ENSC 320 Midterm

Wildlife

Any living “non-human”, "undomesticated" organism in the kingdom Animalia

Domesticated Animals

Species whose appearance and behaviour have been altered through artificial selection (pets, livestock)

Tame Wildlife

Wildlife but comfortable around the presence of humans (zoo)

Biodiversity

The variety of organisms considered at all levels, find differences in the natural world 

• Structural: how biological units are set up 

• Composition:what compose the ecology (species, landscapes) 

• Functional: what is it doing

Ecosystem

Grouping of plants, animals and microbes, etc, interacting with each other and their physical environment

Community

All plants and animals inhabiting an area

Population

A group of individuals of the same species in an area

Species

A group of organisms where all members do, or have the potential to, interbreed and produce viable offspring

Extinction

A natural phenomenon: current rate well above the expected rate

Entering 6th mass extinction event

The Great Acceleration

The ramp up of human impact

The Three Levels of Biodiversity

1. Genetic Diversity: Variation of genes and alleles within and among individuals and populations of a species. This is the raw material necessary for natural selection, evolution, and long-term resilience against environmental changes or disease.

2. Species Diversity: The richness (number of distinct species) and abundance/evenness of different species within an ecological community.

3. Ecosystem / Landscape Diversity: The variety of biological habitats, ecological communities, and biomes across geographical areas, including the physical and ecological processes occurring within them.

Measuring and Quantifying Biodiversity

• Species Richness vs. Evenness: Simply counting the number of species (richness) does not tell the whole story; the relative abundance (evenness) of species is crucial for assessing community health.

• Spatial Scales of Diversity:

  • Alpha () Diversity: Local diversity within a specific, small habitat or community patch.

  • Beta () Diversity: The degree of differentiation or species turnover between different habitats across an environmental gradient.

  • Gamma () Diversity: Total landscape- or regional-scale species diversity.

Why does biodiveristy peak?

Tropical latitudes and complex habitats

Normative Science

Conservation biology is inherently value-laden; science describes what is, but ethics must dictate what ought to be

Standard economic tools

(Cost-Benefit Analysis, Contingent Valuation) often undervalue future generations and non-market ecological goods

Safe Minimum Standard (SMS)

Serves as an ethical hedge: preserve critical biological assets by default unless the social/economic cost is intolerably high

Intrinsic

Valuable in and for itself if its value is not derived from its utility, but is independent of any use or function it may have in relation to something or someone else

Instrumental Values

Relate to usefulness or to economic value

Option

Value of a resource's expected future use

Quasi-option

Value of preserving options given expectation that it may have use in the future

Bequest

Value of knowing something is preserved for future generations

Direct Value

Concerned with enjoyment, satisfaction, or gain received directly by consumer(s) (cows to eat)

Indirect Value

Tend to reflect value of wildlife to society at large, rather than individuals or specific groups (bees)

Consumptive (direct value)

Animal’s value is based on removal from its habitat (dead or alive)

Nonconsumptive (direct value)

Value is placed on the animal in its natural habitat (photo, education, research)

Economic Valuation

Monetary framework often adopted to weigh these values against each other 

Utilitarian

Practical and material exploitation of nature

Naturalistic

Direct experience and exploration of nature

Ecologistic-Scientific

Systematic study of the structure, function, and relationships in nature

Aesthetic

Physical appeal and beauty if nature

Symbolic

Use of nature for language and thought

Humanistic

Strong emotional attachment and ‘love’ for aspects of nature

Moralistic

Spiritual reverence and ethical concern for nature

Dominionistic

Mastery, physical control, and dominance of nature

Negativistic

Fear, aversion, and alienation from nature

Pre-European Era

(11,500 BC – 1500 AD)

Indigenous Worldview: Wildlife was an essential dietary staple and deeply rooted culturally

Era of Abundance

(1500 – 1850)

• Myth of Superabundance: European settlers operated under the belief that natural resources were infinite and inexhaustible. Depleted local areas were simply abandoned for new frontiers.

• Commercial Exploitation: Fur trade drove westward expansion; hunting and trapping formed the economic backbone of early North America (especially Canada).

Era of Overexploitation

(1850 – 1900)

• Drivers: Rapid population booms (US grew from 17M in 1840 to 32M in 1860), railroad expansion, and unrestricted commercial market hunting.

Era of Protection

(1900 – 1930)

• Government Intervention: Recognition of resource collapse led to formal wildlife agencies and regulatory oversight.

Era of Game Management

(1930 – 1965)

• Scientific Resource Approach: Wildlife and forestry academic departments were established; focus shifted to quantitative biology.

• Maximum Sustainable Yield (MSY): Introduced to calculate the maximum harvest rate possible without compromising natural replenishment.

Era of Environmental Management

(1965 – ~1980)

• Focus on Pollution: Public focus widened from harvest limits to systemic contamination of air and water ecosystems.

• Activism & Governance: Formation of grassroots NGOs like Greenpeace (1971, Vancouver; anti-whaling campaigns) and broad expansion of US and Canadian national parks.

Era of Conservation Biology

(1980 – Present)

• Biodiversity Focus: Shifted away from purely utilitarian fish/game management toward global biodiversity preservation, driven by works like Soulé & Wilcox (1980) and E.O. Wilson (The Diversity of Life, 1992).

• Questioning MSY: Chronic fishery collapses led ecologists to challenge linear MSY calculations.

Neoenvironmentalism

Sustainability must be achieved through technological innovation, social adaptation, and ecosystem services rather than pristine preservation on a human-dominated planet.

Compositionalism

Rooted in evolutionary biology; focuses on specific biological components (native species, genes, historical baselines) and views humans as external disruptors.

• Biodiversity: Variety of life across structural levels, specifically emphasizing native evolutionary lineages and taxa.

• Biological Integrity: Maintaining a community structure and species composition that reflects undisturbed, historic evolutionary baselines.

• Ecological Restoration: Active intervention to recreate the exact pre-disturbance species composition and native ecological state.

Functionalism

Rooted in ecosystem ecology; focuses on biophysical processes (energy flow, nutrient cycles, resilience) and views humans as integrated, sustainable participants.

• Ecological Health: The ability of an ecosystem to maintain stability, vigor, and organization over time, even with non-native species present.

• Ecological Sustainability: Maintaining core biophysical processes and resource productivity over time to support both ecological systems and human needs.

• Ecological Rehabilitation: Restoring ecosystem function and services (e.g., stabilizing soil, water filtration) without strictly replicating historical species composition.

Edge Effects

Increases the ratio of perimeter to interior, fundamentally altering microclimates (higher winds, greater temperature swings, reduced humidity up to hundreds of meters inward)

Conservation

Involves an ethic of use, but with view towards long-term protection

Preservation

Maintenance of nature in its natural state, untouched by human development

Wildlife Management

Application of ecology to wildlife populations in a manner that strikes a balance between the needs of those populations and the needs of people

Outcome achieved by: 

• Manipulating populations

• Manipulating habits 

• Managing people (use)

Conservation Biology

 Integrated multidisciplinary scientific field that has developed in response to the challenge of conserving biodiversity

1. Documents biodiversity

2. Investigates human impacts

3. Develops practical solutions

Normative Concepts

• Normative statements affirm how things should or ought to be, how to value them, which things are good or bad, which actions are right or wrong.

• Normative concepts “set the agenda” for conservation efforts

• Often institutionalized in policy, regulations, and legislation

Ecological Services

The often vital and economically valuable functions of healthy ecosystems

• Provisioning Services

• Regulating Services

• Cultural Services

• Supporting Services

Adaptive Resource Management

Structured, iterative process of decision-making in the face of uncertainty, with aim of reducing uncertainty over time through monitoring feedback

Assessments → Decisions → Implemtetion → Monitoring

Ecosystem Management

Notion of enlarging the focus of environmental management to incorporate entire ecosystems, rather than individual components, and basing decisions on the best available science

Sustainable Development

Meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs

Three Pillars of Sustainability

1. Social

2. Environmental

3. Economic

Overexploitation

Unsustainable levels of harvest

Rate of take/harvest exceeds the capacity of the species/population to replace itself

Primack reading highlights:

• Technological advances

• Growing human populations

• International wildlife trade

• Commercial harvesting

• “Bushmeat crisis”

Unique aspects of population

1. Abundance or density

2. Have boundaries

3. Composition (sex and age)

4. Distribution (pattern, scale)

5. Change over time

Natality

Number of young born (or hatched, etc.) in a specific amount of time (generally equivalent to birth rate)

Recruitment

Number of young born in any year that survive to reproductive age

Mortality

Death of individual, but often expressed as % of population that dies in a year (rate) [natural, harvest, total]

Density Dependent Limits

Variables that become more limiting as the density increase

Density Independent Limits

Variables whose importance is independent of the density of the population

Deterministic

Deterministic variables affect a population in constant relation to its size

• Predictable and accountable

Stochastic

Stochastic variables are unpredictable events

• Demographic stochasticity

• Genetic stochasticity

• Environmental stochasticity

• Catastrophic stochasticity
  
  

K-Selected Species

Present in care, few offspring, large

R-Selected Species

Many offspring, absent, small

Common property

Resources owned by the entire populace without restriction as to who can use them and how

Tragedy of the Commons

Is an economic and ecological concept describing a situation where individual users, acting independently and rationally in their own self-interest, deplete or spoil a shared, unregulated resource (the "commons"), even though doing so harms the collective good.

Maximum Sustained Yield

Strategy of achieving maximum harvest from a population over a series of years. Identify the maximum biomass that can be harvested without affecting future harvest

• Doesn’t regularly estimate

• Does not consider quality (size, age, etc)

• Ecosystem consequences (predators)

Optimum Sustained Yield

Strategy of achieving maximum harvest from a population over a series of years, but considers additional variables in determining ‘optimum’

Use

The way an animal uses the physical and biological resources in a habitat.

Selection

Series of behavioural decisions made by an animal about what habitat it uses relative to others

Availability

Accessibility and procurability of physical and biological components

Quality

Ability of the environment to provide conditions appropriate for individual and population persistence

Habitat Loss

Process by which natural habitat is rendered ineffective in supporting the community of species once found there

• Has accounted for 50% of recent continental bird extinctions and most plant extinctions

The Species-Area Relationship

Species abundance and diversity are area dependent

Habitat Fragmentation

Process where a large expanse of habitat is transformed into a number of smaller patches of smaller total area, isolated from each other by a matrix of habitats unlike the original