Caribbean Compass Yachting Magazine - June 2020

Caribbean Eco-News
Are Hurricanes Affecting Caribbean Evolution?
An article by Joshua Sokol in the April 27th edition
of The New York Times reported that a new
study of lizards in Caribbean countries struck by
hurricanes suggests that cataclysmic weather can
reshape entire species.
COLIN DONIHUE
BRIAN FISHER
Local Knowledge Key in Seabird Conservation
After a year of consultation with local stakeholders,
the non-profit organization Environmental Protection
in the Caribbean (EPIC) has released the “Communitybased
Conservation Management Plan for the Seabirds
of the Transboundary Grenadines Archipelago” — a
major milestone for breeding seabirds throughout the
entire Caribbean.
“The Grenadines harbor regionally and globally
significant numbers of nesting seabirds yet face
many threats which must be addressed to stop
declines in their populations,” noted lead author
Juliana Coffey. Seabirds are the only type of animal
to rely on water, land, and sea for survival, meaning
they are impacted by a broad array of human activities.
These impacts are further magnified when they
migrate across different lands and borders with varying
laws and practices.
—Continued on next page
Lizards with larger toe pads seem to be more common
in areas that have been hit by numerous storms.
june 2020 CARIBBEAN COMPAss pAGE 8
Sokol reports that two years ago, Colin Donihue, a
biologist, released a study along with a series of videos.
The videos showed Caribbean anole lizards flailing
in the wind from a leaf blower, holding on to a stick for
dear life. No anoles were harmed. But by proving how
a lizard would try to survive hurricane-force winds
with sheer grip strength, those experiments led Dr.
Donihue, now at Washington University in St. Louis,
and a team of other researchers to a profound suggestion:
Extreme weather events may bend the evolutionary
course of hundreds of species.
A paper published in the Proceedings of the National
Academy of Sciences offers deeper evidence of their
earlier findings. Across Central and South America
and the Caribbean islands, scientists found that lizards
with larger toe pads seem to be more common in
areas that have been hit by numerous storms in the
last 70 years. That suggests that severe but fleeting
cataclysms don’t just leave lasting scars on people and
places, they also reshape entire species.
Read the full story at
www.nytimes.com/2020/04/27/
science/lizards-hurricanes-toes.html
A Red Footed Booby and chick in the Grenadines.