERSEY 2 Rutgers 1, Seton Hall 1
NEW MEXICO 3 New Mexico 2, New Mexico St. 1
NEW YORK 7 Syracuse 6, Army 1
NORTH CAROLINA 16 North Carolina 8, North Carolina State 3, Duke 3, East Carolina 2
OHIO 10 Ohio St. 6, Toledo 1, Dayton 1, Bowling Green 1, Xavier 1
OKLAHOMA 5 Oklahoma St. 3, Oklahoma 1, Oral Roberts 1
OREGON 12 Oregon St. 7, Oregon 5
PENNSYLVANIA 14 Penn St. 11, Pittsburgh 2, Temple 1
SOUTH CAROLINA 4 South Carolina 2, Clemson 2
TENNESSEE 7 Tennessee 4, Memphis 3
TEXAS 16 Texas A&M 9, Texas Tech 4, Texas 1, Texas Christian 1, Baylor 1
UTAH 1 Utah St. 1
VIRGINIA 6 Virginia Tech 5, Virginia 1
WASHINGTON 6 Washington 5, Washington St. 1
WEST VIRGINIA 2 West Virginia 1, Marshall 1
WISCONSIN 4 Wisconsin 4

[geardaddy]

5. There's a link in that story to more possible exinctions

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/gallery/2015/apr/30/animals-and-plants-that-could-be-lost-because-of-climate-change-in-pictures

[Plucketeer]

6. Truly lamentable, but

no worse than the Passenger pigeon, the Dodo bird, various other island (and mainland) creatures that thrived prior to "civilization" having discovered their lairs.

Who was here for T-rex's disappearance? Who vainly fretted about the peterosaur's demise? Where were the caring when millions of other creatures came and went thru the eons???

We humans are NO DIFFERENT than a mega-volcano or a giant asteroid impact - except, unlike those catastrophes, we recognize ourselves as such. But this rock has NEVER been about continuity. Never. It coalesced out of bits of stellar detritus and morphed from an inhospitable blob to a lab for the spark of life to play upon. Of course - we fancy ourselves so fucking smart - but we're not. IF we were of truly superior intellect, we'd figure a way to put a hold on everything JUST AS IT IS. The best we can do at this point is scurry around - collecting and preserving DNA bits in the vain hope we can reverse the degradation of natural habitats and turn back the clock.

We're a catalyst for extinction - quite possibly our own. We COULD maybe take a lesson from that unspoiled tribe that was recently contacted in the tropics. They - like native Americans of the recent past - lived in harmony with their surroundings. But who of we civilized sorts is ready to give up their flat screens and spend our afternoons skinning some hapless monkey for the evening meal? Who? Yeah - I thought so.

[Wednesdays]

7. Is it just me

Or is there not a false dilemma in there someplace?

[Nihil]

8. It's not just you.

There was a distinct "Fuck it, it's not *my* fault and I don't care anyway so there!"
between each set of lines ...

[Nihil]

9. *Something* is "Truly lamentable"

> Who was here for T-rex's disappearance?

Lots of other creatures, some of whom survived.

> Who vainly fretted about the peterosaur's (sic) demise?

Other pterosaurs.

> Where were the caring when millions of other creatures came and went thru the eons???

Just because you weren't there doesn't mean that other creatures cared about each other.

"Caring" didn't start (and end) when Bronze Age peasants started to force their mythologies upon others.


> We humans are NO DIFFERENT than a mega-volcano or a giant asteroid impact - except,
> unlike those catastrophes, we recognize ourselves as such.

WRONG. There is no choice involved with a mega-volcano or giant asteroid, merely luck
or good fortune to be in a suitable place to survive.

The global destruction that we as a species have been performing over the centuries
is completely voluntary - a result of deliberate choices made (usually for personal greed).

That is a MAJOR FUCKING DIFFERENCE.


> But this rock has NEVER been about continuity. Never.

Continuity at geological scales has never been the issue for ecologists, only the
religious morons who insist that they can't be doing any real harm as their sky fairy
is looking after them.


> It coalesced out of bits of stellar detritus and morphed from an inhospitable blob
> to a lab for the spark of life to play upon.

... over billions of years ...

The damage that we have done has mostly been done over a couple of centuries.

That damage has been known and widely publicised for decades.

That damage has increased with every year due to greed.

Every week, more decisions are made to make the situation worse for short-term
profit, in the full knowledge of the destruction that is involved.

*That* is why we are different from a volcano or roaming stellar boulder.


> But who of we civilized sorts is ready to give up their flat screens and spend
> our afternoons skinning some hapless monkey for the evening meal?
> Who? Yeah - I thought so.

No official monkeys around here so the best we can manage is to skin
some of the fat selfish bastards who don't care about other creatures
and prefer to sit on their arse in front of their flat screen TVs.

[Plucketeer]

10. Heh - so when the next assteroid whacks our rock

and a few of us are sitting in some Mars outpost and watching as our home base is scrubbed clean, you'll say what? Something like: "Geez, you'd think Mother Nature would've had a bit more compassion!"

This planet and the life that clings to it have been changing since their conception. We CAN NOT enact and maintain a hold on it - we just can't. We can't turn the whole globe into a zoo. Our development of a "superior" brain is no more significant a development than wings or gills or venom - the brain just fills another niche that was ripe for filling. What we've DONE with this specialization may well prove the undoing of alot of the living things we hold so dear. But the specialization WILL continue to be a catalyst - and THAT we can't stop. Whether we manage to effect some sort of specieal stasis or an Armageddon remains to be seen. But change (evolution) WILL march on and we WILL be a factor in it. How much of a factor - only time will tell. If say - Yellowstone erupts as they're predicting it will, we won't be much of a factor beyond that point.

[happyslug]

11. It appears there was never more then 100 at any time on that island. but may exist elsewhere.

1998 estimated the cay’s population size was 93, based on the capture of 42 individuals. Surveys conducted for the species in 2002 and 2004 detected only 10 and 12 individuals, respectively. These results suggested there had been an ongoing decline in the abundance of the Bramble Cay melomys. A survey in 2011 and two surveys in 2014 failed to locate the species at all. The most recent of these assessments, conducted in August–September 2014, confirmed that the Bramble Cay melomys has been extirpated from Bramble Cay.

https://www.ehp.qld.gov.au/wildlife/threatened-species/endangered/endangered-animals/bramble_cay_melomys.html

This species was only found on Bramble Cay, a small vegetated coral cay (a reef island composed of coral rubble and sand) roughly 340 m long by 150 m wide, but subject to seasonal changes in both shape and size, located at the northern tip of the Great Barrier Reef. This made it Australia's most isolated species of mammal. There has been speculation that the species may also occur on other islands in the Torres Strait or in Papua New Guinea (PNG), given the close proximity of the cay to the mouth of the Fly River, which regularly deposits large amounts of debris (e.g., logs and assorted driftwood, whole palm trees and other vegetation) on Bramble Cay. Further survey work on these islands and PNG, along with clarification of the taxonomic status of the Bramble Cay melomys in relation to PNG species, is required (Latch 2008).

Another report on them:

https://www.environment.gov.au/resource/recovery-plan-bramble-cay-melomys-melomys-rubicola