Madagascar Wildlife

The unique and magnificent wildlife of Madagascar continues to disappear at alarming rates as this island’s tropical forests are burned down and felled by people for agriculture, mining, timber, and charcoal production. Only 10% of the island’s forests now remain, and no end to ongoing deforestation is in sight. And yet, this 10% of remaining forest contains an astonishingly rich and diverse array of wildlife — found no where else but on Madagascar.

Separated from the African continent, the animals and plants of Madagascar, the world’s 4th largest island, developed uniquely: Madagascar contains all of the world’s 30 species of adorable (and humorous!) lemurs, over 60% of the world’s chameleons, and, over 90 percent of Madagascar’s 10,000 plant species occur nowhere else in the world; there are 170 species of palm alone - more than three times the number found in the whole of Africa.  A gigantic new species of pyramid-shaped palm was discovered only this year, which grows so high it can be seen by Google Earth — before the stem tip bursts into branches of hundreds of tiny flowers, killing itself by this massive expulsion of energy! This ‘suicide tree’ is just one example of the miraculous life here. The island is also bursting with incredible marine life, including coral reefs, fishes, bottlenose, spinner and Indo-Pacific humpbacked dolphins - and is a primary breeding ground for the world’s humpback whales.

Unfortunately, all 30 species of lemur are critically endangered because their forest is being destroyed, from the fuzzy giant Indri - whose call can be heard over a mile away! — to the comical Dancing Lemur...whose bounding leaps on his two hind legs propell him into the air with flailing arms ....until he lands and bounces into the air again!

Protecting the remaining forests is critical not only to wildlife, but also to the Malagasy people, who rely on the forests for their livelihoods and resources. Finding tangible means to ameliorate the economic condition of the island’s large and growing population while protecting its remaining forests is a complex, yet essential challenge for MYTHIX.

Forests Stripped Bare: Aerial View of shocking and sad Madagasacar Deforestation which continues unabated, rendering areas lifeless. Just 10% of Madagascar’s forests remain.