The article “Endangered Wild Equids,” written by Patricia D. Moehlman, focuses on the plight of equids, wild animal species related to the horse, who are quickly disappearing from the face of the planet. According to the article, although these species were among the most plentiful herbivores on three continents when our ancestors were still painting on cave walls, today there are only seven species still alive, all of which are on the endangered species list. These species include three species of zebra, three species of ass and one species of horse.
The article is focused primarily on what can be done to try to save these species for the future and presents a plan that has been adopted by the IUCN – The World Conservation Union.
The IUCN has been studying the life patterns of these animals and determined that they are basically organized between two general yet distinct social organization patterns. These patterns are structured based upon the availability of food and water. When these necessities are abundant, females herd together and form stable groups watched over by a single male, who gains mating rights to all females in the group.
This system is referred to as a harem or family group. Where food and water is not so plentiful, each adult is left to fend for him or herself.
Males generally adopt a specific territory with access to food and water that he defends, and he gains mating rights to any females that enter this territory. This obviously has an effect on the social behaviors of the animals as well as their ability to survive and bring foals into full adulthood.
Both territorial and harem groups tend to begin having foals only after they have reached their fourth or fifth year, and then only about one foal every other year is born to a single female until the end of her life at about age 16. While this strategy worked well in the past, current conditions have severely limited the replacement potential. These include avid hunters, loss of habitat and reduced access to precious resources. To illustrate the difficulty of life for these animals as well as the problems of trying to study them, the author provides an in-depth discussion of her own study of the African wild ass in the Danakil desert.
One of the things the article does not go into is the reason why these animals should be saved from extinction.
One of the major threats to these species is a loss of habitat and resources as humans and domesticated animals move into their territory and begin hoarding the available natural resources.
It would seem that the best solution, and perhaps most kind, would be to simply allow them to die out. However, I believe it is also important to look at the areas in which these animals live. Some, such as the African wild ass that the author herself studied, live in some of the most inhospitable places on earth and yet still have managed to find a way to survive for generations. In addition, while many of these animals are similar to animals we have domesticated, they are not the same as is pointed out in the case of Przewalski’s horse.
According to the author of the article, this horse species, which has only recently been reintroduced to the wild, actually has two additional chromosomes than the modern horse. Learning from the history of our own species, it is often these minor variations that enable a single species, such as today’s modern human, to survive situations that have killed off a number of other similar species that existed in the past. While we are uncertain what happened to the other hominid species that lived long ago, we can take care to ensure as many different kinds of species of other animals remain alive today.
Finally, the preservation of these wild species has already provided us with a great deal of information about what life in the wild past must have been like for a variety of species, not just the equids under discussion and this connection enables us, as humans, to become more closely identified with the processes of the earth. By observing, protecting, and helping these species, as the native people in the Danakil Desert and in central Mongolia have done, connections are formed between the wild and the domestic that enriches both – the paradox of sharing providing more to all involved.
Works Cited
Moehlman, Patricia D. “Endangered Wild Equids.” Scientific American. Vol. 292, N. 3, (2005): 86-93.