• Question: What is your view on poaching and how do you think we should handle it?

    Asked by whtalia to Anil, Blanka, Emma, Mike on 4 Jul 2012.
    • Photo: Emma Trantham

      Emma Trantham answered on 4 Jul 2012:

      I think poaching is bad because when people poach animals they are either reducing the number of animals that are left in the wild or are taking some of a farmer’s animals (which is basically stealing). If lots of people poached wild animals the numbers of those animals might get smaller and smaller until they died out.

      It is illegal to poach animals (I think anyway!) so the police can get involved if they find anyone poaching (or if anyone else finds someone and reports them).

      Do you think we need stricter rules than this? How would you handle it?

    • Photo: Michael Cook

      Michael Cook answered on 4 Jul 2012:

      As Emma says, poaching is awful, and very hard to deal with. Some countries have had incidents where poachers are shot, which is an extreme solution to a really difficult problem!

      Lots of steps are taken to discourage poaching – we make the trade of materials made from poached animals illegal, for instance, but that makes it even harder to keep track of because the trading is done in secret. Even with security involved, it can be hard to keep track of every animal out there that needs protecting! Maybe we need more technology to help keep an eye on those that are most endangered?

Comments

  • Photo: whtalia

    whtalia commented on :

    Thanks this is good info and i think that vets or rangers in national parks should go round and saw the ivory tusks of the elephants and replace them with fake but realistic ivory which also has a tracking device in.

    • Photo: Emma

      Emma commented on :

      I see where you are coming from with this but I worry that sawing the tusks off elephants might hurt them? Perhaps there would be a way to safely monitor the elephants without hurting them?