And there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for the sudden death of 10.000 herbivorous mammals that nobody seems to see: Chernobyl fire forests in 30-april-2015 releasing clouds of radioactive dust only 10 days before this event. Dust travelling by air normally settle down after a raining episode.<p>Animals died in few hours with synthoms totally compatible with radioactive poisoning in the chain food. Strange inmunosupresion, diarrhoea, pain in the mouths and guts and problems with breathing. Saigas are animals with a interesting nose that filters dust and those tissues are connect with a net of blood capillaires so poisoning by dust could be quicker in this species.<p>If someone here have friends or know some scientists working in Kazakhstan, please warn them that have extra care with saiga corpses and also with goats and cattle and try to protect native people. Somebody should start looking for radioactivity as soon as possible to discard or confirm this hypothese. I think is the most logical solution to this mystery.<p><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a96nEk-f6Y" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a96nEk-f6Y</a>
An article from the BBC [0] suggests that the animals' immune systems were compromised to the point that they were killed by two endemic bacteria. The suggestion is that they were in a weakened state due to this year's very cold winter and very wet spring. Also they observe that this species has frequent die-offs and repopulations. I suspect that would be more sustainable over the species' original range, which apparently stretched from Britain to China rather than just over one Kazakh national park.<p>[0] <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-32958032" rel="nofollow">http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-32958032</a>
Regardless of the actual cause of this mass-dying, what steps (if any) are being taken to secure the species? Are any saigas being kept in quarantine anywhere?<p>If one third of the total population can be wiped out within two weeks without prior notice, it would make sense to me to keep a small subpopulation in safety somewhere else.