Transcript

10.15.26 · Science Show KY

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Radio Eye's Diary of Science and Nature. Your
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Speaker 1: reader is Kelly Taylor. We'll have articles on the topics
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Speaker 1: of science and nature, but first, a reminder, Radio Eye
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Speaker 1: is a reading service intended for people who are blind
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Speaker 1: or have other disabilities that make it difficult to read
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Speaker 1: printed material. Starting off, we have an article from Vox.
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Speaker 1: The headline is, America's tallest, most spectacular trees are getting
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Speaker 1: heat stroke. This is from October 6th. A grove of
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Speaker 1: coast redwood trees is a forest of forests. Individual trees
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Speaker 1: can live for thousands of years, and as they grow,
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Speaker 1: their canopies develop mats of soils and ferns, creating something
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Speaker 1: like a second forest floor hundreds of feet above the ground.
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Speaker 1: These elevated ecosystems are home to creatures like the wandering salamander,
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Speaker 1: which can spend its entire life cycle on top of
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Speaker 1: a single tree. And the marbled murrelette, a seabird whose
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Speaker 1: nesting habits were a mystery until one day in 1974
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Speaker 1: when a tree trimmer stumbled upon a nest 150 feet
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Speaker 1: above the ground. Sometimes a stray seed, a Sitka spruce
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Speaker 1: or oak or even another redwood, finds its way up
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Speaker 1: a massive redwood and grows into another tree entirely, nestled
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Speaker 1: among the branches of a giant. For millennia, redwoods have
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Speaker 1: been the anchors of this incredibly stable ecosystem. They can
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Speaker 1: even survive wildfires that devastate other tree species. They've also
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Speaker 1: been the source of plenty of human inspiration and drive
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Speaker 1: millions of dollars to California's tourist economy. But like other
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Speaker 1: living things, they aren't immune to warming temperatures, and it
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Speaker 1: turns out these trees have a particular weak spot. A
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Speaker 1: new study from researchers at University of California, Davis, using
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Speaker 1: measurements taken twice a month for two years, found that
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Speaker 1: coast redwood leaves essentially dial down their photosynthesis during periods
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Speaker 1: of extreme heat. This means trees are slowing their breathing
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Speaker 1: and eating because they can't cool down fast enough when
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Speaker 1: temperature rise. It's a problem that's only going to get
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Speaker 1: worse as climate change continues to drive global temperatures up,
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Speaker 1: and it raises urgent questions about the future of these
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Speaker 1: iconic trees and the layers of life that live on
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Speaker 1: and around their shadow-dappled lengths. To understand what's happening to
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Speaker 1: the redwoods and what that may mean for the species
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Speaker 1: that rely on them, first we need to take a
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Speaker 1: quick foray into tree anatomy. Trees use the pores in
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Speaker 1: their leaves, stomata, to do two things. Take carbon dioxide
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Speaker 1: in and let water out. Open stomata mean the tree
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Speaker 1: is breathing, breathing in carbon dioxide and photosynthesizing, but probably
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Speaker 1: also letting water out. Closed stomata mean the tree is
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Speaker 1: conserving water, but also slowing down its photosynthesis since it
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Speaker 1: isn't taking in any carbon dioxide. Quote, because leaves are
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Speaker 1: a physical, light-absorbing object, they heat up just like asphalt
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Speaker 1: would in the sun, said Lily Kleineck, a PhD student
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Speaker 1: at UC Davis who was the lead author on the study. Quote,
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Speaker 1: they're heating up faster than the air around them, she said,
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Speaker 1: and one way that they can cope with this is
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Speaker 1: by opening their stomata and allowing water to transpire out
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Speaker 1: of the leaf, which is kind of like the way
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Speaker 1: that humans sweat. When water evaporates off our skin, it
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Speaker 1: cools us down, and it's the same for leaves, but
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Speaker 1: they can only really do that if they have enough
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Speaker 1: water to lose, end quote. Kleinick and her colleagues studied
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Speaker 1: coast redwoods in Mendocino County, near the southern part of
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Speaker 1: their range, where the researchers used specialized instruments to measure
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Speaker 1: whether or not individual leaves were photosynthesizing. During heat waves,
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Speaker 1: they found coast redwoods hit a point where they can't
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Speaker 1: cool down fast enough and they just keep their stomata closed.
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Speaker 1: While that saves water, it also means the tree isn't
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Speaker 1: taking in more carbon which means it's not eating or
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Speaker 1: building up energy stores it can use to keep growing.
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Speaker 1: This may sound like a technicality of tree physiology, but
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Speaker 1: it could have a big impact on these forests, creating
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Speaker 1: a vicious cycle where trees don't have enough carbon stored
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Speaker 1: to replenish their leaves in the future, which means they
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Speaker 1: won't be able to photosynthesize as efficiently, which will starve
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Speaker 1: them even further, repeating until trees eventually die. And while
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Speaker 1: this sort of behavior has been observed in tropical trees,
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Speaker 1: it's the first time anyone has studied how coast redwoods
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Speaker 1: respond to the same heat stress. Quote, the term people
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Speaker 1: use is carbon starvation, said Chris Still, forest ecologist at
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Speaker 1: Oregon State University. Leaves can be expensive to build for
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Speaker 1: a plant, end quote. Most of the redwoods in California
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Speaker 1: and the Pacific Northwest nowadays are new growth forests planted
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Speaker 1: in the last couple of centuries. That means the trees
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Speaker 1: are relatively hungry, like growing adolescents, compared to their old-growth cousins,
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Speaker 1: so they need to suck in lots of carbon dioxide
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Speaker 1: to grow taller. Redwoods are also incredibly good at storing carbon.
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Speaker 1: Thanks to their bulk and long lives, they store more
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Speaker 1: carbon dioxide per acre than any other forest in the world.
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Speaker 1: Not only is it negative feedback on the climate system itself,
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Speaker 1: with less carbon sequestration from these trees and forests, but
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Speaker 1: the trees themselves are going to obviously not grow as big,
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Speaker 1: said Anthony Ambrose, a plant physiological ecologist and co-founder of
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Speaker 1: the Ancient Forest Society. So even if the trees survive,
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Speaker 1: they might not have as much space for fern and
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Speaker 1: soil mats, which means less habitat for the creatures that
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Speaker 1: live in them, and they may not grow as tall
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Speaker 1: as they once used to, which could hurt them in
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Speaker 1: another way. A central threat to these trees, Kleinick explained,
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Speaker 1: is that in addition to the heat stress, they may
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Speaker 1: also lose a crucial source of hydration and protection. Coast
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Speaker 1: redwoods have an intricate relationship with the fogs of their
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Speaker 1: native Northern California and the Pacific Northwest. The trees are
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Speaker 1: so tall that their canopies reach high into fog layers
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Speaker 1: where they can sip water directly from the sky. The
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Speaker 1: fog also shades the trees from the sun and helps
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Speaker 1: coast redwoods create their own microclimate, which is why these
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Speaker 1: forests are noticeably cooler than the areas adjacent to them.
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Speaker 1: But warmer oceans and drier air are making fog more sporadic,
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Speaker 1: which means the trees are missing a crucial source of
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Speaker 1: relief from heat that is only getting more intense. Quote,
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Speaker 1: it's kind of a double whammy, says Todd Dawson, a
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Speaker 1: plant ecophysiologist at the University of California, Berkeley, who also
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Speaker 1: didn't participate in the study. Quote, they're running out of
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Speaker 1: water and also getting this heat stress. They're used to
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Speaker 1: living in a very narrow temperature range of 8 to
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Speaker 1: 27 degrees Celsius. In California, like everywhere, it's been getting
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Speaker 1: long periods of much warmer days than we've ever experienced.
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Speaker 1: And now the fog, which is normally kind of like
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Speaker 1: an air conditioner, has also declined between 30 and 40 percent,
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Speaker 1: end quote. These temperature swings also impact the organisms living
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Speaker 1: high up in the trees. Quote, if they experience really
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Speaker 1: excessive heat throughout the summer, Ambrose said, then the soil
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Speaker 1: mats and ferns will probably dry out much faster, and
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Speaker 1: then those salamanders and birds might not be able to
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Speaker 1: live there. So we'll see cascading effects through the whole
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Speaker 1: ecosystem at that point, end quote. Klanick said the trees
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Speaker 1: seem to be doing okay after the heat passes, while
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Speaker 1: the leaves she and her team looked at over their
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Speaker 1: two-year study didn't acclimate to the heat, They also didn't
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Speaker 1: lose their capacity to photosynthesize after the heat passed. While
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Speaker 1: that's a bit of hopeful news, it doesn't reduce the
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Speaker 1: urgency of the need to better understand the impact of
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Speaker 1: climate change on these trees and to reduce the warming itself. Quote,
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Speaker 1: right now, the temperatures are coming back to normal in
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Speaker 1: the fall and winter and letting the trees recover, Kleinig said.
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Speaker 1: But in five to 10 years, if temperatures are even
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Speaker 1: hotter and heat waves are even more frequent, We don't
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Speaker 1: really know if there would be a recovery, end quote.
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Speaker 1: For now, the salamanders and seabirds still have their homes
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Speaker 1: high atop the coast redwoods, but we're a part of
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Speaker 1: the redwoods' larger ecosystem too, even if we don't live
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Speaker 1: near them. They, like all trees, are key to keeping
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Speaker 1: our planet hospitable. The trees Kleinex studied have the potential
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Speaker 1: to live for more than a thousand years. The question
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Speaker 1: is if we'll let them. And now a story from
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Speaker 1: a new scientist called Hearing the World. Some of the
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Speaker 1: best nature stories are told through soundscapes, finds Druti Shah.
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Speaker 1: His job as a wildlife filmmaker has exposed Justin Anderson
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Speaker 1: to exceptional scenes. In his book Wilderness Songs, he shares
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Speaker 1: some from polar bears trying to break into his hut
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Speaker 1: in the Stalbard Archipelago in the Norwegian Arctic. to a
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Speaker 1: noisy troop of red howler monkeys in Ecuador's Tiputini Biodiversity Station.
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Speaker 1: Subtitled Nature's Hidden Sounds and What They Teach Us About
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Speaker 1: the Wild, this book journeys deep into soundscapes to discover
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Speaker 1: what we are missing by not tuning our ears to
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Speaker 1: the right frequencies. We travel with Anderson as he studies
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Speaker 1: how and why these extra human noises are made and
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Speaker 1: the tech created to gain access to them. As well
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Speaker 1: as the songs of whales and birds, there are surprises
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Speaker 1: such as the emissions of insects, volcanoes, and glaciers. We
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Speaker 1: learned that indigenous communities spoke of the sounds of the
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Speaker 1: Aurora Borealis long before scientists offered their verified recordings. Anderson
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Speaker 1: starts in the Indian Himalayas looking for a snow leopard
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Speaker 1: to film. Snow leopards don't possess a vibrating layer of
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Speaker 1: fatty elasticated tissue, thus making them the only big cats
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Speaker 1: that can't roar. That doesn't make them silent predators. Locals
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Speaker 1: describe their yowling vocalizations on ridges as singing, But while
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Speaker 1: the noise travels further this way and their songs help
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Speaker 1: the snow leopards find each other, we still aren't sure
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Speaker 1: what they are saying. Anderson admits there are many wild
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Speaker 1: sounds that remain mysterious. Where we can eavesdrop, we find
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Speaker 1: that nature's acoustics can be essential to survival, not just
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Speaker 1: for escaping prey or seeking mates, but for the wider ecosystem.
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Speaker 1: When water is scarce, for example, sand people in the
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Speaker 1: Kalahari Desert of South Africa use the croaking of African
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Speaker 1: bullfrogs as a guide to find recent rainfall. We find
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Speaker 1: out about how microphones the size of a grain of
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Speaker 1: rice are helping us hear the quietest voices, such as
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Speaker 1: the dancing vibrations of the tiny red-faced male jumping spider
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Speaker 1: of North America. The decision to include QR codes in
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Speaker 1: this book is smart. They take you to a recording
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Speaker 1: of the creature you have just been learning about so
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Speaker 1: you can, for example, Hear elephants trumpeting at night as
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Speaker 1: you read. Anderson's recordings are complemented by those of other scientists, artists, filmmakers,
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Speaker 1: and conservationists. I just wish the publisher had added some
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Speaker 1: images to the website so we could see what we're
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Speaker 1: hearing and reading about. And now to BBC Wildlife. Florida
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Speaker 1: has a big python problem. This could be the solution.
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Speaker 1: Dated October 15th. South Florida has a snake problem. The
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Speaker 1: region is home to a significant population of wild Burmese pythons,
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Speaker 1: an invasive species which preys on mammals and birds. Efforts
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Speaker 1: to remove these pythons have mainly been focused on capturing
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Speaker 1: as many as possible rather than targeting specific snakes, but
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Speaker 1: that might now change. A new study by researchers at
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Speaker 1: the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences
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Speaker 1: has developed a tool to help python hunting contractors identify
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Speaker 1: the snakes with the biggest influence on future population growth.
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Speaker 1: The thinking behind it is that by removing high-breeding individuals,
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Speaker 1: the longer-term effect will be far more impactful. Quote, our
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Speaker 1: previous work treated all Burmese pythons as contributing equally to
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Speaker 1: the population, but removing the biggest female we've ever caught
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Speaker 1: is very different from removing a tiny snake that might
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Speaker 1: not survive next year, says quantitative ecologist Alex Romer. the
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Speaker 1: study's lead author. Florida's population of Burmese pythons stems mainly
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Speaker 1: from the 20th century boom in the exotic pet trade.
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Speaker 1: Many either escaped or were released by owners, unable or
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Speaker 1: unwilling to care for them. Today, an estimate from the U.S.
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Speaker 1: Geological Survey suggests there are tens of thousands of Burmese
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Speaker 1: pythons in the greater Everglades region alone. The snakes are non-venomous,
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Speaker 1: but can grow to lengths of 15 feet or more
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Speaker 1: and often eat native species of conservation concern. To combat
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Speaker 1: this situation, researchers on the study have developed a weighted
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Speaker 1: removal index tool, which assigns an ecological value to each
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Speaker 1: python captured. Quote, the idea is that a big female
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Speaker 1: might be worth 100 arbitrary ecological points, while a little
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Speaker 1: snake might be worth five, explains Romer. That tells you
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Speaker 1: how many little snakes you would need to catch before
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Speaker 1: you've had the same impact as removing a large female,
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Speaker 1: end quote. The hope is that Florida's contracted Python removal
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Speaker 1: programs will benefit from using the WRI tool to measure
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Speaker 1: the impact of each removal, with their work becoming more
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Speaker 1: structured and effective in the process. The study also found
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Speaker 1: that removal efforts can be more fruitful at certain times
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Speaker 1: of year. Fewer snakes are generally caught in January and February,
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Speaker 1: for example, but those that are have a higher likelihood
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Speaker 1: of being mature males and females. Quote, if you just
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Speaker 1: count how many pythons contractors catch, January and February don't
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Speaker 1: seem that important, continues Romar. But when you add in
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Speaker 1: the demographic weighting, suddenly those months look a lot more important.
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Speaker 1: End quote. And now from the weather channels. Snow, sleet,
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Speaker 1: or freezing rain? How winter precipitation differs. This is dated
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Speaker 1: October 7th. You are probably familiar with the three types
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Speaker 1: of winter precipitation, snow, sleet, and freezing rain. But do
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Speaker 1: you know the difference among the three? Let me walk
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Speaker 1: you through it. Picture a snowflake forming inside a cloud
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Speaker 1: thousands of feet above you about to begin its fall.
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Speaker 1: That journey between the cloud and the ground is what
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Speaker 1: defines what type of precipitation it will be and while
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Speaker 1: all three occur in winter, the impacts are very different.
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Speaker 1: The temperature of the atmosphere will determine what type of
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Speaker 1: winter precipitation you receive. As the raindrop falls and stays
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Speaker 1: in temperatures above freezing for much of its journey to
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Speaker 1: the surface, it will sometimes enter a layer of freezing
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Speaker 1: air before hitting the surface. If that cold layer is
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Speaker 1: deep enough, the raindrop has time to turn to ice.
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Speaker 1: It hits the ground already frozen, bounces, and lands as sleet,
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Speaker 1: those small, hard ice pellets that ping off your windshield
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Speaker 1: and pile up like tiny beads on the sidewalk. Sleet
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Speaker 1: can build up quickly on pavement, creating dangerous conditions on
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Speaker 1: the roadways and making driving treacherous. Sleet is also heavier
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Speaker 1: than snow, so shoveling sleet off your driveway can cause
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Speaker 1: more physical strain. Now take that same raindrop. and send
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Speaker 1: it through a much longer stretch of warm air on
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Speaker 1: the way down. And when I say warm, we're talking
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Speaker 1: about anything above 32 degrees. This time, the freezing layer
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Speaker 1: it eventually meets is right at the surface. This means
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Speaker 1: it's too thin and too late for the raindrop to
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Speaker 1: freeze in the air. It stays liquid the entire fall,
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Speaker 1: and then the instant it touches down, it freezes onto
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Speaker 1: whatever it lands on. Your car, your front steps, the trees,
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Speaker 1: the power lines. Freezing rain is the most dangerous and
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Speaker 1: most disruptive of all the types of winter precipitation because
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Speaker 1: it can take down entire power grids, knocking down power
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Speaker 1: to people for days or even weeks. And it's impossible
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Speaker 1: to drive on, even for the most snow-savvy drivers out there.
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Speaker 1: It only takes as much as one-tenth inch of ice
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Speaker 1: to create a slick, nearly invisible glaze on surfaces. Bridges
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Speaker 1: and overpasses freeze first, which often catches drivers by surprise.
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Speaker 1: Accumulations over one quarter inch make driving nearly impossible. Also,
17:44
Speaker 1: ice adds incredible weight to infrastructure. A quarter inch to
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Speaker 1: a half inch of ice can snap heavy tree branches
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Speaker 1: and bring down power lines, causing the power outages mentioned above.
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Speaker 1: Snow is easily the winter precipitation type that most people
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Speaker 1: are familiar with and has the easiest explanations. If the
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Speaker 1: raindrop falls through freezing temperatures the entire journey from the
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Speaker 1: cloud to the ground and never enters a layer warmer
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Speaker 1: than 32 degrees, it falls as snow. While snow can
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Speaker 1: be beautiful and peaceful, it can also cause quite the
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Speaker 1: disruption to travel and daily life. Snow can make roads
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Speaker 1: extremely slick and make travel extremely difficult. Heavy snow, along
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Speaker 1: with strong winds, can cause visibility to drop to near zero.
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Speaker 1: Snow can also become very heavy. Snow can weigh anywhere
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Speaker 1: from 3 pounds to more than 20 pounds per square
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Speaker 1: foot of snow depth, depending on the moisture content within it.
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Speaker 1: This means it can weigh down rooftops to the point
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Speaker 1: of collapse, and shoveling it can strain the heart, sometimes
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Speaker 1: leading to heart attacks and death. So winter precipitation isn't
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Speaker 1: determined by the strength of the storm, but rather the
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Speaker 1: temperature of the air it travels through. It's also possible
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Speaker 1: to experience all three types in a single storm, But
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Speaker 1: keeping up to date on the latest forecast can help
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Speaker 1: keep you and your family safe this winter, despite the
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Speaker 1: threat of snow, sleet, and freezing rain. Now we'll turn
19:13
Speaker 1: to Huffington Post, and this headline reads, Expert warns there's
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Speaker 1: no normal weather anymore amidst El Nino and polar vortex worries.
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Speaker 1: This is dated October 15th. Experts have predicted a Godzilla-level
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Speaker 1: El Nino since the start of this year, and it
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Speaker 1: looks like temperature increases at the Pacific Ocean's surface are
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Speaker 1: set to exceed even some of those early estimates. This
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Speaker 1: might in turn lead to flooding, drought, and colder, stormier
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Speaker 1: UK winters. It could even play a role in destabilizing
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Speaker 1: the polar vortex. A stream of colder winds usually stays
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Speaker 1: in a polar region, but could reach further towards the
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Speaker 1: equator early next year. And that all comes after a
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Speaker 1: record-breaking summer of soaring temperatures and drought. So perhaps it's
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Speaker 1: no wonder that Ian Lisk, a chief meteorologist at the
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Speaker 1: Met Office, warned attendees at a recent Airports UK annual
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Speaker 1: conference that we don't get normal weather anymore fundamentally. The
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Speaker 1: expert continued to say the weather we once saw as
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Speaker 1: extreme is becoming increasingly common. He added that the heat
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Speaker 1: waves of this summer reminded people of the effects of
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Speaker 1: climate change and stressed that similar conditions might come next
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Speaker 1: year too. Lisk added, quote, none of this is good news.
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Speaker 1: The heat waves and the events of this last summer
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Speaker 1: had nothing to do with El Nino, end quote. Though
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Speaker 1: El Nino phenomenon does happen every few years and is
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Speaker 1: linked to hotter global temperatures overall, in the UK, it's
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Speaker 1: more strongly associated with harsher winters than scalding summers. However,
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Speaker 1: global warming, the force behind our ever hotter second season,
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Speaker 1: is driving more powerful El Ninos, says Professor Bill McGuire.
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Speaker 1: an expert in geophysical and climate hazards at the University
21:10
Speaker 1: College London. James Richardson, the chief analyst at the Climate
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Speaker 1: Change Committee, who was on the same panel as Lisk, added, quote,
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Speaker 1: we're a long way behind in terms of what is
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Speaker 1: needed for adaptation as a country. The very hot summer
21:24
Speaker 1: we have just had has alerted people to what has
21:27
Speaker 1: been coming for a long time. It is going to
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Speaker 1: get worse than this, he continued. In a previous interview
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Speaker 1: with Huffington Post UK, Professor Lorraine Whitmarsh, the director of
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Speaker 1: the Center for Climate Change and Social Transformation, said she
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Speaker 1: thought 2026 is definitely the least extreme weather we will
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Speaker 1: experience for the rest of our lives. She added, there's
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Speaker 1: no guarantee every year we'll see a hotter summer than
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Speaker 1: the one before, but the general trend is certainly hotter
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Speaker 1: over time. Additionally, climatologist Professor Friedrich Otto, a professor in
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Speaker 1: climate science at the Center for Environmental Policy, at Imperial
22:05
Speaker 1: College London and the leader of World Weather Attribution, told
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Speaker 1: us that unless we stop burning fossil fuels extremely rapidly
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Speaker 1: and global mean temperatures are stabilized, a 2026 summer will
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Speaker 1: prove to be one of the cooler summers for the
22:19
Speaker 1: rest of our lives. This is especially true if we
22:23
Speaker 1: do not urgently address climate change. Now we'll go to
22:29
Speaker 1: National Geographic. The Urgent Plight of Africa's Vanishing Pangolins In
22:39
Speaker 1: the forests of central Cameroon, it was time to wake
22:44
Speaker 1: the pangolins. The first resident, roused from slumber, occupied a
22:50
Speaker 1: wooden crate positioned against the wall inside an airy clinic.
22:54
Speaker 1: The animal that emerged was as unusual as it was enchanting.
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Speaker 1: Around three feet long, with a low, slung body, a narrow,
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Speaker 1: tapering head, powerful forelimbs tipped with curved claws, a prodigious tail.
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Speaker 1: A pregnant, white-bellied pangolin, one of the eight recognized species,
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Speaker 1: she was accustomed to this routine by now, having arrived
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Speaker 1: at the Tiki Highwood Foundation's Pangolin Rescue Center a week earlier.
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Speaker 1: She'd been rescued from a market in the nearby town
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Speaker 1: of Mbalmayo, Her bruised tail suggested that she'd been caught
23:31
Speaker 1: in a snare. Too vulnerable to go outside to forage
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Speaker 1: for the ants and termites that constitute her natural diet,
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Speaker 1: she was being sustained with maize meal mixed with supplements
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Speaker 1: and a sprinkling of soil which helped trigger her instinct
23:46
Speaker 1: to feed and aided her digestion. The center's Zimbabwean founder,
23:51
Speaker 1: Lisa Highwood, held out the bowl of porridge as the
23:55
Speaker 1: animal went to work with her noodle-like tongue To establish trust,
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Speaker 1: Highwood conjured a rhythmic snorting sound from deep in her chest,
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Speaker 1: mimicking the pangolin's chuffing vocalizations. It's like they can read
24:10
Speaker 1: your energy, she told me. You have to succumb to
24:13
Speaker 1: them before they succumb to you. Not that the ravenous
24:17
Speaker 1: creature needed more encouragement. An ultrasound later revealed she was
24:20
Speaker 1: carrying twins. Each pangolin at the center is cataloged by
24:25
Speaker 1: the order in which it arrives in a calendar year.
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Speaker 1: Midway through April, this was number 27, though Highwood referred
24:32
Speaker 1: to her simply as Mum. Even in this sterile setting,
24:35
Speaker 1: 27 was hunched and vigilant, her whole being canted toward
24:40
Speaker 1: the obsessive pursuit of food. Pangolin's eyes, black and glassy
24:44
Speaker 1: like onyx beads, provide limited vision, but what they lack
24:48
Speaker 1: in eyesight they compensate for with sensitive hemispheric ears and
24:53
Speaker 1: an acute sense of smell. In the wild, 27 would
24:57
Speaker 1: be capable of detecting her quarry through several inches of wood,
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Speaker 1: breaking into tree bark or decaying logs with her claws,
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Speaker 1: then using that extraordinary tongue, now hoovering up porridge more
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Speaker 1: quickly than the human eye could track, to gorge. But
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Speaker 1: the most distinguishing aspect of the pangolin's physiology is the scales.
25:18
Speaker 1: A pangolin is often described as a scaly anteater. its
25:22
Speaker 1: top side covered in overlapping keratin plates from nose to tail,
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Speaker 1: yet it belongs in an entirely distinct superorder within animal taxonomy.
25:32
Speaker 1: When threatened by another animal, pangolins generally don't fight back
25:35
Speaker 1: or flee. Instead, they roll into a tight ball, folding
25:39
Speaker 1: their head, legs, and underbelly beneath their tails. In Africa,
25:43
Speaker 1: where the creatures are found in at least 34 countries,
25:46
Speaker 1: this response typically thwarts even the most formidable predators. Lions
25:51
Speaker 1: have been observed batting around a pangolin like a soccer
25:54
Speaker 1: ball in frustration, unable to penetrate the scales with their teeth.
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Speaker 1: It's a bitter irony that the pangolin's defense mechanism has
26:03
Speaker 1: become one of the principal sources of its vulnerability. As
26:06
Speaker 1: in many other places on the continent, pangolins in Cameroon
26:10
Speaker 1: have long been hunted for their meat. But in recent years,
26:13
Speaker 1: they faced another threat as criminal gangs across Sub-Saharan Africa
26:18
Speaker 1: incentivize locals to supply them with scales. While some pangolins,
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Speaker 1: like 27, are ensnared, others are simply found balled up
26:26
Speaker 1: on the forest floor. It makes them easy prey for
26:29
Speaker 1: human hunters. Today, the pangolin ranks among the most heavily
26:33
Speaker 1: trafficked wild mammals in the world. Although the full extent
26:37
Speaker 1: of the illicit trade remains unknown, studies suggest the number
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Speaker 1: of African pangolins harvested in recent decades runs into the millions.
26:46
Speaker 1: The international black market is driven largely by demand in
26:49
Speaker 1: East Asia, where pangolins are considered a culinary delicacy and
26:53
Speaker 1: are coveted because their scales are a key ingredient in
26:57
Speaker 1: many powders associated with traditional Chinese medicine. When processed, the
27:03
Speaker 1: scales are marketed as paoshanjia, an ingredient used in prescriptions
27:09
Speaker 1: to aid breastfeeding and treat a range of maladies, including cancer.
27:13
Speaker 1: liver disease, infertility, arthritis, and various tumors. Studies indicating the
27:19
Speaker 1: product harbors no scientifically proven benefits have done little to
27:25
Speaker 1: temper demand. More than a decade ago, as poaching began
27:29
Speaker 1: to decimate pangolin populations in Asia, traffickers increasingly turned to Africa.
27:34
Speaker 1: By 2016, after years of lobbying by government agencies and
27:38
Speaker 1: conservation groups, countries worldwide agreed to impose a global ban
27:43
Speaker 1: on the commercial trade of all eight pangolin species, but
27:47
Speaker 1: traffickers have continued to thrive in regions where enforcement has
27:51
Speaker 1: been under-resourced or slow to act. Well, that's all for
27:56
Speaker 1: today's Diary of Science and Nature. Your reader was Kelly Taylor.
28:00
Speaker 1: Now stay tuned for further programming on Radio Eye.