[Taxacom] FW: Biodiversity and Species Value

Fri Jun 11 20:32:47 CDT 2010

6 levels - genes, nucleotides.  an ecosystem is just a nucleotide's
way of making another nucleotide... or so I'm told... :)

jim

On Sat, Jun 12, 2010 at 11:13 AM, Robin Leech <releech at telusplanet.net> wrote:
> John,
> Try 4 levels: ecosystems, communities, species, populations.
> Robin
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "John Shuey" <jshuey at TNC.ORG>
> To: <taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu>
> Sent: Friday, June 11, 2010 6:03 PM
> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] FW: Biodiversity and Species Value
>
>
>>
>>
>> Michael,
>>
>> Biodiversity per say has many definitions but most revolve around
>> biological organization at three levels – communities, species and
>> populations. But you will have to tell me what “biodiversity value is! It’s
>> a concept that is foreign to the conservation community (at least on this
>> side of the world)! Like I said before, most planning efforts are defined
>> to identify a system of complimentary reserves that protect all habitats
>> (aka ecosystems, communities etc) in a region – so that all of them can be
>> conserved.
>>
>> The work I’ve been involved with over the years assumes no relative values
>> per say – setting out the premise that all evolutionary lineages should be
>> preserved. No “value” judgments invoked. Just working towards a systematic
>> approach to conserving biodiversity (as above) in a way that is likely to
>> actually conserve a significant portion of it.
>>
>> What I’ve been saying is - while many people like to talk about assigning
>> these values – I’ll ask you to show me any tangible global efforts (or
>> even regional) that actually use them in a conservation scheme that has
>> been implemented. I’m going to guess you’ll come up blank. I’m sure your
>> work is very good, but unless you can place it in a global context (both
>> taxonomically and geographically) it’s had to incorporate into systematic
>> planning.
>>
>> There are exceptions of course – but like I said, these are generally
>> species centric organizations like zoos and WWF that get caught up in
>> these efforts to save a few “big furry creatures”. If you want to see
>> species conservation limited to zoos, seed banks and arboretums – that’s
>> certainly a great way to go. (apologies to WWF – they really do a great
>> job of supporting their targets in native habitats). But if you want to
>> see examples of all the World’s ecosystems safeguarded – I wouldn’t start
>> telling people that my species is better than your species….
>>
>> John
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> Please consider the environment before printing this email
>> ________________________________________
>> John A Shuey, Ph.D.
>> Director of Conservation Science
>>
>> jshuey at tnc.org
>> 317.829.3898 - direct
>> 317.951.8818 - front desk
>> 317.917.2478 - Fax
>>
>> nature.org
>>
>> The Nature Conservancy
>> Indiana Field Office
>> 620 E. Ohio St.
>> Indianapolis, IN 46202
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> From: Michael Heads [mailto:michael.heads at yahoo.com]
>> Sent: Friday, June 11, 2010 5:50 PM
>> To: John Shuey
>> Cc: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
>> Subject: Re: [Taxacom] FW: Biodiversity and Species Value
>>
>> Hi John,
>>
>> What is biodiversity? How do you calculate the biodiversity value of an
>> area? Many authors now agree that it is more than just a raw species
>> number and there is an extensive literature on 'phylogenetic diversity'.
>> There are 1900 hits on Google scholar for papers on pd published since
>> 2009 and many of these papers discuss the conservation implications. I
>> don't think it's fair to say that biodiversity values calculated for taxa
>> and areas are simply subjective or that conservation based on biodiversity
>> value would be 'weirdly screwed'. If conservation agencies are not using
>> this new information yet, perhaps they could have a look at it.
>>
>> Michael Heads
>>
>> Wellington, New Zealand.
>>
>> My papers on biogeography are at: http://tiny.cc/RiUE0
>>
>> --- On Sat, 12/6/10, John Shuey <jshuey at tnc.org> wrote:
>>
>> From: John Shuey <jshuey at tnc.org>
>> Subject: [Taxacom] FW: Biodiversity and Species Value
>> To: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
>> Received: Saturday, 12 June, 2010, 2:55 AM
>>
>>
>> A few notes to clarify my rambling post from my dimly lit back porch last
>> night.
>>
>> The entities that implement conservation don’t really ponder the
>> evolutionary “uniqueness” of individual target species. Value as you are
>> discussing it, is subjective and biased by personal experience – the
>> resulting conservation agenda would be weirdly screwed by all this bias.
>> Value as defined by the conservation community is a cold, hard evaluation
>> of resource allocation – how do you maximize conservation bang for the
>> buck. Your time spent pondering ”phylogentic conservation value” might
>> better be spent counting angels on pin heads (sorry – couldn’t resist!).
>>
>> To follow-up on horseshoe crabs – ironically there is quite a bit of
>> conservation interest pointed in their direction at the moment – but is
>> has nothing to do with their odd evolutionary history. As it turns out,
>> their seasonal mass spawning – the release of hurdreds of tons of eggs
>> each night – is a critical resource that migrating shore birds on the East
>> Coast depend upon. If crab stocks are reduced below a critical threshold,
>> it could have a ripple through impact on shore birds and the ecosystems
>> they influence in North and South America.
>>
>> And Curtis states the obvious about great apes. I’d like to “claim” that
>> they are treated just like every other species. That their habitats are
>> identified as critical for inclusion in a complementary scheme of
>> conservation sites. And that the actual site designs and strategies for
>> specific conservation areas simply include them as an “area sensitive
>> species”, so that great apes (and big cats for a more typical example) can
>> maintain viable populations for the foreseeable future. The reality is
>> that they ARE GREAT APES – and almost everyone interjects personal bias in
>> prioritizing them for conservation.
>>
>> Again, sorry about the "angels on a pinhead thing" - but there are things
>> you could be worrying about that would have a more tangible impact on
>> conservation.
>>
>> John Shuey
>>
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>>
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