South African birds in trouble

Wattled Crane by ƒernando / Flickr

Of the 10,000 bird species on Earth, 1,226 are listed as Critically Endangered, Endangered or Vulnerable. Forty of these occur in South Africa and of these 20 are endemic. Although extinction is a natural phenomenon, species are now disappearing from our planet at an alarming rate, and studies have shown that this is mostly driven by human activities.