AHC: Save an extinct species.
- Thread starter Duke Andrew of Dank
- Start date
-
- Tags
- extinction species
Maybe if dodo birds weren't so extroverted they wouldn't have been gleefully hunted to extinction.
A remember a map of fortnight saving the dodos breeding them in brazil https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/motf-61-the-petting-zoo.245318/
Ideas how save Aurochos?
the heath hen is pretty simple to save: over time, the largest population of them ended up being on Martha's Vineyard and iirc were pretty stable, but then there was a fire that killed alot of them and then the population was unsustainable
dodos were unpalatable--they were wiped out by invasive species, not overhunting
Get Teddy maybe, or another president, or some other authority to set up a national park or equivalent in the Deep Southern Bayous and we might get the Ivory Billed Woodpecker to survive (some say it still does, but in the modern world of digital imaging I doubt the sightings to be true).
There is a foundation now working on a replacement, but I do not think it impossible to have the American Chestnut survive, there just needs to be no introduction of the Asiatic variant which carried the blight that killed it (harder) or just have a weaker blight, or American Chestnut with greater immunity (slightly easier).
I want more tigers, how can we get more tigers. The subspecies used to be numerous, now there is only a handful, I wish we could gaze upon a living Caspian Tiger.
There is a foundation now working on a replacement, but I do not think it impossible to have the American Chestnut survive, there just needs to be no introduction of the Asiatic variant which carried the blight that killed it (harder) or just have a weaker blight, or American Chestnut with greater immunity (slightly easier).
I want more tigers, how can we get more tigers. The subspecies used to be numerous, now there is only a handful, I wish we could gaze upon a living Caspian Tiger.
When the lighthouse on Stephens Island in Cook Strait is built, the assistant lighthouse keeper decides not to bring his pregnant cat with him. It may take David Lyall a little longer to formally describe the wren which he discovered, but it may well prevent him from also having to declare it extinct.
Woolly Mammoths survived on Wrangel Island in the Arctic until 2,000-1,700 BC, 6,000 years longer than on mainland Asia. It appears that their final extinction may have happened because paleo-Eskimo hunters arrived on the island about that time. So say that humans never (for whatever reason) reached the island until 19th century and the woolly mammoth could have survived until the present day. (Stringent protection laws would need to be instituted by the Russian government as soon as the island is discovered and the herd identified, otherwise they're a goner). It also looks as if they were suffering a bit from inbreeding towards the end, so (ASB alert) make their numbers a bit higher during favourable periods, and ensure debilitating mutations don't arise in their DNA.
In a short while, we can add the Northern White Rhino to the list... Making the challenge of saving them relatively easily to come up with.
Too bad none of the inevitable ideas were implemented during the last few decades. :-/
Too bad none of the inevitable ideas were implemented during the last few decades. :-/
Uhh, just saying. If the goal is less extinction, the simplest and most logical response is best. I say this considering no other goal.
it's tough to save island critters once humans get there and bring in all their livestock/pets. A better bet would seem to be one of those animals that existed in large numbers and were wiped out by overhunting... the great auk, the quagga, the aurochs, etc...
Modern Imperialism
Banned
Could you domesticate them? Maybe they become like a tropical chicken? The dodo bird doesn’t just avoid extinction but spread to other areas as domesticated animals. They probably aren’t too hard to domesticate. People literally were able to causally walk up to them. That’s why they were so easy to kill.
What if one guy while staring straight down at one just wonders “hmmm I wonder what their eggs would taste like. Maybe I could raise them like a chicken”. It is more food in long run.
Modern Imperialism
Banned
I think humans that try to domesticate more animals might help a lot. Early Europeans start using dwarf elephant to carry stuff around and labor. A stronger version of a donkey or beast of burden.
You have Greeks riding a mini elephant through Athens or Spartan slaves using them to help them labor and carry stuff.
Elephants are smart creatures. These European ones probably are too
You have Greeks riding a mini elephant through Athens or Spartan slaves using them to help them labor and carry stuff.
Elephants are smart creatures. These European ones probably are too
twovultures
Donor
For passenger pigeons, what needs to be saved is a breeding forest-as long as at least one nesting site is undisturbed, the species is salvagable. Perhaps one of the ubiquitous "southern victory" timelines could end with a no-man's land between North and South that preserves some old growth forests that the passenger pigeons breed in.
The pleistocene extinctions were ridiculously complex events and the more I dig into them the less I can point to "one thing" that can avert them. However, it could be reasonable for any single megafauna species to survive the pleistocene with a bit of luck-perhaps an epidemic in the deer population in the east allows the shrub ox population to grow due to less browsing competition, and maintain just enough of a population mass to survive the extinction. Perhaps the bison could join the woolly mammoth or the cow in failing to cross the Bering land bridge, allowing horses to exploit its niche. Perhaps bighorn sheep could develop a symbiotic relationship with American camels, travelling in inter-species herds while grazing different plants (as seen on the African savanna) and this might help the camels survive as nearby sheep take more of the brunt of human hunting, or perhaps lead camels to run from human predators more by example.
The pleistocene extinctions were ridiculously complex events and the more I dig into them the less I can point to "one thing" that can avert them. However, it could be reasonable for any single megafauna species to survive the pleistocene with a bit of luck-perhaps an epidemic in the deer population in the east allows the shrub ox population to grow due to less browsing competition, and maintain just enough of a population mass to survive the extinction. Perhaps the bison could join the woolly mammoth or the cow in failing to cross the Bering land bridge, allowing horses to exploit its niche. Perhaps bighorn sheep could develop a symbiotic relationship with American camels, travelling in inter-species herds while grazing different plants (as seen on the African savanna) and this might help the camels survive as nearby sheep take more of the brunt of human hunting, or perhaps lead camels to run from human predators more by example.
I resent the insinuation that I have gone extinct...
Interbreeding between archaic and modern humans