WASHINGTONThe race is on to rediscover a list of 25 species that collectively have not been seen in more than 1,500 years.Theres the Wondiwoi tree kangaroo, last spotted in 1928 in Indonesia; the pink-headed duck, missing since 1949; and the bullneck seahorse, a species native to Australia never before seen in the wild.This week, Texas-basedGlobal Wildlife Conservation launched The Search for Lost Species, described as the largest-ever global quest to find and protect animals and plants missing for decades.Don Church, GWCs president and director of conservation, said the organizations most wanted list includescute and cuddly species, the kind people are drawn to and that provide an opportunity to raise awareness about todays biodiversity crisis.Its about raising the profile both of the species that were looking for, but more so the places where they occur, he told The Huffington Post. The reason those places are important is because they have extreme biodiversity value, but very few people have heard about them. People hear about the Amazon basin, but they dont think about the forests of Cte dIvoire or some of the other places where these flagship species and many of the other species occur.The current mass extinction of animalsclaims an estimated 150-200 species every day. Humans have sped up the species loss rate byroughly 1,000 times, according to a 2005 assessment.The groups list of 25 flagship speciesnone of which have been officially declared extinctcomes from a larger list of 1,200 species consideredlost in more than 160 countries. GWC compiled the lengthy list with the help of experts at the International Union for Conservation of Nature.The organization is hoping to launch expeditions to track down species this fall. In addition to roughly $500,000 in funding that GWC plans to allocate to the project, the organization is looking for corporate sponsors and private donations.Robin Moore, a conservation biologist and GWCs communications director, said in a statement that for many of these species, this is likely their last chance to be saved from extinction.To meet GWCs definition of lost, the species must have been unseen by scientists for at least a decade. In some cases, species are thought to have gone extinct due to threats like hunting, habitat loss and disease. In others, species were believed to have existed in extremely small numbers or remote, inaccessible habitats, before their population was decimated or totally wiped out.Church told HuffPost he expects some will be found. But even if they arent, theres an excitement in the journey, he said, which could lead to a greater appreciation for the worlds biodiversity hotspots or the discovery of a species never seen before.Its a message of hope and opportunity to still save these places and the species within, he said. And its not a message thats going to put people into sort of their despair and lead them to throwing their hands up and sayinggiving up, giving up on the biodiversity of our planetwhich is easily done by people when all they hear the magnitude of the environmental crisis across the planet. -- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.
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