Conservation

• Understanding the processes and diversity of life helps us become more aware of ourselves and our place in the biosphere.
• Conservation biology integrates ecology, evolutionary biology, physiology, molecular biology, genetics, and behavioral ecology to conserve biological diversity at all levels.
• Restoration ecology applies ecological principles in an effort to return degraded ecosystems to conditions as similar as possible to their natural, pre-degraded state.
• Scientists have described and formally named about 1.8 million species of organisms.
• Some biologists think that about 10 million more species currently exist.
• Others estimate the number to be as high as 200 million.
• Throughout the biosphere, human activities are altering trophic structures, energy flow, chemical cycling, and natural disturbance.
• In the oceans, we have depleted fish stocks by overfishing.
• Some of the most productive aquatic areas, such as coral reefs and estuaries, are severely stressed.
• Globally, the rate of species loss may be as much as 1,000 times higher than at any time in the past 100,000 years.
• Extinction is a natural phenomenon that has been occurring since life evolved on Earth.
• The current rate of extinction is what underlies the biodiversity crisis.
• Humans are threatening Earth’s biodiversity.
• The three levels of biodiversity are genetic diversity, species diversity, and ecosystem diversity.
• Biodiversity has three main components: genetic diversity, species diversity, and ecosystem diversity.
• Genetic diversity comprises the individual genetic variation within a population but also the genetic variation among populations that is often associated with adaptations to local conditions.
• If a local population becomes extinct, then the entire population of that species has lost some genetic diversity.
• The loss of this diversity is detrimental to the overall adaptive prospects of the species.
• The loss of wild populations of plants also means the loss of genetic resources that could potentially be used to improve crop qualities, such as disease resistance.
• Species diversity, or species richness, is the variety of species in an ecosystem or throughout the entire biosphere.
• The U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) defines an endangered species as one in danger of extinction throughout its range, and a threatened species as one likely to become endangered in the foreseeable future.
• The International Union for Conservation of Natural Resources (IUCN) reports that 12% of the 9,946 known bird species and 24% of the 4,763 known mammal species are threatened with extinction.
• Restoration ecology is a new discipline, and there is still much to learn.
• Costa Rica’s commitment to conservation may be sustained with success.
• We should work to preserve biodiversity because we depend on it for many resources.
• The Sustainable Biosphere Initiative is a research agenda endorsed by the Ecological Society of America.
• One of the challenges the country faces is maintaining its commitment to conservation in the face of a growing population.
• Sustainable development is not just about science, it must include life sciences, social sciences, economics, and humanities.
• The rapid buildup of organic material from the nonnative plant enabled the indigenous plants to recolonize the area and overgrow the introduced species.
• Biological augmentation uses organisms to add essential materials to a degraded ecosystem.
• Many restoration ecologists advocate adaptive management — experimenting with several types of management to learn what works best.
• Living conditions in Costa Rica improved greatly over the period in which the country dedicated itself to conservation and restoration.
• Biophilia includes our sense of connection to diverse organisms and our attachment to pristine landscapes.
• We are most likely to protect what we appreciate, and we are most likely to appreciate what we understand.
• The goal of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative is to obtain the basic ecological information necessary for responsible development, management, and conservation of Earth’s resources.
• The research agenda of the Sustainable Biosphere Initiative includes studies of global change, including interactions between climate and ecological processes, biological diversity and its role in maintaining ecological processes, and the ways in which the productivity of natural and artificial ecosystems can be sustained.
• Infant mortality rate in Costa Rica declined sharply during the 20th century, and life expectancy at birth increased.
• Augmenting ecosystem processes requires determining what factors, such as chemical nutrients, have been removed from an area and are limiting its rate of recovery.
• The 2003 literacy rate in Costa Rica was 96%.
• The long-term goal of restoration is to speed the reestablishment of an ecosystem as close as possible to the predisturbance ecosystem.