AR-News: US CT) Last Stand for Hawaiian Birds

[Animalara2003 at aol.com]

emagazine.com
By Jim Motavalli

In Maui?s Haleakala National Park, at an elevation of 7,000 feet, Hosmer 
Grove serves as a rather enchanting memorial to a failed experiment. In 1910, 
German-born Ralph Hosmer planted 86 varieties of non-native trees in Maui, 
including the eucalyptus trees that have now grown to great heights in the grove 
named after him. Although the attempt to find new forest crops for Hawaii was a 
commercial flop, Hosmer?s grove remains as a last holdout for many of the 
islands? increasingly endangered native birds, and it is still possible to see there 
such species as the apapane and the gorgeous i?iwi. 

Hawaiian native bird expert Renate Gassman says introduced predators (from 
tree-climbing rats to feral cats) have taken their toll on indigenous species 
like the i?iwi.
Jim Motavalli
The first human colonizers found 140 native breeding bird species in Hawaii, 
many of them found nowhere else, but half of them are now extinct. According 
to state accounts, 71 species remain, and 32 are federally listed, 15 of them 
either extinct or on the edge, with less than 500 individuals remaining. In 
fact, Hawaii has more endangered species than any other U.S. state. 


full story:
http://www.emagazine.com/view/?1726 



__________________________________________________________________________
for the news items that Animalconcerns volunteers have entered on the site go 
to the Animalconcerns.org main page and click on "More News Headlines." 

`````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````````


    "The day may come when the rest of the animal creation may acquire those 
rights which never could have been withholden from them but by the hand of 
tyranny. The question is not can they REASON, nor can they TALK, but can they 
SUFFER?" 
Jeremy Bentham 1748 - 1832 



         
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.envirolink.org/pipermail/ar-news/attachments/20040510/cdd94763/attachment.html