The Most Endangered Mammal You Never Heard Of

 I like to listen to Jane Goodall's podcast about hope.  She is still hopeful about the world, the climate, and it's animals.  Recently she talked about the pangolin, a mammal that looks similar to an anteater, that is the most endangered mammal on the planet.  There are 8 pangolin species, living mostly in Asia and Africa.  

Their only real enemy is man.  The 1,000 scales on their body protect them from most predators, but not man.  They curl up in a ball to protect themselves.  But poachers and traffickers in mammal body parts have hunted them almost to extinction.  In the last decade, 1million pangolins have been hunted and killed.  They are thought to have medicinal benefits.  Their scales are ground into a powder or made into a paste.  The scales are used in Chinese medicine to help with ailments ranging from lactation difficulties to arthritis.  Actually, the scales are made of keratin, the same material that makes up fingernails, and have no proven benefits. In 2017 20,000 pounds of pangolin scales were confiscated.  Pangolin fetuses are served in soup in China.  This is supposed to give men more vitality.  Pangolin meat is also eaten in China.

One of the reasons pangolins have been hunted almost to extinction is that they only have one baby at a time.  Hopefully more protection of this endangered species will grow their population.  Poachers and traffickers of mammal parts, like rhino and elephant tusks, must be stopped.  Jane Goodall is a lot more hopeful about the future than I am.