Title of Page:Biodiversity Theme:Biodiversity and Biological Corridors
Workshops
What is biodiversity, why is it important to protect? Why does Costa Rica have such a high biodiversity percentage?
Biodiversity is the total number of species we can find in a specific location. It is important to protect biodiversity because it is a fundamental of nature that balances the ecosystems. Also, biodiversity performs a number of ecological services to humans that have economic, aesthetic or recreational value. For more information on biodiversity Click Here!.
Costa Rica is one of the 20 countries with the highest amount of biodiversity in the world these days. Costa Rica has a greater amount of biodiversity than many places like Europe and North America. It has such a high biodiversity percentage because of several reasons. It is located between the tropic of cancer and the tropic of capricorn. This is also because of the different geographical structures such as mountains, valleys, plains, etc. There exists also a great variety of microclimate which have different temperatures. Its biogeography helps a lot too. We are located in the middle of the continent, connecting two large land masses which makes us a biological bridge for many species of animals that want to migrate from one place to another. This high amount of biodiversity brings Costa Rica many positive incomes like tourism from people of all around the world.
On the Monteverde field trip, we had a workshop in which we learned a lot of things. We learned about biodiversity in Costa Rica, why there is so many biodiversity, biodiversity in Monteverde, its importance, and how to measure it. We can measure biodiversity with three indexes: Species Richness (S), Simpson's Index, and
. If you click on the links before, you will be able to learn how they work and how to calculate them.
Biodiversity Indexes From our Trip:
Pictures of our Trip:
What is the purpose of establishing biological corridors?
A biological corridor is an area where the main goal is to connect the patches of forest. For a more complete definition of biological corridors: Click Here.The purpose of this is that species may migrate easily from place to place without getting injured or damaged. Also to connect habitats that were separated because of natural or human causes and to unite them into a big one to conserve it. Biological corridors can be any where and can be made by anyone at any time. This helps a lot to species who are endangered so they can travel from one place to another so they can reproduce.
Costa Rica is part of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor which is a project in which people want to connect all the main patches of forest from north of Mexico to Panama. This are the countries involved: Mexico, Costa Rica, Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama. They also want to connect all the National Parks.
Monteverde's Biological Corridor is named the Three-wattled Bellbird Biological Corridor. This corridor extends from Monteverde to the Gulf of Nicoya. This allows the migration of native species of the area that are in danger of extinction. An example of these species is the bellbird.
In our trip, we learned all the basics we needed to understand the purposes and uses of biological corridors. If you want to look at the presentation made by a UGA Costa Rica Faculty Member to make us learn about this subject Click Here.
There are many threats to biodiversity. Most are mainly because of human beings. Over-hunting has been a significant cause of the extinction of hundreds of species and the endangerment of many more. People start hunting legally or illegally animals which makes its population decrease noticeably until many species become endangered and even many of them get extinct. All species have specific food and habitat needs. Habitat loss, degradation, and fragmentation is an important cause. Humans use land for agricultural land, livestock, roads and cities. In the future, the only species that survive are likely to be those whose habitats are highly protected. Pollution from chemicals is a great threat to species and ecosystems. The placing or introduction of species that are not native of a place, may cause a lack of balance in the environment because all the food chains and food webs are altered.
How can endangered species benefit from biological corridors? Give a real life example: an endangered species and the type of biological corridor (s) it benefits from.
Endangered species benefit from biological corridors for several reasons. They have a way to move from one place to another to find a mate so it can reproduce. Also because it is a place where they can get food and shelter. Their habitat may becomes protected and in some way expanded. An example of an endangered specie is the Bell Bird. It benefits from the Three-Wattled Bell Bird Biological Corridor. One of the benefits it gets is that it covers or has some important altitudinal migratory routs protected. This helps them migrate easily from place to place, to get food and shelter, and to find mates to reproduce with.
Bell Bird
What are the main consequences of ecosystem change for human beings? How do changes in ecosystems affect human well being?
Human beings are highly dependable on ecosystems. They provide us mainly with food and water. But unfortunately, over the past years, humans have been highly damaging it without knowing the consequences that will bring to them. There are several ecosystem services that are provided to humans by nature. This includes provisioning services, regulating services, cultural services, and supporting services. Provisioning services means that ecosystems provides us with food, water, timber, fiber, and genetic resources. Regulating Services include the regulation of climate, floods, disease, and water quality. Cultural Services such as recreational, aesthetic, and spiritual beliefs. Supporting services are those such as soil formation, pollination, and nutrient cycling. Without all of these services done by nature for us, we wouldn't be able to handle the world. All the ecosystems would become unbalanced and a disaster. We should take care of all of our natural resources because without them, we are completely lost. Human use of all ecosystem services is growing quickly. Because of this, approximately60% (15 out of 24) of the ecosystem services evaluated are being degraded unsustainably.
If humans continue polluting the world and over using resources, soon we will have nothing left; food, water, and different habitats will disappear if we don't use sustainably the resources we have on Earth. More floods, droughts, new diseases, and climate change will happen. We are now a days over populating this world and over using the resources. This will not bring us any benefit, instead, it will bring us disadvantages and problems.
Want to know how biodiversity loss affects me and everyone else? Click Here!
Consequences of Ecosystem Change for Human Well-being
Relationships between Biodiversity, Ecosystem functioning, and Ecosystem services.
Interdisciplinary Questions
How is biodiversity crucial to human wellbeing, sustainable development and poverty reduction?
Biodiversity is crucial to human well beings because humans clearly benefit from it. We use several animals and plants for medicines, food, fibers, other renewable resources, security, health, good social relations, and freedom of choice and action. Also, biodiversity affects the access to water and without it, humans can't survive since we are mainly made up of water.
Biodiversity Is Both a Response Variable Affected by Global Change Drivers and a Factor That Affects Human Well-Being
Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Biodiversity is crucial to sustainable development since it offers opportunities for poverty reduction, human well-being, integrity of people, and in particular, in developing countries which are rich in biodiversity but are poor and struggling to catch up with others. Also biodiversity provides goods and services that help sustainable development in many important ways.
Biodiversity is crucial to the reduction of poverty, due to the goods and services it provides people. Food, fiber, medicine, soil formation, air quality, and climate regulation are some of the services that help. 70% of the world's poor live inrural areas depend directly on biodiversity for food and it gives a great income to rural house holds. The impact on biodiversity affects and is more severe in this people since they have very few options to survive and to produce income among them.
Videos
Biodiversity Informative Video:
Biodiversity Video:
Breathe In, Breathe Out 90 seconds
San Luis Valley, Monte Verde
UGA Campus with a Rainbow
Prezi
A prezi made by some students associating biological corridors with the Monteverde knowledge for the social studies class. Click below to go to it.
"The Equator, Hemispheres, Tropic of Cancer, and Tropic of Capricorn - Geography." Geography Home Page - Geography at About.com. About.com.geography, 16 Apr. 1999. Web. 11 May 2011. http://geography.about.com/library/misc/blequator.htm
Table of Contents
Title of Page: Biodiversity
Theme: Biodiversity and Biological Corridors
Workshops
What is biodiversity, why is it important to protect? Why does Costa Rica have such a high biodiversity percentage?
Biodiversity is the total number of species we can find in a specific location. It is important to protect biodiversity because it is a fundamental of nature that balances the ecosystems. Also, biodiversity performs a number of ecological services to humans that have economic, aesthetic or recreational value. For more information on biodiversity Click Here!.
Costa Rica is one of the 20 countries with the highest amount of biodiversity in the world these days. Costa Rica has a greater amount of biodiversity than many places like Europe and North America. It has such a high biodiversity percentage because of several reasons. It is located between the tropic of cancer and the tropic of capricorn. This is also because of the different geographical structures such as mountains, valleys, plains, etc. There exists also a great variety of microclimate which have different temperatures. Its biogeography helps a lot too. We are located in the middle of the continent, connecting two large land masses which makes us a biological bridge for many species of animals that want to migrate from one place to another. This high amount of biodiversity brings Costa Rica many positive incomes like tourism from people of all around the world.
On the Monteverde field trip, we had a workshop in which we learned a lot of things. We learned about biodiversity in Costa Rica, why there is so many biodiversity, biodiversity in Monteverde, its importance, and how to measure it. We can measure biodiversity with three indexes: Species Richness (S), Simpson's Index, and
Biodiversity Indexes From our Trip:
Pictures of our Trip:
What is the purpose of establishing biological corridors?
A biological corridor is an area where the main goal is to connect the patches of forest. For a more complete definition of biological corridors: Click Here.The purpose of this is that species may migrate easily from place to place without getting injured or damaged. Also to connect habitats that were separated because of natural or human causes and to unite them into a big one to conserve it. Biological corridors can be any where and can be made by anyone at any time. This helps a lot to species who are endangered so they can travel from one place to another so they can reproduce.
Costa Rica is part of the Mesoamerican Biological Corridor which is a project in which people want to connect all the main patches of forest from north of Mexico to Panama. This are the countries involved: Mexico, Costa Rica, Belize, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama. They also want to connect all the National Parks.
Monteverde's Biological Corridor is named the Three-wattled Bellbird Biological Corridor. This corridor extends from Monteverde to the Gulf of Nicoya. This allows the migration of native species of the area that are in danger of extinction. An example of these species is the bellbird.
In our trip, we learned all the basics we needed to understand the purposes and uses of biological corridors. If you want to look at the presentation made by a UGA Costa Rica Faculty Member to make us learn about this subject Click Here.
If you are interested in more information:
Principles of Wildlife Corridors Design
Related Topics
What are the main threats to biodiversity?
There are many threats to biodiversity. Most are mainly because of human beings. Over-hunting has been a significant cause of the extinction of hundreds of species and the endangerment of many more. People start hunting legally or illegally animals which makes its population decrease noticeably until many species become endangered and even many of them get extinct. All species have specific food and habitat needs. Habitat loss, degradation, and fragmentation is an important cause. Humans use land for agricultural land, livestock, roads and cities. In the future, the only species that survive are likely to be those whose habitats are highly protected. Pollution from chemicals is a great threat to species and ecosystems. The placing or introduction of species that are not native of a place, may cause a lack of balance in the environment because all the food chains and food webs are altered.
Are you interested in this topic? Click Here to see how many species we are loosing.
How can endangered species benefit from biological corridors? Give a real life example: an endangered species and the type of biological corridor (s) it benefits from.
Endangered species benefit from biological corridors for several reasons. They have a way to move from one place to another to find a mate so it can reproduce. Also because it is a place where they can get food and shelter. Their habitat may becomes protected and in some way expanded. An example of an endangered specie is the Bell Bird. It benefits from the Three-Wattled Bell Bird Biological Corridor. One of the benefits it gets is that it covers or has some important altitudinal migratory routs protected. This helps them migrate easily from place to place, to get food and shelter, and to find mates to reproduce with.
What are the main consequences of ecosystem change for human beings? How do changes in ecosystems affect human well being?
Human beings are highly dependable on ecosystems. They provide us mainly with food and water. But unfortunately, over the past years, humans have been highly damaging it without knowing the consequences that will bring to them. There are several ecosystem services that are provided to humans by nature. This includes provisioning services, regulating services, cultural services, and supporting services. Provisioning services means that ecosystems provides us with food, water, timber, fiber, and genetic resources. Regulating Services include the regulation of climate, floods, disease, and water quality. Cultural Services such as recreational, aesthetic, and spiritual beliefs. Supporting services are those such as soil formation, pollination, and nutrient cycling. Without all of these services done by nature for us, we wouldn't be able to handle the world. All the ecosystems would become unbalanced and a disaster. We should take care of all of our natural resources because without them, we are completely lost. Human use of all ecosystem services is growing quickly. Because of this, approximately 60% (15 out of 24) of the ecosystem services evaluated are being degraded unsustainably.
If humans continue polluting the world and over using resources, soon we will have nothing left; food, water, and different habitats will disappear if we don't use sustainably the resources we have on Earth. More floods, droughts, new diseases, and climate change will happen. We are now a days over populating this world and over using the resources. This will not bring us any benefit, instead, it will bring us disadvantages and problems.
Want to know how biodiversity loss affects me and everyone else? Click Here!
Interdisciplinary Questions
How is biodiversity crucial to human wellbeing, sustainable development and poverty reduction?
Biodiversity is crucial to human well beings because humans clearly benefit from it. We use several animals and plants for medicines, food, fibers, other renewable resources, security, health, good social relations, and freedom of choice and action. Also, biodiversity affects the access to water and without it, humans can't survive since we are mainly made up of water.
Biodiversity is crucial to the reduction of poverty, due to the goods and services it provides people. Food, fiber, medicine, soil formation, air quality, and climate regulation are some of the services that help. 70% of the world's poor live inrural areas depend directly on biodiversity for food and it gives a great income to rural house holds. The impact on biodiversity affects and is more severe in this people since they have very few options to survive and to produce income among them.
Videos
Biodiversity Informative Video:
Biodiversity Video:
Breathe In, Breathe Out 90 seconds
Prezi
A prezi made by some students associating biological corridors with the Monteverde knowledge for the social studies class. Click below to go to it.
Monteverde Prezi
Bibliography
"The Equator, Hemispheres, Tropic of Cancer, and Tropic of Capricorn - Geography." Geography Home Page - Geography at About.com. About.com.geography, 16 Apr. 1999. Web. 11 May 2011. http://geography.about.com/library/misc/blequator.htm
"Biodiversity in Costa Rica." Biodiversity in Costa Rica. INBio Instituto Nacional De Biodiversidad. Web. 15 May 2011.
http://www.inbio.ac.cr/en/biod/bio_biodiver.htm
"Ecosystem Change." Scientific Facts. Web. 27 May 2012. <http://www.greenfacts.org/en/ecosystems/index.htm>.
"Biodiversity for Development." Biodiversity for Development. Web. 27 May 2012. <http://www.cbd.int/development/>.
"Biodiversity Loss Threatens Human Well-Being." PLoS Biology:. Web. 27 May 2012. <http://www.plosbiology.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pbio.0040277>.
"Biodiversity and Human Wellbeing." Biodiversity and Human Wellbeing. Web. 27 May 2012. <http://www.global-greenhouse-warming.com/biodiversity-and-human-wellbeing.html>.
"Why Is Biodiversity Important for Development?" Why Is Biodiversity Important for Development? Web. 27 May 2012. <http://www.cbd.int/development/about/important.shtml>.
"Interesting Facts." Biodiversity: The Forest Perspective. Web. 27 May 2012. <http://tropicalbiodiversity.wordpress.com/interesting-facts-2/>.