Holocene Extinctions

by Turvey, Samuel T.

• ISBN13: 9780199535095
• ISBN10: 0199535094
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2009-09-28
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The extent to which human activity has influenced species extinctions during the recent prehistoric past remains controversial due to other factors such as climatic fluctuations and a general lack of data. However, the Holocene (the geological interval spanning the last 11,500 years from theend of the last glaciation) has witnessed massive levels of extinctions that have continued into the modern historical era, but in a context of only relatively minor climatic fluctuations. This makes a detailed consideration of these extinctions a useful system for investigating the impacts of humanactivity over time.Holocene Extinctions describes and analyses the range of global extinction events which have occurred during this key time period, as well as their relationship to both earlier and ongoing species losses. By integrating information from fields as diverse as zoology, ecology, palaeontology,archaeology and geography, and by incorporating data from a broad range of taxonomic groups and ecosystems, this novel text provides a fascinating insight into human impacts on global extinction rates, both past and present.This truly interdisciplinary book is suitable for both graduate students and researchers in these varied fields. It will also be of value and use to policy-makers and conservation professionals since it provides valuable guidance on how to apply lessons from the past to prevent future biodiversityloss and inform modern conservation planning.

Author Biography

Samuel Turvey is Research Fellow at the Institute of Zoology, a department of the Zoological Society of London. He is a conservation biologist with a principal interest in the history and prehistory of human-caused extinctions and in developing conservation strategies for today's threatened species. He was deeply involved with the conservation efforts surrounding the Yangtze River dolphin, and was the lead author of the 2007 paper in Biology Letters which declared that it was probably extinct, generating tremendous international media attention. He has published numerous other academic papers in a range of scientific journals, including Nature.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. ix
A note on radiocarbon dating conventions	p. xi
List of contributors	p. xii
An introduction to Late Glacial-Holocene environments	p. 1
In the shadow of the megafauna: prehistoric mammal and bird extinctions across the Holocene	p. 17
Holocene mammal extinctions	p. 41
Holocene avian extinctions	p. 63
Past and future patterns of freshwater mussel extinctions in North America during the Holocene	p. 107
Holocene extinctions in the sea	p. 129
Procellariiform extinctions in the Holocene: threat processes and wider ecosystem-scale implications	p. 151
Coextinction: anecdotes, models, and speculation	p. 167
Probabilistic methods for determining extinction chronologies	p. 181
The past is another country: is evidence for prehistoric, historical, and present-day extinction really comparable?	p. 193
Holocene deforestation: a history of human-environmental interactions, climate change, and extinction	p. 213
The shape of things to come: non-native mammalian predators and the fate of island bird diversity	p. 235
The Quaternary fossil record as a source of data for evidence-based conservation: is the past the key to the future?	p. 249
Holocene extinctions and the loss of feature diversity	p. 263
References	p. 279
Index	p. 339
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