Show Some Love to the Ugly and Endangered

Let’s face it-not every animal is going to win a beauty contest. But all of them are important, and they all deserve a chance at survival. Let’s show a little love for some of the endangered species that may not be the prettiest, but need our help all the same.

Pallid Sturgeon(浅色鲟鱼)

The species has been around for more than 78 million years. These guys once shared the planet with dinosaurs. And sadly，they could be going the same way as their now fossilized(变成化石的)friends. Today, the last wild-born pallid sturgeons are nearing extinction. As humans built dams in the waterways these fish need to survive, they blocked the pallid sturgeon from being able to reach its breeding grounds.

California Condor(加州秃鹫)

The California condor sports a bare featherless head, the better to put into dead things without getting too dirty. With a wingspan of up to 9 feet, they’re one of the largest birds in the world. But due in large part to habitat loss, illegal shootings, and lead poisoning, by 1985 the entire known wild population had been reduced to just nine birds.

Northern Long-eared Bat

Few animals have as undeserved a bad reputation as bats do but they actually provide incredibly valuable services like pollination(授粉)or eating insects that could otherwise kill crops or make us sick.

North American bats like the Northern long-eared bat are being killed right now by a disease called “white nose syndrome”. This infection has lent new urgency to efforts to protect bat habitats and reduce other threats to their survival.

These are just three of a long list of endangered species that need our help-even if they aren’t always the ones that get the lion’s share of the spotlight. This Valentine’s Day, show some love for species like these.

Addy Barrett, an 11-year-old girl from Maryland, the US, is a regular visitor to the zoo, and never gets tired of watching gorillas (大猩猩). “I really fell in love with these smart animals after reading a book about them,” Addy said. “I also learned they were being killed for unnecessary reasons. And I knew I needed to do something.”

Addy is now working to save her favorite animals. She has sold T-shirts and home-made cookies to raise money, and she hosts a party about the gorilla yearly.

Addy asked Meredith Bastian, a zookeeper, about the challenges that wild gorillas are facing and that many people ignore. Bastian said it’s because of habitat loss, climate change and the spread of disease. But there is also the problem of mining. “Some mines in Congo, Africa destroy gorillas’ habitats and make their living conditions worse,” Bastian told Addy.

Addy decided to start the Gorill a Heroes project. She has held fundraisers (筹款活动) hoping to start a conversation on the risks to gorillas. The animals, which are native to Central Africa, are endangered. There are fewer than 900 mountain gorillas and about 100,000 western lowland gorillas in the world. So far, Gorilla Heroes has raised more than $11,000. Addy was recently named a winner of the 2019 Gloria Barton Prize for Young Heroes for her work.

Addy hopes to get close to a gorilla in the wild, but she can’t because she is too young. So for now Addy is sticking to raising money for gorillas.

It’s a fascinating story of how nature is reclaiming and transforming the broken soil we leave behind. Wildlife filmmaker Dan O’Neill and zoologist Yussef Rafik are on a mission to uncover the wildlife secrets hidden inside some abandoned places.

This island off the Scottish coast had been an important strategic location for military defences for over 500 years by 1957. While its buildings might be empty and in bad condition, the wildlife has bloomed. Dan and Yussef watch young seal pups on the beach and spot seabirds and European cave spiders.

Dan and Yussef visit this former slate quarry（采石场） in Wales. Dinorwic closed its doors in 1969 and nature has slowly been reclaiming the land ever since. Dan and Yussef are searching for the fastest animal in the world, the peregrine falcon（游隼） and spot rare wild mountain goats.

Today it looks more like a set from a film, but at its peak Chatterley Whitfield was a busy coalmine. Since it was closed in 1977, wildlife has taken hold. Dan and Yussef find plants including sunflowers that have sprung up in the most unlikely places. And hidden cameras capture footage of the rabbits and foxes wandering these empty buildings at night.

Dan and Yussef explore one of the seven great graveyards in London, which was closed right after the Second World War and soon became neglected. Now hundreds of species live alongside the dead. Dan spots bright green ring-necked parakeets, the non-native bird that’s made London its home and the pair sample blackberries growing among the graves.