Also the heaviest animals in the worldput together, are nothing compared to the weight of us humans.
The total weight of wild land mammals – from elephants to bison to deer to tigers – is today less than 10% of the total tonnage of men, women and children living on the planet.
This is revealed by a study by scientists of the Weizmann Institute of Science of Israel, which explains that the wild land mammals alive today have a total mass of 22 million tons. In comparison, humanity today weighs approx 390 million tons. It’s not good news.
Look at the gallery to find out which are the heaviest wild animals in the world.
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The heaviest animals in the world are fewer and fewer
- Blue whale: up to 190 tons
- Whale Shark: 21.5 tons
- African elephant: 5.25 tons
- Asian elephant: 3.5 tons
- White Rhino: 2.5 tons
- Hippopotamus: 2.3 tons
- Walrus: 2 tons
- Giraffe: 1.4 tons
- Black Rhino: 1.15 tons
- Indian buffalo: 980 kg
- Gaur: 850 kg
- Marine crocodile: 600 kg
How much do all the animals in the world weigh combined?
To the 22 million tons must be added the 630 tons of the species we have domesticated, such as sheep and cattle, as well as other pets such as urban rodents. Everyone competes for the Earth’s resources. The biomass of pigs alone is nearly double that of all wild land mammals.
Humanity’s transformation of the planet’s wilderness and natural habitats into a vast global plantation has devastating consequences for wild creatures. As the authors of the study point out, the idea that Earth is a planet that still has great plains and jungles teeming with wildlife is now seriously distant from reality. The natural world and its wild animals are disappearing while the human population, numbering nearly eight billion individuals, continues to grow.
Photo: Pexels, NOAA Photo Library – anim1754, Public Domain, Crystaldive – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, Abe Khao Lak – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0,
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