poaching of spiders, reptiles and other rare insects has spurted into national parks of the southwestern us , as these species attract high value in the overseas markets. traffic , a division of the World Wide Fund for Nature ( wwf ) that tracks the impact of poaching around the world, estimates that trade of exotic species fetches around us $20 billion every year, a figure second only to the illegal drug trade ( Environment , Vol 39, No 2).

Data compiled by