by James Johnson

Created on: November 06, 2009

When most North Americans think of endangered animals, they think of the disappearing herds of Elephants in Africa or the Siberian Tigers, maybe Tibet Snow Leopards. They rarely consider the continent just to the south and that those vanishing rain forests are home to millions of species, and many have already been lost while the others are becoming endangered.

Few people know what a King Vulture or an Andean Titi even is (it is a tiny monkey)! Ironically enough, South America is considered by some to contain almost a third of the animal species left on the planet. Unfortunately, many may never make it to the endangered species status because they may be wiped out before they can get discovered! So, what are some of these endangered species?

There is an excellent website that has an extensive listing of all the known species, it is Earth's Endangered Creatures. Under mammals there is the Amazonian Manatee, numerous cats, and most of your South American monkeys. There are even sloths and rats, all vanishing along with their habitat. It should be noted that they are not all in the rain forest, but spread throughout South America.

No endangered species list fo a continent or country would be complete if it just listed mammals and so the Earth's Endangered Creatures has separate listings for birds, reptiles, insects, and even aquatic species such as the Electric Ray. Go to the website and check out South America, learn what is disappearing and why.

Why are animals becoming endangered in South America? Is it Global warming? Nope, it is direct destruction of the habitat by man. The temperatures at the poles are rising, but not much at the equator. In South America, they are cutting and destroying the rain forest, which is where most of these creatures live. They may actually leave the animals, but destroy the plants that they feed on or areas where they need to live. One macaw species requires a certain type of clay, pollute the clay and kill the bird!

Can they be saved from the brink of extinction? Possibly if people want them saved. It means taking time to not clear cut the forests, but just remove certain trees or find alternative to the wood. It means keeping the animals alive in zoos and then reintroducing them into the wild when the habitat recovers. It means putting out some effort to save South American creatures!

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