Kiwi and Pest Research & Deforestation Research

Tanja suggested I look into linking my story theme with a real problem -the dangers that Kiwis go through with pests etc. I was thinking of my underlying theme being about deforestation and how it affects the animals but this is also a good theme. It also links to New Zealand more and as I plan my environment to be heavily NZ based it would be a stronger theme. However I will research both and see which interests me more.

Kiwi and Pest Research:

Threats to Kiwi:

• Uncontrolled Dogs: The number one threat to kiwis
• Stoats and cats: Stoats are the worst threat to Kiwi chicks, 95% of chicks are killed by stoats in their first 6 months of life
• Roadkill

http://www.backyardkiwi.org.nz/useful-information/dangers 

• Loss of habitat: In 2006, planted forest was estimated to cover 1.8 million hectares of New Zealand’s total land area. However, since the dairying boom began, fewer exotic forests are being replanted and some immature forest is being converted to dairy pasture. This could turn out to be bad for kiwi.
• Land Clearance: They can be killed when land is cleared by burning, and by the large rollers used to crush vegetation. It concentrates kiwi and their predators into smaller areas.The kiwi’s social organisation is affected. Kiwi are ferociously territorial. Less habitat means more competition for space, more boundary wars, less breeding, and more birds pushed out into farmland where they can fall foul of dogs.

https://www.kiwisforkiwi.org/about-kiwi/threats/people/ 

Deforestation Research: 

• The world’s rain forests could completely vanish in a hundred years at the current rate of deforestation.
• Forests are cut down for many reasons, but most of them are related to money or to people’s need to provide for their families.The biggest driver of deforestation is agriculture. Farmers cut forests to provide more room for planting crops or grazing livestock. 
• Deforestation has many negative effects on the environment. The most dramatic impact is a loss of habitat for millions of species. Seventy percent of Earth’s land animals and plants live in forests, and many cannot survive the deforestation that destroys their homes.

http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/global-warming/deforestation-overview/ 

Palm Oil & Deforestation:

• Impact on Animals: Many animals are killed or injured during deforestation for palm oil
  Wildlife such as orangutans have been found buried alive, killed from machete attacks, guns and other weaponry. Government data has shown that over 50,000 orangutans have already died as a result of deforestation due to palm oil in the last two decades. Over 90% of orangutan habitat has been destroyed in the last 20 years
• Other megafauna that suffer as a result of this development include species like the Sumatran Tiger, Sumatran Rhinoceros, Sun Bear, Pygmy Elephant, Clouded Leopard and Proboscis Monkey.
• Impact on People: The palm oil industry has been linked to major human rights violations, including child labour in remote areas of Indonesia and Malaysia. Children are made to carry large loads of heavy fruit, weed fields and spend hours every day bent over collecting fruit from the plantation floor. Heat exhaustion and cuts and bruises from climbing thorny oil palms are commonplace in these cases, and more than often not, children receive little or no pay for their efforts.

http://www.saynotopalmoil.com/Whats_the_issue.php