BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION 1

BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION

 Biodiversity conservation deals with the concept and scope of biodiversity, and the steps    to take towards the sustainable utilization of our natural bioresources with a view to maximsing their usefulness and making them available for future generations.

What is Biodiversity?

Biodiversity is a term coined in 1985 as a contraction of Biological Diversity ie “Bio” from biological and then “diversity”; both becoming “biodiversity”. It is therefore a modern term which simply means " the variety of life on earth". In concise term it is defined of the totality of different forms of life on earth. This variety can be measured in terms of genetic variation, species variation and ecosystem variation. These may therefore be taken as the verious levels at which biodiversity can be considered.

Genetic Biodiversity

All animals, plants and microorganisms carry hereditory materials called genes in their cells. A gene is a molecular unit of heredity of a living organism. It is a name given to some stretches of Deoxyribonuclic Acid (DNA) and Ribonucleic Acid (RNA) that code for a polypeptide or for an RNA chain that has a function in the organism. Living beings depend on genes. Genes hold the information to build and maintain an organism's cells and transfer genetic traits to offspring from parents. All organisms have many genes corresponding to various biological traits, some of which are immediately visible, such as eye color or number of limbs, and some of which are not, such as blood type, increased risk for specific diseases, or the thousands of basic biochemical processes that comprise life. There are numerous genes in the cells of organisms. For instance, it is estimated that there are up to 30, 000 genes in each cell in the human body. These genes under the influence of the environment gives each individual organism its own identity. The genetic make-up of each organism is referred to as its genotype and the outward appearance is called the phenotype.  Each of all the different species of organisms on earth therefore has its own gentotype and phenotype. In genetic terms therefore, biodiversity refers to variation between individuals of the same species. This includes genetic variation between individuals in a single population (a group of organisms of the same species), as well as variations between different populations of the same species. Genetic differences can now be measured using various techniques. These differences are the determinants of evolution.

At the species level biodiversity refers to the variety of species in a given region or area. A species is defined as organisms occupying the same geographical range and actively interbreeding and producing viable offspring. Species diversity can either be determined by counting the number of different species present, or by determining taxonomic diversity.

Details of how to determine species diviersity can be found following this link: http://www.colby.edu/biology/BI131/Lab/Lab07CalcBiodivers.pdf

A study of avifauna diversity in some airports in Nigeria used Index of Species richness (ISR) as follows:     

        ISR = S/√N                       Where ISR = Index of Species Richness;

S = Total number of Species in the area and

N  = Total number of individuals.

Source: (Menhimick, 1964)

At the ecosystem level biodiversity refers to the variation in the communities of plants and animals, together with the physical characteristics of their environment (e.g. geology, soil and climate) interlink together as an ecological system, or 'ecosystem'. Ecosystem diversity is more difficult to measure because there are rarely clear boundaries between different ecosystems and they grade into one another. However, if consistent criteria are chosen to define the limits of an ecosystem, then their number and distribution can also be measured.

Reference

Menhimick, E. F. (1964). A comparison of some species–individual diversity indices applied to samples of field insects. Ecology, 45: 859 – 861.