Cross Breeds

Importance for saving threatened or endangered animals?

I am doing a persuasive essay and I'm researching on why zoos are a good thing for animals. I already have two points needed for my essay out of the three. The last point is what can saving endangered animals do for us? If you know anything on the subject, please help.

Public Comments

1. By saving species, we can preserve nature for future generations. We can keep fragile food chains together, and we can be more aware of what we put into our environment.
2. Unfortunately, saving endangered species makes very little sense ecologically. An endangered species, being, by definition low in population, will often not have a very high importance in its surrounding ecosystem. If it were to disappear, very little would change. For example, if the Californian condor had not been saved, the ecology of California would be otherwise unchanged. Despite the fact that endangered species will not be missed by the remaining wildlife, millions is nevertheless spent on keeping them around. This is because species have a range of values even if their value to the ecosystem is low - and it maybe surprising to find that conservation is often worked out in financial terms. Saving endangered animals is not about the animals - its about us. We save pandas because they're cute, and the Chinese people identify them as a symbol of china. Pandas are not able to survive in the wild without human assistance - they're too lazy to mate! In Britain, there are campaigns to protect the red squirrel - which is being out competed by the gray. Left to nature, the gray would wipe out the red because it is a stronger, better adapted species. But once again, red squirrels are adored by the British public (including me) and so are saved. My point is, saving endangered species is often more about us than it is about the animals. This is not to say we shouldn't.
3. So that the animals are not harmed in any waypossible.