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TESTING INDICATOR GROUPS FOR RESERVE SELECTION: ARE RARE SPECIES AT RISK OF BEING LEFT OUT?
Citation:
Lawler, J. J., R D. White, J. C. Sifneos, AND L. L. Master. TESTING INDICATOR GROUPS FOR RESERVE SELECTION: ARE RARE SPECIES AT RISK OF BEING LEFT OUT? Presented at Ecological Society of America annual meeting, Tucson, AZ, August 4-9, 2002.
Description:
Indicators of biodiversity are potential tools for selecting areas for conservation when information about species' distributions is scarce. The concept involves selecting areas based on groups of conservation targets whose distributions represent more broadly defined patterns of biodiversity. Due to their inherent rarity, we hypothesized that species at risk of extinction are not likely to be included in sites selected to protect indicator groups. Using a reserve selection approach, we compared the ability of areas selected to conserve the diversity of seven indicator groups (freshwater fish, birds, mammals, freshwater mussels, reptiles, amphibians, and at-risk species of those taxa) to provide protection for other species in general and at-risk species in particular, in the Middle-Atlantic region of the United States. Although sites selected with taxonomic indicator groups provided coverage for between 61% and 82% of all other species, no taxonomic group provided protection for more than 58% of all other at-risk species. We found a positive relationship between a species' probability of coverage by each indicator group and the extent of its geographic range within the study area. Furthermore, we found that although sites selected with indicator groups composed primarily of terrestrial species included relatively high percentages of those species (82%-85%), they included smaller percentages of strictly aquatic species (27%-55%). Finally, we found that at-risk species themselves performed well as an indicator group, covering, on average 84% of all other species.