Alongside the development of the coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, as our cities and suburbs have emptied, more and more stories are appearing on the internet about how this or that animal is suddenly thriving in places where they haven’t been seen for ages.
Deer roam the streets of Zakopane. Monkeys rule the roost in Thailand’s cities. Swans dance with dolphins in the canals of Venice. On the deserted beaches of Brazil and India, sea turtles are reproducing exponentially. In China, elephants are partying on rice wine and sleeping it off afterwards among the tea bushes. Perhaps most exciting of all was a film clip of a Malabar civet wandering the streets of the Indian city of Kozhikode. This predator from the civet family is thought to have been extinct since the 1960s. Yet here, just two days after the announcement of restrictions on movement, it was suddenly resurrected. Even on my housing estate
