By Ramatou Dialo Dakar
Round the world Humans are driving one million species to extinction due to irrationally activities of Man, and such attitudes has caused significant reductions and disappearance of species of fish in most northern part of Nigerian Rivers .
Global warming, marine pollution, habitat loss, and oxygen depletion are the main reasons for the mass extinction of marine species especially kaduna River that use to be occupied with plenty animals and different plants species .
A Nigerian science journalist ibrahima yakubu working with Team of scientists, geologist, volunteer environmentalist and climatologists has spend over 10 years on fact finding missing along kaduna River, while writing news and documentary related stories on issues concerning the disappearance of many aquatic animals in the rivers along the banks of northern Nigeria
The aims of the 1o years missions, is to find out the root cause of aquatic mammals disappearance while writing news that could help towards protecting Marine life against going extinctions due to human irrational activities .
Stressing that he spent these years written news along the river banks to raise awareness to the general public on harmful effects of dumping all sort of trash and garbage into the Marine habitats,so as to save them against going extinctions.
According to him . Report finds that around 1 million animal and plant species are now threatened with extinction by united nation report in 2019 ,as many within decades, more than ever before in human history. The average abundance of native species in most major land-based habitats has fallen by at least 20%,
He note that, Annually northern Nigerian
Farmers loses large hectares of agricultural land due river bank erosion, flood disaster, and other forms of environmental degradation that is affecting the entire eco-system and marine habitats.
Kaduna state been the heart of the 19 northern states of Nigeria derived it name from the crocodiles 5o years back that dominate the river with hippopotamus, and other reptiles that can be seen swimming alone the river bank.
During the 10 years field work and interview with different fishermen in Kaduna.
One of the local canoe driver and fish seller along the river bank , said that they were generating huge revenue from species such as sardine, tilapia and others, many of which had disappeared from the river for no reason.
They said that the population of the available species were also reducing from what it used to be some years ago.
Ibrahima says ,Ocean species are disappearing faster than those on land and as such Climate change is being more keenly felt by the sea’s cold-blooded creatures.
Adding that ,As the river continue to absorb heat trapped in the atmosphere from carbon dioxide pollution, bringing waters to their warmest point in decades, undersea denizens don’t have the luxury of ducking into a shady spot or a burrow.
“Marine animals live in an environment that, historically, hasn’t changed temperature all that much”
“Land animals are at lower risk than marine animals only if they can find cool shaded spots to avoid direct sunlight and wait out extreme heat”
Northern Nigeria farmers Lose Large Hectares Of Arable Land To Desertification,River bank erosion,& Flood disaster annually,and such problem keep on agricultural land for food and crops production.
Nigeria is estimated to be losing 351,000 hectares of its 70.8 million hectares of arable land to desert conditions annually with the Sahara Desert expanding southward at the rate of 0.6 KM each year, according to official records.
Mallam Danladi Sani, a fisher at Kangimi Dam, said that many species of fish had gone extinct, while some others were almost disappearing gradually.
He said that, for the past 10 years, fishes such as sardines and tilapia had completely disappeared, adding, “We are forced to migrate from one river to another in search of other fishes for sale.”
Musa disclosed further that even frogs and crabs had all disappeared from the river.
Another fisherman, Paul Moses, said: “Today, it is difficult to see crocodiles along the banks of River Kaduna. Similarly, frogs, tadpoles, toads, crickets have virtually disappeared or have become extinct.”
He said that because fishermen were unable to make money from fishing, many of them gone into other vocations such as guarding houses and farming.
Dr Piman Hoffman, a Climatologist and Assistant Director, African Climate Reporters, attributed this development to indiscriminate dumping of chemicals, wastes and other adverse human activities to the extinction of marine animals.
According to him, humans have introduced significant number of chemicals into the environment which are very harmful to marine animals.
He said that while some chemicals were designed to get rid of weeds and pests, a significant amount of chemicals were wastes from industrial and agricultural processes.
Hoffman expressed sadness over the attitude of companies who dumped chemicals into water sources without recourse to the consequences.
He said that an anytime chemical waste was released, it effect went into the environment and polluted the water.
“As it rains, the chemicals are washed into rivers, which in turn feed the waterfalls and then go into the ocean.”
Hoffman said that climate change and human activities had caused the extinction of many aquatic life and many were still going due to continuous dumping of hazardous wastes harmful to living organisms in water.
“We dump everything in the oceans, including plastic bags and other plastic debris, garbage, and toxic chemicals, crude oil, sewage and nuclear wastes.
“We kill thousands of aquatic animals daily without knowing the consequences, hence, there is need to halt this ugly attitude.”
Meanwhile the Nigerian science journalist ibrahima, suggested ways to save aquatics animal’s from going extinctions through the following
Everyone should understands that clean water is vitally important. Yet, many things we do can contribute to water pollution in different ways.
This research describes some easy and inexpensive ways to protect water by doing certain things at home and in the community
He cautions the general public to Never flush medicines down the toilet, and never dump them in the nearest pond or creek.
The drugs tend to accumulate in the water, and in fish and other wildlife.
He equally appealed that Dispose of Toxic Chemicals Properly check while encouraging people to stop Water Pollution in Mind:
He suggested that people should be reporting Water Polluters to the necessary authority
