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90 Cards in this Set
- Front
- Back
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What is the most dominant ecological force |
Humans - inhabit almost every habitat |
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Population projections are strongly influenced by |
changes in fertility +/- 1.3 billion with the difference of 1/2 child |
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Overall 2015 report shows that overall growth is |
Slowing |
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Examples of places with low fertility <2.1 |
China, USA, Brazil, Russian, Japan, Viet Nam |
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Examples of places with Intermediate fertility |
India, indonesia, pakistan, bangladesh |
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Examples of places with high fertility |
Nigeria, DR Congo, UR of Tanzania, Uganda, Afghanistan |
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____________ is the fastest growing major area |
Africa - despite decline, still highest - will be 25% of the world's population by 2050 |
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Europe's population is ________ |
shrinking |
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Slower rate of increase in _________ compared to _________ |
more developed, less developed |
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Net migration is projected to account for _________ of population growth in high income countries |
82% |
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Top net receivers of immigrants |
US, Canada, UK, Australia, Germany, Russian Federation and Italy |
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Top net emigration from |
India, Bangladesh, China, Pakistan and Mexico |
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What are the trends in pop size for less developed nations |
- nearly doubled in less developed nations from 1980-2013 - 27/48 least developed countries have highest levels of population growth - concentration of pop growth in poorest countries makes it hard to implement sustainable development agenda |
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What causes the most population increase - high fertility? - Migration? ?? |
Because populations are already large |
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Less developed countries have Young/Older populations |
- young - 1.7 billion children (28%) and 1.1 billion young people (18%) (more developed; 16% children and 12% young people |
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Biocapacity |
capacity of a biologically productive area to generate an on-going supply of renewable resources and to absorb spill-over wastes
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Environmental Impact (I) = |
Human population size (P) x per capita affluence (A) x technology factor (T) Probably can't change affluence - Less developed: population # - More developed: technology |
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What are some resources that can be used sustainably |
- energy resources, metals, other minerals - grasslands - forests - fisheries - freshwater - soil |
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Water sustainability |
- 70% of world's water used for irrigation of crops - over past half century, 18 trillion tons of water have been removed from underground aquifers without being replaced |
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Fisheries and sustainability |
- overfishing and atlantic cod - more fish farms: pollution issues, affects population genetics (if farm fish escape), and relies on grain so extra stress on world grain food supply |
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Forest sustainability |
- over harvesting and over clearing - mostly from agriculture or timber lodging |
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Soil sustainability |
over-plowing, over-grazing, over-using |
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History of conservation in North america: enemy |
First Nations: light footprint but cause of megafauna extinctions overkill hypothesis: humans are responsible for extinction of megafauna in Late Pleistocene |
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History of conservation in North america: Provider |
Early European settlers: nature feared, to be subdued; utilitarian value of nautre recognized "game" and "Vermin" |
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History of conservation in North america:Playground |
increasing prosperity and urbanization: nature becomes valued for recreation |
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History of conservation in North america: Temple |
increasing exploitation of landscape: nature viewed as having inherent value |
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Romantic-Transcendental Conservation Ethic |
Nature offers spiritual connection/enlightenment - anecdotal, theoretical and empirical data that contact with nature promotes health and wellbeing |
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Resource Conservation Ethic (4 points)
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1. Use natural resources for human purposes in a manner that does not exceed Earth's ability to produce them 2. Recognize the ability of a system to continue and maintain a production level or quality of life for future generations 3. Use better science and economics to get nature's resources flowing in perpetuity 4. Nature has no intrinsic value or there is no need to protect species that lacked direct human utility |
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Evolutionary-Ecological Land Ethic |
- The health of the land as a whole rather than the supply of its 'constituent resources', is what needs conserving with land defined broadly to include soils, water, plants, animals and people |
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Conservation Biology Mission |
advances the science and practice of conserving Earth's biological diversity - study the problems, publish data and recommendations in scientific journals |
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Has conservation biology successfully addressed problems it identifies? |
- putting out small fire after small fire is not solving the problem: saving individual species will not solve larger issues - presenting crisis after crisis ("doom and gloom") has not been effective |
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New Conservation Biologists |
Recognizes the need to turn conservation into more than just for the privileged - sustainability: includes development seeking to blend environmental, social and economic goals - blends ecology, ethics, and economics - conservation will not take place unless sustainable solutions are implemented or without conservation biology |
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Name a few ways humans are altering Earth's natural systems |
- changing global climates - 98% of suitable agri-land has been put to use (1/4 of surface) - 0.1% of forest cover is lost each year - oceans depleted of numerous fish species - Transporting species |
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We are creating the __th extinction episode |
6th |
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Present day extinctions |
-75-85% of megafauna extinct - 1.6% of mammals and 1.3% of birds extinct (known and described) - 12% birds, 23% mammals, 31% amphibians threatened - CURRENT EXTINCTION RATE 1,000-10,000 times prehistoric rates |
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Overkill Hypothesis |
humans are responsible for late pleistocene extinction of megafauna |
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Pleistocene rewilding |
- megafauna provided key ecological processes through predation, herbivory and other processes - introduce the closest living relatives of extinct megafauna to habitats in order to revive key ecological processes - use economically marginal farmland to create "New nature" to replace what was lost |
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What is Biodiversity? |
biological diversity - the sum of variation within and across all levels of biological organization |
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Types of variation: phenotype what is it influenced by |
physical or behavioural character influenced by: Environmental variation and genetic variation - though both can affect an individuals phenotype, genetic material is the only cause of diversity that is heritable |
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Functional diversity |
phenotypic diversity - represents the adaptive component of diversity - what natural selection acts on |
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Conservation of phenotypes could be aimed at... |
protecting the process (context of natural selection) rather than the products themselves |
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Is creation of genetic diversity a viable solution to current rates of extinction? |
no. too slow. |
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Natural selection |
the differential survival and reproduction of individuals in a population as a result of their having heritable, adaptive traits |
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Drift |
when chance dictates which individuals survive and reproduce |
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Levels of biodiversity; Populations |
group of individuals that do mate and produce offspring - populations frequently differ genetically |
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Levels of biodiversity: Species |
group of individuals that do or can potentially breed and produce viable offspring (biological species concept) or group of individuals that differ in morphological,physiological or biochemical trait (morphological species concept) |
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Levels of Biodiversity: Community |
species that occupy a particular locality and the interactions among those species |
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Composition influenced by |
predation, parasitism, competition, mutualism, dispersal abiotic factors: climate, history, chance |
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Ecosystem |
biological community together with associated abiotic environment - water cycles, nutrient cycles, energy capture |
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Biome |
defined primarily by environmental variables - ocean, wetlands, temperate forests, tropical forests, ect |
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Ecoregions |
large areas of relatively uniform climate that harbor a characteristic set of species and ecological communities |
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Carolinian life zone |
40% of canada's diversity |
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Landscapes |
geographical area containing multiple ecosystems - scale is very large, from continents to earth itself |
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At what level is it easiest to define biodiversity |
individual - speculation on what constitutes a species |
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How do you measure biodiversity |
1. richness 2. diversity 3. shannon-weiner diversity index 4. evenness |
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1. Richness |
# of species |
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2. Abundance |
# of individuals per sample number of 1 species/total number of individuals (all species |
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3. Shannon-Weiner Diversity Index |
H = -sum(Pi ln[Pi]) |
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4. Evenness |
the relative abundance of each species E = H/ln(S) where S is the # of species |
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1. Focus on areas where biodiversity provides a service to humans Examples |
Oceans and boreal forests as carbon sinks
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Net Primary Production (NPP) |
the net flux of carbon from the atmosphere into green plants per unit time - a rate process - net exchange of carbon dioxide between terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere |
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Oceans as carbon sinks (NPP) |
highest around coasts |
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Boreal forests as carbon sinks (NPP) maybe |
- warmer than normal summer temps in northern mantioba for a mature black spruce ecosystem switching from a carbon sink to a carbon source
- thawing soils store one of the largest pools of carbon in the terrestrial biosphere (200-500 gigatons) |
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2. Protect areas where biodiversity is concentrated |
Hotspots! - get more bang for your conservation buck |
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Hot spot qualifications |
- must have at least 1500 plant species and lost at least 70% of original habitat extent - >50% of the worlds plant species - 42% of all terrestrial vertebrate species - 29% freshwater fish - all endemic to 34 biodiversity hotspots - make up only 2.3% of earth's land surface |
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Human population in hotspots |
- have higher population density than expected when compared to global average - coastal Asian hot spots with major cities are suffering the worst from overpopulation in hotspots - Philippines, japan, western ghats, and Sri Lanka all have 250 people per km2 in comparison to the global average of 42people per km2 |
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What is the problem with focusing efforts on saving areas with the greatest diversity and threat? |
high risk: high reward - lots of people, people damage - lots of agriculture but highest species |
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How does nature serve us? |
Supporting: biogeochemical and ecological processes that support the other services Provisioning: good provided by nature that humans use Regulating: control nature in a way that aids humans Cultural: emotional and psychological benefits |
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Examples of Provisioning |
- food: crops, livestock, fisheries - Fiber: timber, wood fuel, cotton, hemp - biochemical: pharmaceuticals - water |
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Examples of regulating |
- air purification - climate regulation - water regulation/purification - erosion control - pest regulation - pollination |
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How do you assign values to Environmental services? |
1. Stated-preference methods 2. revealed-preference methods 3. Replacement Cost methods |
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1. Stated preference methods |
- ask someone how much they would pay for something |
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Stated preference method Issues |
1. need large sample size 2. clarity on how much money would be raised 3. people can state any value, but does it match reality of what they can pay 4. do people's valuation remain stable over time? 5. is it ethical to place a value on species |
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2. Revealed preference method |
peoples actions demonstrate value |
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Revealed preference method - production function/equation for product sold commercially |
-boreal forests have spruce that produce 2x4's but also wood chips for newsprint, shavings for pet bedding and sawdust for particle board |
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Revealed preference method - production function/equation for product sold commercially Issues |
1. what happens to value of habitat when US adds duties to Canadian exports? 2. When the US housing market collapses 3. when the canadian dollar rises |
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Revealed preference method - travel cost method |
how much people pay to see/do something - tourists spend $1,150 to visit CR rainforest in mid1990's |
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Issues with the travel cost method |
1. what about arctic, deep sea vents, deserts? 2. is this that habitat's only value? 3. does tourism negatively affect biodiversity? |
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Revealed preference method - Hedonic pricing |
premiums people pay for proximity to nature or access to ecosystem service |
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Hedonic pricing issues |
what happens when you argue for protection in these high-priced locations? |
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3. Replacement Cost methods |
how much would you pay for infrastructure/technology that would replace a natural service - ex. wetlands filter water, compare that to how much it costs to build a filtration plant |
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Issues with Replacement costs methods |
at some point, technology may become more efficient and economical at providing service What does that mean for wetlands that provide this service |
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"discounting" in cost-benefit analysis |
- a way to express future costs and benefits at today's equivalent value - people have a "time preference" for when they receive benefits |
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Desiring goods now |
- desire for goods NOW stems from uncertainty in the future and from opportunities to gain further on benefits received now vs. later -gaining now allows you to invest and create net gain in future (compound interest) |
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Issue of discounting |
most people agree that some sort of discounting is necessary, but no agreement on the ideal discount rate - even when rates are small, decisions are made to accept development in spite of long-term damage (net loss over time) - low rates encourage investment, accelerating development that damages - ag, timber, fishing have low rates of return (less investment) |
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Issue of using cost benefit analysis |
- assumption of substitutability - implies more of one good can make up for the loss of another |
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Losing a species reduces ecosystem productivity Supporting argument |
- recovery from collapse in fisheries is more rapid when species is high than when low ( - some ecosystems exhibit large changes when certain species are lost (wolves help regulate moose pop so over grazing is less likely) |
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Losing a species reduces ecosystem productivity Not supporting |
- some grassland habitats produce just as much biomass at low species as they do at high species
- some extinctions have had no visible effect on the ecosystem they once inhabited (golden toad) |
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Keystone species |
species having widespread impact on an ecosystem via its presence and influence - arctic fox is prey for many animals and it regulates the populations of other species |
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Stategies that involve ethical and environmental issues include |
- environmental impact assessments - adding non-substitutability to CBA - payments for ecosystem services |
