The discovery in Alaska of oilfields that promise to be among the richest in the world has raised some complex problems for conservationists. Alaska has a rich and impressive wildlife and habitats that are extremely vulnerable; in summer, when the surface soil thaws out on top of the permanently frozen layers below, one caterpillar tractor can make scars that may lead to disastrous erosion and take years to heal. And how are migrating caribou to get over the unburied parts of a four-foot diameter pipeline that runs for hundreds of miles across their traditional routes. BP, conscious of their responsibility for the wildlife and the habitat, asked Peter Scott to go to Alaska and report on the situation and what could be done to minimise the impact of the oil developments on the wildlife. The following account is drawn in part from his report and in part from his article published in the house magazine BP Shield.

In the summer of 1969 the author returned to British Honduras, on a Churchill Fellowship, to follow up his previous studies of the manatee Trichecus manatus manatus and two crocodiles Crocodylus acutus and C. moreleti, all ‘Red Book’ species (see ORYX, May 1968). He found a good breeding population of the manatee, but the plight of both crocodiles he describes as desperate.

Timber operators building access roads open up the forest in Western Ghana and make it easy for farmer-settlers to come in. The roads also enable them to get their produce to the towns to sell, and thus the farms become profitable and expand, and the wildlife disappears. At the same time the slaughter of wildlife in the forest reserves (its only refuge) is severe and continual, largely because meat is scarce. The author pleads for some forest reserves to be made game reserves as well so as to protect the forest wildlife.

Is it always necessary to cull large populations of wild animals such as elephants and hippos, when they appear to be destroying their habitat? In ORYX May 1969, C. A. R. Savory argued the case for doing so in Rhodesia, and the question of whether to crop elephants in parks such as the Tsavo and the Kruger has caused heated controversy. In this article the authors, drawing on their experience of the Luangwa Valley in Zambia, where a cropping scheme was started in 1966, suggest that what appears to be destruction there may not necessarily be so, and that the real vegetation killer is fire in the dry season. R. M. Lawton is an ecologist with the Land Resources Division of the British Directorate of Overseas Surveys, and Mrs Gough is a skilled observer of animal behaviour with considerable experience in Zambia.

Papua and New Guinea have the makings of a sizeable skin industry based on the two native crocodiles. But the industry today is in danger of collapse as a result of overhunting in the accessible crocodile areas. The best hope for conserving the crocodile is to build up the numbers to enable the industry to thrive on a sustained yield basis, so that the people will accept crocodile conservation as sensible, practicable and profitable. Dr. Bustard has made an extensive survey and study of the problem in the Territory, and here describes the situation and the recommendations he has made to the Government.