Last Chance to See | Themes

Last Chance to See Themes

Poaching

Poaching is one of the major ways in which species have become extinct or drawn precariously close to extinction before governments intervene. Rarely are animals targeted as a food source, although on Réunion Island Frenchman slaughter pink pigeons hatched in captivity and reintroduced into the wild to make casseroles. More often, poaching serves human vanity, most often that of rich foreigners whose middlemen pay piteously small fees for the carnage.

In Zaïre, Adams and Carwardine see mountain gorillas at the Virunga volcanoes. The preserve spans three nations, and those gorillas that wander into Uganda remain fair-game for poachers. In Zaïre the 280 surviving primates who are humans' closest relatives, are guarded with deadly force. Poaching guerrillas has diminished because zoos no longer accept animals from the wild and macabre "collectibles" like stuffed hands are no longer in fashion.

The authors fly next to the vast Garamba National Park,...
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