Endangered animals – Halachic Perspective

There are no applicable Halachas regulating this matter.

I apologize for the delay. I don’t remember when I wrote it up, but I forgot about it afterward.

Koheles Rabbah on Koheles 7:13:
At the time that HKB”H created Adam haRishon, He sent him around
to all the trees of the garden. He said to him, “See my works, how
beautiful and praiseworthy they are; and all that I created, I created
for your sake. Take care that you do not ruin and destroy my world.”

AH was just thinking about that medrash. Think people were quoting it in a climate change thread and i didnt think it was learnt correctly. I always took it to mean in a spiritual sense (like by noachs time when the earth itself became infected.) I recently heard R Shlomo Freifeld using it in the simple understanding though. Dont remember regarding what exactly but was something like forests being cut down or buffalo or the like.

Species do and have become extinct all the time without human intervention – including such famous examples as the Dinosaurs and many other animals that lived around that era and before.

Humans are not the only ecosystem disrupter, but do do humanity’s great numbers and ability to change their environment much more rapidly then just about any other animal, they have become the most damaging invasive species to practically all ecosystems ion land in recent (say, the last 400) years.

The Orev is the only one in Chazal (that I’m aware of) that expressed concern over extinction of a species. Sanhedrin 108b

The species he was concerned with was his own, so he may have been a bit nogeia b’davar.