9 ms·

Botswana: Lab tests to solve mystery of hundreds of dead elephants

161 points by polycaster 6y ago

arilotter 6y ago
Maybe it has something to do with Botswana's lifting of their ban on elephant hunting, apparently because "The number and high levels of human-elephant conflict and the consequent impact on livelihoods was increasing." https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48374880 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48374880 They subsequently auctioned off permits to hunt elephants. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-51413420 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-51413420
- readarticle 6y ago
  Back in May, Botswana's government ruled out poaching as a reason - noting the tusks had not been removed, according to Phys.org. There are other things which point to something other than poaching. "It is only elephants that are dying and nothing else," Dr McCann said. "If it was cyanide used by poachers, you would expect to see other deaths." Dr McCann has also tentatively ruled out natural anthrax poisoning, which killed at least 100 elephants in Botswana last year. But they have been unable to rule out either poisoning or disease. The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems, Dr McCann said. - TFA
  - arilotter 6y ago
    The reason for the lifting of the ban was both for hunting tourism and allowing people to kill elephants that interfere with their livelihoods. If you're killing elephants because they might interfere with your farming, etc., I wouldn't expect to see their tusks removed. I would imagine that hunters (who have already been issued permits to kill 60 elephants so far, see https://www.reuters.com/article/us-botswana-elephants/botswana-auctions-permits-to-hunt-elephants-to-ease-human-wildlife-conflict-idUSKBN20118U https://www.reuters.com/article/us-botswana-elephants/botswa... ) would take some part of the elephant as a trophy, so it probably isn't a result of the legal hunting permits. Just to be pedantic and a bit conspiratorial, poaching is defined as the illegal hunting of an animal. Since lifting a ban on hunting elephants is definitely controversial, I would imagine it's in Botswana's government's interests to be specific in their wording. They've only "ruled out poaching as a reason," they haven't ruled out that these elephants were killed by people.
    - InfiniteRand 6y ago
      Slightly off topic, but It was interesting talking about elephants with my wife from India, she does not have the same warm fuzzy feelings I do regarding elephants as her main memory of them was her father guarding his field against wild elephants
- bpodgursky 6y ago
  > Back in May, Botswana's government ruled out poaching as a reason - noting the tusks had not been removed, according to Phys.org. If the problem was permitted hunting... it wouldn't be a mystery.
  - sukilot 6y ago
    It would if instead of being "hunted" in a "normal" way there deaths are due to an over aggressive and risky poisoning campaign that some people would find controversial.
Fiveplus 6y ago
>The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems This line was extremely sad and discomforting to read. I'm no expert in wildlife but I saw they mentioned in another article about anthrax occurring naturally in the ground in parts of Botswana and has been known to kill wildlife in large numbers but this one rules it out. Hope the true cause of death is not only discovered early but also acted upon to prevent further damage.
smallnamespace 6y ago
The number of mass animal deaths seems to be greatly increasing in over the last two decades: - Half of all Saiga antelopes (120k) died over a month, 2015 [1] - Recent unexplained dog deaths in Norway, 2019 [2] - The ongoing white nose syndrome epidemic that's ravaging bat populations in North America [3] - Gray whales beaching themselves all along US West Coast, 2019 [4] - Ongoing, mass die-off of about 30% of frog and other amphibian species in the New World caused by a fungus [5] Not to mention the commonly noted large decline in insect populations and colony collapse disorder in bees. It seems that the proximate causes for these events are varied, but the sheer pace, magnitude, and number of affected species should hint that this is ultimately caused by downstream impacts of rapid changes in the environment precipitated by climate change. One factor that I'm betting will eventually be implicated in many animal die-offs are biotoxins created by algae and molds. Many algaes and mold species are capable of creating toxins, but are normally non-toxic. However, under environmental stress and disruption, they can quickly produce a wide variety of nasty toxins. These biotoxins tend to target the nervous system, the immune system, and cell metabolism. For example, seafood harvesting has been stopped with increasing frequency in Northern California in the last decade due to high domoic acid levels [6]. Many lakes were closed in the Bay Area due to cyanotoxins potentially poisoning dogs and people. > The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems, Dr McCann said. Top photo on the article looks like a lake undergoing an algal bloom, so potentially elephants are dying from ingested neurotoxins. Unfortunately for us, harmful algae blooms seem to be increasing in frequency [7] and potentially affecting human health. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saiga_antelope#2015%E2%80%932016_epizootic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saiga_antelope#2015%E2%80%9320... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49627463 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49627463 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-nose_syndrome#Cause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-nose_syndrome#Cause [4] https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress/2019-2020-gray-whale-unusual-mortality-event-along-west-coast-and https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress... [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chytridiomycosis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chytridiomycosis [6] https://caseagrant.ucsd.edu/project/frequently-asked-questions-domoic-acid-in-california-crabs https://caseagrant.ucsd.edu/project/frequently-asked-questio... [7] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Judith_ONeil/publication/256015193_Co-occurrence_of_dinoflagellate_and_cyanobacterial_harmful_algal_blooms_in_Florida_coastal_waters_A_case_for_dual_nutrient_N_and_P_input_controls/links/0a85e52fbe07b196ad000000/Co-occurrence-of-dinoflagellate-and-cyanobacterial-harmful-algal-blooms-in-Florida-coastal-waters-A-case-for-dual-nutrient-N-and-P-input-controls.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Judith_ONeil/publicatio...
guiambros 6y ago
Discussed yesterday, 35 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 This comment is particularly relevant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23708416 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23708416
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
typon 6y ago
Found this post also in /r/collapse. Maybe it's a one-off freak event, but reading about this makes me really depressed.
dang 6y ago
Recent and related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920
adamnemecek 6y ago
You guys should consider donating to David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust[0][1] which takes care of elephant and rhino orphans. For $50 a year, you can become a sponsor of a particular animal and they'll send you photos and updates about how your sponsored animal is doing. You can for example sponsor this little fella [2][3]. There is also the the International Anti-Poaching Foundation[4][5] which fights poachers. The founder, Damien Mander[6] is an Australian ex spec-ops sniper who is using his military experience to train park rangers since they, unlike the poachers, tend to be poorly equipped and trained as well as understaffed. [0] http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sheldrick_Wildlife_Trust http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sheldrick_Wildlife_Trust [2] https://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/orphans/murit https://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/orphans/murit [3] http://instagram.com/p/sigT3IAUKb http://instagram.com/p/sigT3IAUKb [4] http://www.iapf.org/en/ http://www.iapf.org/en/ [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Anti-Poaching_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Anti-Poaching_Fo... [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damien_Mander http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damien_Mander
m23khan 6y ago
hopefully it isn't COVID related. Maybe botulism especially if the corpses are not being actively consumed by scvangers.
pvaldes 6y ago
Typically poison symptoms expected from "that" poison in particular. I will not name it. We have enough environmental crimes yet.
- cinbun8 6y ago
  I'll bite. What are you talking about?
rdiddly 6y ago
[meta] The magic of HN: For a while this was right underneath an article about a bot framework, which made me think it was gonna be a "show HN" along the lines of "Botswana: a new bot framework." (Obviously quite sad what it actually turned out to be.)
ljf 6y ago
I'll see if I can find the article but a couple of years ago there was another mass die off of a type of deer that has an enlarged nose. It appears the the average temperature had risen just enough to allow a common bacteria they had in the nasal passage to replicate at speed and poison them. It wasn't just the temperature, but the humidity (or lack of) that also led to this, I'll see if I can find the article. https://phys.org/news/2015-05-mass-deaths-rare-kazakhstan-antelopes.html https://phys.org/news/2015-05-mass-deaths-rare-kazakhstan-an... edit here was the detail. It appears it was the rain that caused the issue and a third of the total population died.
- pvaldes 6y ago
  Yup, the rain... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_issues_in_Kazakhstan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_issues_in_Kazakh... "Most of Kazakhstan’s water supply has been polluted by industrial and agricultural runoff and, in some places, radioactivity".
lowdose 6y ago
Why aren't we putting elephants in the wild on other continents?
- 420basteit 6y ago
  I've wondered this too. It seems like there is a solid argument that they could act as a harmful invasive species and damage or destroy ecosystems which they are introduced to. There is precedent for this in hippos which were introduced to South America. However, these rare and unique megafauna are so valuable (imo), that the potential damage they could cause ecosystems we introduce them to may be outweighed by their increased resilience. The death of all wild elephant populations would be a massive blow to biology, animal psychology, and natural beauty; I wonder if we should think more about prioritizing their survival over other ecological considerations. I'm absolutely not an expert in this area at all, just thoughts of a layman.
- pvaldes 6y ago
  Shrinking habitat. You need a lot of room for a population of elephants and there are rare endemic trees and animals yet inhabiting those areas.
inugo 6y ago
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_...
inugo 6y ago
Scientific studies on 5G effects show a 1°C temperature increase in tissue during in vitro testing, while in vivo testing studies show an 80% exposure-related reaction rate in mice, rats, rabbits, bacteria, fungi and other living tissue. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_...

161 points by polycaster 6y ago

Maybe it has something to do with Botswana's lifting of their ban on elephant hunting, apparently because "The number and high levels of human-elephant conflict and the consequent impact on livelihoods was increasing." https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48374880 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-48374880 They subsequently auctioned off permits to hunt elephants. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-51413420 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-51413420

readarticle 6y ago
Back in May, Botswana's government ruled out poaching as a reason - noting the tusks had not been removed, according to Phys.org. There are other things which point to something other than poaching. "It is only elephants that are dying and nothing else," Dr McCann said. "If it was cyanide used by poachers, you would expect to see other deaths." Dr McCann has also tentatively ruled out natural anthrax poisoning, which killed at least 100 elephants in Botswana last year. But they have been unable to rule out either poisoning or disease. The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems, Dr McCann said. - TFA
- arilotter 6y ago
  The reason for the lifting of the ban was both for hunting tourism and allowing people to kill elephants that interfere with their livelihoods. If you're killing elephants because they might interfere with your farming, etc., I wouldn't expect to see their tusks removed. I would imagine that hunters (who have already been issued permits to kill 60 elephants so far, see https://www.reuters.com/article/us-botswana-elephants/botswana-auctions-permits-to-hunt-elephants-to-ease-human-wildlife-conflict-idUSKBN20118U https://www.reuters.com/article/us-botswana-elephants/botswa... ) would take some part of the elephant as a trophy, so it probably isn't a result of the legal hunting permits. Just to be pedantic and a bit conspiratorial, poaching is defined as the illegal hunting of an animal. Since lifting a ban on hunting elephants is definitely controversial, I would imagine it's in Botswana's government's interests to be specific in their wording. They've only "ruled out poaching as a reason," they haven't ruled out that these elephants were killed by people.
  - InfiniteRand 6y ago
    Slightly off topic, but It was interesting talking about elephants with my wife from India, she does not have the same warm fuzzy feelings I do regarding elephants as her main memory of them was her father guarding his field against wild elephants
bpodgursky 6y ago
> Back in May, Botswana's government ruled out poaching as a reason - noting the tusks had not been removed, according to Phys.org. If the problem was permitted hunting... it wouldn't be a mystery.
- sukilot 6y ago
  It would if instead of being "hunted" in a "normal" way there deaths are due to an over aggressive and risky poisoning campaign that some people would find controversial.

Fiveplus 6y ago

>The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems This line was extremely sad and discomforting to read. I'm no expert in wildlife but I saw they mentioned in another article about anthrax occurring naturally in the ground in parts of Botswana and has been known to kill wildlife in large numbers but this one rules it out. Hope the true cause of death is not only discovered early but also acted upon to prevent further damage.

smallnamespace 6y ago

The number of mass animal deaths seems to be greatly increasing in over the last two decades: - Half of all Saiga antelopes (120k) died over a month, 2015 [1] - Recent unexplained dog deaths in Norway, 2019 [2] - The ongoing white nose syndrome epidemic that's ravaging bat populations in North America [3] - Gray whales beaching themselves all along US West Coast, 2019 [4] - Ongoing, mass die-off of about 30% of frog and other amphibian species in the New World caused by a fungus [5] Not to mention the commonly noted large decline in insect populations and colony collapse disorder in bees. It seems that the proximate causes for these events are varied, but the sheer pace, magnitude, and number of affected species should hint that this is ultimately caused by downstream impacts of rapid changes in the environment precipitated by climate change. One factor that I'm betting will eventually be implicated in many animal die-offs are biotoxins created by algae and molds. Many algaes and mold species are capable of creating toxins, but are normally non-toxic. However, under environmental stress and disruption, they can quickly produce a wide variety of nasty toxins. These biotoxins tend to target the nervous system, the immune system, and cell metabolism. For example, seafood harvesting has been stopped with increasing frequency in Northern California in the last decade due to high domoic acid levels [6]. Many lakes were closed in the Bay Area due to cyanotoxins potentially poisoning dogs and people. > The way the animals appear to be dying - many dropping on their faces - and sightings of other elephants walking in circles points to something potentially attacking their neurological systems, Dr McCann said. Top photo on the article looks like a lake undergoing an algal bloom, so potentially elephants are dying from ingested neurotoxins. Unfortunately for us, harmful algae blooms seem to be increasing in frequency [7] and potentially affecting human health. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saiga_antelope#2015%E2%80%932016_epizootic https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saiga_antelope#2015%E2%80%9320... [2] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49627463 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-49627463 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-nose_syndrome#Cause https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White-nose_syndrome#Cause [4] https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress/2019-2020-gray-whale-unusual-mortality-event-along-west-coast-and https://www.fisheries.noaa.gov/national/marine-life-distress... [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chytridiomycosis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chytridiomycosis [6] https://caseagrant.ucsd.edu/project/frequently-asked-questions-domoic-acid-in-california-crabs https://caseagrant.ucsd.edu/project/frequently-asked-questio... [7] https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Judith_ONeil/publication/256015193_Co-occurrence_of_dinoflagellate_and_cyanobacterial_harmful_algal_blooms_in_Florida_coastal_waters_A_case_for_dual_nutrient_N_and_P_input_controls/links/0a85e52fbe07b196ad000000/Co-occurrence-of-dinoflagellate-and-cyanobacterial-harmful-algal-blooms-in-Florida-coastal-waters-A-case-for-dual-nutrient-N-and-P-input-controls.pdf https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Judith_ONeil/publicatio...

guiambros 6y ago

Discussed yesterday, 35 comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 This comment is particularly relevant: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23708416 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23708416

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

typon 6y ago

Found this post also in /r/collapse. Maybe it's a one-off freak event, but reading about this makes me really depressed.

dang 6y ago

Recent and related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23707920

adamnemecek 6y ago

You guys should consider donating to David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust[0][1] which takes care of elephant and rhino orphans. For $50 a year, you can become a sponsor of a particular animal and they'll send you photos and updates about how your sponsored animal is doing. You can for example sponsor this little fella [2][3]. There is also the the International Anti-Poaching Foundation[4][5] which fights poachers. The founder, Damien Mander[6] is an Australian ex spec-ops sniper who is using his military experience to train park rangers since they, unlike the poachers, tend to be poorly equipped and trained as well as understaffed. [0] http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org http://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sheldrick_Wildlife_Trust http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Sheldrick_Wildlife_Trust [2] https://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/orphans/murit https://www.sheldrickwildlifetrust.org/orphans/murit [3] http://instagram.com/p/sigT3IAUKb http://instagram.com/p/sigT3IAUKb [4] http://www.iapf.org/en/ http://www.iapf.org/en/ [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Anti-Poaching_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Anti-Poaching_Fo... [6] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damien_Mander http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damien_Mander

m23khan 6y ago

hopefully it isn't COVID related. Maybe botulism especially if the corpses are not being actively consumed by scvangers.

pvaldes 6y ago

Typically poison symptoms expected from "that" poison in particular. I will not name it. We have enough environmental crimes yet.

cinbun8 6y ago
I'll bite. What are you talking about?

rdiddly 6y ago

[meta] The magic of HN: For a while this was right underneath an article about a bot framework, which made me think it was gonna be a "show HN" along the lines of "Botswana: a new bot framework." (Obviously quite sad what it actually turned out to be.)

ljf 6y ago

I'll see if I can find the article but a couple of years ago there was another mass die off of a type of deer that has an enlarged nose. It appears the the average temperature had risen just enough to allow a common bacteria they had in the nasal passage to replicate at speed and poison them. It wasn't just the temperature, but the humidity (or lack of) that also led to this, I'll see if I can find the article. https://phys.org/news/2015-05-mass-deaths-rare-kazakhstan-antelopes.html https://phys.org/news/2015-05-mass-deaths-rare-kazakhstan-an... edit here was the detail. It appears it was the rain that caused the issue and a third of the total population died.

pvaldes 6y ago
Yup, the rain... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_issues_in_Kazakhstan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_issues_in_Kazakh... "Most of Kazakhstan’s water supply has been polluted by industrial and agricultural runoff and, in some places, radioactivity".

lowdose 6y ago

Why aren't we putting elephants in the wild on other continents?

420basteit 6y ago
I've wondered this too. It seems like there is a solid argument that they could act as a harmful invasive species and damage or destroy ecosystems which they are introduced to. There is precedent for this in hippos which were introduced to South America. However, these rare and unique megafauna are so valuable (imo), that the potential damage they could cause ecosystems we introduce them to may be outweighed by their increased resilience. The death of all wild elephant populations would be a massive blow to biology, animal psychology, and natural beauty; I wonder if we should think more about prioritizing their survival over other ecological considerations. I'm absolutely not an expert in this area at all, just thoughts of a layman.
pvaldes 6y ago
Shrinking habitat. You need a lot of room for a population of elephants and there are rare endemic trees and animals yet inhabiting those areas.

inugo 6y ago

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_...

inugo 6y ago

Scientific studies on 5G effects show a 1°C temperature increase in tissue during in vitro testing, while in vivo testing studies show an 80% exposure-related reaction rate in mice, rats, rabbits, bacteria, fungi and other living tissue. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_sectitle https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6765906/#__ffn_...