1. ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF CONSERVATION

2. ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF CONSERVATION
OBJECTIVES OF CONSERVATION BIOLOGY
1. Maintain genetic diversity for
a) adapting to changing environments
b) Representative samples of species and
habitats for future generations
2. Preserve rare species
3. Understanding how natural ecosystems work
4. Act as baselines for assessing human
disturbance

3. ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF CONSERVATION
USING PROTECTED AREAS FOR CONSERVATION
e.g. national parks
Protecting:
1.High diversity areas – richness hotspots
- centre of endemism
2. Endangered and threatened species
3. Fragile habitats – e.g. wetlands
4. Species that cannot live with humans
– large predators

4. ECOLOGICAL ASPECTS OF CONSERVATION
DESIGN OF A PROTECTED AREA FOR CONSERVATION
1. AREA – single large v several small
2. SOURCES and SINKS- positive rate of increase
3. SHAPE – ratio of edge to centre
4. CORRIDORS – fragmentation and the need for
connections
5. BIOLOGICAL ASPECTS

5. West Australia forest fragmentation

6. BIOLOGICAL ASPECTS Food webs and Co-evolved links
Protection of a species requires maintaining the essential components of the food web
-Kaka parrots in New Zealand forests
Some species have evolved tight coevolved linkages to other species
-Hibiscadelphus plants and honeyeaters in Hawaii
-Calvaria trees and Dodo on Mauritius

7. FOOD WEB – needs to
be intact
Kaka
New Zealand beech
forests

8. Mountain beech
Habitat of special
adaptations for kaka

9. Scale insect tubes that exude honey dew

10. Kaka holes to reach beetle larvae

11. Hybiscadelphus - Hawaii - extinct. - Depended on pollinators
CO-EVOLEVED LINKS
- need to conserve
both elements
Hybiscadelphus
- Hawaii
- extinct.
- Depended on
pollinators

12. Moho species - Hawaian honeycreeper pollinators all extinct
Pratt et al. 1991

13. Calvaria major
- Mauritius
almost extinct

14. Dodo
- a flightless
pigeon of
Mauritius
extinct

15. Keystone species Keystones determine the rest of the Species community
e.g. Wildebeest in the Serengeti
e.g Pisaster in the intertidal

16. Habitat patchiness Habitats can be patchy – sources and sinks
not always obvious
e.g. Heliconius butterflies in Amazon
e.g. Kokako in NZ forests
Habitats can be reduced to the extent that species go extinct – major reason for species loss.
Largely due to agriculture

17. Heliconius butterflies in South America – showing the patchwork distribution

18. New Zealand
Beech forests
Patches of
suitable habitat

19. Kokako
Presumed extinct,
rediscovered in 1960s
in patches of forest

20. Ecosystem Disturbance
Communities are both shaped by disturbance
e.g fire, flooding, herbivory ( e.g. Beavers)
and changed by disturbance
e.g wahine storm
e.g earthquakes in Chobe Park, Botswana

21. Ecosystem Disturbance
Communities are shaped by disturbance
e.g fire in Canal Flats, nr Kimberley,BC, Rocky
Mountain trench
-seen from fire scars
e.g. Protection from disturbance changes the
Plant community – Milroy Rangelands, East Kootenay

22. FIRE SCARS, LARCH – show a frequency of 1 per 40 years

23. Grassland with grazing
Disturbance
Same area in 1995 after
44 years protection from
grazing. Too little
disturbance results in
change to a Ponderosa
Pine community

24. Ecosystem Disturbance
Communities are changed by disturbance – too much or too great a disturbance
e.g wahine storm
e.g earthquakes in Chobe Park, Botswana
e.g. exotic predators – cause extinction

25. Black swans on Lake Ellesmere, New Zealand
CHANGE IN STATE:
Black swans on Lake Ellesmere, New Zealand

26. Exotic predators
Excessive predation occurs when endemic species have evolved without predators – they have no antipredator behaviour.
Extinction follows

27. Exotic predators – feral cats and stoats

28. Black Stilt
New Zealand
Endangered by
exotic predators
such as ferrets, stoats

29. Pebble beaches in New Zealand rivers – nest sites of Black stilt

30. Rifleman wren
Endemic species in
New Zealand
- endangered by
stoats that can
climb trees

31. New Zealand
moss forest
- Habitat of kiwi

32. Kiwi and egg

33. Laughing owl
- extinct

34. Huia - extinct

35. Pleistocene tundra mammoth - grazer
Ten thousand years ago our ecosystems were dominated by megaherbivores – exterminated by newly arrived humans

36. change in nutrient dynamics of New Zealand forests
MOA
– all species extinct
by the 1700s due to a
change in nutrient dynamics
of New Zealand forests

37. Moa species – extinct in New Zealand

38. Disturbance and scale effects
Spatial scale
Protection is not extensive enough to cover the scale of disturbance
e.g. Giant Pandas and their bamboo foods

39. Current Range for Giant Pandas
RANGE OF GIANT PANDA

40. GIANT PANDA
food supply collapses
over large areas when
Bamboo flowers
synchronously at periods of several decades
conservation requires
reserves of bamboo over
very large spatial scales

41. Reintroductions Breeding programs Reintroduced animals in wild
Chatham Island Black Robin
Captive breeding
Takehe, Kakapo, Arabian oryx

42. Islet off
Chatham Islands
New Zealand

43. Old Blue
The last remaining
Female Black Robin

44. Crossfostering
Placing Black Robin
eggs in Tomtit nest

45. Crossfostering – Tomtit (left) feeding young Black robin (right)

46. Takehe
Rediscovered in 1949
after presumed extinct
Breeding in captivity
and released

47. Kakepo
Flightless parrot
now being bred
on offshore islands
free of rats, cats and
stoats

48. Oryx – bred in zoos and reintroduced to Arabia

49. RESTORATION
The active management of habitats to return them to a previous state for conservation reasons

50. 1. RESTORATION Managing Garry Oak Ecosystems on Vancouver island
Managing Okanagan
Grassland Ecosystems for
Burrowing Owls by creating
nesting holes originally
made by badgers

51. 2. RESTORATION – using history to judge whether change is
A natural succession.
Wildhorse River, Rockies of S.E. BC shows change from
conifer forest to aspen stands Such change
would be natural 2.

52. 3. RESTORATION – creating artificial habitats. Islands of
Wetland in the Campbell River estuary, BC 3.