Mexico Launches ’Adopt an Axolotl’ Campaign to Save Iconic Species Daniel Shailer - AP International News
go to original November 26, 2023

Axolotls are embedded in Mexico City’s culture, and murals and graffiti depicting the unusual creature are ubiquitous in the capital. (EPA)

Ecologists from Mexico’s National Autonomous university relaunched a fundraising campaign to bolster conservation efforts for axolotls, an iconic, endangered fish-like type of salamander.

The campaign, called “Adoptaxolotl,” asks people for as little as 600 pesos (about $35) to virtually adopt one of the tiny “water monsters.” Virtual adoption comes with live updates on your axolotl’s health. For less, donors can buy one of the creatures a virtual dinner.

In their main habitat the population density of Mexican axolotls (ah-ho-LOH’-tulz) has plummeted 99.5% in under two decades, according to scientists behind the fundraiser.

Last year’s Adoptaxolotl campaign raised just over 450,000 pesos ($26,300) towards an experimental captive breeding program and efforts to restore habitat in the ancient Aztec canals of Xochimilco, a southern borough of Mexico City.

Still, there are not enough resources for thorough research, said Alejandro Calzada, an ecologist surveying less well-known species of axolotls for the government’s environment department.

“We lack big monitoring of all the streams in Mexico City,” let alone the whole country, said Calzada, who leads a team of nine researchers. “For this large area it is not enough.”

Despite the creature’s recent rise to popularity, almost all 18 species of axolotl in Mexico remain critically endangered, threatened by encroaching water pollution, a deadly amphibian fungus and non-native rainbow trout.

Over its six year term the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador will have given 35% less money to the country’s environment department than its predecessor, according to an analysis of Mexico’s 2024 budget.

Read the rest at Associated Press

Related: What Do We Lose If We Lose Wild Axolotls? (NOVA Next)

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