The concept of a species being extinct in the wild may be confusing to think about. Extinction means that there are none left in their natural habitat and many if not all of these that occur today are at least in part caused by human activities. 21st Century examples of this include the extinction of the baiji (also called the Yangtze River Dolphin), the West African Black Rhino, and the Bramble Cay Melomys. However extinction is not a concrete category on the conservation status paradigm, as the categorization Possibly Extinct exists as well with examples of this classification included the Ivory-Billed Woodpecker, which had its last confirmed sighting in the late 1980s in Cuba and in the ensuing three decades has had numerous unconfirmed sightings in the southeastern United States since the 1940s, with the most famous recent ones being in the 2000s.
However, there is another category in this conservation limbo that is occupied by a great number of species, Extinction in the Wild. This odd-sounding classification means that there are no more of species X,Y, or Z in the wild but that captive populations do exist. Such is nearly the case for the Addax which is a white kind of screwhorn antelope species that stand about 3 1/2 feet tall at the shoulder with antlers that can be as long as they are tall.
However due to habitat destruction by companies looking for petroleum in the Saharan regions where it was once an abundant species, this magnificent beast’s wild population is, according to the latest census done by conservationists, a whopping 3 animals, meaning the Addax is very close to extinction in the wild.
The good news for the Addax is that there are many large captive populations so conservation has not failed yet and species reintroduction in the future could be a possibility.Without opening the Pandora’s Box of issues that putting wild animals in captivity brings up, it is disheartening that mankind has to resort to rectifying its own ecological misdeeds via captive release programs instead of trying to fix what killed all the wild animals in the first place. In the case of the Addax, it has been reported that guards of the oil prospecting wells have killed many of the previous wild Addaxes despite the illegality. Would we just be sending more out to the slaughter of human greed, or do we have a legitimate shot at saving this quirky animal that like all antelopes, is not quite a goat, cattle, sheep, buffalo, or bison (yes, that is the actual taxonomic definition of what an antelope is). Let’s cross our hoofs.
