http://www.smh.com.au/news/whale-watch/humans-drive-rare-dolphin-to-extinction/2007/08/08/1186530447047.html
THE Yangtze River dolphin, until recently one of the most endangered species on the planet, has been declared officially extinct after an intensive survey of its natural habitat.
The freshwater marine mammal, which could weigh up to a quarter of a tonne, is the first large vertebrate forced to extinction by human activity in 50 years, and only Conservationists described the extinction as a "shocking tragedy", caused not by
active persecution but accidentally and carelessly through a combination of factors including unsustainable fishing and mass shipping.
In the 1950s the Yangtze had a population of thousands of freshwater dolphins, but their numbers declined dramatically when China industrialised and transformed the Yangtze into a crowded artery of mass shipping, fishing and power generation. A survey in 1999 estimated the population was just 13.
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