Summary: Vocab

Chapter 10 Vocab: * Biota: The sum total of all livings organism. The term usually is applied to the setting of natural ecosystems. * Biological wealth: The life-sustaining combination of commercial, scientific, and aesthetic values imparted to a region by its biota. * Biodiversity: The diversity of the living things found in the natural world. The concept usually refers to the different species, but also includes ecosystems and the genetic diversity within a given species. * Instrumental value: The value that living organisms has or species have in virtue of their benefits to people; the degree to which they benefit humans. * Intrinsic value: The value that living organisms or species have in their own rights, in other
words, organisms and species do not have to be useful to have value. * Lacey Act: Passed in 1900, the first national act that gave protection to wildlife by forbidding interstate commerce in illegally killed animals. * Ecotourism: The enterprises involved in promoting tourism of unusual or interesting ecological sites. * Endangered species Act: The federal legislation that mandates the protection of species and their habitats which are determined to be in danger of extinction. * Endangered species: A species whose total population is declining to relatively low levels such that, if the trend continues, the species will likely become extinct. * Threatened species: Species whose population is declining precipitously because of direct or indirect human impacts. * Convention of Biological Diversity: The biodiversity treaty signed by 158 nations at the Earth summit Rio de janeiro in 1992 calling for various actions and cooperative steps betweens nations to protect the world’s biodiversity. * Northwest Forest Plan.

Chapter 10 Review Questions: 1. The biota and the ecosystems they form represent wealth; biological wealth comprises most of the ecosystem capital that sustains human life and economic activity with goods and services. From this perspective, the biota found in each country represents a major component of the country’s wealth. Humans have always depended upon Earth’s biological wealth for food and materials, and as animals, we have always exploited wild species for food. 2. There are two kinds of value: instrumental and intrinsic. Instrumental value is anthropocentric and can be categorized into three areas. These areas are sources for agriculture, forestry, aquaculture, and animal husbandry, sources for medicines, and recreational, aesthetic, and scientific value. Instrumental value means that a species has a specific function for humans. Something has intrinsic value when it has value for its own sake; that is, it does not have to be useful to use to possess value. 3. The four categories into which the human valuing are divided are: * Value as sources for agriculture, forestry, aquaculture, and animal husbandry.
For example pest control, natural enemies, genes for increasing resistance, loss of new cultivars. * Value as sources for medicines and pharmaceuticals; for example vincristine from the rosy periwinkle to treat childhood leukemia. * Recreational, Aesthetic and Scientific Value, for example sport fishing and hunting to hiking, camping, bird-watching, photography. * Intrinsic Value. For example, many hunters kill deer for its profitable values.

4. Game animals are preserved by using hunting quotas; hunting and trapping fees; monitoring of game populations with adjustments of quotas; excise tax on hunting, fishing, shooting, and boating equipment; and establishment of game preserves, parks, and other areas where hunting and fishing are prohibited. One of the problems that have emerged from the adaptations of game species to the humanized environment is that the number of animals killed on roadways now far exceeds the number killed by
hunters. 5. In 1900 Congress passed the Lacey Act forbidding interstate commerce in illegally killed wildlife, making it more difficult for hunters to sell their kills. Since then, numerous wildlife refuges have been established to protect the birds’ breeding habitats. Under the act, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) can bring federal charges against anyone violating a number of wildlife laws. 6.
The Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA) provides protection to endangered and threatened species. When a species is officially recognized as being either endangered or threatened, the law specifies substantial fines for killing, trapping, uprooting (in the case of plants), modifying significant habitat of, or engaging in commerce in the species or its parts. The legislation forbidding commerce includes wildlife threatened with extinction anywhere in the world. Critical habitats must be targeted for preservation and management to aid the recovery of the species. 7. Hgljjj; 8. Biodiversity is a result of speciation and extinction occurring over time, and the result of these two processes has been the gradual increase in the number of species. No one knows how much biodiversity exists. Estimates range widely and the upper limit estimates keep rising. The current estimates place biodiversity as high as 112 million species, but only 1.75 million species have been described. 9. At least 500 species native to the Unites State are known to have become extinct since the early days of colonization. Over 100 of these are vertebrates. At least 200,000 species of plants, animals, and microbes are estimated to live in the nation, but not much is known about them. At least 726 animals’ species and 20 plant species have become extinct since 1500
globally. 10. Physical alteration of habitat, including habitat conversion, fragmentation, and simplification; human population growth; pollution; introduction of exotic species; and resource overuse cause declines in biodiversity. Natural species are adapted to specific habitats, so if the habitat changes or is eliminated, the species go with it. 11. An invasive species is a species introduced into an area from somewhere else, often a different continent. Occasionally an introduced species finds the new environment very much to its liking and can become an invasive species, thriving, spreading out, and