3 days ago
Prehistoric creature known for its distinct appearance makes remarkable comeback: 'Huge territory'
Saiga antelope — known for their distinctive large snouts — have had a turbulent existence on this planet.
They once walked the Earth alongside woolly rhinos and mammoths; early humans painted them in rock art 19,000 years ago. But within just the last 100 years, due to overhunting and climate-exacerbated disease outbreaks, their population has plunged to a fraction of their earlier numbers.
Fortunately, dedicated conservation efforts have allowed the saiga population to stabilize and rebound, CNN reported.
The saiga once were found everywhere from Canada to France; today, they live only in Kazakhstan, with some small populations in Uzbekistan, Russia, and Mongolia.
Their numbers were decimated by hunting in the mid-20th century, when both Chinese and Soviet poachers killed them for their meat, hides, and horns. According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List, this resulted in approximately 150,000 antelope killed each year in the 1950s and '60s, and the species was labeled as critically endangered in 2002.
To save the beloved species, Kazakhstan's government banned hunting the saiga in 1999, implementing education and training to help border guards crack down on poachers and smuggling.
Additionally, the country's Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative was founded in 2006 in order to help conserve the wildlife of the Kazakh steppe, including saiga antelope. Since then, it has been able to secure an area the size of Denmark in protected land.
Daniyar Turgambayev, chair of the forestry and wildlife committee at Kazakhstan's Ministry of Ecology and Natural Resources, told CNN that the government was committed to increasing that area by designating up to 30% of the country as a protected area for wildlife.
"Naturally, given that Kazakhstan is the ninth-largest country in the world, this is a huge territory," he said.
Between the hunting bans, the crackdown on poaching, and the conservation efforts, there has been a dramatic rebound in the saiga's population, up from 21,000 in Kazakhstan in 2003 to 2.8 million in 2024. The species' threat level has been downgraded to "near threatened" on the IUCN Red List.
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Saiga are still susceptible to disease, however. Four major outbreaks have slashed their numbers in the last 15 years, including in 2015 when over half the global population died in a span of three weeks. IUCN specified that this bacterial infection was likely triggered by warmer-than-usual temperatures during calving season.
Considering that temperatures aren't on track to drop anytime soon, groups like Altyn Dala are hoping to keep saiga safe by regularly monitoring for disease outbreaks. Because of their prolific birthing rate — 60% of saiga give birth to twins — the species is able to rebound quickly.
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