What is Biodiversity?
Our planet's diverse thriving ecosystems may seem like permanent fixtures, but they're actually vulnerable to collapse. Jungles can become deserts, and reefs can become lifeless rocks, even without cataclysmic events, like volcanoes and asteroids. What makes one ecosystem strong and another weak in the face of change? The answer, to a large extent,is biodiversity. Biodiversity is built out of three intertwined features: ecosystem diversity, species diversity, and genetic diversity. The more intertwining there is between these features, the denser and more resilient the weave becomes. Take the Amazon rain forest, one of the most bio diverse regions on Earth due to its complex ecosystems, huge mix of species, and the genetic variety within those species.
Why it is important?
Here are tangled liana vines, which crawl up from the forest floor to the canopy, intertwining with treetops and growing thick wooden stems that support these towering trees. Helped along by the vines, trees provide the seeds, fruits and leaves to herbivores, such as the tapir and the agouti, which disperse their seeds throughout the forest so they can grow. Leftovers are consumed by the millions of insects that decompose and recycle nutrients to create rich soil. The rain forest is a huge system filled with many smaller systems, like this, each packed with interconnected species. Every link provides stability to the next, strengthening biodiversity's weave. That weave is further reinforced by the genetic diversity within individual species, which allows them to cope with changes. Species that lack genetic diversity due to isolation or low population numbers, are much more vulnerable to fluctuations caused by climate change, disease or habitat fragmentation. Whenever a species disappears because of its weakened gene pool, a knot is untied and parts of the net disintegrate. So, what if we were to remove one species from the rain forest? Would the system fall apart? Probably not. The volume of species, their genetic diversity, and the complexity of the ecosystems form such rich biodiversity in this forest that one species gap in the weave won't cause it to unravel. The forest can stay resilien and recover from change. But that's not true in every case. In some environments, taking away just one important component can undermine the entire system. Take coral reefs, for instance. Many organisms in a reef are dependent on the coral. It provides key micro habitats,shelter and breeding grounds for thousand of species of fish,crustaceans and mollusks. Corals also form interdependent relationships with fungi and bacteria. The coral itself is a loom that allows the tangled net of biodiversity to be woven. That makes coral a keystone organism, one that many others depend on for their suvival. So what happens when destructive fishing practices, pollution and ocean acidification weaken coral or even kill it altogether? Exactly what you might think. The loss of this keystone species leaves its dependents at a loss, too, threatening the entire fabric of the reef. Ecosystem, species and genetic diversity together form the complex tangled weave of biodiversity that is vital for the survival of organisms on Earth. We humans are woven
into this biodiversity, too. When just a few strands are lost, our own well-being is threatened. Cut too many links,and we risk unraveling it all. What the future brings is unpredictable, but biodiversity can give us an insurance policy, Earth's own safety net to safeguard our survival.
Loss of biodiversity
Biodiversity is a key concept in ecology and has importance on both local and global scales biodiversity is the degree of variation of life or put it more simply the number of different individuals and life-forms in an area scientists usually measure biodiversity for either genetic species or ecosystem levels for example if you wanted to measure the biodiversity of beetles on a global scale you would find there over 350,000 known species of beetle on the planet however if you want to measure the biodiversity of beetles locally you might find only up to 10 not 20 species the reason for this difference is that biodiversity varies greatly with the location habitats and species being surveyed in general terms biodiversity tends to be highest at the equator and decreases at higher latitudes as you get further away from the equator knowing this information where would you expect to find the habitats with the lowest biodiversity pause the video and have a think habitats at the equator such as tropical rain forests usually have the highest biodiversity so if you thought habitats at the north or south poles such as the polar desert you're correct it's important to know that biodiversity is not a static measure but is responsive to numerous factors including climate change in fact global biodiversity is generally thought to bedeclining right now biodiversity has declined in the past and the total offive major extinction events have occurred currently we are in the planets sixth major extinction event known as the Holocene extinction there are many proposed reasons for the current drop in biodiversity some of those reasons are anthropogenic meaning caused by humans anthropogenic factors include things like introduced or invasive species such as the introduction of rabbits to Australia human induced hybridization such as in plants to create optimal species of crop over harvesting of resources and global climate change caused by human activities while humans aren't responsible for all of the current extinction events there is good evidence to suggest that humans are affecting the world on a global scale and causing the loss of many important species the loss of biodiversity could have catastrophic effects on our society and even result in the loss of our food crops for example bees are in huge decline and they are extremely important in the pollination of many plants including our crops there are lots of ways we can reduce biodiversity loss and even increase biodiversity such as managing our land better growing more than one crop and including plants that encouraged insect diversity and also creating cities with space for other species we shouldn't just focus on the rural areas urban places can do their bit by increasing the local biodiversity we can help the environment to sustain itself and give it a better chance for standing the effect of global climate change a healthy and diverse ecosystem can withstand and recover from disasters biodiversity is an important topic that affects us all as a global community we need to take action to protect our biodiversity on both local and global levels.
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