🎶🐾Don’t You (Forget About Me):  🎶🐾Don’t You (Forget About Me): The Last Plea🎶🐾

March 26th 3026…

You wake up to the sunlight shimmering through the window of your beach house on the coast of Queensland Australia. Pulling back your curtain you admire the bright blue sky! As well as the sickly grey, decaying plant life… You try to ignore the thousands of small rodents scattered across the beach and brace yourself to face the wrath of your mom without coffee. But you're used to it now. You have to be. Coffee hasn't existed in years! Neither has any other of the enjoyable things like chocolate. And delicious tropical fruit? It exists but good luck getting your hands on some without forfeiting an arm and a leg! This has been the reality since I became endangered. Because a world without bats is a world without plants and a world without plants is a world without balance. Let's look back to 2026.

You might be thinking, 

“with the 60 different species of flying fox bats, how could they possibly go extinct?” But out of that number, 6 types of us have already disappeared. And many other species are close behind. 

“Who cares? They don’t even live here!” But you don’t realize that these mega bats contribute a great amount to the fruit industry. 

“So what? I can't take a banana in my lunch? I’ll recover.” But will you? 

Jam? Nope. Fruit snacks? Gone. Birthday cakes? Tasteless. Even some food colourings. Off the face of the earth. And sure, there's other pollinators, but do they disperse 60,000 seeds nightly like I do? What will they pollinate if the seeds don't get spread? Eventually once I’m gone, the plants will follow me to extinction, lowering biodiversity of forests. And with that, the habitat of other animals will also disappear. Especially animals like birds. They may hunt me but they do help out the planet.

Take the owl for example. They hunt small animals like mice or shrews. Not only will they not have food, but they also won't have homes after the trees all disappear! So you can expect the mice to be frolicking freely directly into the basement of your house! And crocodiles, another predator. If I'm not there to snap up… Well, they'll be swimming with the fishes. Literally and metaphorically. 

And last and least (Yes, I meant least. It's that bad.) While everyone is panicking about the fruit and the forest and the plants… They'll stop protecting the coral reef that's already threatened. Clownfish and many other ocean life beauties will lose their homes and then their lives. No fruit, no fish, no food and…

             [DUN DUN DUNN]

No bats. So next time you chuck your TimHortons cup to the side of the road, think again. Because soon enough, there will be nothing left to fill that cup. You might not think that bats are that important and that maybe I’m being dramatic but I promise you, If bats disappear, It will only be a matter of months, maybe even weeks until the animal world collapses. The once lively trees losing their leaves, the beautiful flowers beginning to wilt. The world would never be the same. All because of a small bat. I’ll say it once and I’ll say it again. A world without bats is a world without plants and a world without plants is a world without balance. Food chains dying and Animalia dying, humans hoping of someday, but who needs bats anyway?

🎶🐾Don’t You (Forget About Me): The Last Plea🎶🐾

Everyone has always underestimated me. The poachers that have hunted me, the creatures that make up my home, and maybe even you. In fact, without my presence to guard the subtropical ocean waters, the beaches you swim in, and the fishing grounds you humans have forcefully claimed, will be submerged in dead, floating debris! And trust me that is not an exageration.

Imagine the coral reefs showing off their vibrant colours of blue, green, pink, and purple—schools of fish circling enthusiastically around their home, and careful mothers hiding their eggs from nearby predators. An exquisite thought isn’t it? The ocean is balanced.

Now, picture toxic sea sponges conquering the ocean floor. You may not know what a sea sponge is, so imagine gigantic, shapeless, living masses. Fuzzy, silent invaders that stretch into any form they please, stealing the sunlight and hoarding space, which suffocates everything that lies beneath it, including reefs. 

That’s where I come in. 

I’m a hawksbill sea turtle. One of the few creatures that possesses the ability to eat these horrid sponges. My narrow beak slips into the small cracks in coral reefs, pulling out the tresspasser piece by piece. It’s slow work. Quiet work. But it is essential. And every bite I take is not only filling my stomach, but working towards a future where the ocean will never be dull.

Without me, the sponges will take over. Not pausing to grow just because I left, and those bustling underwater cities, will die. 

Just like on land, when losing a crucial member in its food web, the ocean portrays the domino effect. So when the reefs die, everything else follows. The fish lose their homes, and as a result, the predator lose their prey. The delicate web of life starts to unravel, thread by thread.

You may not realize it, but those corals impact your daily lives just as much as they impact mine. They protect your shores from violent waves. They support the fish you catch, the waters that you explore, the economies you depend on. Without them, coastlines erode, fisheries collapse, and dead floating debris will begin to surface. 

And yet, my role still doesn’t end. 

When I travel between the ocean and shore, I carry nutrients with me. The eggs I lay feed the sands, giving strength to the plants that secure your beaches. Without that quiet exchange the land weakens, grain by grain.

Ignore me and the land you love will slowly slip away.

Neglect me and the peace you once sought will fight you.

Betray me and the ocean that provides you with resources will become devoid of life.

So the next time you imagine the ocean, or take a dip in the sea, ask yourself this— do you see colour and movement?

Or complete silence beneath a slow, unstoppable tide? 

Because if I disappear, that second world will be the one that binds you.

If us Koalas all of a sudden disappeared you may not notice a change at first, but over time the importance of our role to the ecosystem will start to show. Imagine a forest with no one to cut down the overgrown branches. What about small mammals and insects? Koalas are one of their main sources for shelter on the ground, whether it be from our fur, branches we knock down or even our droppings.  What would happen to all of the excess leaves falling from the eucalyptus? Dry eucalyptus makes a great fire starter.

Koalas are something called a keystone species and a powerful umbrella species. This means that we have a crucial role in the ecosystem. Koalas have many roles, whether it be maintaining forest health by managing plant growth, promoting nutrient recycling through our droppings or since our habitats are protected by the government, it means that other animals living there also have that protection.

So, what would happen if koalas went away? Many other animals depend on us, such as a bird called the brown headed honey eater. This bird depends on us for building nests, they use our fur to insulate their nests with their offspring. If these birds didn't have access to our fur it would make it more difficult for them to have shelter. Small mammals and insects rely on our droppings and the branches that fall when we climb. Eucalyptus forests have huge amounts of leaves, if there are no Koalas to eat these leaves, the forests would become overgrown, as a result of them being overgrown, forest fires will easily break out, putting many animals as well as humans in danger. By eating as many eucalyptus leaves as we do, we are essentially the “custodians” of the forests and as a result of this we indirectly combat climate change.

Australia's economy relies on tourism and Koalas influence tourism to Australia heavily. If us koalas were to just disappear the tourism income of 3.2 billion dollars annually would disappear. If tourism went down, the jobs people have would also decrease. There are roughly 30,000 Australians working in the tourism industry. What would happen to them? Jobs would be lost, some would have no way to pay their bills. 

In conclusion, the extinction of us koalas not only affects us, but also many species around us, as well as Australia’s tourism industry. If koalas went extinct, there would be too much growth of specific trees in the forest which puts the ecosystem off balance. That means less light reaches the ground, causing less plants to grow, affecting animal food sources. There would be more leaf waste making forest fires more common, and putting many animals at risk of extinction.

🎶🐾Don’t You (Forget About Me): The Last Plea🎶🐾

Silence. That’s the first thing you’d notice. Nothing out of the ordinary—nothing truly notable other than empty dens, abandoned food caches, and the sound of prey munching on grass.

Prey move on with their day, eating plants and berries and shrubs. Predators like eagles, lynxes, assume they’re hiding and simply eat other prey. 

Imagine a rabbit, bounding through a field and gently plucking at the grass, only taking just enough to be full. You don’t expect that to be so monumental. You’d never imagine the effects of my leaving an entire ecosystem could do. 

It’s a clear summer morning. Prey populations are rising steadily, and everything seems great. That one rabbit turned to eight;  a father, mother, and their six kits. Predators lurk, feasting on the rabbits and keeping themselves full. 

The trees stand tall; leaves green and swaying. Sunlight filters through, dappling golden spots over the grass and leaves. Rabbits slowly thinning the young plants underfoot. The grass is getting patchy…

Over the autumn and winter, the rabbits kept multiplying. And yet, the grass doesn’t come back as usual. Maybe it’s an off season? There are less berry plants, too. The rabbits have grown to a mighty hundred and thirty. Bugs are buzzing. Predators boom not long after, living in abundance, with full stomachs and longer, happier lives… Right?

Wrong.

The prey start to die off. The grass is gone, devoured by months upon months of carefree eating. “Just enough” for one, became too much for a single forest to handle. Disease riddles the rabbits as they starve. Still, the ravenous predators don’t seem to stop coming. We foxes aren’t there to weed off the rabbits and prevent disease. Not anymore.

Eventually, the forest is consumed—quite literally—by an endless prowl of predators. All of them forced to depend on animals that simply aren’t enough to keep them full. Grass is gone. Rabbits starve. Predators roam. Hungry and relentless. The air smells dank and musty. Like damp cardboard accompanied by the wet mulch of decomposing leaves underfoot.

After years of deprivation, what’s left is a forest forever changed. The lush forest changes–adapting to avoid the brunt of the struggle. But plants and animals that depend on us foxes die off. Biodiversity slims, and we lose even more plants that we need to combat climate change. 

I ask you now, does my presence in the forest seem crucial yet?

I’m a key component in my habitat. Being a tertiary consumer, I hunt prey to keep their population in check. I spread seeds through my waste, while predators depend on me as one of their food sources. I help promote the spread of the plants we need. 

Now, imagine how deeply my loss would then affect the ecosystem. Don’t think that the disappearance of us red foxes wouldn’t affect you. I contribute in the little ways that you don’t notice until they’re gone–I don’t brag about it, but you know I'm there. 

And you’d better hope that’s how it stays.