Geographic patterns of vertebrate diversity and identification of relevant areas for conservation in Europe

Abstract

The ‘EU Council conclusions on biodiversity post–2010’ re–enforced Europe’s commitment to halt biodiversity loss by 2020. Identifying areas of high–value for biodiversity conservation is an important issue to meet this target. We investigated the geographic pattern of terrestrial vertebrate diversity status in Europe by assessing the species richness, rarity, vulnerability (according to IUCN criteria), and a combined index of the three former for the amphibians, reptiles, bird and mammals of this region. We also correlated the value of all indices with climate and human influence variables. Overall, clear geographic gradients of species diversity were found. The combined biodiversity index indicated that high–value biodiversity areas were mostly located in the Mediterranean basin and the highest vulnerability was found in the Iberian peninsula for most taxa. Across all indexes, the proportion of variance explained by climate and human influence factors was moderate to low. The results obtained in this study have the potential to provide valuable support for nature conservation policies in Europe and, consequently, might contribute to mitigate biodiversity decline in this region.

Are cities different? Patterns of species richness and beta diversity of urban bird communities and regional species assemblages in Europe

“…This pattern could potentially be caused by the non‐random sample of European bird communities used in this study. However, there is no clear latitudinal trend in species richness detectable on a Europe‐wide continental scale, as the peak of bird diversity lies in east‐central Europe (Huntley et al ., ; Assunção‐Albuquerque et al ., ); this is congruent with our results.…”

Factors related to species richness, endemism, and conservation status of the herpetofauna (Amphibia and Reptilia) of Mexican states

“…Similarly, mammalian species richness in Mexico decreased with increasing latitude ( Ceballos et al 1998 ). These results are also similar to those found for amphibians and reptiles in a variety of regions and countries, such as Europe ( Assunção-Albuquerque et al 2012 ), United States ( Schall and Pianka 1978 ), Australia ( Schall and Pianka 1978 ), and North America ( Rivera et al 2021 ; Whiting and Fox 2021 ). The latitudinal gradient of species richness in both amphibians and reptiles in Mexico might be related to latitudinal gradients in climate related factors.…”

“…This relationship suggests there might be a negative impact of human population on species richness, perhaps due to the impact on amphibian and reptile populations. For example, in Europe, climate and human related factors explained 41–42% of variation in species richness of amphibians and reptiles ( Assunção-Albuquerque et al 2012 ). The species richness of reptiles in Mediterranean France is correlated with climate, elevation, and land use ( Barnagaud et al 2021 ).…”

Human density and sampling time explain richness of anurans in the brazilian biomes

“…Furthermore, there are evidences that the changes caused by human activity can also change the ecology of many species, promoting an adaptive advantage to the species that fit their requirements in accordance with resource availability in the environment (López et al 2015), which may reflect the composition of existing species in the habitat (Rocha et al 2008). The identification of a negative correlation between anuran richness and human activity on a large spatial scale has been reported in independent studies from various parts of the world (Assunção-Albuquerque et al 2012, Trimble and Van Aarde 2014, Cruz-Elizalde et al 2016. Despite evidence for variation in the effects of the human footprint due to the scale of the study, a negative correlation among these variables seems to also be evident at a fine scale (Cruz-Elizalde et al 2016), suggesting a tendency for anuran species richness to decrease in places with great human activity or presence.…”