We are living in an ever more connected world but what about our animal and plant counterparts? Their natural habitat is being more and more reduced and disrupted through human activities. Nature reserve and national parks are a great way of protecting natural habitat and species. However being enclosed areas, they have the drawback of causing as well the extinction of some of the fauna and flora which can not freely move or adapt to the changes in environment and climate.
To answer this issue, wildlife corridors are been created around the world. Subways and bridges are offering a safe travel option to the wildlife in spaces chopped up by man-made boundaries such as roads, fences and other residential and industrial developments. The Netherlands, pioneer on this field, have today 600 bridges. There are today many more projects in place, discover in images wildlife corridors worldwide in this article from Candice Gaukel Andrews.
Eminent evolutionary biologist and author E. O. Wilson goes even on step further with the « Half Earth » concept. According to him, creating a network allowing wildlife to spread over 50% of the planet may be the solution to save biodiversity. In the United States some large corridors are already in place allowing wildlife to move north-south from Yellowstone to Yukon and east-west along the Western Wildway. These initiatives are the fruit from public and private cooperations.
Want to know more? Enroll on the next summer field study about wildlife corridors in the Banff National Park, Canada.
Photo credit: Goois Natuurreservaat