Abstract
More than a third of the world’s amphibian species are listed as Threatened or Extinct, with a recent assessment identifying 45 Australian frogs (18.4% of the currently recognised species) as ‘Threatened’ based on IUCN criteria. We applied structured expert elicitation to 26 frogs assessed as Critically Endangered and Endangered to estimate their probability of extinction by 2040. We also investigated whether participant experience (measured as a self-assigned categorical score, i.e. ‘expert’ or ‘non-expert’) influenced the estimates. Collation and analysis of participant opinion indicated that eight species are at high risk (>50% chance) of becoming extinct by 2040, with the disease chytridiomycosis identified as the primary threat. A further five species are at moderate–high risk (30–50% chance), primarily due to climate change. Fourteen of the 26 frog species are endemic to Queensland, with many species restricted to small geographic ranges that are susceptible to stochastic events (e.g. a severe heatwave or a large bushfire). Experts were more likely to rate extinction probability higher for poorly known species (those with <10 experts), while non-experts were more likely to rate extinction probability higher for better-known species. However, scores converged following discussion, indicating that there was greater consensus in the estimates of extinction probability. Increased resourcing and management intervention are urgently needed to avert future extinctions of Australia’s frogs. Key priorities include developing and supporting captive management and establishing or extending in-situ population refuges to alleviate the impacts of disease and climate change.
Highlights
Environmental change from human activities has had devastating effects on global biodiversity, leading to an increase in the number of species lost to extinction over recent decades (Pimm et al 2014; Ceballos et al 2015; Johnson et al 2017)
An increase in the rate of extinction is not unreasonable, given that some frog species have been lost to extinction recently
We remain confident that our results provide a robust estimate of relative extinction risk for the 26 species of Australian frogs assessed
Summary
Environmental change from human activities has had devastating effects on global biodiversity, leading to an increase in the number of species lost to extinction over recent decades (Pimm et al 2014; Ceballos et al 2015; Johnson et al 2017). There has been considerable public and scientific concern over the nature and rate of decline in amphibians This is primarily because high rates of species loss over the past 40 years have occurred in habitats that were considered to be intact, and because there was much uncertainty about the underlying causes of declines (Fisher and Garner 2020). Some of the primary threats facing amphibians globally include habitat loss (Cushman 2006), disease (Bower et al 2017; Scheele et al 2019), contaminants (Hayes et al 2010), climate change (Laurance 2008; McCaffery and Maxell 2010), invasive species (Kats and Ferrer 2003) and over-exploitation (Warkentin et al 2009), with the relative importance of each of these factors varying depending on species, populations and regions (Grant et al 2020).
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