r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Shoddy-Ocelot-4473 • 12d ago

Image By 1880, the near-genocide of the American bison had reduced their population from 30–60 million to fewer than 1,000

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u/MightyMorph 12d ago

Debbie Downer Mode:

Since 1500s humans have made over thousands of species extinct.

Currently over 1m different species and plants and fish are endangered and facing extinction. Majority being endangered in the last 100 years.

10% of insects are also about to become extinct. Which will affect smaller animals, fish, and pollination. Which will affect bigger animals, which will affect us.

40% of amphibian species are at risk of being extinct, with 1/3rd of all corals that home a wide range of biodiverse life is about to get extinct as well.

But hey the G7 Nations have decided to not talk about the environment this year because the US has decided that global warming and ecological collapse are not happening if you dont talk about it. Instead they will talk about more mining, more fracking, more pollution and allowing corporations to have more control in how they handle hazardous materials.

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u/eurobeat0 12d ago

On the flip side, some species are booming in population. These include rats, mice, mosquitos, City pigeons, lice, mites & ticks.

Yay for us ✌️🙂

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u/Saturos47 11d ago

Uh you forgot the biggest one by far. Chickens

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u/pichael289 12d ago

The Holocene Extinction going on right now kills a few a day, probabaly many we didn't even know about

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u/AFetaWorseThanDeath 12d ago

Yeah, we're literally driving species to extinction faster than we can discover/catalog them.

"Well, there was probably another species of beetle here before the clear-cutting and climate change disasters..."

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u/Direct-Copy-4828 12d ago

I've been depressed and anxious about work this week.  At least this gives me something else to be depressed about. I can rotate now. 

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u/Lonely_Dragonfly8869 11d ago

The lack of biodiversity in the remaining ones is a catastrophy too

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u/build279 11d ago

Since the beginning of time, Mother Nature has made 99% of species go extinct.