Species are the Building Blocks of Ecosystem Services and Environmental Sustainability

摘要

Rather than advance novel strategies for achieving the objectives of conservation, Sandier (2013) suggests that we change the goals of conservation itself, emphasizing ecological processes through place-based protection instead of species preservation. We agree strongly that land management goals and strategies need to be revisited under climate change, but we disagree with several of Sandier's central arguments. In particular, we disagree strongly that land managers and conservation biologists should abandon species-level conservation, or replace or demote it with Sandler's alternative, process-based conservation. In fact, we argue that this is a false dichotomy as no function exists without the species that provide it. Also, we point out that in deemphasizing species-level conservation, we risk a critical conservation objective: preserving global biodiversity. Further, we question if the change that Sandier proposes would preclude assisted colonization (managed relocation), a strategy he seeks to avoid.