Die-offs of white sturgeon in British Columbia’s Fraser river in the mid-1990s led scientists to fear that North America’s largest freshwater fish could be heading for extinction. In response, an alliance of commercial and recreational fisheries, government agencies, environmentalists and native groups was formed to try to save the sturgeon population of the lower Fraser river.

In the U.S. election on November 4, 2008, Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama became President-Elect of the United States, beating Senator John McCain by healthy margins with many demographic groups of America’s voting public. Obama is the first African-American to be elected President of the U.S.

Local politicians are once again pressurising the forest department to kill a leopard that has been scaring people in the Vejgaon area of Chandrapur in Maharashtra. The Forest Department has been instructed to shoot the cat.

Once a stronghold of the Great Indian Bustard, the Karera Wildlife Sanctuary in Madhya Pradesh is now in an abysmal state. The endangered bustards have not been sighted here for a long time and the state government has recently sent a proposal to the central government for the denotification of the sanctuary.

Eight elephants died due to suspected electrocution in the first week of November in Mysore. The Hindu reported that four carcasses, including that of a tusker, were found in Kapsoge near Nanjangud while the other four died in separate incidents in other parts of the region.

In October 2008, the Himachal Pradesh government announced that it would impose a voluntary ‘green tax’ on vehicle owners. The tax collected will go into creating a corpus environment fund that will be utilised to implement steps to make the state carbon-neutral.