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T HERE ARE SUCCESS STORIES IN NEW YORK, WHERE THE STATE BIRD, THE EASTERN BLUEBIRD, HAS MADE QUITE A COMEBACK MOSTLY DUE TO CITIZENS PLACING AND MANAGING NEST BOXES IN SUITABLE HABITATS. THESE BOXES ALLOW BLUEBIRDS TO BETTER COMPETE WITH INTRO- DUCED SPECIES LIKE THE HOUSE SPARROW AND THE EUROPEAN STARLING. B i o l o g i c a l 30 D i v e r s i t y
Systematics, or taxonomy, is at the base of biodiversity studies for the simple reason that if species cannot be identified they cannot be studied or marked for preservation. Systematics creates two key products, monographs and inventories. Monographs are complete classifications of particular groups of organisms for some larger part of the world, such as the ferns of tropical America or the Danaid butterflies of the world. The ideal monograph describes the species in the group, presents the available information on their distribution and natural history and interprets their evolutionary history. When appropriate monographs are available, inventories can be conducted of particular sites, including the hot spots of greatest interest in conservation. Typical inventories might include lists of the ferns, butterflies, or ideally all the species found in a rainforest on Cape <strong>York</strong> or the Chocó region of Colombia. The urgency in the need for systematics research comes from the fact that few appropriate monographs actually exist, forestalling inventories of any but a small number of relatively well-known groups such as flowering plants and birds and other vertebrates. As I noted earlier, the vast majority of species of invertebrates, fungi and microorganisms have not even been discovered, let alone described. There is a great need to promote monographic work on selected groups that are so different from flowering plants and vertebrates in their biology as to occupy unique places in the ecosystem and require special techniques in conservation. For adventurous scientists, these other groups await exploration in the field in the same way that elephants, gorillas and rhododendrons awaited exploration in the last century. Organismic biology moves us one level of organization down from systematics, rather than up. It comprises the physiology, genetics and life cycle studies of individual organisms. Once species have been distinguished taxonomically, those of most importance can be determined on the basis of whether they are keystone species, or close to extinction, or of potential economic importance, or offer extraordinary new biological phenomena for scrutiny. Detailed analysis can assess their status and role in the ecosystem. The next logical link in the chain is population biology, moving us back to the level of the species. Here we study the traits of whole populations, species by species, including the detailed distribution of each (selected) population, its fluctuation in size through time and hence its susceptibility to local extinction, and its internal genetic diversity—also important as a factor in potential extinction. B i o l o g i c a l 31 D i v e r s i t y
Page 1: Biological Diversity: T H E O L D E
Page 4 and 5: THE UNIVERSITY OF THE STATE OF NEW
Page 6 and 7: Copyright © 1999 by The New York S
Page 9 and 10: Preface This book is based on a man
Page 11 and 12: Additional information on the activ
Page 13 and 14: Biological Diversity: T H E O L D E
Page 15 and 16: some degree of potency. A much high
Page 17 and 18: Some groups of organisms, such as f
Page 19 and 20: to their environment and to one ano
Page 21 and 22: N EW YORK’S BIODIVERSITY IS THREA
Page 23 and 24: 12 10 Number of Butterflies Observe
Page 25 and 26: It is possible that the next hundre
Page 27 and 28: environment. For almost 3 billion y
Page 29 and 30: W ITH ITS WISPINESS AND LIGHT-AND-D
Page 31 and 32: sophisticated microscopic and bioch
Page 33 and 34: The tropical zones generally have a
Page 35 and 36: average as well as greater ecologic
Page 37 and 38: early extinction within the next 30
Page 39 and 40: perished. As the paleontologist Dav
Page 41: collected in the stream in 1936 and
Page 45 and 46: Community ecology addresses the man
Page 47 and 48: Biological field stations from four
Page 49 and 50: Biogeography 1 The scientific study
Page 51 and 52: Dispersal In biology, the way a spe
Page 53 and 54: Global warming An increase in the c
Page 55 and 56: Ozone A form of oxygen (O 3 ) that
Page 57 and 58: Termites A group of insects that is
Page 59 and 60: Grifo, Francesca, and J. Rosenthal
Page 61 and 62: diverse and why the threat to that
Page 63 and 64: Mitchell, Richard S., L. Danaher, a
Page 65 and 66: 9. Is an ecologist the same as a ta
Page 67 and 68: 31. Do you know of a biological res
Page 69 and 70: B i o l o g i c a l 57 D i v e r s
Page 72: THE NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM IS A PROG

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