Saying Goodbye?

This year's Red List is out:

The Polar Bear... The king of the north... And one of the cutest things in fur... Expected to be extinct within the century because the Arctic ice, its home, is melting... Our most well known Climate Change victim.

• What colour is a polar bear's skin and hair? Not what you think. Look here
• Want to help? Visit Polar Bear International and the WWF
• Watch In the Wild: Polar Bears with Ewan McGregor

The Western Gorilla, the Eastern Gorilla and the Mountain Gorilla...These shy vegetarians can understand human speech and respond with sign language...The western gorillas are being decimated by the Ebola Virus... All of them are threatened by hunters.

• Want to help Western Gorillas? Visit the WWF
• Want to help Mountain Gorillas? Visit the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund
• Watch Gorillas in the Mist and Great Apes

The Sumatran and Borneo Orangutan...Our orange cousins... Nicknamed the 'man of the forest'... They have learned to use boats and untie complex knots.. They are Asia's only great ape...They share 97% of our DNA... In the last ten years they have disappeared by up to 50%.

• In Scientific studies, how does an Orangutan figure out how to put a peg into the right shaped hole? See here for the cute answer.
• Want to help Orangutans? Visit the Orangutan Foundation and the Orangutan Conservancy

These and thousands of other species including coral and birds and fish and plants, are in danger of disappearing forever if we don't take ecological issues like climate change, deforestation, pollution and wildlife preservation seriously.

Visit the amazing ARKive and Conservation International