Amazon Oil Drilling Plan Excludes Unique Hybrid Manatees
Articles/Websites
Grades9, 10, 11, 12, APBiology, Earth and Space Sciences, Geography
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What it is
- This article examines how Brazil's environmental agency approved offshore oil drilling near the mouth of the Amazon River despite risks to a rare population of manatees.
- Students learn that the manatees living in this area are hybrids of the marine West Indian manatee and the freshwater Amazonian manatee, carrying a unique genetic code adapted to the region's mix of salt and fresh water.
- The article describes a wildlife-rescue simulation and the concerns scientists and regulators raised about protecting large marine animals in the event of an oil spill.
Teaching tips
Classroom Implementation:
- Highlight the complexity of cleanup efforts after a spill, and explain why there should be a strong legal process for project approval related to environmental risk.
- Use the article to launch a discussion on trade-offs between energy development and biodiversity protection, asking students to identify the stakeholders named and their point of view.
- Have students analyze the concept of a hybrid population and why a locally adapted genome matters for conservation, connecting it to ideas about genetic variation and species survival.
Extensions:
- Ask students to evaluate the wildlife-rescue plan described and design or critique criteria a stronger emergency response plan would need to meet.
- Alternatively, have students develop a wildlife safety plan for a local development, such as a new shopping mall.
Related Resources:
- Use this article to explore a further challenge for protecting biodiversity in the Amazon: chronic underfunding despite legal protection.
- Read this article about the Endangered Species Act to launch a discussion about how species (including the manatee) are legally protected in the United States; then, discuss how these protections have been weakened recently using this short news article.
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