ENV ch 11

  1. Siberian Tiger Case:
    • The largest cat in the world
    • The Russian Far East mountains house the last remaining tigers
    • Nearly became extinct due to hunting, poaching and habitat destruction
    • International conservation groups saved the species from extinction
    • Research, education, zoos, and captive breeding programs
  2. Define Biodiversity and the 3 levels
    • sum total of all organisms in an area
    • Genetic Diversity
    • Ecosystem Diversity
    • Species Diversity
  3. Species Diversity
    the number or variety of species in the world or in a particular region
  4. Species Richness
    the number of species
  5. Species Evenness or Relative Abundance
    extent to which numbers of individuals of different species are equal or skewed
  6. Genera
    related species are grouped together
  7. Families
    groups of genera
  8. Subspecies
    populations of species that occur in different areas and differ slightly from each other

    • -Divergence stops short of separating the species
    • -Subspecies are denoted with a third part of the scientific
    • name
  9. Genetic Diversity
    Encompasses the differences in DNA among individuals within species and populations
  10. Inbreeding Depression
    genetically similar parents mate and produce inferior offspring
  11. Ecosystem Diversity
    • the number and variety of ecosystems
    • •Also encompasses differing communities and habitats
    • •Rapid vegetation change and varying landscapes within an ecosystem promote higher levels of biodiversity
  12. Why is it so hard to measure Biodiversity?
    -Many remote spots on Earth remain unexplored

    -Small organisms are easily overlooked

    -Many species look identical until thoroughly examined
  13. Terry Erwin
    found 163 different beetles on one tree
  14. latitude gradient
    species richness increases towards the equator
  15. Extirpation
    the disappearance of a particular population from a given area, but not the entire species globally
  16. 5 mass extinctions:
    • Ordovician period
    • Devonian period
    • Permo-triassic period
    • end triassic period
    • cretacious-tertiary period
  17. The Red List
    an updated list of species facing high risks of extinctions
  18. Four major causes of biodiversity loss
    • Habitat alteration
    • Invasive species
    • Pollution
    • Overharvesting
  19. Biodiversity enhances food security
    • Turkey’s wheat crops received $50 billion worth of disease resistance from wild wheat
    • Wild strains provide disease resistance and have the ability to grow back year after year without being replanted
  20. Biophilia
    connections that humans subconsciously seek with life
  21. Nature Deficit Disorder
    alienation from the natural environment
  22. Conservation Biology
    devoted to understanding the factors that influence the loss, protection, and restoration of biodiversity
  23. Conservation Geneticists
    study genetic attributes of organisms to infer the status of their population
  24. Minimum Viable Population
    how small a population can become before it runs into problems
  25. Metapopulations
    • a network of subpopulations
    • Small populations are most vulnerable to extinction and need special attention
  26. Equilibreum of island biogeography
    • explains how species come to be distributed among oceanic islands
    • Also applies to “habitat islands” – patches of one habitat type isolated within a “sea” of others
    • Explains how the number of species on an island results from an equilibrium between immigration and extirpation
    • Predicts an island’s species richness based on the island’s size and distance from the mainland
  27. Species Richness as a result of island size/distance
    • •Fewer species colonize an island far from the mainland
    • • Large islands have higher immigration rates
    • • Large islands have lower extinction rates
  28. Captive Breeding
    • individuals are bred and raised with the intent of reintroducing them into the wild
    • Zoos and botanical gardens
  29. Umbrella Species
    helps protect less-charismatic animals that would not have generated public interest
  30. Flagship Species
    large and charismatic species used as spearheads for biodiversity conservation
  31. UN Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (1973) (CITES)
    protects endangered species by banning international transport of their body parts
  32. Debt-for nature Swap
    a conservation organization pays off a portion of a developing country’s international debt
  33. Conservation concession
    conservation organizations pay nations to conserve, and not sell, resources
Author
kamrunsreno
ID
14787
Card Set
ENV ch 11
Description
ENV test 3
Updated