Lecture Eleven - Zoo Flashcards
What is the Living Planet Index?
A measure of the state of the world’s biological diversity based on population trends of vertebrate species from terrestrial, freshwater and marine habitats.
How many vertebrate populations is the Living Planet Index based from?
10,000
What is the decline in LPI between 1970 and 2010?
52%
What percentage of assessed species are threatened?
31%
What percentage of vertebrates are threatened?
20%
What percentage further reduction did conservation of mammals and birds prevent?
18%
What is ex situ conservation?
Conservation away from nature under human supervision
Give five species that would be extinct without ex situ conservation.
- Black-footed ferret
- Guam Rail
- Hawaiian crow
- Przewalski’s horse
- Arabian oryx
What is the main aim of the WZACS?
The conservation of threatened species and the maintenance of healthy ecosystems.
How much do we spend on wildlife conservation a year?
$350 million on wildlife conservation per year
Give Diamond’s Evil Quartet of deterministic causes of extinction
- Habitat loss
- Exploitation
- Invasive species
- Extinction cascades
Why did original habitat protection fail for the Large Blue Butterfly?
Diagnosis was wrong.
Complicated life cycle, larvae colonise ant nests.
Ants require short-turf grassland,
What is genetic rescue?
Introduction of new individuals into a small population suffering high inbreeding depression.
