New research has emerged with the very upsetting discovery that if climate change continues the way it’s going at the moment, platypus numbers are predicted to drop so severely that they’ll likely be facing extinction in the next 50 years. It might have been feeling like we’re going to hell in a handbasket before but now? It’s platy-personal.
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A recent study by the bioscience schools from UNSW and Uni of Melbourne has found that platypus populations have been predicted to decline by up to 55% in the next 50 years, but with current climate change altering the projections of the future of weather and drought conditions, it’s looking like it might be more like up to 73% of the population by 2070.
I do not like this one bit. No sir, no thank you.
The beloved platypus is already on the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) Red List as a “Near Threatened” species. They are recognised as an ‘in decline’ species with the continuing decline in subpopulations, once of which is located on Kangaroo Island, which was recently razed by severe bushfires.
I mean, can we just take a moment to have a little cry over these precious, impossible babies that are mammals but also lay eggs?
And if we lose these sweet babies entirely, then good luck explaining Perry the Platypus from Phineas and Ferb to future generations, because nobody’s gonna even know what the fuck he’s meant to be.
The research team have urged for national conservation to intervene in the protection of platypus populations in Australia, calling specifically for conservationists to track the species’ trends, increase surveys of populations, and improve the management of habitats in rivers.
