My answer to How is climate change affecting tigers lives?
Answer by Desmond Last:
All Creatures great and small including Tigers are in the front-line of climate change.
A lot of the food and drink we consume is treated before we eat it. Therefore the chemicals we ingest are not as concentrated as the food and water the Tigers consume. Though that is rapidly changing.
There are 4000 chemicals in the air we breathe. As we are doing very little to reduce those chemicals and their concentration it means that the level of poison in our blood and the Tigers will continue to increase.
It is not something that can be denied. Go to the washing powder shelf of your local supermarket and read the warnings on the packets. That is just one small example of chemicals being added to our bio-systems.
Being in a jungle or a grassland in South Africa with no industry in site does not make you immune from the chemicals we breathe in, drink and consume.
Tigers eat other creatures some who eat a lot of grass and drink water in high summer that has a high concentrate of chemicals. As the water level falls through drainage and evaporation it leaves behind chemical residue and concentrate that is not absorbed and broken down by the water that remains.
The meat they eat will be contaminated with chemicals as a consequence the meat will have its highest concentration of chemicals just after it is killed – which is when the tiger will eat it. Tigers are likely to suffer an increased incidence of cancer – probably of the mouth and tongue. They may also because of this become more irritable and dangerous – attacking anything in site.
The Tiger will also be affected by changes to his migration cycles. His water-holes will dry up and his young may die early. He will move closer to inhabited areas in search of food and water.
His young may be still-born as the concentration of chemicals builds up in his body.
We do not have the time that the Paris 21 Climate Change agreement has – 2050 to reduce Greenhouse Gases to save the Tiger or ourselves.
If the world wants to survive Climate Change it will need more than a non-mandatory agreement that does not begin till 2020, and is expected to reduce greenhouse to a level we and the Tiger can survive by 2050.
You can be 100 per cent sure that the £100 billion a year that Paris 21 is spending on Climate Change from 2020 is not going to help the Tiger.
How is climate change affecting tigers lives?
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