Endangered species

Dragonflies, those beautiful and colourful creatures which can often be seen hovering above water, pre-date dinosaurs. Today, some 5,000 species have been described and many more await discovery and description. The value of dragonflies lies in their beauty and distinctive colours which make them valuable subjects for research on insect behaviour, both for ecology and art; the fact that their larvae are aquatic makes them a good indicator of water quality; and because they are predators, they are particularly useful in the control of mosquitoes which pass on diseases to human beings.

Found in a variety of forms and sometimes with very attractive flowers, cacti and other succulents have elicited widespread interest and tremendous popularity worldwide. Although the subject of a certain amount of debate, about 10,000 species of plant are recognised as belonging to the succulent group. Of these, an estimated 2,000 are threatened with global extinction in the wild and many more are regionally or nationally threatened. The main threats to the survival of cacti and succulent plants are habitat destruction and collection for international trade.

The Ethiopian wolf is one of many species endemic to the highlands of Ethiopia but with only about 400 adults remaining, it is also the most endangered canid in the world. The main threats to this creature are loss of habitat to subsistence farming and livestock over-grazing, human development with all its subsidiary effects whereby human activity encroaches on the wolf's territory. Added to this, the small size of the remaining population has also brought with it problems of inbreeding, leading to a loss of genetic diversity, disease and hybridisation.