species loss data

[Guest guest]

Further to the present widespread panic about the alleged

loss of large numbers of species, it is worthwhile to note that

rediscoveries of species previously believed to have been extinct

have far outpaced confirmed extinctions for more than 20 years now,

as scientists gain a better understanding of the breadth of

distribution of the small species such as insects who have always

made up the great majority of reported extinctions.

 

Meanwhile, the total numbers of species known to exist keeps

increasing by leaps and bounds.

 

Three years ago, for example, 260 insects, 50 plants,

30 freshwater fish, seven types of frog, six lizards, five crabs,

two snakes and a toad were added to the list of species known to

exist on Borneo and believed to be unique to Borneo.

 

Just this month, Australian scientists announced the

discovery of 274 previously unknown species of fish, corals,

molluscs, crustaceans, and sponges, found in deep water off

Tasmania.

 

Far from declining, known biodiversity is increasing

globally at astonishing speed, from three different directions.

 

Discovery of new species is one of them.

 

Migration of species -- human-caused or otherwise -- is

another, which frequently results in the translocated species

developing specific adaptations to their new habitat and thereby

diverging from their ancestors.

 

Deliberate creation of species through manipulating DNA is a

third path. As yet, this has produced just a few accidently

released plant species to join natural biodiversity, but the process

is still very new, and the likelihood of more species escaping into

the wild is inescapable.

 

The much-ballyhooed projections of losses of species have

three points of origin, all fundamentally erroneous.

 

The first is projecting the existence of immense numbers of

undiscovered species -- which is reasonable in view of the pace of

species discovery -- and then projecting that huge numbers of these

species will be killed off before we find out that they ever existed.

 

We are indeed finding immense numbers of previously

undiscovered species, and some seem to be quite rare and highly

specialized, hence potentially in jeopardy; but most are doing

quite well in their habitat niches, isolated and extreme though many

of them are, and documented losses of recently discovered species

are practically nil.

 

The second mistake is failing to count introduced species in

assessing biodiversity. A quick example of the magnitude of this

error:

 

 

>Friendly Invaders

>By CARL ZIMMER

>Published: New York Times, September 8, 2008

>

> New Zealand is home to 2,065 native plants found nowhere else

>on Earth. They range from magnificent towering kauri trees to tiny

>flowers that form tightly packed mounds called vegetable sheep.

> When Europeans began arriving in New Zealand, they brought

>with them alien plants - crops, garden plants and stowaway weeds.

>Today, 22,000 non-native plants grow in New Zealand. Most of them

>can survive only with the loving care of gardeners and farmers. But

>2,069 have become naturalized: they have spread out across the

>islands on their own. There are more naturalized invasive plant

>species in New Zealand than native species.

> It sounds like the makings of an ecological disaster: an

>epidemic of invasive species that wipes out the delicate native

>species in its path. But in a paper published in August in The

>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Dov Sax, an

>ecologist at Brown University, and Steven D. Gaines, a marine

>biologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, point out

>that the invasion has not led to a mass extinction of native plants.

>The number of documented extinctions of native New Zealand plant

>species is a grand total of three.

 

 

In short, species introductions have increased the botanical

biodiversity of New Zealand tenfold, and have doubled the number of

plant species who are able to survive without human help, at net

loss of just three " native " species.

 

 

The third mistake is projecting the results from species

introductions to isolated island habitats, where biodiversity is low

to begin with, to mainland habitats, where thousands more species

compete to fill every niche. Sometimes species introductions to

isolated island habitats can reduce biodiversity -- but even this

much-remarked phenomenon turns out to be relatively rare.

 

For example, New Zealand consists entirely of island

habitats. See above. Ascension Island is among the most isolated of

island habitats, and is a place where species introductions are

often claimed to have done great harm, yet Ascension Island now

hosts a rather unique rainforest of introduced species, with a net

increase in biodiversity. Hawaii, another constellation of islands,

has lost many native bird species to human disturbance, with many

others in danger; but Hawaiian net biodiversity has increased

greatly, and even total avian biodiversity is apparently just about

what it always was.

 

None of this in any way detracts from the clear and present

danger to Asian elephants, rhinos, tigers, and leopards, nor to

the clear and present dangers to many other large, charismatic

megafauna.

 

What is clear, however, is that miscasting the issues

afflicting these species as a " biodiversity crisis " is not helping

the species in most need of help.

 

The problem is not a " biodiversity crisis " ; it is human

intolerance of other species who eat livestock or crops, and

continuing markets for other species' body parts, whether poached or

shot as hunting trophies.

 

 

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

Telephone: 360-579-2505

Fax: 360-579-2575

E-mail: anmlpepl

Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org

 

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