Download If Forget Everything Else, Remember These

If You Forget Everything Else,
Please Remember This
Our Population Growth Is
Not Sustainable
(Vitousek 1994)
(World Population Clock,
Population Reference Bureau
2010 http://www.prb.org/)
How Do You Want to Change Growth?
Reproduction, births, natality (B)
Immigration (I)
Population
Mortality, death (D)
“BIDE”
Emigration (E)
Regardless, It Will Change: Density
Dependent
High food addition
Low food
addition
Townsend’s vole
No food
added
Shaded area is winter
Density Independent
The Future is Uncertain, But Not as Uncertain as
Some Would Like You to Believe
• “While ecologists involved in management or
policy often are advised to learn to deal with
uncertainty, there are a number of
components of global environmental change
of which we are certain—certain that they are
going on, and certain that they are humancaused.”
• “…addressing global change will require active
collaboration with a wide range of scientists
outside our field.., but..it is our responsibility to
take the lead in dealing with major components
of global environmental change.”
(Vitousek 1994)
Temperatures predicted to rise 1.1 – 6.4 °C over
the next 100 years (IPCC)
IPCC 2007
SRES A2
2020-2029
2090-2099
Figure SPM.6
IPCC 2007
Our Activities are Endangering Other Species
(Chapin et al 2000)
Global Change and Biodiversity
Continental extinction
rates have increased
from 10-7 to 10-4
species/species/year
Nott, et al. 1995. Current
Biology 5:14-17
Biocentric
Morality
Medicine /
Biotechnology
Novel
Selective
Regimes
Changed
Evolutionary
Trajectories
Economic, Ecological, Social Costs
(Modified from Vitousek et al. 1996 to include Palumbi 2001)
We Must Change Our Attitude
1937
•We abuse land because we regard
it as a commodity belonging to us.
•That land is a community is the
basic concept of ecology, but that
land is to be loved and respected is
an extension of ethics.
1995
(Leopold 1948)
MANY PEOPLE ARE CHANGING: DDT
BANNED
Peregrine Falcon
The Peregrine Fund established 1970, Boise, Idaho
Nesting pairs lower 48:
1940s = 1,500
1970 =
39
2005 = 1,200
“Let there be no doubt: the banning of DDT in 1972 was the single
most important action taken to ensure the survival and recovery
of the Peregrine Falcon in North America. Without it, we would not
have celebrated the delisting of the American Peregrine in 1999,
for it made possible everything good that happened to the Peregrine
in the last decades of the 20th Century.”
The Peregrine Fund, Return of the Peregrine, 2003, p. 18
Our Laws Help Force Change
Endangered Species Act (ESA, 1973)
•
•
•
•
Lists Species by Petition
Stresses maintaining integrity of the ecosystems
Goal = “recover” listed species
Prohibits federal agencies from authorizing,
funding, or carrying out any action that would
jeopardize a listed species or destroy or modify its
"critical habitat"
• Distinctions made between threatened and
endangered
Recovery is a Long Road, But it is Possible
• Captive breeding and release
has brought the condor from
22 birds and extirpation from
the wild to 300+ birds and
150+ wild birds in two
decades
• Condors survive in the wild
only through constant and
costly human assistance and
intervention
José
You Can Make A Difference
Restoring
Habitat
Steve and
Suzy
Humphrey
Fernando
Sanchez
Playa
Hermosa,
CR
(Shafer 1997)
If We Don’t Change It’ll Be Ugly