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Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States
Previous national and global conservation assessments have relied on habitat conversion data to quantify conservation risk. However, in addition to habitat conversion to crop production or urban uses, ecosystem alteration (e.g., from logging, conversion to plantations, biological invasion, or fire s...
Autores principales: | , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Public Library of Science
2011
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3151280/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21850248 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0023002 |
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author | Swaty, Randy Blankenship, Kori Hagen, Sarah Fargione, Joseph Smith, Jim Patton, Jeannie |
author_facet | Swaty, Randy Blankenship, Kori Hagen, Sarah Fargione, Joseph Smith, Jim Patton, Jeannie |
author_sort | Swaty, Randy |
collection | PubMed |
description | Previous national and global conservation assessments have relied on habitat conversion data to quantify conservation risk. However, in addition to habitat conversion to crop production or urban uses, ecosystem alteration (e.g., from logging, conversion to plantations, biological invasion, or fire suppression) is a large source of conservation risk. We add data quantifying ecosystem alteration on unconverted lands to arrive at a more accurate depiction of conservation risk for the conterminous United States. We quantify ecosystem alteration using a recent national assessment based on remote sensing of current vegetation compared with modeled reference natural vegetation conditions. Highly altered (but not converted) ecosystems comprise 23% of the conterminous United States, such that the number of critically endangered ecoregions in the United States is 156% higher than when calculated using habitat conversion data alone. Increased attention to natural resource management will be essential to address widespread ecosystem alteration and reduce conservation risk. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-3151280 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2011 |
publisher | Public Library of Science |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-31512802011-08-17 Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States Swaty, Randy Blankenship, Kori Hagen, Sarah Fargione, Joseph Smith, Jim Patton, Jeannie PLoS One Research Article Previous national and global conservation assessments have relied on habitat conversion data to quantify conservation risk. However, in addition to habitat conversion to crop production or urban uses, ecosystem alteration (e.g., from logging, conversion to plantations, biological invasion, or fire suppression) is a large source of conservation risk. We add data quantifying ecosystem alteration on unconverted lands to arrive at a more accurate depiction of conservation risk for the conterminous United States. We quantify ecosystem alteration using a recent national assessment based on remote sensing of current vegetation compared with modeled reference natural vegetation conditions. Highly altered (but not converted) ecosystems comprise 23% of the conterminous United States, such that the number of critically endangered ecoregions in the United States is 156% higher than when calculated using habitat conversion data alone. Increased attention to natural resource management will be essential to address widespread ecosystem alteration and reduce conservation risk. Public Library of Science 2011-08-05 /pmc/articles/PMC3151280/ /pubmed/21850248 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0023002 Text en Swaty et al. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited. |
spellingShingle | Research Article Swaty, Randy Blankenship, Kori Hagen, Sarah Fargione, Joseph Smith, Jim Patton, Jeannie Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title | Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title_full | Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title_fullStr | Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title_full_unstemmed | Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title_short | Accounting for Ecosystem Alteration Doubles Estimates of Conservation Risk in the Conterminous United States |
title_sort | accounting for ecosystem alteration doubles estimates of conservation risk in the conterminous united states |
topic | Research Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3151280/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21850248 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0023002 |
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