Editor's Summary
15 February 2007
Staying power
Areas of high species richness, particularly those with high numbers of species unique to that area, seem obvious candidates for conservation action. But this takes little account of the evolutionary potential of the plants and animals within that ecosystem. With the likelihood of rapid global change high, the conservation of evolutionary processes is increasingly recognized as a priority. Now a detailed analysis of the well known hotspot of flora biodiversity in the Cape in South Africa has come up with a thought-provoking result: the more species-rich western part of the Cape has lower evolutionary potential than the more neglected eastern part. The eastern area boasts fewer species than the west, but has greater phylogenetic diversity — an index of biodiversity that measures the length of evolutionary pathways that connect a given set of species. This finding has important consequences for conservation planning.
News and Views: Conservation biology: The diversity of biodiversity
Species richness is not the same as evolutionary richness. So which is the better measure for setting conservation priorities? The flora of the Cape of South Africa provides a test for that pressing question.
Arne Ø. Mooers
doi:10.1038/445717a
Letter: Preserving the evolutionary potential of floras in biodiversity hotspots
Félix Forest,
Richard Grenyer,
Mathieu Rouget,
T. Jonathan Davies,
Richard M. Cowling,
Daniel P. Faith,
Andrew Balmford,
John C. Manning,
erban Proche
,
Michelle van der Bank,
Gail Reeves,
Terry A. J. Hedderson
and
Vincent Savolainen
doi:10.1038/nature05587
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