Mystery Animal of the Day

Mama gnome presents the Mystery Animal of the Day

This animal is known for its stripes.

Of its three species, two are listed as endangered and vulnerable because of threats from hunters and habitat destruction, climate change, and farming.

One subspecies, "the quagga, has been hunted to extinction for meat, hides, and to preserve feed for domesticated stock."

Here is a picture of the extinct quagga:


Photo: F. York, London, Regent's Park ZOO, 1870

If you guessed the Mystery Animal of the Day is the ZEBRA... Mama gnome wants to invite you to the International Coastal Cleanup Day on Saturday, September 25, 2010.

Please visit Ocean Conservancy to see where you can participate or you can start your own cleanup project and register it at their website.


Zebras are found in Africa. Their habitats vary from Africa's mountains, grasslands and savannas, woodlands, coastal hill, and thorny scrublands.

Zebras "are very adaptable grazers." Their diet include: short or long grasses, shrubs, bark and leaves.

Zebras are "pioneers and will be the first to enter tall or wet pastures. Wildebeests and gazelle follow once the zebras have trampled and clipped the vegetation shorter."

There are three species of zebra:

• the plains zebra
• Grevy's Zebra
• mountain zebra

Here is a picture of a plains zebra in Tanzania.


photo by: Muhammad Mahdi Karim (www.micro2macro.net)

The plains zebras have the more stable population out of the three species. But they are also threatened by poachers, habitat destruction and farming.


Here is a picture of an endangered Grevy's zebra:


photo by Mara 1

The Grevy's zebra is the largest species of zebra. It has large ears and narrower stripes. It is listed endangered by IUCN. The Grevy's zebras are threatened by: hunters who profit from the zebras' skins, habitat destruction and by climate change causing severe drought and the disappearance of their watering holes.


Increased farming land and fencing threaten all zebras, limiting or restricting their access to watering holes.

Here is a picture of a mountain zebra resting in the sun in Louisville Zoo:


photo by: Ltshears - Trisha M Shears

Zebras are also threatened by wars.

"Recent civil wars in Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan, Ethiopia, and Uganda have caused dramatic declines in all wildlife populations, including those of plains zebra. It is now extinct in Burundi. Civil war in Angola during much of the past 25 years has devastated its wildlife populations, including its once-abundant plains zebra, and destroyed the national parks administration and infrastructure."


Here is a video of a Grevy's zebra:


video from: BBCWorldwide

Mama gnome would like to don her striped camouflage, hide behind tall grasses and stun poachers and hunters who hunt down these beautiful animals with wild braying, neighing and whinnying.

Please help save our Mystery Animal of the Day, the endangered zebras, and go green.
(c) 2010, Jenaelha, Friendly gnome's blog

Walk on the Beach with Mama Gnome

Mama gnome brushed her curly gray hair before donning her pointy hat.

She turned and twirled in her long brown tunic and checked her reflection in the mirror.

Mama gnome has a hot date.

Shhhhh....No, not with Daddy gnome.

Mama gnome has a date with the OCEAN.

This coming Saturday, September 25, 2010, will be the International Coastal Cleanup Day!


video from oceanconservancy

According to Ocean Conservancy's Report:

Of the 43 items tracked during the Cleanup, the top three items of trash found in 2008 were cigarette butts, plastic bags, and food wrappers/containers.

During the 2008 cleanup, volunteers collected 11,077 diapers in the Philippines, 19,504 fishing nets in the United Kingdom, and 1,362,741 cigarette butts in the US.

Here is a seaturtle trapped in an abandoned fishing net.


photo from:http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2005/s2429.htm

Please visit Ocean Conservancy and sign up wherever you are in the world and participate in International Coastal Cleanup Day on September 25, Saturday. And it doesn't have to be at the beach. You can help cleanup a park, a river, a waterway. Anywhere you can make a difference.

If there is no cleanup action close to you, you can start your own and register it with Ocean Conservancy through this site.

Mama gnome and the gnome family will be heading out to help clean up and take tally of how many of Plastic Bag Monster minions are lurking in the sand.

Please help defeat Plastic Bag Monster everyday, walk with Mama gnome...and go green.

(c) 2010, Jenaelha, Friendly Gnome's Blog

The Deforestation of Africa

Mama gnome wonders if you knew about the deforestation of Africa?

From WWF:

"A new study co-authored by a World Wildlife Fund scientist documents waves of forest degradation advancing like ripples in a pond 75 miles across East Africa in just 14 years."

WWF reports most logging is illegal. In addition, illegal charcoal burning is done by local people who don't have any other source of income.

"A trade survey by TRAFFIC, the wildlife trade monitoring network, estimated that in 2005 some 96 percent of harvested timber was exported illegally, losing the Tanzanian government an estimated $58 million of revenue."

It's been reported that:

"In West Africa, nearly 90 percent of the original moist forest is gone, and what remains is heavily fragmented and degraded."

Mama gnome wants to emphasize:

• Most logging is illegal
• "96% of harvested timber was exported illegally"
• Poverty forces people to cut down trees or burn trees because they have no other source of income. What happens when all the trees are gone?
• Almost 90 % of West Africa's original forests are gone.....That's ninety percent obliterated.
  

Please watch this video by the Jane Goodall Institute:


video by: JaneGoodallInstitute

But what is really sad...the slashing and burning of forests is happening in other parts of the world, Mama gnome is quite stricken to say.

Please visit WWF and the Jane Goodall Institute to read about this and pass the information to other humans.

Please help save our forests and go green.

(c) 2010, Jenaelha, Friendly Gnome's blog