The earth goes through different climates, normally based on temperature and precipitation differences. Most of the organisms found on the earth’s surface have developed mechanisms to adapt to different climates, though some climatic conditions are too harsh for these animals. Drought is one of the worse climatic changes since it does not only interfere with the water cycle, but every living thing found on the earth’s surface.
The worst thing that has happened in the current century is not depletion of energy sources, nor is it an increase in nuclear war but loss in the biodiversity. The other catastrophes can be repaired within a very short period but loss in biodiversity would take millions of years to correct.
The biggest threat to biodiversity is drought; this can either occur due to natural processes or can be influenced by human beings. Management and conservation measures of the South African reserve should be aimed at establishing ways of preventing the current biodiversity as well as investing in others.
When planning on the conservation measure to adapt for the South African reserve, certain issues have to be put into consideration; both biodiversity and the ecosystem must be preserved for future generation. Since the drought is affecting the vegetation for grazers, it is likely that most of them will die or be eaten by the predators (the lions and dogs).
This may not continue for long as all the grazers may be killed and some may die out of starvation leaving no food for the predators. This calls for urgent conservation measures in order to ensure that neither the grazers nor the predators become extinct.
Many organisms are able to thrive in the habitations that they are most adapted to, for example, fish cannot be able to survive outside water because they have special features that enable them to stay in water. The same applies to wildlife which cannot be able to thrive in an area without vegetation. Conservation measures should therefore be aimed at preserving the vegetation so as to provide a habitat for the wildlife
One way of conserving the reserve would be to transfer the lions and dogs and some of the grazers to other reserves with plenty of food in order to conserve the affected reserve and ensure that none of the organisms get extinct. Transferring the predators and some of the grazers would not be enough because even after doing that the carrying capacity of the reserve remains low and thus the remaining grazers will soon die of hunger.
Other conservation measures have to be adopted for instance planting of turf grass. Almost every cultural landscape contains turf grass lawn, which dictates the infrastructural aesthetic held by people and enforced by ordinance. The lawn is a landscape that requires regular watering yet does not get wet and require limited use of fertilizer and is always short.
The landscape is in essence designed to separate itself from the two most important components it needs, that is, water and resources. This is the heritage of a cultural endeavour to create a water-loving landscape that cannot put up with water.
Drought may be caused by increased human activities and thus the conservation plan must include measures on how to control such activities. It is true that human influences have led to the accelerating rate of climate change. In most cases, the human activities on land such as pollution and deforestation interfere with the water cycle. These activities do not only affect the aquatic life but also the natural cycle of water.
The aquifer table is depleted leading to increased surface runoff. If man was able to balance his activities with the water cycle, then there could be a strong relationship between land and water where each depend on the other one. Many people have changed their perspective about the environment and are now using measures of conserving it.
As we all know, drought is caused by lack of rainfall and the latter is being influenced by human activities such as deforestation and over-cultivation. To respond to this issue, trees should be planted and the government should issue bans to prevent the exploitation of the ecosystem. With all these measures being put into place, we expect the effects of the drought to decline although this may take quite some time.
Human beings in many parts of the world have become more conscious on the role played by living organisms. For instance, forests and vegetations are believed to regulate the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere thereby controlling the rate of global warming.
Measures have been put in place to ensure that certain areas are left as reserves and most governments have gone to the extent of planting forests. This has created an increase in the habitat of most species and the rate of extinction which has increased significantly is expected to go down.
If the number of reserves is increased in South Africa, animals would be distributed evenly in these reserves and the impacts of the drought would not be as severe as if the number of reserves is limited.