The conservation status of the world's reptiles

Monika Boehm, Ben Collen, Jonathan E. M. Baillie, Philip Bowles, Janice Chanson, Neil Cox, Geoffrey Hammerson, Michael Hoffmann, Suzanne R. Livingstone, Mala Ram, Anders G. J. Rhodin, Simon N. Stuart, Peter Paul van Dijk, Bruce E. Young, Leticia E. Afuang, Aram Aghasyan, Andres Garcia, Cesar Aguilar, Rastko Ajtic, Ferdi AkarsuLaura R. V. Alencar, Allen Allison, Natalia Ananjeva, Steve Anderson, Claes Andren, Daniel Ariano-Sanchez, Juan Camilo Arredondo, Mark Auliya, Christopher C. Austin, Aziz Avci, Patrick J. Baker, Andre F. Barreto-Lima, Cesar L. Barrio-Amoros, Dhruvayothi Basu, Michael F. Bates, Alexandre Batistella, Aaron Bauer, Daniel Bennett, Wolfgang Boehme, Don Broadley, Rafe Brown, Joseph Burgess, Ashok Captain, Santiago Carreira, Maria del Rosario Castaneda, Fernando Castro, Alessandro Catenazzi, Cedeno-Vazquez, David G. Chapple, Marc Cheylan, Diego F. Cisneros-Heredia, Dan Cogalniceanu, Hal Cogger, Claudia Corti, Gabriel C. Costa, Patrick J. Couper, Tony Courtney, Jelka Crnobrnja-Isailovic, Pierre-Andre Crochet, Brian Crother, Felix Cruz, Jennifer C. Daltry, R. I. Ranjit Daniels, Indraneil Das, Anslem de Silva, Arvin C. Diesmos, Lutz Dirksen, Tiffany M. Doan, C. Kenneth Dodd, J. Sean Doody, Michael E. Dorcas, Jose Duarte de Barros Filho, Vincent T. Egan, El Hassan El Mouden, Dirk Embert, Robert E. Espinoza, Alejandro Fallabrino, Xie Feng, Zhao-Jun Feng, Lee Fitzgerald, Oscar Flores-Villela, Frederico G. R. Franca, Darrell Frost, Hector Gadsden, Tony Gamble, S. R. Ganesh, Miguel A. Garcia, Juan E. Garcia-Perez, Joey Gatus, Maren Gaulke, Philippe Geniez, Arthur Georges, Justin Gerlach, Stephen Goldberg, Juan-Carlos T. Gonzalez, David J. Gower, Tandora Grant, Eli Greenbaum, Cristina Grieco, Peng Guo, Alison M. Hamilton, Kelly Hare, S. Blair Hedges, Neil Heideman, Craig Hilton-Taylor, Rod Hitchmough, Bradford Hollingsworth, Mark Hutchinson, Ivan Ineich, John Iverson, Fabian M. Jaksic, Richard Jenkins, Ulrich Joger, Reizl Jose, Yakup Kaska, Ugur Kaya, J. Scott Keogh, Gunther Koehler, Gerald Kuchling, Yusuf Kumlutas, Axel Kwet, Enrique La Marca, William Lamar, Amanda Lane, Bjorn Lardner, Craig Latta, Gabrielle Latta, Michael Lau, Pablo Lavin, Dwight Lawson, Matthew LeBreton, Edgar Lehr, Duncan Limpus, Nicola Lipczynski, Aaron S. Lobo, Marco A. Lopez-Luna, Luca Luiselli, Vimoksalehi Lukoschek, Mikael Lundberg, Petros Lymberakis, Robert Macey, William E. Magnusson, D. Luke Mahler, Anita Malhotra, Jean Mariaux, Bryan Maritz, Otavio A. V. Marques, Rafael Marquez, Marcio Martins, Gavin Masterson, Jose A. Mateo, Rosamma Mathew, Nixon Mathews, Gregory Mayer, James R. McCranie, G. John Measey, Fernando Mendoza-Quijano, Michele Menegon, Sebastien Metrailler, David A. Milton, Chad Montgomery, Sergio A. A. Morato, Tami Mott, Antonio Munoz-Alonso, John Murphy, Truong Q. Nguyen, Goeran Nilson, Cristiano Nogueira, Herman Nunez, Nikolai Orlov, Hidetoshi Ota, Jose Ottenwalder, Theodore Papenfuss, Stesha Pasachnik, Paulo Passos, Olivier S. G. Pauwels, Nestor Perez-Buitrago, Valentin Perez-Mellado, Eric R. Pianka, Juan Pleguezuelos, Caroline Pollock, Paulino Ponce-Campos, Robert Powell, Fabio Pupin, Gustavo E. Quintero Diaz, Raju Radder, Jan Ramer, Arne R. Rasmussen, Chris Raxworthy, Robert Reynolds, Nadia Richman, Edmund L. Rico, Elisa Riservato, Gilson Rivas, Pedro L. B. da Rocha, Mark-Oliver Roedel, Lourdes Rodriguez Schettino, Willem M. Roosenburg, James P. Ross, Riyad Sadek, Kate Sanders, Georgina Santos-Barrera, Hermann H. Schleich, Benedikt R. Schmidt, Andreas Schmitz, Mozafar Sharifi, Glenn Shea, Hai-Tao Shi, Richard Shine, Roberto Sindaco, Tahar Slimani, Ruchira Somaweera, Steve Spawls, Peter Stafford, Rob Stuebing, Sam Sweet, Emerson Sy, Helen J. Temple, Marcelo F. Tognelli, Krystal Tolley, Peter J. Tolson, Boris Tuniyev, Sako Tuniyev, Nazan Uzum, Gerard van Buurt, Monique Van Sluys, Alvaro Velasco, Miguel Vences, Milan Vesely, Sabine Vinke, Thomas Vinke, Gernot Vogel, Milan Vogrin, Richard C. Vogt, Oliver R. Wearn, Yehudah L. Werner, Martin J. Whiting, Thomas Wiewandt, John Wilkinson, Byron Wilson, Sally Wren, Tara Zamin, Kaiya Zhou, George Zug

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Effective and targeted conservation action requires detailed information about species, their distribution, systematics and ecology as well as the distribution of threat processes which affect them. Knowledge of reptilian diversity remains surprisingly disparate, and innovative means of gaining rapid insight into the status of reptiles are needed in order to highlight urgent conservation cases and inform environmental policy with appropriate biodiversity information in a timely manner. We present the first ever global analysis of extinction risk in reptiles, based on a random representative sample of 1500 species (16% of all currently known species). To our knowledge, our results provide the first analysis of the global conservation status and distribution patterns of reptiles and the threats affecting them, highlighting conservation priorities and knowledge gaps which need to be addressed urgently to ensure the continued survival of the world's reptiles. Nearly one in five reptilian species are threatened with extinction, with another one in five species classed as Data Deficient. The proportion of threatened reptile species is highest in freshwater environments, tropical regions and on oceanic islands, while data deficiency was highest in tropical areas, such as Central Africa and Southeast Asia, and among fossorial reptiles. Our results emphasise the need for research attention to be focussed on tropical areas which are experiencing the most dramatic rates of habitat loss, on fossorial reptiles for which there is a chronic lack of data, and on certain taxa such as snakes for which extinction risk may currently be underestimated due to lack of population information. Conservation actions specifically need to mitigate the effects of human-induced habitat loss and harvesting, which are the predominant threats to reptiles. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Original languageAmerican English
JournalDefault journal
StatePublished - Jan 1 2013

Keywords

  • IUCN Red List
  • Extinction risk
  • Threatened species
  • Lizards
  • Snakes
  • Turtles
  • Distribution maps
  • BIODIVERSITY CONSERVATION
  • MOLECULAR PHYLOGENY
  • GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY
  • SPECIES-DIVERSITY
  • VERTEBRATES
  • AMPHIBIANS
  • CLIMATE
  • CLASSIFICATION
  • DISTRIBUTIONS
  • RADIATION

Disciplines

  • Zoology

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