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Are Rare Plant Species "falling through the cracks" of Conservation Strategies Based on Community?
Conference paper

Are Rare Plant Species "falling through the cracks" of Conservation Strategies Based on Community?

Michael A Powell, Arnon Accad, M P Austin, S L Choy, K J Williams and Alison Shapcott
2008 Society for Conservation Biology Annual Meeting: Abstracts, pp.150-151
Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) Annual Meeting, 2008 (Chattanooga, United States, 13-Jul-2008–18-Jul-2008)
Society for Conservation Biology
2008
url
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Abstract

Plant Biology rare species rare plants conservation
Land Managers are increasingly implementing vegetation conservation at the biological community level. This approach may be inadequate for conservation of rare species where community association is weak or where the distribution of species is patchy or restricted relative to the extent of the community or communities it occupies. Moreover ecological theory predicts that species act individualistically, and global warming may change the strength of any community association. We identified vegetation community associations for three rare and threatened mid-stratum trees endemic to subtropical rainforests in southeast Queensland, Australia: Macadamia integrifolia, M. ternifolia and Triunia robusta, and developed statistical models with spatial predictions of potential habitat for them. All three species were found to occupy relatively small subsections of the geographic distribution of a range of vegetation communities, several of which are low conservation status. A small area of common predicted potential habitat was identified within an area now largely cleared. The remnant vegetation community dominant within this area has low conservation status due to presence of a large area of the same community several hundred kilometres to the south, outside the range of the three species. This study highlights the potential deficiencies of community-based approaches for conservation of rare species, and presents a complementary approach subject to availability of sufficient data.

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