Audisee® eBooks with Audio combine professional narration and text highlighting for an engaging read aloud experience! Oahu tree snails and pink velvet worms are two examples of endangered invertebrates. Few of them exist in the wild. Other invertebrates have already gone extinct. What hurts these animals? What can you do to help? Read this book to find out!
Briefly describes a variety of animals, including lemurs, apes and monkeys, parrots, and elephants, which are endangered or already extinct as a result of man's destruction of their forest habitats or man's poaching and hunting.
The vast size of the United States and extensive variation of its climate, topography, and biota across different regions contribute to both the richness of the nation‘s natural heritage and the complexities involved in managing its resources. A follow-up to RFF‘s popular America‘s Renewable Resources (1990), Perspectives on Sustainable Resources in America updates readers about the current challenges involved in managing America‘s natural resources, especially in light of the increasing emphasis on sustainability and ecosystem approaches to management. Written to inform general audiences and students, as well as to engage the interest of experts, the book includes assessments by some of the nation‘s most renowned scholars in natural resource economics and policy. An introductory chapter critically examines the concept of sustainability as it has been developed in recent years and asks how the concept might apply to individual resource systems. It considers the interrelatedness of ecosystem, economic, and social sustainability; the paradigms of resource sufficiency and functional integrity; and the contrast between weak and strong sustainability. The chapters that follow examine America‘s experience with forests, water, agricultural soils, and wildlife. Highlighting the adaptability and resilience of resource systems, each chapter provides a description of the physical characteristics of the resource, a history of its use, a policy history, and a review of ongoing debates in management and policy. Perspectives on Sustainable Resources in America concludes with an innovative treatment of biodiversity as a natural resource. The chapter reviews the definitions of biodiversity, the ecological and economic meanings of biodiversity, and current efforts to preserve biodiversity, especially through regulatory approaches.
We are currently facing the sixth mass extinction of species in the history of life on Earth, biologists claim—the first one caused by humans. Heise argues that understanding these stories and symbols is indispensable for any effective advocacy on behalf of endangered species. More than that, she shows how biodiversity conservation, even and especially in its scientific and legal dimensions, is shaped by cultural assumptions about what is valuable in nature and what is not.
The 7-volume Encyclopedia of Biodiversity, Second Edition maintains the reputation of the highly regarded original, presenting the most current information available in this globally crucial area of research and study. It brings together the dimensions of biodiversity and examines both the services it provides and the measures to protect it. Major themes of the work include the evolution of biodiversity, systems for classifying and defining biodiversity, ecological patterns and theories of biodiversity, and an assessment of contemporary patterns and trends in biodiversity. The science of biodiversity has become the science of our future. It is an interdisciplinary field spanning areas of both physical and life sciences. Our awareness of the loss of biodiversity has brought a long overdue appreciation of the magnitude of this loss and a determination to develop the tools to protect our future. Second edition includes over 100 new articles and 226 updated articles covering this multidisciplinary field— from evolution to habits to economics, in 7 volumes The editors of this edition are all well respected, instantly recognizable academics operating at the top of their respective fields in biodiversity research; readers can be assured that they are reading material that has been meticulously checked and reviewed by experts Approximately 1,800 figures and 350 tables complement the text, and more than 3,000 glossary entries explain key terms
Extinction has occurred throughout the history of life, and nearly all the species that have ever existed have now disappeared. In this Very Short Introduction, Paul B. Wignall looks at the causes and nature of extinction events, what makes a species vulnerable, and the debates in modern science of the role of climate and humans.
