On the Ark

We know that scientists can connect extreme weather events and natural disasters to climate change, and reliable models predict a worsening of these phenomena that increasingly plague the planet. Against such a backdrop, the World Economic Forum annually surveys the concerns of experts, who for 2018 identified climate-related problems as the greatest risks with the most severe possible impacts. Yet here in the United States climate change is an issue where partisanship (let me call it tribalism) makes discourse, not to mention policies, elusive. This is woeful for humans as well as the fauna and flora that share the world with us.

Data from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information list 230 separate billion-dollar weather and climate incidents in the United States since 1980. With regard to animals, the consequences of these droughts, floods, freezes, storms, cyclones, and fires, while impossible to quantify, have been devastating. It took Hurricane Katrina, when people were not allowed to bring their pets to evacuation centers (resulting in an estimated 70,000 deaths), to prompt passage of the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act; this requires states that seek FEMA assistance to have plans for companion and service animals.

While I applaud the post-Katrina legislation (its effects were evident in Hurricane Harvey) and the attention to domestic animals, the many wild creatures whose lives and habitats are threatened by climate change require equal consideration. Some efforts are being made on this front, but in her book Filling the Ark Leslie Irvine reminds us “various populations experience differential vulnerability to disasters.” What can we do to help these highly vulnerable wild species find a place on “the ark”?