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      The Loss of Species: Mangrove Extinction Risk and Geographic Areas of Global Concern

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          Abstract

          Mangrove species are uniquely adapted to tropical and subtropical coasts, and although relatively low in number of species, mangrove forests provide at least US $1.6 billion each year in ecosystem services and support coastal livelihoods worldwide. Globally, mangrove areas are declining rapidly as they are cleared for coastal development and aquaculture and logged for timber and fuel production. Little is known about the effects of mangrove area loss on individual mangrove species and local or regional populations. To address this gap, species-specific information on global distribution, population status, life history traits, and major threats were compiled for each of the 70 known species of mangroves. Each species' probability of extinction was assessed under the Categories and Criteria of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Eleven of the 70 mangrove species (16%) are at elevated threat of extinction. Particular areas of geographical concern include the Atlantic and Pacific coasts of Central America, where as many as 40% of mangroves species present are threatened with extinction. Across the globe, mangrove species found primarily in the high intertidal and upstream estuarine zones, which often have specific freshwater requirements and patchy distributions, are the most threatened because they are often the first cleared for development of aquaculture and agriculture. The loss of mangrove species will have devastating economic and environmental consequences for coastal communities, especially in those areas with low mangrove diversity and high mangrove area or species loss. Several species at high risk of extinction may disappear well before the next decade if existing protective measures are not enforced.

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          The status of the world's land and marine mammals: diversity, threat, and knowledge.

          Knowledge of mammalian diversity is still surprisingly disparate, both regionally and taxonomically. Here, we present a comprehensive assessment of the conservation status and distribution of the world's mammals. Data, compiled by 1700+ experts, cover all 5487 species, including marine mammals. Global macroecological patterns are very different for land and marine species but suggest common mechanisms driving diversity and endemism across systems. Compared with land species, threat levels are higher among marine mammals, driven by different processes (accidental mortality and pollution, rather than habitat loss), and are spatially distinct (peaking in northern oceans, rather than in Southeast Asia). Marine mammals are also disproportionately poorly known. These data are made freely available to support further scientific developments and conservation action.
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            Mangroves enhance the biomass of coral reef fish communities in the Caribbean.

            Mangrove forests are one of the world's most threatened tropical ecosystems with global loss exceeding 35% (ref. 1). Juvenile coral reef fish often inhabit mangroves, but the importance of these nurseries to reef fish population dynamics has not been quantified. Indeed, mangroves might be expected to have negligible influence on reef fish communities: juvenile fish can inhabit alternative habitats and fish populations may be regulated by other limiting factors such as larval supply or fishing. Here we show that mangroves are unexpectedly important, serving as an intermediate nursery habitat that may increase the survivorship of young fish. Mangroves in the Caribbean strongly influence the community structure of fish on neighbouring coral reefs. In addition, the biomass of several commercially important species is more than doubled when adult habitat is connected to mangroves. The largest herbivorous fish in the Atlantic, Scarus guacamaia, has a functional dependency on mangroves and has suffered local extinction after mangrove removal. Current rates of mangrove deforestation are likely to have severe deleterious consequences for the ecosystem function, fisheries productivity and resilience of reefs. Conservation efforts should protect connected corridors of mangroves, seagrass beds and coral reefs.
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              Coastal ecosystem-based management with nonlinear ecological functions and values.

              A common assumption is that ecosystem services respond linearly to changes in habitat size. This assumption leads frequently to an "all or none" choice of either preserving coastal habitats or converting them to human use. However, our survey of wave attenuation data from field studies of mangroves, salt marshes, seagrass beds, nearshore coral reefs, and sand dunes reveals that these relationships are rarely linear. By incorporating nonlinear wave attenuation in estimating coastal protection values of mangroves in Thailand, we show that the optimal land use option may instead be the integration of development and conservation consistent with ecosystem-based management goals. This result suggests that reconciling competing demands on coastal habitats should not always result in stark preservation-versus-conversion choices.
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                Author and article information

                Contributors
                Role: Editor
                Journal
                PLoS One
                plos
                plosone
                PLoS ONE
                Public Library of Science (San Francisco, USA )
                1932-6203
                2010
                8 April 2010
                : 5
                : 4
                : e10095
                Affiliations
                [1 ]IUCN Species Programme/SSC/Conservation International Global Marine Species Assessment, Biological Sciences, Old Dominion University, Norfolk, Virginia, United States of America
                [2 ]Center for Global Trends, The Nature Conservancy, Arlington, Virginia, United States of America
                [3 ]School of Biological Sciences, University of Plymouth, Plymouth, United Kingdom
                [4 ]Centre for Marine Studies, University of Queensland, St. Lucia, Queensland, Australia
                [5 ]Harvard Forest, Harvard University, Petersham, Massachusetts, United States of America
                [6 ]School of Geography and Environmental Studies, University of Tasmania, Launceston, Tasmania, Australia
                [7 ]New England Wild Flower Society, Framingham, Massachusetts, United States of America
                [8 ]Department of Forest Biological Sciences, University of the Philippines Los Baños College, Laguna, Philippines
                [9 ]Centre of Advanced Study in Marine Biology, Annamalai University, Parangipettai, India
                [10 ]Faculty of Sciences and Bioengineering Sciences, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium
                [11 ]Faculty of Liberal Art, Department of Regional Management, Tohoku-Gakuin University, Sendai, Japan
                [12 ]Department of Biological Sciences and Jackson Estuarine Laboratory, University of New Hampshire, Durham, New Hampshire, United States of America
                [13 ]Faculty of Forestry, Nong Lam University, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
                [14 ]Centre for Marine and Coastal Studies, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia
                [15 ]Aquaculture Department, Southeast Asian Fisheries Development Center, Tigbauan, Iloilo, Philippines
                [16 ]College of Agriculture, Central Luzon State University, Science City of Munoz, Nueva Ecija, Philippines
                [17 ]Center for Oceanological Research and Development, Indonesian Institute of Sciences, Jakarta, Indonesia
                [18 ]College of Ocean, Shandong University, Weihai, China
                [19 ]Natural Sciences and Science Education Academic Group, National Institute of Education, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore, Singapore
                Stanford University, United States of America
                Author notes

                Conceived and designed the experiments: BP KEC SRL. Performed the experiments: BP KEC NCD AME JCE EF ESF KK NK SRL TM GEM VNN JEO JHP SGSI JS SS YW JWHY. Analyzed the data: BP LC JS. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: LC NCD AME JCE EF ESF KK NK TM GEM VNN JEO JHP SGSI SS YW JWHY. Wrote the paper: BP.

                Article
                09-PONE-RA-13536R1
                10.1371/journal.pone.0010095
                2851656
                20386710
                85f1cbc5-80f4-4594-b235-8eea3252616b
                Polidoro et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
                History
                : 7 October 2009
                : 16 March 2010
                Page count
                Pages: 10
                Categories
                Research Article
                Ecology/Community Ecology and Biodiversity
                Ecology/Conservation and Restoration Ecology
                Ecology/Marine and Freshwater Ecology
                Ecology/Plant-Environment Interactions
                Marine and Aquatic Sciences/Conservation Science

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                Uncategorized

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