Two Dozen Nuns, 300 Endangered Salamanders

July 31, 2018 8:03 AM

The achoques have nearly disappeared from Lake Pátzcuaro in Mexico. A colony in the care of Dominican nuns offers hope the species can be saved. (slnyt)
posted by Hypatia (6 comments total)

Oh, so they didn't steal them like those people stole that shark. So there's not some bizarre new trend of kidnapping aquatic animals.

That's reassuring anyway.
posted by Naberius at 8:14 AM on July 31, 2018

No, they simply raise the salamanders in order to make cough syrup out of them.
posted by Ashwagandha at 11:34 AM on July 31, 2018 [1 favorite]

And the medicinal use of salamanders goes back to the original native inhabitants, except some want to just say it was the Virgin Mary in disguise. Marketing strikes again!
posted by Atreides at 1:12 PM on July 31, 2018

That's really odd. The BBC just released a podcast by a reporter with the very same story
posted by idb at 9:15 PM on July 31, 2018

That is odd. The NY Times writer makes a special point of the fact that he worked hard to uncover this story.
posted by vacapinta at 2:10 AM on August 1, 2018

Obviously not the main drive here, but there's hints of it, and I am very into the idea of religious communities working to preserve a particular endangered species as a religious practice of preserving creation.
posted by vibratory manner of working at 11:23 AM on August 2, 2018 [1 favorite]