Help Rangers Protect Endangered Cambodian Wildlife

On October 20, 2014, the Tatai Patrol Station in the Southern Cardamoms received a phone call from an informant about a sun bear cub that was being held captive in an area 70 km north of Koh Kong Town. The team left immediately to rescue the bear and called upon the Koh Pao Patrol unit for assistance. When the rangers arrived, they surrounded the house and asked the owner for permission to check the property. The owner agreed, and a full search was conducted, but no bear was found. The rangers decided to search a nearby hut, where they located a blue container. Inside the blue container was a tiny bear cub, no more than 6 months old! Unfortunately, the owner of the hut was nowhere to be found, and neighbors informed the rangers that he only visited the property occasionally. The rangers will continue to investigate the matter in order to identify and arrest the hunter. The bear was taken back to the station, and was transferred the next day to Phnom Tamao Wildlife Rescue Center for care.

Sun bears and other Asian bear species are being brutally targeted by poachers in Cambodia for their body parts which are used in traditional medicine. Because of this active trade in bears and bear parts, their populations - especially in Southeast Asia - have been decimated. The demand for bear parts on the international black market is high and poachers and traffickers can fetch a high price for paws, bile, and gallbladders. Adult bears are poached for their paws - considered a delicacy in soup. Cubs are torn from their mothers and sold into the pet trade. When they get bigger they end up imprisoned in tiny cages or sold to bile farms in Vietnam. Bear "farms" keep the bears caged and alive, while their gall bladder and bile is harvested and sold as traditional medicine.

Help our Forest Protection Program put an end to bear trafficking and continue to rescue animals by making a gift today!

Save a Pangolin this Bonus Day! The Sunda pangolin is a scaly mammal that eats ants and termites, hides in dense forest, and rolls into a tiny ball when scared. However, this secretive and solitary animal is also the most illegally traded mammal in the world. Hunted for their meat and scales, more than one million individuals are believed to have been trafficked in the past decade. In China and Vietnam, their meat is considered a delicacy and is sold for $350 per kg; their scales are used in traditional medicine, and can be worth up to $1,000 per kg. To tackle this escalating crisis, our rangers are working day and night, removing nets and rescuing animals. Last year alone, they removed 15,400 snares and nets, and resued 448 animals. These rangers are on the frontlines of conservation, and $3,500 will help them conduct vehicle checkpoints, remove pangolin traps, stop poachers and prevent this shy and gentle spcies from disappearing forever.

Make your gift go even further and join us on October 15th to help save this incredible animal from going extinct! Visit our micro-project Help Save the Most Trafficked Mammal in the World to see more pictures and learn more about this incredible animal!

October 15th is the final Bonus Day of the year on GlobalGiving - All donations up to $1,000 are being matched 30%!

Links:

• Help Save the Most Trafficked Mammal in the World
• An Investigative Report About Pangolins by CNN