47.1E: Present-Time Extinctions
- Describe the biodiversity loss during the Holocene extinction
Present-Time Extinctions
The sixth, or Holocene, mass extinction appears to have begun earlier than previously believed and is mostly due to the activities of Homo sapiens . Since the beginning of the Holocene period, there have been numerous recent extinctions of individual species that are recorded in human writings. Most of these coincide with the expansion of the European colonies in the 1500s.
One of the earlier and popularly-known examples of extinction in this period is the dodo bird. The dodo bird lived in the forests of Mauritius, an island in the Indian Ocean, but became extinct around 1662. It was hunted for its meat by sailors as it was easy prey because the dodo, which did not evolve with humans, would approach people without fear. Introduced pigs, rats, and dogs, brought to the island by European ships, also killed dodo young and eggs.
Another example, Steller’s sea cows, became extinct in 1768.The sea cow, first discovered by Europeans in 1741, was hunted for meat and oil. The last of the species was killed in 1768, which amounts to 27 years between the species’ first contact with Europeans and its extinction. In addition, the last living passenger pigeon died in a zoo in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1914. This species was hunted and suffered from habitat loss through the clearing of forests for farmland. Furthermore, in 1918, the last living Carolina parakeet died in captivity. This species, once common in the eastern United States, was a victim of habitat loss and hunting as well. Adding to the extinction list, the Japanese sea lion, which inhabited a broad area around Japan and the coast of Korea, became extinct in the 1950s due to overfishing. The Caribbean monk seal, found in the Caribbean Sea, was driven to extinction through hunting by 1952.
These are only a few of the recorded extinctions in the past 500 years. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) keeps a list of extinct and endangered species called the Red List. The list is not complete, but it describes 380 extinct species of vertebrates after 1500 AD, 86 of which were made extinct by over-hunting or overfishing.
Estimates of Present-Time Extinction Rates
Estimates of extinction rates are hampered by the fact that most extinctions are probably happening without observation since there are many organisms that are of less interest to humans and many that are undescribed.
The background extinction rate is estimated to be about one per million species per year (E/MSY). For example, assuming there are about ten million species in existence, the expectation is that ten species would become extinct each year.
One contemporary extinction rate estimate uses the extinctions in the written record since the year 1500. For birds alone, this method yields an estimate of 26 E/MSY. However, this value may be underestimated for three reasons. First, many species would not have been described until much later in the time period, so their loss would have gone unnoticed. Secondly, the number of recently-extinct species is increasing because extinct species now are being described from skeletal remains. Lastly, some species are probably already extinct even though conservationists are reluctant to name them as such. Taking these factors into account raises the estimated extinction rate closer to 100 E/MSY. The predicted rate by the end of the century is 1500 E/MSY.
A second approach to estimating present-day extinction rates is to correlate species loss with habitat loss by measuring forest-area loss and understanding species-area relationships. The species-area relationship is the rate at which new species are seen when the area surveyed is increased. Studies have shown that the number of species present increases as the size of the island increases. This phenomenon has also been shown to hold true in other habitats as well. Turning this relationship around, if the habitat area is reduced, the number of species living there will also decline. Estimates of extinction rates based on habitat loss and species-area relationships have suggested that with about 90 percent habitat loss an expected 50 percent of species would become extinct. Species-area estimates have led to species extinction rate calculations of about 1000 E/MSY and higher. In general, actual observations do not show this amount of loss, suggesting that there is a delay in extinction. Recent work has also called into question the applicability of the species-area relationship when estimating the loss of species. This work argues that the species-area relationship leads to an overestimate of extinction rates. A better relationship to use may be the endemics-area relationship. Using this method would bring estimates down to around 500 E/MSY in the coming century. Note that this value is still 500 times the background rate.
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Key Points
- The dodo was one of the first-known examples of a species that went extinct (in the 1600s) during the Holocene period.
- Steller’s sea cows, passenger pigeons, Carolina parakeets, Japanese sea lions, and Caribbean monk seals are examples of species that went extinct from the 1700s-1900s.
- Major reasons for species extinctions during the Holocene period are due to overhunting, overfishing, and other human-related activities.
- Extinction rates can be estimated by comparing extinction events since the 1500s, but this method may underestimate the actual extinction rate value.
- Extinction rates can be estimated by observing species-area relationships and correlating species loss with habitat loss; however, this method may lead to overestimation.
Key Terms
- species-area relationship : relationship between area surveyed and number of species encountered; typically measured by incrementally increasing the area of a survey and determining the cumulative numbers of species
- Holocene : of a geologic epoch within the Neogene period from about 11,000 years ago to the present
- extinction rate : number of species becoming extinct over time, sometimes defined as extinctions per million species–years to make numbers manageable (E/MSY)