28. Fonseca, F. (2016), ‘Grand Canyon weighs killing, capturing bison to cut numbers’, Kansas City Star, 26 February 2016.
29. Plumb, B. et al. (2016), ‘Grand Canyon bison nativity, genetics, and ecology: Looking forward’, Natural Resource Report NPS/NRSS/BRD/NRR—2016/1226, Fort Collins, Colorado: US Department of the Interior National Park Service.
30. Soubrier, J. et al. (2016), ‘Early cave art and ancient DNA record the origin of European bison’, Nature Communications, 7, 13158.
31. Microbes can be transported as dust-like particles in the air, so a higher proportion of them have nearly global distributions. This would probably always have been the case.
32. Thomas, C. D. (2015), ‘Rapid acceleration of plant speciation during the Anthropocene’, Trends in Ecology & Evolution, 30, 448–55.
33. Wikipedia provides five additional suggestions for extinct North American higher plants which deserve formal IUCN assessment of their taxonomic status, whether any survive in the wild, and whether any individuals or seeds are available in botanic gardens, seed banks, etc; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_extinct_plants#Americas (accessed 14 October 2016).
CHAPTER 10: THE NEW NATURAL
1. Accepting that some world-views (e.g., animism, Buddhism) take a somewhat more integrated perspective.
2. Darwin, C. & Wallace, A. (1858), ‘On the tendency of species to form varieties; and on the perpetuation of varieties and species by natural means of selection’, Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society of London, Zoology, 3, 45–62; Darwin, C. (1859), On the Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life, London: John Murray; Darwin, C. (1871), The Descent of Man, and selection in relation to sex, London: John Murray.
3. Others represent humans living in rose-tinted harmony with nature, usually at some time in the past or far away, serving to emphasize that humans and nature used to be at one, but now we are at loggerheads. This is equally fallacious.
4. Roberts, C. (2007), The Unnatural History of the Sea, London: Gaia/Octopus Publishing; Kolbert, E. (2014), The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History, London: Bloomsbury Publishing. Despite my disapproval of ‘unnatural’ in the titles of these two books, they are both wonderfully written and informative accounts of biological losses and changes in the human era.
5. Oxygen depletion normally involves feedback between geological and biological processes.
6. Because of continued mating between closely related species, some of our genes may have separated considerably more than 7 million years ago, and some more recently than 6 million. Wakeley, J. (2008), ‘Complex speciation of humans and chimpanzees’, Nature, 452, E3–E4; Langergraber, K. E. et al. (2012), ‘Generation times in wild chimpanzees and gorillas suggest earlier divergence times in great ape and human evolution’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 109, 15716–21; Arnold, M. L. et al. (2015), ‘Divergence-with-gene-flow–what humans and other mammals got up to’, in Reticulate Evolution (pp. 255–95), Switzerland: Springer International Publishing.
7. Almécija, S., Smaers, J. B. & Jungers, W. L. (2015), ‘The evolution of human and ape hand proportions,’ Nature Communications, 6, 7717.
8. Love and protection is not engendered by direct genetic recognition, because adopted children also receive love and attention. Similarly, children and other relatives are not loved less if they do not themselves reproduce. Nonetheless, the molecular bases of loving, protecting and provisioning behaviours can have evolved only if, on average, they increase the evolutionary success of individuals bearing those inclinations. Offspring also love parents, developing strong bonds that ensure their own survival and eventual reproduction.
9. Alberti, M. et al. (2017), ‘Global urban signatures of phenotypic change in animal and plant populations’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 201606034.
10. Ecologists disagree whether there are residual negative impacts of radiation (as opposed to effects of land abandonment) on animal populations in the most radioactive areas of the Chernobyl region but agree that numbers are high in the lower-radiation parts of the exclusion zone; Møller, A. P. & Mousseau, T. A. (2013), ‘Assessing effects of radiation on abundance of mammals and predator–prey interactions in Chernobyl using tracks in the snow’, Ecological Indicators, 26, 112–16; Deryabina, T. G. et al. (2015), ‘Long-term census data reveal abundant wildlife populations at Chernobyl’, Current Biology, 25, R824–R826.
11. If the forest is allowed to develop for several centuries, introduced trees like locust and box elder (which are successfully colonizing previously open areas) are likely to be rarer than at present but to remain part of the tree flora.
12. Werdelin, L. (2013), ‘King of Beasts’, Scientific American, 309, 34–9.
13. Roberts, R. G. et al. (2001), ‘New ages for the last Australian megafauna: Continent-wide extinction about 46,000 years ago’, Science, 292, 1888–92.
14. Many oceanic islands were colonized more recently, but they constitute little of the Earth’s total land area (Madagascar approximately 0.4 per cent, New Zealand approximately 0.2 per cent of the land surface). Impacts in the world’s oceans are generally more recent, but also irreversible, given the numbers of species that have been moved from one ocean to another.
15. Excluding microbial communities inside the Earth’s crust, beneath the Antarctic ice sheet, or in similar places that are more or less sealed away from human influence.
16. For a hard-hitting and amusing account, I recommend Thompson, K. (2014), Where Do Camels Belong? The Story and Science of Invasive Species, London: Profile Books.
17. When King Canute forbade the tide from coming up the beach, he was allegedly demonstrating that there were events that kings could not prevent, rather than the more popular version in which he is represented as stupidly imagining that he might be able to stop the tide.
CHAPTER 11: NOAH’S EARTH
1. Villablanca, F. (2010), Monarch Alert Annual Report: Overwintering Population 2009–2010, Cal Poly State University.
2. Millar, C. I. (1998), ‘Reconsidering the conservation of Monterey pine’, Fremontia, 26 (3), 12–16. I refer colloquially to glacial maximum conditions as ‘ice ages’, even though the entire Pleistocene epoch of alternating colder and warmer periods can be thought of as one extended ice age.
3. Berg, P., ‘Radiata pine’, Te Ara–The Encyclopedia of New Zealand; http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/radiata-pine (2012 update).
4. Weiss, S. B. (2011), Management Plan for Monarch Grove Sanctuary: Site Assessment and Initial Recommendations, Menlo Park, CA: Creekside Center for Earth Observation.
5. Less the blue gum, which has a larger original distribution than the Monterey pine and is also planted commercially in Australia.
6. This could threaten some species in the South African fynbos, parts of which are being changed by introduced trees. In such a situation, controlling invading trees may be desirable (to save species, rather than to keep the vegetation unaltered) as a holding plan, while working on a long-term solution, such as biocontrol (releasing insects, fungi and pathogens) to reduce the vigour or reproduction of the invading trees.
7. Smith, S. E. et al. (2013), ‘The past, present and potential future distributions of cold-adapted bird species’, Diversity & Distributions, 19, 352–62.
8. Bennett, K. D., Tzedakis, P. C. & Willis, K. J. (1991), ‘Quaternary refugia of north European trees’, Journal of Biogeography, 18, 103–115; Tzedakis, P. C. et al. (2002), ‘Buffered tree population changes in a Quaternary refugium: Evolutionary implications’, Science, 297, 2044–7.
9. Early, R. & Sax, D. F. (2014), ‘Climatic niche shifts between species’ native and naturalized ranges raise concern for ecological forecasts during invasions and climate change’, Global Ecology & Biogeography, 23, 1356–65.
10. Roberts, C. (2007), The Unnatural History of the Sea, London: Gaia/Octopus Publishing.
11. This applies particu
larly to lesser short-tailed bats, given that there may be a great deal to learn (of potential use to humans) about their take-off mechanics and mode of squirming-crawling movement across the ground.
12. Biodiversity refers to genetic, ecosystem (habitat) and species levels of diversity. Since no one has much information about the genetic diversity of most wild species, this usually ends up being an account of the species and habitats in each country.
13. I am referring to ‘genes’ in a colloquial sense, meaning unique alleles, or any other form of genetic variation.
14. Gibson, L. G. & Yong, D. L. (2017), ‘Saving two birds with one stone: Solving the quandary of introduced, threatened species’, Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, DOI: 10.1002/fee.1449.
15. Donlan, C. J. et al. (2006), ‘Pleistocene rewilding: An optimistic agenda for twenty-first-century conservation’, American Naturalist, 168, 660–81.
EPILOGUE: ONE MILLION YEARS AD
1. Ocean acidification and the possibility that deoxygenation might become widespread could generate a different outcome in the oceans.
2. The rate of bird extinction since the year 1900 has been 132 species lost per ‘million species years’; Pimm, S. L. et al. (2014), ‘The biodiversity of species and their rates of extinction, distribution, and protection’, Science, 344, p.1246752. This is the number of species that would go extinct in a year if there were a million species (or the number that would go extinct if we observed a thousand species for a thousand years). If the existing approximately 10,500 bird species show this level of extinction for the next thousand years, then we can expect approximately a further 12 per cent of species to become extinct. Pimm et al. quote a hundred species becoming extinct per ‘million species years’ as an approximate estimate of documented extinction across several taxonomic groups.
3. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species summary statistics; http://www.iucnredlist.org/about/summary-statistics#How_many_threatened, accessed 1 January 2017.
4. Local diversity (per square metre) has declined in fields with intensive agriculture and where the land is covered in concrete. This is desirable because we must live somewhere and it is essential to feed the world population, which is done most efficiently in relatively weed- and pest-free crops. However, it is the number of species per region that is likely to drive evolutionary diversification. On this scale, diversity is increasing.
5. Moyle, R. G. et al. (2009), ‘Explosive Pleistocene diversification and hemispheric expansion of a “great speciator”’, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, 106, 1863–8.
Index
Aarhus University 102
Abat 65
Abbott, Richard 180–83
Aberdeen 88–9
Aborigine 59, 217
acacia 32
acorn 44
Adriatic Sea 35
Advanced Conservation Strategies 235
Afghanistan 11, 192
Africa 32–6, 38–9, 48, 53, 59, 63–6, 78–9, 82, 102, 105–6, 109, 135, 139, 167, 179, 187–90, 206, 217, 224, 229, 236, 247
Africa, North 185
Africa, West 65–6
African lakes, 109
African Rift Valley 165
Afro-alpine vegetation 74–6
agouti 57
agriculture 3–4, 54–69
agroforest 65–6
Aguas Buenas culture 58
Alabama 101
Alagoas 61–3
Alaska 36, 134
Aldabra Atoll 106
alder 97
Aleutian Islands 51, 180
allopatric speciation 161–79
alpaca 47
Alps 7, 22, 96–9, 106, 226
Alsatian 153
Altamaha River 196
Amazonia 58, 60, 85, 136, 213
America, Central 58, 77, 93, 109, 166, 214, 240
America, North 6, 8, 19, 38, 40, 49, 51, 53, 58–9, 63, 84–5, 91, 101–3, 106, 110, 134–40, 149, 166–70, 177, 185–96, 211–12, 215–16, 224, 229, 236–40, 246, 249
America, South 6, 37–8, 42, 51, 58, 63, 77, 91, 102, 106, 109, 112, 134–40, 166–9, 185–90, 195, 211–12, 239, 242, 247–9
Ancona 96
Andes 58, 85, 91, 166, 179, 248
Anglo-Saxon 182
ant, Argentine fire 172
ant, driver 65
ant, leaf-cutter 212
Antarctica 36, 91
antelope 250
Anthrome 102
Anthropocene 4, 35, 47, 52, 55, 63, 96, 102, 108, 118, 127, 140–41, 150, 156, 170, 179, 196–7, 213, 219, 239, 242, 244, 247–8
Anthropocene Park 199–250
antibiotic resistance 159
antibiotics 229
anticoagulant poison resistance 159
ants, invasive 108
ape 126, 206–9, 234
aphid 104, 188
Aphodius holdereri 79
Aphrodite 13
Apollo 97
Appalachian tiger swallowtail butterfly 191
apple fly 174–8, 184, 190, 247
apple fly wasp 184
apple tree 174–8, 247
Arabia 185
archipelago 40, 112, 130, 161–79, 250
Archipelago, Pangean 118, 161–79, 247
Arctic 79
Arctic Ocean 81, 89
Ardèche 217
Argentina 16, 36, 38, 60, 223
armadillo 6, 38, 134, 166
artificial selection 152, 156, 159
ash tree 97
Asia 3, 11–25, 36, 48, 53, 60, 97–8, 101–2, 106, 113, 134–7, 165–8, 179, 188, 190, 193, 216, 217, 226–9, 239, 247
Asia, Southeast 34, 59, 106, 108, 124, 224
asteroid 41, 43
Atlantic forest 60–64, 68–9
Atlantic islands 224
Atlantic Ocean 13, 16, 63, 124, 134, 140, 184
atoll 84
Attenborough, David 32
Auckland 111, 113, 120, 147
Audubon Society 18
auroch 194–5, 227
Australasia 140, 179, 224, 226, 247
Australia, Western 127
Australia 4, 8, 16, 36, 38, 44, 51, 59–60, 80, 91, 98, 102, 106, 113, 126, 132, 137–40, 159, 169–71, 188, 196, 217, 220, 222, 224, 240, 247–9
baboon 65, 70
baboon, olive 70
Bactrian Plain 11
badger 168
Baikonur 11
Bailey, Richard 21
Baja California 221
Bajo 65
Bale Mountains 71–6
Balkan States 227–8
Balkan trees 234
Balmford, Andrew 60–62, 68
balsa tree 55, 58
balsam, Himalayan 104
Baltimore checkerspot butterfly 149
bamboo 97
barley 3, 54–5
Barnosky, Tony 40
Barro Colorado Island 133–6, 140
baselines 231–2
Basin, Santa Barbara 223
bass, largemouth 101
Basu 65
bat, greater short-tailed 128–9
bat, lesser short-tailed 129, 231
bat, vampire 56, 129
Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis 108–9
bay laurel tree 97
bear 134
bear, black 142
bear, brown 3, 216
bear, Etruscan 96
bear, grizzly 49, 191, 240
bear, polar 191
bear, short-faced 38
beaver, 212
beaver, European 49, 51
beaver, giant 127, 216
bedbug 159
bee, mason 86, 88–90
beech tree 167, 226, 228
beefalo 193–4, 240
beetle 17
beetle, dung 78, 226, 235
Beggs, Jacqueline 111, 188–9
Belarus 214
Belgium 6, 67, 69
Beringia 134
Big Island, Hawaii 169
Big Year 63
&n
bsp; bioenergy 229
biological diversity, future of 243–50
biological invasions 29, 107–10
biomass 45
biotechnology 233–4
birding 63–4
bison 82
bison, American 6, 49, 53, 193–5, 210, 239, 240
bison, European 6, 49, 195, 216, 227
bison, steppe 195
Black Sea 44, 97
Black, Jack 63
blackbird, European 98–101
Blackburn, Tim 103–4
blackcap 159
blackfly (aphid) 212
blackfly (blood-sucking fly) 159
blackthorn 99
blue gum tree 220, 222, 224, 228, 234, 240, 248
Blue Nile 70
blueberry 192
blueberry fly 192
bluebird, Eastern 18–19, 42
blue-eyed Mary 142–6
boar, wild 49, 216, 227, 241
Bobo, Serge 65
bonobo 207
booby 161
Borneo 15, 31, 35, 52, 54, 68, 77, 91, 157, 208, 234–7
Bourn, Nigel 149
box elder tree 216
bramble 99
Braschler, Brigitte 88–9
Brasilia 61
Brassica rapa 155
Brazil 6, 37, 59–64, 69
brimstone butterfly 90, 114
British Columbia 148
British Isles see United Kingdom
Bronze Age 96, 228
Brooks, Tom 60–62, 68
brown argus butterfly 149–50
Brunel, Isambard Kingdom 181
Buenos Aires 38
buffalo 63
buffalo, water 47, 51
bulbul, red-whiskered 133
bull, black 236
bulldog 153–5
bumblebee 54, 98
Bush, Guy 175
bushmeat 48, 65
bustard 125
butterfly 54–5, 67–8, 91, 94, 149
butterfly conservation 86
butterfly flight evolution 159
buzzard 54
cabbage 155, 187
cabbage, Napa 155
cacao 65
cactus 161
calcareous soil 165
California 4, 36, 38, 40, 44, 91, 142, 146, 172–4, 184, 220–25, 236, 240–41, 246–8
California Invasive Plant Council 224
Callaway, Ray 172
calyptura, kinglet 62
cama 239–40
Camargue 237
Inheritors of the Earth Page 30
