Wildlife
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[[Image:White-tailed deer.jpg|thumbnail|right|300px|Various species of [[deer]] are commonly seen wildlife across the Americas and Eurasia.]]
'''Wildlife''' includes all non-domesticated plants, animals, and other organisms. Domesticating wild plant and animal species for human benefit has occurred many times all over the planet, and has a major impact on the environment, both positive and negative.
Wildlife can be found in all ecosystems, Deserts, rainforests, plains, and other areas—including the most developed [[Urban area|urban]] sites—all have distinct forms of wildlife. While the term in popular culture usually refers to animals that are untouched by human factors, most scientists agree that wildlife around the world is impacted by human activities.
Humans have historically tended to separate civilization from wildlife in a number of ways including the legal, social, and moral sense. This has been a reason for debate throughout recorded history. Religions have often declared certain animals to be sacred, and in modern times concern for the natural environment has provoked activists to protest the exploitation of wildlife for human benefit or entertainment. Literature has also made use of the traditional human separation from wildlife.
==Food==
Anthropologists believe that the [[Stone Age]] peoples and [[hunter-gatherer]]s relied on wildlife, both plant and animal, for their food. In fact, some species may have been hunted to [[extinction]] by early human hunters. Today, hunting, [[fishing]], or gathering wildlife is still a significant food source in some parts of the world. In other areas, hunting and non-commercial fishing are mainly seen as a [[sport]] or [[recreation]], with the edible meat as mostly a side benefit.{{Fact|date=February 2007}} Meat sourced from wildlife that is not traditionally regarded as game is known as [[bushmeat]]. The increasing demand for wildlife as a source of traditional food in [[East Asia]] is decimating populations of [[shark]]s, [[primate]]s, [[pangolin]]s and other animals, which they believe have aphrodisiac properties.
==Religion==
Many wildlife species have spiritual significance in different cultures around the world, and they and their products may be used as [[sacred]] objects in [[religious]] rituals. For example, [[eagle]]s, [[hawk]]s and their [[feather]]s have great [[cultural]] and [[Spirituality|spiritual]] value to [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native Americans]] as religious objects.
==Television==
Wildlife has long been a common subject for [[education]]al [[television show]]s. [[National Geographic]] specials appeared on [[CBS]] beginning in [[1965]], later moving to [[American Broadcasting Company|ABC]] and then [[Public Broadcasting Service|PBS]]. In [[1963]], [[NBC]] debuted ''[[Wild Kingdom]],'' a popular program featuring [[zoologist]] [[Marlin Perkins]] as host. The [[BBC natural history unit]] in the [[United Kingdom|UK]] was a similar pioneer, the first wildlife series LOOK presented by [[Sir Peter Scott]], was a studio-based show, with filmed inserts. It was in this series that [[David Attenborough]] first made his appearance which led to the series Zoo Quest during which he and cameraman Charles Lagus went to many exotic places looking for elusive wildlife -- notably the [[Komodo dragon]] in Indonesia and [[lemurs]] in Madagascar. Since [[1984]], the [[Discovery Channel]] and its spinoff [[Animal Planet]] in the USA have dominated the market for shows about wildlife on cable television, while on [[PBS]] the NATURE strand made by WNET-13 in New York and NOVA by WGBH in Boston are notable. See also [[Nature documentary]]. Wildlife television is now a multi-million dollar industry with specialist documentary film-makers in many countries including UK, USA, New Zealand [[NHNZ]], Australia, Austria, Germany, Japan, and Canada.
==Tourism==
Fuelled by media coverage and inclusion of conservation education in early school curriculum, Wildlife [[tourism]] & Ecotourism has fast become a popular industry generating substantial income for developing nations with rich wildlife specially , [[Africa]] and [[India]]. This ever growing and ever becoming more popular form of tourism is providing the much needed incentive for poor nations to conserve their rich wildlife heritage and its habitat.
==Destruction==
[[Image:Map-of-human-migrations.jpg|thumb|350px|Map of early [[human migrations]], according to [[Mitochondrial DNA|mitochondrial]] [[population genetics]]. Numbers are [[millennia]] before the present.]]
This subsection focuses on [[anthropogenic]] forms of wildlife destruction.
[[Exploitation]] of wild populations has been a characteristic of modern man since our exodus from [[Africa]] 130,000 – 70,000 years ago. The rate of [[extinction]]s of entire species of plants and animals across the planet has been so high in the last few hundred years it is widely considered that we are in the sixth great extinction event on this planet; the [[Holocene Mass Extinction]].
Destruction of wildlife does not always lead to an extinction of the species in question, however, the dramatic loss of entire species across Earth dominates any review of wildlife destruction as extinction is the level of damage to a wild population from which there is no return.
The four most general reasons that lead to destruction of wildlife include overkill, habitat destruction and fragmentation, impact of introduced species and chains of extinction.<ref>Diamond, J. M. (1989). Overview of recent extinctions. Conservation for the Twenty-first Century. D. Western and M. Pearl. New York, Oxford University Press: 37-41.</ref>
<!-- Comment -->===Overkill===
Overkill occurs whenever hunting occurs at rates greater than the reproductive capacity of the population is being exploited. The effects of this are often noticed much more dramatically in slow growing populations such as many larger species of fish. Initially when a portion of a wild population is hunted, an increased availability of resources (food, etc) is experienced increasing growth and reproduction as [[Density dependent inhibition]] is lowered. Hunting, [[fishing]] and so on, has lowered the competition between members of a population. However, if this hunting continues at rate greater than the rate at which new members of the population can reach breeding age and produce more young, the population will begin to [[resource depletion|decrease in numbers]].
Populations in confined to islands – whether literal islands or just areas of habitat that are effectively an “island” for the species concerned – have also been observed to be at greater risk of dramatic population declines following [[Unsustainable fishing methods|unsustainable hunting]].
===Habitat destruction and fragmentation===
The [[habitat]] of any given species is considered its preferred area or territory. Many processes associated human habitation of an area cause loss of this area and the decrease the carrying capacity of the land for that species. In many cases these changes in land use cause a patchy break-up of the wild landscape. Agricultural land frequently displays this type of extremely fragmented, or relictual, habitat. Farms sprawl across the landscape with patches of uncleared woodland or forest dotted in-between occasional paddocks.
Examples of habitat destruction include grazing of bushland by farmed animals, changes to natural fire regimes, forest clearing for timber production and wetland draining for city expansion.
===Impact of introduced species===
Mice, cats, [[rabbit]]s, [[dandelion]]s and [[poison ivy]] are all examples of species that have become invasive threats to wild species in various parts of the world. Frequently species that are uncommon in their home range become out-of-control invasions in distant but similar climates. The reasons for this have not always been clear and [[Charles Darwin]] felt it was unlikely that exotic species would ever be able to grow abundantly in a place in which they had not evolved. The reality is that the vast majority of species exposed to a new habitat do not reproduce successfully. Occasionally, however, some populations do take hold and after a period of acclimation can increase in numbers significantly, having destructive effects on many elements of the native environment of which they have become part.
===Chains of extinction===
This final group is one of secondary effects. All wild populations of living things have many complex intertwining links with other living things around them. Large herbivorous animals such as the [[hippopotamus]] have populations of [[insectivorous]] birds that feed off the many parasitic insects that grow on the hippo. Should the hippo die out so to will these groups of birds, leading to further destruction as other species dependent on the birds are affected. Also referred to as a [[Domino effect]], this series of [[chain reaction]]s is by far the most destructive process that can occur in any [[Biocoenosis|ecological community]].
==See also==
{{sisterlinks}}
*[[Biodiversity]]
*[[Biosphere Expeditions]]
*[[Conservation biology]]
*[[Conservation ecology]]
*[[Endangered species]]
*[[Ex-situ conservation]]
*[[In-situ conservation]]
*[[Gene pool]]
*[[Genetic pollution]]
*[[Genetic erosion]]
*[[List of wildlife artists]]
*[[National Wildlife Federation]]
*[[Natural history]]
*[[Ornithology]]
*[[Wildlife disease]]
*[[Wildlife gardening]]
*[[Wildlife management]]
*[[Wildness]]
==Notes==
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[[Category:Biology]]
[[Category:Ecology]]
[[Category:Conservation]]
[[Category:Wildlife| ]]
[[Category:Eukaryotes]]
[[el:Άγρια ζωή]]
[[es:Vida salvaje]]
[[hr:Divlje životinje]]
[[he:חיות בר]]
[[ja:野生動物]]
[[no:Vilt]]
[[pt:Vida selvagem]]
[[th:สัตว์ป่า]]
[[vi:Loài hoang dã]]
[[yi:חיה]]
[[zh:野生动物]]