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Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China

Extinction events typically represent extended processes of decline that cannot be reconstructed using short-term studies. Long-term archives are necessary to determine past baselines and the extent of human-caused biodiversity change, but the capacity of historical datasets to provide predictive po...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Turvey, Samuel T., Crees, Jennifer J., Di Fonzo, Martina M. I.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Royal Society 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4632630/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26246553
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.1299
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author Turvey, Samuel T.
Crees, Jennifer J.
Di Fonzo, Martina M. I.
author_facet Turvey, Samuel T.
Crees, Jennifer J.
Di Fonzo, Martina M. I.
author_sort Turvey, Samuel T.
collection PubMed
description Extinction events typically represent extended processes of decline that cannot be reconstructed using short-term studies. Long-term archives are necessary to determine past baselines and the extent of human-caused biodiversity change, but the capacity of historical datasets to provide predictive power for conservation must be assessed within a robust analytical framework. Local Chinese gazetteers represent a more than 400-year country-level dataset containing abundant information on past environmental conditions and include extensive records of gibbons, which have a restricted present-day distribution but formerly occurred across much of China. Gibbons show pre-twentieth century range contraction, with significant fragmentation by the mid-eighteenth century and population loss escalating in the late nineteenth century. Isolated gibbon populations persisted for about 40 years before local extinction. Populations persisted for longer at higher elevations, and disappeared earlier from northern and eastern regions, with the biogeography of population loss consistent with the contagion model of range collapse in response to human demographic expansion spreading directionally across China. The long-term Chinese historical record can track extinction events and human interactions with the environment across much longer timescales than are usually addressed in ecology, contributing novel baselines for conservation and an increased understanding of extinction dynamics and species vulnerability or resilience to human pressures.
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spelling pubmed-46326302015-11-24 Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China Turvey, Samuel T. Crees, Jennifer J. Di Fonzo, Martina M. I. Proc Biol Sci Research Articles Extinction events typically represent extended processes of decline that cannot be reconstructed using short-term studies. Long-term archives are necessary to determine past baselines and the extent of human-caused biodiversity change, but the capacity of historical datasets to provide predictive power for conservation must be assessed within a robust analytical framework. Local Chinese gazetteers represent a more than 400-year country-level dataset containing abundant information on past environmental conditions and include extensive records of gibbons, which have a restricted present-day distribution but formerly occurred across much of China. Gibbons show pre-twentieth century range contraction, with significant fragmentation by the mid-eighteenth century and population loss escalating in the late nineteenth century. Isolated gibbon populations persisted for about 40 years before local extinction. Populations persisted for longer at higher elevations, and disappeared earlier from northern and eastern regions, with the biogeography of population loss consistent with the contagion model of range collapse in response to human demographic expansion spreading directionally across China. The long-term Chinese historical record can track extinction events and human interactions with the environment across much longer timescales than are usually addressed in ecology, contributing novel baselines for conservation and an increased understanding of extinction dynamics and species vulnerability or resilience to human pressures. The Royal Society 2015-08-22 /pmc/articles/PMC4632630/ /pubmed/26246553 http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.1299 Text en © 2015 The Authors. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Published by the Royal Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/, which permits unrestricted use, provided the original author and source are credited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Turvey, Samuel T.
Crees, Jennifer J.
Di Fonzo, Martina M. I.
Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title_full Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title_fullStr Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title_full_unstemmed Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title_short Historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in Late Imperial–modern China
title_sort historical data as a baseline for conservation: reconstructing long-term faunal extinction dynamics in late imperial–modern china
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4632630/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26246553
http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rspb.2015.1299
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