The sixth extinction / Timing: 7:11

The sixth extinction

Hello, I’m Rebecca Miller and in this video, we’ll be looking at how human-induced extinction has
contributed to the current biodiversity crisis.

As we’ve seen in previous videos, we live in a world full of marvels. However, the world is facing a
biodiversity crisis of epic proportions. Over the past 50 years, humans have changed the world’s
ecosystems more rapidly and extensively than ever before1. The rate of species loss is greater now than
at any time in human history2. If that seems alarming, it is. But as we’ll see, it’s not too late to make a
difference.

The diversity of life on the planet, at any given time, depends on how fast new species evolve and how
fast existing species go extinct. Extinction is the complete disappearance of a species from the planet,
and it is forever. Did you know that in the past 500 years, nearly a thousand species have been recorded
extinct3? That doesn’t include the thousands of species that disappear under the radar, many of them
before we even know they exist. The majority of extinctions are invisible, yet each one removes a brick
from the ecological foundations of the planet. Eventually, entire ecosystems begin to unravel.

The evolution of new species and the extinction of others is a natural process. So, you may wonder, why
is the current wave of extinctions and massive ecological change a problem? The problem lies in the rate
of change. Extinction may be natural but species today are vanishing at an unnaturally rapid rate4. The
Earth’s systems are usually fairly stable over long periods of time and normal background extinction
rates are very low. But when rapid changes occur, life forms have a hard time keeping up and extinction
rates increase.

The current extinction rate is up to a thousand times more than historical rates seen in the fossil record
and projected future rates are even higher. In fact, species are going extinct much faster than new
species can evolve. We are now approaching what many scientists believe to be the sixth mass
extinction event1.

Although very rare, the Earth has seen mass extinction five times before, when the diversity and
abundance of life suddenly plummeted. In each mass extinction event, more than 70% of all species on
Earth disappeared5. Once a mass extinction event occurs, it takes millions of years for the Earth to
recover. Extinction rates are once again accelerating, this time as a result of human activities that are
altering the planet in dramatic ways.

No one factor is causing modern day extinctions. It is the combination of multiple threats – including
habitat loss, overexploitation, invasive species, disease, climate change, and more – that is threatening
ecosystems and driving species to the brink. Species are disappearing from every group and every
region1. There are still many gaps to fill but even just a sample shows the scale of the crisis - more than
half of ancient cycad plants and more than a quarter of amphibians, reef-building corals, conifers,
mammals and birds are threatened with extinction6 while we have no real idea about the status of most
plants, fungi, or invertebrates – things like insects, starfish, clams, and giant squid.

Declines have been far greater in tropical and freshwater systems and species that are less mobile and
have small ranges tend to be more at risk. The St Helena Olive, a small tree found only on St Helena

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The sixth extinction / Timing: 7:11

Island, was felled to extinction for timber and to make way for plantations7. The last wild tree died in
1994 and despite conservation efforts, the only plant in cultivation died in 2003.

Island species tend to be at high risk. You may know of the Dodo, a large flightless bird discovered on
Mauritius in 1598. With no natural fear of predators, it was hunted by sailors and its eggs were eaten by
introduced dogs, pigs, cats and other animals. Within a century of its discovery, it had vanished8.

Some species are extinct in the wild but still survive in cultivation, in captivity, or well outside their
natural range. The last two wild individuals of the Hawaiian Crow were seen in 2002 but habitat
destruction, disease and predation by introduced mammals have since driven it extinct in the wild. It is
now only found in captivity9.

Species may also go functionally extinct when their numbers get so low that they can no longer play an
effective role in the ecosystem or maintain viable populations. The Baiji, or Yangtze river dolphin, is
possibly extinct due to an impressive list of threats, from habitat loss and degradation, to entanglement
in fishing gear, to pollution. Searches have failed to find it in the wild and any few remaining individuals
can only prolong its inevitable extinction10.

Recognising the impact of local extinctions is important, as local declines lead to global extinction and
also represent a loss of biodiversity. Loss of the iconic Western Black Rhinoceros to illegal poaching for
rhino horn meant the local extinction of Black Rhinoceros in West Africa, and the disappearance of an
entire subspecies with all the genetic diversity it contains11.

You may find all this depressing but the good news is that biodiversity loss doesn’t have to be inevitable.
Active conservation delivers results, benefiting both species and ecosystems, and directly saving some
species from the brink of extinction. It's not too late to make a monumental difference in minimising
biodiversity losses by changing our impact on the planet. As Sir Peter Scott once said, “We shall not save
everything, but we shall save a great deal more than if we never tried”.

Now join the forum and tell us about an interesting species that has gone extinct in recent history. In the
next lesson, we will explore some of the main threats to biodiversity and the Earth’s ecological systems.

1
Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) Ecosystems and Human Well-Being: Synthesis. Washington DC: World
Resources Institute. http://www.millenniumassessment.org/documents/document.356.aspx.pdf
2
Dirzo R et al (2014) Defaunation in the Anthropocene. Science 345 (6195): 401-406.
3
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species – Extinct species. Downloaded on 29 April 2015
http://www.iucnredlist.org
4
Pimm SL et al (2014) The biodiversity of species and their rates of extinction, distribution, and protection, Science
344 (6187)
5
Barnosky AD (2011) Has the Earth's sixth mass extinction already arrived? Nature 471: 51-57.

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6
Miller RM (2013) Threatened Species: Classification Systems and Their Applications. In: Levin, S.A. (ed.)
Encyclopedia of Biodiversity, second edition, Volume 7, pp. 191-211. Waltham, MA: Academic Press.
7
Cronk QCB (2000) The endemic flora of St Helena. A. Nelson.
8
BirdLife International (2012) Raphus cucullatus. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2014.3.
Downloaded on 29 April 2015 http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/22690059/0
9
BirdLife International (2013) Corvus hawaiiensis. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2014.3.
Downloaded on 29 April 2015 http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/22706052/0
10
Smith BD et al (2008) Lipotes vexillifer. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2014.3. Downloaded on
29 April 2015. http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/12119/0
11
Emslie R (2011) Diceros bicornis ssp. longipes. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2014.3.
Downloaded on 29 April 2015. http://www.iucnredlist.org/details/39319/0