The mountain pygmy Opossum is at risk of extinction due to rising temperatures

In Australia, a very rare species of mountain pygmy opossum (there are just over 200 specimens), about 14 cm and weighing between 10 and 50 grams, risks being erased by the rise in temperature, apparently insignificant, man-made.

He is about to end up run over, his mother saves him

Opossum australiano at risk of extinction due to the changing climate. THE climate changes to which our Earth is seen subjected, we know, not only upset our habits or our life, they are, in fact, enormous and are taking place all over the planet involving entire ecosystems that were up to now perfectly functioning, and this precisely because of the 'raising, even of only 1 degree, of the temperatures.

This is because everything, even if we often tend to forget it, is connected and even more in nature.

In Australia, one very rare species of mountain pygmy opossum (there are just over 2000 specimens), of about 14 cm and weighing between 10 and 50 grams, it risks being canceled bythe rise in temperature, apparently insignificant, man-made.

Michael Archer, paleontologist and naturalist at the University of New South Wales explains how these animals hibernate during the coldest 6 months and, thanks to the studies done by him and his team, it was quickly realized how the increase in temperatures - even only in a range between 1 and 3 degrees - may no longer allow this form of adaptation to this species to survive.

The temperature, in fact, increasing, in accordance with the studies published in the "Australian Zoologist journal", causes theabsence of snow, which induces early awakening possum, however, in disagreement with the availability of food present, thus ultimately leading them to death from lack of sustenance.

"Isolation is the difference between life and death in this habitat" are the words of Dr. Archer.

In fact, only 1 degree of temperature rise in this habitat would be capable of cancel this species within ten years.

Scientists are now trying to establish one breeding colony in rainforests plain trying to do re-acclimatize possums at the highest temperatures present in the environments downstream, temperatures similar to those in which their ancestors lived, the only solution necessary for the protection of the species from climate change.

The story, published by the Guardian in recent days, shows how much things are connected: in fact, the little marsupial has been part of Australian life and ecosystem for more than 25 million years, but only just over 2000 specimens remained to live in the mountains between the states of New South Wales and Victoria, in the southeastern part of the country, and now due to changes triggered in an excessively short period of time, for them, if not resorting to a safeguard and forced breeding, there is no there will no longer be any possibility of natural and free life.

Kia - Carmela Giambrone