A soaring demand for ivory in China and the Far East is putting Africa's elephant population under strain and could see the creatures wiped out altogether by poachers in some countries, conservationists have warned.

Trade in ivory was made illegal worldwide in 1989 but the ban was lifted in 2008 to allow Southern African countries to sell stockpiled ivory to China and Japan. Campaigners say this has also fuelled the demand for illegal ivory.

There was a time when the national park rangers did not need visuals to monitor the deer population in the Margalla Hills – a significant number of footprints around water bodies indicated that their population was steady if not growing rapidly. But this was four to five years back.

An outbreak of foot and mouth disease is threatening Kashmir markhor, an endangered species, in Toshi Shasha game reserve near Chitral city.

Markhors contract the killer disease from goats, which illegally graze in the grassland due to their owners’ connivance with the relevant Wildlife Department officials.

Two decades ago, the area situated on Chitral-Garam Chashma Road was declared the game reserve for protection of markhor population subjected to excessive poaching. Also, the department gave locals a number of incentives for the purpose.

A male wolf that made headlines by becoming the first of its species in more than 80 years to be found in the wild in California has crossed back into the Golden State on its determined quest for a mate.

The gray wolf, designated OR7 by wildlife managers, has traveled more than 2,000 miles since leaving its pack in northeastern Oregon last September and heading south, paying its first visit to California in late December.

The current hunting season of Siberian ducks proved to be a wild-goose chase for the hunters, as negligible number of migratory birds came to Chitral this season compared to past.

Talking to this correspondent here, several hunters said that they had not seen such a dull hunting season before, as in most of the outings they did not even shoot a single shot.

Wildlife officials don't usually base hunting policies on how the public feels about an animal. But the black bear seems to be different. The revered king of the forest has bounced back from near-extinction to being a nuisance in some areas. Some states are trying to figure out if residents can live at peace with bears, or if they'd rather have hunters keep numbers in check.

In places like the Smoky Mountains, black bears have always been part of the landscape.

Last year, gray wolves in Idaho and Montana were removed from the Endangered Species List and placed under state management plans. In Wyoming, they remain federally protected, but only until the last details of a deal between the state and the Department of the Interior can be worked out.

The Interior Department has shamefully given Wyoming everything it wanted, including the right to shoot wolves on sight anywhere in the state except the northwest corner, where a license is required.