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60,000 Antelope Died In 4 Days, and No One Knows Why

Posted by Soulskill on from the it-was-the-one-armed-man dept.

An anonymous reader writes: The Saiga antelope has been hunted to near extinction. They've been put on the endangered species list, and they play a vital role in the ecosystems around Russia, Mongolia, and Kazakhstan, where their grazing helps get rid of fallen plant matter, which is prevented from decomposing by the cold temperatures. But earlier this year, a huge die-off hit the Saiga antelope herd in Kazakhstan, felling over 120,000 of them in a few short weeks. Scientists say an entire group of 60,000 died within a four-day span. The cause of this die-off is still a mystery. The researchers suspect some sort of bacteria, and early on pointed to Pasteurella strains. But those bacteria don't usually cause this much damage unless something else has weakened the antelope. "There is nothing so special about it. The question is why it developed so rapidly and spread to all the animals," one researcher said. They're looking into environmental factors, but nothing else seems too far out of the ordinary.

13 of 206 comments (clear)

  1. The remaining few by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The remaining few will have an evolutionary advantage over whatever kill the rest of them. Until a dumb ass human shoots them, that is, to put "the rarest specimens" up on his wall and brag about it.

  2. Now we need... by benjfowler · · Score: 1, Insightful

    ...a pandemic to cull the human herd too.

    I think if 4 billion humans dropped dead next week, we'd all be better off long-term. We're probably overdue for something like this anyway, given how little genetic diversity humans have.

    1. Re:Now we need... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      ...a pandemic to cull the human herd too.

      I think if 4 billion humans dropped dead next week, we'd all be better off long-term. We're probably overdue for something like this anyway, given how little genetic diversity humans have.

      Y'know... unless you're one of the 4 billion that was killed off...

    2. Re:Now we need... by OakDragon · · Score: 3, Insightful

      What an ugly sentiment.

      --
      Dark Reflection
    3. Re:Now we need... by Jesrad · · Score: 2, Insightful

      I think if 4 billion humans dropped dead next week, we'd all be better off long-term.

      And you're dead wrong, even if all the cadavers mysteriously and magically turned into basic mineral components and were sprinkled all over the planet (instead of rotting wherever they dropped dead, contaminating air and water with diseases durably over the following weeks).

      An 8 billion human population is overall better for mankind and also arguably for the planet, than just 1 billion.

      Long-term, a forcibly reduced population would mean a lot less human capital (which is our true ultimate cap for progress potential), and a lot less competition for the same environmental resources, incentivizing a higher waste of these resources. Also, we'd be losing a lot of diversity, setting us back evolutionarily, and we'd just end up with more numerous but less adaptively fit individuals. This effect is well known and observed in all kinds of living organism populations, from bacteria to complex, social animals.

      Oh and, if you'd honestly believe killing people is ultimately doing people a service, you'd have started killing already. Or are you just a cowardly homicidal hypocrite ?

      --
      Maybe we deserve this world ?
    4. Re:Now we need... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      While lauding human potential, you omit cost, which considering how many people with even modertely useful degrees are under or unemployed; you're not getting those sunk costs back. And that is going to get worse as the population climbs.

      Regarding diversity, the Idiocracy argument applies, as that diversity is heavily skewed in one direction, which ends up not being diverse at all. It takes more than sheer numbers.

      Not advocating for any instance of a Final Solution (god knows no one is wise enough to select for best charecteristics), but this feel good, best of all possible worlds handwaving disregards very real problems the human population will face in the coming generations, and simply putting a smiley face on it insures a bloodbath will follow,

    5. Re:Now we need... by GameboyRMH · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't know why some people think that population reduction can only occur through mass-murder/pandemic. People can have less babies you know.

      --
      "When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
    6. Re:Now we need... by tylikcat · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It's hardly a matter of one political bend or another - I just had Jehova's Witnesses on my porch trying to tell about the world that is to come, and how only the really good people will be in it (making for a much smaller population, they emphasized) and God's going to clean everything up...

      But you'll see it as a trope in fiction of all stripes. There's some terrible disaster, and mankind re-emerges into a form that somehow fits the political biases of the author. A lot of people imagine that being in horrible circumstances like that, fighting for survival with less technology and an awful lot fewer people would make for a simpler, more real world and yearn for it.

      Not that long ago, here on Slashdot, a bunch of people were explaining to me that in such a world, as a woman, I would go back into my biologically ordained role of reproductive servitude, which struck me as saying a lot more about their preoccupations, I thought, than anything else, but then people always seem to project their fantasies into these scenarios. (Especially since I'd already mentioned that I was in my forties, as well as being a martial artist and martial arts instructor and having an awful lot of skills useful in such a society.)

    7. Re:Now we need... by Coren22 · · Score: 2, Insightful

      People have been claiming we were hitting peak population since we hit 1 billion. Improved technology has prevented true overpopulation from happening. Those places with an actual growing population will either die out, or figure out a way to deal with it.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    8. Re:Now we need... by ColdWetDog · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Many extinct species would beg to differ.

      How can they do that? They're extinct.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
    9. Re:Now we need... by CrimsonAvenger · · Score: 4, Insightful

      How do you go about convincing China, India and Africa to stop having so many kids?

      China has a negative population growth rate now.

      India's population growth rate is slightly positive, but decreasing steadily. They should be negative growth in another decade or three.

      Africa is a whole 'nuther issue. Of course, what Europe, North America, China, and India have in common is increasing standard of living. - maybe that would work for Africa too....

      --

      "I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
  3. Re:You didn't listen by sinij · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Who will be the next victims of our inaction? Gnus?

    I don't see how global warming could lead to the extinction of Free Software Foundation.

  4. Re:As they say by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    You don't eat the meat of something that fell over and died of non-violent causes.

    The reasons for this should be rather obvious.