Environmental Sciences: Towards a Sustainable Future Chapter 11

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Environmental Sciences Towards a Sustainable
Future Chapter 11

• Wild Species Biodiversity and Protection

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Appreciating the Worth of Diversity

• The worth () of plant and animal diversity in
  terms of goods and services.
• Factors that contribute to a reduction in plant
  and animal diversity.
• Understanding the costs of losing plant and
  animal diversity.
• Programs to protect biodiversity.

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Ecosystem Goods, Services, and Functions 33
Trillion/year

• Gas, climate, and water regulation
• Water supply
• Erosion control
• Soil formation
• Pollination

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Ecosystem Goods, Services, and Functions 33
Trillion/year

• Biological control
• Food production
• Recreation
• Raw materials
• Nutrient cycling
• Waste treatment

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The Value of Wild Species

• Instrumental
• Sources for agriculture, forestry, aquaculture
  and animal husbandry
• Recreational, aesthetic and scientific value
• Sources of medicine
• Intrinsic

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Wild or Cultivated?

• Highly adaptable to changing environments
• Have numerous traits for resistance
• Lack genetic vigor

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Wild or Cultivated?

• High degree of genetic diversity
• Represents the genetic bank
• Need highly controlled environmental conditions

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Sources of Medicine Table 11-1

• Vincristine from rosey periwinkle cures leukemia.
• Capoten from the venom of the Brazilian viper
  controls high blood pressure.
• Taxol from the bark of the pacific yew used to
  treat ovarian, breast and small-cell cancers.

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Recreational, Aesthetic, and Scientific Value

• Ecotourism largest foreign exchange-generating
  enterprise in many developing countries
• 104 billion spent on wildlife-related recreation
• 31 billion spent to observe, feed, or photograph
  wildlife

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Past Wildlife Management Problems

• Restoring the numbers of many game animals, e.g.,
  deer, elk, turkey.
• Passing laws to control the collection and
  commercial exploitation of wildlife.
• Poaching and over-hunting.

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Contemporary Wildlife Management Problems

• Road-killed animals
• Population explosion of urban wildlife
• Lack of natural predators
• Wildlife as vectors for certain diseases
• Pet predation by coyotes
• Changed societal attitudes towards animals

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Saving Wild Species
http//www.fws.gov
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Strengths or Weaknesses of Endangered Species Act?

• The need for official recognition
• Control over commercial exploitation of
  endangered species
• Government controls on development in critical
  habitats
• Recovery programs
• Habitat conservation plan (HCP)

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Causes of Animal Extinctions
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Reasons for Biodiversity Decline

• Habitat alterations
• Conversions
• Fragmentation
• Simplification
• Human population growth

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Reasons for Biodiversity Decline

• Exotic introductions
• Pollution
• Overuse

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Habitat Alterations
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Human Population Growth
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Pollution Exxon Valdez Oil Spill

• March 24, 1989
• 11 million gallons of crude oil spilled into
  Prince William Sound

Oil slick
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Exotic Species
Brown tree snake
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Overuse

• Harvest of 50 million song birds for food
• Trafficking in wildlife and products derived from
  wild species - 10 billion/year
• 90 decline in rhinos
• 1.6 tons of tiger bones 340 tigers
• Parrot smuggling 40 of 330 species face
  extinction

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Consequences of Losing Biodiversity The Plane
Analogy

• The whole plane is an ecosystem.
• There are many different parts (species) in the
  jet plane ecosystem.
• How does removal of one or more species affect
  ecosystem structure or function?

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International Steps to Protect Biodiversity

• Convention on trade in endangered species (CITES)
  
• Focuses on trade in wildlife and wildlife parts

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International Steps to Protect Biodiversity

• Convention on biological diversity
• Focuses on conserving biological diversity
  worldwide
• Does not yet have the support of the United
  States