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Conservation Internationalbiodiversity mapping initiatives
Who are CABS-CI?
Why map biodiversity?
What initiatives exist?
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Conservation International
Founded: 1987
FY99 turnover: $85m
Field programs: 30 countries worldwide
Staff: >1,000
Mission: to conserve the Earth's living natural heritage, our global biodiversity, and to demonstrate that human societies are able to live harmoniously with nature
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CI’s Field Programs
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Center for Applied Biodiversity Science
Established in 1999 with a dual mandate to:
a) Supporting science in CI’s field programs
b) Facilitate stronger interaction between science and conservation generally
Mission: to strengthen our ability to respond rapidly, wisely and effectively to emerging threats to the Earth's biological diversity
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Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?
a) Identifying and filling survey gaps
b) Biogeography and macroecology
c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation
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Mapping museum specimens
• Points showing “area of occupancy”
• Undoubtedly the best biodiversity data: can always be degraded to coarser resolution, but not vice versa
• …but, expensive and time-consuming to collect and compile, causing errors of omission (false absences)
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Identifying survey gaps: museums
• Reptiles of Sub-Saharan Africa (Biodiversity Foundation for Africa/Natural History Museum of Zimbabwe – Bulawayo)
• Reptiles of Melanesia and the Pacific (Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum – Honolulu)
• Birds of Colombia (Natural History Museum – London; Instituto de Ciencias Naturales & Instituto Alexander von Humboldt – Bogotá)
• Bats of PNG (Papua New Guinea National Museum and Art Gallery – Port Moresby)
• Plus: Threatened Birds of Asia (BirdLife International – Cambridge): see http://www.rdb.or.id
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The distribution of Great Indian Bustard Ardeotis nigriceps
From: Collar et al. (2001) Threatened Birds of Asia: the BirdLife International Red Data Book. BirdLife International, Cambridge, UK
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TERRESTRIAL RAP
AQUARAP
MARINE RAP
Filling survey gaps: RAP
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Inductive range modelling
• Overlay habitat maps to determine environmental envelope
• Extrapolate to surrounding areas within the envelope
• Errors of commission (false presences) beyond the extent of occurrence
(due to role of history)
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Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?
a) Identifying and filling survey gaps
b) Biogeography and macroecology
c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation
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Mapping species’ ranges
• Polygons of “extent of occurrence”
• Largely restricted to birds and large mammals
• Easy to interpret, e.g., for field guides
• Errors of commission within the extent of occurrence
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Computerizing species’ ranges
• Birds and mammals of the Americas (CABS-CI, ABI-TNC, WWF-US)
• Mammals of Asia (Univ. of Virginia)
• Birds and mammals of Melanesia (CABS-CI)
• Birds, mammals and amphibians of Africa (ZMUC, Univ. of Cambridge, Natural History Museum – London, CABS-CI)
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Species richness in all African mammals, birds, snakes, and amphibians, mapped on a 1-degree grid
From: Brooks et al. (in press) BioScience
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Deductive range modelling
• Assign habitat preferences to each species
• Identify these suitable habitats on habitat map
• Cut suitable habitats by species’ extent of occurrence
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Modelled distribution of South African Crested Porcupine Hystrix africaeaustralis
From: Boitani et al. (1999) A Databank for the Conservation and Management of the African Mammals. Instituto Ecologia Applicata, Rome, Italy
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Why map (surrogates of) biodiversity?
a) Identifying and filling survey gaps
b) Biogeography and macroecology
c) Assessing representation and prioritization for conservation
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Representation exercises
• Ecoregions (Olson & Dinerstein 1998)
• Include aquatic and marine
• Terrestrial vertebrates now listed by ecoregion
• Prioritization (“Global 200”)
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Ecoregions of the Philippines
From: Wikramanayake et al. (in press) Terrestrial Ecoregions of the Indo-Pacific: a Conservation Assessment. Island Press, Washington, D.C., USA
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“Hotspots” of biodiversity
• Conservation prioritization
• Ecoregions w/ high endemism and threat
• >1,500 (0.5% global) plant endemism
• Endemism estimated, not listed• Myers (1988, 1990), Mittermeier et al. (1998, 1999), Myers et al. (2000)
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HotspotsFrom: Myers et al. (2000) Nature 403: 853-858)
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Current “hotspots” efforts
• “Major Tropical Wilderness Areas”: high endemism but low threat
• 10 more “hotspots”: 1,000 + endemics
• Natural break in plant endemism appears to fall at 500-1,000 endemics
• Dynamism considering threat
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Current “hotspots” efforts
Pine-oak woodlands
Middle Asian mountains
Queensland wet tropics
Melanesia
Taiwan
South-east China mountains
Horn of Africa
Ethiopian highlandsAlbertine Rift
Maputaland-Pondoland
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Other global prioritization exercises
• “Endemic Bird Areas”: ecoregions with 2 + bird species with ranges of <50,000 sq. km (Stattersfield et al. 1998)
• “Centers of Plant Diversity”: ecoregions and sites thought to be priorities for plant conservation (IUCN & WWF 1994, 1995, 1997)
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Conservation Priority-Setting Workshops:
increasing spatial resolution
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CONAKRY
ACCRA
MONROVIA
FREETOWN
ABIDJAN
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Corridorplanning:linking protected areas with “biodiversity-friendly” land use
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Other regional prioritization exercises
• “Important Bird Areas”: sites holding threatened, restricted-range or biome endemic species, or unusual concentrations (BirdLife International)
• “Ecoregion-Based Conservation”: through specialist workshops (WWF)
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Outstanding problems
• Data still incomplete at all levels
• Free, public, global access to data: the internet provides the mechanism
• Referencing and dating every “species-in-mapping-unit” record
• System for continuous data updates: quality vs quantity