Every year, many species considered disappeared are rediscovered. Yet, do these rediscoveries signify the return of ‘viable populations or the delayed extinction of doomed species’?
With rampant degradation and habitat loss, research is vital for conservation and residual biological diversity and is often undertaken to rediscover species believed to be extinct. A study undertaken on the number, distribution and conservation status of rediscovered bird, amphibian and mammal species worldwide is outlined in ‘The World’s Rediscovered Species: Back from the Brink?’. Occurring mostly in the tropics, at least 351 species, which on average were missing for 61 years before being rediscovered, have been rediscovered over the past 122 years.
There are many negative synergies – as outlined by Professors Barry Brook and Corey Bradshaw, from the Environment Institute, University of Adelaide, in ‘Synergies among extinction drivers under global change‘ – which drive the loss of species, with many of the critically threatened species that have been rediscovered remaining on the brink of oblivion.
Read more from the study here.
As humanity continues to deplete the earth’s biological wealth, we must consider what we have, what we have lost, and what we thought we had lost.