Journal article
A global synthesis of plant extinction rates in urban areas
AK Hahs, MJ McDonnell, MA McCarthy, PA Vesk, RT Corlett, BA Norton, SE Clemants, RP Duncan, K Thompson, MW Schwartz, NSG Williams
Ecology Letters | WILEY-BLACKWELL PUBLISHING, INC | Published : 2009
Abstract
Plant extinctions from urban areas are a growing threat to biodiversity worldwide. To minimize this threat, it is critical to understand what factors are influencing plant extinction rates. We compiled plant extinction rate data for 22 cities around the world. Two-thirds of the variation in plant extinction rates was explained by a combination of the city's historical development and the current proportion of native vegetation, with the former explaining the greatest variability. As a single variable, the amount of native vegetation remaining also influenced extinction rates, particularly in cities > 200 years old. Our study demonstrates that the legacies of landscape transformations by agra..
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Funding Acknowledgements
This research could not have been completed without the assistance of several people. In particular we would like to thank Richard Boon, Errol Douwes, Catherine Tait, Alexei Sal'nikov, Robert Bertin, Zdenka Chocholouskova, and Trudie Marceau, who provided very helpful additional information via email. Maria Ignatieva's assistance with English-Russian translations is greatly appreciated. Rowan Ewing, Chrissy Czembor and Laura Shirley provided assistance in undertaking GIS analysis for previous incarnations of this project, and Julia Stammers helped in compiling some of the additional information. This manuscript was improved by comments from Phil Moors, Andrew Hamer, Helen Regan, David Keith and two anonymous referees. This working group was funded by the ARC-NZ Research Network for Vegetation Function. Additional funding and support were also provided by The Baker Foundation, the Australian Research Centre for Urban Ecology, and The School of Botany and Melbourne School of Land and Environment at The University of Melbourne. We would like to dedicate this paper to our colleague Steven Clemants, whose intellectual contributions to our working group, and botanical research in general, will be greatly missed.