Middle East - Anthony Ham [88]
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The Zoo on the Road to Nablus: A Story of Survival from the West Bank, by Lonely Planet’s own Amelia Thomas, is a sometimes depressing, sometimes inspirational account of the last zoo in the Palestinian Territories.
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Although casual wildlife sightings are rare, a dedicated expedition away from well-travelled routes, or a visit to a wildlife reserve (Click here), will definitely increase your chances of success. Desert expeditions in Egypt’s Sinai or Sahara offer the chance to see gazelle, rock hyraxes, fennec fox and even the graceful Nubian ibex. Trekking in the Chouf Mountains, south of Beirut, might also yield a rare sighting of wolves, wild cats, ibex and gazelle. Oryx, ostrich, gazelle and Persian onager, all of which are being reared for reintroduction to the wild, are on show at Jordan’s Shaumari Wildlife Reserve (Click here) in eastern Jordan, while Jordan’s striking caracal (Persian lynx), a feline with outrageous tufts of black hair on the tips of its outsized, pointy ears, is occasionally seen in Wadi Mujib (Click here) and Dana (Click here) nature reserves. The rare loggerhead turtle nests on some of Turkey’s Mediterranean beaches, including Dalyan (Click here).
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In The Natural History of the Bible (2006), Daniel Hillel, a world-renowned soil physicist and expert in water management, sheds light on the local ecology’s influence on the people and world of the Holy Scriptures.
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BIRDS
In contrast to the region’s dwindling number of high-profile wildlife, the variety of bird life in the Middle East is exceptionally rich. As well as being home to numerous indigenous species, the Middle East, despite the critical loss of wetlands in Jordan and Iraq, continues to serve as a way-station on migration routes between Asia, Europe and Africa. Twice a year, half a billion birds of every conceivable variety soar along the Syro-African rift, the largest avian fly way in the world, which is compressed into a narrow corridor along the eastern edge of Israel and the Palestinian Territories.
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Saving the Arabian Oryx
For many in the Middle East, the Arabian oryx is more than just an endangered species. Thought by some to be the unicorn of historical legend, the herbivorous oryx is a majestic creature that stands about a metre high at the shoulder and has enormous horns that project over half a metre into the air.
Adapted well to their desert environment, wild oryx once had an uncanny ability to sense rain on the wind. One herd is recorded as having travelled up to 155km, led by a dominant female, to rain. In times of drought, oryxes have been known to survive 22 months without water, obtaining moisture from plants and leaves.
Their white coats offered camouflage in the searing heat of the desert, providing a measure of protection from both heat and hunters, but the oryxes and their long, curved horns were highly prized and they were stalked relentlessly for them. In 1972, the last wild Arabian oryx was killed by hunters in Oman, which lead officials to declare the oryx extinct in the wild. Nine lonely oryxes left in captivity around the world were pooled and taken to the Arizona Zoo for a breeding program. They became known as the ‘World Oryx Herd’ and eventually grew to over 200 in number.
In 1978 four male and four female oryxes were transported to Jordan and three more were sent from Qatar the following year. In 1979 the first calf, Dusha, was born and the oryx began the precarious road to recovery. By 1983 there were 31 oryxes in Shaumari Wildlife Reserve in eastern Jordan, where large enclosures and their treatment as wild animals served to facilitate their eventual release into the wild. In a landmark for environmentalists the world over, a breeding group of oryxes was reintroduced