Abstract
AbstractRed List status of species should reflect species extinction risk. Because data are limited and species response has a time lag, species may be threatened by extinction even if they are not Red‐Listed. The ability to predict species risk of extinction from ecological characteristics holds promises for proactively targeting conservation measures to species at high risk. In 2005, the risk of extinction from ecological characteristics was predicted for 81 species of Finnish butterflies. Now, after 15 years and two additional national Red List assessments, these predictions are verified. Species with a higher risk of extinction according to the original ecological extinction risk rank (EERR) have indeed deteriorated further as judged by their Red List status, whereas species with a smaller risk of extinction according to EERR retained their Red List status or became more viable. The analysis confirms that predicting the risk of extinction based on ecological characteristics works in practice, and such a complementary approach to Red Listing could help us to advance conservation biology from the crisis discipline toward prognostic conservation practice.
Highlights
Ecosystem degradation and biodiversity loss are accelerating (IPBES, 2018, 2019)
We considered only genuine changes in the Red List status, that is, changes caused by increased knowledge (1 spp.) or changes in criteria (7 spp.) were considered “no change.”
Species which became more threatened since the 2001 Red List had higher ecological extinction risk in the original analysis than species which retained their Red List status or became less threatened
Summary
To stop the biodiversity crisis, one of the most important challenges for conservation biologists is to identify the ecological and life history characteristics of species that might predispose them to threats, leading to population declines and—eventually—to extinction (Davidson, Hamilton, Boyer, Brown, & Ceballos, 2009; Kotiaho, Kaitala, Komonen, & Päivinen, 2005). Such knowledge could be used to proactively target conservation and monitoring actions to species, which are not threatened yet, but could become so in the near future (Coulthard, Norrey, & Shortall, 2019; Zettlemoyer, McKenna, & Lau, 2019).
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